Tournament Participants' Picture

Again in a better quality because I really liked it and found it a really fun picture.

March Madness Scenario

Scenario:

Shared treasure for setup and interacting with the special.
BUT: 4 different deployment zones = place a marker 12'' from every corner (8'' from every side), players will deploy in a 4'' area around the marker

treasure is placed in the middle of the map.

the treasure itself is a LOT more special than your normal Malifaux expedition's loot:
-a model carrying the treasure cannot make any ranged attack (or spells with the range symbol)
-models within 3" of the treasure receive '' - ''x2 on their ranged attacks (or spells with the range symbol)
-models carrying the treasure earns its team 1vp at the ''start draw phase''.

One last rule: Ranged attacks (and anything with the range symbol) can't be used on the 1st turn of the game.

Victory:
-models carrying the treasure earns its team 1vp at the ''start draw phase''.(as said earlier)
-you score 1vp if a model you control is carrying the treasure at the end of the game, +1vp if that model is in yours or your ally's deployment zone.

Special Action:

A model that hits in a melee duel and would receive no negative modifier on his damage flip can attempt a Wp-Wp duel instead of doing damage to steal the treasure from a model carrying it.

Thoughts on the scenario:

After playing it I must say this a really violent scenario that favored aggressive play, by the end of turn 2 in my two games I had lost most of my crew and turn 3 and 4 generally saw lots of desperate actions in order to try and get the treasure.

-Cassandra should be banned OR her ''celebrity'' rules should be ignored (which we did), else she is invincible on the first turn of the game and automatically scores 1vp.

-I think the ''no negative modifier on damage flip'' to try and steal the treasure should be removed, its clunky: the ''steal'' action was here to be able to get the treasure from models with slow to die and soulstone use, but the ''no negative'' kinda makes the whole action useless against these specific models.

-2h30 is approximatively 3-4 turns...And it is enough!! Surprisingly (or not, because we playtested), 3-4 turns of 2v2 is EXTREMELY violent and there's enough action that it feels like a 6turns game.

Thanks to Michael for devising this scenario, thanks to all playtesters (Edson, Austin, Thom, Michael, Ivan...And I :)) who improved it and helped a lot!

March 27th ''Malifaux March Madness'' Tournament (game2)

Game 2:

Opponents: Michael and Austin, playing Leveticus (again?! At least it was a different list) and The Dreamer.

Having playtested this scenario against both of our opponents, I had a vague idea of how they would try to handle it and some of their nasty tricks, nonetheless, I lost my entire crew (including Colette this time) by the end of turn 3.

Here's some pics to try and explain the Arcanist's disaster...

Turn 2: After killing some Steampunk Abominations to try and prevent a Desolation Engine from appearing, the poor Steamborg Executioner gets killed by a whooping 12+ Dg by Leveticus (using soulstones, cheating red Joker on damage flip, etc...)

R.I.P Steamborg Executioner (he only had one activation in both games but always killed 2 models before leaving us)

Colette and a Freikorpsman get in the fray as they try to prevent the Dreamer's crew from capturing the treasure...

Also, Colette avenged the loss of Cassandra and the Steamborg by doing to the Desolation engine the same thing she did to Killjoy earlier in the day.

Some activations later, a lot of the Stitched together died, suffering from Von Schill specialist's flamer or their own ''gamble your life''.

Lord Chompy Bits grabs the coveted treasure.

Not too far from the action, Von Schill is about to try and pull another ''Indiana Jones'' on the Dreamer's Crew...

Beginning of the end: Colette is still alive but won't be after her activation (as a furious desolation engine wants some explanations for the turns he passed in a mausoleum instead of being in the open).

Leveticus looks alive...But will die...and will rest in pieces as Ivan and I make sure of it by killing the Hollow Waif and Colette applying the old ''and eye for an eye, a Steamborg for an old man'' saying on Leveticus.

Finally, the game ended 3vp to 1vp for the Leveticus-dreamer team, able to come back from a terrible turn 1 and slaughtering the Arcanists while resisting every attempt of treasure thievery made by Ivan (and he tried a lot, even a Freikorpsman on his ''slow to die'' attempted to remove the relic off Chompy's claws!)

Thanks to Michael, Austin and Ivan for the game :). (and RIP my one-activation-Steamborg)

Here's a picture of all the players:

From left to right: Ivan, Michael, Josh, José, Austin, Edson, Thom and myself (with the strange arm-crossing).

Congrats to Edson and Thom who finished 1st of the Malifaux March Madness with 9vp!!

Josh and José both won the 2 random prizes...

And Ivan and myself won...our names on the wooden spoon of doom! (the one with very Malifaux Tournament last place's names)

March 27th ''Malifaux March Madness'' Tournament (game1)

March Malifaux Madness...The first 2v2 Malifaux Tournament at Gamers' Vault, and a success in my opinion :)

I'll post the full scenario in a next entry.

So I teamed up with my friend Ivan in a ''Arcanist-Outcast'' alliance to extract treasures and mysterious object from Malifaux graveyards...

Our list:

Me: Steamborg Executioner, Cassandra, Performer + Mannequin and as a master, Colette Dubois.

