Wyrm and I played several games to playtest the beta for second edition Wild West Exodus. This was one of said games, quite late in the beta process, I think we were playing version 0.10 or 0.11. For this game we increased the points level we played up to 1,500, which has been flagged as around the standard size by Warcradle. This gave us access to several more toys than we’d played with previously, and we both opted to take larger models to try out.
The Posses
My Outlaws posse
Jesse James, 5 Raider Cutthroats (one with a shotgun), The Wraith, Jim Petersen, 3 Raider Sharpshooters (one with Sniper Rifle), 4 Raider Sharpshooters (one with Sniper Rifle), Doomsday and a Blackjack
Wyrm’s Warrior Nation posse
Raging Bear, Stonefist, 5 Brave Youngbloods, 6 Brave Hunters (one with shotgun), 3 Firebringers (one upgraded to Cannon), 3 Skystallions and a Great Elk.
Set-up
We rolled for the adventure and got Higher Ground, then set up the table so the two larger buildings were placed as the objective buildings. Wyrm won the draw and opted to deploy first, with me finishing first I had initiative for the game. There was some confusion here as Wyrm hadn’t checked his force against the posse restrictions, but I think we decided to just play on as it looked close enough.
Turn One
I move the small sharpshooters unit into the nearby Church to give them visability across to Wyrm’s objective building.
Wyrm flips the five action point card straight up, and uses it to make two focussed moves with the Firebringers to get them into position for the game.
I activate my other sharpshooters squad and move them up and into my objective building (I think we misplayed these moves, treating each as one AP, whereas it now should be three given they are both move actions.
The Brave Youngbloods activate and make a focussed and dash move, but roll a one for their extra movement. They move up on my right flank.
The Blackjack races forward and fires it’s winch lasso at one of the Youngbloods, using a guts card for an extra action point to focus the shot. He hits, but both the required grit checks are passed.
The Brave Hunters unit moves and gets into their objective building.
My Raider Cutthroats activate and fire their pistols in the air to delay my need to activate the Doomsday or Jesse.
The Great Elk moves forward into the half-built house, using a Guts card for extra action points to make a focussed Iridescent Breath attack on my objective building. This kills three of the four sharpshooters in the building. The Elk then uses a fortune to Hunker Down.
The Doomsday rolls forward and makes a focused shoot attack at the Great Elk. It scores five hits, three of which are criticals, with the Great Elk only failing one grit check, leaving it disordered.
The Skystallions mosey forward, then make a second focused mosey action to get into the centre of the table.
The Wraith fires his revolving shotgun from the Doomsday into the Skystallions, missing initially, he makes the same action again, which hits them and disorders one of them.
Stonefist makes two move actions towards the centre of the table, positioning for next turn.
Jim Petersen passes his reserves roll and pops up in Wyrm’s deployment zone. With Undercover at the time, he got his full activation ignoring the reserve action, so started by tossing a Ketchum Grenade into the objective building, killing two of the Hunters inside and stunning the unit. He then fired his pistols into the building killing another.
Raging Bear, as expected, charges Jim, and lands a crtical hit, disordering him after the failed grit check, and gets an additional attack from frenzy which does nothing. He then makes another strike action, laying two hits, but Jim manages to pass his grit checks, staying alive in Wyrm’s backfield to annoy him further into the next turn.
Jesse James activates last this turn, making a focussed move action to the side of my objective building, getting the Great Elk in his sights. He fires his Hyper Velocity pistols at the Elk and takes it down. I play a glory card for the killing of a XL/XXL based model, getting one victory point.
At the end of the turn, Wyrm and I each hold our own objective buildings so score two victory points each, putting me up 3 to 2.
Turn Two
I win the initiative this turn, with Wyrm playing an interrupt card to steal it off me. I play one straight back at him to retain initiative, and he retaliates with a further one, before I close out this little game with a final interrupt card. I’m not sure that it was worth the investment of two adventure cards to retain initiative, but with five cards in hand at this points level I felt I should be playing a lot more cards when able.
