Round 5 Prep

I’ve given my 50 point list its first run-out last night and feel kinda confident using it. My opponent was Luke who is just starting out in the game with his Retribution force. He came at me with quite a shooty Ossyan list:

Lord Arcanist Ossyan
* Phoenix
Dawnguard Sentinels (Leader and 9 Grunts)
* Dawnguard Sentinel Officer & Standard
* Soulless Escort
Heavy Rifle Team (Leader and Grunts)
Heavy Rifle Team (Leader and Grunts)
Stormfall Archers (Leader and 3 Grunts)
Arcanist
Arcanist
Dawnguard Destor Thane
Dawnguard Scyir

* Griffon
* Griffon
Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios
Ghost Sniper
Ghost Sniper

Mage Hunter Assassin

To add to my 35 point list, I have recruited Wrongeye and Snapjaw, a Witch Doctor (proxied by Totem Hunter for this game and in future games by Crocodile Games' Sebeki Master of Words) and a Bone Swarm.

Maelok the Dreadbound
* Bull Snapper
* Bone Swarm
* Blackhide Wrastler
* Blackhide Wrastler
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Witch Doctor
Croak Hunter
Wrongeye and Snapjaw

Some things worked and some didn’t. Luke set his force up with Ossy in the middle of his Sentinels and HRT’s flanked on my right by the Archers and on my left by the Griffons, Snipers, Eiryss and MHA. I had both Posse’s out front with Maelok and his beasts just behind them in the middle and W+S and Croak on my right.

The game started off with Luke running everything forward in a line abreast fashion which was scarily straight. I mirrored the running but in a far less orderly manner.

Turn two saw the shootiness begin. Some of my Gatormen from both Posse’s were lost already (two from the Posse on my right  falling to Stormfall Archer fire and one on my left hand Posse taking hits from both Ghost Snipers and Eiryss).  I needed to engage very quickly but only managed it with a single Gatorman (who managed to engage five Sentinels all on his lonesome). Nothing else happened really.

Next turn Ossy feated and really piled on the pain. Snapjaw took a fair bit of damage and a few more Gatormen fell (although casualties in my left hand Posse were minimised due to the Witch Doctor – you gotta love Tough Gators). My reaction was to feat myself and Revive a single Gator to my right hand Posse. This Posse then charged towards Ossy with two Gators fencing him in. The sad thing was I forgot to get them to sing their Cold Blood prayer and due to Sod’s Law, I was unable to re-roll both of their initial attacks. As a result, they only put six points of damage on him. The other Posse was quite depleted and didn’t do much damage. Wrongeye managed to Influence two Sentinels and used them to kill two of their own unit. The Croak Hunter moved around to draw a bead on the Sentinel Officer but failed to actually hit him. This would have been so helpful removing Vengeance.

Luke then made all of his Vengeance attacks but didn’t do cause much damage at. The key was that they were all engaged or didn’t have enough room to charge meaning they were only rolling 3d6 at -10 to the damage roll. But they did however remove the threat of Ossy being stuck between two Gators. The other flank moved up with the Snipers and Eiryss making one Gator roll a whole ream of Tough rolls. The Griffons joined in the fun and took out the Snapper, Bone Swarm and another Gator (this one didn’t make his Tough roll). I needed to back up my depleted front line and had to get Maelok and his Wrastlers (Kaine and Ray) into the fight. The first thing I did was attempt to use one of the Wrastlers to throw the other for that little bit extra threat range. For some reason or other the dice totally flaked out on me. The throwee, having not been thrown, ran forward to engage the oncoming Phoenix. Wrongeye got another kill with Influence.

In the next turn, Luke got the Sentinels to clean up their part of the board but had left one Gatorman standing. The last Archer put some more pain on Snapjaw taking out two aspects. The Phoenix took down the Wrastler standing in its face. Ossy moved well out of the way to a nearby bit of forest where he began chatting up the MHA who had not moved all game. She then promptly ran towards the action and away from the lecherous Ossy (I didn’t think that at the time, but writing this out now seems fine).Luke shooty trio joined in causing taking out the Witch Doctor. Time for one last desperate attempt to take out as much as I could knowing that I was not going to win the game and Maelok was going to get skinned (half a handbags worth or maybe just one boot surely). Wrongeye healed Snapjaw enough to cause maximum damage while pulling off another kill with Influence. Snapjaw then proceeded to rag on the Phoenix taking both arms out but not finally trashing it. Maelok healed the other Wrastler after it took transfer damage in the previous turn. This Wrastler did not have the threat range to do anything so simply walked to put himself between Maelok and the Elves.

