Epic Pit
The beacons of Skorne Gondor were lit. Alas, the best they got was Wormtongue Rask.
Rask1 (BC) - Wrastler, 3x Boneswarms, Posse (Max), Croak Raiders (Max), Bokor + Shamblers, Sacral Vault, Bog Trog Mist Speaker, Totem Hunter, 2x Bog Trog Trawler
vs
Mordikaar1 (MoW) - Aradus Soldier, Gladiator, Cyclops Brute, Ferox, Rhadheim, Tycom + Standard, Preatorian Swordsman + UA, Paingivers, Wrongeye + Snapjaw
Had run Arkadius last time in the player matchup, so decided to give Rask more of a go. Yes, this is becoming the diaries of Bog Trogism. Definitely don't really like the idea of Ferox hunting Arkadius, though he definitely has the tools to deal with it and makes an awkward question for Mordikaars feat.
In the actual matchup, Vault definitely has a the Praetorians as a target. Arcane Vortex may also be clutch to stop Essence Blast doom. There's a Defence skew plan going on here, going to have to do something about Wrongeye, I'm expecting either an Admonitioned Bone Swarm maneuver or optimism from the Totem Hunter.
Scenario is Epic Pit, I lose the roll and end up with second.
My side ends up with a defensive forest, from which I'm hoping to contest the centre flag, hide Rask and send the Totem on merry Sprint adventures.
Skorne gets a cloud and hill that have minimal effect, and a wall on the right I didn't think all the way through in terms of complications.
There's also a forest on my left and an obstruction on the far right that don't do a huge amount.
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Round 1: Skorne run forward without dramatic redeployments.
Left side is Preatorians, Beasts in the centre, Ferox run up on the right and make use of the wall. Hmmm......shit. Didn't consider that would happen. Doh.
The Totem Hunter had Preyed the Aradus, expecting it would need to do work and ergo getting clocked by Bone Swarms/Posse allowing it to be re-picked. Not a good move, the correct choice was the Ferox who were definitely going to be in my face and need to be dealt with.
Sacral Vault moves up to the left, starts singing the Doom song at the Praetorians. It only randomizes one soul, so that's unfortunate.
Bone Swarms and Totem Hunter form the front row of my middle bloc, one with Admonition, the one in the forest gets Fury hoping to dash itself to death one day against an enemy beast.
Rask and Shamblers go behind the Swarm wall, alongside the Wrastler. It's a blob of madness to disincentive the Ferox coming in.
Right side, four Croaks move forward and hit Rhadheim, one Ferox and the Tycom Standard Bearer with flaming darts. An oil is attempted that misses hard.
The rest hang back with the Posse for the inevitable Cat attack.
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Skorne 2: As the Skorne tide starts rolling forward, I realise I'd totally failed to give any thought to popping my defensive feat. I successfully convince myself this was part of the plan, as none of the beasts can get to anything I care about, the Swordsman are quite restricted and the Ferox aren't stopped in the least.
Fire kills the Tycom Standard Bearer and damages Rhadheim/a Ferox.
Swordsman and Beasts flood the centre zone, putting a token effort into contesting the left rectangle.
One Praetorian does get to stab a Bone Swarm and do a chunk.
Rightwise, the Ferox move in and stab down four of the Croaks and wound a Posse, they develop a bizarre penchant for the entire game of missing butt bites on Gators.
Rhadheim goes into the Fury'ed Bone Swarm and outright kills it. Hmm. Alright then.
Mordikaar hangs back on the hill and pops feat, Wrongeye throws down all his defence tech and Snapjaw goes over to the right. Mordikaar also tried an Essence Blast at one point, the Vault Vortexed it.
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Minion 2: If Martians were real and more advanced, they'd probably consider Humans to be sex obsessed naked Molerats.
That started of as "Everything was fine until..." then I lost my spaceship of thought.
The feat did a good number on my ooda loop, was quite content with how things were going up until that +3 defence nonsense.
Plan defaulted to clear the left zone, feat to keep the beasts back and wait out Mordikaar's Benevolence of Poltergeistism.
Leftwise, the two Bog Trog Trawlers pop out and charge the Objective, putting it on four boxes.
The Sacral Vault moves across into the left rectangle outside of Aradus murder range. It kills the Objective, then flubbs it on the contesting Swordsman. Said Swordsman then dies to a Boneswarm, who readies itself to die for the cause.
Centre/bottom of the circle zone: A Bone swarm kills a Swordsman and misses Rhadeim.
Rask walks back and feats, camps some focus and gets surrounded by Shamblers, he shoots off Hollow from the Swordsman this time.
Bokor charges Rhadheim, misses his first boosted attack so the Skornite dodges away. Quality trade that one.
Totem Hunter jumps backward like a coward, Wrastler toes the zone. I'd really hoped to be able to deal with Rhadheim to get the Hunter into the campless Wrongeye, alas it wasn't doable.
On the right, Croaks basically twiddle their thumbs, Posse scream Blood Thirst and kill a Ferox, one contests the right zone.
I failed to spot at the time that I should have tried to set up a friendly model to target with a couple Oils to get the effect on Rhadeim.
I get two control points, one for the objective and another for the left zone. 2-0.
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Skorne 3: Fire dismounts Rhadheim and kills a Ferox. Teach you to not wear Asbestos.