I start with the Doomsday, trundling forward straight at Wyrm’s objective building and unloading it’s Reaper Cannons into the unit inside. When the dust settles, two Hunters lie dead, with one final hand from that unit hunkered down inside the building.
I utilise a triggered activation card to have The Wraith go next, firing his repeater shotgun out of the Doomsday to take care of the last holdout in the building.
Wyrm’s artillery activates and fires at the Doomsday, with the gatling guns causing 18 hits, with two of the grit checks failed, destroying the vehicle. The hands inside fail three grit checks, but the final two manage to dodge out of the wreckage, along with The Wraith.
The remaining sharpshooter from my objective building makes a focused shot with his sniper rifle at the Skystallions but misses with a critical fail.
The Skystallions move forward and shoot at The Wraith, hitting him once and causing him to become disordered. Wyrm plays a Guts card for an additional action point for a second shot, with three hits, but The Wraith proves how tough he is, passing all grit checks.
Jim Petersen activates and makes a focussed revolver fan at Raging Bear, hitting twice but causing no damage.
Missed Wyrm’s activation here, obviously wasn’t that impactful…
The sharpshooters in the Church activate and fire at the Youngbloods unit, but all of them miss with triple two rolled.
Raging Bear activates and charges Jim again, hitting twice with with his lethal claws and killing him easily this time. He then dashes back behind Wyrm’s objective building and hunkers down.
Jesse James activates and moves around the corner of my objective building, firing at Stonefist and causing a wound. There was some confusion here as Stonefist had Wrangler on his card, and we’d assumed he started mounted, so we decided he could pass the wound to his mount and be replaced by a model on foot, I think this was changed subsequent. Jesse unloaded again, but Stonefist managed to make the required grit checks and survived.
The Blackjack is last to activate and starts by firing his winch lasso at Raging Bear but misses. I make the same attack again and score a critical hit this time, and whilst Raging Bear passes his grit check the critical causes him to become disordered and pulls him forward into the unit of Youngbloods.
Turn Three
Wyrm wins initiative this turn and activates the Skystallions, moving them towards Jesse James and firing at him. All three hit, and Jesse fails one grit check seeing him disordered. The Skystallions then throw their Tomahawks at him, one of which scores a critical, triggering their decapitation ability and seeing Jesse dead. Jesse James’ dying breath ability triggers, and he returns fire at the unit killing one and disordering another.
The Wraith activates and moves forward towards the Youngbloods before unloading with his revolving shotgun. He hits, with Raging Bear also under the template who fails his grit check and is killed after being disordered in the prior turn.
The artillery activates and fires at the two remaining Cutthroats in Wyrm’s objective building, with the first gatling gun dealing with the unit handily. The cannon fires at the remaining Sharpshooter in my objective building and kills him too.
Wyrm plays an interrupt card to steal initiative off me for the activation but then flips a one action point card. He nominates the Youngbloods who charge the Blackjack but then epically fail to land a hit on it.
The Blackjack then moves quickly away into the back corner of the table.
Stonefist makes a dash move towards my objective building and out of line of sight of the remaining sharpshooter in the church.
The Sharpshooters leave the church and make a focused dash across the board towards Wyrm’s objective building.
Turn Four
I win initiative and move my sharpshooters out of range and line of sight of most of Wyrm’s remaining forces.
At this stage we theory out the balance of the game and call it in my favour with Wyrm not able to make up the differential over the remaining two turns.
Conclusion
This was a fun game that seemed to swing back-and-forth a bit as it went on. The adventure deck is a really clever mechanic and having the dual use of guts/glory for each card makes for some interesting tactical decision making. The size of the deck and nature of some of the glory objectives though does present an interesting RNG problem at points though, as it’s possible to draw something like ‘kill support in a strike action’ where your opponent has no support or you run a shooting army that won’t be looking to make strike actions. That said, the game plays well and seems to force tactical decisions within almost every aspect of the game. Loving the beta rules so far and keen to see the final rules when they arrive in September.
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