Extended Mangled Metal in the great pine woods of Kuhmo 26.12.2010

Last two games of Warmachine for this year.

We played two 15 point games because no-one of us wanted to bring a heckload of models for such long distances.

First game we tried to do as disgusting lists we could. Format we were playing is what I somewhat jokingly call "Extended Mangled Metal" which means only warjacks + 1 solo.

For me it meant

Goreshade
- Nightmare
- Slayer
Bane Lord Tartarus

I was thinking that there would be no good answer for this list if played with capable hands. My hands, apparently, weren't that capable but that's another story.

Nightmare striking its prey that has its target in Dark Shroud either from Shadowmancer or Tartarus or feated thralls would be hitting with effective P+S 26 with MAT 10, and Slayer with P+S 24.


Kreoss
- Vanquisher
- Crusader
- Dervish
Vassal of Menoth

I was expecting opponent would play pure pop & drop. But I was wrong.

I'm not sure if opponents list was that disgustingly overpowered but surely Kreoss was more than suitable of countering half of Goreshade's annoying aspects: Mage Blight.

However, I'm not too experienced Goreshade player. Somehow I was thinking that opponent would be hell-bent on getting to knock down all my stuff just _because_. I was out of his charge range at all times so it was foolish for me to spam Mage Blight, I should have gone Shadowmancer all the way.

Because I didn't I lost my Slayer during the first rounds of both players circling each other, trying to find a way to charge in without losing the game.

To cut that I decided to rush everything forward, come hell or high water. I camped 5 focus on Goreshade. I think I could have camped all 7 because my helljacks didn't move that much after all because I really wanted to stay out of Crusader's charge range.

That maneuver allowed me to charge Goreshade to Vanquisher next turn, feat my Bane Thralls up and charge Kreoss with them.

I did try overkill though.

I ran Deathwalker as far forward as I could but was about 1/4 of an inch too far for giving Kreoss -2 defense. Also, Bane Lord Tartarus charged in and after charge he tried to curse Kreoss. Tartarus' Line of Sight to Kreoss was blocked by my Nightmare and Goreshade so he couldn't do a direct charge and because of that the Curse fell about two inches short.

So I had to take care of Kreoss with only my Bane Thralls and only 3 of them were able to charge him.

Luckily the second one hit home and one-shotted him with an amazing damage roll. It was something like 6,6,5,5, give or take.

So with lucky rolls there's no need to do any of those unsporting shenanigans... just charge in with feated thralls.


Game 2:


Well, then in next game I took a bit more pictures because there was less proxying around and more painted models on both sides.

I was playing Venethrax tier 1 list:

Venethrax
- Seether
- Slayer
- Stalker
Pistol Wraith

And opponent did:

Epic Kreoss
- Crusader
- Castigator
- Dervish
High Paladin Dartan Vilmon

Opponent won the starting roll again (I'm starting to think it's somewhat rare for me to win that roll...)

First picture is from the end of opponents second turn but before my second turns.

Pistol Wraith is on the rightmost hill. It flies forward and shoots Crusader to Death Chill.

Venethrax allocates three focus to Slayer, upkeeps Dragon Slayer and sits with three.

Venethrax uses his feat when he is activated and tries first to shoot Vilmon (who's in Impervious Wall) with Hellfire. He manages to hit but scores only one point of damage to Vilmon. Venethrax is then left with no focus.

Slayer then charges Castigator and attempts to Combo-Strike the snot out of the burning machine. Well, things could have gone better. Castigator had Defenders Ward on it. Slayer misses the Combo Strike and misses second attack too though it needed only 5's with two dice to hit it. Last attack hit home but dent only the mighty beak of the monstrosity.

It was obvious then that I'd suffer the full force of epic Kreoss' feat next turn. I really wanted to take lessen my sufferings so I tried to charge Vilmon with my Seether. Even if Vilmon was impervious I could get my Chain Attack on him and throw him away and knock him down.

The Devout model there is proxying Dervish.

Somehow (dunno if it was because of devout's halberd) I thought Dervish had reach too. That's why I moved my stalker to block charge line to Venethrax. In the end I only lined up a perfect feat turn for epic Kreoss...

In a picture you can see here.


Kreoss charges Seether, uses his feat and wrecks it with his Armor Piercing attack and the extra attack generated from the feat. Extra attacks bought against Slayer dealt some damage but now looking back at the game they should have probably been camped on Kreoss.

Castigator then wrecked Slayer. Not much to tell about that.

Dervish then charges my Stalker and uses both Side Steps to come into contact with Venethrax who had to suffer 3 attacks then. Damage rolls weren't impressive though and the Lich Lord survived.

Vilmon charged the Stalker and finished what Dervish began.

Pistol Wraith aimed its shots at Kreoss and dealt some nice damage.

Then Venethrax moved a bit and skewered Vilmon with Wyrmbane.

Then he launched fully boosted Hellfire at Kreoss. Final damage roll you can see in the picture. Dead Kreoss.

Year 2010 in painting

I think it's rather appropriate for this blog to tally my whole years painting of models.

So I can beat that number next year!

This year began slowly. I wasn't until May-June when I got to paint again more seriously.

It bothers me somewhat that I didn't keep a good track of Talisman and Touch of Evil playing pieces.

I painted about 10-12 Touch of Evil figures but the exact number is unknown. I could shed a tear now.

For sure I painted at least 9 Talisman figures too but the exact number ranged again from 9 to 12 because I might have had a few Talisman figures left to paint from the Frostmarch expansion.

Anyway, Warmachine/Hordes are available in detail.

It took me four months to paint the Megalith and Lich Lord Asphyxious.

Then my painting speed slowly built up and now, after I'm done writing this I'll put some final layers of matt varnish to last models I can paint this year.

So for Circle Orboros I painted the following models:
Heavy Warbeast Megalith
Unit 6x Tharn Bloodweavers
Solo Wilder
Warlock Cassius & Wurmwood

For Skorne:
Units: 4x Paingiver Beast Handlers & 6x Praetorian Swordsmen + Unit Attachment (2 pieces)
Solo Bloodrunner Master Tormentor

And for my main faction, Cryx:
Helljack Corruptor
Solos: Warwitch Siren & Satyxis Captain
Warcasters: Lich Lord Venethrax, Lich Lord Asphyxious
Unit Attachment Bane Thrall Officer & Standard Bearer

Hollywood Talisman

Okay, now I officially admit this playing of Talisman was weird.

The characters that were drawn for start were the evil Wizard and good Elf. It was a two player game. We used the Sacred Pool alternative ending to speed up the game a little.

Well, the game started.

Wizard started to develop very early in game, gaining strenght and craft nearly every other turn. He also found the Runesword that's kind of an iconic weapon for evil characters. In other words... Wizard seemed very threatening and invincible. Elf did try his best but was no match for the evil villain!

Elf did one thing better. He completed many warlock quests while Wizard was struggling to find a certain type of enemy to complete a quest of his.

But at one point Elf dropped to only one life and started the annoying dodging of threats and trying to get healed. But it was to no avail... Elf finally died at the Portal of Power. Can you imagine the good elf grasping for the huge and menacing door that leads either to saving the world or destroying it but finally succumbing to foes that surround him?

Well, another character was drawn to replace the elf.

It was the Swashbuckler. A good hero with an adventurous attitude. Elf, his dear friend, had obviously sent a message to him and called for his help to stop the evil, omnipotent maniac wizard!

Wizard had amazing statistics, obviously way out of range for Swashbuckler to confront directly. But still Swashbuckler gained manageable statistics for himself pretty soon. He completed all the required warlock quests to start running for the Crown of Command. However, his strenght and craft were so bad that he would pass Crypts or Mines only with real good luck. Wizard was still trying to get 4 discarded quest rewards even when his powers were otherwise enough to start running for crown.