Luke ended the game by firstly having his Archer take out Wrongeye (and Snapjaw) and then concentrating on Maelok by sending in the MHA (failed to hit) and then both Griffons.

Quite a frustrating game really as I was pinned back by a lot of ranged attacks. Equally frustrating were the amount of things that I forgot to do:

• Forgetting the GMP prayers a lot of the time – Cold Blood would have been handy in the assassination attempt while Dirge of Mists might have helped with a few of the shots that came my way)
• The Witch Doctor on a couple of turns.
• Snapjaw has got the Submerge animus!!! He and Wrongeye needn’t have taken any Brutal Shots from the Archers. This would have allowed them to get up close and personal a hell of a lot quicker.

I also should have got Maelok further up the field as he was flanked by both of his Wrastlers, which would lead to my two heavies getting some proper action. Apart from that, pretty much everything worked as it should and W+S even more so (Influence cast on the right model can be really good (e.g. is that your Sentinel Officer standing behind Ossy? No, he’s mine now). The only thing that I didn’t get any mileage out of was the Bone Swarm. The plan was to have it amongst a GMP casting its animus, making them even harder to hit. But I am now having a slight doubt about it. I could take out the BS and put in two more Croaks a la Marcus. The Croak got in a great charge attack but was typically useless with the Spear, but I can’t help imagining that he needs a bit of friendly encouragement from fellow Croak Hunters. This is the last (agonising) choice I need to make.
I learnt a lot from this game about my Minion force (and even a bit about the Phoenix which I have missed in the past). Luke used his Elves effectively by thinning down my numbers at a distance and then sending in the Sentinels to mop up. I am looking forward to maybe playing against him again outside of the league to even things up.

Slow Grow Round 4

For Round 4, I took the option to change warlock. I drafted in Maelok to lead the way for the remainder of the league. Not having used him before the game was certainly going to be fun. Also we had the option of swapping out up to ten points, which I also took advantage of by changing the Spitter and Feralgeist for my second Wrastler. So the list now looks like this:
Maelok the Dreadbound
* Bull Snapper
* Blackhide Wrastler
* Blackhide Wrastler
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Croak Hunter

My round 4 opponent was Lewis, the chap who is doing a great job running this league, and his new Skorne army. I haven’t seen him play any of his other games so I’m not sure if changed much, but he certainly changed warlock to eHexeris. I’ve come up against the warlock before and know that his spell book and abilities are quite something. Lewis fielded:

Lord Arbiter Hexeris
* Cyclops Shaman
* Molik Karn
* Titan Gladiator
* Aptimus Marketh
Nihilators (Leader and 9 Grunts)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader and 3 Grunts)
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew (Leader and 1 Grunt)
Tyrant Commander & Standard Bearer

The round 4 scenario was Diversion from the SR2012 pack, where you capture the flag to your right and contest the zone in your opponents half of the table. After the first to roll-offs were draws, Lewis won the third and opted to go first. Lewis set up everything in front of his Nihilators while I set everything up behind my GMP’s.

Lewis ran everything forward leading off with his Nihilators under Ashen Veil towards the flag I wanted.

I ran everything forward myself with one GMP under Death Pact heading for flag duty and the other looking to see what was heading towards the other flag.

It was the Gobbers who moved closest to the flag and the popped a cloud next to the forest creating a large area I couldn’t see into. This was ideal in covering Molik’s approach. The Ashen Veiled Nihilators moved to the other flag with the TyCo and Standard right behind them. The Shaman then drew first blood by casting Hexy’s Hellfire cutting a Gatormen in half.

I responded by charging my undead GMP into the Nihilators. Sadly I didn’t have enough charge range and only managed to fell three of the beserkers. This was further compounded by the Croak Hunter wildly missing the TyCo with a spear.

Lewis’s Nihilators skirted towards the edge of the table in an effort to fence me in while the Gladiator and Molik got in a charge on my undead GMP, only two of which fell (you got to love Death Pact and Spiny Growth spam). Molik then did the obvious thing and Fate Walked out of trouble.

