There's an open invite at the Gamer's Sanctuary in Flint to play Warmachine or the sister game of Hordes on Monday nights. I don't often get there to play, because the wife and I work and have a toddler, so getting out on a weeknight can be a bear. There's another wee one due soon, so that will liven things up further.
But I got to play last night. I got there a bit early, and started a demo of Malifaux with Adam, who is really interesting in showing people the game. It's clear that he likes it a lot. He said he enjoys it because it's a true skirmish game, meaning that a player doesn't need a lot of models to play the game and compete in tournaments. That's all good. He showed me the Lady Justice starter box, and I might pick it up, if only to play a smaller-scale minis game than WarMachine some time. Plus, the miniatures in question are gorgeous, and I'm enjoying the painting side of the hobby. More on that later.
After my demo I found that most of the guys I'd played with before were already getting their game on. So I had to make some new friends to get in a game. I wound up talking to two guys who wanted to play, and we wound up deciding to play a small-scale, three-player game of WM. At 15 points WM is very much like Malifaux described above, with not a ton of models on the table. Adding a third player can really mix it up. We decided to play "King of the Hill", inventing some scenario rules to encourage combat in the center. However, I wanted the scoring to reward aggressive play, while the other two did not. We wound up going with a less stringent point system, and I feel the game suffered for it.
It was still lots of fun.
Player A was a Protectorate of Menoth player, who played prime Scrutator Severius as his warcaster. He had the starter box as his starting point, so his 'jacks were a Revenger, Repenter, and Crusader. Then to pad out his list to 15 points he added a Hierophant, which is the Menoth equivalent of Cygnar's Squire, and a Vassal of Menoth mechanic to repair his 'jacks if they got wounded. Solid. He won the die roll and set up first in one corner of the board.
Player B was playing Mercenaries, specifically the Highborn Covenant mercenary contract, which can include any mercs who work for Cygnar. I own several of the models Player B used, including his warcaster Ashlynn D'Elise. He ran a single Mangler 'jack with her, instead using his points to buy 12 infantry in 6 Steelhead merc Halberdiers and 6 Cygnar ally/merc Percursor Knights, as well as having 3 points for one of the more dangerous merc solos in the game, Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios. Eiryss is downright nasty. He also had a one-point goblin who helps Ashlynn take extra shots. B set up in a central spot between and across from my own and A's deployment zones.
I decided to play a 'caster I've never used, epic warcaster Lord Commander Coleman Stryker, the leveled-up (or, "just different", according to some sources) version of the basic Cygnar posterboy. Epic Douchebag is a more melee-centric 'caster than prime Stryker, and he's got some powerful attacks that allow him to finish games on his own. He's dangerous. I decided to use some powerful troops to support wonderboy, giving him his character Ironclad Ol' Rowdy, a full unit of Stormblades with the UA, and the Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team. That's a lot of elite units to bring out to a small game, but I knew it would be an uphill battle.
Player A moved his 'jacks up super-slow and had Severius cast his awesome upkeep spells to help power and defend his warmachines. Player B raced around some terrain in his way, moving the halbardiers and Eiryss up one flank and the PKs and Mangler up the other. Ashlynn took center stage with her goblin buddy. Ashlynn also cast a Twister cloud in my direction, but it deviated away from the fight. I ran my whole crew closer to the center of the table, as victory conditions dictated that we must fight over it. The only exception was the Black 13th, who moved out on the flank, toward the Menoth 'jacks, and missed all their shots. However, Ryan's Mage Storm area-of-effect attack hurt the Crusader and Mechanic (the mechanic was what I wanted to kill, but poor damage roll. . .).
Player A actually backpedaled the next turn, dropping back and using the mechanic to heal the Crusader's damage and the Hierophant to heal the mechanic's wounds. I was surprised. Ashlynn moved up and got all in the objective with her troops. I knew that it was time to strike, so the Black 13th shot a few guys on Ashlynn's team, then Stryker himself shot a halbardier and cast an electrical storm on 3 others. The Stormblades charged in and finished off the halbardiers, but I knew that the counterstrike was going to hurt. Rowdy got close but didn't actually engage anything.
Player A again moved slowly, just moving his Revenger flamethrower 'jack to try and shoot Eiryss, who was threatening that side of the table. Turns out Eiryss is _really_ hard to shoot, as he defense is 16. Even with three dice the Revenger failed to hit. Other than that the Menites stayed pretty far back.
