I played in a Malifaux Tournament in Longmont at the Hobby Quest store. Some strong competition, and I walked out very wiped out. If you haven't been to the Hobby Quest store, I highly recommend it. They are located on 119 and 287(Ken Prat and Main) in south Longmont. It is hidden in the South West corner of the little strip mall. Hey, maybe I will get to see you there, though I don't get down there as much as I would like. Anyway, back to the tournament.
Game one was versus a guy who had a Vik crew very close to mine, straight down to the paint. He was using the old metal Viks, painted in the original color scheme. He did add a Trapper, Hans, and a Student. We were playing Turf War, with a few handy marker schemes, so I was Tara all of the way. The old models threw me off though, since it turned out he had only played a little in 1.5 and took a long break, only being eight games into second edition. Luckily, I found out before first turn, so I layed down exactly what Tara did, what I was going to do, and went from there. Unfortunately we only made it to turn three, so I wasn't able to get a ton of points. He was able to get some out of me, but I easily held him back, with my patented "here's a Desolation Engine" technique. This game finished like 7-4. A win, but not a resounding one.
Game two was Reckoning, so out came the Viks. This one was versus Daniel, my seemingly arch nemesis. He was running his pretty much locked in Lillith grow list. He took assassinate and breakthrough, I took Cursed Object and Breakthrough. This board had marked edges, so I ran into a couple places where I thought I had room, but when we measured the edge was closer than I had thought, and so I had bottle necked myself. I also didn't push forward as hard as I probably should have for my schemes. As such, I was basically a turn behind. However, I was able to do fairly well on Reckoning, and I also took down Barbaros, Lillith, and a Mature in turn two. Lillith was supposed to live, but a Red Joker made her a puddle. He had gained another Mature, but I still had gutted his list. In the end he was able to sneak a Tot into drop a Breakthrough marker before I killed it. He also got his Mature free to block my scheme runners from dropping when I wanted them to. This meant that turn five was a 3-4 loss for me. However, fate smiled upon me, and I was easily able to drop a scheme marker, giving me another and gained another for Cursed Object on his lone Mature, bringing it to a 5-4 win for me.
At this point, I am the only player sitting on two wins. I think Jules beat the other winner from round one and two of the first round games tied. So, even though there were 11 players, only I was 2-0. However, I had small victories and was pretty sure that not even a draw would keep me in it, so I needed a win, any win. I had never played Jason before, he is from Greeley or some where. He had made a bit of a drive I knew. He was also running Pandora, and I knew his list was pretty nasty as I had heard Russ go on about it after their game. His list was a bit different that what Troy usually runs, relying heavily on the Wp duels to do the killing. It was Squatter's Rights, and even though I kinda wanted to play Leveticus, just because, I decided that Tara would be the better choice. Murder Protege was also in the pool, so the DE was staying home. I also left the Death Marshal out as well. I took Taelor with Scramble, a couple Wretches, Bishop, and Miss Demeanor. I also took Bodyguard on Taelor(say WHAT?) and Power Ritual(which I of course only placed one of in my zone). I quickly raced towards the center, and on turn two activated two Squatter's, while using Tara (0) to block interacts, instead of gaining Reactivate. This put me up a point on Squatter's. It was a large push to center, and Bishop got pulled when a Wretch died, did barely anything then died himself. Taelor and her Wretch were left almost completely alone, and both moved across the table after it became apparent he had no plans to touch my Squatter's markers. He put a lot of effort into holding down Tara, includining Paralyzing her. But if she is paralyzed, she isn't failing Wp checks. I was also able to slow his Sorrows, limiting his ability to paralyze her. I was also able to bury Kade, whom he used heavily for his Melancholy upgrade, not to control my activations, but to force Wp checks. With him gone, and myself having no urge to kill anything, his damage dealing took it in the butt.
However, things were not all fun and roses. I mentioned the failure of not dropping two home Power Rituals. He had also taken Bodyguard on Kandy(I know, HUGE surprise, I mean, who doesn't?) who I just couldn't seem to kill. Kandy also made to my scheme marker and was prepped to remove it. This meant that I would be a point down from Power Ritual, leaving me at 9, to his unstoppable 9. I was pretty sure a draw would put me right out. I drew my hand, fairly nice, nothing great, elevens. I moved Tara with her first activation, giving her reactivate. He moved up with both the Poltergeist and a Sorrow, hoping to hold me with disengaging strikes. I made my last activation, passed both, broke free of the Sorrow, but still in range of the Geist. If I failed to get away this action, it would be a draw.
I didn't fail.
I was able to use my last eleven, beating whatever he had in his hand, moved over, redropped the marker, and won, 10-9. It basically came down to who had the better resources, and it happened to be me. I knew what had to happen and saved all I had for this exact moment. He spent a little earlier in the turn, and I don't know if it would have mattered if he had kept those cards. He made quite a fuss about his cards and what not, but I still felt it was a great game. I think we pushed each other to the very end.
An awesome event. I walked away with a starter of my choice. Probably the hardest decision of the day, I ended up with Karai. Sadly, I will probably miss the next tournament due to work and what not, but I recommend that anybody reading this goes.
Especially since the real competition won't be there and you stand a chance!
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