Fine Art of Deployment

 Had a 50ss game of Malifaux. Here I have almost no pictures since my earlier camera broke and I needed to use manual settings on an unfamiliar SLR camera. I really do hope that new micro-SD memory card fixes the previous camera... because...

Anyway, the game.

Strategy: Break the Line with Wedge deployment

Schemes: Assassinate, Claim Jump, Outflank, Breakthrough, Vendetta

My list:

Molly & Necrotic Machine
Philip & Nanny
Forgotten Marshal with The Whisper
Hanged with Grave Spirit Touch
2x Crooligans
Night Terror
Rabble Riser

Pool:3
Schemes: Outflank, Breakthrough

Opponent:

Asami & Amanjaku
Ama No Zako
Fuhatsu
Lone Swordsman
Samurai with Trained Ninja (Claim Jump)
Akaname

Pool: 8
Schemes: Assassinate, Claim Jump

Turn 1:

As a fun fact, we had to flip for initiative four times because of even results. 

I was the defending player, so I placed my strategy markers on the furthest points of the middle line, right next to table edge. Along with Crooligans. Another two markers were in the middle where you'd expect.

Well then... there was this Obsidian grenade launcher called Asami on the other side of the Wedge deployment zone. With essentially three gatling gun attacks. 

So maybe I'll deploy as a hugeish blob in the middle of the board? What could possibly go wrong?

Looking back, I should have scrapped the idea of contesting middle of the board completely, and focused on the edges. But that's not what I did, and as a result Rabble Riser was at two health remaining, on fire. Philip and the Nanny at half hit points remaining, on fire. Night Terror and Molly, a couple of points in and Night Terror on fire, plus no soul stones remaining. Not to mention needing to waste three actions points to remove the Obsidian Oni before it activated.

Lone Swordsman was nearing my Crooligan on the left. Ama No Zako used double-walk and Dark Bargained itself to make an interact on a strategy marker on middle-right. Necrotic Machine ran towards marker on middle-left, because apparently there were no viable targets for Emergency Syrette and its heal...

Well, at least Molly had given Rabble Riser another activation, who charged Fuhatsu and Hanged managed to land its upgrade on Fuhatsu.

Turn 2:

Lone Swordsman butchers Crooligan with just one action point, and thus manages to lob strategy marker on the left towards my side of the board.

I jump at my chance to possibly kill Fuhatsu - Hanged places its anti-healing aura on, and lands a moderate wound to the henchman despite being on a negative damage flip. Fuhatsu is at three wounds now and unable to reliably heal!

Well, except that then the gunner hit Hanged with Daze trigger, and uses Scatter to place the aura well beyond 4" range. Fuhatsu is at five!

Rabble Riser (now at one health and burning) charged Fuhatsu and after attacking three times. After all the stones and whatnot, Fuhatsu is at three!

Molly then does a double walk and kills the henchman by telling him a real disturbing story.

All good, although Molly was now in the middle of board.

At least Ama No Zako had been busy with killing another Rabble Riser that Forgotten Marshal had summoned earlier, and Night Terror. 

Asami used her hair strike on Philip and Nanny, pulling them away from a strategy marker they were hugging. Then a gigantic arachnotaur appeared behind Molly and in-between the aforementioned strategy marker. 

Thus robbed of their meaningful target, Philip and Nanny charges Asami that had no Protected targets nearby. After all I had Red Joker in my hand, and while I had an inkling that I should have saved the card for something else, at least Asami was at five wounds remaining after Pram Ram.

Jorogumo then removes Philip & Nanny from the equation.

Both players score strategy, and Ten Thunders reveal Assassinate. Scores are 2-1 for Ten Thunders.

Turn 3:

Because I'm kind of worried Molly might soon kick the bucket, she has one last chance to start asking questions from Asami. Irreducible damage would have been nice, but opponent was at full hand. Asami gets to one health remaining from Molly's unending stream of questions, which incidentally was the same amount of health Molly had.

I still had one chance to kill Asami, and that was using By Your Side on Crooligan and delivering the killing blow. It was the heat of the moment that told me Asami would die to minimum damage. Yeah, sure, but that didn't count for soulstones...

Because of that miss-step I lost my chance to get a point off from Outflank this turn. 

Forgotten Marshal and Hanged were busy delivering strategy marker deeper into enemy lines, and because of that Resurrectionists scored their second point from strategy. Ten Thunders did, too, and revealed Claim Jump on Samurai.

Turn 4:

Starts with three models on my side, with Resurrectionists two points behind and opponent 100% scoring two end conditions, and 90% scoring full strategies. No point to continue. Victory for Ten Thunders.

I think it would have been a tough game for Molly even if I hadn't screwed up deployment so bad. My lack of hitting power didn't mesh well with an assortment of Armor +1-2, hard-to-would and hard-to-kill models.

In this particular game Grave Spirit Touch on Hanged was just dead weight - Fuhatsu didn't care about the Terrifying, and the thing didn't actually need regeneration either.

The Whisper on Forgotten Marshal was kind of dead weight too, but that was just because of pure chance - not once there was a high enough Crows coming up to do summoning.