And Trust Was Broken Forever

 A 50ss game of Malifaux on Vassal.

Strategy: Corner Cloak and Dagger

Schemes: In Your Face. Take Prisoner, Hold Up Their Forces, Ensnare, Death Beds

My list:

Pipering Hamelin & 3x Stolen
Nix
Benny Wolcomb
Disease Containment Unit
Midnight Stalker
Rat Catcher
2x Winged Plague

Pool: 5
Schemes: In Your Face, Ensnare

Opponent had:

Jakob Lynch & Hungering Darkness
Kitty Dumont
Mr. Graves
Mr. Tannen
2x Illuminated
Beckoner
Tanuki

Pool: 3
Schemes: In Your Face, Hold Up Their Forces

Turn 1:

So we got a rather challenging map for this strategy. We picked our masters before map, so I was stuck with slow Hamelin2 & Benny machine. But hey! One of the one occasions where two Winged Plagues might be a real option.

Well, Rat Catcher, Benny, Winged Plague and Nix managed to place the required scheme marker for Benny with the help from Hamelin's Obey. But that was for the next turn. 

Because the buildings were blocking such a part of my corner of the table, most of my crew was stuck inside the bottom-right quarter. Nix took the lead, with Hamelin nearby. The piper managed to stun an Illuminated, woohoo. 

One Winged Plague was going up towards second strategy marker from top, and Midnight Stalker did Midnight Stalker things and got within easy distance of top-right strategy marker. 

At least it wasn't any easier for Honeypot. 

Mr. Graves was going towards bottom-left strategy marker with both Illuminated, Mr. Tannen and Lynch nearby. Tanuki offered Mr. Graves some foul-mouthed motivation. 

Kitty had given most of Honeypot crew some extra brilliance  and went right from their top-left corner deployment. Beckoner was running towards rightmost marker, while Hungering Darkness was the last model to activate from Honeypot. The biggie didn't go too far to the right and was nearing the second strategy marker from top. 

Turn 2:

Benny did a bunch of rats. This was when I realized I would not be able to Obey rats to forming a Rat King. So the earliest turn to get a Rat King was... three. Uh oh. 

A Winged Plague in south walked for a bit in between two houses and placed a scheme for potential Ensnaring of, say, Mr. Graves. This might have been a possibility if it wasn't for Jakokb Lynch shooting Benny Wolcomb with a Hungering Darkness. A perfect target to ensnare!

Well, at least if the Winged Plague hadn't just placed a scheme marker tad too far from Hungering Darkness. Hamelin had to activate, remove the scheme, obey Disease Containment Unit to interact a scheme marker and obey Nix to disengage. Would opponent activate Hungering Darkness next, or would Nix have time to scheme?

Yeah, opponent did just that. Hungering Darkness had been stunned so it's activation was not all that impressive, but I missed my opportunity to Ensnare. Fun fact: had Benny not cooked up a bunch of rats, I would've got the scheme.

Nix placed a scheme anyway and attempted a Bleeding Disease on Jakob's totem, failing at that. 

Kitty Dumont went to pick intel, and Winged Plague was able to claim one, too. Midnight Stalker followed suite, leaping to strategy marker and retreating behind house. Beckoner was able to run unopposed within 1" of the top-right strategy marker. 

Below, Mr. Graves took the bait and attacked another Winged Plague. Bait was... effective. Too effective, in fact, when Mr. Graves was able to pin down the plague bat with his fencepost in one strike. That lead to gross explosion, which enabled the dreaded kids to target Mr. Graves. 

Surely enough the spitting kids wreaked havoc once again. One of the kids spat two points off of Hungering Darkness, and another did a severe on Mr. Graves. Unfortunately heal from Tanuki was severe, too. 

Illuminated were just running towards action or concentrating, except for the one that picked up intel. Mr. Tannen kept taking his short, gentlemanly Mv4 walks towards action, still not quite getting Plague within Betrayal and Delirium aura. 

Both players scored strategy for a 1-1 tie.

Turn 3:

Thanks to spawns from last turn, opponent started with eight pass tokens. Hamelin1 certainly manages this a lot better.

Hungering Darkness started beating Benny right off the bat. Damage was being done. Soulstones were being used. And yet, Benny fell down to one health remaining. But I got my Ensnare. Woo hoo.

Fortunately I had plenty of  tomes in my hand, so Disease Containment Unit was able to offer some field meds for Benny, getting him back to four health. Throwing flame at Mr. Graves was a useless affair. 

Beckoner snatched a point of intel and activated pleasant distractions. Which was troublesome, as Midnight Stalker had a point of Brilliance from start of game. 

Benny tried to save his butt just by activating, trying to poke Hungering Darkness with his rusty sword. He did a whole lot of nothing, but at least got two points of Shielded from ending his activation.

By now Hungering Darkness had accumulated seven points of Blight, and opponent realized the risks involved there. Lynch drew his derringer, loaded it up and shot Tanuki in the back, teleporting Hungering Darkness into safety. Remaining attacks went into shooting Benny with a modicum of success. 