One of the quest reward for Swashbucker was to gain all spells he could possibly have. That meant 3 spells. One of them was Toadify that makes a creature you're engaging in battle a toad with Strenght value of 1.

At that instant Swashbuckler started to run through Dungeon in order to fight Lord of Darkness. If it would be turned into a toad victory over it would have been certain. If Swashbuckler won and took the Cloak of Feathers and would've been teleported close enough the Portal all the while dodging the evil wizard... there would have been a chance.

But then.

Classic evil wizard almost guaranteed victory for him! The LAST quest reward that he needed not only made it possible for him to start running for the Crown of Command, it also turned Swashbuckler into a toad in the middle of dungeon! There was absolutely nothing to be done to wizard and his plans of enslaving or destroying the whole world!

Except it took a few turns for Wizard to arrive to Portal of Power. And Swashbuckler was lucky and didn't lose even a single life while he was a Toad. He also managed to pick up all of his things with a lucky movement roll and he was 12 spaces away from Lord of Darkness' treasure chamber.

Well, you know how just at the brink of victory all evil villains start to make weird, unexplainable mistakes?

When Wizard reached the Mines he failed the roll to get through and was teleported back to Portal of Power, buying few desperate turns more for Swashbuckler!

But Swashbuckler didn't get too good rolls. Wizard was nearing the end. He did botch Mines a second time but saved it with use of his last Fate.

When Wizard was at the Pits Swashbuckler was 9 spaces away from Lord of Darkness.

When Wizard was only one move away from victory Swashbuckler was 4 spaces away from Lord of Darkness and it was Swashbucklers turn.

Swashbuckler rolled for move. 5.

Then he cast Toadify on Lord of Darkness and succeeded in turning him into a toad.

Then he cast Bolster on himself which gave him an additional die to be added to his battle combat roll.

Then the Lord of Darkness and our daring hero, Swashbuckler, start the fight!

Even while Lord of Darkness is ridiculed when he has been turned into a slimy toad he puts up a fight and rolls 6 for his combat with his strenght 1!

Swashbuckler had Strenght value exactly 7. If he would beat the Lord's combat roll by 8 or more he would be teleported to Crown of Command there and then, no questions asked.

But that meant that he needed to roll at least 8 with 2 dice. That's a bit above average which makes it distressingly unlikely.

However, Swashbuckler rolled 9!

So, just as the evil wizard was climbing stairs, at the last step before gaining ultimate power, Swashbuckler appears out of nowhere and is teleported to the Crown of Command and all wizards schemes fail and goodness wins in a dashing style!

That game could have been filmed into a movie or something.

Wizard had Craft 9 versus Swashbuckler's 7 and Strenght 8 in battle versus Swashbuckler's 7. On top of that because of Runesword and one warlock quest reward the Wizard had 6-8 lives, don't remember exactly how much but above normal maximum.

So, victory for Swashbuckler!

25.12. Smallworld in Kuhmo

Probably last game of Smallworld here in Kuhmo finished now unless we find enough time in tomorrows hurries.

Anyway, we used Tales and Legends again.

The cards that were in effect through the game were:

2. White Queen (obviously not affecting anything at turn 2...)
3. Puff of Smoke
4. Philter of Forgetfulness
5. Wealth Redistribution
6. Tough Love
7. Youth Powder
8. Necromantic Elixir
9. Mercenaries
10. The Great Curse

Game began with Commando Orcs butchering up some Lost Tribes, scoring 7 points for first round which was quite unusual.

I managed to pick Flying Amazons and was that combo horrible... Sure! But did it leave other players feeling I was "winning" the game? Yeah, I think so too.

Dragonmaster Wizards attacked the orcs and left the ugly guys in decline pretty much there and then.

Orcs were replaced by Diplomatic Elves.

Philter of Forgetfulness caused races in decline not to score points on round 4.

That caused Flying Amazons to go to decline too, replaced by Fortified Trolls. That trend was followed by the wizards too, who in turn got Peace-Loving Ghouls around.

Trolls wreaked havoc on the remains of wizards and ghouls were feasting on amazons. The Elves were pretty much left on their own because, well, you can't do much to them.

Wealth Redistribution didn't affect anyone because all the races - Ghouls, Trolls and Elves went in decline that turn. Obviously the upcoming card, "Tough Love" that gave commando ability looked like a promising aspect to all the players...

Well, on round 6 there were Stout Sorcerers (previously Fortified Trolls), Marauding Goblins (Elves earlier) and Bivouacking Humans (ghouls) bidding for some tough love.

Some love fell for the Sorcerers.

Goblins killed all the trolls, though. Sorcerers dealt a payback: 4 elves killed and 5 regions conquered.

Ghouls shuffled away from farmlands they had been roaming in and there was a disgusting alliance of humans and in decline ghouls.

Well, next was Youth Powder in effect. I had my Stout Sorcerers who could go in decline after their full turn of activations. And Youth Powder gave extra points if you went in decline that turn, so the choice was easy.

Other players started scoring about 10 and over points at that point.

I chose Alchemist Tritons as my next weapon.

Necromantic Elixir was auctioned to goblins who went in decline instantly at that turn. Heroic Dwarves was another chosen race.

Mercenaries made it possible for Tritons to beat the humans' teeth in even when they had their camps around in there. Same went for humans too, though. The one and only farm I managed to get was conquered easily back. Also, a collaboration of necromantic goblins and heroic dwarves with mercenaries caused me to lose 4 of my 6 in decline tokens.

Last turn had the Great Curse in effect.

It meant that no-one could use their special power badges, though racial bonuses still applied.

Not much happened, dwarves continued to expand and humans and tritons bickered themselves. In the end the scoreboard was:

Dragonmaster Wizards/Peace-Loving Ghouls/Bivouacking Humans: 83
Commando Orcs/Diplomatic Elves/Marauding Goblins/Heroic Dwarves: 80
Flying Amazons/Fortified Trolls/Stout Sorcerers/Alchemist Tritons 69

Decline and Fall

Two games of Smallworld just played, now we're having a pause of sorts (which I obviously used to write things up!)

Both were three player games.

Game 1:

First races used were Diplomatic Skeletons, Forest Wizards and Heroic Amazons.

Amazons and Skeletons were kinda paired up, though diplomacy prevented amazons from attacking the skeletons and the heroes were blocking skeletons attacks against them.

I with my Wizards tried to stay as far away from such killer combos but sad thing was that the skeletons and amazons had both taken the side of the board with most forests and magic sources.

Skeletons played for long. No-one could really challenge them. Amazons didn't have to fight them, they could just spread wide and go in decline.

Poor Wizards were soon seized by the incoming skeletons and were put in decline too. I chose Historian Dwarves as my next race, thought of getting few mines and going in decline with them too real soon.

Amazons went in decline too and chose Swamp Tritons next.

Swamp Tritons carved a rather nice spot in to the middle of the Skeleton empire. Skeletons lost 4 regions and 4 tokens but still they had as many tokens as they had when they started the game... So that meant a bit of a weird thing happened. Skeletons were as strong as ever so they didn't go in decline after such a staggering blow. They just continued to kill stuff. And made an alliance with the Tritons, meaning the only way for Tritons to expand was to conquer their own in decline regions.

Skeletons had pretty much devoured my in decline wizards so I decided to go to decline with Dwarves too. To get rid of those horrible skeletons I picked Mounted Kobolds.

However, Tritons had been mauled to near extinction and they went in decline too. Alchemist Orcs came next.

And then when there were two fresh races coming up real soon the Skeletons were finally put to decline too. New race combo was Fortified Goblins.

