Nic v Zorida 25ss

[quotemyname]

My latest game was a matchup of Nicodem vs. Zorida.

My list:

Nicodem (3ss)

The Hanged x2 (16)

Mortimer (7)

Vulture (2)

My Schemes:

Bodyguard (Nicodem, Announced)

Opponent List:

Zorida (5ss)

Silurid x3 (15)

Young Nephilim (6)

Terror Tot Nephilim (3)

Soul Stone Cache (1)

Opponent Schemes:

Reclaim Malifaux (Unannounced)

Strategy: Shared Plant Evidence

Area: Guild Library

Special Terrain: Piles of Tomes ([1] interract gives a model varying effects based on what suit they flip)

Report:

Turn 1:

Initiative first turn went to me. I mostly played, "set-up" during turn one. I advanced with my Hanged (In order to receive advances by flying/sprinting nephilim, and leaping silurids that were attacking from two sides of the board), moved Nic and the Vulture into supportive positions, and tried digging up corpse counters with Morty, which failed.

For his part, my opponent started moving across the board as fast as possible, tagging terrain for his hidden scheme as he went.

As most of my crews ARE Neverborn, I knew what he was up to right away. But I was in no rush to stop him. You'll see why in a moment.

Turn 2:

Initiative goes to my opponent. His three silurids leap to my side of the board. Two acting simultaneously, the third coming in one activation later. His first two silurids (A and attacked Nic and Hanged A respectively. The silurid on Nic hit all his triggers, etc. Nic nearly took 9 damage (from the red joker on a damage flip), before hard to wound caused an additional flip and brought the damage on his teeth strike down. Spending a soulstone to block some of the damage reduced the punishment to 4 wounds.

Between the silurids acting, Hanged A charged Silurid A (through Silurid B which my opponent wasn't happy about).

Finally, Silurid C comes in and is forced to attack Hanged A (who is now standing between Silurid C and Nic). The end result of this whole exchange is that Silurid A is terrified, Silurid B is Horrified, Silurid C is Terrified, and Hanged A has Smell Fear active, with Nic yet to act.

Meanwhile on the other side of the board, Zorida is now on my side of the board thanks to Raven, and has begun tagging terrain for Plant Evidence. But nearby Hanged B in Melee range with her has prevented her from going anywhere else.

At this point, I had a bit of luck.

I activated the Vulture, and cast Decay on the Silurid that was pinning Nic down. Needed to blow a soulstone on it, but it was worth it. Thanks to being Horrified by Hanged A, Silurid A had a low resist flip. The resulting Blast not only killed Silurid A, but healed both Hanged A and Nic for 2 Wd!

My opponent then brought his Young Neph and Terror Tot to bear and pinned down both Morty and the Vulture.

I activate Nic, pick up the nearby Corpse counter from Silurid A, during a Wk action, and fail a few attempts to animate it. So I just Bolstered Undead, and passed turn.

Turn three:

Here's where the battle ends.

Hanged A has single handedly pinned down/killed the remaining silurids with his activation, Morty is taking heavy punishment from a Young Neph and a Tot, (1 wd remaining by the time he activates and regens to 2). Zorida keeps sticking Hanged B with pins, and Obeying the Young Neph for accelerated damage on Morty.

Things were looking bad when Morty's activation failed yet again to produce a single corpse counter, and missed a shovel strike on the Young Neph. Feeling in a Bind, I companioned Nic to try and stem the flow of blood.

Another Wk action puts Nic within LOS of the Young/Tot/Morty/Vulture melee. He Arises his corpse counter to use as a potential shield since he is now essentially on the front lines. Then he casts Decay on the tot. The resulting severe damage kills not only the Tot, but the Young Neph and Morty (a necessary sacrifice). Generating a total of 4 corpse counters mere inches from Zorida and Hanged B and freeing up the Vulture to do it's thing.

Facing down a growing army of undead with only his Master, my opponent threw in the towel.

This was my second time running Nic. But only my first time running him in a real game. During my first run with him, we realized that a large rules snafu caused the scrap to swing heavily in my favor and scraped the scrap on turn 2. So this really was my first full game running Nic.

As always, thoughts/opinions/questions/comments on my posts are welcome.

[Mentor]

Not sure if you were aware but Weird Sketch has a post in the rules form called Extra Errata Items and this may have helped you in your game.

Mortimer

Exhume

Description should read as: "Flip a Fate Card from the top of your Fate Deck. If the card is a :crows, place 1 Corpse Counter within 6” of this model. The flip may be cheated. This spell may only be cast once per turn.

[quotemyname]

I am aware of the Errata. But depressingly enough, I failed to draw a single crow into my hand all game. Not even a low one. Had I had even an Ace of Crows, rest assured I would have put it to use there.

[Mentor]

In a show of sympathy my last game with Seamus the highest crow I drew was the 9, I did draw it 3 times during the game though at least.

It seems you got much more use out of your Hanged than I usually do. I usually end up just using them as light harassers that never really earn their cost back.

[quotemyname]

My plan for the hanged in that scrap was to essentially create a bubble around Nic for protection while my other models played support, and created some corpse counters to turn into some faster moving undead and start grabbing some space on his side of the board. (two canine remains lose insignificant and can cover a good deal of ground.)

I knew it would work pretty well, being as how I was familiar with Neverborn, I knew the models he was running had relatively low Wp and would be hard pressed to resist the Hanged's many Wp tests.

Essentially, I put the Hanged in the two choke points that led to my side of the board, and everything almost everything that funneled through was unable to go any further. Nic only took one attack this way.

Had the battle gone on longer, I surely would have drawn the crows necessary to reanimate some corpses, I feel.