Ivan's list: Von Schill's Freikorps

Game 1:

Opponents: Josh and José playing Leveticus and Nicoderm

If you've seen zombie apocalypse movies, then you can imagine how Ivan and I felt when a couple of activations in the game the board turned into a sea of zombies...

An insane game that started as bloodbath and was one until the very end.

I lost everything but my master and a mannequin by the end of turn 2.

Here's 4 pics to try and represent as much as possible the onslaught of game 1.

Deployment: mysterious object in the middle, my arcanists in the top left corner, José rezzers on the bottom left, Josh's Leveticus in top right and Ivan's Von Schill Crew in the bottom right.

Finally I got to play with the beautiful graveyard terrain (I usually always forget about it).

Turn 1: Cassandra gets to the relic and gets it, Steamborg Executioner follows to provide support.
Nicoderm's vulture explodes revealing Killjoy...Things got nasty and at the end of Killjoy's activation, the Steamborg was but a wreck of scrap and corpse counters.
Cassandra lived to score 1vp for the Arcane Team!

In an attempt to avenge the loss of her Steamborg, Colette made the monstrous Neverborn disappear, a poor Zombie Samurai Punk that was too close to the treasure for its own good will suffer the same fate...Both opening their eyes at the end of turn 2 to realize they're not on the battlefield anymore, or at least, not where it matters.

(for those who know Killjoy, notice how he's going to start killing the unsuspecting hollow waif ;))

Von Schill, proving he's worth the gold he's paid, jumps out of a nasty melee to get to the treasure before Mortimer...All that in a pure Indiana Jones style!

Sadly for the Arcanist Team, Von Schill will suffer a rain of attacks from everything the resurrectionists can send at him...And finally its Leveticus himself that will move in for the kill in a desperate attempt to save the day for the zombie team.

And he did!!!
With a final score of 1vp to 1vp, my army fully wiped and tons of models dead, the Resurrectionists wins with the tiebreakers one of the bloodiest game of Malifaux I've seen (and one of the coolest, Colette Dubois was absolutly amazing, being able to deal with killjoy and killing zombies after zombies, a one-girl army!!)

Thanks to Josh, José and Ivan for this great 1st game of the tournament.

The Joke Crew (part 6): The Fluff

''bons baisers d'Arkham Asylum (Malifaux)''

The Batman Arkham Asylum's crew in Malifaux A.K.A ''The Joke Crew''

A little bit of fluff:

''The Joke'' was Dr.McMourning's best friend when they were still both sutdying at an earthside university of medecine, both were good in their domains but they really excelled at being pranksters... One day a joke ended badly in the science department and ''The Joke'' was exposed to an experimental army gas...Hospitalized, he woke up disfigured and expelled by his university for breaching the code of behavior with his pranks and endangering himself while doing so.

''The Joke'' left to himself in the streets became a criminal, at first he got in a lot of trouble because of his physical appearance but the edge given by his madness made him an underworld boss with equally deranged people joining his cause.

...flash forward...

''The Joke'' judged too dangerous to be kept earthside was sent in the newly built Arkham Asylum on Malifaux where the most dangerous and insane criminals would be sent, far away from civilization.

Because of its confinement, nobody knew a few weeks later that the Asylum was raided by Neverborns; ''The Joke'' made it alive with some prisonners...Enough Prisonners for him to experiment on a little hilarious science project of his own.

Unbeknown to him, a Malifaux Vigilante was about to put an end to ''The Joke''s madness...

But until then, My joke crew will be on the gaming boards!!

The Joke Crew (part 5): Killjoy (as a Titan)

In the videogame, the Joker creates a serum that can transform people into monstrosities of muscle and rage...I needed some large beefy model to represent a titan...

Luckily I traded some warmachine for some Malifaux and got myself a Killjoy, and if Killjoy doesnt look like he's Mr.Bodybuilder 2011, he sure looks big and titanesque!

As an added bonus, he needs a model to be sacrificed to be brought into play, absolutly perfect with the theme of ''The Joke'' injecting a serum to a hapless clown and transforming him into a bloodthirsty abomination!!

Killjoy is one heck of a easy model to paint, I was lazy but still I'm satisfied with the end result...And the ''Fun Times'' tattoo adds a little humor to the beast.

On the field: like all the models (except Nurse and McMourning) I didn't try it yet, but it sure looks like its going to be a loooooot of fun to play!!

The Joke Crew (part 4): Miss Pack (Harley Queen)

One of my favorite thing out of 'Batman Arkham Asylum' was Harley Quinn (And I think its most boys favorite too!) So I needed to have an ''Harley Queen'' for ''The Joke''...

There was a nurse that would have been absolutly perfect...if it was'nt for a facial mask she was wearing, removing all the character from the mini, too bad, she had a perfect haircut.

Miss pack it was.

This Miss Pack technically should still be a WIP, I forgot to finish many many things...But for now it will do.

On the field: Nurses are the ultimate support models...And with the lethal drugs they use, their abilities fit nicely with the theme of The Joke Crew.

(''The Joke''s base and ''Harley Queen''s one go together to give a hint of my inspiration ;))