Step by Step - Vol. 2
Welcome back to Step by Step where I go through my process for starting a new warband and preparing for a large tournament. Last time I selected a warband (The Headsman’s Curse) and ran down my initial thoughts on the warband and discussed where I wanted to go in terms of deck building with them. Today I wanted to go through my first few games with them and then build a deck.
First games
As of writing I have been able to play five games with Headsman’s Curse. I got a single game in with the Reckless Fury/Blazing Assault pairing before that was hit by the forsaken and restricted (FaR) list. I then adjusted the deck with that in place and played two additional games. I have since played two games with a Blazing Assault/Pillage and Plunder pairing which confirmed my suspicion that it involves too much worrying about being feature tokens for my preference.
Before the FaR list came out, I thought that the Reckless Fury/Blazing Assault pairing was the way to go for these guys. The power deck allowed for almost free rein to attack with the Wielder two or three times per round with little effort. As it turns out, that is a winning strategy, especially when you throw in the support that Blazing Assault brings for making more accurate attacks. The objective suite was less smooth, but still certainly workable. I think there is still some play with the pairing, but I’m going to take this as an opportunity to try out other options as I think their best pairing is now very much in the air.
For those of you who are not up to date on the FaR list, it is intended to curtail some of the more powerful cards, by restricting how many of them you can take in a nemesis deck or outright banning them. In the most recent list, four cards from Reckless Fury have landed on the list, three upgrades (Bladecatcher, Fury of Aqshy and Utter Ignorance) and one ploy (Get it Done). I won’t go into what each of these cards do, but these were all very good and integral to the strength of the Blazing Assault/Reckless Fury pairing.
Something needed to be done about the strength of the Reckless Fury deck, however I would’ve preferred a different solution than outright banning 20% of the power deck. My personal preference would be for an errata to these cards, but I understand a reluctance to change hidden information. Barring this I would’ve preferred that these four be put on the restricted list and then making it so you can only include two cards on this list. This way people can still use the cards they just bought, but there would be another decision point for players to build their decks. My hope is that we will see continued evaluation of these cards to find a different solution that allows them to be used in nemesis and that the forsaking is just a temporary stopgap while the designers figure out a real long-term solution. Time will tell, but for now I will move on to other combinations.
Building a deck
The first thing to do is select a pairing. I want to go with something that I have not tried with Headsman’s Curse, and I mentioned in the first in this series that I thought the Blazing Assault and Countdown to Cataclysm would be an interesting pairing, so that will be what I build today.
Once I have a pairing, I like to go through the four card types (Surge Objectives, End Phase Objectives, Polys and Upgrades) and cut the ones I know won’t make the deck. This will include the cards I would almost never take along with the cards that just don’t work for this warband. Then it’ll be time to make the cuts needed to get down a legal coherent deck.
I’ve been experimenting with running more than six end-phases, especially when Blazing Assault is part of the pairing, and I think this may end up the same way. I have also been running 11 ploys and 11 upgrades with Headsman’s Curse since they can draw extra cards every round. We’ll see where this deck ends up, but I may not have to make that tough cut at the end that can sometimes come up when you’re trying to keep our deck lean.
First Cuts
Surges
Strike the Head
The main damage dealers in this warband are 5 and 4 wounds, and we’ll want to be doing most of the slaying with the 5-wound fighter. There are several warbands that don’t have fighters beyond their leader with this much health, leaving us with only one opportunity to score this card. For a different warband this might work, but not for this one.
Strong Start
At best there will be three opportunities for us to score this card. That already makes this a tenuous inclusion, not to mention that we may not get the first kill in a round and the potential to draw this after the first fighter has already been slain in the round. It’s fine that it’s in the deck and certainly not the worst card to have in rivals, but it will not make it into many decks
Nowhere to Run
Another card that certain warbands will be happy to have, that just isn’t what we want to do. We don’t have access to multi move abilities and I generally don’t like to activate the Sharpener if I can help it. There is also a decent chance that having a fighter in each territory is not going to be viable, as there will be times when we only have two surviving fighters or that we won’t want to have fighters in each territory.