Goblins destroyed all of my Dwarves in one fell swoop.

Kobolds conquered around 7 regions in one turn.

After all, it's a world of slaughter?

Game was nearing end and I put my kobolds in decline so I could play the last round with Merchant Priestesses, which was rather nice as I was the last player.

Final scoreboard for game 1 was:

Heroic Amazons/Swamp Tritons/Alchemist Orcs: 89
Diplomatic Skeletons/Fortified Goblins: 87
Forest Wizards/Historian Dwarves/Mounted Kobolds/Merchant Priestesses: 86

Pretty close.

Then it was time for:

Game 2:

Now we decided to use the Tales and Legends expansion.

Tales and Legends cards that were in effect were:

2. Baby Bloom
3. Greedy Gob
4. Tremors
5. Decline and Fall
6. Tabula Rasa
7. Handle With Care
8. Flooded!
9. Wealth Redistribution
10. White Queen

I won the starting roll and opted for Hill Sorcerers.

I thought that it would be a good choice but I guess I didn't take the other options into account that were available. I did check other choices that much that I saw that other options wouldn't benefit from upcoming Baby Bloom.

Well, other races that came up were Heroic Priestesses and Bivouacking Wizard.

So, both had easy access to immunities to my racial power.

Also, Wizards were far far away from the Priestesses and Priestesses were able to block my advance to them so they were building up a pretty damn impressive tower there though they didn't score many points.

Greedy Gob made it quite a race between Sorcerers and Wizards. In the end both scored 10 points so no-one gained anything from that card. Both Sorcerers and Wizards were spreading quite thin so entering decline was drawing near.

Priestesses did enter decline though and built up a 6 priestess tower.

And the new race chosen was Hordes of Elves. It was then when I realised how horrible that combination was.

But then the upcoming event was realised: Decline and Fall. It meant that all active races would go into decline at the start of round 5. It was a nasty turn for Sorcerers and Wizards who had spread themselves all over the board. This would have been the optimal turn to enter decline.

Also it wasn't too awesome for the priestesses either... that awesome tower, only to vanish next turn because Elves with only a few regions were to decline.

Well, the joy only escalates!

When every race went to decline next upcoming event was revealed... Tabula Rasa. I had the effect that all In Decline race tokens would be discarded.

Not. Nice.

New races chosen that round was transition of Sorcerers into Alchemist Goblins, Elves into Berserk Orcs and Wizards into Seafaring Humans.

Handle with care didn't have that big impact. It decided that I would go in decline with my goblins too because they got hit pretty hard in the head by both orcs and humans.

Goblins were left alone in the big small world and a new race of Fortified Ghouls came up.

During the course of floods that shaked the area an evil race of Swamp Ratmen emerged and Humans were put out of their misery.

Also Berserk Orcs had conquered something like 7 regions even when they hadn't succeeded in almost any of their berserk rolls. So away went the orcs too and Underworld Amazons came around, just in time for round 9 and Wealth Redistribution.

Only my poor Ghouls were alone in the map at the start of round 9 so I couldn't attack any active tokens. In the hindsight I should have probably went in decline, don't actually know why I didn't... I wanted to build castles I think.

Well, Ratmen carved an empire of 4 regions that included 2 swamps.

Amazons conquered two of my regions and destroyed one of my beautiful castles.

Last turn there was an auction at White Queen.

It was bought for the once-berserk orcs. That meant the ratmen could only get only few empty regions and amazons could only tease ghouls. Ghouls could do nothing.

Scoreboard:
Bivouacking Wizards/Seafaring Humans/Swamp Ratmen 101
Heroic Priestesses/Hordes of Elves/Berserk Orcs/Underworld Amazons 80
Hill Sorcerers/Alchemist Goblins/Fortified Ghouls 80

"Might makes right" thought the Philosopher

Just finished a loooong game of Talisman.

It was 2-player game but somehow it managed to drag on for nearly four hours.

Characters involved were the Philosopher and Sorceress.

Game had a smashing start and I was anticipating a fast game because of it.

Sorceress' starting spell was "Strenght" and Philosopher's was "Spell Call" which meant instant strenght rise for both characters. Also, first card the Sorceress got was "Solomon's Crown" that straight-out gives +2 Craft. The Philosopher managed to get another Strenght rise very early in the game too.

However, the Philosopher found weapons and all kinds of cool items that raised his Strengh to around 10. Sorceress wasn't that lucky anymore. She managed to lose lives and was constantly searching for healing and trying to dodge any possible encounters.

It didn't exactly help when the Philosopher found the Gong of War and was able to call Sorceress to fight with him. Obviously Sorceress lost her crown.

A Mad Cap emerged. It's a Stranger that changes your alignment randomly. It resulted in a funny situation...

During the course of the game Sorceress was evil twice, good twice and neutral twice or thrice. That was because Sorceress was lingering with only one life and had to move to any and all spaces where it was guaranteed you didn't need to fight.

Also a happening worth of mentioning: Sorceress was evil when she found the "Sword of Light" which had a rule that no evil character can carry it. Within 2 rounds Sorceress visited Mad Cap and turned to good...

Anyway, Philosopher had found Riding Horses from killing a Fire Mane.

That made it possible for him to ride through the Highlands a couple of times.

Another thing worth of mentioning happened then. Philosopher had beaten the Eagle King twice and had got Rage Talon and Dreadwing. Dreadwing was a follower and Sorceress was able to steal followers from any character she lands on.

Dreadwing soon found a more loving home. However, last time I played Talisman same thing happened. Vampiress stole the Dreadwing from same person. History repeats itself, no?

One of these new places where you can buy stuff from stable deck happened to come around and Sorceress had 7 gold. Warhorse costs 6 gold and would have been amazing. But Philosopher paid back there and then all the years of laughing at his poor character special abilities! He had "teleport" spell. So he teleported to stables and used his skill to exchange that place to something completely else.

After the horse- or bird thievery the riding horses of the Philosopher were found out to be Werewolves though.

Sorceress was dropped out of the rat race about there and then. She didn't have quite enough strenght or craft to challenge Eagle King, though that was where she went.

Philosopher was already doing the Dungeon and killed the Lord of Darkness rather single-handedly, and weeping tears of joy carried off a Cloak of Feathers from the treasure chamber.

It looked like end game there and then. In no time Philosopher was in the Inner Region and used Cloak of Feathers to teleport to the talisman region there.

But the game went on and on... We had used the secret alternative ending and it happened to be this new Demon King guy with Craft 12 and 4 lives. Philosopher had only 10 Craft at that point so he decided to start backing off. It meant about 5-6 extra turns for Sorceress.

She tried to charm one dragon to fight for her with a trinket she found from Highlands. However, using the dragon wasn't an option, it had to be used in next battle. With that dragon by her side Sorceress went up to Strenght 15 versus Philosophers Strenght 14. So there was a good possibility of stealing his Talisman and flying off to safety with Dreadwing she had stolen earlier...

When Philosopher got out of the Inner Circle Sorceress decided to try such an evil scheme. Dice were friendly and made it possible for her to try to go to Tavern and try to get the boat ride to middle region from there.

Well, it just happened so that the Sorceress got a bit tipsy and got into battle with a farmer there...

And, uh.

The Dragon awakened. Slight overkill?

After that the Philosopher was fooling around in middle region because there were plenty of Craft monsters around, trying to get his Craft high enough to beat the Demon Lord.

Sorceress tried to build up her strenght and craft in the dungeon and managed to beat Lord of Darkness twice (first by using Energize spell she had from genie and second time by being good enough without any tricks).

But Sorceress was too slow.

Philosopher got his Craft up to 14 and headed off to kill the Demon.

Couple of times she lost or had a stand-off but it didn't buy enough time for Sorceress to even challenge Philosopher.

