No late night gaming, though of course, the one time I didn't bring my X-Wing stuff, Paul is up for a game. What I did play, though, was Malifaux and 40K. I'll wait while you recover from the shock.
Game one was Tara versus Pandora. This was a very frustrating game for me, and I made a few mistakes because of it. One specifically was not using Pandora's enormous melee to Deliver a Message. I took Tara with the same upgrades, Karina(mistake), Bishop, Nothing Beast, 3 Void Wretches, and a Death Marshal. He took Pandora, Teddy, Kade, Kandy, Poltergeist, and a Doppelganger. I think I set it up fairly well beginning turn one. I used Tara to bury the Nothing Beast and the Death Marshal to bury Bishop. The plan, move Tara up, bring out the Nothing Beast AND Bishop, use his Teddy to give everything Fast, proceed to wail, laugh maniacally. What actually happened, I use my only decent card to bury the Nothing Beast, Tara is in prime position, but flips crap for her Horror duel for Teddy's terrifying, become Paralyzed, and the Nothing Beast and Bishop are left floating in the void. Next turn, flip a 4 for initiative, even with the positive, he cheats a 5, Tara is dead before I go. Well, that sucks, but all it does is suck. I still have a chance at a half decent game. I still have Bishop who has swift, and can make the game awesome for me, but I have written it off, and so I don't make it happen. By the way, we have Squatter's Rights, which I get a point for on turn two, I have Distract and Deliver a Message, he has Protect Territory and Deliver a Message. His Deliver a Message is void now. I have Bishop sitting in PANDORA's melee range, but I think I have to be in Bishop's melee range for Deliver a Message. I also have a Death Marshal and Bishop in the middle of this everything for Distract, which has the added benefit of basically double slowing his models or giving me points. Instead I proclaim "SLAP FIGHT" and see how many times I can miss. My cards remained crap the rest of the game, which wouldn't have mattered had I stuck to schemes. After the game, I even went through and checked if I had a full deck, or if I had accidentally switched part of it with someone else in a crazy deck cutting accident thing. Nope, all there. I sorted, reshuffled, and hopefully got some more randomness in there. Now, I of course can't blame the deck any, as what I needed to do to win had absolutely nothing to do with cards. I played a lot like a brand new player to Malifaux, and it upsets me a little, but I need more work on Tara. Perhaps the problem was that I am focusing to much on what I need to do to make Tara's shenanigans work, that I am not properly focusing on the game. Right after, I wasn't sure my crew selection was any good, but in hindsight, I think my crew selection was spot on, with possibly the exception of Karina, but that's partly to do with her excelling versus buried models, and I failed to bury anything of Troy's.
After that I managed to get in a game with a guy from Gryphon's named Nathan. He played Daemons. He had just finished playing Grey Knights against Patrick, and I would have liked to play against those, but that's just the dirty dual Heldrake power gamer in me. He ran his list from our last tournament, two Daemon Princes, Fateweaver, a unit of Horrors with Heralds, and a unit of Daemonettes. A very light troop army, but he brings a Portal Glyph, so that is supposed to make up for it, though he didn't get any from it this game. I'm fairly certain my target selection was faulty this game, but that's what I do. I, once again, targeted his flying monstrous creatures, but in my defense, that's really all he had. I ignored them with me DPs and sent them flying across the board to threaten his troops. I did manage to Enfeeble one of his DPs, but since nothing ever fails a ground check, who cares. I fired a lot into his DP, but only caused a wound. On turn two he layed into my Chosen squads, but I suffered little, though my Black Legion DP died. On my turn, I was out of range of the DPs for enfeeble, but I messed with his troops instead. My Chosen all got out in a kinda tri-star Rhino formation. And promptly managed to ground Fateweaver. Curses, where was Enfeeble when I needed it most? I then promptly charged, then realized(was reminded, actually) that I had fired a rapid fire weapon, and promptly uncharged. And Fateweaver flew away. I charged his unit of Horrors, but I think I should have gone after the Daemonettes, but since I rolled crap upon crap, who cares. He was then able to charge me with his Daemonettes, which have Rending, and were able to kill him, with more blind swings in return. turn three was the final turn, due to time, and wasn't good for my Chosen. Two squads were dropped to a single plasma gunner, while the third was assaulted by a Daemon Prince, and only lived because of the Champions selfless sacrifice, or stupid challenge, you decide. On my turn, they were wiped out. The other two remaining Chosen promptly jumped inside their Rhinos and rode off to something something. In a tournament game, they might have lived to time, which would have likely been the next turn(well, until some jerkme ups the time to 3 hours), jumped out of the smoking hulk of their Rhinos, scored points, while the Cultists ran out of their ruin and scored some more, and maybe I could have won. Actually, I probably could have just looked at the time, moved, run, and won with the chosen, but that's not generally where I am, especially not in a pick up game. Anyway, they hid, the third Rhino ran interference, my Heldrake spit on some Daemonettes at the cost of flying off next turn, and my lazy Heldrake forgot to wake up, remaining in reserves. In the end, he had the 3 point objective and my absent Heldrake and I held a 2 point one with cultists. A great game, though I may have let my opponent down tactically. I deployed to the left, after my opponent deployed to his left, expanding the separation between us, and basically pushing his troops out of reach. The idea was to protect myself with range, but maybe I should have sacrificed the Rhinos for a hard push up the center, and been able to threaten his troops. I would have been able to put shots on his Porta Potty, which would have made his limited troops much more vulnerable. And then my shots could have gone towards his remaining troops, and given me an at worst draw. I do think the cultists is a very good add, as that back scoring "lawn chair" unit is a definite help. I also have to remember in scouring to place the objectives above ground, as that allows the Heldrakes to score. As it was, it mattered little due to just running out of time.
A good, but short day. I didn't win any games, but still had a great time. Troy did ask me if Pandora was still a negative play experience, and I disagreed, my cards was a negative play experience, but Pandora was fine. Also, playing like an idiot may have hampered my excitement. I have never thought my self a great player, but a decent one... maybe I shouldn't go back and look at my record...
Next week will be super short, due to Ag Day, and the week after I am out of town, but October 12th I should be back with a vengeance, hot with new beta cards for Malifaux 2nd Edition.
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