Spread the Net
Round 2 rolls into some travelling Mercies, with Damiano and......sigh......Ashlynn.
Both lists are Cygnar infantry and a medium level of Jacks. I opt to drop Rask due to the table terrain giving me some dreams, realistically it should have been Arkadius who could do the same thing to a weaker extent.
Ashlynn drops, so my current Facebook name is super under threat (HasneverlosttoAshlynn).
It's min Trenchers with the UA, Gun mages with a Mule, Double Thorn, pile of solos whilst Ashlynn has two Toros and a Vanguard Battle Group.
This game is recorded somewhere, no idea where at the time of writing.
I win the roll and opt for first as I can abuse the terrain with my lists either way.
My side has a couple hills, with the left zone have a large forest that makes contesting easy and some corrosive water around my flag that doesn't matter.
Central zone has a forest smack bang in the centre.
Mercs get a huge trench, a wall between their zone and the centre and most importantly a super awkward building in their zone.
That building is basically the carrier of my hopes and dreams. If I'd had it then it's an easy lock out as I have ghostly and can move through it, instead I get to use it's poking out corner as a home for a lesser warlock.
Matchup wise opposing list has a lot of pushes and crit affects, other that nothing I'm super concerned about. Admonition and Countercharge is annoying, however Boneswarm mid activation corpse spend healing makes me not to worried.
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Round 1: Totem Hunter Preys the Trencher Infantry. None of the options felt that great.
A Swarm and one Chef duck over to the left behind the forest. The Chef is doomed to running up to contest in a future turn, after that it'll depend on how we swing around the middle.
Most of my stuff moves up the guts, one Boneswarm with Admo goes directly behind the forest.
I puppet string Alten Ashley so he can move up and do a cheeky shot on Gibbs who is in the Llaelese rubble. not great odds on a re-rolled 9 and he misses, would have been tops. Alas.
Dahlia and Skarath run up the side, range of opposing guns makes haunting Melody a bad bet in the early stages until they seize the contesting position.
Llaelese bunch up behind the forest and cloud wall, the Admonition Bone Swarm triggers a move forward. It can't get to toe a cloud sadly, which would have been the best result.
More Central of the Toro's has Admonition, Trenchers are Quickened.
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Minion 2: I feat this turn, more as a reflex than with much successful planning involved.
The previously Admo'd Swarm goes in and kill Gibbs, flailfs badly at Trenchers.
Rask hides behind Swamp Gobbers and some other stuff, feated in the centre of my stuff.
Totem Hunter moves up to the right, hiding behind two of the Bone Swarms lest the Thorn come up and try to cap him.
Dahlia runs to her hiding spot, Skarath moves in nearby and pops Coutnerblast, ideal being nothing makes it part the Swarm/Totem/Counterblast formation to get to contest my flag.
Some random ranged attacks kill a pair of Thorn Gun mages.
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Ashlynn 2: Trenchers move up the left centre of the board, creating more cloud annoyances as heavies move up behind.
Tinker runs to the merc flag.
The Thorn shuffle in the Merc Rectangle, the healthy unit Thundershot a Bone Swarm to the side and set the Totem Hunter on fire.
Sole survivor of the other unit manages to move up to contest range. Boo. Hiss.
Mercs score their flag, 0-1.
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Minion 3: Enough of these shenanigans, time for something that matters to die.
Leftwise the Gobber Chef runs up to contest the Merc flag. Bone Swarm moves up to clear the zone, maxes Fury and kills a single Trencher. Imph. Not so great.
The Cauldron on this flank gets pushed forward where it can just toe a cloud, it pew pews the Mule and drags it in, as well as spiking the damage nicely. It is now in the Cloud, so the Wrastler charges it and kills it, then overtakes to kill a Trencher and hides behind the centre forest.
Rorsh moves onto the hill in the back, didn't really have a place for him to go.
Right wise Skarath and Totem Hunter kill the Thorn, Totem ends up hiding on the Merc side of the building with the Sprint move.
I can draw line of site over the wall to a back Toro, so a Bone Swarm gets suped up with all the buffs and charges in (Fury/Rage/Boundless Charge/Puppet Strings/Max Corpses), trashes it without even maxing Fury.
