In the lair of the Mutants - Part III

Well, it's been a few years, but I did actually play that third game in the end, but being able to get out of the house prevented me from wanting to sit down and write this one out. Why get back to it after all this time? Well, I've been collating some of my stuff over on my main blog (leadcapes.blogspot.com) and that includes my "superhero" 40k stuff like Inquisitor Kang and, as we're about to see, Kill Team Aesir. There has also been some discussion in the group of using this blog a little more again, so maybe that will play out in the future, who knows?

With an entire Inquisitorial Stormtrooper squad lost to a rabble of mutant scum, the order to purge the site was given, with the nearest team available for the action, none other than Kill Team Aesir, mighty warriors of the Deathwatch! Woe betide the enemies of the Imperium!

Ok, so it's hardly fair, but I've bought along six Deathwatch Veterans for this run, hoping that my rolling will hold out long enough to get revenge for the last two games. I've bought a good core group with Thor, Jane Foster Thor, Volstaag, Fandhal, Balder and Hogun, so my plan is to overwhelm the Scavvies with firepower and then mop up with Thunder Hammers. But we'll see how that goes.

For once, I drew a couple of good cards, so I'm feeling confident going in. To keep things simple, all I have to do is kill the Mutant Psyker, with the enemy deck set up pretty much the same as the previous two games.

The first foe to appear is a lone Scavvie, right in the sights of Volstaag and his Deathwatch Frag Cannon, who wastes no time lighting the heretic up.

Yeah, it's overkill (three times over, in fact), but I'm done with these damn Scavvies and want to paint the walls with their brains.

The next Scavvie to be found is spotted by Hogun, who lacks any ranged weapons, but can still Charge.

With the two cards I drew at the start of the game, I can double Hogun's damage and double it again. With his Power Maul, the Scavvie stood no chance and I moved on to the next Veteran.

My typical luck with this mission finally appears when Balder finds a Scavvie with Autogun and his automatically-hitting Deathwatch Shotgun fails to do anything to the target.

Of course, the return fire is deadly and Fandhal also can't deliver with his Shotgun fire either.

In what would become a trend for the game, the Frag Cannon does the real work, the little scorch mark on the floor being a fun coincidence of the D&D tiles.

The first Scavvie Boss has appeared, and whilst Mighty Thor can't shoot at him, her Storm Shield helps prevent the mutant's attack from doing any damage.

Thanfully, the Odinson is nearby to bring the hammer down, to devastating effect.

Thanks to some good card draws and my having learnt my lesson about staying grouped up, I manage to push forward with no casualties and minimal fuss for a little while.

Even the appearance of a fearsome Big Mutant is something of a non-issue thanks to the mighty Frag Cannon.

The next, very minor, setback, sees a lucky Autogun shot from a Scavvie take Hogun down a wound. Once again, however, Thor makes short work of the filthy mutant.

Finally, Hogun uncovered the hiding place of the Scavvie Psyker, my recurrent nemesis for these games. With psychic powers, multiple wounds and a focus on getting away from combat, he will prove to not be an easy foe to bring down, even with the mighty weapons of the Deathwatch.

In a fun little quirk of the AI I adapted, the Scavvie Psyker backs off and gets the second Scavvie Boss as backup. I try to send Mighty Thor around the back to get into melee with her Thunder Hammer, but instead close off the Psyker's retreat, which isn't a bad consolation prize, all things considered.

Wanting to put the Scavvie Psyker down before he can use his devastating Psybolt to start killing a Veteran per turn, I charge in Thor to attempt to mop both him and the Scavvie Boss up in one go. Sadly, the Psyker survives unharmed and blasts the God of Thunder to the halls of Valhalla.

When you have a Thunder Hammer, every problem looks like a heretic. Using another card to boost my chances of wounding, I charge in Mighty Thor, who doesn't do much better than her namesake, but at least survives the backswing.

Another retreat to find backup at least limits the damage that the Scavvie Psyker can do in his turn, plus both the Big Mutants and Bosses have been pulled from the deck, so only the easiest enemies in the game can pop up from now on to slow me down.

After using Fanhal to clear away the Scavvie, I let him take the risk of getting hit by the Psybolt because he has the lowest damage weapon left on my table and therefore is probably the most expendable. He is removed by the powerful psychic attack, but his sacrifice is not in vain.

Thanks again to the power of the Frag Cannon, the mission is finally complete. It only took three games and going way over powered in the final run, but some of the weakest foes in the Galaxy are finally purged.

As I said above, this game came right at the end of one of the big Melbourne 2020 COVID lock downs, so I didn't have a lot of motivation to continue these games, though I do still have most of the stuff I used to play them. I'm not currently living somewhere where I can set up a big game and I do get to play games at least a few times a week on average, so solo play isn't something I really feel the need to do. Hopefully this was fun to read at the very least, even with a three year hiatus.