Archeotech vaults and grudges to settle.

As our formal big everyone gets involved campaign is taking a while to get started, Steve and Myself decided to carry on our vendetta in a two player mini-campaign until it does. Here is the second battle, finding the respective cults deep in the oldest parts of the hive, searching for archeotech when they spy the familiar shadows of their foe in the distance.

We are playing the Archeotech Hoard mission from Gang war 3, and the only house rule we are using at this point is D3 XP for taking part in a game rather than just 1.

The terrain is Terraclips sets we quickly built on the day, , as all my actual terrain is stuck at the club!

The Third Protocol

Left to right, Sepsis, Rotbringer, Bilebeetle, the Mouth of Rust and Bile, The Compiler of Miseries and Sporeslinger. 

After our first game (which you can find here) I took one straight out casualty when Bitterboil got lanced by a rocksaw, and 2 other cultists got stuck in recovery, leaving me with a much smaller warband. I didn't get enough experience last game to increase anybody, but I did earn enough to spend in the trading post. The compiler went along with the cheque book and bought himself Mesh armour with an armoured undersuit (he knows he going to have to take part in the next game, so he's prepping) and some frag grenades for the Mouth, plus a bit left over to hopefully replace Bitterboil after the next game. My Yaktribe roster is here and is nice and up to date:- 

I managed to pull off a ritual before the game too, calling on Grandfather Nurgle to get my back, though I didn't dedicate it to anyone in particular, as I'd rather not lose another model just yet! 

The Genestealer cultists (still no pics, he's working on it, but you can find his gang and the actual names he has on his roster rather than the ones I made up here) also got a fair bit of cash last game, so they bought their leader a shiny boltgun, he had enough XP to increase something, and after a while decided to up his leaders BS to 2+, a terrifying prospect with a boltgun. (hilariously he's utterly inept with it this game, but as a long term investment it's going to hurt someone pretty bad.)

You will also notice some other changes where eqipment has been swapped, or sold between games. And after this you'll also notice  the genestealer adept losing infiltrate as he doesn't actually get a starting skill and we made a mistake in the first two games... (my roster says I have overseer, but that was a mistake I knew about, I just can't erase the damn thing!)

Deployment

Chaos Deployment- pay attention to the compiler, as he is not moving from that spot. 

Genestealer deployment- yes we now know his leader can't start with infiltrate... 

Overall board view- terraclips ahoy! 

Both the Adept and the Acolyte infiltrated near the automata in the centre of the table, whilst both bands spread out across their table edges- the Compiler declined to infiltrate as there were few places better to hide than the tall ruin right in his deployment zone. he is literally only here due to random gang selection. 

Turn 1

Sporeslingers sniper shot. 

Winning the initiative (for a change!) the Mouth of Rust and Bile led his small fireteam of corrupt Skitarii up the stairs in front of him, he tried a speculative shot at Jorhnson on the bridge ahead but missed wildly. Sporeslinger more than made up for this though by shooting Johrnson from the foot of the stairs, a clean hitting straight between his filthy Xenos eyes taking him out of the skirmish straight off the bat. It can only go down hill from here. (Johrnson awoke after the battle ended and went on quite the adventure getting back to the cult’s turf, surviving against the odds). With no-one in a position to return fire the Stealer’s went for the objective, and the Adept moved to the ancient automata, just about finding the on switch with his limited knowledge of machinery (doesn't matter how smart his stats say he is, he almost fluffed it every time- not a machine head). Whilst he was mucking around in the mechanisms his familiar scampered up through the ruins eager to reach it’s master, and the remaining fighters from both teams advanced (Rotbringer once again summoned the levitation power to aid her advance, whereas the Compiler used the take cover action to hide exactly where he started). 

Caamrhone gets the automata going. 

