Why throw heads when you can throw the ball? The Morticians!

Great tidings to you all fellow wargamers and welcome to another exciting episode of Wargamer Ramblings!  Today I wanted to go over another team in Guild Ball and it happens to be the second team that the household currently has: the Morticians!  As in the previous team review post you can view/download the stat cards for free right HERE.

So if there is one thing certain about living is that death is inevitable and well someone has to take care of the grisly grave work.  That is where the Mortician's guild comes onto the scene and they will take care of your loved ones...maybe?  The team definitely has the feel that whatever they do off the pitch is not quite ethical.  Each model has the look and demeanor that something isn't quite right about them and whatever drives them is malicious.  Gameplay-wise the Morticians are about manipulating the enemy team and influence to fit the plans of the guild of death.  I find that it might be best to look at the models and get an idea of what they do to really make sense of it all.  Given the complexity of the team this might be a lengthy post so get a drink/snack and let's get to it.

Guild Symbol

Alright let's look at the captains.  First off we have old man Obulus who has a pretty decent stat-line save his movement and kicking potential.  That's not why you take him though, you take him for his character plays!  For 1 Influence he can have an ally re-roll all dice for it's next attack or character play.  Next you can use him to steal Influence off of an enemy model though and give it to a friendly model.  Finally you can force an enemy model to one of the following: jog/pass/attack and during this action it's counted as a friendly.  Character traits help Obulus move around the field some and get out of sticky spots if engaged.  His legendary play steals all of the enemy team's MP and you gain that MP.  So let me just say Obulus is quite the manipulator.  Being able to force the enemy striker to pass the ball to a fellow Mortician, to steal Influence that might be desperately needed for a possible score, and to steal ALL of the MP from the enemy?  That's pretty intimidating if you ask me.

Start box with Obulus, Cosset, and Graves S1

Scalpel is the season 2 Mortician's captain and she offers a different take to the guild's playstyle.  Her stat-line is a bit beefier than Obulus but with less overt influence manipulation.  Her legendary play will bring every enemy model within 3" into her which then allows her to bring some pain!  She can manipulate Influence but not to a degree like Obulus.  She can transfer them around to other enemy models which in the right circumstances can be annoying.  Her character traits seem to suggest she favors a bit more of a risky gameplay than Obulus, with benefits to reducing armor and gaining defense on parting blows.  Finally she provides some utility for her team's movement with Second Wind, and helps some people stick around with Wake the Dead.

Graves season 1 has some interesting stuff to bring to the pitch, starting off with a Tackle result with only 1 success in melee!  His kick is decent too, so he can easily snatch the ball from an unwary opponent.  His character play allows him to damage all models in his melee range (careful it includes friendly ones too) for a quick 3 points of damage, but also triggering his ability to put a bleed condition on as well.  Should you get 6 hits he can put Rabid Animal on someone for a -4/-4" move and give the poisoned condition.  Graves season 2 plays a bit off of the season 2 mascot gaining some buffs if nearby the rats.  His stat-line changed to reflect his now increasingly paranoia, and his character play Gravedigger benefits a team who is trying to go for the knock-out win by adding a VP when a targeted enemy model is taken-out.

The overall mood of the Mortician's: gloom and doom

So looking at the other players I want to start off with Cosset.  She is what I consider a risky card in your team, in that she can take 3 damage (with only 12 health to start) to gain +3 to her TAC.  She also can charge for free so combined she can bring 11 TAC to the charge.  She only has a max of 2 influence to spend so it's either to claw out someone's eyes or to use her character play, Lure, and get someone to make a jog directly towards her.  Ghast is a solid choice as well with a decent stat-line and offensive capabilities.  His character play only triggers on 4 hits but it is a nice pulse to push every (again that is friendly models too) 4" away and to give them 3 damage.  The first time he takes damage each turn the team gains 2 MP, so that could deter someone wanting to slap him a bit.  Bonesaw is a bit of a whirlwind of options.  Keep in mind his base size is 50mm but he can pass over other models with his heroic play (if he has the movement to do so) and after his activation he gets +1 Defense from attacks/character plays.  His playbook is short so with a couple of hits he can take the ball and the next attack make a character play to give someone 2 damage and then make a kick, which isn't a bad move if you ask me.  If he does manage to fall he will get up each turn before being officially knocked-out and heal up 3 HP.

