Assasinate!!!

I played a game of Malifaux last night against RPA and his Pandora band. It had been a while, so I was a bit shaky on the rules, but he has been playing a little recently, and helped me out. To be fair though, both of us are still learning our factions, so we played for fun and had a nice time but neither of us probably played optimal with our crew.

we played a 25 SS game on RPA's beautiful Wild West town terrain. To spice things up, we had a train rolling through the middle of the board that caused damage if people were hit by it, or thrown into it. It moved a random card length each turn. It was very cinematic and fun. We each deployed on table halves (3x3) with the train running down the middle. Our factions were:

His Crew:
Pandora

Baby Kade

Candy

3x Sorrows

My Crew

Perdita

Santiago

Nino

Excecutioner

I love Perdita, but have found she is much better with soulstones, so I have been leaving one extra character at home to pump those up. I took Santiago b/c he is always a beast in my games, and b/c I love, love, love the model. Nino is a great, long range threat, and with buildings he's very good to post on a roof. Finally, I don't think the Excecutionar was the best choice for this game, but he's my newest model, and has some paint on him, so I wanted to try him out.

We both drew the Assasinate Strategy, meaing we got 4 VP for wiping out the opposing crew, and 2 VP for leaving only Master's alive. For my schemes, I took body guard (+1 VP if alive at end, +2 if you declare it) on Perdita since I knew I'd want to keep her alive and she's so fast, she can boogy out of danger. I felt confident enough with her to declare this scheme. I also took bodyguard on Santiago b/c he can heal damage and b/c he's such a beast when he get's wounded, I thought maybe RPA would ignore him. In retrospect, I should have taken one of my bodyguards on Nino, since he hid on the roof all game. I didn't find out RPA's other scheme, but he did declare break through, which meant he had to get more of his models in my deployment zone than I had. He had me outnumber 6 models to 4, I knew he was counting on that to help him.

- to start the game, we both advanced towards each other. I got Nino forward on a roof, and put Perdita by the Exec while Santiago came up by himself. I opted to spread out a little, as he could dump his guys anywhere he wanted in my deployment zone and win. He linked his sorrows and crew, and advanced. Below you can see santiago pushing up, the neverborn on on the otherside of the tracks.

- next turn the train got in our way. I contemplated rushing perdita across the tracks, but I knew it would make her very vunerable, and so help back. I did try to "obey" candy in to the train, which worked, but failed to cause any damage. Nino could get a bead on a sorrow, and blew it to hell. Pandora saw throught he gap in the train to Santiago, and caused him to blast himself, and run away. Candy failed to cause the Excecutionar to "self Loath" himself. Below, you can see the crews moving towards each other. Santiago is about to run, and Candy has not yet emmerged from the General Store.

- Next turn saw major action. RPA probably got a bit too anxious, and used Candy's ability to "phase" through the train. When she failed to make people run, this opened her and her Sorrow up to a combined barrage from Nino, the Exec, and Perdita. It didnt' go well for her.

- In round four, the train passed far enough for Pandora to come around the back. The highlight of the game was her attempt to get the Executionar to run and panic 3 times, and to fail them all. This was absolute luck from me, as I drew high cards and RPA drew low ones. The Exectionar even charged her, but failed to do any damage. Later in the round, I popped Baby Kade and Perdita's sorrow, and RPA conceeded.

It was a fun game. I got some lucky cards at critical times, and that swung things. We both could have played better, but we are still learning. It also took to long, but that was 100% my fault, I am rereading the rules again this weekend. Great time though.

Mo Lifaux Mo Problems

well, with school ending it's a pretty crazy time of year for a teacher. Add in the release of Red Dead Redemption, which is a great game, especially if you like Westerns, and I haven't found much time to paint. That being said, I have put a little paint to models, and thought I'd show off my latest WIP of my Malifaux Ortega crew. I am finishing up the box crew which leaves me with Nino and Papa Loco to paint. Nino does have some work done, but I've broken him off his base, so no pics of him right now. Papa Loco is about 85% done. Additinoally, I needed to beef my forces up for 35 Soutstone games, so I bought the Excecutinar. I figured he could give a little close combat punch to my army, and it's a pretty sweet Model. So without further adu, here they are. Sorry the pic quality is so poor, I am still trying to figure out how to take good pics.

