087 - UK Rankings Proposals

There's a discussion currently in full swing on the Wyrd forums at the moment on the subject of the Rankings system, and whether it should be changed going forwards. Brace yourself - things are about to get ramble-y!

For those not in the know, the current system ranks the tournament performance of each player in the UK by assigning a score for each event they attend. Taking first place at an event is worth 100 points (assuming the event had a turnout of at least 20 players), with second place receiving 95 points, third place receiving 90 points, etc. If there are less than 20 attendees, the maximum score for first place is reduced by 1 point for each player below 20 (so winning a 15 player event would score 95 points), and all other scores are reduced proportionally. A player's best three scores from all the tournaments they enter in a rolling 12 month period are added together to give a total score out of 300.

The potential changes that are being discussed are:

1) Increase the number of events counted in your score from a players best 3 to their best 4.
2) Increase the threshold for scoring "maximum" points from being a 20 player event, to something higher. 24, 26, 28 and 30 have all been suggested for the new threshold.

I have a suspicion that a lot of people are weighing in on this discussion without having consulted any actual data first, so I figure that looking at some numbers will help people frame the debate more clearly:

Increase the number of scoring events from 3 to 4

First, we must consider what this change is intended to achieve. The argument goes that the scores at the top of the table are pretty close together, and that moving to a system of four events would distinguish these people a little more.The top 40 of the rankings table as at time writing (29th January 2014) looks like this:

 

The third column of the table shows the number of events that each player has on record that are not currently contributing to their score - ie. the excess events above three.

Couple of initial observations

• As you progress down the table from high ranks to low, the number of unscored events decreases.
• Outside the Top 10, the vast majority of players have only 3 or 4, or less, events to their name. Even among the Top 40, players attending only 3 events in a year appears to be the most common type of player.
• There is a very small number of people that have attended a large number of events - where I'm classing "large number" as more than 6 events.
• The scores at the top aren't particularly grouped up, with the exception that three players are sitting at two-hundred and seventy something. One of these players has only one other tournament that could be added to their score, where the other two have 6 and 8 events to choose the best result from. Intuitively, the players with more options are at an advantage in the tie break.

Highlighted green are the players who would benefit significantly by being able to add another event to their score - because they have more events to choose their next best from. Highlighted orange are players that would benefit somewhat by adding their 4th (and only other) event to their score - this 4th event might not necessarily be a high scoring one though. Highlighted red are the players that would be disadvantaged by the fact that they have only attended three or less events in the last 12 months, so could not gain any more points than they already have.

In moving to a "Best 4" system, the effect would be that players in green would, generally, move up significantly, players in orange would move up a bit, and players in red would move down.

Below Rank 40 there are significantly more players who have only 2 or 3 tournaments to their name. Most of these players would remain in the same rankings order, however the gap between the "Top" players and the "Rest" would widen significantly, creating what would essentially be a two-tier system.

I'd expect the impact for "The Rest" to be:

a) Rankings become less relevant. If you are in the "lower" tier (having 1, 2 or 3 tournaments to your name) it is harder for you to make a meaningful comparison between your score and the "Top" players.

b) It is harder for newer players to break into the higher ranks. Some of the players that have recently jumped into the Top 20 would not be there under a "Best 4" system, and introducing new blood to the competitive mix is always good to keep things fresh.

These two points are why I'm unsure about this particular change - the benefits (in terms of distinguishing the "Top" players) are marginal at best, and affect only a limited number of people, whereas the *vast* majority of people for whom 4 events in a year is just too much of a stretch are disadvantaged, so my preference would be to stick with a "Best 3" system.


Increase the Threshold for Scoring Max Points from 20 to X

This second change is intended to reward attendance at an event with "many" people, and award less rankings points to an event where "fewer" people attend.

The rationale for this must presumably be: "It is harder to place higher at an event when there are more players".

What makes an event more "difficult" to win? The strength of the competition is probably the most obvious answer. Unfortunately, so many factors contribute to a measure of "strength of competition" that it's not that easy to fully analyse.

Some things we can examine though. I've seen it suggested that smaller tournaments could be easier to win due to attracting a different mix of players - with more local/casual players and less of the experienced tournament crowd. I checked this out by analysing the last 12 months of events, calculating an average score* for all the participants, and plotting that against the number of participants at the event.

As you can see, there isn't really any trend of smaller events being a pushover due to having easier opponents - the smallest events tend to have a similar average ranking score attending them as the larger ones, reflecting the willingness for people to travel a long way for an event, even more so if the event is ranked.

The number of rounds played also has an impact - it is a fact that winning 4 games in a row is necessarily harder than winning 3 games in a row. Regrettably, due to time constraints, most Malifaux events recently have run to only 3 rounds. In an ideal world, with 16 players there would be a 4th round, and with 32 players there would be a 5th round. If this recommendation was implemented, it would provide justification all by itself for larger events scoring more points than smaller.

Limited by playing time constraints (it is difficult to get 4 games, let alone 5 games, into a single day event) and with tournaments typically featuring only 3-games, we should consider the tournament "journey" for a player who goes on to win 1st place in a small tournament and in a large tournament, and we notice that the journey is pretty much identical. Their first game is against a random opponent which we would generally expect them to win, their second game will tend to be against a more difficult opponent than their first, and their third and final game will generally be against another of the top players at the event (which, by the scatter graph above, isn't actually going to be an easier opponent in a smaller event than a larger event). What is it about the three games played at the larger event that we should deem it be worth more points? It doesn't sound any more arduous or accomplished - the only difference seems to be how many people are sitting at adjacent tables.

Many people seem to think the threshold should be increased by a fair margin, and I believe the current 20 is somewhat arbitrary, so I wouldn't be opposed to edging it up slightly to 24, but anything beyond that seems rather unnecessary. Indeed, there have been only *four* events in the last 12 months with 24 or more attendees. (Having 24, 29, 33 and 39 participants), and two of those were M1E events, so going beyond that level seems to be out of step with what we've seen of attendances in 2013. Indeed, increasing the threshold to 24 would cause *seven* events between 20 and 23 attendees to no longer have counted max points. That feels somewhat on the ruthless side, and I admit that it would make it pretty much impossible to get multiple players at the top of the table on the same score. Is that all that's required? Probably.

* Players were assigned weights from 100 to 1 based on their current ranking position, and the score was the mean average of those weights. Players absent from the rankings were assumed to be local/casual players and assigned a weight of 1.

086 - Malifaux Masters 2014

So it turns out that through some strange twist of fate I managed to qualify for the UK Masters this year. I remember the 2012 UK Masters being among the most enjoyable events I've been to since I started playing Malifaux, so I excitedly accepted the invite.

I'm currently placed at 15th in the rankings, so only just squeezed into the Top 16 by a hair. Naturally then, the rest of the field is some incredibly tough opposition! And predictably, my competitive record against the majority of them isn't too great... (W/D/L)

1 Joel Henry - 0/0/0
2 James Doxey - 1/0/1
3 Jimmy Balderstone - 1/0/0
4 Luke Cocksedge - 0/0/0
5 Ant Hoult - 2/0/1
7 Craig Johnson - 0/0/3
9 Martin Wodehouse- 0/0/0
10 Rob Smith - 0/0/0
12 Nathan Chenery - 0/1/0
13 Gregory Piskosz - 0/0/1
15 Mike Taylor
16 Maria Wieland - 0/0/1
18 Tim Brown - 0/1/0
19 Jakab Sennett - 1/0/4
21 Robert Balmforth - 0/0/2
22 Matt Ledgewood -0/0/1

So overall that's 5/2/14, and four players that I'm completely untested against.With relatively few M2E games under my belt to date as well, I'm probably gearing up for a painful weekend...

On the bright side, both Joel and Rob are in my pool, so I'm guaranteed games against two players I've never played before. Rounded off with another game against Ant, which is always enjoyable, that's certainly worth travelling to a tournament for any day of the week!

058 - Malifaux UK GT Doubles Roundup

Just thought I'd write a short belated roundup of my time at the Doubles tournament a few weekends back. Actually I realise it's a full month ago today - time flies!

The Doubles format required two players to team up and nominate a single Master that would be their crew leader over 5 brawls. the second Master could be changed from game to game. I formed an alliance with Dom "Dumb Luck" Westerland, one of the more prolific gremlin players in the UK, with him bringing Som'er alongside my Ophelia. Unfortunately I wasn't able to contribute quite as much to the available model pool as Dom, as you can see below.

