Game 29 - an Off day for Midas

Hello Guild Ballers!

After being pummeled by the butchers last week I swore to never underestimate my opponents again.  

Resulting in me pummeling a Midas Team coached by Wouter De Rycke.  I hope he still had fun playing a game where nothing much went as he wanted it to go...

Line-ups:

Wouter fielded a Midas team with Flask, Calculus, Mercury, Vitriol and Katalyst.  

I brought Mash, Spigot, Hooper and a union member Hemlocke with my standard Captain and mascot, Tapper & Scum.

I was elected to kick after Wouter won the roll-off.

So I fielded my team and kicked with Mash

Turn 1:

* Katalyst came in to retrieve the ball and kicked it in front of his team.  Calculus got to snap the ball.  But The big guy was standing there, very close to my brewers...
* Measuring the distance I could drag him into Tapper range with the dodge push results from Mash.  So that's what we went for and were able to pull it off.  No momentum, but Tapper with 3 on him could start a beating next brewer activation if he wanted.
* Mercury came up and lit up Mash as a torch.

* Spigot Tooled up Tapper.

* Midas walked up and hid behind a barrier for cover.

* Scum decided to go crowd out Katalyst (I had husbandry)

* Vitriol Came up the pitch.

* Tapper went in to start the beating Katalyst deserved.

* Calculus dropped poison on the bunched up brewers. 

* Hooper walked up to the barrier, making sure his 2" melee covered the gap between the Barrier Midas and Vitriol were hiding behind and the obstruction on the other side.

* Flask wheeled closer to the middle next to Mercury and popped smoke.

* Hemlocke came in , threw poison on calculus and Mercury and used her smelling salts.  - I fell in love with Hemlocke after this activation.- 

I had some momentum on the Alchemists, but still had to roll. Only to lose the initiative.

Turn 2:

* Calculus cleared her poison after throwing some on the brewers. Then she passed the ball to vitriol.

* Tapper finished off Katalyst and charged into Midas softening him up.

* Vitriol took the ball towards Hooper and popped smoke and activated clone.  Hitting Hooper for momentum and a minor bit of damage.

* Hooper walked around Vitriol and finished off Midas, but failed to kill the Vitriol Clone with NO HITS.

* Flask came in to block a charge path towards Calculus
* Scum came in to crowd out Flask
* As last model able to activate, Mercury wanted to enlighten Tapper and Scum so he threw some fire on them.

* Mash jogged further up field, Spigot followed him ready for an assist next turn after Vitriol possibly scored her goal hoping a countergoal would be a possibility for the brewers.  Then Hemlocke came in and used her smelling salts on Tapper and Scum. Positioning herself where she might be able to hinder Vitriol a bit.

Turn 3:

Again I lose the initiative, in spite of having 3 momentum to spare.
 
* After we measured a bit and figured out Vitriol could actually score.  She gets rid of the parting blow by hitting Hooper for a push dodge.  Walked up to the goal and scored.  The score is now 4-4 with Midas and Katalyst coming on the

board away from where Mash and Spigot want to counter.
* Since the ball is clear, after the goalkick and no Alchemist player can get there I Kill Flask with Tapper, setting the cat and Tapper on fire. 6-4 Then I charge into Calculus with the remaining influence after clearing the burning condition.  Calculus is still alive.

* Mercury rushes in to help out Calculus, but gets some sup-par rolls. Tapper does get pushed into the Calculus poison Aura.

* Hooper further softens up Calculus. but doesn't kill her. (it's eat your dice time)

* Midas comes in and pushes Hooper into the poison aura of Calculus.

* Spigot puts up his 'time's called' to set up Mash for a shot on goal

* Calculus hits Tapper and pushes him into Mercury, she heals herself.

* Hemlocke doesn't want the Katalyst boy getting of his Intensify so runs up and uses smelling salts on Hooper, Tapper and the Cat.

 

 * Katalyst (last activation for Alchemist) sprints towards his own goal and heals up Calculus.
* Mash Sprints (starting within Time's called) to get the ball.  Stops into the Football legend aura of Spigot putting up his super shot enabling him to shoot at goal from where he is.  5 dice are rolled and only one 4+ result (a 5) shows up.  It almost makes me want to eat my fist since I had a momentum that I could've used to bonus time. But the one five does it: 10-4

The ball is shot out behind Katalyst somewhere (read to far away for my cat to go get it) 

*Scum just goes into melee with Mercury burning herself again, betting the Alchemist won't be able to get the ball to Vitriol for another goal and helping for a crowd out so Tapper can Kill the flame-boy for the win.

Yet again I loose the initiative roll.

Turn 4:

* Katalyst goes to fetch the ball and shoots it up field, hoping Vitriol can scoop it up for another shot at goal.  It lands to far off, so she can't snap, but maybe can retrieve it next activation.
* Tapper activates and I cross my fingers.  Loaded up and with some help from the cat and Hooper I buy the Commanding Aura and start swinging.  My first attack does 4 damage.  The second swing only lands one hit for 2 DMG. Third knocks Mercury down.  Fourth swing 4 DMG + 2 DMG. Fifth Swing lands on 4 DMG killing Mercury. (all damage is with +1 from CA included) 

The Game ends with 12-4 for the brewers.

Overall thoughts about the game:

At first I feared putting Katalyst so far up field was a trap of some kind.  But as it turns out, it wasn't.  Midas never got to do anything since he was the second take-out.  Thank God for 2" melee!  I saw the goal against me coming and might have been able to stop it, but as the left flank was my land and mine alone, I just figured I'd get the easy goal in for a 4 vs 4 VP Trade-off, now if Midas was brought back on the field on that side the game might have been a little different.  It was a nice game for me and I hope Wouter has picked up a few pointers from playing against me.  It was his first Brewer encounter and I'm sorry for making it such a brutal one.

Thoughts about my line-up:

First time ever fielding Hemlocke.  And I'm in love, as stated earlier.  Beforehand I was still pondering about taking Friday and go full brewers.  Then I looked into taking Spigot out, but I think Mash is a better striker with Spigot chasing him around.  I didn't feel like I'd be using a lot of dirty knives with a high def team on the other side, so ended up taking Hemlocke.  She didn't do much more than use smelling salts.  Well first turn she landed a noucious blast on calculus, but I didn't use her for anything else...  She did well, against Midas.  I believe smart Smoke players would wait to activate smoke untill I was forced to move Hemlocke.  So an inclusion of A&G might do the trick here.  But if I go this route I'm going to have to make sure Greede doesn't get any conditions thrown on him. 4HP isn't much.  In this regard (fielding Union models)

our local pundit starts calling me 'powerplayer'.  I'm not convinced it's all just in jest. :-)

That's all folks!  See you next time!
Bob out.