A 50ss game of Malifaux over Vassal.
Strategy: Standard Turf War
Schemes: Assassinate, Detonate Charges, Dig Their Graves, Power Ritual, Outflank
My list:
Seamus2 with The Whisper & Copycat Killer
Madame Sybelle
White Rabbit Co
Mourner with Grave Spirit Touch
Dead Doxy
Gravedigger
Rotten Belle
Pool: 7
Schemes: Dig Their Graves, Outflank
Opponent had:
Youko Hamasaki & Chiyo
Bill Algren
Hinamatsu
Kabuki Warrior
2x Bunraku
Tanuki
Geisha
Pool: 3
Schemes: Detonate Charges, Outflank
Turn 1:
What a game. What a game.
I really liked the scheme pool on this one. You could plausibly bluff almost any of these schemes.
The map involved quite a few bottlenecks which divided Ten Thunders into two segments. Up were Kabuki Warrior, Chiyo, Tanuki and Geisha. Middle had another Bunraku, Hinamatsu, Youko and Bill on top of a container of some sort. Bottom part was, well, Bunraku.
Tanuki had placed a scheme marker in corner and for a long time I was quite certain opponent had picked Power Ritual.
Resurrectionists had a slightly more coherent line, with Copycat Killer holding high up, Gravedigger at the strategy marker and Madame Sybelle, Seamus, Rotten Belle and White Rabbit Co in the middle with Mourner not far behind. Seamus summoned another Dead Doxy, and the pair went to take the bottom flank. Non-summoned Doxy had been given a comfortable hat. Gravedigger had dropped a corpse and a scheme to my top corner, hinting at Dig Their Graves or Power Ritual.
Turn 2:
Rotten Belle moves forward and lures Hinamatsu to middle. And she didn't even have to spend any action points for it! Although she kind of did use six action points for it. Hinamatsu walked and charged her dead.
Since Kabuki had been measuring if he'd be able to charge Copycat Killer, I got concerned for his wellbeing. White Rabbit Co gave a hat to Seamus and beckoned Copycat to Gravedigger.
Chiyo runs to place a scheme on top outflank area and Mourner takes a double walk to get into a more relevant position with her aura. Bunraku runs to bottom outflank area, and Seamus puts on his aura and comes to tickle Hinamatsu. At least the puppet had to spend some resources to stay at five health remaining. The corpse of Rotten Belle wasn't all that rotten or even so belle, when Seamus rised a Dead Dandy from the marker.
Dead Doxies manage to get the hatted Doxy to bottom outflank area, and even place a real scheme marker hugging the table edge. I had been worried on where Bill Algren was about to go, and he came to dance with Doxies instead of the (g)rave party in the middle.
A Bunraku and Kabuki Warrior came to engage near the center while Tanuki and Geisha were still far from action. Gravedigger continued to secure Dig Their Graves end condition and interacted with strategy marker as well.
Very last action for me was to take a double walk with Copycat Killer and engage Chiyo with Seamus, who also had a comfortable hat.
Scores go 1-2 for Resurrectionists when both score strategy and Doxy and Seamus both lost their hats at outflanking maneuver.
Still looking like a normal, regular game for sure.
Turn 3:
I knew I was in for some rough time when in the first fourteen cards there were eight severes and only one card below six.
Or maybe they didn't all go when Hinamatsu was mutilating Madame. Perhaps some were used when Bunraku attacked her. But that was only after White Rabbit had given a fancy hat for Madame and beckoned Kabuki Warrior away to do something distracting with Seamus, who was at the top outflank area.
Madame's survival was paramount, so Mourner walked and charged Youko and surprisingly claws her for some damage. Now Youko would need to spend possibly even two actions to get to Sybelle, and perhaps Bill would reconsider repositioning himself from bottom.
Tanuki healed Hinamatsu back to full. Seamus activates Urban Legend aura and spends remaining actions beating Chiyo with a bouquet. Not his best moment, nearly killing a kid with a bouquet. And only nearly. Kabuki Warrior charges Seamus and invades his personal space to such an extent that Copycat Killer is not able to place himself in melee with Chiyo. But at least he had one focused stat 5 attack versus Chiyo's defense of 4 and remaining health of one? Yeah, that he had, and... missed.
Yeah, but now there was a nice aura of automatic damage in the middle. And while scoring Dig Their Graves with Madame Sybelle's hat would probably mean Sybelle dying next turn, I was ready to make that trade.
Except Madame Sybelle missed melee attack and missed Beckoning Call. Dead Dandy missed with his fancy cane, but at least landed a solid biting insult with Urban Legend triggering a damage on the puppet. Sheesh... that was already four mostly wasted action points.
