Deneb

So I will need to do a proper battle-report soon, but I need to stop getting so into the game enough to take better notes! Spent most of Saturday this weekend playing games, so going to talk about some highlights from one of those.

Russ took the Coven, specifically

• Bone Maiden
• Puppeteer Crone
• Wood Mother x2
• Axeman

I took the Ordo Draco

• Komtur
• Ironshod
• Blitz Dragon Knight
• Zweihander
• Schilten

We played Sul’s Court, a scenario where two teams are fighting to control one central objective in the city of Deneb.  We earn VP for contesting, and more for controlling the objective at the end of each turn. First to 6 VP wins.

I tried to keep my main Knights up the deployment zone and out of trouble early on. Deploying my Blitz Dragon late to grab them, fly them over the objective and combat drop them in to contest it.

Russ sets up his Wood Mothers in opposite corners, and both summon their Grimalkin and use the cats speed to get models in to contest that objective right away.

I bring in the Komtur and Ironshod, ready to buff as needed, from the bottom left. Unfortunately, I hadn’t counted on the Puppeteer Crone being able to create her Wood Effigy via one of the Grimalkins on the objective. Leaving my poor Komtur with a creepy wooden doll following her around.

Still, I am ready to fight back. My Blitz Dragon Knight lands, I buff him with an augment from the market place to up his damage, and his claw and tail attack is able to crit both Grimalkins killing the pair. I’m feeling pretty good, but I might have played right into Russ’s hands as gleefully put down Bone Piles for the two dead cats, ready for his Bone Maiden to use.

Worse his Puppeteer Crone activates and the fragile wooden puppet, now fully attuned to my Komtur works his way back towards the Coven models, who will no doubt strike down the Voodoo doll, also killing the Komtur. I try and get as much value out of her as possible in the meantime, Her Armour Expertise buff and the Schilten’s shield wall keep him more or less implacable against the attacks of the Axeman.

So far the Zweihander has been sticking in Defence to make sure the Schilten gets the best possible formation bonus, but I might need him to go more offensive shortly.

I have a plan to try and win the initiative, buy an upgrade for the Komtur and get her to use efficient tactics to grant an additional ap to my Zweihander. Russ uses his Bone Maiden to take the initiative, and despite my Komtur preparing to try and ensure a win on initiative, I missed that the Bone Maiden prepared last turn, I am due to concede on a draw and so Russ gets the initiative. The landed dragon is a tempting target for the Axeman, for a moment I think he might ignore the puppet and let me get that ap tranting boon in. However, Russ wisely checks what abilities my cards have, and figures out my plan. A blast of hex-filled curse energy obliterates the Wood Effigy and it’s Voodoo like sympathetic magic means the Komtur gets torn apart as well.

I bring up the Ironshod ready to get into the action with his iron quarterstaff. Russ responds by having his Axeman hurl a magically enhanced well-aimed axe into the landed Blitz Dragon, killing the mighty beast.

Time to get some revenge though, the Zweihander goes aggressive and puts some hurt on the Wood Mother across from him. I upgrade the Schilten with co-ordinated assault, which along with his brother-knights formation support to finally kill the Axeman.

All these bones play into Russ’s hands though, and the Bone Maiden is soon summoning an Animated Skeleton to help contest the objective.

The Ironshod manages to sweep the Crone off her feet, but he doesn’t get much of a chance to celebrate before one of the Wood Mothers (who had turned into a Raven and flown into the fray earlier) transformed back into a human behind him and blasted the life out of him with a curse.

I upgrade the Zweihanders weapon to a greatsword, and a sweeping extended cleave manages to injure one witch and kill two others. Russ was wise enough to hide his Skeleton out of reach so it could continue to contest the objective.

The Bone Maiden gets an upgrade to a Bone Mother, and is soon animating more skeletons and commanding those already animated to close in on the Zweihander. Unfortunately there isn’t much I can do now. I’ve managed to contest the objective all the way through, and one more big cleave could have made all the difference, but I’d run out of time. We both hit 6 VP, but as I had one fewer surviving non-surrogate model, I would lose the game.

It was a pretty fun game, and it showed just how strong a little formation work can be for Ordo Draco. Keeping them more or less unhittable in the early rounds before cutting through the enemy like ribbons when going on the offence. At one point Russ did manage to even summon a mighty Skeletal Abomination, only to have my Zweihander cut it down before it could do anything. Still, absorbing that attack might have saved the witch that would have let me eke out another turn, maybe I should have let the abomination live and focussed on the Wood Mother?

We played a few more games, experimenting with different forces and scenarios, as well as finding a few things to tweak in the Vassal Model to make life easier, like colour coded aurae for helping keep track of which surrogate belongs to which witch 🙂

An updated Vassal module has been uploaded recently along with v0.94 rules with a few more clarifications based on the latest round of games. No significant changes, just clarifications. Hopefully, I’ll post again soon with another battle report where I’ve managed to take more shots, and notes about what happened each turn!