SAWS – The Missions

It’s been a while since I’ve done a pre-event mission look (I have done one, right?).  That’s probably because many events I go to don’t actually post their missions in advance.  SAWS has pre-posted its missions, and so I’m going to go through them and see what I think and what I think I can’t do (and its lots).  We’ll note that due to my writing it so close to the event, I wasn’t able to squeeze it in to post before the event without bumping my list to after the event.  So I’ve squeezed it in afterwards, but will do better for QCR.

Beyond the missions SAWS assigns 5 secret missions, one of which has to be used each game and cannot be repeated.  These super-secret missions are:

1.       Kill all enemy spellcasters

2.       Kill the most expensive enemy character

3.       Eliminate over half your opponents models

4.       Have more units in their deployment then they do in yours

5.       Capture more standards than your opponent

 

I think I can get 4 and 5 easily, since I put my entire army in their deployment while giving them no incentive to move to mine.  I also can’t lose standards, so I only need to capture 1 to earn that one.  I don’t think I could earn 1-3, though 1 and 2 are possible given the right opponent.  I figure I automatically give up 1 and 4 should they want them, can’t give up 5 and give up 2 and 3 fairly easily.  Giving up or not giving up these doesn’t affect my score except for the points I give up in the game as they earn them.

All missions are 101 points for minor victory and 301 points for major victory.

Now the missions, they are as follows:

1.       Magic Flux

2.       King of the Hill

3.       Battle of Attrition

4.       Wildwood

5.       Battle for the Pass

Magic Flux

This mission is basically battle line with 2 changes.  The first is that spell casters are worth an extra 50 victory points and at the beginning of each magic phase each die is rolled and on a ‘1’ is given to the other player.  This should mean that I’ll end up with more dispel dice then I normally will have and as I have no wizards it won’t slow down my magic phase nor cause me to give up additional points.  The player with the most wizards gets +1 to go first, not me.

King of the Hill

This mission is basically Watchtower, but the building is a hill and winner of the hill is determined by most models.  Also, the hill is worth only 200 points.  The hill also prevents new units from being summoned within 4” of the hill.  I can see this being an ok mission for me, after all, if I’m lucky my entire army could come on the last turn and claim the hill.  I also might be able to use this to stretch out my opponent’s line, allowing me to get points to make up for the 200 loss, but I doubt it.  I’m glad Mark moved this from mission 5, where it was last turn as it was a shitty way to win the event.  In this mission the person with the most cavalry goes first, again not me.

Battle of Attrition

This mission is not only basically battleline, it’s basically 7^th edition.  The person with the most wizards gets +1 to go first, which isn’t me.  Units reduced to 50% wounds or fewer are worth half points, as are any unit that are fleeing.  This could be a good mission for me, assuming I don’t lose all my points through late game flees.  The 50% points could help me earn any large deathstars that I normally wouldn’t have been able to get otherwise – yippee st3, bs3 non-poisoned shooting.

Wildwood

Once again this is basically battleline.  The person with the most units with the scout special rule gets +1 to go first through – and I have 6!  Doesn’t require them to use the rule though, so I can still fake ambush.  In this mission all forests are mysterious.  And that’s it for the special rules.

Battle for the Pass

This is just plain old book mission, and one that doesn’t bother me with my special deployment much.  It does mean that my gutter runners can’t come off the sides, but only on the ends.  This could be bad should my opponent move to block me in and I’m forced to either come in way far away or be pinned to the edge right away.

 

For thoughts I’m very disappointed to not see meeting engagement.  I was really hoping for that mission so that I could roll a ‘1’ on my one deployment and manage to not deploy anything in a game.  I’m also not happy to see that the bonus on the hill mission is cavalry.  I think this makes the advantage where it already would be on this mission.  After all, with some strong empire cavalry, I could push early in the center to keep my opponent off the hill, and then take my time moving my rank and file onto the hill to claim the extra points.  I am glad to see that I won’t be getting the +1 in three games, as I feel my list would do better going second, and forcing my opponent to waste 2 turns with nothing by the engineer to go after.  Hopefully I’ll have a building or other impassible terrain piece, or even a wall to hide him behind.