I sadly only score the right flag and zone, so now 2-1 (Damnable Trencher!)
Ashlynn 3: The previous rounds chewed up a lot of lock for both of us, so onto my belatedly hazy memory we go!
Ashlynn moves to the back left of the board, hides out in the trench. She pops feat and Gallows the Wrastler into the forest, where he can now be seen by the Toro.
Toro charges in and kills it without to much issue, as I was a fool in toeing on the other side of the zone this makes the central zone clear. That's called a problem.
Gun Mages, hanging around the Merc flag on the top left, aim or shuffle to pop shots into Rorsh. They roll appalingly, a few even missing with Roullete doing its dice churn. Little Pig survives with no transfers and a pair of boxes.
Trenchers move, they generally go into the centre forest. More on that later.
The Vanguard assaults a Bone Swarm and toes the Merc sides rectangle, it doesn't do great on damage.
Both sides score their flags, Mercs unfortuantely left a single Trencher in my rectangle so they fail to score the centre zone. 3-2 to me.
Minion 4: Totem Hunter continues being minorly assaulted by Fire, now down to three boxes.
The Bone Swarm in my rectangle ont eh lower left Frenzies, which I believe triggers the Toro Countercharge up into the zone. Well, not clearing that this turn, it also has Admonition on it.
Rorsh cuts for a Fury, going down to one box. This was due to the need to heal Brine who had lost his Mind.
My big time sink here is desperately trying to position Rask to shoot Admo off the Toro, whilst also getting far enough up to buff a Bone Swarm to kill the Vanguard in the Merc Rectangle (That is to say, the rectangle on the Merc deployment side. It was clearly Winions turf at this point).
I end up giving up on the gun shot, buffing the Boen Swarm seemed like a higher priority.
Speaking of the Merc triangle Vanguard, due to time pressure we both completely space on Chosen Ground being up, so the Bone Swarm on the Vanguard gets Puppet Strings and lands a headbutt to knockdown, this allows the buffed Swarm-o-Bones to go in and easily kill it. Woops.
Totem Hunter runs up into the Merc deployment line, basically a poorly chosen reflex action to distract the Mercs, should have gone into the centre forest and eaten Trenchers.
Little Pig heals Brine, moves up behind the forest where the Gun Mages can't see him.
A Bone Swarm beside him pops Swarm.
Swamp Gobbers run to engage the Trenchers in the centre forest, loads of stuff is now contesting the centre zone.
Both sides score their flags and I get the Merc rectangle, 5-3.
I end up just straight up not activating Brine. Good at the game.
Ashlynn 4: Gun Mages pop their mini feat, the Dude shoots the Totem Hunter down. Sadness.
The Trencher Sniper is the only unengaged model in the unit, he sidles around and caps Rorsh. That's some bad placement there, attrition is now pretty level (Given Ashlynn can kill things in melee and Rask.....well, I once meleed Rahn to death with him I spose....).
The Toro tries to kill my stuff in the Winion rectangle, fluffed damage rolls on the pot means it kills the Pot Unit and falls short on the Bone Swarm.
Ragman runs and contests the Merc Rectangle, again both sides score their flags for 6-4.
Rounds 5 - 7: The turns are now very limited by clock, so we both do very little and trade clock taps.
I kill Ragman, the Bone Swarm in my rectangle cops free strikes and walks to cotnest the Merc flag with a handful of boxes remaining, I get up 8-4.
Gun Mages then start running into the Merc rectangle, the contesting Bone Swarm easily dies. I send a moderately buffed Bone Swarm into the Toro late game to try to get the 5th control point, def 11 sadly proves to be to stronk and I miss all my attacks.
We do the clock love tap to the end of round 7, I win on CP 11-7.
Game entirely resides on my flag being uncontestable for the latter half, I'd give credit to the building in the Merc zone making them go hard refused flank and not really trying to score it at all.
Bunch of flawed plays, ultimately happy with not flubbing the clock given that's been a game weakness of late.
One more round in the first day!