So, an amazing thing happened, actually. Philosopher won a game!

'tis season to crush nations.

After all the christmassy stuff we played a 3-player Smallworld here in Kuhmo.

We didn't use the Tales and Legends expansion because other players were playing Smallworld for the first time ever (by the way - I with my magnificient 6 game experience managed to get less points than anyone else).

Anyway, the combos were rather interesting from the start.

The first, free choice was Spirit Priestesses which seemed to be insanely good.

After that was Cursed Ratmen.

After Ratmen were Mounted Giants.

So the first player obviously took Spirit Priestesses. I was next in line and took Mounted Giants which in fact seemed like quite awesome race too.

Last player picked up Berserk Halflings.

Halflings picked their first two spots rather unsportingly so that Giants and Priestesses were against each other. Giants could actually only expand to Priestesses territory. There weren't even neutral zones available.

Well, because of such a scheme the Priestesses couldn't do their impossible dream of an awesome unassailable tower that wouldn't go away after second race goes to decline.

The tower wasn't any cool at all, in fact. Only three priestesses. Though that was three points that wouldn't go away easily.

There were six points on Cursed Ratmen at the moment and Priestesses were exchanged to them. The player got lucky and managed to conquer 4 regions with only one go. After only one turn of doing their stuff they were put into decline and Historian Kobolds entered. But that was later in game.

Around that time the Mounted Giants were exchanged for Dragonmaster Goblins and even Halflings didn't feel that berserky any longer and gave way for Ransacking Amazons.

So there was carnage.

Goblins butchered 2 ratmen and 1 halfling and the dragon crumbled Priestesses' tower.

Amazons retaliated and the co-joined efforts of Amazons and Kobolds drove Goblins in decline almost as soon as they entered the fields.

Seafaring Trolls tried to eat as many in decline halflings as they could but it was no good. There were too many even for trolls' insatiable appetite.

Once all the Ratmen were eradicated some Flying Elves arrived.

Ransacking Amazons had taken only a few casualties but they were spread to 8 regions and there were only trolls with their awesome defense and kobolds with their awesome numbers to ransack so they went to decline too. In came Wealthy Humans who got pretty easily two farm fields under their iron heel.

Game was nearing end and all the Goblins had been killed so I decided it was good to put trolls in decline and fight on last round with a fresh combo. I chose Commando White Ladies who had 5 points on them already.

Well. Humans managed to get even one more farm for them.

Then it was time to count the points.

Berserk Halflings/Ransacking Amazons/Wealthy Humans: 97
Spirit Priestesses/Cursed Ratmen/Historian Kobolds/Flying Elves: 88
Mounted Giants/Dragonmaster Goblins/Seafaring Trolls/Commando White Ladies: 81

Venethrax decides it's time to get axe piercing

Last game for a little while.

35 point game Cryx versus Khador.

My list was:

Venethrax
- Stalker
- Corruptor
- Harrower

Minimum unit of Bane Thralls
Minimum unit of Bile Thralls
Minimum unit of Mechanithralls
Bane Lord Tartarus
Warwitch Siren

And I was facing, well, let's let the picture speak for itself!

Except, well, that much needs to be said that Vlad represents the original Vlad from prime and the winterguard there are Winterguard Infantry.

Opponent won the starting roll and the board was pretty. Fully painted armies on both sides and terrain placement that wasn't just "what there should be in all equality", it looked like a real random place.

Well, all in all I got bad vibes out of the set up. Winterguard capable of spraying the heck out of any meatwall I could be bringing up and Vlad with his feat outranging my "alpha strike".



Also the psychological effect of two hulking monstrosities there in the center of the board was less than welcoming.

Luckily because of the perspective they don't seem that threatening any more as I'm looking only at the picture.

I tried to close a bit but just out of reach of opponents heavy hitters. Mechanithralls formed a meatwall in front of Tartarus so no random charges would take him out and I measured my full control range so that there should have been around 15.5" in between Venethrax and Beast 09.

But opponent didn't really close in at all.



So I tried to do a bit desperate form of getting into range.

I lined up my stuff and used Venethrax's feat. Now on hindsight I should have gone way closer still. If opponent killed any of my lined-up guys they would turn into cloud effects that would block line of sight to any real targets.

But I was afraid of winterguard infantry and sure, all my troopers would have died if they had been any closer.

Obviously opponent sprayed the front line to death but couldn't do much else. After opponents third turn but before mine the Winterguard had done it again:

And then I can whine a bit about the Corruptor.

If it had been the Slayer (actually for 2 points less!) Beast would probably have been if not totally wrecked, too mauled to do anything good. But I'm getting too much ahead in this...

Anyway, Tartarus cursed the Winterguards and charged them to clear up path for Corruptor to charge Beast. Bane Thralls had moved somewhat forward so I was able to place one of the newly crated thralls with Beast 09 in its melee range. That was -2 arm for Beast there. Sneaky.

I had cast, by the way, Lamentation on the first round of the game and upkept it after that, a trend which continued to the bitter end.



You can't actually see Gorman diWulfe in any of the pictures but hey, he has Stealth and at all times he was farther than 5" away from the camera. But after Warwitch Siren had sprayed two closest Winterguards to death the Harrower moved forwards and shot Gorman that was behind a building.

My Stalker had eaten one of the Great Bears.

And then the failure of Corruptor. Earlier I had tried to make an arc node out of one Winterguard. Failed. Now was Corruptors place to shine. It could get a charge off at the Beast who had -2 arm from Dark Shroud.

Well, damage was impressive, sure, even when one damage roll was double 1's. However, in a way I can't think anything else here in this situation that I had actually paid 2 army points for 2 less initial attacks, loss of access to Combo-Strike and 1 p+s less in normal attacks. Even with the same rolls Beast would have had 2 points more damage in and I'd still be buying two more attacks.

But anyway, the ending is quite clear there in that picture there.

Distance between Drago and Venethrax does look long. But Boundless Charge + Forced March made things ugly.



Well I was at first pretty confident that Drago could not do it but I didn't realise the important fact that Great Bears could charge Corruptor and with their reach stay out of Dragos way. Beast botched its damage roll against Corruptor really good.

But the two remaining bears wrecked it and it looked like only good free strike from Tartarus would save Venethrax as Boundless Charge gives pathfinder during charge.

Well, that wasn't to be, as Vlad had moved out of Lamentation range and cast Signs and Portents.

Greylords moved close enough and sprayed Tartarus to death.

To add an insult to injury the last greylord was in range to cast Ice Cage on Venethrax and succeeded.

Drago activated.

Well, Venethrax can now brag to other Lich Lords about the new piercing he's got.

16.12. Nudge of Evil

Yesterday a game of Touch of Evil happened.

Villain proved to be the Banshee and heroes against her were Valeria and Eliza.

Eliza had some inherent bonus against Banshee so things looked nice enough. Banshee did have +1 combat dice against heroes that had less than 4 in Spirit. Valeria's was 2 and Eliza's 3.

Anyway, game started suprising mercifully. For many rounds Shadow Track didn't move at all. However, there was next to no character development on the side of Heroes either as Valeria was ambushed and thus knocked down during mystery phase and Eliza didn't get to do anything useful either.

Valeria found Axe once she got up and went to Echo lake when lucky dice rolls allowed her to go to Inn to heal up some damage. However, that joy didn't last long as the encounter in Inn was "It's a long way down" and Valeria did drop down to Forgotten Island.

Meanwhile Eliza stayed around in town squares and whenever she found her way to corner locations nothing awesome was found. She fought some monsters but got knocked down a few times too many.

Then the Murders started pouring in.

Just in course of very few rounds the Shadow Track was from the safe 8 zone to the first red zone.