Let's talk about my growing favorite, Silence.  At first I am like "that's a good stat-line except for his move..." and then I see his character plays.  Wow.  Just wow.  Being able to force an opponent to activate a specific model next...AND also being able to force them to activate a model LAST is unreal.  Think about it: you set up your guild members to steal the ball and pass it to your striker in prime position and then BAM you can't activate that key member until it is the last one.  How annoying is that?  The only downside is that each costs only 1 Influence so you might need some MP to ensure a hit.  Casket is your big 'ole team member.  He is slow, has a lot of health, can hit hard, and has some neat utility options.  For one he can make it harder for the enemy to charge one of your friendlies, and with 2 hits from his playbook he can debuff an enemy model with -4/-4" and -2 dice on their TAC and plays.  He has a legendary play though that is quite nasty.  If he lands the knock-out blow once per game he nets you an additional 2 VP's but, and I say BUT, THERE'S MORE!  The model knocked out cannot receive icy sponges this turn and in the next maintenance phase!  So you knock out someone and they stay knocked da eff out!

One of my favorite paint jobs, credit to: Battle Brush Studios right here

Finally the mascots.  Dirge does a lot of support when he flies around the field.  His move is high, can mark an enemy model so that friendlies gain +2 to their TAC pool, and if the enemy takes him out they straight out lose 4 MP.  That's not an appealing move if you ask me.  Vileswarm, the pile of rats, is more or less meant to be annoying as hell.  It takes only 1 influence to charge most players and if they take him out then everyone in 3" takes damage and are now poisoned.

Phew what a mouthful!  Compared to the Alchemists the Morticians definitely have a lot of complexity underneath the dirt.  I'm sure with some careful digging you will be able to find the bone of their techniques and get a head of the game!  Anyways bad jokes aside the Morticians have a lot of depth to them and a skilled player will be exceptionally annoying to play against.  Hopefully that gave you some insight into the players of the team, happy gaming everyone and roll well!

Guild Ball team review: The Alchemists

Greetings wargamers and welcome to another exciting episode of Wargamer Ramblings!  Here today we are continuing the recent trend of Guild Ball chatting since the wife and I now own two teams!  While we’ve yet to get a game in (good ole’ life getting in the way) it is something we plan on doing in the near future.  So today I wanted to go over one of our teams in a little bit more in-depth, at least in my humble observation, stat cards can be found/downloaded right HERE!

The Alchemist Guild according to the lore a relatively newer guild as compared to some of the others in the field.  As a faction they tend to have a lot of Area of Effect (AoE’s) abilities and often have some ability to chain those together.  These AoE’s often come with additional penalties making the enemy models think twice before going in them.  They are a team that appear to commonly inflict conditions onto enemy players like putting someone on fire or poisoning them.  The Alchemists can manipulate the battlefield by placing several of these areas onto the field and if you can predict where the opponent wants to go you can cause a lot of problems for them.

The Alchemist's symbol

The Alchemists are on the softer side when it comes to taking hits themselves and most of their team members do not have heavy armor values or high health amounts either (with a couple exceptions to the health that is).  Therefore a cunning Alchemist player will not only use the aforementioned AoE’s offensively but also defensively, deterring enemy charges and plays.  It’s not very appealing for an opponent to cross a cloud of fire or poison to charge at one of your models as much as it is if they were in the clear.  Even if they do charge across the AoE a lot of Alchemist models inflict conditions once you get close to them anyways! 

So with the general faction trends out of the way let’s take a look at some of the model synergy going on in this team.  Like other guilds the Alchemist playstyle will change depending on what sort of crew you’re taking to the field.  Midas and Smoke, the two Alchemist captains, change the way you look at your team composition quite drastically.  Midas for example is a great all around captain with a host of abilities to keep opponents on their toes.  With the ability to replicate one enemy model’s ability for the rest of the game he can change the way you play mid-match.  His Heroic Play allows you to switch what you need for the moment at the cost of a Momentum Point (MP), gaining additional speed, offense, defense, and etc.  He can be a bit of an Influence hog though so you need to keep that in mind when using him properly.  His Legendary Play lets you acquire some MP on the go by spending Influence points, up to 3.  So if you are out of MP but need some in a pinch Midas has your back.

