Collodi vs McMourning - 25ss

[rudders]

First game with Collodi - still less than 15 games for me ever so excuse any apparent mistakes. All previous games have been losses with the Dreamer! I might have some small details a bit awry but this is the best my memory can do!

What I realise now is that I "get" Collodi. I did the right things with him generally and found him far easier to use than the Dreamer. I'm not sure how fun he would be to play against - my opponent got his hands on a couple of Marionettes and polished them off, but that was probably my fault for throwing them in for an attack....

Anyway here is the report:

Me: Collodi, 4 Marionettes, 3 Wicked Dolls 2 Stitched

Strategy: Plant Evidence, Scheme: Bodyguard (Collodi) and Stake A Claim

Him: McMourning, Zombie Chihouaua; Bette Noire, 3 Necropunks, 3 dogs

Strategy: Reconnoiter, Scheme: Stake A Claim

Note he sacrificed taking a second scheme to get 2 additional soulstones.

Terrain

Outdoors - big train line in the middle of the board with two large trains, practially spiltting the board in two. Lots of height 1 and 2 cover on both board sides in the form of boxes/oil drums etc

Deployment

He deployed in a flat line about midway along the edge of his deployment zone I deployed with Collodi, Marionettes and Dolls clumped together and both stitched further off to the left.

Turn 1

I got the initiative. Collodi activated, gave fast to dolls and marionettes and failed to cast Breath Life. The Marionettes then all sprang forward and dragged each other/Collodi to just behind the end of the train in the middle of the board. The stitched moved up one at either end of the train. The wicked dolls were amazing! They sucked up to Collodi and than moved twice to terrain peices in his half. I had two peices of evience planted by end of turn one.

McMourning killed his totem for the parts and McMourning and dogs ran off to the side to get the wicked dolls. The Necropunks all moved forward to behind the train a bit, opposite Collodi and his Marionettes.

Turn 2

I wanted initiative to get the dolls out of McMournings way but lost! McMourning stepped up and managed to get an attack on a doll but I managed to cheat and avoid it! The doll then missed an attack, made another and caused weak (1) damage, but got the Trigger off so poison 2! Cheeky fella then Hags Toy'd it back to Collodi! The other dolls did the same as his dogs came around to chase them. The Necropunks had moved over to near where the dolls were and the stitched on the other side of the board moved up to terrain ready to plant evidence. Collodi activated, gave fast, failed Breathe Life and a marionette moved up and dragged Collodi to near a Necropunk. The other three Marionettes all took it turn to suck up to Collodi, move and attack twice, one even got three attacks in. I only killed one Necropunk! The other stitched managed to Gamble Your Life on another Necropunk causing 3 wounds. Bette Noire popped up and killed a Marionette.

Turn 3

I lost initiative again. Bette killed another Marionette. Collodi activated, raised a new Marionette from scrap and then him and 2 Marionettes shifted about 18" (!) to safety on the other side of the board! The new Marionette got left behind a bit as I hadn't thought it all through properly! The dogs ran up to the midway point near the stitched and the necropunks jumped up to the straggling Marionette. The stitched planted evidence and then moved to intercept the chasing punks. The Dogs however had got a corpse counter and McMourning summon a Flesh Golum! The Golum proceeded to move to the Marionette the punks were chasing and smited him! The Dolls all Hags Toy'd over to Collodi and planted the fourth evidence.

Turn 4

The dogs moved up to threaten the stitched on the left. He activated and killed two of the three through Gamble Your Life. McMourning came up and finished him off, but his Does Not Die reactivated him. He killed the last dog with Gamble and failed to hit it on Bette.The other stitched stood up to the punks and golum that caught him. He managed to Gamble and finish off another punk, but was down to one wound. Collodi took his dolls and marionettes into McMournings deployment zone ready to achieve stake a claim.

At this point the FLGS was kicking out so we had to stop! I had my strategy and both schemes. Chances of killing Collodi were incredibly slim if we continued and my Stake a Claim couldn't really have been stopped. He hadn't yet, but could of got the stake a claim scheme, but with only four models left (McMourning, Flesh Golum, Bette and one punk) chances of getting Reconnoiter were slim. My last stitched would have had four potential go's to Gamble his last punk to death and I had 3 dolls, 2 Marionnettees and Collodi running around, plus two scrap counters I could use on the field to replace Marionettes with.

Conclusion

I love Collodi! All fustration I had felt with the Dreamer peeled away ;-) At 35ss games I am bringing in Zoraida and hopefully a big hitter like JuJu or KillJoy for fun. I have no idea how to get rid of Bette and if I had to kill off McMourning I would have been in trouble. I made a mistake using Collodi and all Marionettes to take down one Necropunk, but is was lack of numbers for him that put his strategy out of reach once his 3 dogs and 2 punks were gone so it may have been the right thing to do. The stitched lost a few Gambles but who cares - when it works it is glorious! Must have high cards in hand ready when I plan to hit hard with it.

[cerealkiller195]

Usually people find Dreamer to be easy mode, is it more the somewhat complex placing/actions to make sure that once you strike you can safely run away that didn't appeal to you about the dreamer?

Collidi to me is all about zipping across the board via his dolls ensuring that a lot of models in his crew are fresh to keep attacking. About bette noir doesn't she need living or undead models to spring from? In which case constructs are non living models so she could not spring from them, don't have the book on me but I believe that's what her "drawn to death" rule is.

Though you had the game when time is called remember that mcmourning also has a few tricks to summon more minions out and he doesn't rely on just constructsfor counters. Mcmourning players would happly cut apart their own minions for spare parts lol

[LORD of STUFF]

Bette Noire is living or undead killed to summon (i had to check) As for dealing with the stab happy cow, jus remembering she's there is enough as you can plan for it. My approach was kill something easy to draw her out (necropunk) then drop her quickly before she has a chance to warm up. The stitched are probably Collodi's best option i think for this job. She can only be unburied once a turn so the sooner you get her back in the dirt the more freedom you'll have when she's gone. You're unlikely to actually kill her this way, but it avoids the problem for a bit until you're ready to take her on your terms.

[rudders]

What happened was that I killed the Necropunk with the Marionettes and that was how she appeared. My plan was to reduce numbers as much as possible before sinking her again. Is there anyway to deal with corpse counters? From what I can gather McMourning had a few he could pick up and then spring some other guys back...

I think with the Dreamer he wasn't as straight forward as Collodi for me. I'll definitely be using him and Collodi/Zoraida as my main masters for now so will give him another go but it was so nice to actually be productive with a crew!