So why do they call it top decking.......

   The first thing that I need to say to everyone is Thank You.  The reason I say this is because of the huge jump in readers in my last blog post.  I added a few sites to tell more people about my blog, but I think the big jump was because I added some pictures.  I would love to hear more about both what you enjoy about the blog (if anything) and what you would like to hear more about.  Post in the comments and let me know what you think, but whether you do or don't, enjoy the blog.....  
 

Von Shill

   I got to play another game of Malifaux 2nd edition on Thursday night, and lets talk about another unique aspect of Malifaux.  In the community it is called Top Decking.  So this means not just getting great cards in your hand, which we consider to be nice pre-made hand full of re rolls, but flipping cards off the top of your deck when you need and what you need.  Now in Malifaux, just in case you don't know, both the number AND the suite of the card make a difference.  The number is what is needed to compare against your opponent's number (along with your skill) and the suite can be used to get off a trigger, which can add a bonus damage or extra condition.  Many times those triggers can be a lot more important then the damage that you do, because they will cause more damage later, or give a condition that will help with other attacks in the future.

Specialist with a Flame Thrower

   Now the reason I am talking about top decking right now, is because I had a great game of second edition on Thursday night, and I top decked like I never have before.  So it was about 9:30 on a Thursday night and I am hanging out at the game room just like normal.  I have just finished another in a long line of games of Discworld, which I happily won again, and Matt asked me to play a game of Malifaux.  I have not played since wave two came out and I was feeling a little.....iffy about playing.  In the good old days of first edition, he was asking for a good three hour commitment and a bit of work to get through the game.  I hate to turn down a good game, so I said sure, but how about smaller, so we will go with 35 stones.
   Now a normal game of Malifaux is 50 stones, but for that game I wanted something a bit smaller, so we agreed to 35 stones.  Now a 50 stone game usually leads to about 8-10 models,except for gremlins, which would be closer to 15, but they take a LOT of little guys.  At 35 stones it ends up being around 6 models for each side.

Librarian proxy for Hannah

   I was playing against my friend Matt who was playing his guild as usual.  I picked outcast, as I was looking for something simple to play.  Since with Malifaux you pick your faction first, that is all we had to tell each other, then we started getting ready by picking deployment type, strategy and scheme pool.  Once we had all the prep work done, then you announce your crew.  Matt was playing Lady Justice, and I was playing Von Shill.  Now here is where we can really start talking about top decking.
   As we talked about a little earlier, Malifaux is a card based game rather than a dice based game.  Because of this, there are only certain numbers of each number of card in the deck.  There are only 4 aces, just like there are only 4 13s.  With dice, especially me, I can roll 1s all night. So when you pull a great hand, like I opened with playing with Matt, and you have 3 or the 4 13s in your hand, you usually assume that you will be flipping worse, and then playing those cards out of your hand when you "cheat".  In Malifaux, "cheating" is when you replace a card that you flipped, with a card in your hand because you need a higher number, or a better suite if you are already winning.  Well against normal luck, even with 13s in my hand, I was flipping 11s and 12s for the duels I was having with Matt.  It just seemed like every time I was flipping a card I was getting the cards and suits I needed, and on the occasions I didn't get that card, I was able to cheat in the card I needed.
   Fighting is not the most important part of Malifaux, because it is VERY objective orientated, but the scheme we had was Turf War.  That means starting from turn 2 we both had to have 2 models within 6 inches of the center of the board.  When you have models moving in to a small location as quickly as you can, there is going to be fighting.
   So Matt and I both moved models up in turn one, taking the odd pot shot or two at each other, but it was in turns two and three that we really got into it and because of my great cards, I ended up killing a couple of Matt's guys before he could do a lot to stop me.  Once he was down a few guys, it became harder to keep going with the mission and I ended up outscoring him 5 to 10.

Freikorp Front

   10 is the max score you can get which was 4 points for the Turf War, 3 points for bodyguard, and 3 points for assassinate.  Bodyguard is when you keep your henchman alive, which I did, and assassinate is when you kill the enemy master.  It was a good game, and with my flips I did make achieving the mission much easier.

Freikorp Back

   So by the time the game was over, it had been 90 minutes, which was about and hour less then a 1st edition game would have taken and I had a really good easy time playing.  It just seems so much easier and more intuitive when we play even though not a lot has changed about the game.   I am going to try and play a couple of my more difficult masters over the next few weeks and see what kind of difference that makes to my game playing experience.  So far with all the book 1 masters and crews, I have enjoyed the game every time I have played it.

   So a quick explanation of the pics sprinkled through this blog post....the cards are the new foil deck that my wife bought me as part of my Christmas gift this year.  It was a nice treat they offered on Black Friday and I was excited that I got it.  The models are my Von Shill crew.  Von Shill is the man with the eye patch.  The Librarian is the thin girl on the weird base (I am using her as my Hannah proxy and I just threw her on a 50mm base.  The guy with the Flame Thrower is the Freikorps Specialist, and the last two guys are both just Freikorps men.  This is the whole crew I played against Matt in my last game.

  I hope you enjoyed the light battle report and my discussion of top decking.  Let me know what you thought.

Thanx!!