The 3 member starter!

The other captain plays a bit differently of course.  Smoke being the Season 2 captain the Alchemists gained, she specializes in manipulating the various AoE’s on the field.  Whereas most models will be able to drop down 1 type of AoE, she can drop 3 down.  She can drop a smoke field and her other two abilities replicate already in-play friendly AoE abilities.  All for 1 Influence each.  Her replication abilities are not limited to smoke however.  So for 2 Influence points you can replicate 2 more clouds of fire or poison which is pretty nasty when you think about it.  That 3” fire AoE can easily become a 9” wall of flame with the right set-up.  While she lacks a Heroic Play her Legendary play allows her to drop 2 3” AoE’s that deal 3 damage AND if they stay in there or move into it they are poisoned.  Ouch!

To save some time I won’t go over every single model in the guild but I will note some trends.  From Season 1 Calculus and Mercury are both great for laying down AoE’s that cause conditions while also providing some utility such as blinding enemy models, or in Mercury’s case just blasting a mofo with fire.  Vitriol takes advantage of being in smoke effects, gaining offensive/mobility boosts while her targets are in the AoE.  Katalyst is true to his name and his abilities play off of models with conditions on them already either gaining bonuses or causing additional damage and he is also one of the two models with a high health count.  Flask is one of the mascots and if positioned correctly he too can add to the AoE shenanigans by contributing a smoke cloud while also inflicting damage on those who have conditions on them.

A team example: Midas, Calculus, Mercury, Vitriol, Katalyst, and Flask!

The Season 2 crew continue this theme but with some additional twists.  Venin prefers to deal out his poison in melee but he also likes to inflict it upon himself to get some bonuses.  He also can do a pulse move for those already poisoned and cause them to start bleeding out as well, for double condition damage!  Compound is a dual Alchemist/Engineer model who functions as a goal-keeper.  His abilities make it harder for others to score goals while being able to counter-charge them if they get too close to the goalpost.  Katalyst Season 2 is something of a suicide player in a way.  He constantly takes damage each turn, has a huge health pool and offensive stats, does additional condition damage, and has a heroic play where if he takes someone out he can also choose to be taken-out but the team gains an additional 2 VP’s!  So he’s great if you are going for the offensive game but I feel like he’ll work best when you can have him take out a couple other people or keep him reserved for the final 2 points for the game.  Naja the Season 2 mascot functions primarily to work in tandem with Venin and other than giving him boosts serves little function in terms of team synergy.

Beautiful paint job (especially Mercury) from Battle Brush Studios:
here.

So that’s the overall gist I can glean from the Alchemists in Guild Ball.  Great battlefield manipulation, great condition control, and potentially annoying to deal with if played correctly.  Now if I start getting them painted up then we should be good to go!  I hope that give you all an idea of the way the guild plays, if I’ve missed anything feel free to leave a comment below.  Until then happy gaming!

p.s.: I mis-read Smoke's abilities and she does not put down a third AoE within 4", she just moves the targeted AoE up that distance.  My apologies readers!

How the wife and I got started with Guild Ball

Good day to you fellow wargamers and welcome to another set of ramblings!  I hope you have been making progress with your models in whatever way it is.  For me I’ve been working on assembling models from GenCon and so I wanted to talk briefly about a particular set of them.  In this case I’m going to go over Guild Ball, yes that’s right the game of low-fantasy medieval rugby!

So while we were at GenCon I was excited to see that Steamforged Games had a booth and of course being the excited gamer I went by to check them out.  The amount of people rushing the booth was incredible.  That boot was so busy it was unreal, I’m not sure Steamforged realized how popular they would have been.  I think it was just a glob of people watching demo games and they were just running demo games over and over and over.

So when Courtney and I were able to get a demo game in it was pretty quick and straight-forward.  Our demo guy was a great guy by the name of Jaime who is part of the GBHL crew on YouTube (link to their channel can be found right here).  He did a fantastic job of teaching us yanks the basic mechanics behind Guild Ball.  We could tell he was worn down since he probably ran demo after demo non-stop.  He took the time to give us a rundown of each faction, mostly for my wife’s sake than mine (I’ve been reading up on GB for a while now). 

