NahooToo

So I'm back from a 500 mile round trip to Scotland for Dave Kerr Smith's 'Welcome to Malifaux' event.  This event represented two firsts for me.  My first incursion into the Scottish Malifaux scene, and the first M2e event in the UK*.

Round one, full gallery here.

I wasn't really sure what to expect when I arrived at Worlds at War for the event, what I found was a pleasant little store located in small dilapidated shopping mall the heart of a housing estate in Livingston. I think I've heard regulars refer to this as having hints of 'the Alamo' about it.

That being said the locals were very pleasant and as with all the Malifaux communities I've met this one was very friendly and welcoming. Although there was some confusion as to why anyone would drive four hours north for three games of Malifaux. I guess I'm just crazy.

My cards and match ups went with me on the day and I was thrilled to take first at the event and an amazing trophy for my troubles. Winning all three games; 5/2, 6/5, 9/5 for a cool 9/+8/20 result. Giving me a clear TP win over team mate and fellow southerner Ant Hoult. Full results posted by Dave here.

My cards helped well in places and I happened to have the right crew with me to counter my opponents. I mostly played the following for the day;

Ramos
+ 7ss Cache
+ Combat Mechanic
+ Under Pressure
+ Field Generator

Joss
+Imbued Protection

Brass Arachnid
Howard Langstrom
Electrical Creation
Moleman
Moleman

I switched the upgrades around for the first game, swapping UP for Bleeding Edge Tech on Ramos and giving Joss both Open Current and Recharge Soulstone.

I'm not going to go into a lot of detail about builds and model selection as we haven't seen the final build of M2e anything typed now may be out of date in a month. It's also difficult to draw too many conclusions about the game based on three rounds of play. That said Hank was the star of the show for me, playing against; Perdita, Tina, and Criid meant his steam cloud was invaluable.

My general impression of M2e in a competitive setting was very positive. The game still felt incredibly tactical, but without some of the mental burn, despite the extreme temperatures on the day it felt like I could mentally play a fourth round more easily then in 1.5.

It broadly seems to me like the games were being won or lost on the schemes and the strategy was consistently being played to a draw. I enjoyed this as it created a 'frame of reference' for the game to be played in. Completing your schemes while trying not to loose two models in a turn in Reckoning was a lot of fun.

The event used per-generated scheme pools, so for example we knew weeks in advance that round one was Reckoning with;

• A Line in the Sand
• Breakthrough
• Entourage
• Protect Territory
• Spring the Trap

I can't say pre-generating pools is a problem, as it allows for players to do upfront analysis. For example I chose to play the above round with Ramos despite the pool being technically better for Marcus IMO.

My instinct however would be to have the TO flip for the scheme pool at the start of each round, then have the whole event use that pool. This way players have to crunch numbers on the fly and it removes any temptation for TO's to fix the pools in advance. Even with good intentions this would be a slippery slope and not one I'd want us to go down in the long term.

We're certainly going to have a lot of fun figuring out how to make competitive play work in M2e. 

I'm going to try and make it north for the Scottish GT at the end of the year, with a few more reinforcements, the Scottish guys are great and I'm looking forward to facing them again. This has certainly wet my appetite for more M2e organized play and tournaments in general.

Thanks again to everyone for being so welcoming and Dave for running an event after working a night shift the night before.

Round Three, Turn One.

Event photos taken by Dave Kerr Smith.

*We were using the final public Beta M2e rules.

For anyone wondering NahooToo is the album by Paul Mounsey which contains the track 'North' used in the visit Scotland cinema and TV advertising campaign.