Overwhelming Force
The fighters we want to be making most of our attacks only have two dice, and the Scripter doesn’t have a printed melee attack. This means it will be difficult to get up to four dice, and there are better options in this surge suite.
End-Phases
Go All Out
We’re planning to have the Wielder make at least two attacks each round. Accomplishing this means that we will at most have three fighters with charge tokens, meaning our opponent needs to have at least two. While this will most likely happen every game, it might not happen when we have this card in hand and our game plan of slaying enemy fighters will work against this card. If we truly needed another end phase, then this could work, but I don’t want to have to worry about it for a single glory.
On the Edge
Leaving a fighter vulnerable is significantly less valuable than slaying them, so this isn’t an objective that we will be trying to score. In addition, our high damage output means that we should be slaying most fighters in a single attack.
Denial
The accidental counterplay and tough condition to satisfy make this an easy cut. It is hard to keep your opponent entirely out of your territory, especially when most objectives require some sort of engagement or going into enemy territory. If this were worth more (perhaps with extra conditions to satisfy) then I think this might be something to look at to make opponents come to us, but as it stands I won’t be including this.
Annihilation
Despite this being that basic goal of every game with an aggressive deck, this is a card that I think should never be taken in a competitive deck. It is simply a win more card that will not help you win games. The only time this card will be helpful is when you table your opponent and still lose, which certainly can happen, but it is very rare. If we’re slaying everyone we should be winning games, if we aren’t winning those games we probably need to look elsewhere to change that.
Ploys
The End is Nigh
We’re not necessarily looking to get our cataclysm value high very fast, so this will be almost as likely to hurt us as it is our opponent. The randomness of this along with the potential to hurt ourselves makes this an easy cut
Do or Die
We’ll generally want our fighters to be inspired longer than a few activations. The Scripter and Bearer get a large amount defensively from their inspiration and if we want the Wielder to be doing four damage consistently then we’ll want to inspire him naturally. If the meta ever shifts to warbands that have a single large fighter and several smaller ones this is maybe an option to try to take the big guy out early with a surprise 5 damage Wielder attack with grievous, but for now this stays at home.
Upgrades
Deadly Aim
One day I hope to produce an analysis of attack odds, but the short of it is that in general I don’t feel that an upgrade that just gives ensnare is worth a card slot. In most games it will be of some value, but the fighters that we want to slay are often on shields, and if they’re not we’ll just have to overwhelm them with dice. If you feel good about the rest of your deck and you just need one more upgrade, it won’t be useless. In this pairing though, I think there are better options.
Tough
Other than the Wielder, there isn’t a fighter in the game that has a damage characteristic higher than three. There are fighters that can get there with grievous, but this will typically require an upgrade or a ploy. On top of this, it’s not all that helpful on the Wielder and I’m much more concerned about a damage ploy in a power step followed by a three-damage attack in the next activation against one of our four health guys since the majority of non-random damage ploys can’t be used on a vulnerable fighter. This is also worth two glory so there’s every chance that the fighter that we want to put this on takes enough damage early that a three-damage attack will just slay them anyway.
Bringer of Doom
As I mentioned earlier, we’re not looking to accelerate our cataclysm tracker, so cards like this aren’t of much use. This also requires us to have a fighter be slain while equipped with this upgrade, and it isn’t enough of a deterrent to protect that fighter. There are decks out there that may run this card, just not this one.
Extinction’s Edge
Another card that helps us accelerate the cataclysm tracker, so another card we’ll pass on. I like this one more than Bringer of Doom since it meshes better with our gameplan, but again we don’t need to accelerate the tracker.
Inescapable Grasp
See Deadly Aim in this section for the reasoning behind not including this in the deck. Of note if a meta of dodge fighters ever becomes a thing; you can include this and Deadly Aim in the same deck to double up on ensnare.
