James Wilson Codes

This was my first game with Reva Cortinas, Luminary. I’d been looking at her for a long time, especially since I picked up the regular Reva in the middle of last year. I didn’t want to dive into the title at first because she was widely regarded as so overpowered that she was ‘sure to be nerfed’ so it made sense to wait until that had happened so that I didn’t have to relearn her (and be sad while doing so).

So, I’d read her card a lot but I’d never seen her on the table before. Then, I was in a rush for this game, and didn’t really have much time to think about my crew. I decided to play ‘nearly all my new models’ and picked Reva 2, and the Resurrectionists Starter Box in its entirety. This is my third game with them, but the first in which I’d used Oskar so I was interested to see the synergies.

Being my first game with her, I didn't have much of a plan other than

1. Pulse out focus with Blasphemous Ritual
2. Smack her up the board with Shieldbearers
3. Try and set things on fire

And 1 and 2 are the same thing I try to do with Reva 1. The original Reva is quite happy for opponents to be on fire (especially since I realised in the Lord of the Flames event that she can reduce the Burning condition on enemy models to turn it into Healing) but her focus has never been incinerating my opponent.

Now, it looks like that's very much what I want to do - especially as, if I use Immolate, which makes enemies take damage from Burning, and it kills them, I can summon a Lampad. And people love Lampads.

Adam had declared Wong - not someone I'd ever faced before, and he explained that he'd not had many games with him, but I knew that he had been practicing his Unpack - so it was going to be a learning opportunity for both of us.

I didn't know a lot about Wong, other than that he could Launch Into Space to make Scheme Markers appear on my side of the table, a prospect I was not too pleased about.

Scheme-wise I wasn't sure what to do. Deliver a Message is good for Lampads, as they can use Hovering Flame to get in or out - and if they get killed, they can hopefully come back with Demise(Possessing Flame). I also don't usually take Hold Up Their Forces but with two Shieldbearers and two Dapperlings, I was hoping to have a better chance of scoring it.

Being a first game with Reva 2, I forgot a lot of stuff. Adam was very sporting in reminding me. I forgot that she can drop a Pyre Marker during the Start Phase of each turn, and that every time a Pyre is dropped (once per activation, but specifically added to that Start Phase one) all models within 2 inches can push 2 inches. I'd just about learned this by the end of the game, but it seems like a very powerful ability that I need to learn how to unlock.

Adam had been practicing his unlock, and while I was concentrating on how Reva 2 would work, he was speedily working through his activations, and all of a sudden it felt like all of his models had the Fast condition, where at or beyond the centreline, and had a ton of Glowy tokens (which he can use to reduce damage) - I was quite scared!

I still forget to activate Corpse Candles before killing them. They don't always do anything, but it would help with activation control.

It was also the first time I'd used all the Fungal models together. There's some interesting synergies. Oskar gets to draw a card and either Batsch and Amalie or Oskar can Interact ignoring Engagement - which seems really powerful but didn't come out too much in this game. I can imagine it being great for setting up Ensnare, but it does require hiring 15 stones worth of Versatile models. However, it was nice to have 4 potential Spore Spurts forcing your opponent to Discard cards, and potentially give out Distracted.

Adam had some bad luck - he'd told me about a recent game with Wong where he'd flipped severe damage on a double negative for hurting his own models - and then it happened again to him! Also, he spent a soulstone to get a positive flip to get off The Glow, hoping to draw two cards - and drew a 2 and a 3. This put a crimp in his turn, and I always feel for an opponent who flips worse than might be reasonably affected. Especially as I managed to flip the Red Joker on a triple negative damage flip!

We ended up with a big scrum just away from the centre of the board. Reva 2 and two Shieldbearers, against Alphonse and a Swine-Cursed. I was finding it hard to kill anything due to the Glowy. Looking back I should have sucked it up and used Immolate to do some big 5 damage hits and just used up all of their Glowy, but at the time, I was concentrating on pinging them by using Corrupting Flame to do one damage and one Burning damage from the built in Smoulder trigger, which could not be reduced with Glowy. Shield Slam is also a good action here, as it pings damage and also moves them through a Pyre Marker to give more Burning.

Adam, however was also having trouble killing my models - the Shieldbearers' combination of Spirits in the Flames giving them Shielded whenever they did anything in a Pyre Marker and Reva's Visions of Fire healing them when they gained Burning, which was happening a lot as they were standing in Pyre Markers. I don't think I took full advantage of these opportunities and when I've got a few more reps in with Reva 2, I think there's going to be a lot of plays here to frustrate my opponents.

Meanwhile, there was another Swine-Cursed just doing his own thing in the corner of the board, gaining an intel token each turn.

Wong's Fzzzzap! action didn't reach its full damage potential in this game, I think, but it was still scary, especially when he centred the shockwave on a Swine-Cursed, so it was Size 3 and could see over models to other models.

Eventually, Alphonse used Growth Spurt and when his Df went down to 4, the tide changed. The Dapperlings had a chance of hitting him, and eventually Reva immolate-ed him and turned him into a second Lampad.

At this point, there was one of those strange Malifaux occurrences where your every instinct is to kill the Swine-Cursed that is now alone and vulnerable, but you don't want to because you are going to score Hold Up Their Forces. My original Lampad managed to scoot over to Wong using Hovering Flame and Deliver a Message, leading more classic Malifaux manouevring around not killing Wong and trying to make sure he ends up near a Scheme Marker.

I sent the second Lampad over towards the Swine-Cursed that was operating unchallenged. My thinking was to at least cover the Strategy Marker with its base and stop Adam scoring Cloak and Dagger so easily.

I then had a Corpse Candle left to activate and was wanting to keep Wong close to the Lampad, and Scheme Markers. So, I tried to use Death Urge which would have pushed him into the Pyre Marker. Adam cheated up, not wanting to end up in the Pyre Marker, and I, in what felt like a display of audacity, cheated in the Red Joker, to declare the Faces in the Flames trigger and stun him. This was really painful as it would nobble Wong from using the Cataclysm trigger on his Fzzzzap! attack, effectively halving his damage output.

However, the Bayou experts among you might be screaming at your screens right now, because we had both forgotten Wong's Three Demon Bag ability, meaning that you can never declare triggers against Wong, so it wouldn't have worked anyway! One of the issues when you're both learning a new master.

We only had time to play four turns, sadly. I’m not doing a scoring block, because it was left a bit unresolved. It was 4-4 at the end of Turn 4. In a tournament, however,  I’d have won 6-4, because we’d have scored final points, and I’d have got Hold Up Your Forces(Dapperlings and Shieldbearers), and Deliver a Message(Lampad) - but he explained he had a lot of ways to try to deny them in Turn 5 - and I’ve seen how good he is at the end game analysis! So, I declare it to be a draw, and a fun exploration of masters we weren’t familiar with.

It's reinforced my view that the Resurrectionist Starter Box is very good - although Oskar didn't do very much, other than murder a Flying Piglet that Sammy summoned and I was worried would score. However, because I was trying to shackle him to Batsch and Amalie to get the most of Network of Mycelium he wasn't very mobile - and I always seemed to be blocking the Fungal models in with each other.

Overall, I'm looking forward to exploring Reva Cortinas, Luminary over my next few games!