Finally the Automata itself activated, it’s rusted joints screeching as it powered up and began moving toward the bulkhead door. Old and crotchety the machine may be, but it’s welding beam was certainly in working order as it turned and blasted Sepsis clean off the stairs and into recovery in a single shot. (the other Skitarii just shrugged and carried on in a remarkable display of not giving a crap) One casualty each and the Chaos worshippers were playing catch up on the objective. 

Turn 2

Grenades are big and clever. 

Already both Cults were checking to see if it was time to run, but both stuck around for the time being. The Stealer’s won initiative, and elected to activate Caamrhone, who had been left in the open after the Automata moved. He jogged to the automata and again narrowly succeeded in manipulating it’s arcane controls (seriously, the guy is an idiot) whilst his familiar finally caught up with him.   Their reunion was to be short-lived however, as The Mouth moved within range and threw one of his newly purchased Frag grenades into the Adept, the Automata and the familiar. The adept was knocked from his feet and wounded by the blast, and the automata shrugged the tiny explosion off. The familiar was not so lucky however, as it was knocked clear from the bridge (catfall don't matter if you're already dead!) and down to the ground beneath, taken out of the game by both the blast and the fall (no worries, he'll get a new one, they're like guinea pigs...). 

Next turn is going to get sticky, one way or another. 

The remaining Stealer’s gave up on shooting and pressed home their objective advantage by moving forward as quickly as possible, as did Bilebeetle and the flying Rotbringer. Seeing the Chaos champions closing up Caamrhone decided to get on with the mission rather than melting stuff (as amusing as that was), and commanded the automata to head toward the door as fast as it could, which was admittedly not that fast. The compiler was still happily hidden where he deployed, and was not about to change that status any time soon. 

Turn 3

Not the face! The Mouth goes down for the count. 

Neither cult bottled it turn 3, and the Stealer’s kept the initiative.  Glodsmyth noticed The Mouth’s lack of cover and engulfed him with Autogun rounds, shredding the cultist demagogue and leaving him seriously injured on the ground. Rotbringer attempted to reciprocate by summoning warpfire to blast the already wounded Adept, but the shadow in the warp must have been blocking her connection to papa Nurgle as she couldn’t gain the power, (alternatively Rotbringer knew she hadn't actually taken that power as a skill yet so couldn't actually manifest it, keeping me from cheating..) settling instead for pinning the adept with a poorly executed autopistol shot. In return he stood and made a giant hole in a nearby pillar with a Boltgun shot that may go down in history as a spectacular miss.  

This mission was literally the worst one we could pick- cultists are not bright. 

On the east flank both Hidlystrom and Mhogg-Rhise moved to the automata, attempting to get it right up to the door for next turn. Despite the fact that neither of the two were particularly bright, by some miracle Hidlystrom actually managed to power the machine up, (he's been fiddling with stuff again apparently) and it was soon striding towards the objective. Bilebeetle climbed to the top of  the building near the objective, with the aim of getting into the vault as soon as the enemy opened it. At the rear the Compiler was sitting calculating the current value of his Catallus Corporation shares, despite Sporeslinger encouraging him to get involved as he ran up the stairs firing an inaccurate volley toward Hidlystrom.  No sooner had Sporeslinger got within sight of his demagogue however, than the Nurgle leader passed out, unconscious and out of play (for the next game at least, Nurgles blessing kept all my injuries down to just recoveries thankfully).) 

Turn 4

And there goes Rotbringer.. not her finest hour. 

Whilst both cults were still holding their nerve it was getting touch and go for team Nurgle. They managed to snatch the initiative though (it's becoming a habit!) and Rotbringer once again tried to summon forth witchfire to burn the enemy leader, but the warp was still evading her and she ended up spraying autopistol rounds into the stonework instead. (Still keeping me honest by accident there.) Glodsmyth was determined to get his mutant of the match medal, and stepping to the corner casually hosed Rotbringer down with another burst of precision autogun fire, stripping both wounds and seriously injuring the rogue psyker. Caamrhone failed spectacularly to do anything useful with his shiny Boltgun. Again. (New toy syndrome is well and truly screwing him this game.) 

