Gencon 2011 - Master of Malifaux Round 4

Round 4 found me at the second table, with only 4 unbeaten players in the tournament. In first place was Bunniegodd (from the Wyrd Forums) with his Mohawk of Doom!!!

Followed by Dixon (The Pharoh) aka DarcXON (from the Wyrd forums) who got munched on by a Beholder earlier in the day:

PgBSamurai (Palmer) (from the Wyrd Forums) was close behind Dixon and was my opponent:

Strategy in this round was Shared Reconnoiter, and I knew Palmer was playing Neverborn. I had seen him pull out Dreamer earlier in the tournament, and also saw him pull out Nekima and a single Lilitu earlier. With that in mind, I chose to go Dreamer instead of my FILTH list. The FILTH list was working well for me, but it just was not a strong match vs Neverborn, especially with the chance Chompy hits the table.

That said, I pulled out my reliable Chompy list, specifically geared toward Reconnoiter.

The Dreamer -- 7 Cache
3 Daydreams [6ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Coppelius [9ss]
Insidious Madness [4ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]

Across from me Palmer turned out the following list (I think):

Lilith, Mother of Monsters -- 6 Cache
Primordial Magic [2ss]
Lelu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Nekima, The Dark Sibling [13ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]

Ouch. I will admit I was a bit surprised to not see Chompy as I was at least partially expecting a mirror match on this. Looking at his crew I had some choices to make on schemes. I had pre-picked some schemes prior to the tournament that I knew would work well with both crews I was planning to take, and also fit with a variety of strategies. Of those, I only had a couple left. I knew I was going with Breakthrough, as it compliments Reconnoiter without putting all my eggs in the proverbial one basket. Its also a pretty straight forward scheme with Dreamer. I scanned through the rest and decided I would go with Grudge. I looked at his crew and realized a couple things:

• I cannot grudge the Tot, they will disappear when they grow and I lose out on Grudge
• Grudge on the totem is not wise, as its too easy for him to just kill his own totem
• Grudge on Nekima is not wise, as I need Chompy to take her down reliably in this list.

That left me with the two twins. I decided to Grudge Lilitu, as I planned to hop out and paralyze her anyway to avoid the lures. With my plan set, we got ready to start the game.

So, my schemes were Grudge (Lilitu) and Breakthrough, his were Kill Protege (Coppelius) and Reclaim Malifaux.

This is a good time to point out where my head was at in this round. I was not overly happy with my scheme, but had settled on using grudge. I knew that to have any chance at first place, I needed Dixon to beat Bunniegodd and I needed to get as many points as possible beating Palmer. Dixon was only at +12 for his differential, so I went into the game ahead of him on the first tie breaker.

In retrospect, some of these thoughts contribute to my loss overall. Again, purely in hindsight:

1. Grudge was a really bad choice to take when the only melee hitters in my list were Coppelius and Chompy.
2. During the game I kept doggedly pursuing grudge, instead of giving up one of my schemes for lost and focusing on the rest
3. My list was good for reconnoiter, but knowing I was facing NB, this would have been a better list (which is another Chompy list I regularly play)

Neverborn Crew - 40 - Scrap
The Dreamer -- 6 Cache
3 Daydreams [6ss]
Coppelius [9ss]
Lelu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]

That said, lets get back to the game.

Our board was a fairly standard Terraclips set-up for the tournament, with a number of buildings, arched court-yards, and such scattered liberally around the table. I set-up behind a building in my deployment zone slightly back from the line. I was set-up to prime the Alp bomb and then bury to move down the table. He set-up on the line, in a straight line across the front of his deployment zone. He set Nekima in the middle, directly on the far side of an arched courtyard, directly across from my crew. We flipped initiative and I got first turn.

Seeing a list with Nekima as a lynch-pin, I knew I had to do something to her early to knock her down or slow her down. Knowing my opponent was at the top tables (so a high-caliber player) and a Neverborn player, I decided there was no need for subtlety. I activated Dreamer and 2 daydreams on companion and moved down the board. Using the Dreamer movement tricks I land Chompy within 1 inch of Nekima on the first activation, leaving Chompy with 1 Melee Expert and 1 AP left to use. The troubling factor at this point was I had to cheat 2 cards to get the casts off to do this.

