065 Fiona1 TC vs Calandra1 SotN
05. Aug 2020
It is time for the first game after summer holiday and I am up against Trollbloods. I need to practice my lists before the Showdown finals match so I have to choose between Fiona1 TC and Magnus2 Irregulars. My opponent has Calandra and Kolgrima but tells me that he would like to play Calandra. Since I don’t have to worry about Kolgrima shutting down my shooting I decide to just go with Fiona so that we can see which Befuddle caster is the best.
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Mercenaries
[Theme] Talion Charter
[Fiona 1] Fiona the Black [+27]
– Mariner [14]
– Mariner [14]
– Mariner [14]
Bloody Bradigan [3]
Bosun Grogspar [5]
Doc Killingsworth [4]
Lord Rockbottom [4]
Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile [4]
Powder Monkey [0(2)]
Powder Monkey [0(2)]
Powder Monkey [0(2)]
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt [8]
Press Gangers (min) [7]
Scharde Dirge Seers [0(6)]
Sea Dog Deck Gun [0(3)]
Sea Dog Deck Gun [0(3)]
Sea Dog Pirates (max) [11]
– Mr. Walls, the Quartermaster [4]
– Sea Dog Pirate Rifleman (3) [3]
The Commodore Cannon & Crew [7]
Trollbloods
[Theme] Storm of the North
[Calandra 1] Calandra Truthsayer, Oracle of the Glimmerwood [+27]
– Earthborn Dire Troll [14]
– Earthborn Dire Troll [14]
– Trollkin Runebearer [0(5)]
Dhunian Archon [0(6)]
Fell Caller Hero [5]
Trollkin Champion Hero [5]
Trollkin Champion Hero [5]
Valka Curseborn, Chieftain of the North [0(6)]
Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (min) [6]
– Northkin Elder [3]
Northkin Bear Handlers & Battle Bears [10]
Northkin Bear Handlers & Battle Bears [10]
Northkin Fire Eaters [7]
Northkin Fire Eaters [7]
Trollkin Champions (max) [16]
Deployment
I get the first turn and get the side with the least amount of cover. We are playing one of the pre-made VTC maps, but please note that we misplayed the large central rubble piece on my opponent’s side as a rough terrain piece. This should actually have been an obstruction, but we mis-remembered the new interpretation of the old WTC hills.
My opponent drops Calandra on the side behind the rock and Champions centrally. I need to try and squeeze my whole army through the gap in the middle since I know that the Battle Bears will be coming in from the sides later on.
Turn 1A
I use the bombardment AoEs to prevent the worst sprays from Fire eaters and fan out the pirates while maintaining within Doc and Bosun’s command bubbles. I brain fart and try to snipe out a Fire eater with Soulfire. The first spell misses and he Dhunians the second. This means that I am unable to reclaim the last focus I need to cast Roth’s Mercy. Great start!
Turn 1B
Calandra advances up and casts Star Crossed. The right Earthborn receives Bullet Dodger who is now within three terrain types, within stone aura and with Bullet Dodger and Roots of the Earth up! Fire Eaters do some sprays, but only deals limited damage due to misses and tough rolls.
Turn 2A
Ayana kisses the right Fire Eaters and I remove the two in the zone with Hold tand the Deck Gun. My plan is to Chasten the left Earthborn to remove RotE and then Befuddle it away from the Obstruction and cast CoV for an effective -2 DEF and -4 ARM swing (not 6 because it is already outside of the stone range). However, I miss Chasten twice on a 5+ so I change plans and go for a CoV instead which also misses. She then feats and camps 1 focus.
At this point I don’t really know what to do since I know I can’t kill the Earthborn with my RAT 5 POW 14 guns. But I don’t have any better ideas, so I let the Pirates clear out the Fire eaters with Payday (to get around Star Crossed) and shoot all my guns at the Earthborn. I can’t remember how many boxes I did, but it was far from enough to remove it.
