The Sea Tournament at Adepticon was the one event that I wanted to make sure I participated in. I built and tested a list that I expected to do quite well (spoiler alert: it did) and brought it to the event. I’d like to share my list, and some thoughts, with the community.
Scenari-Woes
My list design started Blood & Pigment‘s event pack. As someone who has organized tournaments myself: choosing scenarios for Sea is hard. Pigment didn’t do a bad job choosing, and had a clear mix of scenarios that would favor ranged combat, and boarding-centric lists. But one thing that Pigment could not avoid (barring custom scenarios) is that many of the scenarios give the Attacker the advantage by starting them upwind. The Raid scenario was a particularly brow-raising inclusion, because the attacker can win that fight by simply turning around and sailing away.
I knew right away that I wanted any of the game’s 6 factions which enjoy a +4 to the Attacker roll. I also knew that I would be using a Sharp Eyed Lookout, not only to reroll my own dice, but to also force my opponent to reroll theirs. This practically guarantees winning the roll.
Ogle Boggles
I chose British Royal Navy, led by Chaloner Ogle. At 20pts, he’s a steal. He comes with False Colors, Sailing Master, Strict, and Expert Broadside. He has 2 Command Points. He’s a 20pt Seasoned Standard British Commander with a better version of Broadside, plus an extra special rule and False Colors. Yes, he does give up 4″ of Command Range, but that’s hardly a problem aboard a ship. Finding the incredible synergies from this character is a no-brainer, as he can only lead British Royal Navy. Why would you ever take the Standard 20pt commander in that faction?
A COnsistent Sauce
The next major goal of my list was consistency, and on that note, we look at the list’s “secret sauce” – the Captured Merchant.
The in-game effect of the Merchant penalizes the Shoot Skill of any unit targeting his unit. Importantly, in the case of sea games, this effect extends to the entire deck section which the Merchant is occupying.
Swivel Guns perfectly illustrate how this affects consistency. Right away, the +1 penalty caps enemy swivels at 16<20″ range, instead of the usual 20<24″. At that range, enemy swivels are hitting on 10’s, while my own swivels, mixed with Strict from Ogle, are hitting on 8+. That is 3x more likely to score a hit. In a turn-over-turn gun battle, my identical cluster of 4 swivels will score on average 3x more hits than my opponent. The rift in effectiveness does taper off as the enemy gets closer, and that is why my list is designed to maintain its distance. I don’t want to sail in close, and with False Colors, I can keep rolling to stay “invisible” until I reveal myself with the perfect shot.
I hear you,
“But Tyler, what about scenario objectives?!”
And I ask, what about them? The oft-overlooked second part of Hostages & Advisors is what happens at the end of a game. If your opponent has not captured or killed your Hostage, then they automatically gain +1 Strike Point at the end of turn 6.
This means that I can effectively turn any scenario into Encounter, where we only care about damage to each other’s crew and ship. Every win that I get, I get another +1 bonus to my Strike differential.
The rest of the list was very straightforward. I had a large unit of Sea Dogs to crew the 4 swivels at the back of the Sloop. I had a smaller unit crewing the Light Cannons in the front, which were upgraded to include grapeshot. Joining them at the bow was Ogle and his unit of Able Seamen, with the hostage. The 6+ (with cover to 5+) Shoot Save on Ogle’s boys mean that they were a wounds-sink for the gun crew. They were also the ones responsible for handling and repair the ship. I gave them muskets so that they could make some shooting attacks when they weren’t busy – I think they managed to fire and reload twice, in the whole tournament.
You can view or download the whole list, here
Theory, Put to Practice
My list did exactly what it was meant to do in Game 2 of the tournament, against Josh Shivak.
Josh, if you’re reading this: I’m still sorry, and I did vote you for ‘Best Opponent’, in no small part because you didn’t load a sock with Milicianos Indios and bludgeon me to death.
The scenario was Raid, and my +4 with rerolls made me the attacker. Rather than fight Josh’s massive 6th Rate and horde of Florida Militia, I simply turned around and ran. He had no hope of catching me, with a -2 Windward penalty his ship was travelling at 3″ per turn while I was clipping along at 4″ (or 5″ with Sailing Master) to get away. I shot some casualties in him, although I can’t recall if I actually inflicted enough damage to cause a Strike. At the end of the game, I had an automatic 2 Strike Points. One of the objective, +1 for the Merchant.
Game 3 was a similar experience, with a Draw being turned into a win. Game 1 was a narrow loss, where I let myself get too greedy and broke my ideal of consistency. It was also the only game that this list has lost to date.
Incendiary Insights
Finishing 2-0-1 and with the Strike Differential afforded by the Hostage, was enough to net me 4th place. The lists ahead of me were the two Firepot lists, and Jayden’s 2nd place Barko list. Pigment has a writeup of all of these lists available on their blog.
There is an ongoing dialogue about how to fix the effect of Firepots moving forward. To me, it perfectly illustrates a rift within Blood & Plunder’s rules, that I’m uncertain how to address: the inherent differences between Land and Sea balance. Firepots are brutal at sea, and hardly seen on land. Ogle is the same, and so is the Merchant. How do you apply points to something that varies in effectiveness depending on theater?
But that is a discussion for another time. Another article, perhaps. Who knows? Suffice it to say, what makes Blood & Plunder – and by extension, author Mike Tunez – so innovative, is how well the system can tackle both modes without needing an extra rulebook.
The tournament that Pigment put on at Adepticon was a lot of fun, and very well – wait, hang on – very well run. I had a great time, considering the chaos of the convention going on around me, and I got to play against some great opponents. Getting to play against Josh was great fun, and despite the man living a little over an hour away, the Land tournament was the first time I’ve ever played against Fernando. I’m excited to see what kind of broken-as-hell bullsnot everyone brings to the next one!
Dead Man's Chest 