I flipped my melee expert attack to be quickly reminded by Bunniegodd (it was so nice of him to watch out game , perhaps he was nervous?) "What about Irresistible?". Crap, we forgot that. I asked Palmer how he wanted to handle it, and we agreed to use the first card of the paired flip for the WP, then flip a new card for the attack. The first card passed, no worries, I discard it and flip a second card onto the paired. I believe he cheated higher to push the damage to a neg flip, but I still had a ram to trigger onslaught. Weak damage. I flip the irresistible for onslaught and have to cheat to pass (down to a hand of 3 cards, still holding an 11) and take attack #2. Paired flip, on damage, and another 2 damage. I move to my first AP, flip for irresistible, cheat again to pass (2 cards), he cheats up, I do not have a ram so I throw the 11 for "All Done" and stone to push for a higher total aiming for a straight flip. I flip a 1 or 2 and am still at a on the damage flip. Damn, I was only able to bring Nekima down half way, that's disappointing. I flip the first damage card and a Severe (I think it was a 12) comes up. Further disapointment (which Palmer felt with me... very cool opponent). I flip the second card for the and its the Red Joker. Damn, good luck finally. Palmer and I look at each other then I flip the additional card into the Red Joker. Another Severe (I think it was a 13). Nekima crumples to a 12 point hit and Chompy turns back into a little boy. Palmer is cool as ice with this, but I am pretty sure he was crying a little on the inside, I know I would have been.

The still-to-activate companioned daydream re-summons Chompy and puts him to sleep to pull dreamer back to my deployment zone, which I have to cheat my last card in my hand to accomplish. First activation of the game, I burn 6 cards and a soulstone, but get a kill on Nekima before he activated. I am willing to trade that.

The turn proceeds with him shifting forward and me continuing to prime my nightmares with Defensive Stance and such. At the end of the first turn, I try and bury everything with my last Daydream and fail to flip the necessary card. Very disappointing. At the end of the turn, Palmer has reclaimed 4 quadrants of the board, I have killed Nekima, and his Twins have shifted forward toward the middle of the board, separated a fair amount.

Turn 2, I draw my hand and have 1 decent card (something like a 10) and 5 cards fairly evenly split between 1's and 2's. I may have had a 3 in my hand, but I am not sure. Palmer gets initiative and activates Lilitu, moves around a bit, and lures Coppelius forward. I resist the double-take on the lure and activate Coppelius. Coppelius moves over to Lilitu, attacks and plucks out an eye. I figure I have the crow for the trigger now, so I should grab the eye and then attack on my second round to paralyze her. The Tot (the only living model around) does not run from the eye-plucking, I attack again, and fail my irresistible check. Lelu activates and charges Coppelius. Hits Coppelius, attacks with his Melee Expert and our flips leave him at a on his damage. He flips the first card and its a weak. Yay me! He flips his second card and its the Red Joker. In a wonderfully karmic play, he flips the additional damage card for the red joker and its another severe. Coppelius goes down in a pool of goo.

At this point the game gets incredibly intense. For the rest of round 2, through to round 4 (or 5) we have a back-and-forth running battle of my trying to maneuver to get melee attacks on Lilitu and him moving around the board to grab his reclaim malifaux. I spend 2 turns trying to take down Lilith with Alps and a stitched together before successfully taking her down. He whirlwinds and kills 2 alps before missing 1. (after becoming slow). It was an incredibly challenging game, fought tooth and nail throughout.

We come to the final activations of the final round and the board is as such:

• Palmer has all 9 sections of the board reclaimed (2 points)
• Palmer killed Coppelius (2 points)
• From my side of the board:
  • He has Lilitu in the far right board quarter, near the center line of his deployment zone
  • He has 1 tot (wounded with 2 wounds remaining) on the back of the board, mid way across the far left of his deployment zone (I guesstimate ~8 inches from the tot on the right).
  • He has a tot mid-way to my deployment zone on the left.
  • He has nothing in my back right deployment zone
  • I have my stitched in my back right quarter (1 point)
  • I have the Insidious madness just over the line in my left hand board quarter.
  • I have dreamer, an Alp, and a day dream left to activate.

Basically I have 1 chance to pull this out.

I activate Dreamer and a Daydream on companion, buries the insidious madness and the alp, and passes. Dreamer decides he can fly, moves into the far left quarter, and summons all his friends (cheating to get all my friends). I put the Alp as far forward toward the Tot as possible, and the Madness back to contest the near left hand quarter. Alp activates (Palmer was out of activations) and charges the Tot, ending on the far board edge 1 inch away from the tot. Charge attack flips and I miss the tot with nothing in hand to cheat to hit. Game over.

