Majestic 13: Operation Eye Exam

 What's this? Another game report already? Yes, I know it's rare that I actually play more than one game a month, but I had a couple reasons to set up for another game of Majestic 13 after Monday's game. First and foremost, it's just fun. Second, to inaugurate some newly finished terrain - a set of three prepainted MDF residential trailers from Black Site Studios. And three, I'm trying to take better care of my mental health this year and one of the things I've found to be really good for me is getting the table cleared off and playing games. 

I had started the BSS trailer park kit back in November, gotten side tracked, and came back and finished the last unassembled trailer (as well as gluing all the windows into all three trailers) this week while riding the high of Monday's game. Between these, the Bingo Hall (also from BSS), gas station and the 3D-printed doughnut shop, I'm able to put together a properly dense urban table, and that makes me really happy. 

 

So for tonight's mission, Keel's Killers were assigned to hunt down an "Ocular Enigma," an elusive and stealthy creature with the ability to inflict psychosomatic blindness on anyone trying to harm it; as a secondary mission, they needed to collect two supply drops on the monster's side of the table. The characters who collected each drop would receive a +1 to damage rolls for the remainder of the game. The Killers are, as always, from Hasslefree Miniatures, while the Ocular Enigma is a Reaper Bones "Hivewarden" I painted back in 2018 with an eye towards using in Fistful of Lead: Galactic Heroes as a pulpy Big-Eyed Monster.

I also had an interloper early on that threatened to make the game much more challenging:

Fortunately, he was lured off the table before he sneezed on any of my MDF. 

The first two turns were a bit clown shoes; the Killers were passing their saves to avoid blindness, but failing their attack rolls or succeeding and rolling minimum (or nearly minimum) damage. For it's part, the Ocular Enigma just skedaddled around its half of the board, moving from cover to cover to try and avoid being seen. 

Johanna Keel got close, lined up a shot, passed her blindness...and then, because the creature had partial cover behind the dumpster, needed to roll twice and take the worse result for her attack roll.

Could have been a critical hit, but not. Critical fumble. Thanks dice. Turn 2 also saw our FUBAR result for the game:

 

A Time-Space Distortion struck abruptly; most of the Killers maintained their footing, but Agent Arnold was flung 11" off the doughnut shop roof, taking falling damage on top of the damage from the FUBAR. The Enigma was also bounced off a chain-link fence by the distortion, dealing more damage than the Killers had up to that point. 

Turn 3, Agent Barker was struck blind by the Enigma, while Agents Arnold and Keel managed to seize the two supply objectives. 

Keel wasn't alone however, with the Enigma sneaking up behind her. Moseley was struck blind by the creature, as was Keel when she activated again; the monster, seizing the opportunity, lashed out with its "Poisonous Visions" attack; both Keel and Moseley, despite being blind, are assailed with disorienting, nauseating visions, dealing psychic damage to both of them and inflicting the "Poisoned" status effect on both of them, halving their movement until it's cleared. The monster then darted for its next patch of cover (I imagine it making the Zoidberg "woop-woop-woop-woop" noise as it goes). 

I have tokens for the "Stunned" and "Pinned" conditions, but I really need to get proper "Blinded" and "Poisoned" ones for Majestic 13.

Agent Arnold, sick of the monster's shit, called in a drone strike on Turn 4. Moseley, clearing his Blindness but not his Poisoned status, and Klass managed to get their respective acts together and start putting lead into the Enigma, while Barker remains Blinded. 

Seeing an opening, the Enigma scales the doughnut shop to attack still-blind Barker despite having taken enough damage to activate its "Extremis" state (in which it takes bonus damage but gains an extra action). Klass and Arnold both manage to shoot the creature again, while Keel and Moseley, both still Poisoned, attempt to limp into position for another shot. 

 

Unfortunately, the mission ended then with the conclusion of Turn 5; the monster was sitting pretty at 7 hit points out of its original 115. One more turn (or one fewer failed shooting rolls) and this could have been a victory.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about the design decision to have games last exactly 5 turns, no more; I think it's an excellent decision that forces strategic thinking beyond simply outlasting the monster and keeps games from degenerating into slogs. 

Rolling in the post-game, I did pretty well since nobody was put Out of Action by the monster; everyone boosted their Combat skill rating (and Barker also boosted his Dexterity), and the Bureaucracy approved one of my two requested sniper rifles (assigned to Moseley) and my base upgrade: Keel's Killer's center of operations now boasts "Upgraded Point Defense Systems," which means whenever I undertake a Special Mission (in which I'm fighting directly against the soldiers of FORCE, the alien organization dropping monsters on Earth), my enemies start the game down by 1D6+3 hit points. 

This is particularly useful, since my team rating has advanced to "3" which means my next mission is my first Special Mission. Which means I better get my FORCE strike team painted up soon.