Guild Ball (#43): Corsair vs Obulus - 4+ is the new 5+

I have been having a bunch of friends over for my annual boardgaming birthday party. I managed to squeeze in a game of Guild Ball between the Dominion, Kingdomino, Splendor and X-Wing games. For this game, I play Corsair against Obulus.

Fishermen

Corsair
Tentacles
Hag
Sakana
Siren
Avarisse & Greede

Morticians

Obulus
Dirge
Brainpan & Memory
Ghast
Greaves
Silence


I get Field Dressing, Knee Slider and Who are Ya? Obulus kicks off.

Turn 1

Corsair: 6, Tentacles: 1, Hag: 1, Sakana: 1, Siren: 3, Avarisse: 0, Greede: 1
Obulus: 6, Dirge: 0, Brainpan: 2, Ghast: 1, Greaves: 1, Silence: 3,

Hag goes forward and kicks the ball to the squid. I dodge forward Avarisse, I think this was wrong, I should have extended Corsair's threat range instead. Also, I should have used Sakana. He can't do much useful stuff on turn one, better to move Hag later.


I pass the ball a little. Obulus pulls Avarisse forwards.

Both he and Brainpan overextend, but I miss a both a 3 dice Lure on Obulus *and* a 3 dice Drag on Brainpan. At least one of them landing on 4+ is a 98.5% chance. If I had pulled one in I could have build a ton of momentum with Corsair and taken the first takeout in Round 2.

What a terrible start to the game!

Silence hits with a nice AOE and sets Corsair, Hag, and A&G on fire.

Turn 2

Corsair: 6, Tentacles: 1, Hag: 0, Sakana: 1, Siren: 0, Avarisse: 3, Greede: 2
Obulus: 5, Dirge: 0, Brainpan: 4, Ghast: 2, Greaves: 1, Silence: 1

My super bad luck in the last turn allowed Memory to get the first takeout on Siren. The ball scatters and Barinpan picks it up and kicks, misses, and it scatters to Ghast.

In my first activation I do land a 2 dice blind on a 5 influence Obulus, though, which feels pretty good!

Corsair should on average one-round Brainpan (2 hits for Knockdown, 3 hits for 2 Damage Push into range of Hag and Avarisse, and then 4 8 dice attacks on 3+ with 1 armor should do the last 12). I whiff the first two and just do 1 damage on each. He ends up at 1 single hit point.

Siren uses her Legendary to pull in Obulus. He has no problem disentangling himself afterwards, so that was pretty pointless, actually. I think I must either hit Obulus after he is done for the turn, or just go for someone else.

Brainpan is taken out by A&G. The score is 2-2.

Turn 3

Obulus gets a nice goal. Greaves is pulled in and killed by Corsair and A&G. Hag is taken out by Ghast. 8-4 to the Morticians!

I kick the ball out to Tentacles, but it is no help.

Turn 4

Obulus steals my momentum, and next turn he makes Tentacles pass to him, and he scores again. 12-4 to the Morticians!

Post Mortem

I did some misplays the first turn, but missing everything was just sad. On the other hand, I think that if the Morticians had positioned better, I might not really have had many first turn opportunities.

I think that Shark would be a better pick. All my Close Control is useless against Obulus, and having two throw-away defense 5 models to block with makes it difficult for me to pull someone in in the first turn. Obulus is also very hard to pin down.

Putting the ball on Siren would be better here. At 5 defense it is at least a little bit risky for Obulus to try to mind control her. An alternative would be to play Salt instead of Tentacles, the low kick range and 5 defense makes him an excellent ball carrier.

Even with such a bad start it is pretty clear that I am outfighting him. Some possible replacements might be A&G -> Kraken for less damage but more Drag opportunities, and Tentacles -> Salt for better ball killing. But I suspect that Shark might just out-football the Morticians, I have to try it out now!

Well played game by my opponent!