Quick recap: Malifaux is a story-based miniatures skirmish game where factions battle it out for the resources of the magical world on the other side of a mysterious breach that was opened in Europe in the late 19th century. The Guild is the faction comprised of the European governments that seek to control access to that world. There are twelve “titans” in the magical world that manifest as spirits that form alliances with the humans that travel to that world; the titan December resides within former Guild prisoner Rasputina. Lady J – Lady Justice – is the head of the Guild’s “Death Marshalls”, a squad of death dealers charged with rooting out necromancers. After a epic battle left Lady J blind and weakened, and her lover and most of her squad dead, Justice started using necromancy herself in order to sense the world around her and bring back her dead squad to continue their mission.
Okay, that was a not-so-quick recap, but that’s where we start.
My opponent’s husband actually worked with Wyrd Games on this fourth edition and has played many, many games, and so I came into the game not expecting to win (and I didn’t), but Malifaux is just fun for the stories you tell, even if winning isn’t going to happen.
Deployment was flank (opposite corners), strategy was Plant Explosives (all units carry a bomb that must be placed on the opponent’s half of the table).
My team is same as last: Raspy (Abominable), Mara, Ceddra, Snow Storm, Bashe, Silent One, December Acolyte, and Blessed of December.
Opponent’s team was: Lady J 2, Judge, frickin’ pinata, some rider, some other minions. I’ll be glad when the app is released on iOS so that I can look at my opponent’s cards and recap the match.
Turn 1 I had the Reshape the Landscape scheme, which just means putting four or five markers of my choice entirely on the enemy side of the board. That’s easy for December; just plop some ice pillars there and call it done. We tied on the strategy and my opponent did not make their scheme, so 2-1 me.
Turn 2 had Lady J use her crew’s powers to drop remains markers to good effect, as she took control of my beater, Bashe, and borrowed his big attack to strike out at any of my units that were within six inches of a remains marker.
I’d slightly overextended, so Blessed went down fast, and I soon lost Ceddra and Rasputina while trying to recover. Bashe was killed last once he had served Lady J’s dark purpose to kill his own team. With my big hitters gone, I conceded after the second turn.
There were things I could have done better. I tend to leave opposing masters alone; I should have been pushing back with the ice pillars, forcing her to deal with them instead of letting her take control of my team. I made an early mistake where I used Bashe’s Eternal Hunger ability to pull him toward one of my ice pillars, removing it from the board. It was not really necessary to do that, and that pillar was empowering Blessed. This move severely weakened that position, and Lady J punished both Blessed and Bashe because of it. That may have been the key mistake that lost me the game. I was left with only a strong left corner position, but with Lady J able to use Bashe’s bite attack essentially anywhere, even that wasn’t safe, and I lost Ceddra and could not trigger her Demise ability (to instantly resurrect) because I had exhausted my cards.
I could have used Mara to get some cards back, but I didn’t think of it.
I’ll know better for next time.