It was somewhat of a comfort when Bill Algren with fast condition tried to challenge the summoned Dead Doxy, failed and then heroically intervened the other Dead Doxy. Instantly he saw the error of his ways and regretted all the wrongs he had done when Doxy flipped masks.
Bunraku at bottom had placed a scheme marker and went to engage summoned Doxy. By now it was clear that opponent had Outflank. Good thing that I had two 3" pushes available with stat 5 versus wp 5, the other of which would be with negative fate for Bill's defense.
Failed, all failed.
What is happening in here?!
I feel like I had solid moves planned, but really - all that I actually achieved this turn was to strike a kid in the face with a bouquet and insult a wooden puppet! Well alright, there was that attack by Mourner against Youko that did a little damage, but that damage wasn't impactful.
Scores even out to 3-3 when both players get strategy and Ten Thunders reveals their outflank.
Turn 4:
Grave Spirit be praised! Resurrectionists won the initiative. Seamus activated, and thanks to The Whisper I knew I had no masks in initiative flip, in starting hand or three upcoming cards. As if I needed those soulstones anyway. So Seamus was able to take Madame Sybelle by the hand and lead her away from Hinamatsu. He activated Urban Legend with bought Alone in the Dark and attacked Bunraku once, missing. Second attack went to Hinamatsu as I didn't want to attack Df 7 Bunraku. Guess what? It was a miss.
Not a problem. There were plenty of hats where they came from! White Rabbit Co. came to offer their services immediately and tried to use beckoning call to move Bunraku to give it distracted and staggered. Madame Sybelle's scarlet temptation even gave negative fate for Wp 4 Bunraku. Yeah, miss. Needle and thread? Miss. So that's already seven action points of aggression towards the Bunraku, out of which only one insult hit home.
Gravedigger charges Bunraku next and misses. Last action goes to heal Madame Sybelle, and at least that was a decent severe. Next challenger was Mourner, who lands On Your Heels with Feed On Grief against Bunraku. Shocking. I actually hit with an attack and dealt one (1) damage point. Well, it was positive for me and negative for Bunraku. Although that doesn't guarantee anything as I learned in this game. Claw attacks scored On My Feels when they... missed. Ten action points. Two successes.
By then Tanuki had not activated, but the lucky On Your Heels made it possible for me to block any easy line of sights to Bunraku. During the Bunraku beatings Bill Algren had killed Dead Doxy with one strike and Kabuki Warrior had done the same to Copycat Killer.
Things were growing more desperate by the minute. But all was not lost! Bunraku was at half health remaining, so Madame Sybelle could get straight flip against it despite some distractions. Yeah, miss.
Alright. We still got one more chance. Kill Bunraku with last attack and score Pulled Here and There. Two fate cards. Bleeder Lash, go! AND LOOK AT THAT! Indeed Masks came up with a decent card of 10 and opponent had 9 and Red Joker was still in my deck. With original stats the attack would have hit. But because of extra defense from Bunraku's Df-trigger, the attack missed by one. Just for giggles Madame Sybelle tries Undivided Attention and flips Rams for healing trigger. But card value if five and needed six. Such a bad luck was no longer even annoying, it was straight out hilarious. Twelve actions, two successes. Two points of damage done by me, one by opponent.
But as it happened, Hinamatsu activated and went to attack Dead Dandy, failing her attacks. But then she takes Aggressive Stance and things take a surreal turn. Both players had taken notice of the absurd levels of bad luck and tiny cards Resurrectionists had got and deck was nearing empty. High cards were expected when Madame Sybelle, Mourner, Seamus, White Rabbit Co and Dead Dandy had to take Willpower 13 checks of gain Distracted. Not a single card was above four! They all failed!
Seriously? At this point one couldn't help but audibly laugh at the situation.
Dead Dandy activates next and turns a scheme Tanuki had placed into a corpse.
Throughout the turn I had struggled to get required suits for my cards for anything to work. To end the train wreck of a turn with at least a psychic satisfaction of insulting a cute little furry, Dead Dandy declared a distracted Biting Insult at Tanuki.
And the thing is... Biting insult has no triggers at all. And that was where I managed to flip the Red Joker!
That really broke the bank and my stomach muscles still hurt from laughing spasms as I write this.
Turns out that yeah, it can get a lot, lot worse.
We didn't play fifth round when scores went to 3-4 for Ten Thunders from strategy.
I had relatively secure one point coming but zero chances of any additional points, while Ten Thunders had Outflank with 100% certainty and quite likely Detonate Charges and fourth strategy point.
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