The Skarre Bomb
So it’s summer 2006 and bunch of us are playing Warmachine in a friend’s basement. The matchup is my undead Cryx army led by Pirate Queen Skarre vs Grady’s knights of the Protectorate of Menoth led by High Exemplar Kreoss. Leading up to this, Grady spends the entire day telling me how impossible it will be to beat him and he had a plan to make sure his Warcaster was going to be basically invincible. Now Warmachine plays a lot like chess where the game will automatically end if you lose your army leader (or Warcaster), so protecting them is a major priority. The game is also known to be incredibly unforgiving at times and not knowing what a single piece on the board will do can cost you the game very quickly. So Skarre had this trick the community affectionately called the “Skarre Bomb” where she could sacrifice one of her own troopers to deal a potentially lethal amount of damage to any model inside of 12” of her. No need to check for line of sight, or obstructions or blocking models or even roll to hit, just a straight damage roll on 3 dice. Grady had no idea this was a thing, got within range and one dice roll later I was saying “good game.” He sits there in silence and I can actually see him start going through the stages of grief. He picks up the Kreoss model and while intently staring into the little metal model he starts asking me questions like if I misplayed, asking to see the rules, asking if there a way of avoiding the damage. After seemingly all other options were exhausted Grady shrugs and hurls Kreoss into the concrete wall in his basement.
My original Skarre model in all her glory.