LVO Mission Reports: Survey and Control

Continuing my report from LVO 2017 here is my report for my first mission.  

Survey and Control

First time playing this mission.  It essentially comes down to hopping from building to building to gather as much intel as possible with a little randomness changing things up.  

My opponent was also running Shaltari with a Leopard brick (2 leopards protected by a Dreamsnare).  My wife plays resistance and regularly curses my Shaltari shenanigans and this was the first time I got a taste of my own medicine.  Deployment and first round went ok.  I was able to score a Focal Point on a back building of mine.  

Brave VS Brave

The tides turned once my opponent moved a pair of Braves until CQB with my pair of Braves.  Given that infantry score all the points in this scenario I thought I would spend a turn quickly killing off his Braves and therefore prevent them from scoring anymore points.  I dematerialized four additional bases of Braves to bring the total CQB to my six Braves to his two.  I then began to position my gates to let the Braves jump to other buildings once that CQB was finished.  A little aggressive perhaps but I felt it justified as I had already damaged some of his other Braves with Falling Masonry.  Killing off a whole squad of Braves as well as the other damage Braves would leave my opponent with no ability to score points.

CQB Begins on turn 3...........And it never ended!

Braves are difficult to kill, we were both rolling for sixes.  However, the dice would be against me as I could not get kills on his braves.  This was my downfall.  Two stands of Braves tied up my six stands of my Braves.  I could no longer hop buildings and grab intel.

Lesson Learned:  CQB can be risky for Intel missions.  Braves are difficult to kill.

Dragon Cannons and Cooked Hedgehogs

I had learned the value of going to the walls in other missions.  Braves have a decent E9 shot and against armies like Resistance (my typical foe) those extra shots can be a nice addition.  Not so much against Shaltari.  I took the above Braves to the wall in an attempt to take out a birdeater.  My opponent then dropped off his Leopard Brick in an attempt to get my Gharial.  Just out of range I quickly dematerialized the Gharial to safety, leaving my six little space hedgehogs looking at six Dragon Cannons (Dragon Cannons are a type of Microwave Gun).  Ignoring Soft Cover and rolling 12 dice each, my little hedgehogs stood no chance.  48 dice against one base, 24 against the other.  They were cooked, "well done."

Lesson Learned:  Going to the walls has no place in Intel missions.  Even without facing Dragon Cannons its better to keep them moving and save any DP for the occasional Falling Masonry.  They are too valuable to risk for a few extra shots.

A Gharial's Last Stand.  

At this point I was desperate.  Six Braves stands locked in CQB, two cooked "Well-Done" by Dragon Cannons, the best I could do is prevent my opponent from getting further points.  The Gharial had dematerialized away from the Leopard brick and I dropped in on my opponents half of the board looking at more of his infantry.  I love flame weapons and the Gharial has a decent one.  He also has some Demo shots and one of the buildings was already about to go down from my Tomahawk shots and others.  A hit from the Gharial's flame weapon and one demo shot should take out a squad of Braves and the other Demo shot would surely take down the other building.  This would leave, to my recollection, only his Pungaris left (also previously weakened).  Snipe his gates away and he would be stuck same as me.  Misery loves company.

You know where I'm going.......

The flame went ok but both demo weapons missed.  The curse of the Shaltari is having so few shots. And being Limited weapons they were all gone.  The Gharial gambled and lost ( ba da dum!  word play, the tournament was held in Vegas! ).  Being an aggressive move on my opponents end of the table he was at risk.  My only hope was that is P4 passive saves could help him live one more turn.  It didn't.  A shot from a firedrake, coyote and Braves overwhelmed his passive saves and he died.

End Game

My opponents AA destroyed my gates that had nothing to do with my Infantry all tied up in CQB.  My AA and Warspear shot down his few Spirit and Haven Gates.  We were both at a stand still and we called it.  I scored my few intel and my uncontested Focal Point.  My opponent got a couple of points from Kill Points bonuses.  

Final:  5 to 15.  

Other Quick Thoughts:

-  My opponents Firedrake was not as scary as I was expecting.  My skimmers survived mostly unharmed.

-  A Jaguar by itself is not much of a threat.  He didn't do much and I probably could have played him better.  Doesn't help that he was staring at a Leopard brick.  2 E10 shots is as effective as the blowing wind to a Leopard brick.  

-  Birdeaters, although needing to be gated on, can be effective due to their ability to climb buildings.  It gives them great LOS over most of the board.  

-  I could have saved some Kill Points by retreating my gates once my plan was "cooked."  Laziness on my part.
-  Losing a commander is a lot of Kill Points as you count the commander value as well.  If you sacrifice a commander make it late game and make it worth it.  

-  Jeff