My Very First Ashen Core

 A 50ss game of Malifaux 3rd edition, with the addition of terrain scaling and jumping from 4th.

Strategy: Standard Raid the Vaults

Schemes: Take Prisoner, Sweating Bullets, Information Overload, Power Ritual, Let Them Bleed

My list:

Leveticus, Pariah & 2x Hollow Waif
Rusty Alyce
Ashes and Dust
Marlena Webster
Vee
Soul Battery
Scavenger
Abomination

Pool: 2
Schemes: Sweating Bullets (Ashes and Dust), Power Ritual

Opponent had:

Kastore, Awakened & Marathine
Barbaros
Gwyll
Leech King
White Eyes
Cavern Nephilim
Urnbearer

Pool: 3
Schemes: Sweating Bullets (Barbaros), Information Overload

Turn 1:

Amalgam was quite evenly distributed along their deployment. From left to right I had Hollow Waif, Ashes and Dust, covering the bottom-left corner. Ashes left a scheme marker there, tool Rusty Alyce and Marlena were just beyond bottom-left corner's strategy marker, while Leveticus went already to cast a useless Soul Harvest. My idea was to limit regeneration overheals that way, but only Leech King actually cared about that.

Scavenger, Abomination and Soul Battery were around the centerpoint. Vee placed a scheme marker to bottom-right corner and took a walk forward, as I had no targets for intel gathering. Last Hollow Waif was at the right table edge, biding her time.

Most of Neverborn Resurrectionists walked and concentrated, plus had their overheal shenanigans. White Eyes was coming from the left, hugging table edge there. Cavern Nephilim was next, inside a ruined building. Leech King was behind the building, near  top-left strategy marker and Urnbearer next o Leech King. 

Gwyll went on top of building, next to top-right strategy marker. Kastore was a bit further on the same building, having enthralled Scavenger to charge Soul Battery. Barbaros was past the building, so all Returned henchmen and master was in top-right quarter, and Ashes and Dust for sweating bullets was in bottom-left corner. Yay.

Marathine had gone to place a scheme marker past centerline near center-right strategy marker.

Turn 2:

Leech King was able to summon a Giant Leech right next to Leveticus, who did two pings of Soul Harvest next, and finished off the Giant Leech with a lucky melee attack.

Cavern Nephilim does an Echolocation to Marlena, blasts damage to Alyce and uses its second action to maul her. White Eyes walked, charged Ashes and Dust and leaped to Rusty Alyce to attack her, too. And lands a Red Joker on damage. Damage block reduced that by two, armor by one and one was transfered to Marlena. It felt wild to mark only two boxes of damage from Red Joker.

Alyce has to stay in melee with both models to contest bottom-left marker... although I don't quite know why. I guess I still had some hopes to deny Returned a point. As even Vee took a walk, Gathered Intel for Soul Battery, and didn't get tomes for her own burial. Soul Battery rant to contest bottom-left strategy marker, too.

Urnbearer comes to contest center-left marker that was held by only Leveticus, so Ashes and Dust had to walk and charge her, not doing much. 

Kastore enthralls Abomination to slam a bush in front of it and charged the thing. Abomination survived, but was finished off by Barbaros.

Scavenger was staggered and stunned from last turn, so he wasn't able to do much.

Hollow Waif slammed a part of the hedge maze and takes a shot at Kastore, not doing anything.

Gwyll exists, staying disguised on top of a building.

End phase thing of Kastore drops third required marker for Information Overload reveal, and both crews get their strategy point for a 2-1 lead for Kastore.

Turn 3:

Bottom-left quarter sees some fierce combat. It takes the combined efforts of Rusty Alyce, Marlena Webster and Hollow Waif to finally kill the gravely injured White Eyes. Soul Battery doesn't do much of anything, but he does explode into two soulstones. 

Cavern Nephilim and White Eyes attacked Rusty Alyce, so much so that I was almost out of soulstones again despite Soul Battery's sacrifice. Last to join the fray was Kastore himself, who took a double walk and charged Marlena. I don't blame him, both Rusty Alyce and Marlena were starting to be low on health - but so were Cavern Nephilim and Kastore himself after a lucky shot from Scavenger's shotgun and Hollow Waif's gun.

Leveticus walked, pinged Leech King and Urnbearer for a point of damage, and killed Urnbearer with a strike. Leech King charged him, and so did Barbaros. Well, technically he charged Ashes and Dust, but that inbuilt Shove Aside is a thing. After Barbaros was done, both Ashes and Dust and Leveticus were low on health. Well, Ashes wasn't that low, but a bad Cage Fighter coupled with Black Blood might rob me of Sweating Bullets. So, Ashes and Dust just had to concentrate and shrug.

Scavenger and Vee were controlling center-right, Leveticus and Ashes and Dust the center-left. Cavern Nephilim had bottom-left all by itself, so both players got their strategy. Both also reveal Sweating Bullets, so scores go 4-3 for Kastore.

Turn 4:

Somehow Marlena Webster survived the onslaught of Kastore, and that spelled doom for Kastore. Sure, Returned master took kind of a risk, but Marlena was like down to three health or so - she should have been removed with four master action points. 

But instead Rusty Alyce and Leveticus make the Returned master Gone. 

Buuut... after Leech King and Barbaros were done, Leveticus was down to one health remaining and Ashes and Dust was transformed to Ashen Core and Dust Storm. 

Cavern Nephilim did a scheme and went on top of tower, still contestin bottom-left marker. This eventually forced Marlena to go contest it.

Vee had walked and healed Leveticus, and was contesting the center-right marker with Gwyll. Where did Scavenger go? Well, he was able to score Masks with Weird Device to get an 8" teleport, then walk to control top-right strategy marker.

This evened scores to 4-4.

Turn 5:

Barbaros sure enough killed Leveticus with bonus action and charged to beat Vee. Gwyll went to place a scheme, contesting center-right marker, but did so near enough Vee that she was able to engage both henchmen for Sweating Bullets.

Rusty Alyce walked within 6" of centerpoint and tried to finish off Leech King, but failed to do so. Instead the King engaged her. Giant Leech was also summoned.

Hollow Waif at one health remaining went on top of the tower where Cavern Nephilim was, but it took both of her actions. Fortunately Cavern Nephilim failed to kill her with one attack, so it wasn't able to drop a scheme. 

That was pretty much the last deciding factor, as now Marlena and Scavenger were able to deny Kastore the Information Overload.

Outcasts got Power Ritual reveal, and both players got Sweating Bullets end condition for a 6-5 victory for Leveticus.