Mine are the models in muted tones. Dom's have Scorpion Green bases

Round 1
Since I was the last person to arrive at the venue, team "One and a Half Grem" suffered a bye through to the next round.

Round 2
Shared Destroy Evidence vs Jo-anne (Neverata) and Aidan (Cunningstunt) fielding Leviticus and "Ramatar" (that's aRamos to everyone else!).
This was where I first experienced the Pigapult and saw how it really comes into it's own when firing disposable Bayou Gremlins at Evidence markers. The first turn saw two Gremlins sucessfully destroy their evidence, and Reckless used to fire a third to protect an enemy counter from a roaming Watcher. My first meeting with Ashes and Dust ended when it met the Gremlin gunline, and Ophelia met a sticky end when she gambled our last Soulstone on a Pigapult launch (only a DF 12 flip required and she flipped a 2 and then Soulstoned a 1! Opheliafaceplantapult!). Ramos manifested late in the game and did his best to clear up the gremlins in his DZ for breakthrough but it wasn't enough and the Gremlins squealed to a narrow victory

Round 3
Shared Reconnoiter vs Mitch (Stern) and Simon - another meeting with Avatar Ramos, this time with Kaeris in support.
The Gremlins again turtled up in our deployment zone with the plan of launching from the Pigapult or just plain legging it across to the enemy half once they came a bit closer. Ramos manifested early and was on us too quickly. Ophelia got paralysed when we forgot about the Arachnid Swarm's trigger, which meant our main offensive power was out of action. In Turn 3 aRamos was in our deployment zone cutting up Gremlins with impunity and droppings Large SPAs and Electrical Creations in their midst. It was a bloodbath and the Arcanists sealed a comfortable win.

Ramos reaches the Gremlin gunline, tears up Ophelia and rips our plan to shreds

Round 4
Shared Escape and Survive vs Rich and Phil playing as Perdita and Hoffman.
In the first activation of the Turn 1, a companioned Ophelia, Pigapult and Pere Ravage managed to land a very big explosion into the middle of the Guild forces. Nino, his Grandmother and the Enslaved Nephilim all perished in the detonation, as well as a big chunk of Perdita's wounds. I later learned that Dom had promised our opponents (guys from his FLGS that he was relying on for a lift home!) that he wouldn't pull this move, so I felt rather bad for how effective it was (especially with +1 feud damage!). The Guild never fully recovered from this strike. Hoffman secured himself in the center of the board with Stake a Claim and Bodyguard active meanwhile Somer manifested and, with the help of Reactivate from a Hog Whisperer, crossed the whole length of the table in one turn, including a brief pause for Peaches to stampede all over an unfortunate Guild Guard. His ability to give free Reckless to all Gremlins around him, combined with McTavish giving everyone the Scout ability, meant that the Gremlin horde was able to quickly cross the table and gang up to finish off Perdita and claim max VPs for the strategy, giving the Gremlins their second win of the weekend.

Round 5
Shared Claim Jump vs Malcolm & Andrew playing Hoffman & Lady Justice.
We had a similar tactic in this game to the previous. Turtle up in a corner and make more Gremlins for a few turns, then Avatar up and make a rush for the Claim (with Swamp Gas to push enemies off the marker) in turns 4-6. Hoffman and his Peacekeeper/Guardian combo positioned themselves near the claim but also refused to commit. We sent our Mosquitoes to get rid of a roaming Watcher, and once it was gone, to tie up enemy models in melee to stop them walking about.
The plan went pretty well, a couple of hit and run strikes with Rami and Ophelia got rid of some Death Marshalls, but Lady J was hiding behind the building nearest the Claim and we couldn't get a bead on her. Andrew and Malcolm wisely kept her protected after we announced Assassinate on her, but this worked in our favour as it kept her out of most of the fight.
In Turn 5, we suddenly realised that aSom'er has "Companion: Bayou Gremlin", and how ridiculous this was when combined with Reckless Frenzy. Thus began around 10 or 12 simultaneous activations whereby we swarmed onto the claim marker all guns blazing. Unfortunately Som'er didn't make it close enough to use Swamp Gas, and the Peacekeeper advanced next to the claim marker. All that remained was to see how many Gremlins survived the Peacekeeper/Lady J melee onslaught.

The buildings made accessing the Claim Jump marker rather difficult

In the final tally, the Gremlins had two extra models within 3" of the objective (helped by the large base of the Peacekeeper blocking too many Guild from getting close). Another Gremlin victory!

Our final results for the day were thus 3W/0D/1L and a bye. Unfortunately the first round bye only ended up counting for 0.5 Tournament points, and so we finished on 9.5TPs which put us in 4th place. Narrowly behind Mitch and Simon who also had 9.5TPs but a much higher VP Diff due to a rollicking 10-0 final game win (I heard that Collodi + 8 Marionettes wrecked the enemy Master in the first activation of their game!).

Narrowly missing out on a podium spot (and a pair of custom 3rd place trophies made up of the Hog Whisperer and a Piglet) was a bit disappointing, but it didn't detract from an awesome weekend with a great bunch of people.

I don't think I'll be able to make it to the Team GT in June, but the main GT in November is getting closer and I'm already looking forward to it!

Mike

054 - Malifaux Doubles Grand Tournament

I'm up bright and early this morning and on route to Maelstrom Games for the weekend to take part in the Malifaux Doubles Grand Tournament. Ophelia is going to get another outing, alongside Dom "Dumb Luck" Westerland's Som'er. An objective has been set of setting up a summoning machine and running out of Gremlin models!

As per the Masters tournament earlier this year, there will be some live Twitter action, so if you're on there and want to know what's happening as it happens, then follow the hashtag #mxdoubles.

I'll be back with a full summary after the event.

Mike

051 - UK Masters Tournament Report: Part 3

Sorry to anyone following these posts for the delay in writing this tournament up - given that it's now over a month since this happened, I hope my recollection of the 5th and final game is accurate!

Game 5: Shared Turf War Seamus vs. Lilith Opponent: Neverata Game Type: Tournament

This would be the 4th tournament in which the Swiss pairing system had put me and Jo to face each other in the final round. We'd previously crossed swords at Leeds (her Lilith killed my Seamus), Stockport (my Seamus killed her Viktorias) and Leeds again (my Pandora killed her Lilith). Jo needed this to settle 2011 at two-all.

I wanted another try at using Insignificant spam so chose my Seamus list. With hindsight, I would have done better with Pandora, and this tournament wasn't really the place for experimenting with different tactics. Jo's Lilith crew included two Lelu, one Lilitu, one Young Nephilim and two Desperate Mercs.

Although I'd saved breakthrough for this Strategy, I had very little in the way of other useful Schemes left so chose Steal Relic, hoping that I'd be able to nip in with Seamus and nab it before pulling him out. Jo took Bodyguard and Grudge.

On my left side, Madame Sybelle and the linked Grave Spirit went up against a Lelu, while on my right side I planned to hold up the other Nephilim twins by throwing a dog at them and hoping Bête could work some magic. Seamus and the Belles shored up my center, face to face with Lilith, the Young and the Mercs.

Fearful of the damage potential of the Mercs and the fact that the Young probably was looking to Grow asap, I made them the focus and killed all 3 in the first two turns for no losses. I threw the Canine at the twins on my right, but Bête Noire proved no match for Lelu and Lilitu, who also lured in a Grudged Belle to beat up. A complete lack of high cards in my hand on the turn after Bête appeared meant her fate was sealed.

Sybelle was outclassed by the Lelu she faced, only managing to damage it slightly before falling to poison, and Seamus ended up on his own, face to face with Lilith.

With all my other VPs looking untenable, I wanted to at least get my hands on the Relic, but with a higher Soulstone pool, Lilith was able to hang onto it and eventually beat Seamus into the ground. In the final turn, Lilith chased down and killed my last Belle who had made it into the Neverborn deployment zone for breakthrough. The game ended a complete massacre and an 8-0 victory to Jo.

Looking back, I played this game terribly (not to take anything away from Jo who did all the right things), and it highlighted to me a lot of the things I'm doing wrong in playing this game, in particular, my poor choices when it comes to picking my fights. This match in particular has given me the impetus to stick with Seamus as my main competitive master in 2012 and to really get the most out of him, and the measure of that will be whether he performs well next time I take him to a competitive event. Watch out Lilith, that's two deaths he owes you now!


