Who's the Boss 17!

Fair and Balanced

On December 6th Crippled System hosted a Who's the Boss event in Madison, WI. Since I wasn't able to make it last year I was damn sure I was going to make it this year… even if that meant trudging 40 minutes to my car in the morning through a blinding hangover. I make good decisions!

For those of you who don't know what Who's the Boss is, here's a quick rundown on the format:

• Each round you get to spin the Wheel of 'Casters, which randomly determines which warcaster or warlock from all of Warmachine will lead your forces in battle
• The selected 'caster conforms to the rules of your faction. Your faction is considered Friendly Faciton for your 'caster and is a warcaster or warlock based on whether your faction comes from Warmachine or Hordes. This also means that any references to warbeasts/warjacks in the battlegroup are swapped and effects that remove fury instead add focus and vice versa.
• There are also little cheats that you can buy by donating to charity, such as switching your 'caster back to their Mk I Remix version, swapping casters with your opponent, or even swapping out your caster in the middle of a game.

I decided to bring the following list:

• Phoenix

• Banshee

Houseguard Thane

Arcanist

Arcanist

Eiryss, Angel of Retribution

Mage Hunter Assassin

Mage Hunter Assassin

Narn, Mage Hunter of Ios

Max Mage Hunter Strikeforce + Strikeforce Commander

Max Houseguard Halberdiers + Officer and Standard

...and I just realized now that I was playing two points down the whole day. Sylys could've made it into the list after all! I make good decisions!

As far as why I chose what I did, our Mage Hunter models tend to get a bit… broken… with some 'casters, so taking as many as you can is generally seen as being in good taste. Taking an arc node is also a good idea, as certain 'casters *cough*SORSCHA*cough* are ludicrously broken with them.

Anyway, I select my long time friend/nemesis/opponent Russell to be my first round matchup. We approach the wheel of casters and I roll up Vlad1 and he rolls up Vlad3. I choose to time shift my Vlad back to his Mk 1.5 version (hooray 3 cost Signs and Portents and Blood of Kings!) and we get our game on.

Russell brought the following:

• Bronzeback Titan
• Titan Gladiator
• Molik Kharn
• Aptimus Marketh

Max Paingivers

Max Nihilators

Max Incendiarii

… probably something else.

I won the roll to go first and realized that my Strike Force would be doing little this game due to Vlad3's Wind Wall spell. So my game plan was simply to jam with them and set up a ridiculously long distance alpha strike with my 'jacks and halberdiers thanks to Vlad1's feat doubling the myrmidon's speed. Speed 12, it's a thing.

Part 1 worked out pretty well as the Incendiarii focused all of their fire on the Strikeforce. My Halberdiers got a bit jammed up by Nihilators that refused to die, so Vlad feated so that my Phoenix could clear out a couple with Combustion and the Banshee could charge Molik and get past (not over, just past) the wall that he was hiding behind. With S&P the big guy went down pretty quick.

Russell then overestimated Vlad3's killing ability and only waded halfway through my Phoenix with his feat up and didn't manage to sprint away. This allowed me to (barely!) clear a charge lane for the One and True Vladimir to charge the mounted pretender and put him to bed under Blood of Kings. It also allowed me to have fun with Mimic, which allowed me to copy one of Vlad3's weapon's abilities. At first we thought that Crit Knockdown from the mount was in the game, but unfortunately the Umbrean horse lord can't quite capture the essence of iron hooves. Brutal charge and MAT 10 did the job anyway.

Round 2 I fought my perennial opponent Josh and his Mercenaries. Mercs are in an interesting place in Who's the Boss as you can select a given 'caster's list or contract to pull your models from. Josh decided to go with his bro Magnus to get some of those fancy Renegades into the mix.

-Renegade

-Renegade

-Galleon

Max Boomhowler and Company

Max Cylena Rafaeyll and the Nyss Hunters

Lady Aiyanna and Master Holt

...probably something else.

Josh rolled first and got Haley1. With the words "This game isn't going to be fun, FYI" Josh time shifted her back to Mk 1.5 for the truly aggravating version of Temporal Barrier (all enemy models in her control area get their speed halved and can't charge… oy veh freakin' Mariah!). I rolled into Madrak2.

