No joke its April Fauxs Day

Don your Croy, for April Fauxs Day

Last week I got my shots, invoked the various rituals of protection, and updated my will before heading of to Croydon for a days gaming.

Car, tube, tube, train, walk saw me arrive at the Croydon conference centre for April Fauxs Day. A four round, 50ss event. First things first the venue was a pleasant surprise. A bar, decent loos, and praise Almighty December air con. There were two events on, Faux in one half of the room and AOS in the other side. Worries I had that it would be hideously loud soon passed as no one seemed in the mood to shout.
Also it was cool to see a few people I used to play fantasy against in my brief pre-Faux era.

Usual pre tournament routine of registration, get tea, and talk shit I can't back up on the table went well and soon it was time to kick off.

Round one I was up against Dom and his gremlin horde. It was squatters and I took claim jump and inspection. It didn't take long to realise I was out matched so I decided to just throw everything towards Somer and hope I could do enough damage early on to give me an edge. It didn't quite work, Dom weathered the storm then ran off to score VP while I left my crew stranded in the middle of the table. It was a really fun game despite my lack of points. I lost game one but had high hopes for game two.

The game did have one interruption which was TO Conor coming around taking drinks orders. This went on all day and it's safe to say that anyone who brings me that much tea automatically gets add to my list of favourite people.

Game two was a bit of deja vu I faced off against Jay using Ophelia in extraction I once again run Raspi. Which was the exact set up in round two of my last event when I also faced Jay. It was a great game we both went on the offensive early despite frame being in the pool. Jay won the early smack down taking out a few of my key minions while I only put a few dents in his, but Ophelia did take a few shots a my acolyte killing her to score me frame.
After that it became a bit of a brawl around the extraction marker while a model from each crew tried to score claim jump.
The game ended in a slight win for me but mainly down to a few lucky flips on my side and it could have easily gone to the green skins had the luck turned.

Lunch! I popped my crew out for best painted which was judges choice today. As usual I didn't hope to win but I always enter to see how I stack up against better painters and there were a few great ones on show.
Down stairs from the venue was a slightly hipster burger place, which I highly recommend to any heading that way as the food was great and in truth I ate enough that I probably should have had a nap instead of heading back to the event.

Round three. Interference against Reva. I played Toby who I always bump into but never get to play. Turn one I tried to be clever and take a few pot shots at Reva with an over keen December acolyte, Reva shrugged it off and then squished the acolyte in return and that pretty much sums up the game. The left side of the table was a bundle with Lola and a mannequin not really doing much other than being swamped in models and fluffing hits, the right side of the table was my crew dying while Cooper ran and hid repeatedly. The MVP for me was a raptor dropping to deny claim jump the flying off again next turn... until it got squished too.
Game ended  with a well deserved win for Toby and the Pony rider, another fun game, another crushing defeat.

Game four. I was facing off against the second best member of High Fauxdelity at that table (for those that haven't heard it High Fauxdelity is a podcast which stars Ritch, puts up with me and let's a couple of other fellas on to do the heavy lifting) We were playing reckoning and it was Raspi vs the Viks. Carnage doesn't even begin to cover it. I pushed forward early looking to start throwing ice around, the Viks charged an insanely long way and started whirl winding everything in range. Snowstorm exploded with enough force to kill a vik and end of turn two I had two minions left neither of us had a master and I had run out of tea. It was a dark time. The game continued in this chaotic style until the end when Ritch scored all the points and I gave his snipers dirty looks. Solid win for Ritch and a great game to end the day on.

Cup of tea while things we finished up, people won things as always check the rankings page as I don't remember stuff like that but congratulations to those that left with shiny things.

I then took the long lonely train ride home while trying to work out how to lessen the many mistakes I made. (which, I got a chance to do the following Saturday and I'll write up next)

Big thanks to all my opponents, next time I'll try and give you more of a challenge. Thanks and well done to Conor for running a fun and smooth event.

Sorry, totally Zoned Out there...