Following the 5th Round and after lunch (Maelstrom Games provided a very nice toad in the hole), the top four winners had a playoff to decide the overall winner. From what I've heard, the four games played between Adam (magicpockets), Ian (Calmdown), Ant (Stryder) and Craig (ukrocky) were a smackdown of epic proportions. Knowing that watching these games would be a valuable learning opportunity, I had intended to watch them play out and see the top players at work, but I was offered a game of Puppet Wars which I've wanted to have a try of for a while, so I ended up missing the finals. A four-player Puppet fight kicked off, all of us complete noobs to the game, with Dave (Clousseau) talking us through how it all worked.

3 hours later and with our Puppet Wars game only half way through while the finalists had played 2 full games of Malifaux, we called it at the end of the afternoon. I may post my thoughts on the game in a future post, but in summary: lots of fun, but probably not £80 worth of fun.

That was the end of a fantastic weekend (thanks again to Jo for putting it together), and probably the best tournament I've been to so far. I'm not especially hopeful that I'll be in the top 16 this time next year, but the incentive of another weekend like that one definitely gives me something to strive for!

050 - Ophelia Second Thoughts

I had a lot of fun with Ophelia at the Harrogate Icebreaker tournament last weekend. She performed well against Perdita in the first round, helped by me drawing the Red Joker into my hand on three of the six turns. Nino, Santiago and Perdita herself all took a Red Joker to the face.

Unfortunately she came up against serious opposition in rounds 2-4, in the form of Pandora, Hamelin the Plagued and then minion Hamelin (accompanying Nicodem). Probably three of the nastiest things for a Gremlin crew to come up against and they were all queuing up to give Ophelia a kicking.

She gave it her all, but ended up narrowly missing out on a draw vs Hamelin and losing the other two games convincingly.

My first games with a Slop Hauler proved him to be worth his weight in gold in keeping the Dumb Luck shots coming thick and fast (thanks for the recommendation Dom!), and I got some great results out of Rami who one-shotted Nicodem with a very dumb and very lucky shot.

I think I have an effective anti-Hamelin the Plagued tactic (hide from his ratty death-star until it gets closer, then run around it to reach your objectives behind him, popping off a few shots as you run past for a distraction.

I currently have no plans on how Pandora should be dealt with though. Low WP across the board and low WDs mean that it takes much less than "one thousand cuts" to make your gremlins die very fast indeed. The paralyzing power of Coppelius (automatic on WP 4 Ophelia) is also something that doesn't have a great counter.

I'm a little disillusioned with Ophelia as a competitive master due to the ease in which an opponent can put a hard counter in their crew to make the game an uphill struggle for her, but that may be due to the fact that it was common knowledge at the tournament that I'd be using gremlins.

I'm looking forward to using her again at the Doubles GT next month, but I don't think that she'll have a long and illustrious competitive career after that. We shall see.

048 - UK Masters Tournament Report: Part 2

There were two more games in the afternoon, making for a bit of a marathon of a gaming day, and with the calibre of opponent there was no room for relaxation.

Game 3: Shared Reconnoiter Seamus vs. Dreamer Opponent: Calmdown Game Type: Tournament

This was going to be a difficult matchup. I decided to stick with my original plan of using Seamus and attempting to Insignificant-ify his crew when they showed up, but expected Ian to be fielding the Dreamer. If nothing else, I wanted to try and prove to myself that Seamus wouldn't be a pushover for Chompy.

Ian started with a standard Dreamer crew build containing Lelu & Lilitu, 3 Stitched Together and 3 Daydreams. His game plan was obviously to try and remove as many of my models as possible so that I'd have nobody to contest quarters at the end of the game. For my Schemes I chose Frame for Murder (unannounced) on Sybelle, and Exterminate Dolls, intending to take out the Stitched Together. Ian's Schemes were Hold Out and Steal Relic.

Dreamer prepares to launch his Nightmare Friend at Seamus & Co.

Winning the initiative, the Dreamer did his signature slingshot move and Chompy ate one of my Belles before retreating behind a distant building, a place I knew he would continue to hide his master unless I got one of my models behind his lines. I therefore advanced everyone as quickly as possible towards the center of the table, luring forwards the exposed Daydream and taking him out to try and limit Ian's future mobility.

I won the second turn initiative and put Seamus in Defensive Stance, knowing that he would be the next target and he re-raised the Belle from the nearby corpse to keep my model count up. Chompy jumped out again, and this was where I made probably my biggest mistake of the weekend. Seamus had plenty of Soulstones and managed to survive the first Strike, but in the Onslaught that followed and every subsequent attack I forgot to flip extra cards for his defense! These are the worst kind of mistakes, the "what-ifs". Not knowing how the result might have been different, and knowing the potential effect Seamus could have had on the subsequent turns, means you're always kicking yourself that it could have been different. Ian knew the best way to put Seamus down was to go for lots of negative flips and hope for the Red Joker to inevitably come out. Flipping 4 cards on each damage flip meant he quickly hit the card he wanted and Seamus went down. Whoops for Ian here though as in his rush to kill Seamus, he'd forgotten to Steal the Relic!

After my master was dead, Ian felt comfortable dropping his crew to engage my minions, and the game became a protracted fight in the center of the board. I'm struggling to remember the details of exactly who killed who from that point. One Belle almost made it through in an attempt to deny Hold Out, but was killed before she managed to escape. Knowing that it was my only chance to claw back some VPs, Sybelle attacked and wounded Chompy, and was eaten in retaliation, but this only gained me 1VP. Bete Noire appeared from Sybelle's death and managed to kill Lelu with a timely Slit Jugular, but she was unable to get close enough to the Dreamer to pick him off before being Chomped. I think I managed to put down a couple of Stitched Together, but it was around Turn 5 when the last of my models fell to the Neverborn attack and Ian was able to position his survivors to gain 3VPs for the Strategy which along with 2 for Hold Out gave him a 5-1 win.

This was another excellently played game by an expert Dreamer player. Even had Seamus survived that first round of attacks, he would have gone down in Turn 3 or Turn 4 at the very latest, so I'm not confident that the result would have been much different. Defensive Stance isn't something I've used all that much (and I know that's an issue in itself), so when I did need to use it I completely forgot it was still active. Ah well, lesson learned. I still believe Seamus can hold his own against The Dreamer if played a bit better, and with a slightly more optimal crew selection, so I think I'm going to make that a mini-objective for the year.


 

Game 3: Shared Distract Pandora vs Colette Opponent: 13th Warrior Game Type: Tournament

The final game of the day used a strategy that I’m not at all familiar with – in fact I don’t think I’ve ever played Distract until this point. The majority of the games I’ve played have used the Core Strategies chart and not the Expanded, mainly because that’s what people tend to prefer in my local meta. The Expanded Strategies are more varied (and dare I say it, more fun), but also have an element of imbalance in that they can advantage certain crews more than others, in contrast to the Core strategies which are generally fairer. Another thing for my 2012 objectives list: Play every one of the Expanded strategies at least once.

For Distract, I knew I needed a fast Master, and one that could either kill the enemy Master or really slow them down. I toyed with the idea of using Seamus again to drop Insignificant on the enemy master and stop them getting any VPs, but he wasn’t particularly speedy, and I suspected I’d be facing Colette who’d be a) hard to pin down and b) dropping SS like crazy to stop me hitting her. I plumbed for Pandora, since I’d have to use her at least once over the weekend, and using her in Game 4 would mean I’d have complete freedom of choice in Game 5.

Rob’s crew was the cookie-cutter Colette crew, with Cassandra, the Coryphee duet and one Performer/Mannequin pair. For his schemes he selected Power Ritual and Breakthrough. I chose Kidnap (2 Coryphee and the Performer) and Assassinate. Kidnap would be a little easier on me as the Coryphee would obviously combine and disappear from the table, and I’d only have to take care of the Performer. Assassinate would be a little harder but my main aim Colette and making her run off the table would be just as good as killing her for that Scheme.

In Turn 1, Rob interacted with the two corners in his half of the board, and ran Cassandra alarmingly fast up my left flank to try and capture another corner. The Coryphee joined into a Duet and positioned themselves ready to rush me on Turn 2. I flew the Doppelganger, and the Madness into the ruined tower in the center, and the rest of my crew shuffled forwards slightly.

Turn 2 was where it all kicked off, with Lilitu casting Lure on Cassandra to pull her away from my left corner. Rob decided that his lieutenant was too exposed on her own, and after some fire-breathing and some swapping about she was repositioned safely in his deployment zone. I foolishly moved the Doppelganger out of cover (I can’t even remember what combo I was trying to line up here – it was late in the day and I don’t think I was thinking straight), and Colette pounced on the opportunity, casting Disappearing Act with her trigger and turning my most expensive minion into a Mannequin.