If Sporeslinger can make this shot, I have a chance... 

Mhogg-Rhise ran toward the isolated Bilebeetle, but was thwarted when Bilebeetle leapt the gap and landed right beside the automaton! This move caught Hidlystorm off guard too, and he could only wound the bloated Disciple with a burst of heavy stubber fire. Trying to stay in the game Sporeslinger took aim at Hidlystrom’s back, but despite acing a sniper shot that hit multiple times he failed to penetrate the neophytes tough hide. Rotbringer decided she wanted to be part of the bleeding out squad and succumbed to her injuries too. not looking great for me at this stage.  

Turn 5

they think its all over? well it is actually. Damn Xenos. 

At this point The Compiler stuck his head round the wall and using mathematical wizardry decided the odds were not in Nurgle's favour today, and promptly called a retreat. The chaos forces bottled leaving the Xenos horrors the vault, though the automata could only hold the door open for a limited time before it came crashing down, forever sealing what the Stealer’s left behind in it’s adamantium depths. (we made an arbitrator ruling that as two of the Genestealer cult’s model could have moved into the vault this turn, we would count them as being in the vault for victory conditions- otherwise I would have caused a draw by bottling, which is not the spirit of the game) The game was pretty close, but turn 4 was a conclusive one for the Genestealers as they turned in another victory over their rusty nemesis. 

We've got game three coming up, and we've both got enough credits to replace a casualty or two- I will get a win against these alien scumbags one day! 

Float like a Butterfly, sting like a Berserker.

This week I'm going to continue my musings around the Skills of necromunda by giving you my take on the first two skill tables- Agility and Brawn, this is pretty apt for those who have picked up the new boxed set as they are the primary skills for the two gangs in the box, although as we'll see the Escher skills are not particularly suited for a 2D game..

I didn't play last week due to family commitments, so have no nice pictures to share, instead I went the the 'Chronicles From The Underhive' podcast's Facebook group and stole some nice gangs from there, credits below the image:) you can find more pictures and a nice friendly community HERE.

Agility skills.

Agility is the primary skillset of the Escher gang and a secondary skills for Delaque, Cawdor and the cults (and a primary for Van Saar Juves too, nimble little sods). Agility skills emphasise passive skills and are perfectly balanced between reactive and proactive types. Agility skills are almost always situational, and as such can seem underwhelming compared to the power of combat/shooting/savant skills. That said it has two of the most useful skills in the game in Spring up and Sprint so expect to see these featuring heavily in Escher gangs on the table.

Escher gang by Paul 'Spuddy' Shaw

Catfall- passive/reactive. (half all fall distances, I test to avoid pinning after falls)

One of the most reactive abilities in the game Catfall's usefulness is going to depend entirely on the sort of boards you play on, if you have a tendency to play high in big three dimensional Sector Mechanicus games then it's an option, particularly as a second skill for snipers and heavies who want to get the best field of fire without risking extra injury. Unfortunately this is one of those skills that can be entirely negated by equipment- Drop rigs and Grav chutes will do the same job, and you're more likely to have a rare trade action spare than a hard-to-get skill slot at the moment. If you roll Catfall randomly it's a nice bonus, and gives a fighter more freedom to run around on top so may change the way you use a fighter, but I can't see anyone actually choosing this skill. certainly not in two dimensional Zone Mortalis campaigns!

Clamber- passive/proactive.(full move when climbing)

An underrated ability, Clamber is a movement enhancing skill that like Catfall is only really useful in 3D games. I quite like Clamber for snipers, objective grabbers and even combat beasts- the ability to charge unexpectedly up a vertical surface can catch a opponents out and get you safely into combat whilst taking the maximum advantage of cover.  A great second skill for Infiltrating and Sprinting objective grabbers to get right into the thick of things straight on, it's also a nice add-on for Impetuous Cawdor fighters, giving them a 4" climb after combat that will allow them to change levels on most terrain after taking someone out. Randomly gained it's a skill you will use, but it's definitely up there as a choice, especially if you intend to have a specific role for your fighter in later games. Again- if you only play Zone Mortalis it's no use whatsoever.


