The world’s first Fallout: Factions tournament has concluded with a top-dog crowned after some fierce fighting. The Goonhammer team are sad to report none of them came out on top, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have some thoughts of our experience.

Lenoon

Walton Goggins did me in.

A fantastic day spent playing a fantastic game with fantastic people. In the lead-up I definitely felt that I hadn’t done enough gaming preparation (spending much more time playing Fallout 4 than reading the rules), but felt quite secure in my list, which I thought would operate like this:

• Unkillable Paladin area-murders weaklings for two turns before wiping out a leader with Storm (3)
• Vertibird dropped Knight-with-machete charges through the backline like an uncontrollable Brahmin
• Initiates scurry around searching for chems
• Protectron does general utility stuff

Some of that worked! Some. I played five great games, won two, felt that a third could have gone either way with some better choices, lost one outright and have no idea how I could have done anything but lose another. Thank you to everyone I played with, you were fantastic and I had a blast!

Instead of going blow by blow on the games, I want to have a look at the assumptions above and what I’ve learned – I want to play a lot more Fallout, and that’s what competitive players do, right?

1. Unkillable Paladin. The Brotherhood Paladin with Lifegiver is absolutely unkillable, provided that you don’t leave them exhausted in the open with 5+ enemy models to activate. I did this twice and lost the Paladin immediately both times. Stand in the open with one or two activations left for the enemy? Yeah ok. Let the entire enemy crew fire uninterrupted fast weaponry and expect to tank it all – not doable! I might even ditch Lifegiver for Ricochet, because that’s funny – and punishes the raider who tries to chip off a harm!
2. Area weapons. In one test game, the area Gatling murdered two gangers and caused another to flee off the table, which I then thought was the best idea possible. I got suckered (twice!) into risky shots by the prospect of a nice group of enemies, spreading a fair bit of harm but having nothing to follow up with. If you’re shooting area weapons (particularly four dice area weapons), you should expect to spread harm but not kill – follow up as soon as you can with fast weapons to get the chip kills. I want to stick with the Gatling because Storm (3) is very good, but I certainly felt the effects of slow – perhaps a flamer might be a better option?
3. Vertibird Knight Using this ploy was great fun, but the Knight needs a fast weapon. The Machete just didn’t hack it (a-ha!). If you’re going to go down the charge and deep strike route, you need a Ripper, ideally upgraded to add Pierce to the already nasty Maim. The idea to charge-kill-charge-kill is a good one, but you’ve got to get the kill, or at least get the second activation – my brave knight did a lot of damage but got killed most games waiting for his second swing.
4. Initiates and Chems. This worked well, and I’d stick with a Scribe hanging about with a Strong Back Initiate to pick up chems. That Initiate would be better with a Combat Rifle, but a Recon Hunting Rifle would let me save some points – Strong back would let them rummage, aim and shoot in a single round.
5. Protectron. The basic Protectron model is absolutely fantastic, a straight upgrade for the Brotherhood compared to an Initiate or Aspirant with laser rifle, and a good way to get some tough, accurate fast shooting in too. Don’t leave home without one.
6. Bodies! I never felt hideously outnumbered, but taking a few cheaper bodies (Scribes with a 10mm are the Brotherhood’s cheapest pieces in Tournament play at 19 caps) who I don’t expect to achieve much beyond chip harm would have been better than taking more expensive bodies who don’t achieve much. Swapping out an Initiate for another Scribe is high on my list for next time.
7. The Ghoul. Don’t bother shooting at the bugger, kill everything else, especially if your choice is Super Mutant Master with Plasma Pistol or Walton Goggins. Both will fuck you up, but one is killable.

There’s a lot to work on there, but I think the heart of the list and the concept behind it is good, though all I’d definitely keep at this point is a Protectron and the Charge+Ripper+Vertibird Drop Knight.

I’ll be keenly looking out for more Modiphius events – partially because they were all such nice people, and partially because I enjoyed playing every opponent I faced. I’d like to see you all again on the battlefield, where I’ll have learnt from my mistakes in order to make entirely new, worse, ones. Ad Victoriam!

Josh

I got my ass kicked and all I got was this lousy Eyebot.

No, but really. This was my first time ever at a tournament of any kind and I had a total blast. It was fun to rock up and meet so many new (and some not so new) faces and chat while we celebrated a new game we were all enjoying. It was amazing to see every crew with some paint on them stacked against each other on the tables.

My plan of keeping it simple fell as part as I forgot too many things but I did very good in the first-half. Like Lenoon, I’m not going to do be a play-by-play (because it’d be blunder after blunder), but I’ll hit the top-notes.