The only positive from this was that it gave Pandora a nearby target for Incite which gained her some extra movement and allowed her to engage the whole of Rob’s crew. A liberal usage of Soulstones on some casting flips, and a high Crow that I’d been saving for the occasion meant that after Pandora’s onslaught, the Performer and Colette herself found themselves on Rob’s board edge and needing to rally. The Duet shot around my right flank, captured the 3rd table corner and hit a few things along the way, but I wasn’t too worried about it.

I was pretty confident at this point that I had Colette trapped and potentially even run off the board. You might even say I was over confident. Colette rallied and recovered in the next couple of turns, and I realised that fate had deserted me when I drew a hand of cards with nothing above a 5. Colette’s retaliation was brutal and effective. Magician’s Duel, Magician’s Duel, Magician’s Duel. Pandora bit the dust and the Showgirls started to close on my deployment zone. With time running out on the round, Rob picked up his tape measure to move Colette her Wk which would bring her into my DZ and score him points for both Distract and Breakthrough. With the tape measure poised, Jo the Tournament Organiser rushed past shouting “Time’s Up! Tape Measure’s Down!” Unlucky for Rob, this denied him 4 VPs, but Cassandra still got to take her free activation at the end of the game and interact with the final board quarter for Power Ritual to give him the game at 4-2.

Sorry it's taking me so long to finish this series of posts - my very helpful place of work has recently decided to ban blogging from work at lunch time, which has meant I'm struggling to fit time in to write these up. Recap of the final game and the results coming soon though.

047 - UK Masters Tournament Report: Terrain Pics

There's been some discussion on the Wyrd forums and elsewhere recently about how much terrain to use on a Malifaux board. I took snaps of the 8 tables used at the Masters last weekend and thought I'd share. To me these are a bit of a mixed bag - some definitely had too little terrain, and one in particular had perhaps a little too much, but as a general guide they're probably not too far off.  Most of the terrain is from Maelstrom Games' collection, with the addition of the Sarissa Precision wild west buildings that had been kindly brought along by Dave 'Clousseau' Brown.

Once again forgive the photo quality. I'm yet to work out how to take a satisfactory picture on my iPhone - tips welcome!

046 - UK Masters Tournament Report: Part 1

As I posted about at the end of last year, I was fortunate enough to be invited to play in the first ever Malifaux Masters event for 2011, where the top players in the UK Rankings would gather for a weekend of Malifaux madness. Now I've had a bit of time to recover from an epic weekend, I'm going to write up a short series of posts with my recollections of the games and some of the highlights of the weekend for me.

Since the strict time limits meant there wasn't time to make any notes during play, I'll be giving a summary of the game (which will be heavily weighted towards my perspective on things) rather than a complete blow by blow. I think I'll be using this Battle Report format going forwards to, as it's a bit less resource intensive during play. Please forgive the shocking quality of my iPhone photos, which were hastily snapped during the game with no thought to how they might turn out.

All 16 players had had to submit 3 fixed lists that they had to use at least once each over the weekend (over 5 games). I decided to bring three different masters for a bit of variety.

List 1:
Seamus, Grave Spirit, Madame Sybelle, 3 Rotten Belles, Bete Noire, Canine Remains, 7ss

A relatively standard Seamus list. The plan was for Seamus and Bete to spam Insignificant at enemy minions in the games that required significant models.

List 2:
Pandora, 2 Sorrows, Doppelganger, Insidious Madness, Lelu+Lilitu, 8ss

Another standard Pandora list, although I hadn't had chance to try out the Doppelganger in many games yet. Pandora was another mobile master that I hoped to use in Shared Distract.

List 3:
Dreamer/Chompy, 2 Daydreams, 2 Stitched Together, Lelu+Lilitu, Insidious Madness, 8ss

I'd rushed to get Chompy and the Daydreams painted in the week before the tournament, because both my other two masters lacked punch for Slaughter, or a reliable way to reach the neutral evidence marker in Destroy Evidence. I'd had 3 practise games with him, but in hindsight not enough to be comfortable enough with him to compete in a Masters tournament. The Madness was mainly in there to sacrifice for a reflip on inititive in Turn 1 of Destroy the Evidence if it was required.

All games were shared strategies that were announced well in advance, and the first draw had been done ahead of the day, so I knew I'd be facing James Doxey in the first game, and I was fully expecting a Chompy mirror match.

Game 1: Shared Slaughter Dreamer vs. Dreamer Opponent: MythicFox Game Type: Tournament

James' Slaughter list included 3 Stitched Together, Teddy, Insidious Madness and 3 Daydreams. He announced Bodyguard and Exterminate Woes, while I chose Kill Protege on Teddy and Eye for an Eye.

I won initiative but played cautiously, deciding not to dive in for an attack straight away. This proved to be both a blessing and a curse, as in James' activation he slingshotted Chompy forward and killed a Daydream (exactly as I would have done), but later confessed that this was a massive mistake and that he was very lucky I didn't capitalise on it at the time. I should have brought out my own Chompy who would have been able to activate before James' companioned Daydream could pull his master out of trouble, and do some serious damage and perhaps even win the game right there and then. Unfortunately I missed the trick and Chompy retreated back to James' deployment zone.

Difficult to see my tiny Chompy behind the bulk of Nightmare Chompy

I advanced my own Dreamer and killed a Stitched Together, but some time around Turn 3 I mismanaged my masters' bury mechanic and LCB was stranded with no support. James' bigger, meaner Nightmare LCB jumped at the chance to chew up his tiny diminutive cousin, and that was just the start of my troubles.


James wisely kept Teddy buried in reserve so he was safe and not giving me easy VPs, and the bear made his first appearance in Turn 5 when most of my models had been eliminated and there was nothing to threaten him. I wasn't as careful with my minions, as both Lelu and Lilitu had died by this point. In the final turn, LCB chased down my Insidious Madness (I underestimated how far he could reach without Daydreams) to secure a 7-3 win. I only had 1VP from the Slaughter for reducing his crew below 50%, and 2 points for Eye for an Eye as there wasn't much left on the table by this point.

Apart from that first mistake, James played flawlessly, using only his Stitched Together and Chompy hit and runs to wear me down before bringing his other models onto the table. It was a fun game and an education in how to get the most out of The Dreamer. It seems that The Dreamer plays quite different to his normal tactics when facing a mirror match and, as James commented, a big advantage is usually gained by the person who commits second.

Part of my plan was to use Dreamers Daydream to summon a replacement Daydream to the table mid-game if required. I had pulled this off in Turn 2, but I hadn't realised the cost of doing so (a high suited card) and in hindsight I think I'd have done better including the Daydream in the starting list and taking a slightly smaller SS pool.

Game 2: Shared Destroy Evidence Dreamer vs. Hamelin Opponent: Serigala Game Type: Tournament

The second game was more or less a straight refight of a practice game I'd had a couple of weeks before in LCB School where I'd been learning how to use him - same opponent, same strategy, similar crews. For schemes I chose Stake a Claim (feeling that I'd easily be able to drop a model on the table next to one of the large buildings, and the safe option of Bodyguard. Ian selected Hold Out and Hamelin's personal scheme, both of which surprised me since it meant he'd need to kill four of my (limited number of) models within 6" of Hamelin, and stop me finishing in his deployment zone, despite my obvious speed advantage.

Winning initiative I slingshotted Chompy to the center evidence, but had to use two companioned Daydreams to pull him back to my side of the board as he was unable to use the All Done trigger to allow instant teleportation. Unfortunately, and in my second massive mistake of the weekend, this allowed Hamelin to get a bead on The Dreamer by moving forwards twice and positioning so that only the Dreamer was within range for a Pipes attack using his Fast action. Ian cheated and Soulstoned high, and I did the same to resist but came up short (little boys are only Defense 2 apparently!), so you can imagine my relief when he flipped the Black Joker for damage!

Ian took initiative on the second turn and tried the same spell again, but unfortunately his flips weren't up to the task and the Dreamer managed to escape, flying up field to a) drop some Nightmares in the centre of the board to slow Hamelin down, and b) position Chompy on the evidence in Ian's deployment zone. With Chompy stuck on the table, Nix moved into position to bring my master into his Emptiness aura, but Ian had nothing else nearby to capitalise on the negative flips debuff.

