Marvel Crisis Protocol - WIP

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Marvel Crisis Protocol – A few years back skirmish games were popping up all over the place and I fell into chasing each new game hoping to find a replacement for my main game of Warhammer 40,000. Back then 40K was in a weird place and I just wasn’t enjoying it. Which seemed to be the case for many gamers as skirmish games were taking off with Malifaux, MERCS, Helldorado, Relic Knights Guildball, Deadzone, Batman The Miniatures game and a bunch of others snagging huge chunks of disenfranchised players. Of course Games Workshop course corrected with new editions of their core games and bringing back old favorites like Necromunda and Warhammer Quest, which seemed to the downfall of many of those start up skirmish games. I’ve noticed that skirmish games are coming back for a variety of reasons.

The most notable reason for the rise in skirmish games is the pandemic. Right now it’s not really safe to spend several hours in close contact with someone else in a cramped game store. In some states like Michigan it’s not even a viable option because most stores have their gaming areas closed off. Of course basement gaming is an option but there again spending hours in an enclosed space, even masked up increases your risk of possible exposure. Which means for many players getting a game of 40K isn’t happening.

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In my group we were able to play variations of Necromunda over video conference for a while. With a skirmish game it works to a degree but it’d not ideal. So over the last year my primary gaming group consists of my wife and sons. The challenge there 40K, Necromunda and Killteam have to much information having to cross reference multiple books and investing a significant amount of time on the lore before you can really enjoy the games. (Because lets be honest, people love the 40K universe for the depth of story and modeling opportunities not the quality of gameplay).

So that’s a long way to go to get to the point. In order to enjoy a miniatures game with my young sons and wife I needed to find something that was already something they liked, that has concise consolidated rules that they don’t need to study ahead of time and is playable in under an hour or two. Which lead me to Marvel Crisis Protocol.

I had painted a few of the models for a client and knew that the game was pretty solid so I felt pretty safe in investing in it. Worst case scenario I’d have some nice minis to display from one of the family’s favorite universes. After receiving the core set for Christmas I had what I needed to get started. Of course other projects required my attention first but once I got to it I was hooked.

Atomic Mass has created a unique game that has all the flavor of the Marvel Universe as well as pretty balanced gameplay with all the rules you need to know printed on the cards or a quick reference sheet. (yea the full rulebook is online and way more extensive for competitive play but you don’t need to reference it much for fun games).

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I have a few modern terrain board I had put together for Batman and MERCS so revisiting those projects to actually finish something is an exciting proposition. After a few games with my older son he’s caught on quick and really enjoys the game. I think this will be the gateway to other mini games or could possibly become my go to game. It plays quick and is tons of fun.

Clan Yamazaru - Ninja All-Stars

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Ninja All-Stars – I’ve been able to make a dent in my personal backlog this year, not necessarily the models I had planned on painting for the Year of the Rat. (This was going to be all Necromunda all the time, but the nature of that game requires social interaction with a group of people, 2020 being what it’s been my gangs have been on hiatus.) The amount of time I’ve been spending with the kids has reinvigorated my interest in some game that I had shelved, Ninja All-Stars is one that didn’t quite click with my gamer friends but my kids love it, and to be honest it’s grown on me.

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Clan Yamazaru is the fourth named clan I’ve painted up, leaving me with just Clan Kitsune, Tanchyo and some Ronin to complete. I don’t think Ninja Division is supporting the game any more so once I finish the stuff that’s out I’ll have the entire game fully painted. Which is really exciting because the game is beautiful and the models look so good with paint on them.

Year of the Rat - Stimmer for the Win!

Necromunda – We haven’t started our official pit fight campaign yet, however I was able to play a few exhibition matches to test out my latest fighter.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about a grenade launcher wielding Stimmer in a pit fight. Not having access to his guns until round three could be a bit scary, that is until I found inspiration from Sump City Radio. Their discussion of House of Chains in Episode 5 was quite good and it made me rethink my opinion of the Muscle Skill Tree.

My champion Knuke did a phenomenal job smashing his opponent. Dancing around the board is a little easier when you’re playing 1v1 so most games I was able to either get off the charge or weather the storm of blows to beat my opponent back with my Fists of Steel.

I think this will be my fighter of choice for our Pit Fight campaign. He’s tough enough that most weapons have a hard time hurting him so I might feel pretty comfortable betting on myself in a few matches.