My response was to feat and Revive one Gatorman. My undead GMP charged through the Nihilators taking out the TyCo and putting a bit of damage on the Gladiator and Hexy himself. Then for some reason I thought I could get a charge THROUGH the forest to go for Molik, but it turns out that I couldn’t and ended up putting the other GMP into said forest just because there was nothing else to do.

Lewis Nihilators took down two of my undead gators and hurt one of my Wrastlers (Ray) a little. Hexy eventually disengaged himself from the super hard Gatorman in front of him, while Molik walked into the forest, killed two Gators, and walked back out again.

My brain-fart in the previous turn kinda left me on the ropes. The last remaining undead Gatorman failed to kill any of the Nihilators in his immediate vicinity. Maelok killed two with his Venom spray while Ray charged into the Gladiator. Not having any mind really reduced the damage output. Then I just tried to move stuff out of harm’s (Molik’s) way.

Lewis feated this turn but only reaved the fury from Ray, as that was the only one of my beasts in his control area. The Nihilators moved into action and seriously hurt Ray a bit more but could get the last Gatorman near them. The Gobbers moved closer to the action and popped yet another cloud. The Shaman pulled off the shot of the game by killing a Gatorman standing in a forest in one go.

I responded by getting Kaine (the other Wrastler) to first trample two Nihilators (which worked well) and then hit the Gladiator (which didn’t work so well). Maelok then moved for moving’s sake.

Lewis put the game to bed by getting Molik to destroy the Kaine and then a Gatorman for a laugh. This freed up a Nihilator to soften up Maelok for the killing blows to be delivered by the Gladiator.

Everything seemed right in my head and a GMP with Death Pact and a few Spiny Growths are a tough nut to crack, but then they had a bit of trouble dishing out damage with my dice. My downfall was to screw myself into a little corner while not being able to get out. On one side I was fenced in by some crazy tough Nihilators and on the other I had Molik waltzing around like he owns the place (which you would understand, just look at him). My brain-fart halfway through the game didn’t help and Lewis pounced on my mistake. I think I should have made the Gladiator a higher priority target and also to try and take advantage of the Croak’s Gang ability.

This was a game where Lewis was in full control and he deserved the win, he really made me panic a lot during the game.

Minion paint update.

Finally, I’ve gotten my friend to get my second Wrastler to tabletop standard while I’ve done the same with Maelok and a Boneswarm. These three now takes my Minion force to just over halfway done. To be fair, there are 52 minion models in my collection and a handful of them are don’t really have a place in any Blindwater Congregation force I may try out; models like Brun Cragback and Lug, Dahlia and Skarrath, Alten Ashley and Lanyssa Ryssyl. So taking these out I’m almost two-thirds finished.

While I could get away with most of my minis being tabletop ready, a lot of them could do with some highlighting. This frightens me a bit as I’m not incredibly skilled with a brush. The last time I tried to highlight something, I ruined my Ravenwing bike squad. After I have finished my minions, I might try and practice a bit on the handful of plastic Space Marines I was given. If I don’t do this, I’ll just move back onto my Skorne and try and finish them off. My aim is to steadily move on through each faction and try and get everything done eventually. For Skorne and Retribution, there is quite a bit that has been started and just wants finishing off, but Menoth is a whole different kettle of fish. At only11.8% completed I’m not looking forward to it, especially having to model three whole units of Knights Exemplar.

But that is some ways away in the future. What I really want to roll off my paint table is my unit of Bog Trogs and second Croak hunter. The Bog Trogs have been sitting there mostly done and were some of the first Minions I started, so it would be good to just get them out of my hair. The Croak will need to be done for Round 5 of the Slow Grow league and I might just get a start on Victor Pendrake and Swamp Gobbers just in case there is room for them in Round 5.

Post Slow Grow plans

While we are at the halfway stage of our league with two rounds and a one-day tourney to go, I am already thinking about what’s going to happen afterwards. After the tourney there will be a few months until The UK Masters and the European Team Championships. I plan to take the Mordikaar army I used at the end of 2011 to these tourneys. I would also take the time to see if I can get a handle on either Hexeris. My Skorne would not take much effort to be completely ready for play as most of what I would intend to use is fully painted.