Lelu & Lilitu look down on Hamelin from above

The bulk of Hamelin's forces were approaching the center of the board, so I deposited a Stitched Together on each of Ian's target Evidence markers to make a bit of work for him before they could be destroyed. Lelu and Lilitu engaged Hamelin in the middle building and Lelu duly took a stick to the face and died - I'd put them in there more as a distraction for Hamelin as Chompy ran along the back of the table, destroying some evidence for 2VP and finishing in base contact with my Stake a Claim objective. We'd only reached Turn 3, and the risk of Hamelin running back and making LCB insignificant was the only thing worrying me, so a well timed Lilitu's Lure meant he was too far away to deprive me of those points.

Time was called around that point, which was a shame for Ian as he'd not really had chance to get started. The rat swarms were still in play and in a position to give me a steamrollering in the next couple of turns, and Hamelin had cleared up the Nephilim pests in the center and was free to make a mess of the rest of my crew. I'd been unable to shift the swarms from my two objectives in the center and so I hadn't even tried, leaving the final result as 7-0 to me.

The lunch call went up at this point, and a buffet spread was kindly provided by Maelstrom Games free of charge. Loaded up with egg mayonnaise sandwiches and sausage rolls, it was onto Round 3....

041 - Malifaux Masters Invitational

Last week I was pleased to recieve an invite for the UK Malifaux Masters Invitational tournament to take place early next year.

The invited players are all in the top 16 of the UK Malifaux rankings, but I'd thought I was out of the running, since following the upload of the 2011 Grand Tournament results (which I couldn't attend), I'd dropped to around 20th position. As it happens, the 2010 Grand Tournament hadn't yet dropped from the calculation (only results from the last 12 months count towards your score), so when that happened, a few people who had good results at the 2010 GT but hadn't played much in 2011 fell a few places down and I found myself at position 14 and holding a golden ticket!

The event is going to be a 2 day tournament, with five qualifying games on Saturday 14th January, and then the top 4 from the day fighting it out on Sunday to be crowned top dog. It's going to be a really fun event, and I'm looking forward to crossing fate decks with the top players around, most of which I've played before, and most of which have given me a proper kicking, if I'm honest! Note: Some players in the top 16 have opted not to attend, and so the next in line player from Rankings HQ has been offered their spot.

1 Craig Johnson - Craig's Marcus beat my Seamus in the first game of the GT Warm-Up Tournament I've already posted about. It was a tense, close game, and I'd love another stab at his Arcanists.

2 Ant Hoult - Ant recently won the 2011 GT, and his Kirai crew took me to pieces at the Streets of Malifaux Tournament I posted about in June. I still rank that game as the most comprehensive drubbing I've ever experienced, and so I'll be reading up on anti-Kirai tactics in the hope of settling the score a little.

3 James Doxey - I've played James numerous times at the local club, and we've met twice in competition play, currently standing at 1 win each. It'll be fun if the opportunity comes up to settle a decider for the year.

4 Adam MagicPockets - Had an incredible game with Pandora against Adam's Hamelin at a tournament in September, which we both rate as one of our personal most enjoyable games ever. It'll be good to re-fight the encounter and see what happens.

5 Ian O'Brien - I haven't had the chance to play Ian as yet, but he has a reputation for being particularly deadly with his Dreamer crew. I definitely think he could be one to watch for this tournament.

6 Aidan Kirk - Another experienced Neverborn player that I've so far managed to dodge at tournaments. I believe he favours Pandora, so it'll be interesting to see if I end up with my first ever Pandora mirror-match!

8 Ashley Pinder - I think Ashley usually plays a Colette crew, which I don't have much experience of playing against. I may have to get another practise game in against Collette in case we end up facing off.

9 Mitch Harrison - I posted about my game against Mitch back in May, which just happened to be the first tournament game of my life ever. It was a fun game against Perdita, but I think Mitch has switched his crew of choice to a deadly Lady J/Lucius combo that I've not run into before.

12 Justin Plimmer – I played Justin’s Chompy crew at Toy Soldier earlier this year. I received a bit of a beating, as Chompy landed on top of Seamus in Turn 2 and ripped him to shreds. I almost pulled it back and managed to kill the Dreamer by luring nightmares away from him, and then finishing off Chompy with Bete Noire, but his Alps had already capped his objectives. With the Alp nerf, maybe I’ll do better second time around…

13 David Brown – I’ve met David at a number of tournaments but we’ve never met each other across the table, something I’m looking forward to correcting.

14 Me

15 Steve Scurr – Steve gave me a lesson in Leveticus a few months ago, and I learned how deadly he can be. Levi is master I’m definitely very wary of, as I don’t really have anything that can effectively wipe him and his Waifs from the board in a single turn.

16 Tim Brown – Tim’s Chompy gobbled up Baby Kade in the game we played in Birmingham in June. Thanks to Tim, I now know not to bring Kade when the enemy master gets bonuses against Harmless models! My memories are of a very tense and closely fought game that ended in a draw on VPs. A decider is needed.

17 Ian Brocklebank – Ian is a local player that I’ve played a couple of times, including at the first Leeds tournament, but I’m yet to get the better of his Viktorias. Another grudge match here!

18 Rob Owens – Rob gave me an intro to Colette once, which was a lot of fun, but we’ve not played each other competitively before. He has a large number of crews so could be unpredictable, and it’ll be good to play against him with the gloves off.

19 Jimmy Balderstone – Jimmy is another Arcanist player and fan of Kaeris, so it’s likely she’ll make an appearance in his lists, which will probably feature Showgirls and Constructs.

As you can see, quite a formidible list of players, and each and every one of them is capable of giving me a complete pasting! I'll be back in January with a full report!

Mike

035 - GT Warm-Up Tournament Report

Last week I attended a tournament in Stockport organised by Craig (aka UKRocky), intended as practice for next week's UK Grand Tournament (EDIT: By the time this is published the GT will have been and gone). Although I'm not attending the GT, I'd been itching for some Malifaux action after not managing to get a game for the last month or so, and so I decided to go along for the day. There were 14 players there, including many of the UK tournament regulars, but a few new faces also.

The format was designed to emulate the GT, and there were 3 games, each of which had exactly the same conditions as one of the GT games due next week, allowing people to refine tactics and lists. Over the course of the day I played:

25ss Shared Treasure Hunt
35ss Shared Slaughter
45ss Shared Destroy the Evidence
Schemes were unique for the day.

I didn't remember to take any pictures, so I'll keep the battle reports short and sweet.

Game 1:
25ss Shared Treasure Hunt vs. Craig (UKRocky)

Me
Seamus
Sybelle
2 Belles
Punk Zombie
Grave Spirit
7ss cache
Hold Out, Frame for Murder (unannounced)

I decided to roll with my pretty standard Seamus crew, apart from adding in Sybelle with the intention of using her to get to the treasure counter first. I wanted a high cache, as in smaller games like this one the Master becomes even more important and I wanted Seamus to be the lynchpin of the crew, with enough SS to throw some into attacking and not just saving them for defense.

Craig
Marcus
Kaeris
2 Silurids
Student of Conflict
Jackalope
Eye for an Eye, Steal Relic

Highlights
I won Turn 1 initiative and, with a high mask in my hand, used Sybelle to catapult a companioned Belle close to the treasure counter. After a quick rulebook check we quickly both learned that the treasure counter can in fact be picked up in melee (something neither of us had realised), and Craig moved one of his Silurids in to contest the objective.
Marcus charged the Grave Spirit that had linked onto the Punk Zombie, but flipped Black Joker on the damage and had to retreat again causing no damage. Seamus moved to reinforce the developing combat in the center of the board, but was wary of Kaeris so didn't get too close. A .50 calibre gunshot wound to the face took down the other approaching Silurid, despite its camouflage. The first Belle on the scene picked up the treasure, but couldn't escape the melee, and was eventually killed by a Silurid bite and dropped the treasure back where she'd found it.
Marcus took another charge at the Grave Spirit and to Craig's exasperation again flipped Black Joker on damage. Determined to finish off his new nemesis, Marcus took a second Strike action which killed the spirit, but this left him dangerously close to the Punk Zombie.
Winning initiative again, the Punk Zombie obligingly used Flurry on Marcus, bringing him to the edge of death. Marcus killed the Punk, and Kaeris did some serious serious damage to Seamus (bringing him temporarily to just 1 wound!) before casting a Flame Wall to give her Master some cover. Seamus slit the jugular of the other Silurid and healed himself from the brink of death.
Undeterred by the wall of fire, Sybelle charged through, taking 3 damage in the process. Marcus was surprised to see a flaming zombie appear out of nowhere, and Sybelle stripped him of his last wound with an Iron Fan slice.
Kaeris picked up the treasure and stole the relic from Seamus, who hit her back with his Bag O'Tools, making her Insignificant and unable to gain VPs for the treasure. Craig's cunning plan was therefore to use the Student of Conflict to remove her Insignificant in the final turn "until her next activation", meaning she would be Significant at the end of the game and able to score points for the strategy. In another amazingly back luck clip he turned over another Black Joker and she was deprived of the 2VPs for carrying the treasure.

