M2E for Beginners - A Basic 'Opposed' Duel Part 1 - Shooting

One of the changes in this new version of Malifaux is that the mechanic for 'Duels' has altered slightly.

Whereas in 1.5 and earlier there was a difference between Casting duels and those for Melee and Ranged attacks, those in M2E now work the same way. Here's the first part of a basic tutorial covering a simple encounter between two enemies that will neatly cover some shooting, a spell or two and a bit of stabbing. We'll mention Triggers, Abilities and other considerations as we go but we'll wait for their own tutorials to cover them in any significant detail.

Lets get started then...

First we need to look at the new format for the stat cards though for this tutorial it's only really the Defense (Df) stat that we're going to need.

Your stat for shooting is (Sh), the one for Melee is (Ml) and the Casting value is the old familiar (Ca) and they are now listed next to the appropriate attack ability.

A Guild Guard (A) and a Rotten Belle (B) have met while strolling through the woods. Unfortunately they've both realised that their outfits clash and therefore there's no alternative but to destroy each other utterly.....












Lets start with a ranged attack...or two...

In this edition of Malifaux all the values you require to make an attack are on the rear of the card in the Attack Action section with each attack listed separately...like so.

Any built in card suits are by the appropriate value like the Ram above (circled in blue) and any attack that has a Trigger will have it listed right next to the appropriate attack which is a distinct improvement over 1.5 cards where they were separate.

Pre-measuring is entirely fine in M2E so the Guild Guards player measures the distance and finds that she's easily within her 12" range so decides to take a shot and as there's nothing between them to block the shot there will be no modifiers for cover. As she is neither a Master or a Henchman and cannot use soulstones she doesn't get to use them at all so she'll just have to hope that Fate is on her side.

The Guild Guard (A) uses her first Action Point (AP) to take a shot at the Rotten Belle (B).
She has a Sh value of 4 to which she adds the value of her first card flip which is an 8 of Crows giving her a total of 12.with a Crow and a Ram (the Ram is built in)
The Rotten Belle (B) flips an impressive 12 of Rams which added to her Df of 4 gives her a total of 16.
So far the Guild Guard (A) has missed as her total is lowest. knowing she has another AP to spend she decides not to cheat.



Having few other options she decides to take another shot with her pistol. The fates are not being kind to the Guild Guard (A) and this time she flips a 2 of Tomes giving her a Sh total of 6. The Rotten Belle (B) flips a marginally less crappy 5 of Rams giving her a total of 9. So far the Guild Guard (A) is missing and as the model with the lowest total gets to cheat first this time she decides that she's going to. Wanting the best chance of success she uses a 12 of Crows giving her a very respectable total of 16. The Rotten Belle decides to take it on the chin *insert obscene joke here* and doesn't cheat...

It as at this point after both players totals have been established that Triggers are declared. The Guild Guards Refurbished Collier Pistol has the 'Halt' Trigger and that requires a Ram that the fortunate Guard already has built-in to her Sh stat. This particular Trigger imposes a condition on the target model called 'Arrest' which in this case means that it must discard a card to take a Walk (Wk) or Charge (Cg) Action. deeming this to be a good idea the Guild Guard declares the Trigger and the condition is imposed.

The mechanic for deciding how many cards we flip for damage is identical to that of 1.5 but I'll summarise it briefly here,

If the totals are equal then the flip is double negative (- -). That would be flipping three cards picking the lowest. If the result is in the 1 - 5 range then it would be a single negative (-). That would be flipping two cards picking the lowest. If the result is in the 6 - 10 range this would be a standard flip (no modifiers) and if the difference is 11 or greater then we have a positive flip (+).

So in this case the flip for Damage (Dg) would be a straight one but the Belle has the Hard to Wound Ability which negatively effects the Damage Flip by a single negative (-)

The reason this is so beneficial to the Rotten Belle is that in addition to stacking the odds of a low card in it's favour (and the low card must be selected in a negative flip) it also prevents the Guild Guard from cheating the Damage Flip as negative flips cannot be cheated. In this case our Guild Guard flips the following cards...

Though she'd love to pick that Severe Damage this is a negative flip so she has to pick the lowest which unfortunately for her is in fact only Weak Damage and does a grand total of 1 point of Damage.

As soon as the Rotten Belle gets to have a go she may have something to say about that....

In Part 2 we'll look at a bit of spell-casting...

Thoughts and comments are (as usual) most welcome.