But lately I have been looking back at my Menoth collection as a result of Bloody Barnabas and Maelok’s feats being quite similar to a couple of Menoth feats. I had fun taking a pKreoss all exemplar force to the Darksphere event back in November. It turned out that I wasn’t as rusty with my first ever caster as I first thought I would be as I broke ‘The Streak’ and could have helped myself to another win on scenario (and maybe out-attritioned a heavy Khador army in the last game). I know the last half of the previous sentence suggests that I’m dreaming, but looking back through the pics I took (and that day’s second opponent acknowledging that I would have won if he had been less brave) I think that a move back to Menoth might not be a bad thing. So with Barny’s feat mirroring pKreoss and Calaban using tricks from eSevvy, I see that Maelok’s feat pretty much mirrors the Testament’s. Now ToM is a caster I do not have in my collection. I have used the Prime version of Silent Bob quite a bit and he definitely features in my fave 5 (which can change from day to day). However, I have been reading up on ToM recently and am seriously using this guy to make my return to the church. His short range soul collecting ability is not what I’m used to with Mordikaar and Hollow, but not allowing the enemy to do the same makes up for that. I love Revive which is something I have with Mordi and Maelok when I choose to use him. But with his low Focus stat, I’ll be looking to take the Avatar of Menoth (generates own Focus) and the new Sanctifier (collects souls) when it’s available, both jacks are fairly self-sufficient. Then I’ll see how many Zealots I can fit in; I currently have two max units and the Bearer with an eye on a third unit.

Alternatively, I can pay a bit more attention to my Retribution (have a bit more practise with Ossyan) as I’m just not feeling my Troll (sorry Grissel) force at the moment. Or just go mad and begin those Witch Coven or Gorten lists I’ve had my eye on. Thankfully my feelings for the latter two (armies I have yet to start anyway) have lessened recently now that I’ve got a bit more (6% or so) patience with a paintbrush. Wanting to finish painting up lists or even whole armies in my collection will hopefully curb my spending over the coming months (yeah right, I want those Venator Slingers, It’s about time I bought Molik, I’ll say yes to another unit of Errants, etc).

Of course, this is all to do with PP games. What about finally messing around with my ever-growing Outcasts crew? OR my Combined Army and Yu Jing forces?

We’ll see how it goes. I’ll never be good at proper planning, will I?

Minion paint progress

The clubs Slow Grow league has been a very useful aid to painting my Minions force. Pretty much all of it has been painted already for the previous rounds. So far, over the last month and a bit, I have completed:
Bloody Barnabas
Calaban the Grave Walker
Blackhide Wrastler
Ironback Spitter
Bull Snapper
Gatorman Posse (max) x 2
Farrow Bone Grinders (max) (not in pic)
Croak Hunter
Feralgeist
Wrongeye and Snapjaw

Still on my to do list:

Maelok the Dreadbound
Starting a second Croak Hunter
Putting the finishing touches to my Bog Trogs (max)
Finishing off a Bone Swarm

There are other Minion bits and pieces that I’d like to work on afterwards:

Totem Hunter
Thrullg
Victor Pendrake
Alten Ashley
Ordering the missing arm for my second Bull Snapper.
Starting on my second Ironback Spitter (although this really is not priority, at all)
Swamp Gobbers
Brun Cragback and Lug

My friend, the one who got me into miniatures in the first place, is currently painting up my second Blackhide Wrastler for me. He is a good painter and I’m hoping to keep his interest up by letting him throw some paint on things like Brun and Lug and or the Totem Hunter. I might maybe give him license to do my Yu Jing force if he has any patience for it. I don’t think that he’ll start throwing dice around and pick up wargaming, but it would be nice to see him producing some good minis (he entered his Eldar Avatar for Golden Demon 96).
Once I have finished off my minions (or at least when the Slow Grow League has finished) I’ll move back to painting the rest of my Skorne (63.73% done) in readiness for the Masters (if I can snap up a ticket) and ETC. And after that I may make an effort to make my Menoth army look presentable (11.56% done).

Do I want a change?

I have a bit of a dilemma going into round 4 of the clubs Slow Grow league. We can change warcaster/warlock and swap out 10 points of the force that we’ve all built up over the previous rounds. The latter was quite easy for me as I have taken out the Spitter and Feralgeist and changed it for my second Wrastler. That was an easy decision for me to make as I don’t think the Spitter has quite got what it takes. Ok the ranged attack is pretty good and can be devastating, but everything else about it is just meh. So the second Wrastler comes in for some more heavy hitting power. I’m hoping that I can use this change to be a bit more aggressive in my play style, and leave my conservative style behind (maybe).

