One year after respawning

Somehow, it has been a year.

Last September, I started Respawn at Midnight as a place to write about the games and hobbies occupying far too much space in my head and, increasingly, my shelves. I didn't really know what the blog would become. I simply wanted somewhere to record games, talk about decks and crews, explore the lore behind them and occasionally investigate questions that no reasonable person had actually asked. Twelve months later, I think that last category may have become more important than originally intended.

A year of Eternal Struggle

VTES has undoubtedly become the heart of the blog. When I started writing, I was still relatively new to the game. Since then there have been new decks, tournaments, experiments, victories, spectacular failures and an alarming increase in the number of vampires living in my house.

The clans have taken me in different directions. The Ventrue appealed to the part of me that believes every supernatural conspiracy could be improved with proper governance and a sufficiently organised board meeting. The Tremere encouraged experiments, research and an entirely reasonable amount of staring at deck lists. Then came the Hecata, and apparently somewhere along the way I decided that the obvious solution to most Methuselah-related problems was necromancy.

There have been tournaments too. I was in Cambridge, made a final in Bedford, travelled to Edinburgh for the Scottish National Championship, experimented with decks ahead of the UK Nationals and spent a significant amount of time deciding what to bring. The Hecata eventually won that particular internal struggle, only for illness to keep both me and my carefully prepared corpses at home when Nationals finally arrived.

Perhaps the most enjoyable part, though, has been introducing other people to the game. Friends have joined our tables, decks have been built and rebuilt, and I've discovered the peculiar satisfaction of designing a Salubri deck for someone else only to have them use it to oust me. Task failed successfully.

Through the Breach

VTES hasn't been the only game appearing here.

My journey into Malifaux has continued as well, although opportunities to actually play remain frustratingly rare. I've taken crews through the Breach, learned the rules one mistake at a time and slowly expanded the collection.

There have been battles involving Kastore and Seamus, teaching games with Dashel Barker and the Guard, and Titania's attempt to conquer a small western town. That particular invasion ended when the local authorities introduced the Autumn Queen to rifles and an Executioner. She'll be back!

Malifaux has also given me an excuse to paint more, not just crews, but scenery. Some of that has even turned into a family project, with my daughter helping me prepare terrain before games. There is something particularly satisfying about putting a newly painted piece onto the table and immediately having imaginary people fight around it.

Experiments, rabbit holes and other questionable research

Some posts have been harder to categorise. We've looked at new cards and upcoming releases. I've written about the changing World of Darkness and what Vampire: The Masquerade Sixth Edition might mean for both the RPG and VTES. I've experimented with deck building, compared tournament results and occasionally wandered into statistics.

At one point my daughter helped me sort vampire cards alphabetically, which naturally resulted in me writing software to investigate why there seemed to be so many vampires whose names begin with A. As any respectable Tremere will tell you, research does not need to be useful to be important.

Looking back, the blog has ended up becoming a mixture of game reports, deck building, lore, opinion pieces, painting, statistics and whatever other hobby-related question happens to send me down a rabbit hole that week.

There is, however, one conspicuous absence.

In my very first post, I said that Respawn at Midnight would also be a place where I'd write about my computer gaming adventures. One year later, the number of computer game articles published stands proudly at...zero.

It's not because I stopped playing computer games. Quite the opposite. There have been plenty of digital adventures over the past year; somehow, whenever it came time to write, vampires, card games and tiny painted people kept pushing their way to the front of the queue.

Perhaps that should change. I'd happily write about the games I'm playing, old favourites I keep returning to, interesting discoveries and whatever digital world happens to consume my evenings. I just don't know whether that's something people coming here for VTES and Malifaux would actually want to read.

Which brings me rather conveniently to you.

What do you want to read?

As Respawn at Midnight enters its second year, I'm curious about what you actually enjoy reading here.

I know which articles I enjoy writing, but blogs are strange creatures. Sometimes the article you spend days researching quietly disappears into the internet, while something you wrote because you were wondering why there aren't enough vampires called Wilhelmina gets considerably more attention than expected.

So I'd love to hear from you.

Over the past year, the blog has covered (or, in one notable case, promised to cover) topics such as:

• VTES game and tournament reports – stories from actual tables, including the questionable decisions made around them.

• VTES deck building and experiments – building decks, changing strategies and discovering whether the theory survives contact with another Methuselah.

• Clans, cards and playstyles – exploring different clans, interesting cards and what makes particular strategies appealing.

• New VTES cards and releases – first impressions, ratings and thoughts about where new cards might fit.

• VTES statistics and strange investigations – tournament numbers, card data and questions nobody realised needed answering.