If I had been able to hit the tot and get at least moderate damage, the damage plus the slow effect would have killed it and summoned another alp, which would have put 2 significant models in his deployment zone for my breakthrough and contested the far right quarter. The end of the game ended as follows:

• Palmer:
  • Reclaim Malifaux (2 points)
  • Kill Protege (2 points)
  • Shared Reconnoiter (1 point)
• Bill
  • Grudge (0 points)
  • Breakthrough (0 points)
  • Shared Reconnoiter (1 point)

For a 5/1 loss. My final record was:

• 2 Win, 1 Loss, 1 Draw (7TP)
• +12 Diff
• 23vp
• 9th place

It was an incredible day with some fantastic opponents. I would like to think I gave my opponents fun yet challenging games, and I hope I challenged Palmer, as he certainly challenged me. Everyone was fantastic and great sports. I went from a draw to the second to top table playing for 2nd place. Not too bad for a tournament showing in my book.

Next year I plan on winning.

Gencon 2011 - Master of Malifaux Round 3

I have to apologize to my 3rd round opponent, I do not remember his name. As an admission, I was doing really good with names until about 3am Saturday night/Sunday morning and then they slipped right out of my damn head. Its thanks to Dixon that I remembered Stan's name. So, if this is you, please post on here and let me know!

Round 3 strategy was Shared Claim Jump, and my opponent had declared Outcasts. In pre-con planning, this was one of the strategies which I felt was ideal for the FILTH list, plus outcasts were one of the fair matchups for the list. With that said, I jumped back to the same list that served me well on round 2.

Pandora -- 8 Cache
Primordial Magic [2ss]
Desperate Mercenary [2ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Nekima, The Dark Sibling [13ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]

My opponent busted out Leviticus with the following list:

Leveticus, Steampunk Necromancer -- 2 Cache
Guardian [7ss]
Killjoy [11ss]
Rusty Alyce [8ss]
Steampunk Abomination [3ss]
Steampunk Abomination [3ss]
Steampunk Abomination [3ss]
Steampunk Abomination [3ss]

One of my local players played Levi pretty heavily for the past year plus, so I am very familiar with his threat range and other nastiness. With this, I was very comfortable going into the game.

I do not remember his schemes, but I took Kill Protege on Killjoy, and bodyguard.

At the start of the game my opponent and I discussed the terrain set-up and agreed that the Sewers drawn on the Terraclips mat would all serve as difficult terrain. Bridges and such were all open terrain, and the buildings stuck to the pre-defined terrain rules. The Claim Jump was set-up in the center of the board, with an "arched bridge" to the right of it. Basically this was a set of walls with an arch facing me and an arch facing him. Anyone on the claim jump could not see into the "bridge" or to the other side, but people on the "bridge" could see through.

My set-up was nearly identical to my round 2 set-up, with the puking snake on my left instead of my right. He set-up with a Waif inside a building on my right, 4 SPA's in diamond formation to pull themselves forward, Rusty Alice to my left, and Levi behind the SPA's. The guardian was behind the SPAs and next to Levi.

The first couple activations of turn 1 for me worked out the same, with the exception that I had a 12 in hand. Merc Defensive, Nekima defensive, smacks the merc, cuts for blood, gives out masks, moves forward, Tot kills the merc, gains blood, Nekima gains blood, grows.

This time I remembered to have my Merc hand out some healing with Last Noble Deed to Nekima, giving her a 2 point bump back toward full. I then have my Puking Snake move forward through some buildings, staying out of sight.

During all my set-up actions, his SPA's had moved forward and sheltered behind the bridge building, near the claim jump. He had moved in such a way that on the 3rd move forward he ends up leaving one of the SPA's behind and lonely. I am not sure what happened here, as I have not seen someone misplace SPA's before, especially not a player who could make it to the 3rd round of the masters with wins. That said, I saw the separation and knew I had to capitalize on it and stop the Desolation engine from coming on the board.

