Eggs to be hauled

Last minute change of plans left me with a spare Saturday to find some trouble, thankfully with a fully booked tournament calendar I could grab a ticket and head North to join the fun a Haul of eggs.

Finally my ongoing car issues were sorted so Saturday morning I hopped in the car, picked up Claire (partly out of the kindness of my heart and partly as we were heading so far from the safety of the M25 it was in case I needed someone to throw to the reavers)

A smooth run up the M1 and we were at Battlefield Hobbies. A great venue that you'll remember from my Nationals write up. (Yeah like anyone suffers reading this twice)
Best way to describe BH is it's a warehouse with unlimited tea. (In truth the place could be full of rabid wereotters and I'd be happy spend the day there as long as my mug was full).

Usual registration fun, plenty of chat, a bit of well meaning abuse, and a chance to top up my tea.

Game one. A Cooper off! Extraction versus Stef. A mirror match always has the potential to be a bit of a grind but we both took different set ups and schemes. We both got an early kill with Purple Coops blessed killing my Envy and the Red Coops Emissary killing the blessed. Shockingly neither of these scored for frame. After that the game changed gear and become more about dropping markers and weathering the storm around the extraction marker.
Last turn my Coop and Lola were paralysed and I had (thought I did) the markers down I needed so the mannequin took a pointless swing at a performer... Scoring a point for Purple Coop in frame. My idiot move was countered by an unlucky one from Stef leaving a marker just out to score end of game. The game ended in a well earned draw.

Game two. This time we had Guard the Stash. Cooper was back in the case as I'd decide to run a different Master each game. This time it was Raspi. I was up against Andy with Nico.
Because the deployment was flank I was lucky enough to secure a good position early to really unleash the filth of Raspi. Frozen heart was a life saver this game as the scary models Nico sent forward had terrifying as their main defence. One of the few times a pair hanged aren't scary is when they're sitting in the open ten inches from Raspi.
The game ended in a solid win for me (everyone was in almost as much shock as me)

Lunch. Food was provided by the venue a nice buffet the while tasty wouldn't have looked out of place at a great aunts funeral.
Painting was put out for judgement. There was two painting competitions, best three minions which have a huge amount of entries. And best painted egg, which has fewer than hoped but all of them were amazing.
I entered both and had a good nose at the other more impressive entries.

A quick walk in the sunshine to stretch my legs (I know who knew there there was sun up t'north)

On to game three, now I was sitting precariously high on a draw and a win, so I was likely in for a tough match to finish the day.
I got this in the form of fellow Dark Sphere player, captain of the fauxmads, and Angeleye's only fan. Marcus.
It had been ages since we'd played so it was cool to see how we'd both progressed. The game was recon Lucius v Marcus and considering neither of us were playing ressers the was a shocking amount of undead on the table. (Most of my available beasts are from my time playing ressers).

As expected the game was controlled by Marcus from the start but I did manage to put a few speed bumps in the road making good use of a charging emissary and a super quick Marcus.
The game ended in a win for Marcus but left me for I think the first time ever on a positive VP diff to finish a tournament, +1 is a lot better than the previous weeks -18.

As always people won things and there was clapping and raffles and all that fun. Check the rankings if you want to see the standings and things by this point in the day my brain has shut down so I just join in when other people clap. I did win some chocolate eggs and a trans Daw crew which was a pleasant surprise.

One last cuppa, a fair bit of hand shaking and working who'll be a what event next then it was back in the car, remembering to get Claire (no reavers so far but better to be safe).

All in all a great day. Lots of chat, almost enough tea, and I didn't embarrass myself (on the table anyway). Big thanks to my opponents, and to Mr Brown for running things.

Thanks for reading next up for me should be Spring Showdown (tickets still available I believe)

And so it begins...

   

Its finally time for my tournament season to kick off again, and also time to start the now legendary Arc'17 (legendary might be pushing it but its big trust me)

Once again I was heading down to Wayland games, this time it was Lost Love 5 run by the unstoppable Mr David Brown. This is my third lost love and it's always an event I look forward too. It was touch and go a few days before the event if I would make it at all as I had slight car issues but I was rescued when the heroic Mr Paul Butler offered to pick me up on his way down. (once again proving how amazing the Malifaux community is).

So when got down to Wayland in chilly Hockley and after giving a hand to set up the tables it was time to register. Lost Love is slightly different than a standard GG event in a few ways, firstly it's fixed Master, second it's 45ss games which changes things slightly, and third you have a 70ss pool to hire you're models from. All these aspects are there to make it a bit more beginner friendly while still keeping the veterans entertained. 