While my intrepid teammate Dr Walnut had headed off to Wayland to take part in Lost Love, I was braving the perils of the Midlands to help TO the second event at the brand new Warzone Workshop. Normally this would require the special kind of hell that is the British train system but luckily for me the very beardy Stuart "Snezzley" Snares had offered to give me a lift. Huzzah!

We ended up with 26 players in the end out of an estimated 28 - sadly Mr Battrick had been unable to make it due to bad weather in his area but hopefully he'll be able to get to the next one! It was lovely to see people who had travelled from a few different places, as well as some of the Warzone locals we also had a large contingent of Squigs (including THE Joel Henry), 2 of the Tractor Massive (Mike "Lord of Malifaux" Marshall and Spooner) and then Snezzley who in a move that was either brave or foolish had made the drive from Kent to Northampton. Loon!

We had a very easy and fun journey up to Northampton, managing to get there a little before the stated start time of 10am. As the Warzone shop is on the small side, Karl & Ben had annexed the cafe across the way which had the added benefit of being able to serve hot drinks to any players who wanted them. A bonus when you're playing at an event in February I feel.

We got underway with our 2 unfortunate drop outs and Ben used the very cool Bag O Tools software to get the first round draw done. In possible the most malevolent display of artificial intelligence since Skynet, the software decided to pair Matt Spooner with Joel Henry. I'm not ENTIRELY sure but I think Matt was a bit annoyed. In fact, I think he might have said a bad word or 50. Of course everybody else found this incredibly funny was very sympathetic to Matt.

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!    

  

Band on tour!

In the recent past, last Sunday to be precise I took on the epic journey of driving forty minutes down the road to sunny Hockley. To take part in the first (but not last hopefully) Bending fates run by Bendyboards with the ever gracious Wayland games as hosts.

And against all my better judgement (there's not a huge amount of that) I took the forever cool if just a bit poor (sounds like me) Crossroads Seven along.

As before all events, late to bed and early to rise seemed like a solid plan. First breakfast and a few cuppas and I was ready to go.

Drive down was uneventful apart from the car overheating but she's a tough old thing and I employed the tried and tested method of drive faster and ignore the problem which seemed to get me there in once piece.

Once there it was time for a second breakfast this one involving plenty of fried stuff, and another tea to keep me going.

Next up the classic stand in front of Wayland talking shit and shaking hands with everyone.

Next up we were in and registering which involved a lot of me say yes I'm taking the Crossroads Seven, yes really, no I didn't lose a bet, stop laughing it'll be fine, etc and so on.

Once registered and with the very nice gift of a measuring widget from Bendyboards I nipped off to grap a much needed tea then we were ready for game 1.

First game was against a charming fella called Gavin from Wales. (No I didn't "do the accent", I'm a grown adult I don't go around mimicking people's accent... Yes I really wanted to).

Great game of Ophelia vs Wrath in head hunter. I threw Greed and Pride in early in the hopes of giving him something to worry about while the rest of the crew got into position. This half worked, the rest of the crew got to roughly where I wanted them but Ophelia and friends didn't even pause while killing Greed and Pride and strolling on forward now with a few points for the heads in the bag.

The game carried on like this with me losing a couple of models a turn while scraping a few points together where I could.

Finished 10-6 to Gavin. Really fun game and I was happy with how I play despite the lack of VP.

Time for lunch!

Start of lunch I drop down my crew for the painting comp, this may have involved a display

board, yes I know I'm a wanker. (Still a bit gutted I never got a good look at the painting crews as I was too caught up chatting, fingers crossed there will be some pictures floating around of them soon)
Next a classic Wayland meal deal.
Chat about the first round with people, compare emotional scaring from the beatings we received then back to the fun.

Game two was against fellow Dark Sphere club mate Ross running his Gremlins. So Ulix v Wrath in Extraction. As always a fun if crazy game against Ross. Lots of carnage in the middle of the board with Pride trying to act as scheme runner up one flank (also this crew needs a leap or similar, on Pride or Greed would work great). This was a game of paper cut damage by me while pigs had a picnic on the bands guts and also on any scheme markers that I managed to drop. Ended up pulling five VP from the game, which took every resource and trick I had. Ross took the Win 10-5 and well deserved.