Valeria was obviously pretty rich (from gaining investigation from shadow track going down) but Eliza less so.

Heroes had an unused Blood Transfusion and combined with that they were thinking of starting the Showdown in three turns, on to heal at Doctor's, one to train Spirit to 4 and one to visit Blacksmith & start Showdown (Villain's Lair was the Covered Bridge).

But, well.

Banshee had been looking for some time at the pathetic progress of heroes and decided that it's time to put them out of their misery.

Cooperative Mystery Phase Chart: 1, 1. Surprise Showdown.

She one-shotted both heroes so they couldn't escape.

Victory for the Villain!

Game where nothing but epic things happened

Beginning picture was in fact an omen about the game to come.

We happened to roll for start with different dice so the dice were actually lying around in there so we could place them next to each other. Three times in a row we rolled same number for starting and only at fourth roll the starting the game fell on me.

Well, it was a 35 point game and lists involved were:

Epic Asphyxious
- Slayer
- Cankerworm
- Nightwretch

Maximum unit of Bane Thralls + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Bile Thralls
Withershadow Combine
Bane Lord Tartarus
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall

Opponent had:

Epic Vlad
- Drago

Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry (as this particular opponent builds love for them I have a firm foundation of dread, hatred and loathing of them + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Man-o-War demolition corps
Kovnik Joe
Drakhun (with dismount)
War Dog
Yuri the Axe + 2x Manhunters
Eiryss, Mage hunter of Ios

I had given a fair warning that I would be playing epic Asphyxious. In my opinion it is the Right Thing To Do in casual games because he really is a pain. Epic Vlad nicely counters on of the most annoying defensive mechanics of Asphyxious - the Caustic Mists.

But anyway, on with the game.

Winterguard Infantry were again on one flank and I was thinking of trying to ignore them again. This time I didn't have anything terribly fast in my list that could easily tie them up. I wrote in the picture some of the models that are either hiding from camera or too blurry. Eiryss tried to shoot Nightwretch with disruptor bolt but missed.

I begin my next turn from earlier picture by moving up my Nightwretch. There was less than half an inch too much so that counter charge from Drakhun didn't activate. I didn't know if that was good or bad. I tried to move close enough to give opponent the choice.

Withershadow gave Asphyxious the reroll and after that I activated Asphyxious. With Tremulus' reroll I was able to one-shot Drakhun to dismounted version with Excarnate. Losing the threat of counter charge I moved Cankerworm to kill one manhunter. With Asphyxious' affinity I then moved Cankerworm behind Eiryss. With everything else I advance cautiously, trying to stay far enough from Winterguard.



Yet I underestimated 6" move and 8" spray again. All except one Bile Thrall was destroyed by the sprays. Dismounted Drakhun tried to save Eiryss and actually hit Cankerworm and dealt loads of damage in. But would have needed one damage point more to destroy the armor piercing head.

Drago failed its charge for good which was a kind of a turning point in the game in a way. Man-o-Wars charged my Nightwretch and managed to destroy everything else except movement system.

Vlad moved then to position you can see him in and launched Razor Wind at the last remaining bile thrall. Had it survived there would have been quite a bit of sticky goo that formerly had been Winterguard.

Anyway.

I tried to charge with Bane Thralls but only one got to contact with Winterguard. One did go to the Man-o-Wars though. One failed its charge and rest just ran. Cankerworm made some lucky rolls and killed Eiryss.

Slayer advanced a bit and started beating Drago who was left with less than eight damage boxes after Slayer was done with it.

Enter Withershadow Combine. I actually managed to pull off Dark Industries on Drago and promptly got Harrower to deal with Winterguard. My joy wasn't long lasting, though.



I would have pretty much been Game Over there and then for me if I would've had any other warcaster in play. Did I mention I hate Winterguard Infantry?

Yuri killed one Bane Thrall.

Then body count for Winterguard Infantry for one turn: Admonia, Maelovus, Bane Thrall Officer & Standard Bearer, 8x Bane Thralls, 1x Winterguard Infantry, some scrap damages to my warjacks. Horrible. Absolutely horrible.

Just as things were going nice and smooth.

Also, dismounted Drakhun charged Tartarus and killed him.

Vlad used his feat and made remaining Man-O-Wars killing machines, one Manhunter and the War Dog.

War Dogs movement was enough to dodge Harrower and still go bite Tremulus. Tremulus was left with one hit point.

Man-o-Wars killed few remaining Bane Thralls and the Nightwretch.



On my turn I allocated focus to Cankerworm and Slayer. Cankerworm moved in and bit the dismounted Drakhun in half in scuttled next to Man-o-War.

Slayer one-shotted one Man-o-War with Combo-Strike. Remaining focuses were spent on trying to buy attacks against def 14 Man-o-War but all missed. But most importantly, Harrower was free now.

It moved as far as it could next to Winterguard and treshered its melee range empty.

Asphyxious was brave enough to charge the War Dog himself. Dog would've been killed but it passed its tough roll. Then Asphyxious teleported to safety.

Necrotech finished the bleeding puppy.

Tremulus then charged the remaining Man-o-War and managed to hit because he had gaind the war dogs soul and was able to boost his attack. Man-o-War didn't die, however.



Opponent was then hell-bent on killing the Harrower. All the Winterguard tried to shoot it and did damage. One Winterguard did kill the Necrotech, though. Remaining Man-o-War destroyed the Cankerworm with few good rolls.

Manhunter tried to charge Harrower but fell short. Yuri did the same and didn't fall short. Only his attack wasn't enough. How ironic - autonomous Harrower lost it's cortex and nothing else. It still had on damage box left in left and right arm and movement. Exactly everything that was needed.

Asphyxious himself charged remaining Man-o-War, killed him and teleported to where you can see him in pictures second part.

So, Harrower moved a bit forward and treshered Yuri, Manhunter and Winterguard officer to death. That warjack is a walking nightmare. Almost more so than the actual Nightmare. Slayer charged two winterguards and promptly killed them.



And the remaining winterguard bastards managed to wreck my precious Harrower!

Their death count for the game was staggering. But maybe my pain is eased by the fact that the Harrower wasn't actually originally in my army list.

I moved Slayer a bit to kill the winterguard standard bearer. I really wanted the two remaining to be killed too so I moved as near as I could with Asphyxious and launched Excarnate on one of them. I shot another one at the last guard standing and spent the last focus on boosting to hit because the last one was in cover to me.

Then Vlad himself came and did short work of my last model, the Slayer helljack. So it was Vlad & Kovnik Josef against Asphyxious alone.

Well, on my turn Asphyxious charged Kovnik Joe. I boosted to hit and Joe was killed. Asphyxious had 6 focus remaining. For a short moment it was two epic casters face-to-face.

Asphyxious boosted to hit and Parasite hit home with boosted hit. Vlad was behind my wreck marker so he was in cover but luckily for me, attack roll was high enough.

Then it was time to use Asphyxious' feat.



And then brave brave sir Asphyxious teleported away.

Tartarus cursed Vlad and charged in.

Attack roll was succesfull and enough damage sank in to leave Vlad crippled with 5 damage boxes remaining.

However, then the real challenge began, as now Vladimir was sitting at a nice defense of 18. My resurrected Bane Thrall officer had two MAT 7 attacks and the remaining had MAT 6. Because of Tartarus' Curse officer needed "only" 9's to hit. Missed both.

Then the little grunts started pouring in and I needed 10's to hit.

One bit home.

And rolled enough to make Vlad join the Spectral Legion.

End of a very cool game!

(Oh, and if you're wondering about the bane thralls in the close-up picture they were placed a bit shoddily there and Vlad's cloak messed up the placing of thrall officer.)

Lose some, win some.