Dodge- passive/reactive. (6+ dodge save, move 2" when dodging templates)

Extra saves are always great, especially for the lightly armoured girls of house Escher, but the relative low chance of success balances the skill out somewhat.  Now if you are my mate Steven and have his ability to roll nothing but 6 this is a clear winner for you, for anyone else I'd say it's a good back up skill, especially if you know your regular opponents are the hidey/shooty/fortress types who are unlikely to move more than a few inches from their deployment zone- anything that gets you there is good.thing, But I would not take Dodge as a starting skill unless I was deliberately building a tank, and even then, maybe not.. Randomly it's nothing to sneeze at but it's not on my choice list, even for paper thin Escher.

Escher gang by Tom Carter

Mighty Leap- passive/proactive. (ignore first 2" of gaps  for I test when leaping)

I genuinely have never used or taken this skill (yet) so I'm all theory here, but Mighty leap is probably the least useful Agility skill. It suffered initially from being badly worded in GW1 so it just wasn't a choice then, and even though the errata has fixed it it still lacks the wow factor of other skills on the list. Escher in particular have no issue passing I tests for leaping anyway so it's not even something I'd consider as a back-up skill at this point. Now if you gained it randomly I'm pretty sure you'd find useful things to do with it, it's a surprise factor if nothing else, but it's definitely not a viable choice compared to pretty much any other skill in the set, or in most skill sets really.

Spring up- passive/reactive. (free INI test at start of activation to escape pinning)

Spring up is one of the best skills in the game- possibly top 5 though the fact it's reactive is a downside (you have to get shot and then survive before it kicks in, not exactly something to plan for, though you can pin yourself with Take cover- see later). Great on heavies- pass the test and you can still fire that turn, combat beasts can test and then charge straight in, and snipers can still move and fire or aim if they need to. fighters actions are one of the games core resources and anything that gives you an extra one (or stops you losing one) is golden for me. Update- It's been pointed out to me that in combination with the Take cover action, Spring up is a brilliant tool for good initiative gangs, deliberately pinning yourself as an action, then standing for free next turn before taking an action (like shoot) and pinning yourself again is a great way of keeping a sniper out of enemy crosshairs as they can't target pinned models behind cover- pop up attacks are back on the menu boys! and I've started with this skill in several builds so far, so it's always a choice- in fact I'd say it's a go-to for Escher's in particular due to their awesome initiative. If you rolled this randomly you would be pretty damn chuffed with yourself.

Sprint- costed/proactive (if both actions move, double distance on second action)

I mentioned in Spring Up about actions as a resource, and Sprint is another excellent skill because of the way it stretches two actions into three. This falls into the costed skill category as you need to spend BOTH actions moving to get the bonus movement, but on turn one and two it can be more versatile than infiltrate and once you have a couple of sprinters in your gang you can start pressuring your opponent very early on. A great skill for both objective runners and combat beasts Sprint is a skill that rewards you for having a plan when you hit the table- if you go straight into the enemies barrels you won't get the best from it, but with a little finesse it can turn games, especially when grabbing crates, rescuing prisoners and setting up to despoil relics. I'm always looking to take sprint on at least one model if it fits the role, and if you rolled it randomly you would have spent that XP very well indeed.

copyright Games Workshop

Brawn Skills. 