Final score 4-3 to Marcus - We'd both achieved our schemes but nobody got any points for the strategy.

I remembered after the draw for the second round had taken place, that Kaeris should have done a WP duel at the end of the game or count as dead, and that this would have affected Steal Relic and maybe given me a draw, but it was too late by that point. It's a shame to finish on a "what if" like this, as I'll forever wonder if I would be the first person to break Craig's 29-games-long winning streak with Marcus. It's worth mentioning that Craig is placed number 1 in the UK Malifaux Rankings, so I was very happy with the outcome of this game, and was extremely pleased when he remarked that this game was the best he had seen Seamus played.

Game 2:
35ss Shared Slaughter vs. Jo (Neverata)

Me
Seamus
Sybelle
2 Belles
Punk Zombie
Grave Spirit
Bete Noire
8ss cache
Kill Protégé (Ronin), Assassinate

I opted to use the same crew as the previous game, adding Bete Noire for her killing power and resilience - in my experience in a Slaughter she can kill 10+ SS of enemies without too much trouble, and very rarely gives up her own high SS cost to your opponent. An extra SS for Seamus meant he had the full cache and could be my other main damage dealer. My schemes were aimed to synergize with the Strategy, as I'd be gunning for the Masters anyway for the additional point (and to stop them slicing my own models into small chunks of dead meat)

Jo
Viktorias
6 Ronin
5ss cache
Hold Out, Eye for an Eye

Highlights
4 of the Ronin advanced up my right flank, with the Viktorias and the other two Ronin (including my Kill Protégé target) moved forwards on my left. My plan was to keep my entire crew to the left, moving around the large obscuring building in the middle, and try to take on Jo's crew in two halves. Unfortunately my guys got bogged down in melee in the center, allowing the 4 additional Ronin to catch up to me on Turn 3 and meaning I had attackers on both sides.
A Belle lured one of the Ronin accompanying the Viks, attempting to split that group up too and prevent a massed charge, but even with the help of the Punk Zombie she was unable to kill the target due to Hard to Kill. One of the Viktorias became engaged in combat with Seamus, Sybelle and a Belle, and wounded them all, but she took heavy damage in return. She suffered a barrage of attacks from most of my crew in Turn 2, but she weathered the storm of blows by burning through her entire cache. She managed to hang onto her last wound before swapping places with her sister further back. I also faced a particular dilemma twice in a single turn - what do you do if you want to Flurry (requiring that you discard a card to make 3 strikes) but all three of the cards in your hand are 11+? I opted to just Strike twice, and I'm still not sure whether that was the right decision.
Jo sneakily committed Sepakku with the Ronin that was my Kill target, gaining herself another two soulstones and depriving me of two VPs.
The center melee was joined by four fresh Ronin, but Bete Noire appeared from the body of one and slit the jugular of another two in an impressive knife display, while the last Ronin failed her Terror test and ran away crying after trying to charge Seamus.
The fresh Viktoria managed to finish the job on Seamus, but was killed by my crew's counter attack. With only one Vik left (and on 1 wound), Jo opted to retreat, but my remaining models were unable to catch up to her. I made sure one of my Belle's sprinted forwards for the final two turns to end the game in the enemy deployment zone and deny Hold Out.

Final score 2-1 to Seamus - Neither of us had achieved any Schemes, but I managed to claw a few VPs in the very complicated Slaughter conditions, while Jo gained a point for killing Seamus.

For Jo and me, this was our 3rd competitive matchup to date. It seems that whenever we're both at a tournament we're guaranteed to get drawn against each other, but I'm not complaining as she's always fun to play. It was a nice surprise too to see her using a different master as I was expecting to be facing Lilith again. This game regains Seamus' honor (slightly anyway...) after she beat him with Lilith in the first Leeds tournament back in May, and I'm sure she'll be looking forward to get a game against my Pandora at our next clash to try and equalise that score too. Actually... maybe not. Nobody looks forward to playing against Pandora.

Game 3:
45ss Shared Destroy the Evidence vs. James (MythicFox)

Me
Seamus
3 Belles
Punk Zombie
Onryo
Crooked Man
Shikome
Grave Spirit
3 Canine Remains
6ss cache
Army of the Dead, Bodyguard

This was the first time I'd ever played a game above 35ss, and I was at a bit of a loss about what to take. I swapped out Sybelle and Bete for a Crooked Man (intended for objective denial), a Shikome (intended to objective capture) and an Onryo (an additional damage causing body). I brought the 3 Canines intending to use them to gather up Corpse Counters and send them to Seamus for the Army of the Dead scheme.

James
Zoraida
Collodi
4 Marionnettes
1 Wicked Doll
Bad Juju
Mature Nephilim
Insidious Madness
5ss cache
Kidnap (Canines), Kill Protégé (Shikome)

Highlights

I’ve found in the past that Shared Destroy Evidence can often come down to whichever player wins the first activation flip, as so many crews out there have enough movement tricks to get to the center Evidence on the first activation and begin the game with a 1-0 unrecoverable advantage. I knew Collodi was capable of some movement tricks but MAN is he fast! Winning initiative with a 13, James activated Collodi and his Marionettes, who proceeded to run up the board at incredible speed and destroy two Evidence markers (both requiring a (2) Interact action and being 8” apart and 12” from his deployment zone!) within the first activation of the game. They were part of the way towards destroying a third when their momentum ran out.

At a bit of a loss of where to go from there, and with Collodi rather close to my deployment zone, most of my crew moved up table slowly, being wary of Bad Juju who had popped up on my right flank. The Shikome declared the Insidious Madness as prey and began to stalk it, but it stayed put and the winged demon was denied any extra movement. Zoraida, with a vantage point on top of a pillar, cast Obey on the Mature Nephilim, and her summoned Voodoo Doll did the same thing, which meant it was close enough for a diving tackle into my lines. The Mature Nephilim made short work of the Shikome before getting mobbed by several of my crew in an attempt to stop it destroying move evidence markers. It wore them down though, including the last Canine Remains that had dived in the combat to try and pick up Corpse Counters to send to Seamus.

The Punk Zombie charged Bad Juju and with a fortunate Red Joker managed to put it down, in the uneasy knowledge that it would be back next turn. It did so, and parked itself on one of my evidence objectives. Zoraida watched over another evidence marker, casting Obey to make any of my models that tried to get close to it, to turn around and walk away.

In my deployment zone, Collodi made a dash for the last piece of evidence and destroyed it. I’d already marked him for death after his first turn escapades, but this took the biscuit and so, in the knowledge that I wasn’t going to come close to achieving my strategy in the few turns remaining, I decided that he needed to be taught a lesson. The Punk Zombie used Slice and Dice with another Red Joker to cut down all of his nearby Marionettes, and then Seamus finished off Collodi once he was unable to bump hits onto his puppets.

Final score 8-3 to Zoraida - The board was littered with corpse counters, mostly from my own crew, so I picked up 3 VP for my schemes but nothing for the Strategy, whereas James had completed all his objectives.

James is a pretty regular opponent of mine, being from the same locale, but this was only our second competitive matchup, putting us at 1-1. I’m not sure about whether I liked the larger scale of the game or not, It might just be that I’ve grown comfortable with 35SS, so I’m willing to play a few more larger Scraps and see how I get on, but it felt at times like the game got a little bogged down with the larger number of models on the table. James played exceptionally well and gave me no real mistakes to capitalize on (except maybe forgetting about the Punk’s AOE damage – but Collodi had served his purpose by that point), whereas I made a number of blunders. The Shikome should have had the Mature Nephilim as its prey instead of the Madness; Sybelle should have been in the crew to attempt the Turn 1 Belle Catapult tactic etc.