I activate Lilitu #1 and flip to summon her brother (Lelu), cheating the 12 from my hand and sacrificing the Tot. Now I have a chance to fire up the bond/super lure combo starting turn 2. Lilitu moves forward 1 time, and lures the "tip of the spear" SPA into B2B and kills it. Now there are 2 SPA in B2B at the corner of the "bruidge", and 1 SPA ~4 inches further back. My opponent starts inching Alice up on my left flank, keeping her behind buildings and out of sight. I move forward with my second Lilitu and chain-lure the remaining 2 SPA behind the bridge, killing them both. Levi activates and moves to the left side of the board, sacrificing himself to bring out KillJoy on the far-side of the "bridge" from the claim jump marker. The rest of the turn was a little positioning.

End of turn 1, I have a ball of nastiness mid-way between my deployment zone and the claim jump, he has Alice to my left (hidden out of sight), Killjoy and a guardian to my right (with the bridge between them and the claim jump), an SPA sitting near mid-board about 10 - 12 inches in, and Levi comes back to the Waif at the far side of the bridge from me.

Turn 2 starts and I pull 3 high crows into my hand and get initiative. Pandora starts, tags the SPA with Pacify, pushing forward down the board. I get LOS onto Levi, toss out a PE with a crow and stone it. Levi fails to resist (burning a stone), the waif makes her resist, Levi runs for the board edge. Pandora drops PE on the guardian, then I tag it with pacify and push back up the board, leaving myself out of charge range from anyone. Rusty Alice moves forward and takes a bead on Pandora. Opposed WP duel stops her shot and leaves her in the open. Nekima activates, defensive stance, gives out masks, and moves forward toward the claim jump. Levi activates and clears his falling back, but does not do anything else (specifically does not do anything to kill himself). My young nephilim moves forward toward the objective. Waif activates and passes. Primordial magic moves forward. Killjoy comes out on my side of the bridge, lining up for a charge next turn. I see my chance and activate both Lilitu's and Lelu. Lilitu #1 moves forward, chain lures the last SPA, and fails a cast which I let go. Second Lilitu stands still, chain lures Rusty Alice to her death, chain lures Killjoy to his death, Killjoy tries to smack her with his slow-to-die and fails vs her irresistible, then she walks toward the objective. Lelu activates and moves toward the objective. My opponent is looking pretty frustrated at this point. His guardian shifts around a bit to try and hide and the turn ends.

Turn 3 my opponent does not draw a new hand due to Levi not dieing. I activate and run through the Nekima standard operating procedure (SOP), able to now move her on top of the claim jump marker. Levi activates and walks back toward the Waif, keeping a bit cagey. Pandora scoots forward a bit, pings the guardian, and tosses out PE to give it a neg flip before coming to rest on the wall of the bridge closest to the Claim Jump and within the 3 inch target. Guardian activates and moves up the bridge, Lilitu moves slightly and chain lures the guardian to its death. Waif passes, I move the rest of my crew to strategically position around the claim jump marker, all within 3 inches and most out of sight of Levi, but with good LOS to cover the approaches.

Turn 4 starts, Waif activates and passes. Nekima activates, DS, gives out masks, passes. Levi passes. Primordial magic passes. My opponent looks at me and points out if we are both going to keep passing, then we might as well call the game as he cannot do anything and I already sit on 8/0. We call the game. Game ended 8/0 win for me. Record was now 7TP / +16 Diff / 22vp

His list was not the typical Levi list that I am used to seeing, and I think was at a disadvantage from the start. I was able to throw out my lures with 6's several times and he had little chance to resist. (guardian within 6 inches of Nekima is at WP 4, looking for an 11 to resist the 14 cast on the lure). Levi could have jumped into my line turn 4 and after to do some damage, but I am not sure it would have gone in his favor or he would have been able to turn anything. I have time to throw Nekima, Young, and Lelu at the waif to kill her, and could easily take down Levi. By turn 4 he had no stones left and I was still sitting on 5.

Gencon 2011 - Master of Malifaux Round 2

Here we go, round 2 of the Master of Malifaux from Gencon.

Round 2 I played Mike? (Names are quickly slipping from my head...) and his Resurectionist Crew.

Round 2 was Shared Treasure Hunt, and playing Ressers. I had already planned to use my "Filth" list. Now, I want to point out that this list was the primary list I was planning to take to Gencon, simply because this was the Masters tournament and I felt this list was broken. It did not fail to deliver as expected. (and for that I actually feel bad for my opponents. I would never bring this list out in a friendly game, and am unlikely to bring it back in a tournament).