I think it's fair to say that Muscle was the single worst skill set in the entirety of the original Necromunda, Ferocity was pretty bad, but Muscle was absolutely terrible. Of course it had Bulging Biceps, a skill that was practically mandatory for every heavy, but in reality we all had heavies with Headbutt, Iron Jaw and Hurl opponent before we got the running, gunning brutes we were after. It's refreshing then that Brawn, the N17 offspring of Muscle, is actually pretty good, with some good choices in there for combat beasts and even one to help keep your stimm-heads alive. Almost entirely proactive you'll use these skills when you want to, not when your opponent  forces them on you, but remember it still has one major downside- you need to be very (very) close to your enemy for this list to shine. The Goliath's primary skill set, it also features in  Orlock's and Cawdor (gangs of legend at least) as a secondary skill.

Goliath gang by Ramon Nanez

Bull Charge- passive/proactive. (+1S & Knockback when charging.)

Bull charge is a skill designed for people that want to hit hard and fast. Stick it on a Goliath with S4 as standard, plus a +1S melee weapon and you are wounding most starting fighters that aren't from your house on 2+ on the charge. Once you've had  a few increases or bought some better stuff/drugs then S8 is well within the reach of your champions, making even Goliath's and Aberrants easy pickings. Knockback is a nice bonus too (remember you can get an extra strength and damage if you can trap them with the charge) but needs to be used carefully in melee- you don't want to punch them out of base to base and lose the safety of combat if they have shooty friends around. The biggest downside of Bull charge is that initially it doesn't make a lot of difference to S4 models- they wound most things on 3+ anyway, and as with all strength enhancements- you have to hit first! Like Catfall, a starting model can gain the same benefits from equipment as this skill, (in fact better as +1S on a melee weapon isn't charge only) so I'd never start with it, but it is a grand second skill to choose for a brawler, and you wouldn't be unhappy if you rolled it randomly.

Bulging Biceps- passive/proactive. (ignore unwieldy on melee weapons)

How the mighty have fallen.. Once the height of underhive chic Bulging Biceps has been errata'd down into the sump of potentials, no longer as sought after as a one-in-a-million boltgun... Alright, it's not that bad, it's effectively +1 attack when using an unwieldy weapon as it allows you to gain the benefits of an additional melee weapon, so its ok. Remember though- you split attacks equally between weapons, so if you give a model a Spud Crumper in their off hand they'll have to use half their attacks with that instead your expensive renderiser (that's why I like it with pistols as they are only ever one dice from the combat pool). I've taken as a starting skill in the past, mainly because i love renderisers, so it's definitely a contender, but I'm always torn between this and Berserk Charge for effectiveness. Randomly rolled it could be utterly useless as the model may not have an unwieldy weapon, (and depending on house rules may not be able to swap equipment to get one) but chosen for the right model it can be a solid skill.

Crushing Blow- passive/proactive. (increase one non-pistol melee dice Str and Dam by +1)

What's that you say? another skill for +1 Strength? this time with +1 damage as well? crikey! There's a theme in Brawn as you can see, and it mainly involves punching people really hard in the face. again this Crushing Blow can be replicated by weapons but (like bull Charge) it does stack with those very same weapons and can make some horrifyingly effective killing machines. I might choose this for a starting skill for an executioner type champion, someone I was definitely going to send after enemy champions and leaders and kit them out appropriately (two melee weapons, one already D2 with knockback if I can get one for the potential D4 smash!). Randomly rolled you'd be happy, and it's a viable choice but only if you have a plan for it- Bull charge or a better melee weapon are probably wiser options for the most part.

Goliath gang ' The Warboys' by Tom Carter (yes, I used him twice as these are ace!) 

Headbutt- costed/proactive. (may headbutt (basic action))

I love Headbutt, it's like an extra attack in melee (remember we talked about action resources earlier) and what's better most other houses have puny T3 so you are very likely to smash face at S6 D2 when you use it! I like it on shooty champions, so they have a back-up plan if they do get engaged, but it's also obviously useful for pure melee beasts to cause even more carnage if they don't get the charge. Probably not worth taking on a renderiser or serious damage dealer as they can usually be relied upon to drop the enemy without needing to plant face. One of my favourite uses is when you have been ganged up on- you can use this before your melee attacks to try and drop one of your opponents as it isn't effected by interference modifiers, and you can potentially take out 2 enemies in the same turn:) I like this skill as a starting skill, a choice for brawlers and I'd be well pleased if it came up randomly. alright there's a chance you can hurt yourself, but that's what Necromunda's all about!