I played Warmachine today at friends place.

We played two 25 point games with following lists:

Mortenebra
- Slayer
- Cankerworm
- Deathripper

Minimum unit of Satyxis Raiders + Sea Witch
Withershadow Combine
Satyxis Captain

versus

Epic Vlad
- Drago

Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Kayazy Assassins + Underboss
Greylord Ternion
Kovnik Joe
War Dog


And second pairing was:

Warwitch Deneghra
- Corruptor
- Nightwretch

Minimum unit of Mechanithralls + Brute Thrall
Minimum unit of Soulhunters
Bane Lord Tartarus
Skarlock
Warwitch Siren

versus

Butcher
- Kodiak

Great Bears of Gallowswood
Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Kayazy Assassins + Underboss
Kovnik Joe
War Dog

So on with the game reports:

Game 1:



After first rounds movements things looked like that. I had originally deployed my Satyxis to the rightmost center but I decided that I got better use out of Satyxis elsewhere and tried to remove the Winterguard threat just by ignoring them. Also if they would actually present themselves as a juicy target I was sure I could launch Satyxis back at them with their amazing threat range.

Anyway. Such pondering was a bit useless as opponent did something unexpected.



So, epic Vlad used his feat. Four Kayazy Assassins were affected. If they had been about half an inch closer Mortenebra would probably have taken 3x MAT 12, P+S 15 damage boosted charge attacks where were one additional dice around, lowest discarded.

Well, luckily for me, they weren't half an inch closer and I got only one such attack. Still got six points in from only one such attack.

All in all things didn't look too bad because I had survived epic Vlad's feat with only six points of damage in and dead Sea Witch and one Satyxis Raider.

Those 3" area pieces of paper are, by the way, centered on the models they're closest to.

Well, I decided that the playing board looking like it did, it was time for me to wrap up the game and beat the snot out of Vlad.



It was all too easy!

Drago had moved to block Line of Sight to Vlad. However, Deryliss moved and put up Overrun on Mortenebra.

Then Mortenebra did something a bit foolish. She moved a bit and provoked one free strike. I wasn't too aware of the fact that Hand of Fate was active even on my turn. Well, Mortenebra survived the free strike. With one hit point!

Anyway, after that it was way like a walk in the park or a ride in the rollercoaster! Mortenebra cast Terminal Velocity, used her feat and killed one of the Kayazy near her, triggering Overrun. I moved Slayer so it had Line of Sight to Vlad, though there was one bothersome War Dog standing in its way.

Well, a three Satyxis Combined Melee Attack killed a Kayazy engaging Cankerworm, who after that charged the War Dog and ate it. If I smoked tobacco I would have lighted a cigar of victory at this point and if I grew moustache I would have twirled it already, savoring my awesome victory!

Well, then I moved Withershadow Combine and Admonia dealt 3 points of damage to Vlad via Unbinding. Tremulus gave his feared, game-winning re-roll to Slayer.

Then Slayer charged Vlad and decided to use Combo-Strike. Vlad had armor 19 at the moment.

So, Slayer crushed Vlad under its mighty strike that hit home. Victory for the mighty forces of Cryx!



Except.

Umm.

How the heck did that happen?

Well, for starters, the Combo-Strike damage roll was only 4, 3, 2 which meant I would be dealing 12 points in, which wasn't enough to one-shot Vlad. I decided to roll the 3 and 2 again using Tremulus' re-roll because it would've been so damn easier to deal only a couple of damage in with following attacks and getting 8 with two dice isn't impossible, which would have killed Vlad.

Well, the re-rolls came out as 3, 1. So I gave only 11 points in.

Then... Terminal Velocity gave boosts against living models and I had 3 focus on Slayer. That meant 3x p+s 16 attacks. Vlad did have defense 18 from his "get bonuses from being damaged" thingy but getting 11+ was within totally possible range even without getting to re-roll all the failed rolls.

But I did.

I didn't manage to roll 11+ even a single time from six tries I had.

Vlad survived with 4 damage boxes left.

Then Drago charged Mortenebra who had defense 15, arm 16 and one hit point left.

Drago had full focus and Hand of Fate from affinity.

End of this sad story.

Game 2:

Next game I happened to won the starting roll which seems to be a bit rare for me.



In this game too I was resolved to stay as far away from the Winterguard Infantry as possible, again.

But this time, as I was facing the Butcher, it meant that if I didn't confront the Winterguard I was against defense 17 Kayazy Assassins (defense 19 in melee).

I ran my Nightwretch real close to Kayazy and decided to try to put Crippling Grasp on them. And I succeeded and I thought I could sigh from relief until I realised that even after giving one of the best debuffs in the game to them they still had defense 17 against melee attacks.

Anyway, I put a Parasite on the Kodiak too. Then I just shuffled around because opponent didn't have any real threat range.



Anyway, things could have looked grim here.

I had placed Soulhunters way too up so Great Bears had an easy charge against them. Butcher also moved up front and used his feat. So two prancing ponies were reduced to little more than disgusting miasma.

This time Winterguard failed one important mission, though.

Four of them made it close enough to Tartarus so they could use their spray on him. And Butcher's feat really does affect also ranged damage rolls. I had to look that one up from the book, so amazing it sounds.

Well, the first shooter missed Tartarus altogether, that in hindisght probably was the miss that saved him. Because next spray hit and dealt 4 damage, next dealt 3 and last dealt nothing.

Tartarus still standing when people are lined up like there in the picture always makes Cryx player smile.

But also that line-up meant a devastating feat turn for Deneghra's feat.

Which promptly happened.

I moved Deneghra as much as I could to catch opponents whole army under her feat and flinged Scourge at the War Dog that was sitting real close to Butcher.

I scored a hit and the War Dog died and, well, Butcher was knocked down. That changed my plans somewhat. Even when the Thresher attack looked tempting on so many warrior models I really wanted Tartarus' weapons to bear at Butcher.

Remaining Soulhunter charged one Kayazy Assassin, getting itself so it could make two attacks at Winterguardsmen too who were standing in Tartarus' way. Well, it missed the Kayazy (MAT 8 missing any warrior model that suffers from Deneghra's feat and Crippling Grasp with other double 1's is just plain... wrong.) but killed the two Winterguard and used light cavalry movement to get from Tartarus' way itself.

Then Warwitch Siren moved up and lined a perfect Venom spray at three Kayazy's, all of whom died. Even the one who was preventing Tartarus' charge at Butcher.

Tartarus then charged and gave tons of damage in to Butcher. But still Butcher had tons of damage left so no big deal there...

Then Corruptor aimed and shot Butcher and managed to do some damage even (Butcher had -4 armor from Dark Shroud and Deneghra's feat).

Skarlock also threw one Venom at Butcher and it did some damage in too but still the bastard was left standing. (Yeah, he was standing even when he was knocked down! Or at least even when he lies on his back he still towers over the feeble, skinny wussies of Cryxian empire!)

Not many warcasters can boast surviving a well enough arranged Deneghra assassination run.

Luckily Butcher couldn't do much on his own turn as he himself and his army was suffering from Deneghra's feat. He did kill Tartarus though that kinda stuff he does in middle of breakfast and going to toilet in the morning.



He cast Iron Flesh on himself and camped one focus.

However, Kodiak came too close to him.

When it was my turn Deneghra upkept Parasite on Kodiak, gave two focus to Corruptor and launched a Scourge at Kodiak. Resulting area of effect knocked Butcher down too and then Deneghra charged in herself.

And Butch got served. On a plate. To lord Toruk.

2.12. War Dog kills Strakhov

Played against Khador today. It was a 35 point game.