Rat Catcher managed to give moldy cheese for the remaining Winged Plague, which prompted Kitty to pick up intel in haste. As this brought strategy marker within interaction distance of the Winged Plague, it did just that and flew to charge Beckoner. No hits.

Illuminated models started to activate. They walked and used Scintillating Clouds on my swarm of weak models. After surviving the first volley, I got scared for the safety of my rats and formed a Rat King in haste.

Surprisingly, Benny survived this turn. He only took two attacks from Hungering Darkness, two shots by Jakob, two Scintillating Clouds and some despicable promises to face. However, he was at one health remaining, so he couldn't have done it without four soulstones he had to use, and Shielded+2 he got. 

Mr. Graves killed a rat, and kids kept spitting at the burly bouncer. Tanuki ran to bottom-left strategy marker and healed Mr. Graves with well placed albeit foul words. 

Both players scored strategy, and Outcasts had also revealed Ensnare for a 3-2 lead.

Turn 4:

I had a suspicion Ten Thunders might have In Your Face, as they had been focusing so much on Benny. My plan was to activate Benny first and run like hell. 

Too bad Ten Thunders won the initiative, and Benny was in a precarious position. Cheat? Take a point of damage. Flip a one? Take a point of damage. Yeah, he didn't survive Lynch's activation and opponent was able to declare their In Your Face. 

But it got worse. Quickly. Remaining shots went to Nix, who was brought down to one health remaining. 

So it was time for emergency medikit. Disease Containment Unit activated, pushed a couple of rats, Nix as far from danger as possible while also healing the dog for two, plus Hamelin a little closer to Mr. Graves. She was also able to burn Mr. Graves for a bit. 

Grave mister didn't run away. He had had enough of this trenchcoat that had an uncanny resemblance to three kids on top of each other. He struck Rat King with fencepost and brought it down to one health remaining. Not good news with regards to Black Blood. But some sacrifices had to be made. That was my six action points standing there, having only contributed to game one action point away from Mr. Graves.

Hamelin activated and did two Bleeding Diseases on the bouncer, killing him and Rat King in the process. In Your Face, I guess. Last action was another Bleeding Disease on Tanuki, bringing it down to one health and even stunning the little... thing. 

Mr. Tannen got furious over the death of his accomplice, and decided to come and knife a puppy. If you can call Nix a puppy. And wow, look at that. Back to one health remaining. 

I figured Nix didn't have much to lose, so he walked past Mr. Tannen and attempted to Drink Spirit. It succeeded, but both Illuminated and Mr. Tannen passed those tests with impunity. There goes nothing, Nix thought and bit Mr. Tannen. No ones out of deck, and attack hit without boosts. Mr. Tannen had only two points left after some kids had shown their appreciation, so both of the undercover Neverborns went down in the same turn. 

Tanuki was horrified and shivered like only a tiny, drunken critter can shiver in terror. It picked up intel and ran as far as possible from anyone's line of sight.

Kitty picked another intel after Rat Catcher had already activated. Winged Plague and Midnight Stalker tried to tickle the Beckoner, but Beckoner survived. 

Soon enough it became apparent why Illuminated didn't kill Nix.

Ten Thunders scored strategy and all their schemes, Hold Up Their Forces included. Outcasts got only In Your Face, so tides had turned into 4-5 lead for Ten Thunders.

Turn 5:

There was some hope in Nix not dying, because opponent needed a few of my models alive for Hold Up Their Forces. 

However, Illuminated wanted to pet the dog and they petted it hard. Real hard. Nix died before he was able to activate.

My brain had an accidental moment of flatulence when Midnight Stalker had already leaped away from Beckoner's melee range last turn. I kept thinking that I needed a high enough Masks for a leap to leap away and get to Ten Thunders deployment zone for In Your Face end condition. 

My plan was to start sacrificing children. They ran and charged and did whatever to block Illuminated from moving to engage Disease Containment Unit and Hamelin. Waves after waves children were turned into rats. Rats kept dying both because of my own attempts and the enemy.

However... it wasn't Illuminated that went to engage Hamelin and D.C.U. It was Hungering Darkness. With Looming Darkness trigger. A continuous barrage of derringer shots kept raining on Disease Containment Unit, and without the armor she would have died. 

But Hungering Darkness needed to be dealt with as soon as possible. So, Hamelin activated. He failed to stun the totem because scaary, but then proceeded to use Bleeding Disease on Hungering Darkness three times. Three, because on failed.

This left me out of options to even try to get both Ensnare and third point of strategy. Strategy seemed like safer bet, and Winged Plague, Rat Catcher and Disease Containment Unit managed to claim the intel required. 

Midnight Stalker ran to Ten Thunders deployment effortlessly, but so did Kitty Dumont. 

Game ended in 6-6 draw, with Ten Thunders getting only In Your Face and Outcasts strategy and In Your Face.

Only Tanuki lost.

Having been shot in the back by its own master, trust was broken forever.