Journey to Malifaux UK Nationals 2024

Driving down to the tournament I had a little anxiety about the day ahead. I hadn’t been in a tournament for such a competitive game in a long time and my previous experience was a little negative. Which was mostly on me as I had underestimated how competitive it was going to be and was woefully underprepared. Was this the same? Was I way out of my depth? Had I made a huge mistake signing up for nationals? Well before I knew it we were there and game 1 was just around the corner and I managed to talk myself down from the high anxiety to just a little bit of panic.

So rather than do the usual round by round breakdown I will sum up the crews, Strats and schemes then just do an overall summary of the game and how I felt it went.

Also a quick note I wanted to take photos of all the tables but didn’t get a chance but were some gorgeous ones around so here are a couple of them

Here are the crews for the game 1, we played at a standard 50 soulstones game, we got wedge deployment in raid the vaults and death beds and outflank for my schemes;

Von Schill

Steam Trunk

Freikorps scout 

2 x Freikorpsmann

Metallurgist

Hannah Lovelace 

Arik Schottemer

Tunnel Rats

2 soulstones

My opponents list was;

Marcus Alpha 

Jackalope

Myranda

The Scorpious 

Sightless Snow

Soulstone Miner

Order Initiate

4 Soulstones

Okay this will be as brief as the game was, as I suddenly realised I was probably going to be playing a lot of crews and even factions I had never faced before. In a blind panic I picked a crew that wasn’t very coherent or useful at all for the strat, but I rolled with it as best as I could and picked a couple of schemes I thought I had a chance of doing. The game moved along at a brisk pace and I felt okay up to turn 3. I had lost a couple of models and so had my opponent. However things went south fast in turn 3 model after model was eradicated and in turn 5 my opponent gave me a hint that I had a chance of the possibility of scoring a single point. I managed to figure out the route and my opponent kindly helped me with the finer details and I managed to score a single point. At this point I was neither disappointed as losing was what I was expecting, but also it didn’t feel great to lose 8-1. However at this point I was chatting to some of the other players and discovered that the person I had drawn at my first tournament in my first round was ranked No.5 in the UK and was more than likely winning the tournament as well (which he did). Suddenly I didn’t feel so bad as I managed to score a point against him, admittedly with some help, with a panic built crew. Also he was incredibly kind, patient and helpful both during and after the game, Giving me some hints and thoughts on crew building and model use for the rest of the day which I took on board and he also gifted me some game aids as well. With this welcoming attitude and generally great vibe I looked forward to my next two games.

Here are the crews for the game 2, we played at a standard 50 soulstones game, we got standard deployment in plant explosives and hold up their forces and information overload for my schemes;

Von Schill

Steam Trunk

Fumigator 

Freikorpsmann

Drachen Trooper

Metallurgist

Hannah Lovelace 

Lazarus

Tunnel Rats

0 soulstones

My opponents list was;

Captain Zipp Dread Pirate 

Earl Burns

The First Mate

2 x Iron Skeeter 

Beau Fishbocker

Swashbuckler

Gracie

4 Soulstones

Going into game 2 I was a little more composed and all anxiety had gone. I didn’t know the crew at all, but I know that Gremlins are squishy and there tends to be a few of them. So I built a crew that would have a good damage output and some blast to hit the groups if there were any. This was easily my favourite game of the day as it was very back and forth and I never felt like I was going to get to an unassailable loss. I had a solid plan and with some minor drawbacks it mostly went as planned. The crew I faced was not what I had expected. There were far fewer models than I had anticipated and some were quite tough to deal with. It ended at a 7-5 loss because of time I don’t think winning was an option. I may have been able to eke out a draw at best with good card draws, still a great game and again my opponent was gracious, patient and helpful throughout.

Here are the crews for the game 3, we played at a standard 50 soulstones game, we got Flank deployment in Stuff the ballots and death beds and sweating bullets for my schemes;

Von Schill

Steam Trunk

Freikorps scout 

Drachen trooper

Metallurgist

Hannah Lovelace 

Arik Schottemer

Freikorps Engineer

Lazarus

2 soulstones

My opponents list was;

Anya, Rail Magnate

Sovereign

Corvis Rook

Winston Finnigan 

Yannic Waller

Surveyor

Catalan Rifleman

Operative

6 Soulstones

Weirdly game 3 was the toughest game I had as the crew I faced were nothing like anything I had come up against so far. I wasn’t even that familiar with Anya at all. It was a lot of condition handouts, messing with my hand and generally making it tricky for me to get anything else done. I also did not help myself as in the end phase of turn 1 I thought I had picked deliver a message for my scheme, but had in fact picked death beds. So I had been gearing up for one thing and ended up having to switch plans in turn 2 to something else. It was a really tricky game and I am not sure what I could have done differently at this point to negate the conditions or hand shenanigans. My initial thought was rather than hires focused on getting in close I should have picked a far more ranged crew. We didn’t manage to turn 5 so with 15 minutes left we talked out the way we thought things would go. I once again failed to think about the strategy and only focused on my schemes so at the end of the game we agreed on a 7-2 loss.

So final thoughts on the day. All in all although I finished dead last, that is exactly what I expected. The crucial thing is I got to play someone way above my level and pick their brain a little, have a great game, face 3 crews and factions I had never faced and I learnt a ton of things. So what are the big things I learnt, I need to keep Von Schill out of melee and not rely on him for handing out equipment quite so much. I need to think more about the strategy at hand and then pick my schemes based on what I have not the other way round. I gave out focus so many times and barely ever used it which was not smart as when I did remember it really helped me get rid of some models. Lastly and most importantly I had some fun, even in the direst game I still managed to have a bit of fun doing silly things. Also the community was more than welcoming and just so friendly and helpful in general I couldn’t have asked for a better introduction to the tournament scene. I will also talk a little about the venue. It was a great store in Milton Keynes, a little more focused towards board and TCGs than wargaming, but still a fantastic venue called Wargames Workshop so if you are in the area it’s well worth stopping by. So what next? Well I have a main goal in mind for my next game whether or not I will achieve it we will see but that is a tale for another entry dear reader.