Congratulations to our top 4 players from the Fall 2023 Escalation tournament! It has been a really fun time getting to this point with many changes in the standings. The playoffs will be 350pt games with a 2 hour time limit and 18pt gambit. Without further ado, here are the players and squads competing in the first round of the players:

thereisnotry:

http://www.bloomilk.com/Squad/249490/a-hord-of-sith-350

--A Hord of Sith 350--
63 Darth Bane, Sith'ari
50 Darth Cognus
48 Darth Zannah
42 Tulak Hord, Lord of Hate
40 Imperial Agent
39 Sith Eternal Emperor
18 Dark Force Nexus
17 Vongerella, Dark Jedi
14 Exar Kun, Dark Force Spirit
10 Sith Guard x2
6 Ugnaught Demolitionist x2
3 XT-6 Droid

(350pts. 14 activations)


Map: Rancor Pen

Overly28:

http://www.bloomilk.com/Squad/249648/inquisitorious-victorious--ge-fall-2023-

--Inquisitorious Victorious (GE Fall 2023)--
100 Darth Sidious, Sith Mastermind
41 The Inquisitor, Jedi Hunter
45 Second Sister (Trilla Suduri)
35 Darth Vader, The Emperor's Fist
35 Third Sister (Reva)
32 Ninth Sister (Masana Tide)
27 Wilhuff Tarkin
15 Sith Holocron
8 R7 Astromech Droid
8 Teek
3 Ugnaught Demolitionist

(349pts. 11 activations)

Map: Rhen Var

DarthMaim:

--StEiffel Tower 350--
60 Raskta Lsu
56 Revan, The Prodigal Knight
46 Ven Zallow, Jedi Master
37 Satele Shan
33 Bastila Shan, Jedi Master
32 Xesh
27 General Vaklu, Defender of Onderon
18 Arca Jeth, Jedi Spirit
11 Teethree (T3-M4)
8 Wicket
3 Mouse Droid
9 Ugnaught Demolitionist x3
6 XT-6 Droid x2
2 Kneesaa, Ewok Princess

(348pts. 17 activations)


Map = Rhen Var


http://www.bloomilk.com/Squad/249661/steiffel-tower-350

spryguy1981:

http://www.bloomilk.com/Squad/250042/cinful-bliss

--Cinful Bliss--
66 Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi General
48 Cin Drallig, Jedi Battlemaster
47 General Skywalker
39 Quinlan Vos, Double Agent
36 Master Tholme
30 Serra Keto
29 Aayla Secura, Jedi Knight
16 Qui-Gon Jinn, Force Spirit
9 R2-D2, Astromech Droid
8 Mas Amedda
8 Wicket
5 Spaarti Clone Trooper Demolitionist
3 Ugnaught Demolitionist
3 Mouse Droid
2 Kneesaa, Ewok Princess

(349pts. 15 activations)

Map: Rhen Var

Tint and I are kick-starting the playoffs tomorrow at high noon (est)

Overley28 defeats Spry on Rhen Var 359-327

Both had Rhen Var I lost map roll so set up on left.

R1: Positioning - I was able to get into gambit with Reva.

R2: I roll a 1 so Spry wins initiative. A little more positioning with a few doors being blown open in the middle. Reva uses force push to kill the spaarti. Tarking uses his movement CE to move ninth sister 6 squares to set up a charging assault and force attuned Repulse that Kills R2 and hits 4 other jedi. Spry makes all 4 activation saves. The ninth sister dies to brutal strike by Aayla and 1 last finishing force lightning by quinlan. The sith holocron dies as well after losing the ninth sister and activating. Tholme heals Quinlan the 30 back. I get gambit

