Indeed!
Gonna update this post with photos from the last pulp alley scrap, about 30 total and i'll be doing captions, gonna do several and submit a few times.
I let my opponent choose my league and he went with the standby of Buck and Company. He continued to use his Gorilla Gangsters. My opponent wanted to play the Lost Keys scenario (must have a minor plot point in order to solve the primary plot point) in Podunk Ville USA, and provided most of the scenery with the exception of the on redbrick convenience store.
We rolled on our pre-scenario event chart and he got to deploy a vehicle after regular league deployment (it's the truck that Eyegore and Bananas are hiding behind), and I got to shift my die type up for the initiative roll by being familiar with the area. We each placed 7 secondary plot points (3 of which were red herrings and provided no benefit) and due to the Lost Keys deployment rules, we then placed one model each until we were through with our leagues.
I won the initial Initiative roll, and managed to keep it for much of the game. I attribute a large portion of my success to this fact. The game lasted 5 turns as I didn't need to use my plot point reward card to extend it.
Initial game Setup. We pretty much set up on our own sides with a unit or two each deployed somewhat to flank. Natalya for me, Eyegore and Bananas for my opponent. I placed the rest of my team relatively close to objectives (the deployment specifications make it impossible to make a move on an objective on the first turn).
The Primary plot point was a wheelchair bound millionaire and his aide, a nurse. We had to convince a local he was acquainted with (the minor plot points) to help us make contact before he would trust us. I'm guessing Buck planned to lobby for financial support, whereas Da Boss was just going to kidnap the poor guy and ransom him.
Bananas is a very slippery character, he's a good shot and has a phenomenal dodge roll, eyegore is a lower level objective solver without much ability to fight or shoot, though he can dodge a little.
Though I knew it could eventually cause her to run afoul of Da Boss, I like my initial placement of Natalya. She was able to be very mean to the Scientist's Daughter (can't remember the name) harassing her to the other side of the table, and eventually tying up Da Boss for most of the game.
Now, Rico is pretty much just a shooter. He can dodge a bit too if he's too worn out to shoot effectively but this game I had a
plan. I used my single solitary point of gear I got in one of the last missions (first 1, second mission was basically scrubbed for my team) to buy a Gadget X which allowed Rico to solve a single plot point without rolling. I'm not sure if using it on the minor point and not having it for the primary point was the right way to go. Though given the limited nature of the turns I'm thinking I could have done worse. If he spent 3 turns trying to convince someone to help him with the primary plot point, its entirely possible he wouldn't have had time to get to it.
I figured Coco and Speedy would make a good team. Coco is punchy and dodgy enough to handle even some sidekicks, at least for a little while, and speedy is way better at solving plot points than Coco. That's speedy's new trick, solve a plot point, duck out of
LoS, go into hiding.
I need to sort out the windows on my Mars Attacks building, but I don't consider it 100% done yet so I think it worked. I also like my opponent's classic cars, they really fit the Pulp Alley timeline/theme, and look fine without extra painting.
Falco *can* solve plot points, but any round he isn't violently assaulting the enemy with his bow is a round poorly spent! With 4 dice from one perk, and the ability to range-gap his opponents with another, leave him often throwing 5 dice at an opponent who has 3 at best to fight back with! If the opponent survives or another contender advances to the 6" normal short range, he may have to fall back on dodging, but falco can put the hurt downfield something fierce. He managed to put down Mr Yellow, wound Da Boss, and probably knock old Eygore over once or twice. I think he may have even dropped Bananas towards the end.
The Mad Scientist's Daughter (I think it's Anne?) operates much like Speedy. Da Boss, however, is pretty well good at everything. I'm still not sure what all 3 of his perks are but I know he has to have commander and hardened veteran. Maybe one of the perks is for finesse or cunning? This guy gives me fits, all I can do is tie him up, even Buck would be swinging or shooting at him with equal dice and Buck'd wear out when Da Boss wouldn't.
Mr Yellow and Mr Purple are much like rico, good shooters, but as allies they couldn't afford to buy much else in the way of skills.
More atmospheric shots, I took a lot of photos up front and then just a couple a round after that.
Now we get into the action. For my first turn, I had the initiative and I kept it the whole turn. Here you can see Falco advancing Into range of Mr Yellow. Buck will advance to a similar position later in the turn. Speedy and Rico have advanced towards some plot characters but they had to move too far to reach them and still have any actions left. Natalya Moved up to the fenceline and took some shots at Anne, though I'm not positive they were effective.
Coco Rushes into action in this photo, and you can see that Buck and Falco managed to put Mr Yellow and Mr Purple both down, and out as their end of round health checks were failed. Eyegore moved to be close to a plot point, and Da Boss and Bananas also took some actions, but the memory and pictures don't make exactly what they did terribly clear.
The aftermath of Buck and Falco's onslaught, I'm kind of surprised, as allies have a pretty high rate of recovering in our games so far. I guess it really is just 50/50 though.
Natalya harrasing Anne. I felt it best to keep his plot point solvers tied down as much as possible.