Skin that smokewagon...

well, I've finished my latest malifaux figure, Santiago. Santiago, besides being a sweet duel wielding model, is an absolute beast. Well, actually, he's more like the Hulk. He starts out ok, but when you put some shots on him and damage him, he "hulks" out and turns into a bulldozing nightmare for your opponents. Just ask Rasputina. I really love how he plays, and it was nice to get him all painted up. I just need to do his base, but I'm going to base the whole family together at the end. As for my remaining three crew members, Papa Loco is about 75% done. Nino and the Executionar are both in the beginning stages, but I gotta be honest. I am not enjoying painting Nino, he's very weedy, but the Exec is an awesome model. I am loving painting all the skin. Should be fun!

updated pics

Hey all,

here is a few updated pics of my crew. I'd say these are about 90% done, including the work that needs done on the bases. Comments and Criticisms welcome. Hoping to take the Ortegas out for a spin sometime in the next 7-10 days!

Here we see Francisco, Perdita, and then a shot of them together!

enjoy.

Getting the Gang together

Started putting paint to model on my Malifaux gang. I am about halfway through the gang, and nobody is totally done, but I'm happy with how it's going. It's pretty fun to take a break from fantasy models and paint some wild west stuff.

I also really enjoy this game. I have taken my "Crew" out for a spin a couple times. The first game was a practice game, and the 2nd was a draw against RPA's Rasputina. The most recent adventure was last Thursday against RPA's Pandora crew. For Strategy I got Treasure Claim (or something like that) where by I had to grab a treasure in the middle. I could then score 4 VP's for possessing it at the end fo the game or 2 VP's for having it in my deployment zone. For my scheme, I took the one where noone is in my deployment zone, as I knew I'd be hanging out there guarding my treasure. RPA rolled up the recinoiter (I think that's the name) whereby he got 4 vp's for having 1 model in each table quarter, or 2 vps' for being in 3/4 quaters. He took the same scheme as me. We had diagonal corner deployment.

as the game started, I used Perdita to rush up to the treasure in a building and grab it. With fast ability and quick walk, she can cover 18 inches in a hurry. RPA advanced cautiously, not wanting to get in range of my guns too quickly, an d having to attatch woes to his crew. We also had some questions on what exactly Pandora and her mind tricks could do to my Ortegas, especially Pandora, and that hurt RPA's aggressiveness some. The rest of game involved me retreating to a building in my deployment zone, giving the treasure to Francisco hiding in the building, and then staging an Alamo-sytle defense of my table quarter. Some sharp shooting from Perdita and Nino took down Baby kade and Candy, and at this point, RPA conceeded, realizing I was going to get 6 VP's (Scheme and strategy) and at most, with his reduced forces he was going to get 5, and probably more like 2.

Overall, it was really fun. I think RPA's lack of expeirence with Pandora and our confusion on Immune to Influence vs. Pandora's tricks hurt him. there is little doubt in my mind that his crew will be a lot tougher when he gets some more experience with those guys. Regardless, we had beautiful terrain, and it was a fun game.

here's a couple shots of my crew as a work in process. I am happy with how they are looking, espeically on the table.

Malifaux part 2

Got another Malifaux game in. I took on RPA and his Raspitina gang. He took 'Tina, an big ice golem and 3 of the small ice golum. I was shocked by how good she is at casting, and how potent her ice magic can be. I took Pedita and the whole Oretga contingent. We both drew Assasinate for our main objective, and decided to not play any secondary ones to keep it simple.

RPA deployed in a cluster in the middle of his deployment zone and used his forces to project 'Tina's spells into me. For my part, I split my forces go around the hotel building in the middle of the battle field. I should have played more and cat and mouse with Perdita, but I didn't and ended up getting her shot up by ice magic and killed. I now had to get to 'Tina to get the draw. He contiuned to blast my forces and I lost Papa Loco and Nino while only taking out one of his small golems. However, the game saver for me was Santiago. He got blasted down to four wounds, and began hulking out. He used his improved skills and healing flips to mow down the Arcanist scum and pumped about 16 rounds into Rasputina's body. She didn't get up. It was amazing how good he becomes after being damaged, and his ability to stay on one wound and then healing flip was pretty sweet. He was definatly my MVP.

result - draw

spring break starts next week, and next Thursday we should have a chance to get all the big boys out as it looks like it might be an all day Malifaux fest! I will be sure to have pictures to go with the write-up.

Malifaux

Played my first game of Malifaux this past Wednesday. Well, to say I played a game is a little generous as we mostly just trotted out our models and gave it a shot to familarize ourselves with the rules and mechanics. We didn't play with any strategies or things like that. I took my Ortega gang, and my opponent, my friend Jason, took his proxied Nicodem force. We both sorta trundled forward, and in the end, I blasted him to pieces, taking very little damage myself. I think this has mostly to do with the ease of playing the Oretgas vs Nicodem for beginners. The highlight for me was Papa Loco running into the middle of Nicdems force and blowing up for huge damage on everyone, including himself. Great fun.

The game is really fun, and much different than other things I play. I was very happy to have bought it, and look forward to playing it some more in the near future.