Honeyed Rats

A friend visited me for a few of days. For starters we had a couple of games of Malifaux.

First game. Strategy: Turf War.

Kirai Ankoku + The Whisper & Ikiryo
Datsue Ba
Lost Love
2x Onryo
Gaki
2x Seishin
Shikome + Grave Spirit's Touch

Pool: 7

Schemes: Deliver A Message, Outflank

Opponent had:

Jakob Lynch & Hungering Darkness (Claim Jump)
Kitty Dumont
Mr. Tannen
Mr. Graves
3x Illuminated

Pool: 1

Schemes: Claim Jump, Outflank

Turn 1

We had an action packed game right from the start. Hungering Darkness, after being pushed by Kitty Dumont, went and interacted with the middle turf marker. Mr. Graves came to offer his bulky presence as emotional support.

Ikiryo charged Hungering Darkness and accomplished little. Shikome with upgrade, on the other hand, went for Mr. Graves and flipped a red joker on damage, cutting right through Mr. Graves's Hard to Kill.

Lost Love and Gaki interacted with turfs on my side, and two Illuminated did the same for enemy.

Kirai summoned a Shikome and fired & forgot it against an Illuminated.

Turn 2

Ten Thunders wins the initiative, which is unfortunate since Tanuki was able to heal Mr. Graves back to Hard to Kill threshold.

Shikome and Onryo die in the middle, while Ten Thunders only have to grieve the passing of Mr. Graves.

After enemy deals with the Shikome that was summoned last turn, Kirai summons another one which gets an extra Walk action from Datsue Ba. Enough for it to score Deliver A Message.

Gaki and Onryo place themselves to score Outflank. 

Scores go 3-1 for resurrectionists.

Turn 3

Summoned Shikome gives opponent a headache on the top-left quarter of the board. Eventually an Illuminated dislodges itself and manages to charge Kirai, who redirects one attack to Lost Love.

Kitty Dumont and an Illuminated tease Gaki, who survives. 

Opponent forces Kirai to activate before Hungering Darkness does, so she only summons a Shikome this turn. The one Illuminated who charged Kirai survived attacks from the master herself, the summoned Shikome, Datsue Ba and even a Seishin. Talk about wasted action points.

Then Hungering Darkness butchers Ikiryo. 

Ten Thunders scores Claim Jump and a strategy point, evening scores to 3-3.

Turn 4

Kitty finishes Gaki and speeds towards turf marker on bottom-left, that had earlier been neutralized. Illuminated closes in towards a turf marker on bottom-right.

And why not. I managed to get only one summoned Onryo even remotely close there.

But at least I had the numbers advantage on top, where Kirai had also summoned a new Ikiryo.

Datsue Ba gave walk action for both Ikiryo and Shikome, who then orchestrated a neutralizing of top-left turf marker and claiming it for Resurrectionists. 

Mr. Tannen charges Ikiryo, and due to some amazing flips he manages to shank the spirit down to two health remaining. 

Resurrectionists score their second strategy point, going 4-3 in their favor.

Turn 5

Ten Thunders won the initiative, and an Illuminated went and interacted with a turf marker on my table half. Kitty Dumont walked up the hill and interacted with the marker I had twice already neutered. And opponent had kept the center since turn 1, so strategy looked grim.

Shikome tried to tie up Lynch for other models to deliver a message to him. Lynch, however, disengaged and shot Ikiryo dead. But, most importantly, Lynch had now activated. If only Mr. Tannen wasn't engaging Onryo, who'd be able to place the required scheme marker for Deliver Message...

Datsue Ba charges Tannen. Manipulative foils her plans, but at least she manages to scare Hungering Darkness and give him -2 Mv. This way the beast was pretty much guaranteed to stay in the middle to score Claim Jump end condition.

Kirai moves closer and uses Spirit Barrage on Mr. Tannen and succeeds to kill him. Unfortunately I had wasted my last soulstone on giving this attack masks. Because now I wasn't able to summon an Urami to deny point for Claim Jump.

Game looked like a draw.

Then Onryo close to the Illuminated on my table half activates. It uses the adversary action on Illuminated and succeeds. Then it charges and does three points of damage.

