Tomsey took Dark Avengers starter less Ares to bring it back to 30 points (so, MS Marvel, Iron Patriot and Sentry), whilst Wyrm ran his Avengers starter (Black Widow, Cap, Ironman and Thor).
Table and Scenario
We were using repurposed 40k terrain for the battle, and sizes were agreed as follows:
Size 1 – Barrels
Size 2 – Barricades, tank traps and pipes
Size 4 – turrets of the gun emplacements
Size 5 – bunker
Size 6 – ruins
The rationale was that we didn’t want ruins being tossed around, and given the turrets could be removed from the gun emplacements this would make a cool cinematic idea, whilst leaving a solid building in place.
The scenario selected was Control the Energy Pillars from the rulebook. We haven’t played survival yet, as it looks unbalanced (due to the asymmetric deployment zones), however would be interested to hear thoughts on whether this is the case in others’ experience.
Round One
Tomsey wins the initiative, and Iron Patriot fails his will power roll (even with re-roll!) losing one POW. As he cackles to himself he is lucid long enough to fly up to one of the flank pillars and activates it for Tomsey. However, this is the pillar Black Widow deployed next to, so she promptly slicks it back to Wyrm, makes a Mixed Techniques attack (two POW, one damage, Distract/1, Awkwardness/1) on Iron Patriot, then a two POW move over to the middle pillar.
Sentry is up next for Tomsey, and he flies forward to the middle pillar and Black Widow. Not bothering to activate the pillar, he makes a Death Blow attack (once per game, four POW, four damage, critical +3 damage, irresistible) on Black Widow, which goes critical, dealing eight damage, almost immediately incapacitating her. She takes her Stamina check and passes, remaining conscious. Sentry decides to finish her off and makes a Leadkick attack (one per round, two POW, two damage, push/4), which also crits and incapacitates her.
Thor, seeing Black Widow go down, flies up to Sentry and makes an overloaded grab on him. It goes critical, and Thor throws Sentry at Iron Patriot, who neatly dodges out of the way.
Ms Marvel is Tomsey’s last activation, and she flies up to the so far uncontested pillar and activates it.
Ironman flies over to Ms Marvel and attempts to grab her, but she activates Phase Shift, going incorporeal and unable to be the target of physical attacks. Ironman then turns his attention to the pillar, putting it under the Avengers control.
Cap is the last activation for the round, and he moves up twice using Agile towards Thor and makes an overloaded Shield Bounce (once per round, three POW, two damage, 8” range, irresistable) on Sentry, using Ricochet (can be overloaded to make a strike on another target within 3” of the original target) to target Iron Patriot however the Ricochet misses.
Wyrm scores a victory point for holding all three pillars. Sentry makes a Stamina check, which he fails and is KO’d.
Round Two
Tomsey wins imitative again this turn, and Iron Patriot again fails to keep his sanity in check.
Iron Patriot activates and makes a one POW move to the nearby pillar and activates it for the Dark Avengers. He then overloads a Repulsor Blast (two POW, two damage, range 8”, overload +1 damage) on Thor, which Cap bodyguards and Shield Blocks, cancelling the attack. Master Tactician is then activates, which is passed on the re-roll.
Sentry recovers form KO and stands up, makes a one POW move towards Cap and Thor and uses his Fury of a Thousand Suns attack (once per game, seven POW, five damage 5” expansive wave attack). Both Thor and Cap pass their agility tests, minimising the damage taken.
Thor is up next, and furious at the sunburn he received moves into contact with Sentry, using an overloaded grab and throw, which hits, and throws him at Iron Patriot who dodges out of the way. Sentry is Incapacitated from this attack. Thor then makes an overloaded For Midgard attack (once per round, four POW, four damage, 4” melee, push 1d8, overload explosive/2) on Iron Patriot, which achieves a critical hit (and additional damage from Heroic Action), which pushes him back an inch.
Tomsey elects to pass, saving Ms Marvel.
Ironman makes an overloaded grab and throw on Ms Marvel, which hits and goes critical, and throws her into the corner of a nearby building. He then follows up with a Repulsor Blast attack which is overloaded for +1 damage, and hits.
Ms Marvel gets up and makes a two POW move to the nearby Pillar, then switches it back to the Dark Avengers control.
Cap makes a one POW move and uses his Avengers Assemble ability, which pulls Ironman and Thor towards the middle of the board. He then makes a Shield Bounce attack on Ms Marvel, who uses defensive improvements but is still hit and pushed into the red zone, but manages to stay conscious.
Ms Marvel passes her end of round KO test.
Round Three
Wyrm wins the initiative, and Iron Patriot finally manages to get himself under control.
Ironman activates and receives a bonus power from Cap’s leadership ability, makes a two POW move to MS Marvel and makes an overloaded grab and throw. This goes critical with a double eight roll, throwing her back into the nearby building, which incapacitates her. Ironman then resets the pillar back to Avenger control.
