So, to day I took on James' Plague - Cosmic Undead.
My Astarians have been rejigged since I last used them and I found them to be a bit better as a result. I did away with the Rifle Cyphers re-designating them as Marionettes with a camo drone and a weapon drone added to each unit. I also did away with my Assassin Drone and replaced it with the gunship model that I just finished.
And so...
I knew that the Plague were going to be difficult. They are tough and plentiful. They don't shoot well and rely on close combat. So my tactic was to try and shoot the hell out of them before they managed to get close to me. In some cases this worked and in some it didn't. James set up his urban table and as we deployed I was looking for fire lanes.
Now, despite being a close-quarters undead style army the Plague do have heavy weapons available to them including tanks and Striders (a mech type thing) as well as shooting units. They also have things called Abominations... But more about them anon.
The center piece of the table. A big comms tower.
The first moves were, as can be expected pretty straight forward with little action. One of the Zombie meat-shield units moved out and I fired all the weapons of my new grav-tank drone at them but missed 4 times. Was this an omen of things to come?
The rest of the turn involved each of us moving into position or trying to draw each other out.
On my left flank James moved his Strider forward a double move and I managed to reactivate my grav-tank which allowed me to move it into position to take a couple of shots at it. It did some damage but failed to destroy the vile, rust encrusted beast.
In the center, the Plague tank moved out and I go a couple of good shot into it with one of my heavy weapon drones. It took two hit off the rotting behemoth but, again, failed to destroy it.
Also in the center, a zombie unit moved out and I blasted it good and proper (so no, there was no curse on my dace this day). My Pluse Bombard was responsible for this and, once again, proved to be a formidable piece of kit.
On my right I had moved my Warden Cyphers up hoping to tempt the zombie horde into charging them. James had other ideas and shot them up instead. Luckily, their shields held up and reduced the casualty count to a single model. However, if they just stood there they would slowly get picked off, so they charged into the Astro-Zombies. The fight was short and sharp. Four zombies fell but so did 2 Cyphers. There were 10 zombies to start with and although my Cyphers won there were only 3 of them left. They retreated into an alley which was soon to become quite a mess place.
"Shoot over there my mighty Drone of Death."
A new turn and the Strider on my left took out on of my heavy weapon drones and the grave-tank once again landed a decent shot in return. But, again, not enough to destroy it.
A bit of photoshopping makes for a nice looking anti-grav image.
Much shooting and killing ensued all over. In the center a group of Plague troops had occupied a building and they were proving hard to root out. No doubt the building would require heavy fumigation after they vacated it anyhow.
The grav-tank-drone moved & finaly took out the Strider but then, in turn, one of the Aberration's charged it an tore it to shreds in a single round of combat. Following that the unit of marionettes (see above) took up position on top of a building and pulverised the Aberration with some serious firepower (16 shots!).
What Happened in Gore Alley...
My Warden Cyphers were taking cover in an alley following their close-quarter combat with the zombies in the previous turn. In this turn they activated and again took on the zombies, this time killing all of them without taking any casualties themselves.
However, another Aberration tore into them and ripped them apart. Bits of robot and dead zombie were everywhere. Unseen by the Aberration was a heavy plasma vortex drone on the roof of the adjacent building. This little drone floated down behind the vile, rotty beast and blasted it into chunks of infected meat.
Unfortunately for the heroic little drone the Plague Commander (Colonel 'Merca) came rushing in around the corner and, seeing the mess that use to be his once ferocious beast, proceeded to pick up the drone & smashing it into pieces in a fit of rage,
While all this was happening my invaluable Pulse Bombard drone lined up on the Plague Lancer Tank, took careful aim and blasted it into a smoking hulk.
The battle was drawing to a close and the Colonel 'Merca dealt his final card- Murder Birds.
They swooped down out of the sky. took stock of the situation and moved in, to destroy my Pulse Bombard. And failed & retreated. This defence by the lone drone allowed my Overseer (commander) to move into a more defensible position. But the Murder Birds came again and moved in for the kill.
This time the drone was taken down and my forces, consisting of a depleted Marionette squad, a heavy drone and my commander, only controlled the bottom right hand side of the battle field.
I the dying moments of the battle the Murder Birds moved in again, to take out my Overseer. In a desperate move the Overseer took out her pistol and fired off two shots. One of which was enough to throw the Bird's back to their starting point and send them to ground.
Time to teleport out of this place. No doubt.
Outcome...
Another great game with much slaughter on each side that I really enjoyed. Mistakes were probably made but we're still learning the rules. And what better way to learn than by rolling dice and destroying each other.
Unfortunately the Asterian's were unsuccessful in stemming the tide of the Plague this time around. A summing up of Victory Points in the aftermath found them 15VP to 18VP.
The Infection moves ever onward...
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We both had nice looking troops on a nice looking table which attracted plenty of inquiries. Hopefully we can get a few other players into playing Firefight. As far as I'm concerned, the more the merrier. It isn't always the number of different factions available but how different players interpret and play them.
Saying that, I'm hoping that we can get enough players involved before the various factions are given a particular dogma that they invariably get stuck with. I'm already beginning to see this happen where everything is being compared to its 40K counterpart. I too, can see the comparisons but I'm trying to steer as clear of them as I can. I'd prefer to not have my imagination stifled in this way for as long as possible.
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P.S. A few more pics from my friend Robin. He's a far better photographer than I.
This is actually a photo of my dead-pile early in the game.
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