FILTH

Pandora -- 8 Cache
Primordial Magic [2ss]
Desperate Mercenary [2ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Nekima, The Dark Sibling [13ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]

His list, as best as I can remember was:

Nicodem, The Undertaker -- 5 Cache
Bete Noire [9ss]
Canine Remains [2ss]
Canine Remains [2ss]
Canine Remains [2ss]
Canine Remains [2ss]
Canine Remains [2ss]
Mortimer, The Gravedigger [7ss]
Rotten Belles [4ss]
The Hanged [8ss]

For this round I chose (I think) Hold Out and Kidnap on the dogs.

We had a fairly straight line down the center of the board with a fair amount of terrain to hide behind, but not a lot to block LOS. The Treasure was set mid-board between us and I deployed in a knot at the edge of my deployment zone. Lilitu #1, Pandora, Lilitu #2 in a line. Nekima behind that line, Merc to her right, Tot to his right, Tot #2 to my left in a building, Puking Snake (Primordial Magic) to my right in a building.

He deployed Dogs on the line in the center, ready to run for the treasure, Mortimer in the center of the dogs. Bell was set to the left of the dogs, back a bit from the deployment line, and Nico was hiding behind a building to the right of the dogs. Hanged hid out in a building and Bete was off the table.

So, my list works in a fairly prescriptive manner. Turn 1 went along these lines:
I get initiative:

1. Merc activates and goes defensive stance (my opponent and I joke about 3 hungry women leering at him must make him nervous)
2. Dog moves toward the treasure
3. Nekima goes defensive stance. Gives all Nephilim Masks on their cast, Cuts herself for 1 blood, Melee Expert hits the Merc (I cheat weak damage), Moves 4 inches to in front of the line of Girls (Pandora, 2 Lilitu's)
4. Dog moves toward treasure
5. Tot #1 smacks the Merc, killing him, gains 1 blood (Nekima gains her second blood), grows to a Young. At this point I forget to use the Desperate Merc's healing ability on Nekima, minor glitch.
6. Dog moves toward treasure
7. I do not have a 12 in my hand, so... Lilitu moves forward 1 move, starts with Luring one of the Dogs. Dog fails to resist, lure auto-triggers double-take, keeps luring until dog is in base-to-base, and dies from a combo of whip hits and Pandora's 1 dmg. Lilitu targets dog #2 and does the same thing, killing it as well.
8. Mortimer moves forward and buries himself, my opponent makes the comment that he is not going to play around with letting mortimer get lured all over.
9. Lilitu #2 moves forward and lures a dog, dragging it in and killing it. Bete pops out of the dog. Lilitu fires up her last AP to lure bete to her death. Bete does "1 with the night" and goes back under the bed.
10. 2 Dogs move forward toward the treasure
11. Tot #2 casts sprint and shoots out to the Treasure, sitting comfortably on top of it, planning to pick it up next turn.
12. Belle moves forward and lures the Tot 5 inches forward.
13. Puking Snake moves forward through the buildings on the right
14. Hanged comes through the building to get a bead on the Tot.
15. Pandora activates, walks twice to get in front of Nekima and the Girls. Pacify on the front dog, push 4 inches, pacify on the Hanged, push 4 inches, PE on Mortimer, tagging the hanged and a dog, push 4 inches, pacify the Bell, push back, pacify the last dog, end the cycle.
16. Nico wanders out from behind the building and positions for a bead on my crew for round 2.

Round 2 ended up much nastier than that. I drew a high crow in hand so started with Pandora first. Pandora uses Pacify to shoot down the board and gets in range of Nico. I drop a PE on Nico, forcing him to run to the board edge. I push around dropping some more PE and pacifies before shifting back toward my line. He activates Mortimer first and buries himself. I activate Nekima and give everyone masks. He attacks the Tot with the Hanged, but missed. I still have no 12s in hand, so I activate a Lilitu and lure the Tot back onto the treasure. I then lure another dog to its death, Bete jumps out only to face another lure and death. This time she does not go back under the bed and stays dead. I can see my opponent getting frustrated. Nico activates and rallies. Tot activates and picks up the treasure. Belle lures the tot, making him drop the treasure. My other Lilitu lures the belle to her death, then switches and lures the hanged to his death. 1 of the casts in that chain failed to cast, no worries on that as I have plenty more. Dog attacks and kills the tot. Young jumps forward to grab the treasure. Puking snake moves forward.