Hurl- costed/proactive (May Throw Opponent (basic action)) 

Probably the best consolation prize in old school Necromunda when you once again failed to get Bulging Biceps, we all have fond memories of our Heavies throwing cheeky Juve's off buildings when they had inevitably ran out of ammo. Suffice to say it's still pretty much doing the same thing as before, with the difference being that it is it's own action now. between this and Headbutt there's actually little difference, if you tend to play tough opponents Hurl is better, against nimble enemies go for Headbutt. they both allow you to get out of melee without using a melee action, which is great for stopping interference modifiers, but where Headbutt relies on you passing a test, Hurl relies on your opponent failing one. Hurl is also less likely to injure an opponent, but will allow you to re-position them and pin them so again it's swings and roundabouts. Where Hurl really shines is on your 3D sector mechanicus boards, the ability to throw someone of a ledge for them to take the initial S3 hit, then falling damage, and then be pinned is a big advantage. Also Hurl is good for sharing kills and XP amongst a team- if your melee attack only wounds a multi-wound enemy, or flesh wounds them, chuck them into a nearby allies charge/shooting range for them to finish the job- especially easy with group activating champions and leaders. My favourite use for Hurl is on people with Combat shotguns, use hurl to get your opponent out of melee then give them a taste of the old Salvo. Marvelous. If you know you are fighting low Initiative enemies in a campaign it's worth picking, and it's pretty good if you get it randomly too.


Iron Jaw- passive/reactive. (+2 Toughness vs unarmed attacks)

Sort of the black sheep of the Brawn family, Iron jaw is an odd one. It's the only reactive skill in the set, and the only skill that on the surface isn't about beating face. This skill is pretty damn situational- but when it does kick in it makes a fighter very reliable in melee. A lot of players tend to load the living crap out of their leaders and champions, then just straight copy and paste autogun/lasgun etc down the gangers with no back-up weapons or melee reserves, and it is against this sort of gang that this skill is frankly epic. If you charge a standard ganger who's not got a melee weapon equipped, then even if you utterly fluff your melee attacks (which I do a lot) when they retaliate they can only wound you on a 6- even another Goliath needs a 5. Early doors in a campaign this allows you to throw your melee monster in against these morons that brought guns to a knife fight with very little risk, so it can change the whole way you play. However- late in a campaign when credits are more free and everyone has their backup pistol or fighting knife it's not as useful, though you can offset this by picking up Disarm skill or Disarm weapons. Definitely worth considering as a starting skill if your opponent has a cookie cutter gang and low imagination, and not bad if random (again, buy a Disarm weapon ASAP.) I can't see this being a viable choice as a skill in later campaign games unless you do have Disarm AND a Disarm weapon, in which case that's a pretty nasty combo for stopping enemy melee monsters in their tracks.

Copyright Games Workshop

That's the first two skill sets done, I just realised there's eight of them so i'll need to do a whole month of skill reviews before I move on! What I may do is intersperse them the game reports etc to break up the tedium for me and you:) Anyway I hope this is useful to someone out there, and I'll hopefully see you next week! comments and arguments more than welcome:)

Skills to pay the Bills

I’ve been playing Necromunda 2017 for a while now, and after building and painting 5 gangs and seeing others builds inspired me to ramble about the game and how I play it, starting with skills and working my way through equipment, tactics and terrain later. Necromunda has always been my absolute favourite game, from getting the first box as a teenager as a Christmas present and playing a full campaign with my brother and cousin, (with us all maxing out at least one gang by new year). The new edition gave me jitters at first as I wanted it to be good but you never know, after playing it for the first time I was hugely relieved- if anything the gameplay is smoother and more logical than the first edition, and the models are amazing. (not as keen on the campaign rules at first, but subsequent gang wars are improving my impression) 

So this first post is about skills and how I use them in the game. I’ve always mentally splits skills into groups, based on when they are useful and if they have a downside or cost to using them. You can see my chart below of the current skills and where they fit in my head, and I’ll go into more detail into why after.