Quick dash for tea and to check how everyone else was getting on then straight into game three. The final and as chance would have it I was in line for a prize. The much coveted and desired wooden spoon awarded to the most generous gifter of tournament points. (the loser)

The final game was against the comedy legend, the happiest man in Malifaux Sir Matt of Spoons.
Matt was running Ramos v Wrath in Collect the bounty. (Did I mention my crew was all enforcers?)
Figuring I needed to put the pressure on early I threw Wrath forward and took out Johan start of round 2, I took out a few spiders as well. Then I got hit by a train! The rail golem killed whatever it looked at before Lust could push it into a corner for a turn. This just meant that Joss took over with the face smashing.
As you would expect from Matt it was an enjoyable game with plenty of swearing to keep things moving. Despite the score I honestly think I played it as well as I could, I forced some tough choices and got in strong positions I just didn't have the tools to finish the job, while Matt kept the pressure on each turn and made sure he scored his points. The game ended with a loss of 9-2 but both of us happy with how we played.

So that's it, there was some cheering as people won trophies that weren't as good as my spoon, If you want to know who they were check out the rankings as I will probably get the names wrong.

There was a raffle with cheering as well. Then it was time to thank the TO's Bendyboards and the hosts Wayland games. Then I just had to drive home, scrub the gamer stink off me, and maybe put the band in a little box at the back of my hobby cupboard for a while.

Thanks for reading (if anyone still is) next event should be Falldown II where I think I'll be back to running Molly maybe with a bit of Yan Lo thrown in for good measure.

A lodda work for cheriddy mate.....

Lo, it is I! I have returned from another trip to an event although this time instead of heading into the wild lands north of the M25 car park, I went south. Into the wretched hive of scum and villainy known as Kent.

The very awesome Dave Hill had decided to take the plunge and run his own Malifaux event with the aim of raising money for Ronald McDonald House Charities, an excellent organisation that provides accommodation for families with a child in hospital care. A very worthy cause indeed and Dave had come up with some excellent stretch goals to help raise as much money as possible. The event was held at Grumpy Goblin in Ramsgate which is a lovely store over 3 floors with a shop, cafe and gaming area. Jake, who owns the business, had very kindly donated the use of the large gaming area for free. Awesome stuff.

Not only did we have the obligatory raffle (which had a ton of prizes donated by people in the community) but there were baked goods for sale and the ability to pay a £5 fee to grudge the person of your choice in the first round, as long as they agreed of course! The charity shenanigans didn't stop there however; Dave had pledged to TO the whole event dressed in costume (Radioactive Man from The Simpsons) but the brave soul had also agreed to take a cream pie to the face at the end of the event. Joe Wood had promised to dress as a Rotten Belle for the event as well as playing a joke crew made up of Leviticus and 9 Belles, which has been a long running joke in the UK scene as a "broken" crew. Ben "Joffrey" Crowe had also joined in with the fund raising by allowing his opponents to pick his Master for each game. As he was playing Guild I suspect Lucius came out to play at least once.....

UP AND AT DEM!

I had travelled down the night before with THE Joel Henry and we'd had a lovely evening with Lee Battrick and the Lord of Malifaux himself Mike Marshall. Truly we were humbled. Dinner was acquired at the hotel and then Joel and I took ourselves off for the very serious business of studying crews for the next day Pokemon hunting in Ramsgate. So many electric Pokemon on the seafront.......

First round is underway and I had been grudged by Lee Battrick as we'd never had the opportunity to play. Lee has currently left the Bayou for the Guild and had chosen Sonnia for this game of Collect the Bounty. It was a fantastic game, Lee was very patient and helpful as I am not at all familiar with Sonnia so there might have been a bit of coaching going on. A super fun game that ended 5-4 to me with huge thanks to Lee reminding me Ophelia can shoot in melee. Doh!