Burnt Out
The focus action can do most of what this card does but also allows a cycling of objectives that can’t be scored and doesn’t give our fighter a stagger token. Focus is also something we can do from the beginning of the game and doesn’t use glory that could be spent on other upgrades. In short, leave this card at home and learn when to use the focus action.
Duplicate Cards
Great Fortitude
Great Fortitude is present in both decks and we can only include one of them. There is no functional difference between the two, however our warband is featured on the Countdown to Cataclysm version, so we will be taking that one and leaving out the above version.
Current Deck
We’ll need to cut two surges and depending on where our glory ceiling is we’ll also have to cut one or two end phases. I’ve been liking running the power deck at eleven ploys and eleven upgrades due to our warscroll card draw and I think that’s where I’ll start for this deck. That means cutting seven ploys and two upgrades.
I generally like to separate out the cards that are locks to make it into the deck and the rest will be on the chopping block to be cut.
Surges
Locks 🔒
Branching Fate
A near auto-include for me with warbands that have three dice attacks. Both the Scripter and the Sharpener can score this card at any point in the game. With extra dice from a ploy or an upgrade the Wielder and Bearer can also score this. The attack not needing to be successful and only requiring two dice if we ever fall behind is just gravy. Easy include.
Critical Effort
There is ~31% chance of rolling a crit on two dice and ~42% chance on three dice, and we’ll be making attacks in nearly every activation so this card should score most games as long as we get it early. Add in rerolls and extra dice and this becomes even more likely. This also fits in my preference when playing strike to include objectives that should just score at some point if we follow the game plan.
Get Stuck In
There is very little an opponent can do to stop this card early in the game. This is especially good with a ranged attack that can be made from the safety of a treasure token in neutral or friendly territory. If we’re attacking 10-12 times on average, there is a good chance that one of them will be on a fighter in enemy territory.
Chopping Block
This leaves five cards for three slots. I’ll start with the three that will make it and then discuss why the other two got cut.
Made the Cut
Shocking Assault
Most games I have played have had a single treasure token in neutral territory, meaning that we only need to hold that one token to score this. This also gives us a bit of passive scoring that we can leverage to make our opponent come closer to us.
Collateral Damage
This is a way to dissuade our opponent from attacking the Sharpener early and to make up some lost bounty on our other fighters. Being able to get it for any reason as the underdog is nice if we find ourselves behind at the end of an action phase. The only reason this isn’t an auto-in is because we only have one low health fighter and he likely won’t often be a high priority.
The Perfect Cut
This card is another in the line of things that should happen over the course of a game if we attack 10-12 times. The short version is that we have ~32-37% chance of this happening on each attack if the defender is on either one shield or two dodge. This goes up as we add more dice to our attacks or if we can get cleave or ensnare on our attacks.
Missed the Cut
Too Close for Comfort
This is harder to score early in the game since we won’t generally be using the Sharpener and the Scriptor will likely be 3-4 hexes away after an attack. We certainly have enough positional tech available in our power deck to play this, but we might not have it when we need it and I’d like to use it to get the Wielder in position to attack without charging.
Perfect Strike
At the start of the game this has a 25% chance for the Wielder or Bearer and significantly worse odds for the other two. This goes up as we get rerolls and flank the enemy fighters, but that isn’t as likely at the start of the game when we most want surges.
End Phases
Instead of just cutting the ones that I think are least likely to score, I’m going to approach the end phases a little differently. We want to make sure that our glory ceiling is as high as we can reasonably make it, so I’ll first take a look at the multiple glory objectives and then at the one glory ones to round it out.
2 Glory Options
Made the Cut
Spread Havoc
There is no reason to not run this card, it’s almost like getting points whether or not you put your name on the test (only somehow easier). One glory just for playing would have this make nearly every deck, but the fact that it stretches up to two glory rather easily seals the deal.
Wreckers
Another easy include. This will either be two glory for executing the game plan or we’ll be losing anyway. Strategically using the phrasing on the plot card to keep our Cataclysm value lower will help with scoring this if it’s in our hand early.