Year of the Rat: Necromunda - Via Google Hangouts

Necromunda – Prior to all this COVID nonsense I was participating in two separate Necromunda campaigns. Neither of my gangs was doing particularly well, but I was having fun. Both campaigns were moving along and didn’t seem to be in danger of stalling out, then the world went to shit and getting together for games wasn’t going to happen.

After a few brainstorming sessions we decided that running Necromunda pit fights over video chat seemed to be the most feasible way of playing. Only having one model per player to keep track of and an easily translatable grid seemed to make sense. In the event that this goes well we can continue to have fights during lockdown and generate some credits for our gangs when we can meet back up face-to-face.

Here’s the rules I came up with, I’ll post a follow up later this month with some type of after battle report.

Year of the Rat - Campaign Update

Necromunda – Necromunda can be a brutal game. Part of the fun is seeing your guys get better over time and/or your enemies get worse. Most of the time things even out over the course of a campaign particularly if you’re playing enough games in a cycle to generate income and experience. With a good number of games under you’re belt losing a model hurts but you can typically play catch up with most of the houses as they get the Settlement to recruit Juves from.

One of the Necromunda Campaigns I’m taking part in is a Dominion Campaign that meets once a month to play 1-2 games. For that campaign I opted to play Enforcers against a Van Saar, Healot Cult and Corpse Grinder Cult. The first month things went ok and we worked out the kinks with a multi=player game.

This month however things took a dramatic turn for me. We played a three-player “Tunnel FIght” on multi level board. We house-ruled a triangular deployment so everyone had relatively the same distance between them, and infiltrators had plenty of options. The game seemed to be going well with my Enforcer teams working together to take out a few models. That was until the Corpse Grinder Leader joined the fray. Some nasty combats saw my leader and one of my champs in need of medical care and one of my patrolmen in recovery. During the post-game sequence I had to pay out all my credits to visit the Doc who couldn’t save either model. So essentially my gang was gutted.

In a normal duration campaign I could probably come back from this. Because they died at the Doc I keep their equipment and get a single Rookie that I could gear up, and my remaining champ could take on the leader role. It wouldn’t be easy but I might be able to keep myself in the game.

However since we’re only getting together once a month and this was only the second game, I’m retiring this gang and starting over. With the infrequency that we’re playing I’ll struggle to catch up and won’t have much fun in the campaign, So instead I’m going to found a new gang. I’ll be tw games behind, but the odds are better that I could catch up from the baseline rather than being down 1/3 of my crew.

Sneaky Space Marines - Playing with Raven Guard Successors

Warhammer 40,000 – I’m super bummed. Space Marines finally get their day in the sun with a glut of new rules and the Internet can’t stop complaining about how over-powered they are. I don’t get it ever since I started playing this game every time a new book came out it took some time to adjust to the new options, although the rapid fire pace books are coming out now makes it hard to adjust as there are just so many things that are good. Which I think is a good thing and heathy for the game. Instead of looking at the marine release as one over-powered army it should instead be looked at as 6+ unique armies with their own play-style, which if any other factions suddenly got six brand new armies I think the impact would be very similar.

Anyway, I’m a fan of Space Marines and always have been. The new books have given every model in my collection a chance to shine and I love building new lists. I do have some favorite units like the Vanguard Vets, Chaplain and Captain so they tend to find their way into more of my lists than not but I’m trying to push each list in a new direction.

Twilight Ravens Fourth Company - Progenitor - Raven Guard • Successor Traits- Master Artisans, Whirlwind of Rage

BATTALION ONE
HQ - Captain: 2x Chainsword, Jump Pack, Warlord Trait: Shadowmaster Relic: Teeth of Terra
HQ - Chaplain: Litany of Hate, Exhortation of Rage, Jump Pack Relic: Master-Crafted Weapon, Plasma pistol Hero of the Chapter: Swift and Deadly
TROOP - Scout Squad: 4x Sniper rifle, Heavy Bolter Camo Cloaks
TROOP - Scout Squad: 4x Sniper rifle, Missle Launcher Camo Cloaks
TROOP - Scout Squad: 5x Astartes shotgun, Power Fist
ELITE- Vanguard Vets - 4x Chainsword & StormShield 6x Dual Chainswords
HEAVY- Mortis Dreadnought - 2x Twin lascannon
DEDICATED TRANSPORT- Land Speeder Storm - Heavy flamer