• Vampire: The Masquerade and World of Darkness – lore, RPG changes and what developments such as V6 could mean for VTES.

• Malifaux game reports – adventures through the Breach as I learn different crews and introduce new players.

• Malifaux crews and tactics – what I'm learning about Masters, crews and how they actually work once the cards start flipping.

• Painting, miniatures and terrain – hobby projects that eventually make their way onto the gaming table.

• Teaching games and introducing friends to the hobby – what happens when unsuspecting people encounter VTES or Malifaux for the first time.

• Computer games – my adventures on the PC, currently represented by an impressive collection of zero articles.

• General hobby stories and experiments – everything else that somehow turns into an article.

So consider this my first, extremely informal, reader survey.

What would you like to see more of in year two? More battle reports? Deck-building experiments? Deeper dives into clans and cards? More Malifaux? World of Darkness lore? Painting and hobby projects? More completely unnecessary statistics?

And importantly: would you be interested in reading about the computer games I'm playing as well?

Leave a comment, send me a message on Discord, hire a magician to project your preferences onto the night sky, whatever method you choose, just let me know what you'd like to read more of. I can't promise the results will be analysed with anything resembling proper scientific methodology, but rest assured that the Tremere Research Department will record every response, regardless of whether it arrives by comment, Discord or blood ritual.

A year ago, I started this blog without really knowing where it would go. Since then I've met players, travelled to tournaments, introduced friends to games I love, painted tiny monsters, summoned an unreasonable number of zombies and written about all of it.

Thank you to everyone who has stopped by to read, comment, share a post or simply follow along. It's been considerably more fun knowing there are people on the other side of the screen.

Year two begins here.

The game never ends, only pauses. I'll see you at the next move.

Custodian Hargrave

The Autumn Queen flies West

There aren't many opportunities for me to play Malifaux, so whenever one appears, I have developed a very sophisticated decision-making process: I say yes.

A new gaming club recently opened nearby, offering tables for local players, so obviously we had to investigate. When we arrived, the place was already busy with D&D adventurers, Star Wars: Legion armies and the distant thunder of Warhammer 40K. We, however, had brought something different. A box of strange miniatures, several decks of cards, an unreasonable amount of scenery and everything else required to briefly open the Breach in an otherwise perfectly respectable gaming club.

This time I was joined by Aaron and his son, Isaac, neither of whom had played Malifaux before. My first challenge therefore wasn't tactical at all: I had to decide which crew to give them. I eventually settled on the Guard. Dashel Barker, riflemen, mounted officers and an Executioner seemed like the perfect introduction, particularly because I suspected the western law-enforcement  theme would appeal to them. I wasn't wrong.

For myself, I had something rather less civilised planned. Over the previous few weeks I had been painting Titania and her Fae, and although the crew wasn't completely finished (several bases were still awaiting attention) I was far too impatient to leave them at home. The Autumn Queen was finally going to war.

Before any fighting could begin, however, Malifaux demanded its traditional sacrifice: fifteen minutes spent arranging tiny buildings until everyone agreed that the table looked suitably dramatic. Our western saloon took centre stage, joined by the nook and market, while abandoned houses, fences and a broken-down cart filled the surrounding streets. By the time we finished, it looked exactly like the sort of peaceful frontier settlement where absolutely nothing terrible was about to happen. Then Titania arrived.

Because this was primarily a teaching game, I built Aaron a straightforward Guard crew: Dashel Barker, the Dispatcher, an Executioner, a Mounted Guard, a Sergeant and two Riflemen. At around thirty Soulstones, it offered enough variety to demonstrate different mechanics without requiring Aaron to study an organisational chart of the entire Guild before his first activation.

My own crew consisted of Titania, the Erymanthian Boar, Ithanna, a Carnivorous Wyrdwood, a Rougarou and two Bultungin. I had read the cards. I had considered the synergies. I had even formed some vague strategic ideas. This naturally meant I was completely prepared to discover that I had misunderstood half of them.

We kept the encounter deliberately simple. The main goal was to teach duels, positive and negative flips, Cheating Fate, movement and the basics of Malifaux's action economy. We played Plant Explosives as the Strategy but left Schemes out entirely. There would be plenty of time for secret objectives later. For now, learning how to shoot an ancient Fae creature seemed complicated enough.

Deployment immediately revealed our different philosophies. Aaron positioned his Guard conservatively, forming something resembling an actual defensive force. I did the opposite. The Carnivorous Wyrdwood went as far forward as possible, while the Rougarou started near the edge of the battlefield ready to sprint into enemy territory. The Fae apparently considered subtlety optional. Then the battle began.