Set Explosives
We already decided to try to hold the treasures in no one’s territory for a surge. If there’s already two there then we’re all set. If there’s only one then we just need to get on another token before the end phase. We can also score this by holding everything in our home territory or opponents territory. As long as we have two fighters alive this should be doable.
Missed the Cut
Uneven Contest
The possibility that we would need to hold or delve up to three specific treasure tokens makes this a tall task. One of them not in a place we want makes it even harder and we don’t want to be spending too much time on tokens to begin with.
One Glory Options
If you’ve done the math at home along with me, you’ll know that we currently have thirteen total objectives and a glory ceiling of 16 in the deck. I like this glory total and all of the one glory objectives left in the deck are easy enough to score that I’m going to leave them all in to give us a ceiling boost and some potential fodder for a focus action. In the previous edition this would be a bit taboo with the extra objective, but I’ve found it to be easier to go through the objective deck in this edition. We may revisit this decision in the future, but for now I want to try it.
I’ll still go through each of them here to quick discuss why they make it in -
Keep Choppin’
If any card perfectly spells out our game plan it’s this one. If we spend more than one activation in a round not attacking, it’ll have to be worth more than the one glory from this plus whatever the bounty was for the fighter we could’ve slain. It also doesn’t require any of the attacks to be successful, so we can still get this if the dice go cold.
Fields of Blood
A perfect example of a card that should eventually score in a game. It might not score in the first round, but it will almost always score. This also perfectly fits in with what we want to do and our fighters getting damaged will also help score this.
Hounds of War
This will be hardest to score in the first round, but we can do it with a kill and a single damage on another fighter. We should be slaying at least one fighter every round, especially after the first round.
Loaded for Bear
This card asks us to load up a single fighter with upgrades. We will be doing this with the Wielder anyway, might as well score a glory for it.
Ploys
As I mentioned at the start of the deck build, I have been running 11 ploys and 11 upgrades with Headsmen and I think I will at least start there for this deck. Normally I wouldn’t do this as I typically want to see my best cards more often. However, we should be expecting to get extra cards every game due to the Trial and Execution ability on our warscroll. I’ve found that this gets us 2-4 cards on average every game. We will also average 1.5 cards from losing roll-offs at the beginning of the rounds. If we assume that we use all of our cards each round and that we get 4 cards combined between losing roll-offs and slaying condemned fighters, then we will see 19 cards over the course of the game. This leaves only a single card if we want to focus and if we get unlucky in the roll-offs or slay condemned fighters that are worth more then we won’t have any cards left for this. Because of this, I like to have a bit more of a buffer to be able to draw cards at every opportunity assuming the cards are worth including.
I’m hoping to put in as many pushes as we can so that we can get the Wielder in position to attack without charging. So, that’ll be a running theme through the cards that make it in. I would also like to throw in as many accuracy cards as I can.
Locks 🔒
Determined Effort
Extra dice to help our big damage attacks go through? Sign me up.
Lure of Battle
This card has fantastic applications to both pull enemy fighters out of position to deny scoring and to get them next to the Wielder so that we can attack with him without charging. There’s also potentially some play with pulling one of our fighters into spot so that they can make a charge they otherwise wouldn’t have, or force an enemy to charge to attack.
Sidestep
A push to get the Wielder in position or potentially get a fighter on a token to either score an objective or to deny opponents scoring. I can’t imagine that this will ever not make a deck that I make.
Commanding Stride
The starting hex limitation is warranted here with how massive a three hex push can be. It does mean that we can’t push onto a feature token, but I'm not looking to hold anyway.
Illusory Fighter
Not quite a push, but another card to reposition the Wielder for a non-charge attack. This can also be helpful if we poorly position the Scripter and don’t have an enemy fighter within five of him and we go second. Hopefully we don’t need it for that, but this could bail us out if we do.
Healing Potion
More health for our big guys to continue doing big damage. Easy include with fighters that will rarely be one shot.
Violent Blast
Another push, this time with the potential to push multiple fighters. Keep this card in mind when placing feature tokens at the start of the game. If we can get one by a stagger hex that may set us up to deny some scoring by pushing an enemy fighter off of it and one of our fighters on.
