This week instead of a warband, you have two... going at it live... well, kinda live...
It was an Epic battle, (literally, with Jain on the board), but as said, in the end, Two men enter, and one man leaves! So here we are, after much anticipation, Jez, Jaina, and Savin are about to throw down with Triple Amalar. How did we get here though? Well quite simple really, with all the talk of the Meta for Realms, the topic of discussion was around Triple Amalar and it's ability, or perceived ability to auto-loose to Jezbella, Jaina, and Savin. So finally, two great warriors shuffled to the arena, and they threw it to the ground!
If you want to see the party make up, go here and you can check things out here: http://www.critshappen.com/2009/10/ali-vs-frazier-vassal-battle-of-boards.html
Match I:
First, I have a whole new respect for Will Brinkman and what he does. I am sticking on the path of trying to design games instead of writing about matchups. Will, that's all yours.
French!? Wait, all of a sudden I'm getting "Blue Savin moves En dehors du plateau... " oh freetranslation.com where art thou!?
That's somewhat cool that Vassal is available in French though... now if only we can get the dice to show the Critshappen.com logo on the 10 side... hmmm.... Tillman... project for you!
But seriously, on to the matchup... Wulfgar wins the roll 8 to 1 and we're off! ( I planned on screencaps, but like an idiot, I didn't do them correctly in the haste of keeping up, so I apologize... match II is MUCH better for visuals.)
Wulf opens with all Amalars sporting Hand of Rags while Savin is sporting the Bulwark for Blackbloc. Whew, no equipment issues :-) Amalars opened with all three stepping up as did BlackBloc, with a water elemental coming in. Water Elemental came in and scored two hits on Green Amalar...
Purple Amalar steeped into the fray, to meet up with Savin. Savin then said, "By the Light..." and swung with a powerful 6 out of 7 dice hit on purple Amalar, striking for 4 damage and putting the pain on, but taking two back from the Hand of Rag. BlackBloc then brought out his Greater Water Elemental again and used his blessing of wisdom for a quick AOE, but only hit for 2 dice. This left Purple Amalar at 3 health, clinging to life. Meanwhile Red and Green Amalar's stepped into the mix as well. Jez then hit with Blessing of Wisdom as well, and amazingly hit for only 2 dice, leaving Purple Amalar at 1 life. Finally, the GWE came in and finished off Purple putting the match at 4 to 0 with Blackbloc scoring first blood.
Green Amalar came across and swung at Jaina with Sulfurous, only to be hit with a Blessing of Protection from Savin, pushing the mighty paladin to tick 1, but saving Jaina for the moment. Jez attacked Green Amalar with BOW again in play, finally hitting for more than 2, succeeding on 5, with a crit, pushing Greenie to 3 life but leaving herself at 1 life now after all the take back damage from Hand. With the Crit she teleported to the hill and it was Red Amalar's turn. Another Water Elemental later, and Jaina fired at Red Amalar pushing him to 8 and Jaina down to 5. GWE came in with a big 3 dice roll off the hill and slapped Red down to 4 health.
Red Amalar Attacked Savin with Sulfuras for a big 7, with a crit, and Savin saved 3, taking 5 damage. The Crit attack hit all 3 and Savin missed all three killing him, making the score 4-4 and pushing him to tick 3. Bye bye paladin and blessing of wisdom for quite some time now. Another GWE and Jaina attacked Red and got him down to two health, teetering on the hill... GWE came up next, and finished off the prey, making it 8-4 BlackBloc.
On tick 5 Purple Amalar came back in, moved up, and sat around watching Jezbella take the hill. That chick looks a lot like Tinker in Vassal doesn't she? But wait, she' not just taking the hill, she's striking with FLAMESTRIKE! 6 hits and a crit! One save and it's a 7 quick damage, killing Jezz with the Sulfuras damage, making it 8 a piece in a close match up so far. Who said this was an auto-loss?
Purple Amalar came in and Mortal Struck Jaina, putting her down to 1 life... oh the Epic humanity! Not attacking though, leaving her clinging to 1 life and passing the turn. Jaina came onto the hill and summoned the GWE, attacking the Green Amalar to get him to 1 life as well.
The first KOTH point was scored and we moved to tick 7.... making it 9-8 BlackBloc.
Green then mocking blew away and killed Jaina, making a big jump to take the lead, 16 to 9, and clearing the hill for Purple to take control of.
Starting 9, it was 18-9 Wulfgar, with a few points for sitting on the hill, reminiscing of Thunderbluff when he was a child... but I digress...
Jaina came back in and of course, summoned away. In fact, unless you hear differently, assume she's doing that ALL the time. AOE for Jaina hits both Amalars and kills both, making her own little "legendary" score kill, and making it 18-17 with Wulfgar hanging onto the lead, but BlackBloc closing in!
Red Amalar came in next, ticking up by 1, awaiting the impending GWE attack. It does, and it's 3 hits to 0 successes for 4 damage. Pet DPS FTW! Jez comes in and ticks up one as well and we're ending 10, readying cards and moving on with the score still 18-17 Wulfgar and 32 minutes to play in the 60 minute match up.
Everyone shifts in during tick one, and GWE attacks again, hitting and pushing Red Amalar down to 2. Red ducked away behind some cover, and Jez came up to position for some high ground toward the bottom hill.
GWE stepped up after some positioning and took out Red Amalar, you can run Wulf, but you can't hide! GWE is MVPing himself into the record book tonight as he pushes the score to 21-18 Blackbloc. A Jez flamestrike on Green and we started seeing rolls like the beginning again for BB as he hit for only 3 and Amalar resisted one, leaving him at a healthy and manageable 6 health, and allowing him to take the hill to attack Jaina, only to be met by Mr. Ice Block! Who'dathunkit!?
Another KOTH point for Wulfgar pushed him up to 21-19 but still in favor of Blackbloc at the start of turn tick 4. Finally, Savin comes back into the mix and amazingly swings 7 dice, hits 4 and Amalar resisted all of them denying the snoozing little dwarf!
21 to 20 now, Blackblock still holding the lead.
Blessing of Wisdom back in play and it's Magic time boys! Jez fires 6 dice at Green Amalar killing him and leaving her at 1 again, but pushing the score to an almost certain win for BlackBloc, 25 to 20. But, being left at 1, means you are only a Mortal Strike away from CERTAIN DEATH! And that's what happened, making it 35 to 24 BB still leading.
Purple Amalar then crit on Savin with a normal attack, and with the 4th defense roll, Savin saved all the damage. Red Amalar meanwhile stepped onto the hill... attacking Savin, with the Hand of Rag, and Savin used Blessing of Protection to negate it. To get some damage through though, a Mortal Strike was laid down on Savin for 2 damage.
Jez then came in attacking Purple Amalar, putting the pressure on for the last needed kill, hitting for 4 total damage and a critical teleport. Purple Amalar was now reeling at 3 health after a Jaina AOE... and...
The GWE came in with 3 successes killing Purple Amalar and solidifying the win for BlackBloc 29 to 25!
Whew, I'm exhausted after writing that... so...
Match II:
With suggestion from the Wild Pozsgay, we have a log file for you to peruse of the next match... download the file, open vassal and load the logfile. You can then click the play button to go move by move and watch the game as it happened... and if you are smart, not seeing a match III should key you in on something... :-)
Congrats to BlackBloc, and thanks Wulfgar and all who watched tonight, it was a lot of fun!
If anyone is interested in a Battle of the Boards II, hit me up and we can see if BlackBloc wants to defend his title he earned tonight, or if two other combatants want to throw down!
If you have any issues with the logfile, just let me know and I'll try and help, should be fairly easy though.