R3: I win with Sidious CE. Spry goes first with a little more positioning with fodder pieces on both sides. I move Teek too far and Skywalker gets him with GMA and moves away. Sidious moves and lightnings Cin for 50 who save 16 for activation. The grand inquisitor moves and force pushes him for 40 to kill Cin. Aayla comes up to Sidious uses Brutal strike and CRITS TWICE to leave him at 50. Tholme heals Aalya 30. Vader uses his Dominant Force Grab on Aayla. Trilla then moves and hits Tholme for 30. Quinlan leaves Sidious at 30 health. I get Gambit

R4: I win initiative but Tholme has Sidious suppressed and swaps rolls to go first. Using Keto to kill Sidious with Lightsaber Throw while adjacent. Vader uses Grab again dealing 20 to Aayla. Grand Inquisitor uses spinning blade. Hits Aayla, gets Makashi save - hits Tholme, who defenses - hits Keto who makashi saves - hits Quinlan for 40 - hits Skywalker who defenses and fails the djem so. Obi Wan hits Trilla who parry saves. Tarkin attacks Aayla and misses, using the CE to move Trilla away from Obi and get next to Aayla who Makashis the first 2 attacks then crits on the 3rd and fails the makashi to kill Aayla. Quinlan attacks grand inquisitor who ripostes and each deal damage to each other. Spry crits with Quinlan on Grand Inquisitor and Tholme heals Quinlan. Reva attacks Keto and deals 30 damage after 1 makashi save and 1 failed save. Skywalker is able to then finish off the Grand Inquisitor. Both of us get gambit.

R5: Spry wins initiative and attacks Trilla with LS Throw but misses. Reva moves and kills Quinlan with Ambush for 60. Obi attacks and leaves Tarkin at 10 health. Trilla LS Throws and kills Keto and then hits Tholme with an attack leaving him at 60. Vader moves next to Tholme, gives an AOO which hits, Vader djem so styles and brings him down to 40. then Vader stops movement and hits Tholme with the next 2 attacks to finish him off. Wicket crits on Trilla who reflects and Wicket saves. Skywalker (60 hp) attacks Vader (110 hp) and get into a Djem So frenzy and Vader lives with 30 hp left and killing Anakin. There were about 4 djem so styles each way here. Tholme attacks and kills Vader.

R6: I win initiative and Spry swaps rolls with the Ghost. Tholme attacks 3 times and gets 1 attack through parry on Trilla. Trilla misses an attack, then kills tholme but gets avoid defeat and misses the 3rd attack. Tarkin goes and pushes Reva with his CE between Tholme and Wicket. Reva then doubles and kills both of them and also the ghost. My uggie kills kneesa. Spry's uggie crits and kills Tarkin with Spry as he says why not have another crit this game? and then does. Spry gets gambit but I reach over 350.

Overall this was an insane back and forth game. I thought I would win, then thought Spry would win and back and forth a few times. Great game and it was definitely well played and a fun one for sure!

Drew and I are scheduled for Thursday evening at 8:00 pm Central (9:00 Eastern).

I am Drew. Though I wish I made it to the champs, I did not.

DarthMaim and spryguy have decided to forgoe the matchup to determine 3rd and 4th place, so it will be just Overly28 and thereisnotry battling it out this week.

thereisnotry defeats Overley28

I guess you could read this summary, but it's probably better to just watch the video that Bryan made of the game (see the link above). Vader gave Force Attuned to all Inquisitors. Tulak gave Distraction to Zannah, Exar haunted Cognus, and Vongerella gave an extra FP to Bane.

I won the map roll, which turned out to be a huge deal. Overley chose to set up on the right. I set up in such a way that my Agent could draw a nasty LOS in the first round.

Round 1: Basic intuition and advancement of pieces. However, toward the end of the round my Agent used IF to swap forward into a position from which he could draw a nasty LOS on the 9th Sister, who was unactivated. I rolled a 2 on the first of my attacks, but it still hit because he was out of range of the Indimidation abilities. The end result was that she took 90dmg (made one of the Dark Armor saves) and I got gambit. Gambit for me, 18-0.