Round 3 Nico walks back up the board, Mortimer buries himself. I shift the whole line forward and then shoot Pandora up the table as much as possible. I was either in range, or was in range at the start of round 4, but I end up dropping a PE and self loathing on Nico. Nico runs off the board smacking himself in the head with his cane. Mortimer flings dirt in a laughing moment at Nekima. Nekima charges Mortimer and hits him with her big sword. Lesson learned, never fling dirt at the Nephilim Princess! At this point the game is over, the young picks up the treasure and walks back to my deployment zone. Game ended 8/0 win for me. Record was not 4TP / +8 Diff / 14vp

More reports when I get another break from work to write them!

Gencon 2011 - Master of Malifaux Round 1

Well, Gencon is over and I am on the road on the way back. Magical technology lets me post while I have my road-trip partner driving. Over the next several days I am going to get my battle reports posted for the Master of Malifaux tournament I played on Saturday.

Some quick statistics for anyone who is interested. Wyrd claims that the Master of Malifaux was the largest tournament to date (I  believe it was at 32 people). I wonder if thats accurate, as I believe the UK Malifaux GT hit 40 players. Regardless, this was the largest Official Wyrd run tournament to date and the competition was exactly as I expected it to be. I had 4 rounds vs great opponents, even though I ended up playing broken (not fun) lists in 2 of my rounds. My opponents still held up to the pressure and NPE factors of my list and we joked and had a good time.

Further statistics on the tournament:

• Faction breakdown: 
• 10 neverborn 
• 7 outcast
• 6 resurrectionist 
• 4 arcanist
• 3 guild
• Final round - top 2 tables:
• Table 1 was Dreamer/LCB vs Avatar Zoraida
• Table 2 was Dreamer/LCB vs Lilith (grow list)
• Final Standings
• 1st. Neverborn
• 2nd Neverborn 
• 3rd Outcast. 
• Top 8 places were 4 neverborn, 3 outcast, 1 resurectionist (in 8th)

 Lets jump into my Round 1 of the tournament:
Master of Malifaux Round 1

Round 1 I played Stan, who was a whole lot of fun!

Round 1 started out with Shared Turf War and I was matched vs Outcasts. My plan had me choosing 50/50 between my 2 lists. Turf War has me working to get my crew to his half of the board, and into his deployment zone to max my points. I chose to take my Dreamer list:

The Dreamer -- 7 Cache
3 Daydreams [6ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Coppelius [9ss]
Insidious Madness [4ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]

My Opponent set down Gremlins across from me, consisting (if I remember correctly) of:

Som'er Teeth Jones -- 3 Cache
1 Giant Mosquito [2ss]
Bayou Gremlin [2ss]
Gremlin Taxidermist [6ss]
Hog Whisperer [5ss]
Piglet [3ss]
Piglet [3ss]
Slop Hauler [4ss]
Slop Hauler [4ss]
Warpig [8ss]

Looking at this across the table I chose Reclaim Malifaux and Steal Relic as my schemes. I thought this would work out well vs So'mer, plus I have the movement to reclaim Malifaux and still push through to the opposing side of the board.

We both deployed and after setting up, I noticed I had a straight shot to toss Chompy/Dreamer down the board and possibly take Som'er down first turn. I started to activate and set my crew for an early bury (Defensive Stance, etc), waiting for him to activate a load of models. I finally reached the point of decision and So'Mer was hiding right behind the wall of one of the buildings. I looked close, the building wall was ht 3, Chompy should be able to see over it, and I companion activated the 3 day-dreams and Dreamer. Daydream/Chompy/Dreamer/Chompy shuffle and I place chompy next to the wall of the building, within 2 inches of So'mer, inside the building. I declare the attack and my opponent asks if Chompy can see So'mer from inside the building since there are no windows. At this point I realize my error, I am not allowed to even place Chompy inside the building. FAIL! I pick up Chompy and measure all my other options. Nothing comes to mind. I place Chompy at my best choice of location and only have a Bayou Gremlin to kill, who dies promptly. I trigger "All Done", then use the daydream in my deployment zone to pull Chompy/Dreamer back home and use the third DayDream to bury everyone.

That was annoying. I have now tagged the three zones. End of Round 1 I have tagged the three Reclaim zones in my deployment area, the insidious is forward ready to grab one of the next areas, I leave 1 Alp out and forward to grab the next area, and have a Daydream positioned in the center to summon up another nightmare to grab the middle section.