All in all a very enjoyable tournament! Thanks to all my opponents and to Craig for organising the day.

Mike

019 - Streets of Malifaux Tournament Report

I realise this post is a little late, but on the 4th June I took part in the Streets of Malifaux tournament, hosted at the UK Games Expo in Birmingham and organised by David aka Clousseau. Prize support was given by Simple Miniature Games and KR Multicases.

The tournament was four 35ss games, with crews chosen from a 55ss pool. Masters weren't fixed, but I'd decided to go with a fully Pandora list, and I don't think anybody changed masters between games on the day.

I took:

Pandora, Candy, Kade, Teddy, Lelu, Lilitu, Insidious Madness, Stitched Together, 3 Sorrows

Lelu and Lilitu had been kindly loaned to me by Ade (who was on holiday and wouldn't be needing them), since I'd been having difficulties ordering them from 4 different stockists. They seemed to be out of stock countrywide!

Game 1 - Doctor McMourning (James/Mythicfox)
James' crew was McMourning, Sebastian, 2 Canine Remains, Jack Daw, Zombie Chihuahua, Bette Noir and a Belle. The strategy was shared Claim Jump.

The game was divided into two halves. On one side of the table, McMourning faced off against Pandora, Teddy and the Stitched. I lured one of his dogs out of position early on to attempt to deny him the body parts he'd inevitably get from dissecting it himself. Regrettably, Bette Noir popped out from this death and managed a Slit Jugular trigger against Teddy - and I'd already spent my hand - turning the big bear into a pile of stuffing. Pandora managed to trigger Mental Anguish on Jack Daw, which put him out of my hair for a couple of turns, and for a while the Claim Jump looked secure.

At the far table, James considers his next move

On the other side of the table, my Nephilim twins and the Madness attempted to stop the Belle and Sebastian (isn't that a band?!) from making it to James' Stake a Claim marker. They did relatively well, although struggled a little when Bette Noir showed up and started getting killy. It was brutal though, and in the end there were no survivors on that side of the board!

In the final turn of the game, Jack Daw had positioned himself on the Claim Jump. I had no control hand left, but cast against him anyway. James uttered the immortal words "he's safe unless you flip a 13crows", and inevitably that was exactly the card that I turned over! With Jack fleeing and Pandora stood alone on the Claim Jump, McMourning ran close and in the final action of the game attempted to summon a Monstrous Creation. This would leave me outnumbered on the objective and give him a 6-4 win. Unfortunately for James though, he hadn't learned from his previous mistake and he uttered the words "anything but a Black Joker". The final result was 4-0 to Pandora! Thanks to James for a very well played and tactical game.

Game 2 - Dreamer & Lord Chompy Bits (Tim/Oshova)

Tim was using the beautiful Nightmare edition Lord Chompy Bits, who I'd never seen in the flesh before. This model was also the prize for first place in the tournament, so I was anxious to continue my winning streak! Tim's crew was Dreamer, Chompy, Lelu, Lilitu Insidious Madness, 3 Alps and 3 Daydreams. The strategy was shared Reconnoiter.

In Turn 2, the Alp-Bomb landed (James later suggested that "bomb" should be adopted as the collective noun for Alps - like a "pride of lions", or a "school of fish", we now have "a bomb of Alps"). I think I coped relatively well with my first A-bomb. Pandora managed to scare one of the critters away, and my Lelu and Lilitu managed to kill off a couple more (Lure helped a lot!), including scoring two points for my Grudge scheme.

Lord Chompy Bits chewed Baby Kade up and spat out the bones - I hadn't realised that he eats Harmless models for breakfast, and then he proceeded to tear my Lelu limb from limb. In retaliation I killed off Tim's Lilitu, who had been slowly advancing and Reclaiming Malifaux along the way.

In the final turn, my Insidious Madness, heavily wounded, retreated to a corner of the board to claim that quarter. Tim's Lelu beat a retreat back to his deployment zone, and despite the best efforts of Lilitu and Pandora to bring him down, he just survived the turn, depriving me of my Exterminate Woes scheme and contesting a table quarter. The final score was a 4-4 draw.

Game 3 - Kirai (Ant/Stryker)

Ant told me after this game that he'd played Pandora numerous times before, and that he'd never lost against her. This was pretty obvious, as he had perfect anti-Pandora tactics that he executed perfectly.

Ant's crew was Kirai, Lost Love, Jack Daw, 2 Insidious Madness, Gaki, 4 Seishin, and our strategy was Shared Slaughter.

Turn 1 was the worst (for me) Turn 1 of a game that I've ever played. Thinking I'd be able to get some early points towards Slaughter, I chain-Lured the Gaki towards my crew, but was unable to finish him off. Ant used Swirl Spirits to swap the wounded Gaki for an aura-primed Insidious Madness, and then to summon a Shikome on top of my Nephilim twins. With paired claws targetting Lelu's WP (which was at a negative flip from the Madness), and the bonuses from Lelu being its prey, the Shikome killed Lelu in 2 attacks (claiming 2VPs for Grudge) and then used its remaining action from Fast to kill Lilitu by cheating the Red Joker in for damage. Half my crew dead by one model in a single activation... not a great start! (I have a feeling however that the Fast ability should drop off the Shikome after she kills her prey - and I'm still waiting for a Wyrd rules marshall to clear that up).

It was all downhill from there. Denial of Sanzu on my Madness meant it could do nothing towards either of my schemes. Both the Madness and Candy eventually fell to a second summoned Shikome - which flipped Red Joker on the damage flips for both of them!

I did manage to Paralyze Jack Daw, but he spirit swirled out of range and when he came back 2 turns later it was to stand next to Pandora and activate his deadly aura. Surrounded on all sides by terrifying creatures and unable to cheat her duels to stay there, she fled only to be cut down as she ran.

Ant took the game 8-1, giving me an education in how deadly a Kirai crew can be when played to the fullest of her abilities, and giving Pandora her own personal nemesis!

Game 4 - Kirai (Andie/??)

Another game against Kirai?! You can imagine that as I sat down to face Andie I was dreading another game against this master, but I decided to take the opportunity to get some revenge on her.

Andie's crew was Kirai, Lost Love, Datsu Ba, Shikome, 2 Onryo and 4 Seishin. Our strategy was Shared Treasure Hunt.

I attempted to get my claws on the treasure straight away by Companioning Lelu and Lilitu, and using Lure to get Lelu stood next to the treasure in Turn 1. Andie had the same idea though, and had a faster crew. He summoned Ikiryo next to the treasure, then used Swirl Spirits to swap it with the un-activated Shikome who picked it up and Nimbly started walking back to its deployment zone.

This time I played very cautiously with Candy, keeping her well back as she was the target of Andie's Kill Protogee scheme as well as being the Shikome's prey.

In Turn 2, Lilitu lured the Shikome off the treasure, and then Lelu and Pandora beat it to the ground. A second (summoned) Shikome also made a beeline for Candy, and I was forced to cheat in a 13 and the Red Joker on two defense flips to keep her alive before Pandora came to the rescue again. Kirai later summoned a third(!!) Shikome who was finally able to take down Candy. Did I mention I really really hate Shikomes?

On the other side of the table, the I managed an Emotionally Exposed/Gamble your Life combo against Datsu Ba, but she charged and killed the Stitched. My stupid mistake of the day was then to use the Stitched's reactivation to walk twice... I'd completely forgotten that he'd already died!

I managed to score a couple of points for Steal Relic, when my Insidious Madness went up against Kirai. Luckily Andie had only brought a couple of soulstones to the match, and so when those were exhausted the Madness jumped in for a quick steal and then made a run for it.

In the closing turn of the game, with the treasure still lying where the Shikome had dropped it, Pandora used a Pacify chain to cross half the table and pick up the treasure. With nothing able to kill her or force her to drop it, Kirai was forced to concede 2VP and the final result was 6-4, as we had both also completed all of our schemes.

The Results

After the VP totals had been counted, I was surprised to find that I'd placed 5th out of 13 players, which I was incredibly happy with. I'm not sure if I'd have fared so well if I'd have taken a less competetive crew - I think I'd better give 50% of the credit for my placing to having used Pandora (usually regarded as being towards the overpowered end of the power-spectrum) and I'll challenge myself to achieve a similar placing in the next tournament with a less imbalanced choice of Master.

The winner was Adam (Magicpockets) who deservedly cleaned up with his Hamelin crew. As you can see, he'd already begun celebrating by the second game!

