Mirage
Wintercon time, running Arkadius usual nonsense and Rask.
Good thing we did that last minute Mirage practice, for here is the latest scenario blight. Also Bobliness running Primal Terror madness, so that's awkward. He knows my own caster considerably better than I do. Fortunately, Hillmeister hadn't used the latest Legion abomination before, so we have a chance!
All the models were borrowed for the opposing side, so we started with an exercise of what model was what and how squads were differentiated (It turns out, skin tone.).
I wasn't super into the dollies going into the day, so I was somewhat resigned to having a medium length game and maybe dropping after the first round. That said, the Rask list was specifically there to give at least some fight to the Primal Terrors shenanigans based on a few things, more on these two thoughts later.
I lose the roll, Blobster takes first. I take the side with a defensive wall and small obstruction for more anti-Hellmouth drag stuff. There's also a central forest, a hill on the left and some other terrain that doesn't matter.
Template wise:
Green = Forest
Brown = Hill
Blue = Water
The Primal Terrors build is the Doorbell special, so Thags1, Blightbringer, Golab, triple Warmongers and Rotteneye, double Hellmouth. Support solos.
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Legion 1: One Hellmouth goes behind the hill on the left, another is toeing the Legion circle and hiding behind the central forest, so that's going to be a fun mess.
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Minion 1: The distances are going to close up enough that we can give up on the prospect of feating later on. Dahlia throws up Haunting Melody and moves up to the front, intent being for her to be a anti-drag safety net and make Ogrun sad, have to be wary of Skarath being killed and her getting Oblited by Thags. Or just shot by the Blightbringer every turn.
Totem Hunter also picked the central Hellmouth as the Prey Target. Poor choice, only way that's relevant is in clutch Maw kills or Tentacle clearing, any of the Warmonger units would have been better.
Move up mostly as a blob on my zone, Dahlia and snake on the left, Ninja Pig on the right. Admonition on the left Bone Swarm, Fury on the Totem Hunter. I throw out a Veil of Mists, it does nothing beyond assisting in good habit creation.
One Gobber Chef runs far left, Alten Ashley goes far right.
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Legion 2:Stuff runs forward. Thagrosh is super mean and stays outside of Brines threat range.
A Warmonger from each unit runs up on the right to engage stuff and make an awkward social situation as they beg to be hurt to trigger vengeance. I guess if it's consensual we can make it work.
Skarath sprays with counterblast to kill a tentacle. Well.....tried to anyway. The left Boneswarm proced Admonition off said Tentacle to move up into charge range of the left Hellmouth.
Legion are a blob in the middle of the board. A scary scary blob. Of scary bitey things.
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Minion 2: Mirage wise, Legion has a small number of solos. I think there has been a general lack of response thus far to change lists to incoporate the existence of Mirage, which specifically needs a large number of solos to keep scoring super live (Alexia1, Gobber Chefs, Tinkers, Spell Martyrs, that sort of low tier garbage). I think you can get away with only one unit, on the proviso your happy for your caster to score circle zones in Invasion.
Anyway, what this means is that once the War Chief pops I have much better scoring capability assuming I can get board presence. Thags/Ammok will probably only be defensive scorers, which is fine.
That's future turn thinking though, for now I have to wish we were in a pub so I could have a morning pick me up and start chipping the blob.
Skarath messes up and doesn't clear blocking tentacles, so the Swamp Horror does it instead. I'd hoped to send the Horror into the left War Monger unit, using its drag attacks to pull them out of Thags Aura and the Blightbringer buff. As it was the tentacles were a struggle, as was the one blocking Ogrun and it maxes Fury to get the work done. Not ideal.
Ideally the squid would have been placed to drag the tentacles outside of Hellmouth command and auto kill, alas positioning didn't allow that.
That chaff clearing means the left Bone Swarm gets Fury, Rage and Boundless Charge, goes into the left Maw and one shots it. That felt unlawfully good.Dahlia then moves up, putting the left Warmongers under Haunting Melody.
Right wise, Brine/Totem Hunter kill the forward Ogrun then Souie/Sprint back a bit. A few charges can get to them, so the right most Bone Swarm casts Swarm and charges in toi take one for the team.
Gobber Chef runs to the right flag, a Swamp Gobber runs to contest the Legion zone. Alten Ashley and the Efaarit shoot down an Ogrun and repo away to the right, Alten is super far up at this point.
I score my zone and the right flag, 2-0.
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Legion 3: Like a Pokemon trainer under the strain of self realisation, Legion shambles forward and starts the slaps of pain while screaming "It isn't me! It's not my fault! The system created the slavery! I'm just living my life! etc.".