• Wonder Boy did amazing, and went down a total of once to a list that felt hyper-optimised to do such things. Party Boy was more of a threat than it was actively useful in my games.
• Rocket Boy and his Missile Launcher were great… when I rolled well with it. Obviously that sounds like a no-brainer but there is an inherent swinginess to it that can’t be boosted with bonus dice due to it being an area weapon.
• What did work well all the time though was Strong Back. After firing off a missile, he would stomp straight up and rummage up some Chems to feed the rest of my team. This was an excellent combo.
• The Protectron. It did wonders, especially in Wasteland Raiders. Due to how the Roboteer perk works he gave up no points for missions that counted ratings as kill points (but it did turn the Roboteer into a high value target), and it was armed with a Fast laser-rifle equivalent.  Best of all? There was nothing stopping me from using the Oh Yeah! Ploy to overdose him into a murder-machine despite robots not being actually able to take chems. (This worked once! A whole once!!!)
• My numbers are mostly just right. I can out-body teams like the Brotherhood and drown them in shots, and I can tackle teams bigger than mine. (in theory…) I think Wasteland Raiders are a strong contender for being all-rounders, especially due to their ability to stack Power Armour.

Overall, I did better than I expected which honestly caused me more frustration than I thought it would. I had a great first two games, both close, and then I proceeded to get absolutely demolished in the last three games as I matched up with people with many many many more hours under their belt than I. (They were all literally the games’ developers!)

There’s something to be said about managing that frustration in the moment. I’m autistic, I struggle to process some emotions more than others, and frustration is a real tough one for me. It isn’t to say I’m not in control of my emotions and turned into a frothing embodiment of Nerd Rage, but there were definitely moments I had to centre myself and remember failing at something is the way to get better at it. I’m sure it’s a universal feeling for a lot of us but for me in particular that frustration could have overwhelmed me years ago.

Ultimately, I took my breathers, let that feeling go, and remembered that the last thing I ever want to be is a bad memory for someone else over something as simple as getting my butt kicked at a miniatures game. Anything negative was gone by the time we had a few pints and a curry.

I felt I did well for just having three or so games under my belt. I’m excited to get more in, and I’m headhunting games locally to dig into whilst I paint up the few prizes I got.

As for the painting contest, I felt very satisfied with my paint job and with not being the winner. There were some amazingly painted crews, but ultimately I knew from the moment I saw the Stars ‘n’ Bars crew they were going to win it. They rocked, and we love to see a funky idea get executed well. I’ll get ‘em next time for sure.

Rich

Is it even a tournament if you’re not still painting the day before?

I hit a real wall around the Wednesday before the event – I’d gotten most of the way through my power armor, although I felt something was missing, but in the meantime I’d started painting my Scavvers and Psychos and just completely lost motivation. Sometimes though, it turns out that perseverance is really the only answer. I kept picking at the gang over the next couple of days, and ended up with something that’s not quite perfect, but that I am pretty happy with. I even went back to add some freehand markings after these photos were taken. Warthog’s Wastelanders were ready to roll out.

Really, they rolled out and got rolled in roughly equal measure. I won two games and lost three, but had an absolute blast across all of them (even when being dismantled incredibly quickly). Thanks to my opponents Luke, Greg, Chris, Justin and Tom for five fantastic games!

I really like the Wasteland Raiders – I think they’ve got a nice mix of some scary threats in the Butchers and Boss, with enough mooks to still engage in some action economy wrangling too. I do think that they feel quite reliant on chems to make a dent – in two of the three games I lost I had bad rummage rolls, or couldn’t get to the markers, and not being able to claim the chems really slowed me down. The ploy to pick a rare chem is really valuable too – a free dose of PsychoJet at the right moment can be a lifesaver!

The missile launcher did work all event, as expected. The flamer was reasonably good, but maybe not as impactful as I was hoping. The minigun was a real heartbreaker. When it hits, good lord it hits – in storm range it becomes one of the only guns that can reliably trigger the instant kill from doubling your target’s endurance. It’s slow, though, and can really make it feel like you’re not getting the most from your Boss’s great statline.

For my next run-out, there are going to be a couple of changes. I’m definitely removing Steady Aim from my flamethrower Butcher; in my hasty listbuilding I had missed that bonus dice can’t be applied to area weapons. I’m also going to drop Ricochet from my Boss. It seems like fun, but despite my boss being shot a lot over the day, it never triggered once. I’d like to see something make this happen slightly more often, as it does seem like fun. I think I’m also going to try running the non-power-armoured Veteran champion instead of one of the Butchers, and put some extra bodies on the board.

Overall, the weekend has left me thrilled about the game, and I’m really keen to play some more!

Neon

Well that didn’t go to plan.

I’m not gonna sugarcoat it, I got slaughtered. Turns out that drugs and Deathclaws wasn’t the one true path to victory. But that’s okay! We get back up, pick up the last of our teeth off the blood soaked floor and limp away with what little dignity we can scrape together.

Dropping the bit, I honestly had a fantastic time at the GHO. Just damn good vibes all around from everyone involved. I had some serious fun and can’t wait for the next time.

