Down Low of Cojo Dojo

 Sunday 6th I went to a tournament in my second event in Sheffield. Cojo Dojo. Normally run by Jimmy Balderstone, so often known as Jimmyfaux, the man was stuck in France for real life or some other ridiculous reason, so the event was run by the store (I feel bad I didn't catch the owners name, he was a champ the whole day) helped out by James Doxey and Joel Henry. It was a great day, amazing atmosphere and loads of banter. The tables are quite tightly packed, boards right next to each other, if you are on the walled side it's a bit cramped, but that might be because I'm a bit fat.

 I apologize for the lack of pictures, I did bring a camera but most forgot to take pictures and then left the camera behind because I am that stupid. So you'll get pictures of the models I painted the other day from the new Gremlin box set, here's Lenny with some sexy sweat patches.

 Before the event there had been some banter on twitter between the squigs, a gaming group somewhere so far South it might aswell be France, Tyne and Wyrd, Geordies, and the newly forming Worhamma Headhunters from Sunderland. I was challenged to bring home some sguig heads. Sure enough my first game was against Brookes from the Sguigs. In fact, the last time I went down my first game was against the very same guy.

 Last time he ruined me.

 Safe to say I was a little bit hesitant going into this game. Pressure was on to do well and this same, friendly though he is, gamer had taken me apart in our last game. It was looking a tough fight. Initially things were looking bad. Gracie was picked out by Rasputina in combat to be given paralysed and then promptly devoured by the Wendigo. Trixxie 'Gremlin Lured' Snowstorm back to his board edge, however, and he then stomped over and squished a skeeter to free up a acolyte to plant markers for Line in the Sand and claim one squat marker. This left most of his crew out of position however. I dominated the centre squat markers for the game, the Mech rider eventually grinding the Bayou Gremlin hordes down on the opposite flank to Snowstorm, but not quick enough to get through for breakthrough. Burt shivved Raspy and then got shot and scored frame for murder. Som'er gave her tasty end of his boom stick leaving her just intact. A Bayou Gremlin finished the job to get Assassinate, what a hero. Final score I got all my VP and Brookes got 5. 2 for Squat and 3 for line in the sand.

Whilst we had our lunch break we also had the best painted competition. I must say the standard was very high. Sy had an amazing Pandora crew with a scratch built teddy, with whiskers and all, and some amazing creepy shaddows on the children. Will Lambert had a gorgeous Resser crew with some beautiful colour selection. Deservedly, however, Ben Halford claimed best painted with his ever fantastic models. I did get some lovely comments about my models, particularly basing (see what I am doing here...) so here's a skeeter.

 I was feeling a lot more confident going into my second game, particularly after enjoying a rather tasty burrito which was part of the ticket price. This was soon stripped, however, as I was drew against local (and actually from the North East) player David Golden. We joked about it on the way back, but we always seem to draw each other at events and I almost always get beaten. David likes robots and was fielding Hoffman for the day. Loads of armour. The strategy was reckoning. I hate reckoning. Once again I lost Gracie early doors. I completely forgot that he had given Joss nimble and moved so that he got a free lunge at her, combined with melee 7 from power loop and the axe of ignoring everything she died promptly. Trixxie got me 3 points at the end of the first turn though, using her presents 0 to drop a scheme marker right in the middle of 4 enemies. David set up his scheme markers for power ritual. A stroke of luck in the second turn ensured that the game wasn't lost immediately when I red jokered my defense flip against Joss' choke slam on my warpig. Somer topped the watcher and the Warpig topped the guardian, both of which had been damaged in the previous turn to get me reckoning. Hoffman burned through the Warpig with his soulstone torch to take her down to 3 wounds, I pulled her out of combat with Old Major's nudge 'em on only for a jammy (we both had no cards) shot from the mechanical attendant causing 3 wounds and killing her. Absolutely gutted. The following turn I killed the mechanical attendant and the mobile toolkit to score, but Hoffman and his puppet machine meant that he and Joss escaped to drop breakthrough. My Hog whisperer was mm out of removing Dave's power ritual marker, which meant he got eaten alive by a hunter. I though I still had it until I found out the large steam punk arachnid can eat enemy scheme markers to get it's positive flips and not just scrap, so my breakthrough markers placed by Trixxie were promptly devoured. The following turn was pretty null, I couldn't get a way to place scheme markers that wouldn't promptly be eaten by the spider and he couldn't kill me for reckoning. A hard fought game and a deserving win to Dave, final score 6-5.

 The last game was against a new opponent for me, Mr. Josh Fletcher. I had spoken to him on twitter, or at least known him as a champion of Von Schill and all things facial hair, but didn't realize until after the game how highly ranked he was. The game was turf war and without any specific schemes I went back to my first crew. With lots of hard to kill and armour I new this would be a grind. Once again first turns were looking rough. I completely forgot the Schill can charge out of combat and promptly did to slice up some armoured bacon, made worse by the fact that Gracie had failed to top the trapper and heal. The skeeter once again performed admirably though, pinning the trapper to the wall so it couldn't push out and fire. Burt withstood a great deal of pain holding up lazarus in combat, just so we could both exchange cursed object. With a red joker in hand, I went all or nothing with Som'er and focussed and fired on Schill and with his two shots dragged him down to his hard to kill. The following turn saw the slop hauler to go reckless to one wound to polish him off in combat. Burt dies, but not until he gives out all the necessary cursed objects and Trixxie dies after repeatedly failing to Gremlin lure people out of the centre. Som'er manages to kill the librarian and trapper, however, meaning we are both running out of models fast. The Bayou Gremlin gets cursed object, but simply goes drunk and reckless to kill himself when he activates. In the last turn I no longer had enough models left to score Turf War, but Som'er survived in range of two markers to get protect territory. Final Score 9 for me, 3 for all possibilities. 6 for Fletcher, 4 turf and 2 cursed object.

 I must say Josh was a cracking opponent. Very helpful all the way through and making sure I understood what was going on. Gentlemen to the end... even if he was gutted by the number of red jokers I saw in my hand!

 So at the end of the day we racked up scores and started giving out prizes. Malifaux North East's very own Nate Zettle got best sports and won the raffle, going home with an armful of toys. 5th went to Josh Leak, 4th to Maria Weiland, 3rd James Doxey (maybe not so washed up after all...) 2nd, and big congratulations to him, David Golden and at the top of the pile Mark Elwood.

 I think I can safely say that I think everyone had a cracking time, I know I did. I am definitely considering attending the next one, let's see if I can talk Jen into giving me the pass! I am still mulling over what I learnt from the day, no doubt I will post soon about it. Until then.