So now it only needed a severe injury to finish the Ten Thunders minion. With two negative modifiers to damage flips I can guarantee it wasn't a severe injury. It was severe+1, neutralizing the strategy marker.

The other Onryo interacted close to Lynch, and scores went 5-4 for Resurrectionists. And all thanks to this one lucky Red Joker.

So. In the end opponent had killed two Shikomes, two Ikiryos, two Seishin, one Gaki and one Onryo. Eighty percent of my starting number.

Second game. Strategy: Corrupted Idols. Corner Deployment.

Hamelin & 3x Stolen
Nix
Mad Dog Brackett + Wanted Criminal
2x Rat Catcher
Rat King
2x Malifaux Rat

Pool: 6

Schemes: Ouflank, Harness Ley Lines

Opponent the same list as earlier, except for chosen schemes of course.

Jakob Lynch & Hungering Darkness (Claim Jump)
Kitty Dumont
Mr. Tannen
Mr. Graves
3x Illuminated

Pool: 1

Schemes: Breakthrough, Harness Ley Lines

Turn 1

Pretty much only positioning happening here, as the crews are so far between, and all of the strategic points are also on the middle line. Hamelin had a nasty bottleneck with difficult terrain, but at least the rats jumped easily over with Rat Catcher and Unclean Influence.

Turn 2

Kitty throws a corrupted idol on my side of the board to a position I can't possibly reach. But I try to make the enemy models (Kitty, Mr. Graves, Illuminated) to at least pay for their actions. Focused Mad Dog Brackett and charges, toting his Chesterfield Shotgun. I even spend a soulstone to get extra blast markers. Nope. Nothing.

And second action, nothing. At least he blew up some destructible terrain. Woo hoo. Thirteen soulstones well spent.

Lynch shoots Hungering Darkness into melee with Mad Dog Brackett, which forces Hamelin to activate before Darkness does. He lures the incorporeal monster nearby, advances and then charges the beast just to save Private Brackett.

A Rat Catcher runs into base contact with the idol on top-left, but is unable to throw it anywhere.

Ten Thunders score strategy, Outcasts nothing. 

Turn 3 

Nix lodges itself within range of Kitty, Illuminated and Mr. Graves.

Lynch shoots Hungering Darkness into melee with Mad Dog again, and again Hamelin lures it away from melee with Mad Dog to melee with himself. "I guess", thought Hungering Darkness and began to maul Hamelin, taking some half of his hit boxes away.

Rat King gnaws at a scheme marker and walks to the strategy marker Kitty threw on second turn to lob it back to the side it belong. Rat Catcher on top-left throws another marker on Ten Thunders' side, and puts also a scheme marker. Malifaux Rats that had been accompanying him tried to slow down the Illuminated.

Despite Mr. Graves, Lynch and even Tanuki attacking Mad Dog Brackett, the bandit didn't go down. Well, he was at one hit point remaining and had spend two thirds of my saved up soulstones... 

Outcasts score a strategy point.

Turn 4 

Mad Dog dies this turn, and so does Nix, but I believe the doggie bought his points back by wasting a lost of action points from opponent. Sweet Taste of Failure is rather infuriating rule, at least for the opponent.

Hamelin decides to try and save the "flanks" so to say, and engaged Lynch, Mr. Tannen and lured Hungering Darkness into melee with him. And strangely enough, Hamelin endured. 

Round had relatively few attacks going on, because both players were laying scheme markers down like it's the end of days. (Although... Why would you lay down scheme markers during end of days?)

Both players score a strategy point and Harness Ley Lines.

Turn 5 

With toil and trouble Ten Thunders remove all of Hamelin and all of his children from the board. My Rat King scurried to table corner bottom-right, as it wasn't feeling exactly safe with its one hit point remaining.

Rat Catcher on top had to disengage from Illuminated, and succeeded eventually and reached that hallowed 3" from the corner edge to score Outflank.

Opponent didn't have the action points to deal with these two, because he wanted to secure end condition of Harness Ley Lines.

Which he did. 

There it is. 

First draw of my history with Malifaux. Scores went 4-4. Outcasts had killed zero models from Ten Thunders, while Ten Thunders had removed all but two Rat Catchers and a Rat King.