Obviously everyone has their own preferences, and people will disagree with some of this but that’s fine, it’s always more fun to play people who see things differently as it means you get more variation on the table and a better campaign overall.

	Passive skills	Costed skills
Reactive skills	Catfall Dodge Spring up Iron Jaw Combat Master Counterattack Parry Step Aside Lie low Escape Artist Nerves of Steel True Grit Unstoppable Inspirational Iron Will Mentor Regroup Medicae Munitioneer	Overwatch
Proactive skills	Clamber Mighty leap Bull Charge Bulging Biceps Crushing Blow Headbutt Combat master Disarm Backstab Evade. Infiltrate Berserker Impetuous Fearsome Commanding presence Gunfighter Marksman Precision shot Trick Shot Ballistics expert Connected Fixer Savvy Trader	Sprint Hurl opponent Rain of Blows Overseer Fast shot Hipshooting

Reactive skills are skills that are only useful when an opponent or game effect gives you the option to use them- in other words you have no control over them yourself. Most reactive Skills are passive, and take effect when a fighter is attacked or injured, though some are simply situational skills that require a fighter to be placed in a certain situation by an opponent. Reactive skills tend to be used to alleviate a player’s bad luck or an opponent’s actions, so can sometimes appear to be of little use if the right situation does not arise.

Proactive Skills are those skills which can be used at the players convenience, or where the player can generate the right in-game situation without requiring his opponent to do anything (other than play the game normally, move into shooting range, charge range etc.) Again most of these abilities are passive.  These skills suit aggressive play more, and are often more visibly useful than reactive skills.

Passive skills have no in-game cost to activate or use, they may be additional actions that a fighter can take without paying AP, or simply enhancements to standard actions. A Passive skill is generally used more than a costed skill as without a penalty to use they are always beneficial. Most skills in the current books are Passive skills.

Costed Skills are skills that require a specific action be taken, or require AP to take an action that could be used elsewhere. Sometimes this is a forced ‘double’ action, other times it could simply be taking the same action twice and losing the flexibility of multiple actions. The upside of costed skills is that they are some of the most powerful skills in the game, and when they are in the right situation they can often swing a confrontation in the users favour.

The acolyte better have some mad skills if he want's to walk away from this one..

Starting skills.

Starting skills are new to this edition of Necromunda, and they are part of the reason I starting musing on skills. Choosing skills rather than randomising them gives players a great level of customisation to their Leaders and Champions right from the first game, you can make sure that not only do your boys and girls have the tools for the job, they have the tactics too.

So how do we choose our starting skills from the array presented to us? All champions have at least 12 to choose from and leaders 18 so finding the one that works for you should be easy, until you start worrying about the ‘best’ skill. When there is a certain skill that seems amazing compared to the others available it can seem tempting to simply splat that across the entire gang (Nerves of Steel Goliath’s and Fast Shot Van Saar I’m looking at you). Or give it to every leader regardless of gang loyalty (Overseers, Overseers are far as the eye can see…) but this doesn’t just miss out on the fun, customisation side of Necromunda, it can also hamper a gangs effectiveness on the board.

Having three Nerves of steel sounds great, escaping pinning for free? Brilliant. But because this is a reactive skill it needs the right situation to come up- you need to be hit by an enemy, not wounded (or just losing a wound for multiple wound models) and you need to pass the Cool test. If your opponent has turned up with proactive skills he will have the upper hand in leading the game right from the word go- Passive Reactive skills rarely change an enemies tactics because frankly they are going to shoot you whether it pins you or not, but knowing that the fighter with the plasma gun has fast shot means you are far less likely to leave anyone in his line of sight if you can help it.