So those who know my wife knows that she is a gentle, quiet kind of woman who’s interest in miniature gaming can be best described as mild.  She enjoys the occasional game of Warmachine, has been getting into painting, and likes being a part of our local gaming group.  She does not get super excited and obsessive like I do when it comes to gaming.  So when my wife, after being given an explanation of Guild Ball mechanics/factions, rather quickly declared her chosen guild and said we should buy into it before I did, well you can imagine my surprise and delight.  So she chose the Alchemist’s and I went with the Mortician’s guild.  Some money exchanged later and we were on our way to getting ready for some matches.

So today I wanted to just give a quick little blurb on the models themselves.  The models are made from white metal and to be honest are fairly easy to assemble.  Out of the 21 models I’ve assembled only a few had any noticeable flash on them and even then it was not in large amounts.  Mold lines were minimal and so most of them were not hard to clean off.  There were a few places that were a bit odd to get a file in there but I think I either managed to get at them with some angle work or I decided to leave it alone and hope for the best.  The larger models had nubs and spots for pieces to fit in but mostly were solid pieces requiring no pinging whatsoever.  Overall they were quick to assemble and once I cleaned them up it took about an hour to get a whole team up.

The one thing I will say is that the tabs for the slotted bases were either hit or miss.  Some of the models’ tabs were perfect fits and clung to the sides allowing the super glue to hold on.  For other models thought the tabs were waaaaaaaaaay too skinny to be effective and required some bending to get the connection points in.  I would say the ratio really was about 50/50 in terms of being perfect or not but it really wasn’t an issue.  More of a minor inconvenience really.  Speaking of the bases most of them will require some sort of filler to close the gap in if you care about that sort of thing.  I am thinking of using green stuff to fill it in but will take suggestions.

As you can see I was able to get both of our teams assembled and put together in about 2 days work (2 hours per day that is lol), so the wife and I are now ready to toss around the ball and knock each other’s teeth out!  That’s about it for our introductory foray into the game of Guild Ball, if you are interested here is a link to Steamforged Games.  The rules are free as well as stat cards and even paper doll cutouts if you want to try the game before buying in.  Until next time fellow gamers take care and happy gaming!

Feel like a late posted batrep? Why yes please!

Good morning/evening/night/whatever fellow war gamers and welcome to another exciting battle report!  I'm your host here at Wargamer Ramblings and I hope you have been having a fantastic time doing whatever it is you are doing!  I know for me it's been a lot of model assembly from GenCon but that's a post for another time!  Today I wanted to post up the battle I had with my local Cryx guru Kevin with my first true Mk3 game, 75pts and the SR2016 Incursion scenario!  Let's get started!

The scenario

For reference here was my list (mind you I am rusty with PoM, like really rusty, so it might not be the best list):

• Severius 1
• Devout
• Reckoner
• Blessing of Vengeance
• Knights Exemplar w/ UA
• Knights Exemplar w/ UA
• Full unit of Exemplar Errants w/ UA
• Exemplar Errant Seneschal
• Vassal of Menoth
• Wracks
• Covenant of Menoth
• Min unit of the Choir

Also here is what I remember Kevin taking though it might not be 100% accurate (if it isn't, sorry Kevin!)

• Deneghra 1
• x2 Deathripper
• Nightmare
• Madeylyn de Corbeau
• Min unit of Carrion Thralls
• Max unit of Carrion Thralls
• Max unit of Croe's Cutthroats
• Max unit of Satyxis Blood Witches w/ UA
• Max unit of Cylena Raefyll & Nyss Hunters

All right so I will level with you all.  This is a really late batrep.  Like two weeks old.  I've been busy with GenCon, work, wife duties, and assembling new models to put this up.  So this is what I remember:

My deployment sucked.  I essentially put my force into two blocks whereas Kevin spread his out and favored my left flank.  In doing so our first turn was mostly with moving into better positions while I ended up taking a couple of his Carrion Thralls out with some Errant crossbow bolts.  The second turn however is when it started to get sticky for me.  For one Kevin was able to jam up my movement with Carrion Thralls.  While not particularly deadly they served their purpose, to keep me in place.  I did not move very much this game sadly.  The loss of Pathfinder and my poor deployment skills really put a damper on my game plan.

Bad PoM, bad deployment!

