What Lurks Below – Second Entry

Originally published to Miniature Trading on October 12th, 2015

This is my second and therefore unofficial entry into notalwaysyou’s What Lurks Below Fleet Challenge.

I’d like to think that many of you have seen Mind Control, although it only has 3 votes right now! 

You can almost think of this as “Mind Control 2.0”. It’s not nearly as effective or fun, but the sheer amount of stuff happening and the nature of this specific challenge let me make a fleet I couldn’t resist posting.

The Seleucis is an absolutely perfect fit for this meeting of the Mind Control strategy and this particular fleet challenge. With at least one sea monster present in the opponent’s fleet, Seleucis will always have a rival beast to toss around. If enemy monsters are eliminated, Tsuro can effectively be given a move and shoot.

Tsuro is a gimmicky Cursed serpent that relies on a die roll to control it’s enemies, but it does work on a 5 or 6. Again, Tsuro could receive a move action from Seleucis at some point during the game, and then be given a regular action to attack. However, especially in the early stages of the game, Seleucis and Tsuro will stay docked at the home island, causing chaos in the opposing fleet while remaining immune to shoot actions.

The Bloody Jewel is outfitted with an explorer and none other than Lady Baptiste. Lady Baptiste may seem out of place with no EA/SAT crew or even a captain, but she serves a vital purpose. Baptiste will be the one to bang on the infamous Kraken Gong. Her reroll will give her a second whack at the fickle instrument, hoping for a deadly Kraken to emerge from it’s lurking below and freak out the enemy ships. Especially in a smaller game like this, the presence of a new Kraken could be a real game-changer. Lastly, rolling a 1 early on could be great for this fleet, since it could eliminate a Kraken in another fleet for this challenge.

The rest of the ships were chosen with the sole purpose of finding UT’s. I generally try to maximize the potential of my gimmicks working, and if a fleet suffers in creativity as a result, so be it. All four ships (and probably not the Jolly Mon) will swarm out and try to find the UT’s. Maps of Alexandria will aid in this process, and if the maps reveal that an important UT such as the Gong is within reach of the enemy, all available ships (including the Bloody Jewel) can swarm the enemy and try to steal it back, which could be effective with so many potential rams. In this case of a UT panic (I invented a new strange term! lol), Seleucis adds flexibility by allowing Tsuro to move L+L per turn to catch any opponent that has a desirable UT. Also, with so many runners available, it’s likely that at least one good UT will be found. The goal with Chariot of the Gods was to put Baptiste on Tsuro to reroll the controlling ability, but bringing in a Kraken is more important. If everything goes right, perhaps Baptiste could command Tsuro after she summons a Kraken. (Maybe she’d even like her new role more than the Golden Medusa (despite her flavor text lol) and become the new Hag of Tortuga!)

For those of you who will complain about the potentially detrimental effects of the Cursed Conch and Elizabeth’s Piece of Eight being used against me: this fleet is all about maximizing the gimmick, and that’s about it. Those two UT’s a great for mind control, especially with this challenge.

I hope to test this fleet sometime. It doesn’t have a true gunship, but with the amount of possible scenarios (even just winning by having more gold with all the runners), it will be fun and chaotic. Thanks for reading – comment and vote! 

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