My Master and pool for the event was

Which was quite simple to choose as that's most of what I had painted in Arcanists. I've only had a few games with Rapsi before the event so I wasn't hugely confident (no change there) but I knew enough that I hopefully didn't completely embarrass myself.

Quick stop for tea and a run around saying hi to some of the 44 other players that had shown up despite knowing I would be there.

Game one was against Lucas (spoiler he also went on the finish very well this event), he was running Som'er with a fleet of gremlins and we were playing head hunter.

First few rounds were surprisingly close with me managing to kill a few waves of gremlins but Lucas kept up the pressure and steadily kept scoring VP while I took pot shots at his crew.

The game ended 9-3 to Lucas. It was a fun game and the fact that it wasn't a white wash boosted my confidence with 'tina.

Lunch time was a Wayland special and another tea. The tea was even more vital than normal as standing in a warehouse in mid February is a bit nippy.

Round two and I was up against one of my locals and also someone who I faced round two at Nationals Rich who was running Tara (shiny new fixed Tara). This time we had Stake a Claim, which with the notoriously slow December gang wasn't looking to easy.

For the first few turns this was a really cagey game with nothing dieing but both of us putting down a wave of scheme markers. Then one activation after the other we both killed our frame for murder targets and then we settled it to a game of him trying to bury me and me trying to kill him.

schemes were a draw so it all came down to claim markers and unfortunatly for me no matter how much I kill that doesn't get rid of markers. 

The game ended 7-5 to Rich which I have to say was a well deserved win. The margin of loss was getting lower and combos were stating to click with the crew so I was happy going into game three.

Game three was against Sean running Tatiana in Squatters rights.

I was expecting a barrage of neverborn tricks and speed, which I got with silurids grabing squat marker early and Tati and mature neph flying straight over my ice pillars. however I managed to have an incredibly lucky run of cards meaning the emissary grabbed my some hunting party points early while Raspi blasted away about half of Tati's crew. After that the weight of numbers on my side meant that I could keep the pressure on and keep blasting into the crew. 

The game ended up 8-5 to me and I was really happy with that result. Luck may have paid a large part but now I knew I could win a game with Arcanist.

Tea, Tea, and more Tea... I could almost feel my fingers again by this point.

Game four my final game was against Shaunie running Pandora (I'm not a huge fan of facing box girl so  this wasn't great news. And Shaunie didn't seem too keen on facing Raspi so we were even)

This round was interference and as it had been a long day and Pandora was looking terrifying I decided to go fairly agressive and just ignore the strat while I concentrated on killing everything.

A lot and nothing seemed to happen in this game and honestly I think if the game had been play early in the day not at the end it would have been a bit higher scoring both sides.

I managed to do enough damage to Pandi to get 1 vp for eliminate that may have been the high light of my game. Pandi kept fairly defensive while ticking up points for last stand.

The game ended in a 6-6 draw which wasn't a bad result. I'll also use this point to send people over to check out the events running over in Woking this year where Shaunie is henchman Under the hanging tree . Well worth checking out.

So thats it first event of Arc'17 and I didn't (overly) embarrass myself of the cult of December. I finished 32 out of 45 so no wooded spoon to add to the collection this time.

Big thanks to Dave for running it, it was a huge event that managed to keep the friendly community feel of past Lost Loves as well. Thanks to Wayland for the tea and table. Thanks to all my opponents for not throwing anything at me. And again a huge thanks to Paul for getting me there.

Next up will be Snowdown back at Wayland again for the first of the years showdown series. I should be adding a second master to the case for that one when I decide between Marcus or Cooper and is you wanted to come along and see my looking confused you can find a ticket here - Snowdown!    

  

I Falldown, but I get up again.

On Sunday I headed down to Wayland for another in the showdown series of events, this time Falldown (get it, get it?).

A few days before the events it was touch and go if I'd actually make it due to work joys followed by a run of car problems, but I managed to cheat fate and come Sunday morning off I went to sunny Hockley.

As always when I get there first stop is the cafe down the road grab a tea (just a tea this time no full English for once I'm cutting back to just one breakfast a day) then back to Wayland to take part in the most sacred of showdown traditions. Standing around outside talking shit and waiting for the venue to open.

Once the doors were open we rushed in to queue up and register, then stand about talking shit again but this time inside (variety is the spice of life).