Speaking of that next time though, I’ve got some thoughts on how to change things up with how I approach things going in…

1. Ditch the Deathclaw. The poor thing is just a massive 70 cap liability thanks to having no way to deal with Fatigue. For the same cost you can get a Yao Guai that’s just as killy, just as resilient but can shrug off all those annoying lil’ Suppress tests that the Deathclaw’s Int 1 just cannot deal with. Or hell for less I could have gotten a second Power Armoured Butcher with all the trimmings. Out of 5 games my poor Mama Claw spent 3 of them being crowd controlled by a single yahoo with a rusty rifle, and then eating dirt on the other 2.
2. Ranged>Melee. My gang had about an even split between melee gangers and ranged gangers and that was a mistake. Ranged has a big advantage in Fallout: Factions and you gotta leverage that. Melee threats are for bullying units off objectives and cleaning up after the firing stops.
3. Fast is a ridiculous weapon trait. If you see fast weapons in your options, take ‘em. Being able to shoot twice in a single activation is a game changer.

In general as well I think I’ve gotta learn to play a little more methodically. I’m not gonna lie, I’m very not used to playing games with alternating activations and it puts me into a strange hurried state of mind as compared to other games. I really need to metaphorically slap myself and just chill the hell out, think things through a tiny bit more.

What’s next for us?

Josh

I’m honestly very satisfied with my progress into the game right now. The Makeout Creek Marauders have enough versatility in how I field them that I won’t feel trapped but I definitely need more games under my belt to get a better grasp of the system.

This means one thing: Expansion.

I’m not personally interested in other raider Crews right now, despite having my ass-kicked by them, but if I find the Nuka World box cheap enough I’ll snag it and cook up some lists to let people play down at my local.

If not, my personal interest will be getting another sprue of Wasteland Raiders when they come out to round out my force, and side-grading into more esoteric support pieces – I want more robots, critters, and specifically the King of the Park wasteland legend.

Thankfully, I’ve come away very well from the tournament in that regard. I’ve gotten myself a Bottle & Cappy, which I’m going to paint up in a Nuka Quantum neon blue, and a box of X-01 power armor which is going to contribute to my raider roster in the form of new Butchers and Bosses.

One thing I’m very excited for is more robots! I already have a box of Mr. Handys on the way to paint up for next month, and I got an Eyebot which was split amongst us. I hope the Factions team include more robots in the mix because I’d love a Sentry Bot or something insane to make a centrepiece for my next Crew.

My main line of thinking is that if I build a wide-range of ‘neutrals’ then I’ll give myself more options when Crews I’m interested in release, which right now is mainly the Survivors. I’ve got some theory I want to put into practice when those come out.

Other than that, I want some terrain to take with me down to the FLGS so that I’m not forced to isekai a bunch of 1950s alt-history bozos into the grim darkness of the 41st millennium. I’m thinking of some Wild West MDF kits. (truthfully I might end up using some of the Octarius junk-piles I have laying around alongside them though.)

Rich

For me, I think I’ve got three main goals for Fallout: Factions now. Step 1, get a second gang built so that I can begin roping people into playing the game with me! I’m not sure what that’ll be – the upcoming plastics from the standalone rulebook all look amazing, but I might also be tempted to put together one of the more esoteric crews like the Zetans. Or perhaps both.

Step 2, get a table to play on at home. I was lucky enough to come away from the event with one of the nice neoprene game mats, so that’s one obstacle down. In the short term I think I’m going to buy a couple of the card terrain sets, which are currently up for preorder. They’re great quality for the price, and the boards we used at the weekend featured 2 sets each and were plenty dense enough. Longer term, I’ve got some of the Modiphius STLs for Dry Rock Gulch, so I’ll be making the nuclear cowboy theme park zone of my dreams.

Step 3 is to add some robots, critters and Legends to my collection. The four of us each came home with an Eyebot, and I’m keen to replicate others’ success with Protectrons. I’m definitely not going to be able to resist Securitrons, either, even if I have to proxy one as a Protectron.

Lenoon

Next up is finishing a few more options for my Brotherhood – Ripper Knight, some Initiates, a second Scribe and a flamer Knight. Then I can approach list building with all the tools I need to implement some of the changes I’ve identified above.

After that, I need a table but more pressingly I need a second warband – Survivors or Raiders, I think, picking up some of the ghouls from Modiphius to do a rather different looking survivor band. After that? Top three in the next tournament, or the one after that, or after that…

Neon

Next up for me is rounding out my collection so far. And there’s only one, glorious faction I have to go…

That’s right baby, it’s Mothman time. And I’m going all in. Not just the gang, but a table’s worth of terrain to go along with them as well. And should my schedule allow it this year, I might be tempted to try my hand at making a display table for the whole shebang…

Closing Thoughts

So that’s it for our preparation for, and experience of, playing competitive Fallout: Factions at the Goonhammer Open! Thanks for following along with our journey getting to grips with the game – clearly we all love it, it’s a really fun system and we urge you to give it a try if you have even a passing interest in the setting. We also enjoyed meeting and playing Goonhammer members at the event, thanks very much for your support!

There will be plenty more Fallout content on the way from us, including a full review of the Wasteland Raiders kit that some of us used this weekend, and which is up for pre-order at the moment.

Are you excited for Fallout: Factions? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. Want articles like this linked in your inbox every Monday morning? Sign up for our newsletter. And don’t forget that you can support us on Patreon for backer rewards like early video content, Administratum access, an ad-free experience on our website and more.