James Wilson Codes

This is my first write up of a tournament - I'd hoped to do each game in the level of detail that I normally do, but with how intense playing in a tournament is, I didn't manage to take enough notes/photos. So it'll be a bit more of a general write up.

Skivemind II was organised by the lovely Yan Pietrzak, co-host of the Green Jokers podcast, and someone who drives and organises a lot of the local Malifaux scene.

It was three rounds of GG4 with the Bans 1 format. This means that after masters are chosen, you can ban a keyword for the opponent to hire from. Versatile models can still be hired, so it's really just affecting Out of Keyword hiring. As it turned out, I, along with all three of my opponents were playing totally in keyword, so it didn't have any impact - unless it meant that they weren't choosing OOK so that I couldn't ban it, of course.

I'm not sure I'm quite at the level for Out of Keyword hiring yet - I'm having enough trouble learning keywords... That Said, Bête Noire, I've got my eye on you in my forthcoming Reva crew!

Goals

I only had one main goal for this tournament, which was Win One Game. I also didn't want to clock out. Have Fun too - although I almost always do when playing Malifaux!

I'm incredibly lucky to have Powder Monkey Gaming within walking distance of my house. I really appreciate it, as I know some players travelled much further to be there. It's such a boost having a FLGS nearby - so I would encourage people to support local stores wherever they can!

Round 1

A lot of people say that they're quite happy to lose their first round at a tournament, as then the pressure is off, they'll likely be facing an opponent more at their level next. I guess it depends on who you get matched up with for how you do. I was facing Jonathan Cuming who had taken Tara.

I'd never played into the Obliteration keyword before, save for a very early Henchman Hardcore game against Yan, where he had the Scion of the Void as his leader, and the model hiring was such that he could not score Vendetta. I knew Tara had a reputation as being hard to stop her from scoring, so, I was a little nervous.

I chose Kastore, Awakened here, as in general, he's schemier, and I chose Death Beds with Strategy markers (thinking that in Raid the Vaults, at least some enemy models would be next to those markers. I also hoped that Marathine could help me drop markers for Ensnare (although as it is Insignificant, it cannot score Ensnare itself)

Jonathan very kindly offered to go through Tara's models. I knew there was mechanics around giving me Fast, and then burying me already. I didn't realise Tara gets two activations. It does mean Tara procs Gwyll's Whisper in Their Ear twice, but I would happily swap that for her only activating once.

The game didn't go very well for me from the start. Jonathan said it was his fourth game with Outcasts, but he clearly knew how to play Tara, and set about burying my models. He has a model called Scion of the Void, which basically stayed buried for the whole game, and kept hitting me from the Void using its Mark of Obliteration trigger. This was beyond annoying, and the only plan I could think of to deal with him, was to use Kastore's tasty Dominate with Enthrall trigger to make Talos smack him with his Void Hammer as Talos can target buried models. Unfortunately, I'd cheated so many cards to stop my models being buried that even with Stat 7 and focus, I couldn't force it through.

A fun part of this game was the little 'Void Party' we had at the side for buried models. I insisted on dropping my poor Cavern Nephilim's corpse in the void, as well as the Enslaved Spirit's Scheme marker that it drops from it's Demise (Claims of the Court) ability. I didn't claim these markers did anything. Many of my models were at the Void Party, but most of them left or died or both.

As the game progressed, I didn't manage to do very much. The combination of buried models forcing me to activate in a different order, and Jonathan choosing where they pop up. As he told me, with a smile, "I'm trying to be as annoying as possible" - and it worked!

I managed to kill Talos (with an Urnbearer!) and I tried to suck Tara in to the Urnbearer's Hazardous Pools of Blood aura, which is a lot of fun, but she's just so mobile that she just waltzed out.
There was also choosing where to push the Void Wretch that I'd used Dominate and the Called By Blood trigger to heal an Enslaved Spirit - it's not a Returned model, but the Leech King is, so I could use I'll Have What They're Having to pass the overheal on.

Also, Giant Leeches using Body Slam on to Void Wretches is an amusing thought.

Overall, I lost 7-1 - I did a lot of thinking about trying to either score Death Beds or Ensnare, and ultimately didn't manage it - partly because I'd got them mixed up in my head, so I was trying to score Ensnare by dropping a Scheme next to a Strategy before an enemy model's activation. It was fun though, and Jonathan kindly gave me some advice: Kill Karina next time you face Tara, as her healing is what keeps the Scion of the Void alive and buried.

I'm not sure if Kastore 1 was the best choice here - I'd have been able to kill a few more models with Kastore 2, I think, and even if gets unburied across the board, he is so mobile that I could have overcome it.

Round 2

A quarter of the players at Skivemind II had declared the Bayou faction - so it was only a matter of time before I faced some gremlins, and sure enough, out popped some Fisherfolk! This match was against Joshua Price, and it was a lot of fun!