I misplay Bloody Bradigan a bit here since I am placing him outside of 14” from the table edge, but in a way that also puts me more than 3” inside most of the forest. This means that he would not be able to charge out of it next turn. I am also a bit too far back to comfortably be able to run out of the forest and still contest the square zone.
Turn 2B
Ambush Bears come in on both sides and run in to jam my flanks. The left Earthborn tramples in and kills Doc. Fell Caller Hero clears the right flag and Valka scores it. Calandra just walks into the left zone and puts up Star Crossed. Champions run/charge into the Pirates, but don’t do any damage.
Score 0-2
Turn 3A
Press Gangers ambush in on the left side. It is possible to spread out such that I can both contest the zone and get two charges onto the Battle bear Handler. But first Fiona walks out of Star Crossed and arcs a CoV. The PGs and Bloody Bradigan manage to kill the Battle Bear Handler and one of the bears. I am not 100% convinced that this was the best line of play even though it worked out well in this situation. On one hand I was in danger to get overrun on the left side, and the CoV was necessary to get the job done. But on the other hand I was very lucky to get much work done at all. Bradigan could easily have missed his attacks or failed to kill even with average damage rolls. In which case my opponent could just have started healing with Dhunian once I started to kill Champions. CoV would have given me a lot more value if I had risked the boosted 9 to hit the Champions. There I have a million pirates with Payday and two attacks each. Dice values here are all over the place due to different stats on the pirates’ hand weapons and guns and stone aura range (they all have gang). But they will be within the range between dice -8 and dice -4. Adding 2 to each of those 10-15 rolls would have made a huge difference to the overall damage output.
On the right side I have to use both Mariners to kill the bears under Kiss, but eventually I manage to clear the zone. Dice are not kind to me when to remove the central Earthborn. I have a grape shot from the cannon, one fully loaded Mariner and a couple of charging pirates under Payday, but really struggle to get through any hits under Star Crossed.
To make this train wreck of a turn even worse I forget that the Champions have Retaliatory strike from the Champion Hero. I do the Pirate attacks in the wrong order and end up losing Mr. Walls to a Retaliatory strike. This causes multiple of my pirates to lose their attacks due to being out of command – including the pirate who was contesting Valka’s flag…
Score 1-3
Turn 3B
At this point it would be very easy for my opponent to just score two points, kill some stuff and clock over. I would be surprised if he didn’t end up with an attrition lead at the end of the turn and with a 4 point scenario lead I think it would be hard for me to come back.
However my opponent is a showman and goes for an assassination run with Valka. He had explained to me how it works before the game and having played Fiona with Toros before I was familiar with the concept of Befuddle and counter charge. Combined with Righteous Vengeance Valka is able to go extremely far. I was aware of the threat and tried to play around it by packing stuff in front of Fiona while also camping 3 focus. But after some throwing shenanigans, Befuddle and Counter charge he was able to get Valka onto Fiona. Lucky for me he misses the charge attack needing a 6 and ends up not rolling high enough on the damage roll for the second attack to finish the job. We decide to call the game at this point so that we can re-rack for one more round
This was quite unlucky on my opponent’s part, but he pointed out an interesting fact related to the sequencing of Calandra’s rerolls after the game. On the charge attack which Valka missed my opponent got a bit greedy and decided to try the feat rerolls first instead of using a fury point for Fate blessed. When that failed he still had to use Fate blessed, but after that he would not be allowed to re-roll 1s and 2s for feat. If you sequence the rerolls the other way around you would get a higher expected value, but at the expense of spending a fury point for Fate. Needing a 6 under feat and the possibility for a Fate reroll is by no means unreasonable, but when the game hinges on making that charge attack roll it would be best to maximize the odds.
Victory for the Mercenaries!
:: Evaluation ::
As always it was a bit overwhelming to get going again after not having played in a while, but this was a very entertaining game. It felt quite even up until the point when I started to make some bad decisions (such as getting Mr. Walls killed through a Retaliatory strike) and a bit cold dice. A bystander actually commented on my horrible dice rolling, but as my opponent pointed out: It will even out. And this game they did in a spectacular manner when Valka completely fluffed the assassination run.