Similarly having a full deck of matching Proactive skills (Three Orlock gunfighters for extra shots every turn is dead shooty but a bit limited) whilst giving you great board control initially, means you are more likely to be punished for errors without the backup of skills to negate bad luck. Necromunda is a game of luck after all, and even Van Saar can miss an easy shot leaving a model vulnerable to counterattack where Step Aside or True grit would come in a lot handier than Trick shot..

My advice for both a fun game and one you’ll have a chance of walking away from with a win is to balance your starting skills out, have at least one Proactive aggression beast, be it melee or shooting, and at least one reactive survivor to keep you in the game when it goes wrong. I’d always advise two champions to start with, so this leaves you with an extra skill to choose which is where you can tilt your gang towards your own playstyle, I often go for a Costed skill in whichever style I go for on the extra guy, whilst sticking with Passive skills on the others. In campaign games you also need to think about where you want that fighter to go in the future- what role are they going to play on the table and what skills would work well with stats increases and specialist equipment to help with that.

Some examples from my gangs-

Goliaths-

• ·         Leader with Combi plasma, Power Hammer and Nerves of Steel.
• ·         Champion with Combat Shotgun, Brute cleaver and Hurl,
• ·         Champion with Renderiser, Stub Gun and Bulging Biceps.

With two wounds, toughness 4 and furnace plates goliaths have already got survivability built in, so I went for an aggressive build initially. The exception is my leader: he needs to be close to get the best from his great stats and weaponry so Nerves of steel will hopefully keep him on his feet under enemy fire. The first champion is designed to stay out of melee and lay down fire into enemies (eventually I’ll get him a heavy weapon when I can afford it) Hurl is an excellent skill in that if an enemy does engage him, he can hopefully suck up any damage, then chuck them out of melee and lay into them with a close range salvo (usually pretty fatal). The second champion is another melee beast, I love the Renderiser but hate losing the extra attack dice, so Bulging Biceps or Berserker is a  must. I went for Bulging Biceps so he can use the pistol in his off-hand and gain the dice even if he doesn’t charge.

Escher-

1. ·         Leader with Shock Whip, Plasma pistol and Inspirational
2. ·         Champion with Combi bolter/needle, stiletto knife and Clamber
3. ·         Champion with Power sword, two Autopistols and Sprint.

Anyone who’s played a few games with Escher knows that once the going gets tough, the girls get the hell out of dodge faster than you can say ‘enforcers!’ The gangs high Cool is a massive Achilles heel in protracted games, so taking Inspirational on the leader is a great way to offset that- the downside is it means the leader needs to stick with the crew quite closely, so needs to be outfitted appropriately.  The first champion is a full on sniper- boltguns are (as always) great weapons for blowing big holes in your opponents hopes and dreams (and gangers) with good range, rapid fire and damage stats.  Clamber is a great skill for a dedicated sniper in that it allows them to get to a vantage point really quickly, and often unexpectedly for your opponent. Finally the last champion is designed for Melee and objective grabbing, she needs to be fast to get there with the Escher’s poor armour and average toughness, so Sprint is a good choice. Remember +1 move is one of the cheapest upgrades for experience in a campaign, and that would give her an 18” move, not too shabby.

You can see both gangs have a decent variance in weaponry and skills, and the mix of proactive/reactive/passive/costed skills is pretty even, though both swerve a little to the proactive as I'm trying to play more aggressively at the moment. 

That’s it for now as I don’t want to write too much, but next time I’ll be going over some of the skills in more detail, who I like them on, how to get the best from them and why naming fighters after their skills and equipment  is  an amazing idea if your memory is as bad as mine.

Mick