Iron Patriot makes an overloaded Tactical Missile attack (once per game, five POW, three damage, 14” range, explosive/6) on Thor, however Cap bodyguards and Shield Blocks this, cancelling the attack. He then backs up, seeking to get out of the way of the now dominant Avengers to stay in the game.
Thor makes a three POW move into contact with Iron Patriot, then makes an overloaded grab and throw on him, which scores a critical hit.
Cap, makes a two consecutive move actions (using Agile) to get into contact with one of the non-Avengers pillars and activates back to their control.
Iron Patriot passes his KO test, keeping Tomsey in the game, and Wyrm scores a victory point for having held the middle pillar for three consecutive turns. Sentry then redeploys from his Unstable ability, coming in on Tomsey’s left flank, lining up Ironman.
Round Four
Tomsey wins initiative and Iron Patriot again keeps himself under control.
Iron Patriot stands up and moves towards Cap, making an overloaded grab and throw on him, which hits despite Cap’s Defensive Improvements, and throws him at Thor, who isn’t able to get out of the way in time and takes a Cap to the face. He then takes the pillar back form the Avengers, and attempts Master Tactician which fails despite a re-roll.
Thor stands up and moves into contact with Iron Patriot, and makes a For Asgard attack (three POW, two damage, push/2, can’t be overloaded), which hits and incapacitates him.
Sentry activates next, making a move to Ironman. He then launches his Death Blow attack (details), which is overloaded and hits despite Defensive Improvements, dealing five damage. He then makes an overloaded grab and throw, tossing Ironman back into the nearby building which puts Ironman into the red zone and sees him KO’d.
Cap gets up and makes a two POW move towards the pillar, which he switches back to Avengers control.
Ironman remains unconscious.
Round Five
Wyrm wins initiative this turn and starts with Thor making a Bring the Thunder attack (once per game, five POW, four damage, 20”range, Overload stun/2) on Sentry, which he overloads for an extra dice. It hits, dealing four damage, and Thor then repositions slightly.
Sentry makes a two POW move to Ironman and does a Sentry Strike attack (once per round, three POW, two damage, stun/2), which hits for three damage and incapacitates him. He then makes a grab and throw, tossing the bunker building at Thor, who stands there staring as the bunker comes crashing down on him with a double eight on his agility roll.
Cap moves forward and makes a Shield Bounce on Sentry which scores a critical hit for three damage, pushing Sentry into the pale zone.
At the end of the round, Thor passes his KO roll, but Sentry fails his, seeing Wyrm pick up the victory, with all Tomsey’s characters either KO’d or incapacitated.
Post-game Thoughts
I got Tomsey and Wyrm to each jot down a few thoughts on the game (this one specifically and more generally given we’re all still learning) to accompany the report.
Tomsey
“Great game, felt the rolling panels of a comic book with each activation. Many cinematic moments.
Tactically I played poorly, still coming to grips with the team and the game. Felt out foxed from the beginning, as Wyrm is a canny player to start with, but having two games with this scenario and team experiential advantage over me felt like the Kobayashi Maru. Also being one character down in numbers is a disadvantage in this type of mission, but that is the price you pay taking in a beat stick like Sentry.
It
is a fun, fast moving game that puts you right in the comic book genre. Cannot fault it so far.”
Wyrm
“Going into this scenario I knew how important it was to get onto the objectives as soon as possible, as it pretty much cost me the game against Rob (I got lucky and KO’d his team but I was truly outplayed by Rob’s street level thuggery). So my goal early was to get around the objectives and hopefully use Black Widow (being the extra figure) to my advantage. I didn’t know much about the Dark Avengers so didn’t know what to expect. In retrospect I really like this team (this is one thing that I love about this game, every time I read a new characters rules I am generally impressed with how cool the abilities are vs how the game balances). The Dark Avengers seem very aggressive and very mobile (even Ares can be thrown or he has leap) so I look forward to seeing them on the tabletop again.
We have had several discussions regarding Throw, wondering if the mechanic is too powerful. One thing we have tried to reduce this is to purposely upscale some terrain so that some of it is a permanent cover for smaller characters (ie we will make some terrain size 6 just so that Thor and Sentry can’t throw them). We are currently still discussing and trying new ideas in regards to throwing and terrain. I really liked how the turrets we had were used so that part of it (the base) couldn’t be removed but the turret could be thrown. This still allows the big guys to throw stuff and still leaves cover for the little guys and just felt more organic than a large piece of terrain just disappearing.
Moving forward I will continue to get paint on The Avengers (I also have the Hulkbuster the Hulk being assembled) and from there will start on my Sentinel Apocalypse styled table.”
Conclusion
The Dark Avengers were up against it in this scenario, with fewer bodies on the pitch to contest the pillars, and Wyrm’s two games of experience using his team also tipping the scales. Grab and throw is an interesting and significantly used mechanic, and is great for dislodging characters that are on objectives and a way of dealing damage and effectively draining POW via knock down.
Repurposing the box of 40k terrain we had on hand for this game worked quite well, with the only thing to think about in future being a greater mix and quantity of smaller sized terrain, but this will come as we continue work on our collection.
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