Last of all, I'd like to say thanks to David for putting in the effort and organising the day, and supplying some lovely terrain to play on, and to the sponsors for putting up the highly sought after prizes. Also thanks to all the players who made for a great atmosphere and a very enjoyable day.

Mike

015 - Leeds Wargaming Centre Tournament

Oh dear is it really a month since I last updated? Shame on me! Luckily I haven't been wasting all that time, I've spent it preparing for last week's Malifaux Tournament!

Held at the Leeds Wargaming Centre on the 7th May, the event was organised by the local henchman James (also goes by the name Mythicfox) and it was a lot of fun. All photos in this post were taken by my girlfriend/official photographer Charlotte (http://justcharlotte88.blogspot.com)

Ade considers his next move

The format was three 35ss games with a fixed master but flexible crew selection with games using the Core Strategy table. Schemes were restricted to one use only on the day.

My crew
I'd spent the last few weeks painting a variety of models to go with Seamus to give me a bit more flexibility, but come the day of the tournament I opted to stick with the same list in all 3 games.

Seamus
Grave Spirit
Madame Sybelle
3 Rotten Belles
Punk Zombie
Hanged
5ss cache

I benched Bête Noire and the Copycat Killer (who had both been underperforming in my practice games) and swapped in the the Grave Spirit and a Hanged Man that I painted from start to finish the evening before the event.

The undead assembled for their group portrait

The Games
Round 1

24 players attended, and the first round was a random matchup. My first opponent was to be Mitch (aka Stern) who'd brought his lovely lovely Perdita crew. This crew was the well deserved winner of the Best Painted prize.

Perdita (riding a dinosaur - someone made the very true observation that "EVERYTHING becomes cooler if it's on a dinosaur")
Drill Sergeant
Niño
2 Guild Guard
Austringer
Misaki

I flipped Reconnoitre, and opted to Grudge one of the Guard and Hold Out, while Mitch had Treasure Hunt and Bodyguard and also opted to Hold Out.

Setting Up on one of Kaine's scrumptious boards

The Grave Spirit linked onto the Hanged to give him armour, and together they soaked up a lot of the Guild's shooting, taking just one Wd per shot after reductions. I took advantage of my Belle's speed to run her into the centre to guard the treasure before Mitch's forces arrived.

They advanced slowly, using the Guard's Cordon ability to try and prevent me reaching their deployment zone. A couple of Lures though was all it took to pull my Grudge target forwards for an early 2 VPs. The Austringer hiding in nearby ruins took the occasional pot shot at me from behind cover, the cowardly little bird-lover.

Misaki took out the Belle in the centre with some impressive damage but was taken out herself by the Slow to Die retaliation! The Drill Sergeant tried to make off with the treasure but didn't get far as I had 3 models bearing down on him, and before long the treasure was safe in the hands of my Belles.

On the other side of the table, Seamus entered the woods with Sybelle and the Punk Zombie for support, while Perdita and the other Guardsman entered from the other side. The trees afforded my guys some good cover from Niño, who found himself with a lack of targets until he got Lured over and smacked about the head by another Belle.

Nino thinks he's got the drop on Green Belle, but finds her too irresistible to kill

Perdita and Seamus traded blows and severely weakened each other but neither could manage a killing blow. The Punk stepped up to the plate and managed to get a Flurry against Perdita, but forgot to use his Paired swords for two of the strikes! Luckily she was weakened enough by this point that his 3rd and final strike finished her off.

At this point Mitch only had the Austringer, whereas I had all my models surviving (albeit heavily wounded). I spread out to complete my Reconnoitre, claiming 3 of the table quarters. In the closing turn of the game, the Austringer got a sneaky shot or two at Seamus and the pesky blue-tit (or sparrow or whatever it was!) managed to land enough damage to kill my master!

I wasn't too upset though, as I'd managed a 6-0 victory in the first round.

Round 2
After a lunch break and after the crews had been displayed for the Best Painted award, my second game was to be against Ian, one of the Night Owls regulars that I hadn't yet had chance to play.

Viktorias
3 Ronin
Friekorps Librarian
Friekorps Trapper

This was another master that I'd never faced before and I think that, with hindsight, I was buoyed up by my first round win and I severely underestimated them.

My strategy was Destroy the Evidence, with Steal Relic and Army of the Dead as Schemes. We asked for a ruling from the tournament organisers regarding whether I could steal the relic from either Vik or if one had to be nominated at the start, and it was decided that I could take the Interact action against either model. I fancied my chances for this scheme, and also Army of the Dead, given Ian's low model count.

Ian had Slaughter, and also had to Stake a Claim on the house on my side of the table, and had a Grudge against the Punk Zombie.

Looking to thin out the enemy quickly, I lured one of the Ronin across to my side of the river, but she was saved on her last Wd by being Hard to Kill. This cost me my Punk Zombie early on, as with melee expert she was able to take him down quickly in retaliation.

5 against 1.. should be easy right?

I made the silly mistake of luring the sword Vik closer to try and separate her from her sister. She responded by charging in and killing Madame Sybelle and one of the Belles guarding Seamus with a Whirlwind. Also piling into the combat were the other 2 Ronin, who used a push off the Belle I re-summoned to get into melee with Seamus. I put the hurt on Viktoria, but not enough to kill her, and she teleported out for the fresh gun Vik next turn.

Seamus was then on his lonesome, on 1Wd and surrounded by gun Vik and 2 Ronin. I didn't realise until long after the game that I'd forgotten his Necrotic Ministrations ability (which would have healed him 6Wds and 3 cards from the Belles dying around him), and so he may have survived a little longer. I'd already wasted some actions on trying to steal the relic, but was starting to see that scheme as my only chance of getting any VPs, so Seamus tried again and succeeded (scoring 1VP), also putting up his Terrifying aura. Undeterred, Viktoria passed her morale duel and took his final Wd.

My last couple of surviving models found themselves outnumbered and blocked off from the Evidence markers and unable to achieve anything until they too were killed. To add insult to injury, Ian discovered the Friekorps Trapper had the Gravedigger trait, and proceeded to hoover up all the corpse counters and deny my other scheme.

I can't fault Ian, who played his crew very well, but next time I'll come prepared for the Vik's potential damage output, and take more care positioning models to avoid Whirlwinds!

The final result was 8-1 to Ian.

Round 3
Going straight into the final round, I was drawn against Jo-anne (you may know her by the name Neverata) and compact but deadly Lilith crew.

Lilith
Lelu
Lilitu
2 Mature Nephilim

With so few enemy models, I was hopeful when she flipped Reconnoitre - if I killed just 2 models and piled my models into one quarter she'd be unable to contest it and fail her Strategy. She also took Bodyguard and Hold Out. My final Strategy of the day was Claim Jump, which I decided to pair with Stake a Claim and Bodyguard.

This being the first time I'd played a Claim Jump, I made the mistake of heading all my models there at the start. I think I'd have done better if I spread out a bit and moved towards the marker later in the game.

As it was, Lilitu used Lure to get Sybelle all the way across the table to get ripped up by Lelu. I think she managed to cast Lure at least 5 times in a single activation.

The Matures outflanked me on the left, and dived over the castle in the centre to charge and engage most of my crew. One was brought down by the combined efforts of several Belles, but then bled all over the survivors. Seamus attempted to escape (again forgetting his Necrotic Ministrations) but was unable to get free of the melee.

In one memorable moment, I took a call to attack a Mature that was close to Seamus even though he was on his last Wd, as I believed him to be further than 1 inch away. When it came to measure the distance, it was so close to an inch it was impossible for us to call so we had to ask for an independent ruling, which went in my favour (just!).

It didn't save Seamus for long though, as Lilith then joined the fray and went to town on him.

On Turn 4 my only survivor was the Hanged, and he didn't last long from the combined attacks of Jo's crew. She still had 4 models left, which was plenty enough to spread out and claim a 8-0 victory.

The Hanged suddenly realises his day is about to get much worse

The Results
With only 3 Tournament Points to my name from the first game, and 2 complete pastings from rounds 2 and 3, my final placing was 19th out of 24. Not very impressive, but for my first ever tournament I'm happy enough!

The overall winner was Craig Johnson and his Collodi Crew, with Paul Hansel and Rob Owens taking 2nd and 3rd with their Lilith Crews. My opponents Mitch, Ian and Jo-anne placed 5th, 7th and 6th respectively, so I can always claim I was beated by some of the top players!

A good day was had by all, and I'm now looking forwards to my next tournament experience

Mike