Welcome back to Sleek’s Bowl, the series where we cover off-meta choices, lesser-used pairings, and things that are generally great fun. Today’s article will be a special tournament report written by Mike Prime/Mr. Bowl himself, detailing where he took Blackpowder’s Buccaneers with the Hungering Parasite to a local tournament and ended up snagging a Shadeglass trophy for his efforts with his deck “Black Spot”.

To read more like this, here’s a Link to other Sleek’s Bowl articles. As you’ll see below, Sleek is far too humble to act like the Brash Braggart he deserves to, so I’ll do it for him. Fear the Black Spot, lest ye’ landlubbers who style yerselves heroes find out just how hungry thy Bane can be!

Before you die of both laughter and joy, it is important that you understand the context of this victory. Context changes things friends. For example, if a friend of mine told me he was going to the tire store today, I would think nothing of it. However, if that was his response to a question of mine, “Where would you like to go for lunch?” The answer would be not just curious, but perhaps endangering to his health.

This victory comes with some caveats based on the context. Here they are.

An OP Kit to Give Away

Our tournament scene has diminished over the last 10 months or so. The local game store still ordered an OP Kit. It had been sitting in the game store since the release of Wintermaw. Knowing this would be the only opportunity to use that kit, we resolved to give away all the things from the kit regardless of tournament size. This included Shadeglass.

A Small Crew

The tournament was scheduled to have 7 people. Only four showed. This means that it was organized in a Round Robin 3 round format. Everyone agreed that this would be the best way to do it, regardless of wins and losses. We also determined that due to our time allotted, we should do best of 1 with total glory as the tie breaker. This was all established prior to the first game.

(Editor’s note: if you’re curious about tiebreaker methods, read this article)

Meta Preparation for the Tournament

Our meta likes aggro a lot. We like to roll dice and smash face. This is so true that when someone plays something cagey or passive it has a polarized impact. Either they die definitively, or they just can’t stop scoring. When planning my deck and the way I was going to play it, I was relying on seeing aggressive play. This really skewed some of my deck choices and gave me some good options for the tournament.

The Deck

Objective Cards of Note

The deck used a massive amount of cards from Hungering Parasite including three cards that some folks have (potentially rightfully) thought of as difficult with HP. Those cards are Thwarted Destiny, Temporary Reprieve and The Clutches of Evil. All surges.

Now going back to what I mentioned about the meta, I did not feel it was a risk to play both Temporary Reprieve and Thwarted Destiny. The fighter with the Bane of Heroes upgrade was going to die because of an attack action. I knew this because my opponents who will likely be playing aggressively, will need to kill with attack actions. I just needed to find the “Right Bait” – pun intended. Alternatively, this is a deck that likes to give my opponent the Bane of Heroes upgrade (more on that later). If I select my target correctly, I could see him off and control when he goes down. I likely would not bring Temporary Reprieve into an unknown meta or one that has a balance of passive/hold and aggressive play. So, in short, it was a meta call.

Thwarted Destiny on the other hand is an easy score due to its hybrid nature. I can always break the upgrade with my power cards and stick it on an inspired fighter to score. Many games that just happens anyway as the location of the upgrade is more important than the inspiration. It also pairs nicely with The Clutches of Evil.

So, this one I know is controversial. If you put the upgrade on an enemy fighter you have now lost control of the upgrade. Your opponent has the initiative and to get it back you have to kill that fighter. UNLESS, of course, you have the Light-Fingered reaction. All you need to do is land an attack. You can break the upgrade and be on your merry way. In addition, this card pairs nicely with Powerful Pawn and I have scored that combo quite a bit. Add to this that I had an expectation of fighters having charge tokens on them somewhere near me, and unless they had out of activation movement, I could slap it on someone with a 1 damage attack. Then I could follow up with Black powder to kiss them goodbye and score all the glory.

Every other objective should be self-explanatory. Tall Tale is easy with a free upgrade floating around and Brutal Belaying pays me for what I am wanting to do all the time.

Let’s talk about Eyes on the Prize. This objective is gold. Its worth 2 and flexes into 3 if the Swag game is going well. But even at 2 glory, that’s simply two successful supporting attacks and holding your Grunderbuss shots for a few activations. I did score this in the tournament twice for 3 for having six Swag.

Gambits of Note

From Blackpowder I chose Flurry of Claws, Hasty Shot and Gold Rush and Grand Theft.

Flurry of Claws is damage in the power phase, supports Light-Fingered as it is an attack action, and will be played on someone with at least grievous 1 (potentially grievous 1 with 2 damage critting up to 3). That’s a lot of smoke. Plus, if it’s successful, add a Swag and inspire since their inspire condition does not specify it must be done during their activation.

Hasty Shot is justified for some of the same reasons. Just make sure BP has a supporting fighter before you play it and it is essentially a 2-hammer attack that can trigger inspires, more Swag and 2 damage in the power step.

These two are great cards.

Gold Rush is in there for more mobility as the poor Buccaneers have yet to get their land legs.

Grand Theft is in there for two reasons. 1. Many of the more powerful warbands have dodge fighters nowadays. 2. It’s a way to get another Swag off of an attack. Notice it doesn’t say successful attack action. So, if you succeed that’s two Swag. If you fail, it’s still one.