Second game and I'd decided I was going to take a different Master in each game as I am trying to practice with Wong and Mah so as not to become too reliant on Ophelia. The second strategy was Extraction and after taking one look at the amount of cover and severe terrain on the board, I decided to go with Mah, hoping that being able to ignore severe terrain with chores and being a more melee focused Master would help me in the match up with Paul Dean's Ten Thunders Misaki. Misaki is another Master I don't know too well and Paul had taken some other unfamiliar models such as Ten Thunders Archers, Fuhatsu and The Lone Swordsman. Ultimately the Archers being able to take a free shot at the end of every turn thanks to Blot the Sky and having the ability to ignore cover and not randomise was more than my crew could handle. Paul played really well and came out the 10-5 winner of another fun game. Note to self. Kill the damn archers next time!

Last round and yet another new player - Grant Dickinson. This time however it was a more familiar Master, the mad undertake himself, Nicodem. This was the first time I'd seen the Carrion Emissary on the table against me so I was keen to find out what it could do in the game of Guard the Stash. Turns out, it's really bloody annoying! For the last game I was using Wong as I've been having fun with him and want to try and use him to his full potential. Given the Emissary's ability Shards of Kythera, which places big LoS blocking pillars all over the shop, it's more than a little frustrating!

Another really good game of Guard the Stash that resulted in a 10-6 loss for me. Lots of horribleness ensued from Nicodem which involved summoning over the course of the game, 3 Hanged, 2 Flesh Constructs, a horde of Mindless Zombies, a Punk Zombie, a Crooligan and a couple of Shikome. Bloody Ressers. I simply didn't have the firepower to take them down and some clever use of Shards of Kythera helped keep Grant's key models safe from Wong's blasty magic. Lots of fun but my Gremlins were simply overwhelmed!

End of the event and there were a couple of things to attend to before getting down to the business of results. First the raffle, which had so many prizes that I think most people went home with something. I was lucky enough to come away with a Miss Step, which my Arcanist playing partner was very pleased with. Then we had the very important matter of Dave bravely taking a cream pie to the face, which was duly applied by Ben Crowe who I think enjoyed it far too much....

Pie time!

As for the results the Best Painted award went to Mike Hutchinson (author of the very cool Gaslands game, go check it out!) for his lovely Miaski crew. The wooden spoon went to Al and then we had 3rd place of THE Joel Henry, 2nd place for John Burgess (moving onto Outcast filth instead of Neverborn filth!) and our 1st place prize went to George Hollingdale from the Flippin' Wyrd team. But the real winner of the day was Ronald McDonald House Charity who will be receiving a total amount raised by this event of over £1000 which is amazing. Huge congratulations to Dave for running such a fun event and to everyone who donated and everyone who did daft things in the name of charity. And I still think Joe enjoyed the tights way too much......

Next years Miss model perhaps.....?

Into the Warzone!

Yes it is I, your intrepid explorer! I have returned from a perilous and harrowing journey to Outside of London and into the Middle Lands North of the M25. Basically, I went to a tournament in Warzone Workshop, located in the exotic location known as Northampton.

For those playing along at home, I'd been to a Story Event run at Warzone Workshop at the tail end of last year and had a great time. This time it was a standard 50SS Fixed Faction event run by the local Henchman Ben Harris. And I'd volunteered my services as an assistant TO and spare player for the day. Let the games begin!

We ended up with 25 players after having a last minute drop out so Ben and I decided to rotate playing and being admin, which gave us both a chance to relax and get a drink given it was shaping up to be a very warm day and while the venue is perfectly fine, being on the top floor of an indoor shopping centre means that there's not a lot of options for ventilation. We did our best with strategically placed fans but the hard truth is that putting 27 people in any confined space for a long period of time on a hot day and it's inevitable that the temperature is going to be on the high side!

 We had a good mixture of players from different areas - there was a strong showing from the local meta, including my frequent travel buddies Karl McConnell and Craig Woods, Graeme Nicholls and a few new faces I hadn't met before. We were fortunate also to have amongst us The Man, The Beard, The Legend that is Ritch Keeling. Ritch is currently fufilling a bet to play this year's Nightmare Edition crew at Nationals so he was getting some McCabe practice in. If you'd like to find out a bit more about his bet and the road to Nationals then make sure to check out his blog Brutal Efficacy for more details. Tis a good read. And last but not least we were all blessed by the presence of the Lord of Malifaux Mike Marshall (aka Captain Troy Tempest) who had made the trip over from Norfolk with the ever-lovely Lee Battrick. Truly, we were honoured.

