TMI: Bolt Action Malifaux

I managed to score a couple games this last Saturday, one of Malifaux, the other, a new face, Bolt Action.

I showed up early to get in some Through the Breach, but we had too few people show, and had to cancel. Instead, I played Patrick at Malifaux 2nd Edition. This was my first chance to bring out Tara, and I jumped on it. I should have an On the Table later this week with a update on how the crew is coming paint wise, but here is how they are coming game wise. I forgot everything. Not quite, but I didn't hand out Fast aggressively as I probably should have. I also didn't activate in the most efficient manner, meaning I activated some models before I activated others, likely in the wrong order. We forgot to flip for deployment type, and just played standard. The strategy was the new Claim Jump one, with myself taking Beakthrough and Cursed Object, while he took Breakthrough and Line in the Sand. I had Tara, Karina, Nothing Beast, three Void Wretches, and two Death Marshals, a very basic Tara crew. He had Nicodem, a Flesh Construct, Sebastian, Mortimer, and four Canine Remains. On turn one I buried the Nothing Beast with Tara's range attack from her upgrade, moved everything forward, used Patrick's Construct to give everything Fast, brought out the Nothing Beast with Tara's last activation, charged the nothing beast in, beat the crap out of the Construct, then buried it. I did this most of the game. Found the annoying target and just buried it. At one point my Nothing Beast was down to two wounds and poison. With Sebastian there, he would have taken three wounds. Instead a Fast Death Marshal walked over and Pine Boxed the Nothing Beast for the Wretches to heal next turn. This did however leave Tara unprotected and she eventually died, which really hurt the crew, since I couldn't give out as much Fast to both sides. In the end, my Death Marshals dropping scheme markers and a Fast Karina making a run for the enemy zone gave me full points for my schemes, but I only managed two for the strategy. Patrick on the other hand was able to get two for a unrevealed Line in the Sand, three for breakthrough, and the full four for the strategy, giving me a 8-9 loss. A real good game. I think I frustrated Patrick a bit, burying his models at inopportune times, but I forgot plenty of things that would have made things worse for the models on the table. Sebastian was a pain in my side, sitting in the middle where I wanted my models to be, but he hurt for having to stay. I can't wait to give it another go next week.

After that, I played a game of Bolt Action versus Nabors. Bolt Action is a game that Nabors played at Tacticon, and bought into whole heartedly. Like $300 bought in. I do have to say I see the appeal(no, I'm not throwing hundreds of dollars in, it was just fun). He currently only has the starter, but the rest of his stuff should be in this next weekend. I played the Germans and he played the Americans. You can see the table above, the objective was wholesale slaughter. The Germans have longer range, high rate of fire machine guns. The Americans have close range guns, but shoot on the move easier. The Americans do have a sniper, which could be an serious annoyance if use properly. As it was, I just huddled in the corner behind a wall, and forced him to come through the ruined city towards me. It was pretty much a slaughter. Except the last turn, I was getting all of my dice before he was getting many of his. This meant he wasn't moving before, so I couldn't really shoot him, but it also meant that, while I couldn't afford to advance and fire, I was instead set on Ambush, and could unload on him later. In the end, I destroyed all his units, save his Sniper, who had to make a morale check and basically gave the finger as he ran. In return, I only lost one unit. Afterwards, Patrick threw down versus Nabors, also as Germans, and despite his constant statement of my plan being full of the suck, took far heavier casualties. Not really anything to do with my games, I just thought it should be noted for posterity. And for gloating. As for the game itself, it felt a little unbalanced, but because of scenario and terrain, rather than the forces themselves. I think as he adds more and balances the forces abilities more, that may go away. Also a scenario where I couldn't sit on it would have changed things immensely. A bridge scenario, where he assaults me, about the same, the same scenario, but with me assaulting him, could be rough. Especially if I can't sit back and pepper hime before coming in.

Afterwards, I bought a box of Space Marines and started in on my next project, the Night Lords! Curses to Nabors for drawing me back in, I was almost out. I should have that up on OTT soonish, too.