Around the left flag which favours the Legion deploy Golab, two War Mongers and one Warchief go into the Boneswarm which killed the Hellmouth. Said beast defies the odds, somehow surviving albeit with only its Spirit remaining. By the power of the Swarm Animus!
Another pair of Warmongers go into the central Boneswarm who was shielded by the wall, they do little.
Rightwise, Vengeance attacks killed the suicide Boneswarm blocker, the Ogrun then knocked out Brines mind, killed the Gobber Chef on the right flag and did five damage to the Totem hunter.
Blightbringer just ran to get into position for its armour buff to get out there.
Legion score their zone and the central flag with Ammok, now 2-2.
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Minion 3: I can get Brine onto the Blightbringer! I just have to kill one blocking Ogrun. The forward Boneswarm Frenzies due to a Fury overload (Expecting them to die seemed reasonable to both sides), he triggers a freestrike to do so and dies. Farewell noble swarm of bones.
Alright, time to clear up this blocking Ogrun.
Totem Hunter puts on the cool shades of murder.
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And sods it up.
Rasks gun, the Cauldron shot and Lynus and Edrea all fail.
Completely hosed for even the bad options, we need our hero. Our hero is a charging Mistspeaker.
That Mat 5 POW 10 might comes through, killing the Ogrun and letting Ninja Pig get smoked forward. Rask also put Rage and Boundless Charge on him. I reasoned that it was better to use the Wrastler Animus so that Brine could buy an extra attack, haven't done the math that I likely should. Certainly less dicey in the direction of an average result.
Brine charges the Blightbringer. Maxes Fury, rolls pretty well, leaves it on 6 boxes. Curse you Thagrosh Aura of strength penaltyness!
Alten moves in. Shoots. Does 5 damage with his special anti-warbeastness. His popgun does a single damage point to finish it off.
Never in doubt.
Wrastler and Boneswarm clear out the pair of Ogrun in my zone.
Skarath and Squid beast kill the left side Ogrun including the Warchief, also take out most of Golag. Swampy could have dragged Golag in for a Bite attack, I elect not to as if it fails Rask is threatened.
A Swamp Gobber runs to contest the Legion zone.
I score my zone, go up 3-2.
I'm under 15 minutes, so the pics stop.
Legion 4: We discover Ammok strips upkeeps, and Dahlia isn't the ptron saint of saving the matchup like I thought. He does that, then Golag eats her. Skarath goes into hibernation because 'tis winter.
I'm doing pretty good attritionally and have the solos remaining for the scenario, so one Ogrun kills a Mistspeaker while another charges Rask camping 0. Does 12 damage to put him on three boxes.
Legion score their zone, 3-3.
Minion 4: Rask Paralyzes Golag, who then gets eaten by the Squid.
The Gobber Chef I ran to the left side in turn 1 runs in toward the left flag.
Efaarit, Pot and Boneswarm clear out the Ogrun. Efaarit also moves to the right flag.
Alten Ashley completes his long march, toeing in the back right edge of the Legion zone.
I score the right flag, lacked the attacks to kill a contesting tentacle I think? 4-3 off the Efaarit flag, though the exact scoring pings evade me at this point.
Legion 5: Thagrosh feats Golag back, who moves toward Rask. Tentacle fails to kill Alten. Thagrosh kills the last Bone Swarm and sprints back.
Must have been some Ogrun still around to contest, something kills the Totem Hunter.
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Endstate (Minion 5/Round 6): I become hyper focused on the scenario win. I have a turn of screwing around, then a turn in which the Wrastler kills Golag for the second time. The Gobber Chef and Efaarit stay camping the side flags. Had I just killed Golag and passed the turns to get to round 7 I unavoidably win, alas I waste time making attacks I didn't need to on a tentacle contesting my zone and clock out on the bottom of 6. So close.
Loved this game, though I was exhausted by the end of it. A tough first round is not how I do my tournaments, haven't had good under pressure situations for some time. Should start practicing with a reduced Deathclock.
In any event, I found that dolly mashing super engaging, so happily looked like I'd summoned the energy to play out the tourney.
List wise, I finally accepted this game that Lynus/Edrea are hyper sillyness. The list is emant to deal with this Primal Terrors bend were on, whereas they are some luxury Gremlin killing junk I don't need. I'm also not sold on the Squid, does good work however the understandable Fury 3 is painful to me in practice.
Anyway, can't change the list at this point, onward to round 2!