Back to the tricky bit; the option to change caster/lock. There is no need to change, but I have all three of the Gatorman Warlocks available to me. They all have the same amount of warbeast points so do not affect the composition of my 35 point army at all, but they may affect the final 50 point list due to their Tiered options. So here’s what I’m thinking of at the moment;

 Bloody Barnabas: My starting Warlock. He comes from the Mikael Kreoss School of Feating and can be a tough nut to crack with the likes of Iron Flesh (on himself or a beast) and can mobilise his beasts with Warpath. I like him a lot. Already painted up, although has got a chip on his snout (Gators have snouts don’t they?). The Feat alone should be golden against high Def models.

 Calaban, The Grave Walker: I moved him in for the Fluff Week game (and managed a second game with him the week before). I really enjoyed his feat and the damage it can cause. I like the debuffs to opponents and the chance of turning them into Arc Nodes with his ranged attack. Definitely a lot of fun.

 Maelok, the Dreadbound: The unknown quantity for me as I have barely broke him out of the blister. Can make tough troops stupidly tough and bring them back. Revive is fast becoming my favourite spell with Mordikaar and the fact that Maelok has this, makes me really want to field him. Testament of Menoth as well, but that’s for another post. I think the challenge for Maelok would be to use Revive effectively as, unless he stuff is killed close to him, he is just not going to be able to gain as many additional fury like Mordi can. If he upkeeps Death Pact and Malediction, then he only has the chance to Revive one Gator.

In short, I’m excited about using all three. If I look at it practically, Barny and Calaban are fully painted, but Maelok needs work over this coming weekend. As Marcus (whom I played in my last game – he took Maelok) told me last time, Maelok is a bitch to paint. Which isn’t good news for me.  With regard to the Slow Grow League, the differences would show at the 50 point level where the Tiers all differ from each other; things like Barny’s cheaper warbeasts or Calaban’s Bone Grinders (which are painted). Maelok’s Tier list would only really begin to feel good when the Witch Doctor models are released in a couple of months’ time. One thing is for sure, I’ll be throwing Wrongeye and Snapjaw into the mix. I’ve wanted to use them for some time and would like to see them in action. I did think about Bog Trogs and the threat they pose, but I think they don’t quite have a place in any of these warlock’s 50 point lists.

Not an easy decision for me to make going into Round 4; my head and heart keep changing their minds. I may just end up rolling a dice.

Slow Grow round 3

Week 3 of our Slow Grow League was Fluff Week. Games were arranged so that we could replay as many of the stories from all of the PP books. I haven’t seen any of the other games, but the one I played against Marcus was the Minion fluff from the Domination release; Calaban (me) vs Maelok (Marcus).
Although the option to change warlock/warcaster doesn’t happen until Round 4, it decided that I should swap Bloody Barnabas for Calaban for the sake of Fluff week. This was good for me as I had wanted to try Calaban for some time, plus I already had him fully painted and ready to go. I was also happy as it meant I could see him in action before Round 4. So far I’ve played two games with him and think that there is a lot of potential there.
One other thing that I was looking forward to in this game was seeing Maelok in the flesh (or lack thereof), and I can say that I was impressed. He did the simple things which made Marcus’ force work really well. So without further ado, I took:

Calaban, the Gravewalker
* Bull Snapper
* Blackhide Wrastler
* Ironback Spitter
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Croak Hunter
Feralgeist

to go against:

Maelok, the Dreadbound
* Bull Snapper
* Blackhide Wrastler
* Blackhide Wrastler
Bog Trog Ambushers (Leader and 5 Grunts)
Gatormen Posse (Leader and 4 Grunts)
Croak Hunter
Croak Hunter
Croak Hunter

For the game we used the Command and Control radial scenario from SR2012 and both set up at the front of our respective zones. I lost the roll-off and Marcus opted to go second.

Turn 1:

I chose to run the Spitter and Calaban towards the nearest flag leaving the rest of the force to attempt to hold the control zone in the centre of the board. Calaban had cast Carnivore on the first GMP and threw down a couple of Spiny Growths on the Wrastler and one gator.

Marcus ran his force forwards as well and reached the edge of the control zone in a very neat wall of gatory and frog-like meanness. Maelok had cast Death Pact on his GMP and Malediction.