This felt like a pool made for Kastore 2! In Your Face is kind of his thing. I also took White Eyes, to try him out for the second time after the errata. I also picked Outflank in the hope that with a Cavern Nephilim

And Kastore did, indeed, get Killy. The rest of the Returned crew are really good at pushing him forward for an alpha strike, and he managed to do quite a bit of damage to Uncle Bogg on my right flank - and White Eyes, assisted by some Chain Gang movement from the Enslaved Spirit, managed to pounce in for the kill. I couldn't score In Your Face turn 1, but there was a Buckaroo nearby that I had in mind for that.

Meanwhile, Sir Vantes had moved into a big patch of Severe terrain near the centre and proved to be very hard to dislodge. Bruce kept healing him, and if I'd had the game again, I would have targetted Bruce a lot earlier. Joshua nearly took out my Urnbearer, and it was only due to an unlucky flip for him that she survived on 1 wound. As she had one of my intel tokens, this was fortunate for me! Judd & Honey were very disruptive from a distance.

Kastore did eventually rush in, ignoring the Severe terrain, but did not manage to drop Sir Vantes. Which led to my opponent scoring Sweating Bullets. Eventually he fell, and the last turn ended up being a rush to score points. I had an Enslaved Spirit with nobody around him on one Flank, and the Cavern Nephilim on the other. But then I realised that needed the Nephilim to be in the opponent's deployment zone. I could have got Kastore there in time, but I wanted to deal with Judd & Honey, the only other model near the centre to try and prevent the second point of Sweating Bullets. As it turned out, if I'd read Judd & Honey's card, I'd have realised they couldn't engage anyone as they don't have melee. However, after much careful reading of the rules, I realised that a Giant Leech I summoned on Turn 4 could score me the outflank point. As I was running out of time, a lot of activations were 'giant leech double walk <hit clock>' and while I did clock out and forfeit my remaining activations, I did manage to secure 8 points. My last move was White Eyes stealing some intel tokens from the Clampetts! Having been hit by this before, I know how painful it feels. But I still did it. Final score was 8-5 to me.

The game was a lot of fun! Kastore 2 always seems to do well into Bayou for me, and if he can kill a few enemy models, it makes it very hard for them to score Cloak and Dagger just due to the number of AP needed.

Best Painted

There are some pictures of the best painted competition on the Powder Monkey Facebook page. The category was 'best Versatile' - I entered a Gwisin. I don't know why I didn't pick the Enslaved Spirit which is a little better painted, but regardless, I mainly entered because I'm not a super talented painter, but I didn't want to let that hold me back from entering. It's always nice to get a glimpse at just how talented some people are, and well done to Esme for winning!

Round 3

This round I was up against Dan Brown - who I've never played against before but have seen a lot on Discord.

He declared Marcus 1 and I declared Kastore 1. This was a mis-tap on the app, but I wasn't fully sure which would be better to pick. I picked Deliver A Message with White Eyes as he has a lot of mobility and can escape with Unnatural Speed, and Protected Territory.

I'm not one to complain (too much) about my flips, but I would like to point out that I took The Whisper on my master, and for THREE of the five turns, I had a Black Joker in the top three cards! Thinking back, it would have made sense to use Gwyll's Whisper In Their Ear to scoop it into my hand, but I didn't think of that at the time.

Turn 1 often feels slow on Corner deployment, but I moved White eyes towards a ballot box, the Cavern Nephilim and Enslaved Spirit towards the opposite corner, and the rest towards the middle.

White Eyes ended up being tied up by the Razorspine Rattler for most of the game. Futile Struggle meant he couldn't use Unnatural Speed to get out of engagement to vote, and I probably should have tried to kill it rather than use Terrorize to push it out of the way. It also meant there was no way of scoring the first point of Deliver A Message, because Marcus never wandered over that way. I should have thought about trying to score the final point without the first, which I always forget about. Perhaps spending those Black Jokers on the Broodmaster's Domain bonus action was a mistake.

There was a surgical assassination of my Cavern Nephilim - 3 min 3 hits from outside of **Black Blood** range and he was out. This left Kastore dealing with the Beast Within and Ceddra, and while he did some cheeky bits and pieces with Dominate and the Enthrall trigger, they kind of kept him occupied.

By the end of the game, I had the Order Initiate and the Blessed of December on 1 health each - but that doesn't stop them from activating and scoring points.

In the end, I lost 4-6, and I was surprised that I scored that many points, in honesty!

Kastore 2 would have been better at getting stuck in, especially on Corner, and maybe killing some models earlier would have helped. However, it was another fun game, and Dan was an understanding opponent who took the time to make suggestions like 'oooh, maybe you could push to there and then stop me voting' - which is much appreciated.

Overall

Compared to my goals:

✅ Win one game

❌ Don't Clock Out

✅ Have fun

but as I won the game I clocked out on, I'm not complaining...

I came 15/20 which is my best tournament placing so far - and I'm very happy with. I had three fun games, and I got to walk home, so a great day overall. I toyed with the idea of bringing Reva 1 one round, but decided I just didn't have the reps yet - I may spring her out at the English GT in a couple of weeks.

Thank you to all who organised and played!