With the cast introduced, we have our first day. Having left Ord to make our fortunes we have settled into an area halfway between Corvis and Fort Falk, east of Ironhide's Hold. The Mechanika's Mercenaries mostly does repairs, we have a small rented shopfront where we bring in jacks and do repairs, but also do heavy/dangerous labor out on the warfront. The area here is dangerous. Trollkind, Skorne, Menites are all common to the area. Circle of Orobos arn't uncommon either. Then there is the constant threat of bandits, potential Khadoran patrols and even Llaelese 'patriots'. In short, the perfect place for a starting mercenary charter to set up shop.
So we do. It is a typical morning, quiet, not much work today lined up, our jacks are currently standing outside with us as the four of us run some tuning on the jacks, a common enough occurrence in a group of Mek heads like us. The first signs that something isn't right is the sounds of gunfire followed by explosions and smoke rising over the far side of town. That's the direction of the Cygnar Barracks, but nothing should have been able to get close enough to the city without being challenged. Not in any significant force. The confusion for us was compounded when an Iosan, in heavy armor, behind two strange looking light warjacks came around the block heading straight for our shop. Weapons drawn and blood in his eyes. Nearby another Iosan, whirling a bladed chain weapon of some sort ran towards us as well. Our shock and confusion was nearly complete.
The Retribution had come to our city, and intended to lay waste to all of the jacks and warcasters within the city. But they hadn't come to simply kill the casters, no, their plan was more insidious. It was to weaken Cygnar enough that the Skorne would roll over the city and wipe out the rest of the humans here, as well as moving into the soft area of Cygnar, flanking Fort Falk and Corvis. If the Skorne couldn't do it then forces of Menoth could be directed towards the weakened area, or others. But first all jacks and those who ran them, be they marshals or warcasters, had to be eliminated. And so a massive strike force hit the city. Their information was quite good so they knew too of our small mercenary company and deemed two Griffons, a Dawnguard Scyir and a Mage Hunter Assassin(12 points) to be sufficient. Eiryss lead the assault on the main encampment, which was a total success and would arrive a little later to check on her strike force and their progress.
To build the list I used Warroom and used the stats as they are in the cards. The only change to the stats was to improve the Vitality of the Scyir and Assassin from 5 to 15 each. This put them on par with the PC's but I didn't give them life spirals, mostly because tracking it would have been a pain. This seemed to work just fine.
And so it was that our band of mercenary field mechaniks sat outside our shop, waiting for work, our jack's moving scrap around the yard when enemy arrived!
 |
| Battle of the Forge Start: Yes some of those are D&D tokens, and for those in my PBP Blackwoods campaign, Yes I reused the Blackwoods map. |
The party stood up, confused by this turn of events, they had no idea what was happening and the initiative fell to the Retribution War party. The party had little time to do much more than gape as the griffons charged into the party, intent on immediate death. The first one fell on our surprised warcaster, who while fully focused, had nothing else up. The blow was heavy but a heroic dodge later, combined with the over charged field and the extra health of the powerfield, he was standing unharmed, but clearly shocked(12 damage over a 4 point boosted armor left us clearly understanding that IKRPG meant business). The other griffon's assualt went after the Mek and Lucky was the unlucky recipient of that blow, though it didn't do much to him. Neither of the two Myrmidon's had much luck getting any damage in with their shields, and the Dawnguard was just outside of charge range, so he was relegated to closing the distance. The same was true for the assassin who simply closed, planning to assault the party. The valiant mechaniks recovered quickly and as a group urged their jacks into combat. Lead first by our warcaster, who cast aura of protection and kept the other two focus to boost his armor rating. He used his actions to boost the attack and damage of Andrew 'Jackson who proved that even a labor jack, armed with a flail can be dangerous, though he did only minimal damage to the Griffon. This was followed by Lucky and Finnegan proving that this dangerous combination of human and jack can sometimes be completely ineffective as the two failed to hit or damage their target at all beyond taking out the Griffon's shields.
But it was our Arcane Mechanik's turn that turned the tide. Starting first with free casting of temper metal on Arkadi, followed by Positive Charge on Arkadi and Drive: Boosted Damage, Arkadi proceed to nearly drop the Dawnguard in a single hit. This was followed up by Taltos failing to finishing the job, despite being driven to boost attack and damage by Emma, who, like Andrew, is primarily a ranged character.
It rolled around and the Dawnguard drove his jacks to reroll misses. The one on top turned to Finnegan, while the one on the bottom, with the Dawnguard turned on Arkadi. That was the danger to them it seemed.
Finnegan suffered greatly taking 8 points of damage(heroic dodged to 4) while arkadi laughed at the inability to crack his armor 18, despite being hit several times. This was the real sign of trouble for the Retribution force. The assassin closed the distance and hit Taltos, beating his armor by a couple points but with his bonuses the party realized he was a real threat.
 |
| Round 2 after the Retribution Actions |
The Party responded and things turned ugly for the Retribution now. Andrew and Jack put a world of hurt on Griffon 2, boosted by Positive Charge on Arkadi(we determined that 1 round means such spells last till the casters next initiative), and Andrew using his actions to drive boosted attacks and damage from 'Jackson. The flail also proved it's usefulness in ignoring the shield on the Griffon and with nearly max damage, took out half the Griffon's health. Moving around to the back of the Griffon proved fortuitous as Finnegan and Lucky, through Drive Ancillary Attack, and their own well placed hits, crushed the griffon between leaving it with a single box of movement left.
Arkadi took out the Dawnguard, renewing positive charge and upkeeping temper and things looked grim for the Retribution. Taltos suffered in silence, managing only to do some minor damage to the other griffon, taking down it's shields.