Ashlynn was not so conservative. Player B moved her up and used her feat, which forces two extra dice on every attack made within 12" of her until her next turn, and Player B gets to choose which two to drop. So everything on her side essentially hits during this turn, and everything on the counterstrike will probably miss. She also cast Distract on my Stormblades, meaning that they weren't as good at hitting or defending themselves. The Mangler and PKs killed all but three of the 'blades and hurt Rowdy pretty well (better than average damage rolls).
I had a hard time countering that, with Ashlynn's feat up my accuracy sucked. Stryker and the B13 were out of her Roulette-bubble, however, and the four of them fired some shots into combat, Stryker disrupting the Mangler and the B13 killing some PKs. The Stormblades charged the Mangler but only one hit through Roulette. He did some impressive damage to a heavy 'jack, but not really enough.
Player A stayed out of the fight and tried to crispy Eiryss again. Ashlynn & Co. hurt Rowdy some more, and the Mangler killed my remaining Stormblades. Epic Stryker really likes to have spare melee troops around to benefit from his feat, but with the 'blades gone I wasn't doing much. Eiryss moved over to threaten me instead of Severius. I had the B13 clean the PKs off of Rowdy, had Rowdy charge and kill Eiryss, and then had Stryker charge the Mangler himself. Ashlynn actually used her upkept Admonition spell to move behind the Mangler during this charge, and the Rowdy used his counter charge ability to try and rush and punch her. He missed, but he had her engaged. Ashlynn stabbed Rowdy for his temerity.
Stryker used his Overboost ability to hurt himself and gain additional strength for melee attacks. Then he chopped the Mangler into pieces himself in three quick swings. I used his feat to move over the wreck marker of the Mangler and stab the now-closer Ashlynn with a single attack which did a substantial amount of damage. Ashlynn's player was not pleased with the turn of events, as I'd managed to almost kill his warcaster, and besides her all he had was a goblin in the control zone.
Player A joined the fight finally, moving his flamethrower 'bot in and setting Ashlynn on fire (finally got a good roll, Ashlynn's defense is even better than Eiryss') and killing her. Player B was out of the fight. Player A moved his guys up a bit toward me and popped Severius' feat, which stops my 'caster gaining any focus next turn. Uncool.
At this point I was in some trouble, as I'd lost a huge chunk of my army, and Rowdy was hugely damaged, with his big hammer arm crippled (roll one less die to attack). Aside from Rowdy all I had was Stryker and the B13, and since the Menoth 'jacks had spread out a bit I moved up my guys and took potshots at Severius. The B13th rolled well and managed to do 10 wounds to him. Stryker shot his decent-power Magnum at the Repenter and disrupted it (it can't gain or use focus while disrupted).
Player A thought he had me dead bang at this point. He moved his flamethrower 'jack Repenter in to shoot, but as he couldn't give it focus he had to roll well. He _did_, setting Stryker and Rowdy on fire and doing several wounds to Stryker. The Revenger ran at the B13 and engaged two of them, killing one. Severius tried to convert the other B13, but I passed my command check.
He overextended, however, and Stryker managed to put the fire out (rolled a 1 or a 2 during the start of my turn, fire goes out. Otherwise stay on fire and take a Power 12 attack every. single. turn. until you roll a 1/2 during Maintenance phase) and walk close enough to get Sevvy in range of Magnum. Stryker squeezed the trigger and it was lights out for the Scrutator. Cygnar won the hill. Combined arms FTW.
It was a weird game. We should have set more aggressive point-gaining conditions, as we were playing to three points, but after our 5 or 6 turn game (which took more than two hours) no one had scored ANY points. Next time I'll lobby for better chances at getting points.
I think I'm going to Gen Con, but I'm going to want to paint a lot of stuff before I get there:
Epic Nemo warcaster
Constance Blaize warcaster
Heavy warjack kit mainly for Defender or Gallant
Storm Strider battle engine
Harlan Versh
Epic Eiryss
Archduke Runewood
Full Unit of Precursor Knights and Battle Chaplain (12 models)
and Full Unit of Arcane Tempest Gun Mages
I've got like 5 weeks to paint A LOT of stuff, and I'm gonna have a new daughter soon. I hope I can get it all done.
-Merlin out
No comments:
Post a Comment