Turns 2 and 3 are a lot of positioning on both our accounts. I continue to reclaim sections of the board, Gremlins run forward and snap off shots at random nightmares, one gremlin makes a charge for my deployment zone on the right side of the board (he has staked a claim on a piece of terrain there as well), and the insidious madness was fighting two piglets. The Warpig made a run forward, but Chompy jumped out and killed it dead (making bacon I might add.. Bacon makes everything better). I also left an Alp behind to try and head off the Gremlin making a sprint for my deployment zone on the right side of the board.

Turn 4 started on my side with another run on So'mer and a group of gremlins who had not left his deployment zone. Day Dream jumps forward and calls up the big boss, Chompy. I have the plan in my head and its all planned out. Chompy will Melee expert So'mer and hit him. If I onslaught I will take it, cheating low if I have to in order to not kill off So'Mer. I will use my 1st AP to steal So'mers relic (I have a 12 in hand and can soul stone), then finish the Gremlin Boss off with my 2nd AP, attacking and triggering "All Done" (I have a 11 of Books in hand) to put the boy on the table. Dreamer will activate with 1 AP remaining, summon all his friends ( I have a 3 of masks in hand), make them terrifying, and then the turn will be over. The turn starts out well, Chompy attacks and flips a high ram. I do a fair amount of damage and So'Mer has no stones left. Chompy Onslaughts and hits So'Mer again, bonus! I look over my hand, look over So'mer's health, then attack again and hit. I toss the book out, flip damage and kill So'mer. At this point I try and figure out what I am going to do with 2 AP on Dreamer. Chompy is "All Done", Dreamer comes back out with 2 AP and 2 (0), Summons all his friends as planned, makes them terrifying, decides he can fly, and scoots over to be ready to grab another quadrant for reclaim Malifaux. We activate 2 or 3 other models before I realize.....

FAIL!!

I forgot to steal the damn gremlins Relic. Best I can now score is 6 points on the game.

At this point I am fairly frustrated with myself for losing track of my schemes. Coppelius clears out his deployment zone, the pigs kill off the insidious madness and the Alp is just not fast enough to catch the gremlin running for my deployment zone. We have some small skirmishes but the game ends with Dreamer having reclaimed Malifaux, I have more models on his half of the table than he has on mine, his gremlin and my Alp are playing ring-around-the-Stake-a-Claim. Our final scores are tallied and we end up with a 6/6 draw (I get 4 points for Turf War, and 2 points for Reclaim Malifaux).

That Draw set us up at the exact middle of the tournament, as the only draw in the round.

Its Gencon, Master of Malifaux is going on now

So the tournament is here, and by the time you start reading this I should be well into Round 1 of the tournament. So the question is, what did I end up choosing to take?

I made the decision a couple weeks back not to take an Avatar list. Avatars are nice, but based on the pre-release rules as I understood them, they are not really tournament worthy. Sonnia Criid and Justice are ok for tournaments, but not fantastic. I was strongly considering taking a Criid Avatar list until I came across something else.

Locally while testing this list we termed it the FILTH list. This was first discussed by Mike on his blog, and he determined it was just not a fun list to play, especially against. Through some thinking and discussion, I thought that sounded like the ideal tournament list, so I started testing it.

FILTH
So we start with Nekima and a couple Lilitu's, and build from there. Here is the list I ended up taking into today's tournament.

Neverborn Crew - 40 - Scrap
Pandora -- 8 Cache
Lelu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Lilitu [7ss]
Nekima, The Dark Sibling [13ss]
Terror Tot Nephilim [3ss]

So you are already cringing, I am sure. The basics here are Nekima giving the Lilitu's masks on thier cast so I can chain lure models to their death. Add to this Nekima's and Lelu's hitting power for finishing models off and this gets nice. Pandora adds a whole new dimension to this, removing those pesky immunities and pushing damage out there as well.

To be fair, this list sounds a lot nastier than it actually is. Through a variety of play-testing, I find that this becomes weak vs a strong Zoriada list, Dreamer list, and Lilith list. The low model count also provides some bad match-ups vs some of the Arcanist lists. With this in mind, I am keeping a second list in faction as an alternative.