When I was able to move up Kevin was able to take advantage of his ranged units but also having stealth.  Without many options of my own I couldn't really retaliate.  If I did manage to move up Kevin was ready and either shot them up before they could get a charge or he was able to tie my units up with cheap/hard to hit models.  Kevin was able to move around my left flank so freely you'd think it was American territory over there.  My Reckoner took a solid couple hits early on and he was pretty much out of the game in terms of being useful, so instead of trying to accomplish something with him I let him rot away.  On my right side the Errants and subsequent follow up with the Knights did their best to clear the troops but he had so many!  So many bodies.

I just managed to clear out those cursed birds!

Eventually Kevin was able to secure two control points, the center and left side, and put me in a poor position.  I had used my feat to clip Denny's counter-feat I felt was coming up but it didn't matter at this point.  My unit were jammed up, I couldn't move through the small forest quickly enough, I was fighting a battle of attrition and the attrition won.  I had played into Cryx's strength without realizing it until afterwards.  The last turn of the game Kevin was sitting on 3 control points and all it would take was a "activate-everyone-not-do-anything-I-win" kind of thing and I couldn't assassinate Denny.  She was too far away.  He had the jacks block my path and I couldn't move through.  Thus I conceded like a gentleman and took my loss well.  Cryx victory!

My poor options at hand

That didn't go as planned hmm...

So my first real PoM Mk3 fight went...well...rough.  I definitely need practice not only mechanically but with list building and deployment.  I felt that maybe with some different units I might have had a chance but not having pathfinder on the Errants sucks ass.  Vindictus anyone?  Anyways it was a great game with a great opponent and once again gave me a lot to think upon.  If anyone has had any recent games let's hear about it, until then take care everyone and happy gaming!

Gencon 2016 part 3!

All righty so this is my last post of Gencon and it's a bit more tame than the others.  So as I mentioned my wallet is now empty, much to the sadness of my wife, but much to my hobby happiness.  So here is the loot collection:

As we can see we ended up with quite a bit of new stuff.  I picked up the new MERCS rulebook which has been a pleasure to read.  I ended up with the new Kukulkani starter set for Dark Age and even though it's not my favorite faction (I still want to get into Ice Caste) it is a good choice for now and it is an even 500pts!  We got 4 of the new casters from Privateer but 2 of them are going to our local guys so really we just got out faction ones.  I also grabbed a metal sculpt of Denny, the GenCon exclusive Skarre, and the new Satyxis Gun mages!  Then we bought into Guild Ball pretty hard.  Wife went Alchemists while I ended up buying into the Mortician's.  As we play I might also look into the other guilds but for now we are set.

So that was our GenCon trip in a quick nutshell.  We had a blast and I hope that if you all, including the international gamers, can make it next year it is worth the experience.  Until next time when we resume 'normal' posting, take care and happy gaming!

Gencon 2016 part 2!

Hey everyone it's part 2 of the Gencon excursion we just came back from.  I grabbed some videos of the 'con and it was on my phone so please excuse the poor quality.  Nevertheless here they are:

 

I took a video of the Cosplay Parade but the file was too large so here's a link to the YouTube video

https://youtu.be/WjD_ss0qR9Q

So the following video needs some backstory.  Josh from our local crew wanted to come up to GenCon this year but couldn't.  He being the Privateer Press fan, also our local Press Ganger, wanted the new Alison Jakes model desperately.  So bad in fact that once he learned she was coming out that for everyday he repeatedly asked for her.  So we trolled him a bit and one of us told him we would get her so to calm down.  He did not.  He was like the annoying child who didn't stop asking.  So thus this video explains how it went down at GenCon:

In the end we got it for him anyways, but not after a couple days of continued trolling.  

Anyways next up is the last bit of GenCon pictures and whatnot!

Gencon 2016 part 1

Hello fellow gamers and welcome to more Wargamer Ramblings!  Today is a bit different in that I don't really have a topic, shock!  Instead I am going to just throw up all the cool stuff I saw at Gencon!  I went with my wife, the crew from Wise, and a full (now empty) wallet!  So here is what I saw (in no particular order at all)
:

 

Ok so this one I have to comment on.  I saw this and read the game description as basically a tentacle hentai game.  My face was priceless.

Less than average Shawarma for a 30 minute wait

So that's the first part of my gencon postery, stay tuned for part 2!