Left/centre wise, the Swordsman walk in, pop their mini-feat and kill the furthest forward Boneswarm and put the last one on a couple boxes, to then die to Rhadheim. A single Swordsman contests the left rectangle.
Aradus goes to the end of the forest, basically in the centre of the board. The Cyclops Brute wades into the forest with Rush and pops the Bokor Shambler.Wrongeye goes behind the forest and pops Submerge/Star Crossed.
Right side, Snapjaw and the Ferox leave a single Posse alive. Gladiator goes into the Objective and demolishes it.
Mordikaar and Paingivers hang back on hill/wall land.
Skorne replicate my last turn of scoring, now 2 all.
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Minion 3: Attrition is looking poor, in particular Heavy Trading isn't on the cards with the Bone Swarms spent to get this far. Thankfully Rhadheim got distracted, as he could have walked up and made a go at the Totem Hunter, having him alive gives me a chance of some rubber banding (Some Lap Banding would also not go astray).
It's continue the left side scoring play, with the real struggle being whether or not I can manage to contest the Skorne grip on the right zone, a difficulty made by the Ambushers needing to come in for objective killing previously.
Left wise, Rask puts Fury on the Totem Hunter then shuffles next to the Vault and Paralyzes the Aradus. Admonitions himself.
Bog Trogs, Vault and Wrastler wipe out most of the Swordsman, leaving a pair left one of which is the standard bearer.
Mist Speaker and remaining Shamblers array themselves in Call to Sacrifice locations.
Right wise, the Totem Hunter walks up, jumps over everyones heads into Wrongeye's back arc. Takes both attacks and a failed tough roll, gets it done. Game state saved. he then sprints to the Roackwall in the Skorne zone, he' going to die but dream lived.
Croak Raiders and the last Posse member kill a Ferox each. It's all coming up slinky.
I score the left zone, now 3-2.
Admonition on Rask is a mistake, ought to have been put on the Wrastler, given he's the vital piece at this stage (Ever seen a Vault versus a Carapced Skorne Beast? I ahven't and I don't want to).
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Skorne 4: Fire kill Rhadheim. Long play for the win!
Paingivers and Swordsman run toward the left zone, one Giver and the Swordies both make it into my zone. Those that didn't make it up spread in front of the Aradus, who limps to threaten the Wrastler.
The Brute stays int he forest and kills a couple Croak Raiders. Tyrant Commander kills the Totem Hunters. Gladiator runs toward the left a short distance, toes the centre and right zones.
last Ferox jumps into the final Posse's back, puts him down to four boxes.
Mordikaar stays chilling on his hill.
Skorne score their right zone, 3 all.
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Minion 4: Clock win is looking very good for me, have to not let scenario get away just in case though. Critical factors are removing that last Ferox and removing all the little pieces that can contest my zone.
Need to fill up the Sacral Vault. To my shame and representative of my poor Minion-ness, I put Rask into melee. He shows my folly to me thoroughly, as he only kills a Paingiver and fails to get the Swordsman he engaged, though he did have to burn most of his stack to put Fury and Rage on the Wrastler.
The Trawlers resuce me from ineptness, one popping the Standard Bearer, the other killing the dude on Rask, though only thanks to the Mist Speaker being a Vet Leadery dude. THAT'S HOW IT'S DONE RASK.
My favourite play of the game, the Vault aims and shoots the remaining three Paingivers. Sends them out of collection range to hit the Gladiator and load it up with Fury. All your rules belong to us.
Wrastler easily smashes the Aradus into the ground.
Right side, where things didn't look so rosy to start.
The Posse goes base to base with the Ferox, screams for re-rolls, manages to land both his attacks and eat him.
Two Croaks go either side of the Brute, the other two toe the right zone and set the Gladiator and Tycom on fire.
Should have oiled the Tycom.
Score on the left, now 4-3.
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Skorne 5: Brute frenzies on a Croak, turning to no longer be engaging the other. Both Fires run out, though I'd gotten more than my fair share of murder by the crackling process anyway.
Gladiator slams the Wrastler. Sure would be good to have Admonition on him....
A middling roll lets the Gladiator follow up and contest, alas the single pip makes a showing.
The Beast follows up anyway, buys attacks to hit the Wrastler, takes off about half it's health and gets no aspects. Skorne beasts with Enrage seem so much friendlier.
Mordikaar moves to the right zone, between his ranged attack and the Tycom the zone is cleared.
Both sides score their rectangles, 5-4 to me.
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Minion 5: Wrastler gets to use Rise! Posse charges and eats the Tycom. Rask Paralyzes Mordikaar, Vault shoots him twice, opponent concedes rather than transfer for the inevitable round 7 loss.
It's pretty hard for Skorne from here, it's an absolutely fair concession. Rask has plenty of Call to Sacrifice, no real targets for Essence blast, I'll kill the Gladiator and score the centre zone this round.
Sweet game, felt quite swingy. One of the more enjoyable games in recent memory.
Ferox remain a pain in the enigma, Vault keeps printing money. I was expecting the Posse/Croak combo party to be weak, however it is definitely being flexible in different matchups.
Real issue is that this is my off list and the factions it's meant to face aren't represented. Still, creates neat coin flip game into Clockwork Legions. Speaking of which...