This game, as advertised, was frustrating, but Madrak, World Ender I found to be a whole ton of fun… as long as you interpret his 'Grim Salvation' ability to be any friendly warrior model and not just Trollkin. Otherwise he would've been Galleon bait.

Early on I engaged his Nyss with my Halberdiers and Feated to thresher through them and get some damage on the Galleon. I then charged some Blood Furied Strikeforce into it (i.e. 5 dice for damage)… but failed to space appropriately and left the big guy on about 1/3 of his health left. From there on Josh remembered to cast Temporal Barrier every turn, and I got bogged down until my clock ticked over. Even so I managed to kill all of his models except for a single Trollkin, Aiyanna and Holt and his 'caster, and the only reason Haley was still alive was because of that incredibly broken spell and a large tower that was just inside the kill box. But still… extra shots with Strikeforce/Eiryss/Narn and threshering Halbs? Not bad. Not bad at all.

Round 3 I got to have the singular pleasure of re-recruiting Lord Ghyrrshyld (Goreshade1) into Ios' armed forces. I decided to Time shift him back to Mk 1.5 due to the following benefits:

• His jack teleportation spell allowed them to activate

• He had Death Shroud as a model/unit upkeep spell

• Cloak of Shadows prevented him from being charged or targeted by ranged attacks

Pretty gravy. Against this my friend John had his Cygnar with Durgen:

• Stormwall

• Squire

Stormcaller x 2

Junior Warcaster

Max Boomhowler and Company

Max Horgenhold Forgeguard + Cygnar unit attachment

...probably something else.

This game my plan was to gang up on the Stormwall with two jacks and tear it to pieces while jamming with Halberdiers to go for scenario, with Narn eventually running through everything to get a Phoenix to Durgen. Unfortunately I keep on forgetting that Trolls aren't exactly slow, and they ran up into my front lines with covering fire protecting them pretty darn well, and Narn died to a damn storm pod. Once my Banshee was down and the Forgeguard were engaged in my front lines it was time for a Last Ditch Assassination ™, as John had left a narrow path for dem Banez (thanks feat!) to get to his 'caster. A round of Phantom Hunter shots from the Strike Force and Goreshade being a BMF led to the path being cleared and  4 Banez getting on Durgen. One missed, the others hit, and Durgen went tumbling down.

Lord Ghyrrshyld summons Banez TO THE FACE!!1!

Finally Round 4 I got into a Ret on Ret matchup, me with Hexeris1 and this time Lord Ghyrrshyld supporting the other side. His list:

• Phoenix

Houseguard Thane

Mage Hunter Assassin

Mage Hunter Assassin

Eiryss, Angel of Retribution

Lady Aiyanna and Master Holt

Max Magehunter Strikeforce + Commander

Max Houseguard Halberdiers + Officer and Standard

Max Dawnguard  Invictors  + Officer and Standard

… Sylys? I think?

Anyway, he got first and ran up. My guns shot down half of the Halberdiers and I parked my Halberdiers slightly behind the thin line of Strikeforce. He counterstruck with Halbs and reformed one guy into my Halbs, teleported the Phoenix in and murdered all of them plus Narn in one master stroke.

I got pretty desperate then and attempted to go for an assassination instead of disrupting and slamming his Phoenix, but failed to clear my trample lane. So Hexeris feated… and everything died. For those of you not familiar with his feat, basically whenever I kill something in his control area I get to make a 3" move with that killed model, make an attack, then remove it from play. This cascaded into me killing 9 strike force and 10 Invictors plus the rest of his Halberdiers… which if I'd been able to slam the Phoenix (which I missed) would've have pretty well turned the game in my favor. In the end he got Goreshade to make a Deathwalker within 5" of Hexeris and the Phoenix finished him, but man was that turn fun!

So, not exactly a stellar showing, but WTB isn't about winning- it's about doing silly stuff, and I think I did plenty of that.

Thanks for reading this rambling entry, next time I'll be getting back to more regularly scheduled battle reporting with a story ripped from the pages of the Iosan Civil War. Until then, shank a round ear for me!