This is a bit further along as you can tell. Buck had to make the choice between nabbing a plot point unopposed, or running interference against Eyegore and Bananas. He chose the later, backed by Coco and Falco, and I like to think it paid off. Rico used the commotion across the way to make a dash and get close enough to attempt to coerce the Millionaire on the next turn, while Speedy continued to struggle with his plot point. Eyegore and Anne were also busily solving plot points during this round, while Da Boss bum rushed Natalya to continue their brutal grudge match from the last mission.
Coco cornered Bananas around turn 3, and they duked it out for the rest of the game. Bananas has a superior dodge score, but had very little room to go backwards, and we're pretty sure leaving the table means you've fled and can't come back. Both parties were injured at least a couple of times, Bananas recovering and Coco managing to get back up, until turn 4 when she couldn't pass her health check and had to stay down. I had a card to pass a health check, but at that point both Buck and Falco were already in place to deal with Bananas, and it was more important to use the card to get Natalya back into fighting shape. You can also see Buck harassing Eyegore to keep him from solving the plot point.
Natalya has a problem passing recovery checks. It's happened in all 3 games now. She's a complete badass at full power, but often bites off more than she can chew and gets injured. This drops all of her stronger
d8 abilities down to
d6's, and leaves her open to getting knocked down from subsequent injury. She has had very bad luck getting back up to full health on her own. She'll pass the recovery check to stand up from being down, but almost never passes a check to go to full health. I think she went down twice while fighting Da Boss this game, but managed to stick around. Da Boss actually took an injury twice, once from Falco's cross-table shooting, and once from Natalya at full power. Passing health checks on a
d8 isn't too hard though, and he managed to heal up at the end of both of those rounds.
Close up of Rico trying to Solve the Primary plot point. My opponent threw a 2 success challenge at me and Rico only had one die for either of the viable abilities. He got one success right off, failed the next turn, and finally succeeded the turn after that. Rico's first solve got me the... tip?... reward card which also allows the player holding it to draw two fortune cards per turn, and those really helped me stay ahead combined with keeping the initiative alot.
I think this must have been close to the start of turn 4.
Agent Falco takes pot shots at Eygore while Buck tries to solve the plot point before Eyegore can. Coco and Bananas battle on.
Coco did a great Job of punching above her weightclass in this scenario, I highly recommend a dodgy fighty animal type character in any league.
Having finally Convinced the woman in the yellow suit to help him out, Speedy joins Rico at the Millionaire. Rico ultimately convinces the Millionaire to flee with him to have talks with Buck after the scenario, and both Rico and Speedy will hide and creep away on the last turn.
I swear Buck isn't threatening that poor man at gunpoint, honest! Anne solved her plot point towards the end of the game as well but it was a red herring! The point buck is currently at proved to be a red herring too.
Da Boss gloating over Natalya. This is the second time he's knocked her block off. Of course, he spent the whole game doing it and didn't get to shoot down any of my weaker allies (much like Buck was able to do). Natalya managed to stay in the fight for the whole game, but once she was injured she had no way of keeping Da Boss from winning their brawls.
I had three plot points, including the major one. We played out the last round, though I didn't get a photo then, but this was pretty much where we were at.
Falco managed to pick off Eyegore, allowing buck to make a second attempt at the objective, to no avail. Bananas managed to put Coco down and out in this round, and in the next round buck shot Bananas down. Falco ran around the fence and helped Buck pin the gangster down, and Buck solved the red herring plot point on round 5.
So, this was a very solid win for Buck and Company. I got my point of gear back, I got a point of tips, and I got the coveted XP card. I have two points now. I'm not sure if I'll try to get 3 and make Falco/Natalya even more deadly, or just save them up to make Buck more of a Dynamo. This was a lot like a game of make-it-take-it basketball. I had the Initiative for probably 70% of the game and for the entirety of the first turn, and most of the second. When Mr yellow and Mr Purple both went out from being down on the first turn, it was a bit of a downhill slope for my opponent then. I managed to get my guys do do exactly what they were good at, while Da Boss got stuck fighting a sidekick instead of challenging Buck or clearing out my allies. Having the Initiative means you can go first and get prime shots, and if your opponents survive to shoot back they're often winded from the multiple combats rule. It helps that I was careful to pick fights I knew I had good chances of winning (losing a fight shifts the Initiative to your opponent). It was a fun game although I'm sure my opponent would have liked a bad roll to stall my momentum and give him a better chance to react to my movements. I had pretty hot dice for that whole first turn, though they cooled quit a bit moving through rounds 2 and 3, especially involving plot points. My league's reputation as earned them a new perk/ability, now when my team rolls on the pre-scenario event chart, if I don't like the result, I can reroll it. The Gorilla Gansters are probably a solid victory away from getting that point of rep for themselves.
Or next game will involve a collaboration of Terraclips Malifaux Sewer card terrain, and battle systems scifi scenery, in hopes of creating a daring escape from a mad scientist's lair into the adjoining sewer system.
Yeah it's working pretty well for now, we'll see if I can keep it up!
Don't start any rumors