Summer Showdown run down.

A really brief write up of my trip to Summer Showdown recently, before you get excited I didn't do too well in terms of points but I was funny and charming so I'm taking the moral victory ( I do that a lot it's the only win I tend to get )

So we'll start with the beginning I drove down to Wayland games and made it despite the best efforts of my sat nav and other drivers trying to kill me. I even got there early enough to have a cup of tea.

My first game was slightly delayed due to my opponent reading the start time off the website not the forum (true story) which meant I had time for tea #2 before facing off against Conrad and his resser Yan Lo. I ran resser McMourning all day. Even with the slight delay we managed a solid four turns and a lot of back and forth resulted in a 4-4 draw

Break for lunch and tea #3 before back to the action.

Neverborn: my painted collection

After completing #TOMB2 and uploading photos of my finished crew, I decided I should do a photo of all my painted malifaux models since I haven't had a big photo of everything together yet. I spent a weekend doing touchups on all my metal models, varnishing them (since I hadn't done that the first time), and painting all the base edges black (since many had paint splattered on them). The process was quite fun as I got to see how much I have improved from my earliest models (Dreamer crew) to the most recent (Bishop, Nekima).

Here are a couple shots of all the models I have currently painted. For anyone who is curious, 21 of the models are metal and 27 are plastic (as you can see I am not at all opposed to the old metals like some people are). Just a note that their are two models in here that I didn't paint as they were given to me by other players (thank you guys!). The Brutal Effigy was painted by Mike Marshall and Lazarus was painted by Joel Henry.

Cards or Dice & Chancing to win (not lose)

One of the key differences for Malifaux that every player notices is, of course, no dice and a deck of cards in its place. There must be endless articles on this fact but I thought I would muse on a few things over the matter and a brief take on playing the odds.

While many of the other elements of the game of Malifaux, Schemes & Strategies or building your crew 'on the fly' are also quite unique and go a long way to make Malifaux the amazing game that it is the use of cards, for me, is the real big separator from other systems.

Country Mouse and City Mouse Death Match.

Once again a slightly rambling post which has a tenuous link to gaming (I feel tenuous and rambling is my niche in Malifaux so I’m sticking to it.)

Following a recent chat about prize money at tournaments and how I’m very against it. This got me thinking about why I’m so against having cash prizes in Malifaux, and I think the main word to sum up how I feel is community (not the TV show).

One of the best features of Malifaux in the UK and I hope the rest of the world is that it attracts a great community feel. I’m going to liken it to a country village, you know everyone or at least you know someone who knows them. You may not all be friends but we all work together and do what we can to keep things nice.

Now I know this might be a bit of a rose tinted view of the Malifaux scene but from the what I’ve seen and from the people I’ve met I’d say it’s true for me if not for everyone.

Riding the pain train

Well, the first half of the year has been a cracking one for my Malifaux game. I’ve kept with the Ten Thunders, mostly Yan Lo but have just switched to Mei Feng

The difference is night and day. I really love the fluff of Yan Lo and turning him into a nearly indestructible spirit by the end of the game, but I’ve noticed he isn’t the most powerful of masters. He is solid, tough and lightning dance has won me the game on positional play. Then I switched to Mei Feng for the recent league at Darksphere. My gosh, but she is awesome. The movement game with the constructs and the pure hitting power of her crew combined with some ridiculously tough models, a great totem and the utility. She has rapidly become my fave go to master. I’ve loved her flexibility and then there is the awesomeness that is the MIGHTY KANG!

#TOMB2 Month 4: This is the End

Month 3 Catchup

Before I get into all the fun month 4 stuff, since I hadn't finished month 3 in time I thought I would include some photos of my month 3 model Nekima here now that she is completed. Nekima ended up being a very long process but I am quite happy with the results. Went for Grey skin like Lilitu and gave her Red Clothes and Blue wings (keeping with the Grey,blue,red colours used on Lilitu/Lelu, my only other painted Nephilim) Also tried putting a gloss coat on the sword to see if I liked the shine (it's fairly subtle but I think it adds a little bit. This was my first attempt at proper blonde hair and it ended up being a bit more yellow than I'd planned. Since it isn't on a human though it's not a big deal. Nekima has been a blast to play even though I haven't come anywhere near to getting her rolling at peak effectiveness yet. It is great to get her up to min damage 6 from the Nurse and watch her attack 4 times in a turn (3 in her activation, once from obey). Will definitely be trying to get some more playing time as the competitive community seems split on how great she is.

End of the League.

Short post as I have tournaments to plan. (make sure you've got your ticket to Dark Faux in July)

At our club we have just finished a short league. The idea was a quick fun league that would be good for new and old players alike.

What I came up with was a 5 week escalation league that covered all the rulebook strategies and all the schemes. All the Strats and schemes were pre announced so that everyone had time to think about how they wanted to build their crews.

 There was also a ranking system in place to help balance the experienced and newer players. This seemed to work as most of the games were very close.

Spirit of the game.

My most recent Malifaux master is Kirai. I picked up her box set along with Izamu and Yin.

I really enjoyed painting these as for a resser player it was a nice change from zombie flesh tones.

First up was Izamu the Armour in the style of a terracotta warrior.

Learning Lynch

I could be wrong but I think Lynch might be the master everyone wants to play but often feels he (or they) come up short when it matters. Who doesn't want to be a card shark in a card game!

So, as I am currently 'learning Lynch' myself, from the Neverborn angle I should point out, I thought I might do a bit of a spiel on what I have discovered so far.

Quick disclaimer, I'm no pro, I have played 4 games so far only with Lynch, these are my initial thoughts on Lynch and I hope to post additional musings and tactical genius (hah!) as I go along!