Anima Tactics - Romeo must Die

My first game of the year was a return to Amina Tactics after a long break without any games; none since the LWC closed down in fact.

Picking the forces on the day, I opted for my Black Sun faction, as it allowed me to field the Raziel NK-X I painted up last year.

The rest of the 250 levels force was comprised of Clover, Tsubasa, Sophia and Promethea.  This gave me a powerful attacking force, with an effective female tactical support team.  Conversely Paul, my opponent fielded a Church force of Romeo Exxet, Justina, DamienSaint Astraega and Alis Testarossa.  Not a force I'd faced before, and Romeo presented a potentially tough target.

With Paul still quite new to the game, we just set up a simple encounter battle with a notional limit of seven turns.  On my advice we did not over clutter the board with terrain, and what there was was mostly of ruins, Paul would see why I advised this.  I deployed in a tight cluster as the Black Sun clearly work best in a close group.  Paul was rather more spread out.

At first both sides swung around one another in an arc, keeping the actual range between one another fairly equal.  Having moved up in support of the Raziel NK-X on the second turn though, Tsubasa was fired upon by Justina, whilst simultaneously unleashing a magical ranged attack on Damien.

 Cue Star Wars blaster noise

This drew the Church leader, Romeo forward, and the Raziel was able to engage him with a charge.  Damien joined the fray and soon the Lumbering Raziel was proving an imovable object to their unstoppable force, and vice versa.

Astraega stood to the rear dealing out healing.  Keeping Romeo in the fight, resulting in the NK-X looking much the worse for wear.

At this point I had gained enough ground with Tsubasa to charge Justina, but also more devastatingly, Clover was in a position to unleash his Prometheum attack.  He charged Romeo first, cutting him down, then smashing Damien away from the Raziel, and finally flinging an unfortunate Astraega through the ruins behind her.  Two kills from one charge.

By now Alis Testarossa had dropped in on the girls at the back and a half hearted cat fight had broken out.

At the main front, Damien re-charged the Raziel and was able to put the hurt on it, but it's unstoppable nature meant it would still fight to the end of the turn, and in doing so it was able to smash Damien to pulp!  Furthermore it absorbed his essential essence and came back to unholy life itself.  Paul was gutted, figuratively...

Clover joined the fight against Justina, and it signed the end for her too, as another of the Church's warriors was flung into a wall of rock, never to rise again.

Two big swords+one little man = SPLAAAAAAT! 

And so at this stage it became no more than a mopping up exercise; with a turn in hand the battle scarred but still highly effective Black sun team turned to advance on the last of the Church faction; who then had the wisdom to withdraw.

The game was closer than it at first appears, for both Tsubasa and the Raziel were close to being lost, infact the NK-X was technically dead for half a turn.  Clover did not escape unscathed either, and it was only determined dodging and the aid of Sophia that kept Promethea safe.  But it was nonetheless a clear win for the Black Sun, and must've given Paul plenty to think about.

Elsewhere at the Thursday club the usual sort of thing was going on, including DBMM and two games of Puerto Rico.  Most interesting to me though was a trial of the rebooted Mongoose version of Starfleet Battles, as a simplified tabletop game.

Deep in the Beige Nebular, known for its tree-like asteroids...

Featuring all the familiar ships from the original board game (looking through the fleets in the rulebook was like a trip down memory lane, fondly drooling over the Gorns - my favourites - Kzinti, Orion Pirates and more).  These are rules I think I will have to try at some stage, and the models look really nice too.