Turn 2:

I knew I wouldn’t be able to engage the enemy so I ran most of my Gators into the control zone. Not a very good move as I found out later. The Croak hung back a little and moved behind the Gators looking for an opportunity in the next turn to take advantage of his Gang ability. The Wrastler moved up in support while Calaban claimed his flag with the Spitter a short distance away from him.

Maelok upkept his spells and shifted forward. Marcus got his GMP to charge mine and took out my front three and his supporting knot of frogs (I looked up the collective noun (or  ‘term of venery’ (from medieval times) if you want to be fancy) and while not a good noun it’s far better than having a knob of toads) pitched in and killed another. Marcus’ Wrastlers stood by and watched. It was no surprise that the Bog Trogs made an appearance to my left just inches away from my table edge. They ran towards Calaban and his flag and looked to be a thorn in my side which I quite expected.

Turn 3:

Surrounded, it was time for a big action turn. First of all, The Spitter walked back slightly to cover Calaban and spat at a clump of Bog Trogs killing two and sticking corrosion on another. That was fine. But then I activated Calaban and popped my feat. He moved and unsuccessfully cast Bone Shaker a couple of times. Then the remaining Gators from both Posses charged their opposite numbers. Due to Marcus’ GMP having a stupidly high armour value, only a handful of wounds were dished out. In turned out that my Croak Hunter was the only thing to actually kill something, and boy did he do it well. Using Gang to get the hit, I rolled for damage and from 4d6 (charge and poison weapon) I got three 6’s and a 4. The Wrastler couldn’t do anything to his opposing Wrastler as one of Marcus’ Gators was blocking its charge lane. This was really bad as my Wrastler didn’t have enough movement to engage.

It was Marcus’ turn to feat which is quite horrible (I now want to have a Maelok of my own, him and the Testament of Menoth). Needless to say that his army went through mine with some ease leaving me with only one Gatorman and totalling my Wrastler. There wasn’t much else for Marcus to do so he ran his Bog Trogs (who were down to three as one had succumbed to Corrosion) even closer to Calaban.

I must have deleted the pic for Marcus’s Turn 3 so I’ll include a fun conga-type-thing pic.

Turn 4:

With not a lot to do with not a lot of my army left, I took out what I could. The lone Gatorman finished off the remaining Croaks as he was never going to scratch Marcus’s Gators. The Feralgeist controlled Wrastler picked himself up and round on his killer causing a massive… 1 wound from his attacks. Calaban’s mastery of magic failed him repeatedly. The Snapper went to occupy the other Wrastler but causing no damage of two attacks. This only served to block charge lanes to Calaban. All that was left to do was finish the turn with some fun and threw one Bog Trog into another killing them both.

Marcus ended the game in style by Reviving three Gators, which then charged Calaban. One of them got had to go past the Snapper and take a free strike and subsequently got eaten. Marcus was thankful that he had chosen the Cold Blood prayer for them as he had missed with all four of his initial attacks. But unfortunately, he got all of the re-rolls and cut my warlock down in four hits.

A disappointing game for me made better by the Fluff aspect of it. Not having the first turn is one thing, but to play into Marcus’s hands in the second turn was quite silly. I think I should have noticed that when Marcus hadn’t made out to capture a flag, I should have just concentrated on the bloodbath in the middle. As it was I placed a bit too much confidence in two GMP’s, a very effective Croak Hunter and a Wrastler. The idea had been to let them handle things while Calaban, protected a little by his Spitter, made sure that I had the flag so I could start scoring points. Marcus played very well making sure I stayed stretched with the Bog Trogs creeping up behind me and the Knot of Croak Hunters causing a distraction. Three of them together can really make you think about what you need to prioritise. Having said this, Marcus could have easily gone for the scenario if he wanted. I think Marcus really controlled the game to the extent that his second Wrastler really didn’t need to do anything at all as I focused a little too much on the super-hard GMP and Croaks.

The game showed me that I am finding it hard to find the place in-between conservative play and ‘no fear, no doubt, all-in, balls out’ play. In this game I really wanted to take the game to Marcus but found I was in no position to from turn two onwards. It was at that point that I should have been a bit more conservative. But hey, I learnt what my warlock cannot do and I now know a little more about what Maelok can do so it’s all good. Hopefully in the next round of our Slow Grow league will go my way.