BATTALION TWO

HQ - Librarian: Enveloping Darkness, Shadowstep, Combi-flamer, Force sword Jump Pack
HQ - Lieutenants: Chainsword, Master-crafted boltgun
TROOP - 10x Intercessors: Auxiliary Grenade Launcher Stalker Bolt Rifle, Chainsword, Korvidari Bolts
TROOP - 6x Intercessors: Auxiliary Grenade Launcher Stalker Bolt Rifle, Chainsword
TROOP - 7x Scouts: Astartes shotgun
ELITE - Apothecary
ELITE - Eliminators: Bolt sniper rifle, Camo cloak

Raven Guard have a weird Combat Doctrine bonus, being in the Tactical Doctrine gives them +1 to hit and wound rolls against characters. The effect is pretty strong but very situational. My initial thought was to bulk up on snipers, turn one gives you an extra AP to potentially clear threats and turn two moves you into character sniping mode. Popping the Target Sighted stratagem makes that big Primaris unit able to target characters, hitting on 2’s, causing additional mortal wounds on 5-6, which is pretty solid, 3CP is a hefty cost to pay to take out a character but I don’t know that splitting their fire will make sense. Most likely the Lieutenant and Apothecary will camp next to them buffing up the unit. I gave the Sergeant Korvidai Bolts so he can target units 42” away an out of LOS. I don’t know how strong it will be but it feels in theme.

The Scouts and Mortis Dread help to compliment the shooting and provide some additional threats to pull attention away from my other threats. Nothing crazy here more or less just objective holders/campers that can shoot when a target presents itself.

Since the focus of Raven Guard Successors isn’t solely shooting based I worked in another layer of threats with my old stand-by units of a Chaplain, Captain and Vanguard Vets. Added to this mix is a Librarian. The mix of traits, prayers, relics and psychic powers I chose allow them to ignore overwatch, charge after advancing, deep-strike closer to another unit and give a unit -1 to hit makes for a pretty nasty assault element. First turn charges are totally possible the question is what do I go after? From prior experience smashing somebody first turn is great, but if you do to good of a job that assault unit winds up flapping in the breeze in front of a gun-line eager to blast them to oblivion. I imagine I’ll learn the right play with a few games under my belt.

The list above is geared for 1500 point games which have become our weekly standard. In the event that I need to bump up to a 2,000 point list I’m considering adding in the following:

OUTRIDER

HQ - Chaplain in Terminator Armor: Litany of Hate, Recitation of Focus, Combi-flamer
FAST- Assault Marines: 6x Jump Pack, Thunder hammer
FAST- Inceptors]: 6x Assault Bolters
FAST- Land Speeders: Assault cannon, Multi-melta

Of course as with my previous article I may need to bring this down to a 750 point list for a team game if we have an odd number of players on any given week. In that case I’d take the list down to:

BATTALION

HQ - Librarian: Enveloping Darkness, Shadowstep, Combi-flamer, Force sword Jump Pack
HQ - Lieutenants: Chainsword, Master-crafted boltgun
TROOP - 10x Intercessors: Auxiliary Grenade Launcher Stalker Bolt Rifle, Chainsword, Korvidari Bolts
TROOP - 6x Intercessors: Auxiliary Grenade Launcher Stalker Bolt Rifle, Chainsword
TROOP - 7x Scouts: Astartes shotgun
TROOP - Scout Squad: 4x Sniper rifle, Heavy Bolter Camo Cloaks
ELITE - Apothecary
ELITE - Eliminators: Bolt sniper rifle, Camo cloak

Space Marines - Who's your Daddy?

Warhammer 40,000 – With seven new books Space Marine players have more choices than ever. Way back in third edition I opted to paint my Marines in a unique color scheme, this was in part because I didn’t want another black army (I was playing them as Raven Guard from the old IA article, since Chaos was rampant) and partially because I wanted to future proof the army. Marines being fairly generic can be used like a multi-tool across so man different lists, by picking my own colors and building out options I found interesting I was able to amass a substantial Marine collection. Which means I have a ton of models to try to work into lists.

With the new “build-your-own” successor traits as well as the ancestor mechanic you can specialize your traits to max out the effectiveness of your force. Love the Assault Phase? Then claim White Scars as your ancestor for that sweet extra damage in the Assault Doctrine. Prefer heavy weapons pick the Iron Hands or imperial Fists and start the game with bonuses. Midrange more your speed roll with the Ultramarines or Raven Guard for turn two shenanigans. As a successor you not only get access to the cool Combat Doctrine bonuses but also the Stratagems, Warlord Traits, Relics and Tactical Objectives. Granted the “choose your own traits” are a little weaker on their own being able to mix and max gives you more ability to tailor to exactly how you want to play. The biggest drawback to choosing the successor route is loosing access to special characters (unless they’re from Forge World – more on that later) and having to pay CP to get access to the best relics.