My list:

Witch coven of Garlghast
- Slayer
- Harrower
- 2x Nightwretch

Minimum unit of Bane Thralls + Unit Attachment
Withershadow Combine
Skarlock
Necrotech & Scrap Thrall

Opponent had:

Strakhov
- Kodiak

Great Bears of Gallowswood
Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Greylord Ternion
Maximum unit of Man-o-War Demolition Corps
Widowmakers
War Dog
Kovnik Joe



Here is a picture I took from the end of first rounds movements.

Cycling Infernal Machine is something I have rarely done this "professionally". And sure my heavy warjacks ran disgusting distances! Oh, and in case someone is wondering about the wreck marker in the woods, it's actually the Kodiak that couldn't balance too well on some rubble.

Meatshield lining up in form of Winterguard Infantry gave me some headache but let's talk about it more when I get next picture up.



I thought I'd lose all my heavy hitting power next turn unless I used my feat. I could go and beat the hell out of Winterguard Infantry with Harrower but then there were Man-o-Wars just polishing their, umm, hammers?

So, I ran a Nightwretch into woods where the Kodiak was lying. Admonia had upkept Infernal Machine on Slayer.

I shuffled around in the middle, I knew that even with my feat on the Winterguard would be spraying around. But still I didn't realise how lethal rat 3 with boost could be... Anyway, I wanted to clear path for my Coven to move as much forward as possible, put on feat and Veil of Mists (no marker for it in the picture but it's in the forest where Slayer is) and shot Curse of Shadows on the Kodiak (who had Superiority on, by the way).

Tremulus gave his re-rolls to Slayer and then it charged to Kodiak.

And it would've been joyful to witness that dice-rolling if it didn't bring a tear to my eye.

Charge attack roll: Double 1's. So I had to use Tremulus' re-roll exactly there and not save it for dice screw at damage roll. Well, I gave 13 points in with my Combo-Strike, broke Kodiak's movement and started to buy more attacks.

Second attack: double 1's.

Third attack: Scored a hit. Damage roll: double 1's.

Also, by the way, Slayer is standing on top of the tree there where the crude arrow shows and wreck marker is still the Kodiak. Who, as it just happened, didn't transform into it's proxy.

Then I brought stuff forward. I didn't want to do anything "real" with the Harrower because bringing it to melee with winterguard would have probably meant some charging Man-O-Wars up its face. So I tried to place it as front as possible to make it difficult if not impossible to line Winterguard for perfect sprays.

Well, winterguard DID line up. And it sure looked hilarious, next picture is taken from Harrower's view...

I chuckled at the idea of Tresher attack.

I didn't chuckle any longer though when the infantry did their sprays.

Lost like 4 Bane Thralls and Necrotech, which was acceptable enough even from rat 3 sprays, but one of the winterguard one-shotted Admonia which wasn't only an insult to injury but also, like, a double injury (anyone noticing my figures of speech to be... lacking?). Pow 10 would kill a Withershadow member only on damage roll of 5 & 6 or 6 & 6. It was 5 and 6.

Anyway, curious things happened at the woods. Things that made the game, actually.

Strakhov himself charged Slayer (and in turn gave me 13 points in) and also put Overrun on Kodiak.

Then some Man-O-Wars came and mauled Slayer real good, too, and it was left to a shabby condition for Kodiak to deliver Overrun which would bring Strakhov to safety (Strakhov in middle of white circle in messy picture).

Kodiak beat next and scored hits with all of its attacks which were boosted. Superiority and my feat kind of canceled out each other. However, first damage roll was double 1's. Yay for me. Next damage roll was rather high, though, but not high enough. It left Slayer with just one damage point left in Cortex.

Well, then Widowmakers moved as close as possible and one of them was in range. They have the ability to deal 1 point of damage instead of a normal damage roll.

Widowmaker scored a hit and that's the reason you see Slayer wreck on top of a tree. But most importantly, no overrun for Strakhov.

Then the last turn of the game started.



One Winterguard was in front of Harrower on whom I had upkept (myself now as Admonia was killed) Infernal Machine.

Skarlock launched a Stygian Abyss on it and it was gone.

Then I decided to take a pot shot with aiming Nightwretch in the forest at one Man-O-War. It hit just barely but damage roll was double sixes.

After that I lined my other arc node in position to finish the dog. Then witches shot a to-hit boosted Stygian Abyss on the poor pup and boosted damage too. However, the bugger made its tough roll.

Then Harrower advanced, starting in the back arc of the unfortunate Strakhov.

It walked up to where you can see it and used Tresher. Only the War Dog was killed.

Tremulus had given its re-rolls to Harrower.

When Tresher came into contact with Strakhov I managed to score a hit but damage roll (which I boosted) was only 1,1,2. I decided to re-roll all of them via Puppet Master. I rolled 1,1,3.

So I bought another, damage roll equaled 4.

I was needing only fives to hit so I didn't boost my attack rolls and was able to buy still one more attack with focus. Damage roll was 6. That was 15 points in.

Then the soul of Strakhov's most beloved war dog got me yet one more attack and it was the end of Strakhov.

25.11. Epic Sorscha mistakes skorne's pointy bits as hammers to be nailed in.

So, today it was Skorne against Khador. It was a 35 point game and I was sporting with:

Hexeris
- Bronzeback Titan
- Basilisk Drake
- Basilisk Krea

Maximum unit of Praetorian Swordsmen + Unit Attachment
Minimum unit of Cataphract Cetrati
Minimum unit of Beasthandlers
Aptimus Marketh
Bloodrunner Master Tormentor (who you can see blurry in starting picture. At first I thought I'd take pictures that showed only or mostly painted models but, well, it was a bit impossible.)

Opponent had:

Epic Sorscha
- Beast 09
- Devastator

Great Bears of Gallowswood
Maximum unit of Winterguard Infantry + Unit Attachment
Greylord Ternion
Kovnik Josef
Gorman diWulfe

And it happened so nicely that for starters I won the starting roll. Nothing much happened as I advanced cautiously as did my opponent and to cut short on the reporting nothing here's a picture from the end of my second turn. I decided to take the picture a bit farther away so that the level of my unpainted-ness wouldn't show that badly.

Anyway.

I had put up Psychic Vampire, Death March on Praetorians and Soul Slave on the Bronzeback.

You can also see in that picture my greatest single mistake in the whole game, which was to gravely underestimate the 6" move and 8" boosted hit sprays.

Now thinking back I should have been more courageous with Hexeris and put him in middle of praetorian because I was sitting anyway with Krea's animus that made both Hexeris and everyone within 2" of him difficult to hit with ranged attacks.

But leaving speculation behind, here's a picture that makes things a bit more clear:

I was thinking that I'd lure the winterguard to kill a few of my swordsmen, I was considering 5 or even 6 kills wouldn't be too bad because I had Aptimus Marketh close by. But the resulting bloodshed killed nine of my swordsmen and the bloodrunner master tormentor.

Epic Sorscha came there a bit too close and got two damage points in because of casting spells under my Psychic Vampire. In that picture you can see a bit more clearly my futile attempt at making a death trap to one of the heavy warjacks. Luckily opponent didn't take the bait because, uhh, well, after that situation we had a talk where I was reminded that Beast had thresher. So maybe risking two free strikes Beast could probably have taken down all my Cetrati and Bronzeback too. Eww.

My response:

You can't see epic Sorscha in that picture really well but she's behind those two huge warjacks.

First I moved my Basilisk Drake up there and sprayed a lone winterguard who was standing there. Opponent had messed order of activations a bit so Winterguard didn't have Iron Flesh on. Had they had it quite a few of my swordmen would have been saved but no. It was the critical inch there...

Anyway, basilisk managed to score a hit on Sorscha and deal 8 points in which was a success in my book.