First round and due to the drop out, poor Graeme drew the short straw and had to play the first ringer - me. As the strategy was Reckoning, I decided to take Ophelia and a fairly elite crew including Mancha, Trixiebelle, Merris, and Francois. For my schemes I decided on Leave Your Mark (between Merris and Trixie this seemed doable) and Undercover Entourage on Trixie. Graeme had moved onto Arcanists for this event and had picked Kaeris for this game. Ultimately I couldn't do enough damage to his crew to score for Reckoning (bloody Joss. Stupid Armour. Sodding Johana with a sodding heal!) and Graeme played very smart to kill Trixie when I moved her too far forward and left her in range of the Oxfordian Mages. The game ended in a very decisive win for Graeme but it was a very fun game, despite me still being half asleep and flustered so apologies to Graeme for that!

Next up was lunch and the painting contest. The standard was incredibly high from all the entrants and out of the field of 25 players, we had 14 entries for the contest. That's pretty incredible and really good to see so many people making the effort to have nicely painted minis!

Round 2 and I'd tagged in Ben as ringer so I could take a break and have a sit down, which was quite welcome at this point of the day! I also managed to have a wander round and see how everyone was getting on - the atmosphere was very relaxed and there was a lot of laughing from various tables which is always a good sign everyone's enjoying themselves.

Amusing table numbers are a common theme at Ben's events!

 Onto the final round and I jumped back in to play Nick, who was a local I hadn't met as he'd been taking a few months break from Malifaux and had only just started attending events again. This round was Extraction and just for ease of playing I decided to go with Ophelia again, but a slightly different crew including Gracie to tank some damage and a Rooster Rider to try and get 3VP for Leave Your Mark/Convict Labour which were the two schemes I picked. I was a little worried as Nick was running Von Schill, a Master I don't have a lot of familiarity with. Plus his chosen crew had an awful lot of bulletproof models in it, not ideal against a shooty Master like Ophelia! It was another fun game and Nick was a really lovely opponent to play against, even though the game went fairly definitively my way, he managed to keep laughing and joking - especially when he managed to get the Abomination summoned in by Rusty Alyce to kill Mancha Roja. Gutsy little guy! Finished up 8-0 to me.

So the end of another event and another fun day. Time to hand out the prizes! As is usual at the Warzone events, the prize support was excellent, with a selection of boxes and other goodies for the raffle as well as some lovely trophies for the top 3 in both painting and playing.

So once the dust had settled we had a top 3 in the painting of Hayden Smith (3rd) The Lord of Malifaux Mike Marshall (2nd) and in 1st place was Craig Woods with his gorgeous Whiskey Golem. Sadly I didn't get a picture as I was rushing around during lunch but it looked amazing, as did all the entries. It was a really high standard contest and everyone's entries looked great.

For the Best Sport we had Karl McConnell who is starting to make a habit of being in the running for these awards. Not sure why.....(I kid I kid!). So well done to him as well, despite struggling with a bad back all day!

Finally we had the gaming prizes. Starting with the medal for Best Loser we had my 3rd round opponent Nick, who seemed thrilled with his medal and promptly put it round his neck. He told me later he'd had a really fun day and was planning to come down to the local gaming nights more often so it'll be good to see him at more events in the future. 3rd place we had one of the local guys Steve Wilson, 2nd place was the ever lovely Stuart Snares (even if we did give him a bit of abuse about it, all in good fun!) and our overall winner was Rich Bream, another local lad who has been using Neverborn recently.

In summary, I can highly recommend the events at Warzone Workshop. The shop is in Northampton town centre so there's plenty of parking nearby and it's not a terribly long walk from the train station, which gets a regular service from Euston for all you London type people. I had a lot of fun and I'm hoping to be able to come along and help out again someday (hey someone has to get Ben to events on time :p).