almost a sefadu batrep

So initially I was slated to play Malifaux, but then my dance partner dropped out. I suggested trying out 7tv, but then I realized I didn't have time to properly prep for that, and I want to make sure to get it right the first time. Crucial for selling a new game to a gaming group. OK, so we dithered back and forth and decided on bringing back AE-WWII, and I was all ready to go with that. But then, a day out, we switch gears, and it's time for Mercs. We're indecisive like that.

That overpass should have sefadu on it, not FCC. Whoops.

I'm diverging from my usual loose and woolly style of batreps here, and I will explain why. Yes, there's lots of fun moments. Me ace-ing the first initiative roll, me blowing that initiative on nothing productive. My Grenadier chucking some firebombs at Maurice's FCC camped out on the overpass. etc.

But, as this is was my first "real" game of Mercs, I did find one thing. It went by fast. It's only five on five, and you more or less get one action each go-round, but even with my lack of experience with the system, there was always something happening, and something I had to be paying attention to. This is a real strength of the game. What you give up in realism, you make up for in high-speed action. And that's a positive in my book.

As noted above, I threw lots of nines and tens for activating on the first turn. What I should have done, in retrospect, is bounded my slower guys, and essentially redeployed all up and over the overpass. What I did was play conservative, and get into cover, so the next turn I could get stuck in. This cost me dearly, as the FCC Housemaster and Chem-Engineer took the overpass instead and used it to rain death down on me for the rest of the game.

My only footnote is an MVP award for the Berserker, who performed exactly as expected.

The paint jobs are... coming along slowly.

The lesson here is aggression. The sefadu megacorp (yes, it's lowercase) is all about move and fire, and I should have relied on that maneuverability rather than hoping for a slightly better cover bonus for one turn. My other error was not deploying the sniper in the backfield in elevated terrain. Again, I was concerned there was no cover up top, and that the overpass itself would block too much line of sight. And that concern cost me, as the sniper could have been covering my approach to the overpass. So! Formally schooled.

Oh, and, there's this.

huh?

Maurice made me take this picture, by sticking his hand in front of my phone while I was trying to take a pic of the board. He never explained. He's like the wind, baby!