Counter-charge
Another push, this time providing a defensive boost to our fighters in the form of flanking an attacker in addition to being able to take a standing swing at them after. The only problem here is that this is reliant on our fighters getting attacked and us having another fighter within 3 hexes of the attacker. However, a surprise three hex push is well worth the limitation.
Chopping Block
After the locks and the easy cuts we have 10 cards left to consider. We need to keep at least two of them, but I still like the idea of taking 11 ploys, especially with how many I’m still considering.
As with Surges I’ll look at the ones that I’m keeping in before discussing the ones that got cut.
Made the Cut
Twist the Knife
This might be here because I’ve been playing against a lot of Grandfather’s Gardeners as normally this would be an auto include. However, with the Wielder having a high damage output in general, the bearer gaining grievous natively when inspired and Whet the Blade giving us access to grievous in the early game, this became less of a priority. In the end this is still a worthwhile include since it gives us access to a 4 damage attack early in the game.
Shields Up!
A guard token will help score our two objectives that want fighters to be standing on treasure tokens. This can also help the Wielder stay in the fight longer, allowing us to play even more aggressively with him.
Scream of Anger
Two damage can be a steep price, but being able to charge again with a heavy hitter in a key moment can swing the game in our favor. If Reckless Fury ever comes back into the meta in a major way, this can also help deny some of the scoring in that deck.
Missed the Cut
Since there are seven cards in this category, I’ll put them roughly in the order from the one that just missed the cut to the card that got cut first.
Improvised Attack
A free attack in the power step is very nice. The main hope would be to use this to drive back an enemy fighter, but I’m not looking to have a super high cataclysm value, so the odds of this attack doing what we want it to is lower.
Savage Blow
If we had decided to keep Perfect Strike in our surges this would be going in the deck. Combining this with Cackling Court would guarantee that every dice in our attack roll would be a success. As nice as this would be, I think we have enough other ways to improve our attack odds, so this misses out.
Growing Concerns
Another card that would be better if we were going for a higher cataclysm value. Slowing down movement for a turn could be game changing in terms of limiting where an enemy fighter can go and this will make other decks, but we have so much push tech that I’m not worried about the Wielder getting locked out of charge range and we’ll deny scoring via slaying enemy fighters.
Total Collapse
Once again we won’t be going for a high Cataclysm value and The Wielder should be able to slay just about anything he hits. There will also be times that we want to do all of our damage via attacks so that we can inspire more fighters in a round.
Sunder the Realm
Another ping card, this time with a chance to hurt ourselves. The potential of putting damage on multiple enemy fighters makes this appealing, but we may find our fighters near neutral territory and again, we don’t really need more ping damage.
Wings of War
With four move and packing as many pushes as we are, there shouldn’t be too many instances where we can’t reach the fighter we want to reach. The mostly likely time for this would be the first round, but I generally don’t want to be taking cards that will be situational at best.
Raging Tremors
Rerolls for our big hitters would be nice, but I think the other cards will have a more consistent impact. This is especially true in this edition where there is more incentive to delve tokens and no restriction on doing so while having a stagger token.
Upgrades
Since I decided to include 11 ploys, I’ll need at least 11 upgrades. From the initial cut there are 13 left, so just need to cut two more.
Locks 🔒
Hidden Aid
I quite like this card anyway, but this can trigger Cackling Court without the need of another fighter. That pushes it from likely being on the chopping block to here in the locks section.
Accurate
It’ll be a running theme in the upgrade section of cards that make the Wielder more accurate with his attacks and this is the first one. A reroll isn’t quite as good as an extra die, but it’s still good.
Great Strength
This may be a little confusing since Twist the Knife ended up on the chopping block, but being able to consistently threaten 5 damage in an attack is just too good to pass up. Also, the upgrade suite has fewer cards in consideration than the ploys did.