Then I got a bit too greedy with Hexeris. I wanted to get the full use out of his feat so I moved him to a risky position with only little gain. I had upkept all my spells with Aptimus. I tried to make a potshot with Obliteration against Sorscha, I hit Devastator in front of her and got a blast damage roll against her. I boosted it of course but resulted in no damage.

Then my remaining few praetorians advanced to the winterguard and used the minifeat of theirs. I managed to kill four winterguards, all of which were turned into my zombies but not one of them managed to hit their fellows. Why is this feat always so glorious when I use it?

Then I tried to put some stuff in front of Hexeris to block the easy charges against him.



You can see how much that helped, though.

Sorscha was feeling brave and moved close-by and used her feat. Then she shot remaining two praetorians with her quad-iron. Also she took one point of damage from casting Boundless Charge on Beast 09 so she had only 6 points remaining.

Then came the Greylord Covenant and tried to spray the remaining models from Beasts path away and well, they succeeded. Partially at least.

They didn't manage to kill Aptimus Marketh (who did take 2 points in from one spray) but they did kill the most important blocking Cetrati with few lucky enough rolls. Sorscha's feat is annoying because it escalates the lucky rolls of the little performers to astonishing heights.

But they all died to Psychic Vampire though, the Greylords I mean.

Then came the remaining winterguard and shot Aptimus to pieces.

Funny thing in the last picture, however, is the fact that it's not the picture of the last turn of the game!

Beast put on Murderous which even froze Hexeris on the first strike which also dealt 28 points of damage. Twenty eight.

But I had two fury remaining for transfers and such damage was promptly dispatched to Bronzeback.

Next damage roll was double 1's and I sighed in joy. Double ones dealt, under epic Sorschas feat, only 10 points in.

Last damage roll did a bit more, I think 22 points in. Which was transferred to my undamaged Basilisk Drake and some damage even came back from there. But Hexeris survived.

My response:

I thought my only chance would've been either to destroy the undamaged Beast 09 and then charge Hexeris to Sorscha or get a line for my Cetrati to charge to Sorscha. The line that was there would have provoked too many free strikes from both Beast and few Great Bears.

Earlier in game I had been toying around with the idea of Beat Back on Hexeris' weapon.

I got all I could away from my Krea and one I got from reaving a dying Bronzeback. Then I had to cut myself all I was able to and it resulted in having 6 fury for Hexeris, who was then at only one hit point.

Hexeris shaked off the stationary (though this was done on the hindsight - both forgot he was frozen but fury was enough to backtrack that a bit) and upkept Death March that Aptimus had cast on Cetrati on the last turn he was still alive.

So I shuffled there a bit and Beat Back Beast 09 as far as I could to open a charge lane to Sorscha who was behind a fence (+2 to defense in melee). I think Hexeris even did a few points of damage in the way!

Well, I needed 9+ to hit and I managed to bring only two Cetrati in melee with her. One died to a free strike from a Great Bear.

Sorscha had 6 hit points left and had one focus left on her. So if even one of my attacks hit her she would die on a damage roll of 11 with four dice.

But as it happened, even if I could have "combined" their attacks rolls together I wouldn't have hit her. First Cetrati rolled 1 and 2 for hit. Second one rolled exactly same.

Then it was the last round of the game.

Sorscha Cycloned in and killed all the three beast handlers you can see there and then charged Hexeris herself. She managed to hit and let's have the picture speak for itself: (the faction dice you can see there is the charge damage roll)

Painted pool party

I finished painting all the new Sacred Pool characters for talisman.

They are pretty much the finest miniatures that Fantasy Flight has come up with Talisman. Even Cleric who is the smallest of the lot is pretty decent sized. At least when you compare her to the ancient but tiny weeny vampire that was introduced in last expansion...

But anyway, now I'm ready to play a game of Talisman. Hopefully it'll be soon enough.

17.11.2010 - Touched by Evil. Twice.

Today I played two games of Touch of Evil at friend's place.

First game we randomised the villain and got Necromancer up.

Heroes involved were Anne-Marie the Schoolteacher and Eliza the Witch Hunter.

All in all that game was incredibly brutal. Zombies were popping up from everywhere, which was most of the fun of course. It didn't actually help that Eliza couldn't win any fights but luckily Anne-Marie managed to get herself one book that made her able to beat zombies rather single-handedly. Their ears may have rotten off but still they dissolved at Anne-Maries words of wisdom.

However, there were just too many and Eliza lost way too many turns by getting Knocked Down during mystery phase.

The game was over almost before it even started. When Anne-Marie bit the dust while Eliza was lying there at the Town Hall there were twelve monsters on the board by then.

Because first game was so short we decided to play another against the same villain. We randomised heroes again though and this time we got Katarina the Outlaw and Isabella von Took.

That was an awesome game.

Again it was "zombies, zombies everywhere!" atmoshpere but this time the heroes fought back valiantly.

It did help that Isabella was able to ditch most of the random wounds the Living Dead gave her by losing Investigation Points. Also Katarina was blessed with plenty of wounds and good combat abilities.

However, Isabella had a bit too high opinion of Katarina because she was sure Katarina could take on all the zombies marching toward the Town Hall. By leaving the village and venturing off to monastery Katarina was left with around four or five zombies to take care off.

It should have been piece of cake for Katarina though but even zombies can roll triple sixes with four dice it seems.

But it was not all in vain, because Isabella found spiritual enlightenment from the monastery. She found an item that rised the Honor of her by +2, and earlier in the game Isabella had the courage to eat a really exotic meal with the Hanbrooks at their manor (roll 3 dice, 1 wound for every 1-2 rolled because it tastes so weird and for every 6 you gain one honor because you manage to eat it with a smile). Those together raised her Honor to equal Katarina's, which in turn managed her to train her skills so that Cunning and Spirit was equal to 8. (If they weren't 8 or more combined the villain would've been next to impossible to defeat).

However, because of nasty rolls from the zombies Katarina shared the fate of Eliza from earlier games. She lost quite a many turns because she got knocked down during mystery phase, but different from Eliza was the fact that she managed to kill her tormentors before she went down herself, giving her enough investigation points not to lose items when she got up.

When Isabella came back from Echo Lake things were looking nice on the zombie front, both had enough brawn to fend them off. But then a few mystery cards made things desperate.

First, came The Hour is Late, meaning it was guaranteed that the Shadow Track dropped every single turn. And once it's red you get two zombies every turn instead of one.

But once "Something Wicked" hit the board it was decided that there would be no other chance than to start Showdown as soon as we could. We had geared up nicely, though both were rolling only 5 dice on damage.

Well, Katarina had spent most of her game lying knocked down at Town Hall. It was a bit weird that she hadn't figured out already that villain was hiding exactly there.

Showdown started with Isabella with three investigation, four base wounds and 5 dice on damage and able to prevent 2. Katarina had four wounds too and no way to prevent them and 5 dice too.

Villain had 16 wounds and 7 damage dice (one of each being the "Good" Doctor)

Well, Villain rolled rather badly but we didn't exactly shine either.

First round Isabella gave Katarina a total of 13 dice to damage.

On third fight round Katarina died but Isabella was still saved but left with only one wound. Fourth fight round Isabella was dealt two wounds, both of which she prevented. Villain had two wounds and Doctor Manning with him, which still meant 7 fight dice.

Isabella had 5 fight dice and crossbow, which meant that as long as one of the dice she rolls is a 6, one additional wound is delivered.

Well, Isabella was splattered to the wall, but as her last effort she managed to... roll a 6. Only one 6. Which meant the villain was left with one wound that obviously was Doctor Manning.

So if a storyline is to be found, the Necromancer either fell and Doctor continued his reign of terror or if not, he healed Necromancer after the heroes were turned into hideous zombies...