Sudden Swap, Tempting Lure and the Curse Demands help me with positioning and movement for my three move fighters. A Curse Divided and Lure of Power help me score my HP objectives.

Malefic Siphon is just too good to leave at home.

Upgrades of Note

I only take two from Blackpowder and they may not even be worth it. Tiny Braggart makes Pegz amazing. But any strategy that relies on Pegz is doomed to fail. Troggoth Grease appears very powerful on paper. However, in practice, people just crit through all day long. I am not 100% sure, but I can’t think of a time where Troggoth Grease saved me as opposed to me just rolling a crit on one of my three dice. It certainly discourages attacks on my fighter however, so that’s strategic.

Instinctive Reprisal is awesome on Blackpowder but I never drew it in this tournament. Everything else is just support for Bane of Heroes play including the ability to break the upgrade, heal and do more damage.

Round 1 Vs Drepurs Wraithcreepers and Tooth and Claw

This is one of the aggro bands I expected to see. At the end of the game I just had Shreek left. One pivotal moment was the Patrician was in range of Blackpowder at the end of the round. I won the roll off to go first and charged in with Blackpowder with the Bane of Heroes and despairing strength and Shreek supporting. This means two hammers with supports and re-rolls on a four-damage attack. This lands and the patrician and all the extra movement are gone for the Wraithcreepers. I was also able to put the Bane of Heroes onto Drepur after that which uninspired him. I then played weakened soul and removed him from play with a minion scoring Brutal Belaying. That bounced the parasite back to me and I gave it to Pegz. He took one and I Malefic Siphoned it off. So, there was some fun play there.

At the end of the game it was extremely close as he could easily kill my fighters and Blackpowder died. Win to the Buccaneers 15-14. He did have to discard Hurricane Force as we have played this match up before and I refuse to stay in my territory.

Round 2 vs Maskwatch (Grymwatch Malevolent Masks)

This was not a good match up for me, or so I thought. Passive play and reasonable wound counts are tough for Blackpowder to crunch through. Plus, the resurrection mechanic! I chose my targets to remove the ones that could not be resurrected. Trevor was able to get seed glory and really get his mask game online. I was able to bait out a kill on Pegz scoring me both temporary reprieve and thwarted destiny. I only had Blackpowder left on the board and there were two ghouls. I used Wicked Aim to fire off a five dice attack at a ghoul (I had Careful Aim and the ghoul had my Bane upgrade) from five hexes away. I rolled all supports.

We ended the game and we were tied 20 to 20 but Blackpowder was on objective 4 and he was on objective 1. BP wins again! Except, I felt it was important to revisit the scoring since it was so close and make sure we accounted correctly for everything. Once we did that, Maskwatch came out on top by 1 glory! Score of 19-20 win for Maskwatch! (editor’s note: Trevor used The Maskwatch deck previously described on Spent Glory in another Sleek’s Bowl article – click here!)

Round 3 vs Hexbane Tooth and Claw

Pat really likes his Hexbanes Tooth and Claw and it showed. He played them very aggressively throwing caution to the wind. I did manage to win this game 20-8 but there were a few really swingy critical successes that tipped the scales my way. I do think Light-Fingered against upgrades that good is just amazing.

The Results

We had four players and the top three players were all 2-1 including myself. But fortunately, I had scored a truck ton of glory. We revisited the games to make sure we had accounted for the right amount of glory. It was then I found out that Dustin playing Drepur’s Wraithcreepers had stopped his game when Pat, the Hexbane player, conceded during round 2. We figured he had the chance to maybe score five more glory with scythed down and hurricane force. Even adding those in, since I won the match up it would still put me in the lead. Or if we went to the Italian Sevens then I would have won by one glory. So, no matter how you slice it, a tourney win to Blackpowder!

What Would I change

With The Deck

I don’t know what to do with the upgrade section. It seems I just don’t have great options there. My power cards are rock solid. My objectives are okay with the weakest ones being Tall Tale and Brutal Belaying. But even those aren’t bad since they play into what I am doing.

With The Warband

I really think the beasts should have 3 wounds in this warband. Bump Mange and Shreek to three wounds and I think it would go a long way to making the warband competitive. Or provide powercards where the warband can’t be hit with one damage like in Rimeworm’s Bite. I think the Light-Fingered reaction works great. It seems to me to be an appropriate amount of both challenge and reward. Also would it kill the balance to Give Shreek and Mange 2 damage on inspire instead of 1 with grievous? That feels like a reasonable change.

Anyhow, I hope this inspires you to run up your own Jolly Roger, go thieving for loot and try some new pairings. I just find the warband so fun and thematic and the Light-Fingered ability is a blast.

That’s a wrap, folks! Thanks for coming along on this ride, and hopefully you can replicate some of Mike’s success at home. If you have a warband you love, with enough dedication and practice you can make it work and hang with the big dogs. Should you so happen to want to talk about your beloved warband or fun deck, let me know – I’d love to share your story in the Spent Glory Love Letters Series. Email inquiries and drafts to SpentGlory@gmail.com and until next time, be sure to enjoy spending your glory!

P.S. Stay tuned for more Sleek’s Bowl content, as last I heard Mike is pondering a doomed quest to become the premier Brethren of the Bolt fanatic this side of the Mariana Trench. Brethren of the Bowl/Sleeksbolt may soon be coming to a webpage near you…