Round 2: Overley won init and let me go first since neither of us had a significant offensive play to make. Door blasting, fodder spinning. Then after another IF swap my Agent was able to draw another nasty LOS across the board, this time targeting Tarkin...that was the end of him. The 10hp 9th Sister now ran 12 and used Repulse 3 (via Force Attuned) to put 30dmg on both Tulak and Cognus. Tulak used Sith Reflexes to LS Throw the Sister to death. Cognus made her save to remain ready. (There was an initial mix-up about using Force Attuned after using a Replaces Turn ability, but we resolved it easily enough.) Tulak moved up to put 60dmg on Reva (down to 30hp) with Rage/Jarkai, and then took 30dmg on the AoO as he moved away. Vader moved up to grip Tulak for 10 more damage (down to 50hp now), so Tulak said, "Enough of this!" and Teleported to safety. Bane moved up to kill Reva and Teek, and also 30dmg on Vader. The Nexus used Easy Path to return Bane to safety. [Contrary to what they said in the video commentary, I wasn't playing cagey...I was trying to bait the Imperials to come into my Sidious' LOS so that I could do some devastating stuff to them; it was a setup.] The Emperor and the Inquisitor teamed up to spend a bunch of FP to destroy my 90hp Cognus (Zap for 50, Push for 40), which also eliminated Exar...a huge move! However, this brought some people into my Sidious' LOS, which allowed me to do the devastating combo that I had been wanting to unleash from the start: Sidious used Sith Battle Manipulation to pull the Inquisitor JH, and Sidious, and Vader into a clump. Then I used Drain Life 5 on all of them (Inquisitor made his save, but the others each took 50dmg). Then Zannah used Force Corruption to put 30dmg more on each of them...that was 190dmg all at once (and all 3 of them need to make a corruption save at the start of their next turn). This left the Inquisitor at 90hp, Emperor at 70, and Vader at 20. 2nd Sister moved up for a 30dmg LS Throw on Zannah, but Zannah rolled a 19 on her SSM save, and so (via LS Combat Expert) she sent it back at 2nd Sis. Vongerella bravely charged forward to serve as a meatshield for the start of the next round, when the Imperials would surely win init. I also moved my XT-6 droid to within 4 of the Agent, because he had only been marginally effective so far this game. Gambit for both, 153-82.

Round 3: Sidious rolled a 1 for init! Ugh. I went first; Bane used Force Focus and then Force Lightning to put 50dmg each on 2nd Sis, Inquistor, and Sidious (down to 40, 40, 20 respectively). Then I sac'ed my XT-6 droid to allow the Agent to eliminate the Inquisitor and miss Sidious. 2nd Sis destroyed Vongerella (failed LS Defense). Tulak came up for a big raging jarkai attack against 2nd Sis, but she made both her Parry saves. Vader killed an Ugnaught whom I had sent forward as a body-blocker. Sidious then zoomed in for an Assault on Tulak, hitting the first attack (failed SSM), which resulted in Tulak using Sith Reflexes to Teleport to kill Vader, who then made his Djem So save and killed Tulak (failed SSM again). Zannah then used the Nexus' force points to Corrupt again, killing Sidious and dropping 2nd Sis to 10hp. Gambit for both, 362-165.


I received a significant advantage by winning the map roll. That allowed for some evil sniper shots in the first 2 rounds, which put me ahead in the damage race. (During our discussion after the match, we agreed that the Agent would've been significantly less impactful if we had played on Rhen Var, and that map also would've allowed the Imperials to approach more safely and quickly.) Overley had some good counterplay to eliminate Cognus/Exar, but then I did 340 unanswered dmg via forcepowers at the end of that round and the start of the next, which basically ended things. I likely would've lost if it had come down to a melee slugfest without all that damage going out, since his pieces were all doing 30dmg with Jedi Hunter and many had melee defenses of various sorts. Well played by Overley, despite an uphill battle on a difficult map. And big thanks to Mando, for organizing and running this event! Fun times, as always.