Sharpened Points
Coming from first edition I never would’ve thought that an upgrade that only gave cleave would make it into the locks section, but times have changed. The strength of a two shield save characteristic and a prevalence of fighters that have that natively or can get it fairly easily means that I’ve bought a truckload of stock in cleave. Even if dodge warbands become the norm, cleave will still be helpful against fighters on guard. It still feels odd, but without an overwhelming amount of dice, this will be very helpful in pushing our high damage attacks through.
Duelist
Basically overrun without needing a crit and not limited to the hex the opponent was in. This will be useful for pushing onto treasure tokens after attacks or to skate the Wielder around the board to make more attacks without charging.
Keen Eye
As I mentioned earlier, extra dice is great and I’ll be taking every card that gives me that. This is even better than a ploy since it’s repeatable. This should go on the Wielder most often, but can be put on the Bearer in situations where we need him to pull more weight.
Driven by Pain
You want to drive the wielder back so he can’t attack without charging? Fine, I’ll heal him. And then I’ll use one of my many pushes to get in range anyway. ‘Nuff said
Great Fortitude
More health for one of our fighters. This probably goes on the Wielder, but either the Scriptor or the Bearer could be good. Keep in mind that Upgrades break when a fighter is slain, so if we bring back either of those two they’ll be back down to four health.
Chopping Block
5 cards left for 3 slots, so 2 cards need to be cut. But first, the ones that made it in.
Made the Cut
Brawler
In general we don’t want to be getting flanked or surrounded, so this may seem like an odd choice to include. However it will open up other landing spots for charges and help out on defense if one of our fighters is on a feature token and we want to keep them there through several attacks. This also helps against a fellow Blazing Assault player trying to make use out of Hidden Aid.
Hurled Weapon
I like this as an option to make attacks without charging. It might also be a way to make the Sharpener useful after Whet the Blade has been used so he can just stand on a treasure token.
Desperate Rage
This would introduce a third fighter that can do three damage in a single attack. Taking a damage on one of our fighters isn’t ideal, but giving the Scriptor (or even Sharpener) a highly dangerous attack means the Wielder doesn’t have to carry as much of the load.
Missed the Cut
Utter Conviction
If our Cataclysm value is ever at 3, then this becomes great. But, as I’ve mentioned several times, I’m not planning for that to happen. The main purpose of this would be to slap it on a recently raised Bearer or Scriptor since they’ll come back uninspired with one dodge defense. This would be helpful, even at a Cataclysm Value of two. Ultimately this just misses because I’d rather have upgrades that don’t derive most of their value from us giving up bounty.
Visions of Ruin
As I mentioned with Wings of War, there shouldn’t be too many scenarios where we can’t reach the fighter that we want to reach. I like this card even less than that one since it requires a glory and gives our fighter a stagger token. If I consistently end up against opponents that are hiding far away from the Wielder then this may get in.
Final Deck
The 14 total glory is slightly inaccurate since it’s counting Spread Havoc as a 0 glory objective. In actuality it should be 2 nearly every game. That means we have a 16 glory ceiling from the objectives. This should be more than fine when you add in that we should be getting 4-5 glory in bounty in the average game.
The game plan will be to make as many high damage attacks as possible with our high damage dealers in the Bearer and most notably the Wielder. This means that most of the upgrades will be going on one of these two fighters, with most of those going on the Wielder unless he is slain or close to slain in the early game.
As I expected when I decided to build this pairing, Blazing Assault dominates the power deck with 16/22 cards (arguably 16.5 since Great Fortitude is in both decks), but makes up much less of the objective deck, especially in the end phases. This isn’t too surprising, but the disparity certainly speaks to the complementary nature of the two decks.
Next Steps
With a deck built it’s time to play some games. After the first couple games it should be obvious if any of the cards included was a blatantly bad choice. It will take more games to determine if any other improvements can be made.
Next time, I’ll go over the results of the games I’ve played and any changes that need to be made to the deck. I’m also hoping to have some painting updates.
Until then, remember; death comes for all in due time. The precise moment, however, can prove a matter of violent negotiation.
-Zach “TheMisterDoctor” WTH?!