Dreamer
Neverborn Crew - 40 - Scrap

The Dreamer -- 7 Cache
3 Daydreams [6ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Alp [3ss]
Coppelius [9ss]
Insidious Madness [4ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]
Stitched Together [5ss]

Max is a great standby for me, as he fits my play-style and addresses many of the weaknesses that have popped up with the FILTH list. Dreamer works well for me against most match-ups, so will be my choice for Arcanists, Neverborn, and possibly for Outcasts. I have options to swap around my build, but the build above is a great control crew with a large number of significant models.

So, wish me luck, I hope things are well underway at this point. I expect to get some results up here over the next week after Gencon!

Over a Month since the last update

So its been over a month since my last update. I have been a bad blogger, I am sure. Lots has been going on and July as a whole has been pretty crappy. The month started off with my Dad passing away and me doing a quick shuffle of travel plans to get my family of 5 3/4 of the way across the country to try and help out my Mom and family. That's never a good way to start out a month. Plus, funerals bring out the deepest dysfunction in a family, which true to form is what happened in this situation. That ended with another unexpected (and last minute) shuffle to get my entire family of 5 back home.

This was followed up by my being needed in NYC for a week of work in the office. I have not worked in an office in over 3 years now, and being in the corporate office was not a way for me to relax. So, after a week up in a city I am not fond of, I return back home with more responsibility and an additional work load.

That said, the travels at the start of the month required my cancelling our family vacation to London, leaving the family home at the start of August. In a bitter-sweet turn of events, this opened up my opportunity to attend Gencon this year. I was not planning on attending Gencon until 2012, and now I will be making the trek out to Indianapolis for the largest gaming convention in the world. This brings me to current events.

Gencon starts this week and Wyrd Miniatures has a whole slew of things for me to spend money on. 7 Avatar's are being released, a number of Alternate Master sculpts, a brand new game (Puppet Wars), and a new rule book. This is all very exciting, along with the newly released Terraclips making an appearance. This has driving my shopping list high-enough that my wife feels emboldened (and entitled) to a Disney trip early next year. Yay!

Gaining Grounds - Master of Malifaux

That brings us to the next big reason I am heading out to Gencon. The Master of Malifaux event on Saturday. This is a 40ss scrap run using the Gaining Grounds tournament document. I am really looking forward to this, as it has been acclaimed that I do not know how to play Malifaux because I end up losing in tournament to newbies. I have hope that this event will provide some truly stiff competition, and give me a good feel for how my Malifaux skills and my local play group stack up competitively against the rest of the country/world. I have a couple things to consider for lists to take to this tournament. Within the format chosen, I am aiming for as many VP as possible, which means maxing out my schemes and strategies each round. I am down to a choice between Neverborn and Guild for this, both of which have advantages.

Whichever way I decide to go, I have the option to use one of the Avatars that is being released at Gencon. For the Guild, there are 2 Avatars coming out, Lady Justice and Sonnia Criid. Both are fantastic looking models (Criid at the opening of this post, Justice to the left), and viable for tournament play. Neverborn receive one of the masters I play, Pandora,  as a released avatar. There has been a fair amount of commentary on the Wyrd forums about if Avatars should be used in tournament play or not. The official stance is Avatars are released, so the are eligible for play. The community concern is that this gives playtesters an advantage in the tournament.

If I were to use an Avatar in the tournament, I have a couple challenges to overcome. First, I would need to grab time on Thursday and Friday to paint up the Avatar models I wanted to use. Second, I have the same amount of time to become comfortable with the final version of the Avatar Rules. Both of these are challenges I feel comfortable overcoming. I was not originally planning on attending Gencon this year, so missing out on some time at the con is not a huge loss for me. Then again, I am not sure I want to put the time in painting at Gencon when I could be wandering through the halls and playing more games.

So that brings me to the next challenge, which is do I feel that the Avatars (at least my understanding of them) are appropriate for the tournament. I expect I will see 1 or 2 avatars at the tournament, but not too many. I have some solid lists I am comfortable playing, which do not use the Avatars yet. While Avatars may catch my opponents by surprise, I do not believe a top Malifaux player will be caught out and at a disadvantage against them.

With this in mind, I find it unlikely I will be using an Avatar at the Master of Malifaux event. I have some other 40ss lists to consider, and feel pretty comfortable meeting the challenge of the tournament with those lists. Overall, I am really looking forward to the tournament.

We will see how things go.