So what’s this Forge World nonsense you speak of? Well in the best set of Imperial Armour Books (The Badab War), Forge World explored the chapters involved in that conflict and introduced characters for each of those chapters. Under the old codex those characters unlocked access to chapter tactics which changed up how your army worked. With the advent of eighth edition that model no longer worked and the Forge World chapters were tweaked in the imperial Armour Index to stand on their own, with the caveat that you could just pick whatever chapter tactics you thought best represented those characters. Cool, right? Well with the 2019 Space Marine book you just got a whole ton of new options, particularly for Chapters that have not been clarified as having a defined Progenitors like the Characadons, Red Scorpions, Exorcists, Angels Revenant, Red Hunters, Star Phantoms, Minotaurs, Fire Hawks, and Astral Claws as not only do you get cool rules from the characters but you can pick a Progenitor and Successor traits to maximize your list or fit your play-style.

Back when my gaming group was playing the Badab War I did a series of articles exploring lists based on each of the Chapters that took place. I’m considering putting together a group to play through a variation of that campaign again. Stay tuned as i’ll post more once I’ve put in some work.

With my Twilight Ravens I’ve gone through a variety or lists and options trying to find the sweet spot that I want to play for an extended period of time. I doubt a settle on anything anytime soon as there are just soooo many variations available. Currently for my groups weeknight gaming sessions we’re stickling with 750/1500 point lists. With a smaller point limit it’s easier to get a game done in a reasonable amount of time when you account for the lackadaisical nature of our game nights.

What I’m currently running for 1500 points is:

Twilight Ravens Third Company - Progenitor: White Scars?
Successor Traits: Long Range Marksmen, Whirlwind of Rage

BATTALION ONE:

HQ - Chaplain Dreadnought (2X Heavy Flamers + Dread Close Combat)
HQ - Lieutenant- Combi-flamer Powerfist
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
ELITE - Agressors - Flamestorm Gauntlets
FAST- LandSpeeder - 2X Heavy Flamers
Dedicated Transport - Drop Pod -Deathwind Launcher

BATTLION TWO:

HQ - Captain - 2x Chainsword (Teeth of Terra)
HQ - Chaplain - Master Crafted Plasma Pistol
HQ - Lieutenant - Dual Lightning Claws
TROOP - Intercessors - Bolt Rifle, Chainsword
TROOP - Intercessors - Bolt Rifle, Chainsword, Auxillary Grenade Launcher
TROOP - Intercessors - Bolt Rifle, Power Fist
ELITE - Vanguard Vets - 4x Storm Shield Chainsword, 6x Dual Chainsword
FAST - Attack Bike - Multi-melta

I really like this list so far. Being able to outflank with 11” range flamers or deepstrike a unit with flamers and be able to clear and area the turn they arrive has been fun. With Whirlwind of Rage + Exortation of Rage the Vanguard Vets can put a hurt on most units.

In the event I need to jump up to 2000 points I can add in the following:

ELITE - Relic Sicaran Battle Tank - 2x lascannons sponsons
ELITE - Aggressors - Flamstorm Gauntlets
FAST - Attack Bike - Multimelta
Dedicated Transport - Drop Pod - Storm Bolter
Dedicated Transport - Drop Pod - Storm Bolter

This give me even more flexibilty and a few more threats to spilt my opponents attention.

Of course if I need to run as part of a team I can break the list down to this 750 point force.

BATTALION ONE:

HQ - Chaplain Dreadnought (2X Heavy Flamers + Dread Close Combat)
HQ - Captain - 2x Chainsword (Teeth of Terra)
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
TROOP - Tactical Squad - Combi-flamer + Flamer
ELITE - Vanguard Vets - 4x Storm Shield Chainsword, 6x Dual Chainsword
FAST- LandSpeeder - 2X Heavy Flamers

Not quite the same impact, but it gets the playstyle across and takes advantage of the traits I’ve chosen for this list. I figure if I call each of my iterations a company I can forge my own narrative as my Chapter is on a Crusade and the companies are spread out over several systems.