Dashel started barking orders (yes, I am absolutely taking that pun) while one Rifleman climbed to the first floor of the saloon and established a firing position overlooking the street. Dashel himself advanced towards the centre alongside the Executioner, creating a rather intimidating welcoming committee. I suddenly became considerably more interested in careful positioning. I didn't yet know how durable Titania's crew would be, but I knew perfectly well what happens when Guard models carrying enormous weapons get close enough to demonstrate their job descriptions.

The first turn was therefore mostly a dance for position. There were a few minor clashes, but both crews concentrated on spreading across the town and planting explosives. My more aggressive deployment paid off and I managed to place two explosives in Aaron's half while the Guard planted one in mine. The opening score was 1–0 to the Fae.

For a brief moment, everything was going according to plan. Turn Two corrected that misunderstanding.

The Executioner and Dashel descended upon my Erymanthian Boar and proceeded to transform it from a terrifying mythical beast into what I can only assume became several reasonably priced cuts of meat. Meanwhile, the Riflemen opened fire on Titania herself from across the town, while the Sergeant and Mounted Guard quietly got on with the actual objective and started planting explosives.

My Fae responded with the sort of card flips that make you wonder whether Fate has developed a personal grievance. Attacks failed, opportunities disappeared and the Guard continued advancing. Ithanna, at least, provided one particularly entertaining moment by using Lacerating Roots to lash out at several nearby Guard models at once. There is something very Malifaux-y about watching uniformed enforcers discover that the local vegetation has become actively hostile.

By the end of Turn Two, both crews had three explosives planted, earning us one victory point each. The score was now 2–1, but the battlefield was beginning to tell a rather different story.

By Turn Three, the Guard had apparently decided that it was time to address the fairy infestation directly. Both of my Bultungin were killed, leaving me three models down overall. The Sergeant and Mounted Guard began removing my explosives with the calm efficiency of council workers cleaning up after a particularly supernatural festival, while Dashel, the Executioner and one Rifleman continued applying pressure in the centre.

Titania fought back by spreading Underbrush Markers across the battlefield, trying to divide the Guard and control their movement. At one particularly important moment, the terrain helped prevent the Executioner from reaching Ithanna, which probably saved her from joining the Boar in the rapidly expanding casualty department. The Autumn Queen was finally beginning to reshape the battlefield around her. Unfortunately, the Guard had guns. And numbers. And an Executioner.

By the end of Turn Three, Aaron had managed to plant four explosives on my side of the table while I had only two remaining on his. That earned him the final point and brought the score to 2–2.

We didn't have enough time to play the fourth turn, so that was where our little invasion of Malifaux ended. Officially, it was a draw. Unofficially, considering I was already three models down and the Guard were steadily dismantling my position, I suspect another turn would have ended with Dashel filing a very confident report explaining how law and order had been successfully restored.

But winning wasn't really the point.

Aaron and Isaac got their first taste of Malifaux, learned the core mechanics and seemed to genuinely enjoy commanding the Guard. I finally got Titania onto the table after weeks of painting her crew and began learning how the Fae actually function outside the comforting theoretical world of reading stat cards. We made mistakes, discovered interactions and watched a little story bloom naturally from the game.

An ancient Neverborn Queen emerged from the wilderness, leading beasts and twisted creatures into a dusty frontier settlement. The Fae crept through the streets, strange forests began growing where they had no business growing, and explosives appeared around the town. Then the local brute gathered his men. The rifles came out, the streets filled with gunfire, and Titania discovered that conquering Malifaux is considerably easier when the town doesn't have an Executioner waiting in the middle of it. Will the Queen return? We shall certainly see. One failed invasion is hardly enough to discourage the Autumn Queen, and I strongly suspect her plans for this little frontier town are far from over.

The game never ends, only pauses. I'll see you at the next move.

Custodian Hargrave

Where fate meets darkness

Although Malifaux Fourth Edition has been out for some time now, I only managed to play a couple of games. Life has an annoying habit of getting in the way of hobbies and without regular games, even familiar rules begin to drift back through the Breach. When James and I finally picked a date for a game a few weeks ago, I immediately started looking forward to it.

It also gave me the motivation I needed to finish another piece of terrain for my western table. A lonely market stall had been sitting unpainted for far too long, patiently waiting for inspiration to strike. Thanks to the school summer holidays, I found myself with an enthusiastic painting assistant. My daughter joined me for the project, and I was genuinely impressed by how steady her brushwork was. Together we finished the market stall in just two days, perfectly in time for Monday's game. Every gaming table tells a story, and now this one had a little bit of ours built into it.

James and I already knew we wouldn't have time for a full game before the club closed, so we agreed to treat it as a practice skirmish. That suited me perfectly. My rules knowledge needed dusting off almost as much as my measuring tape. For my crew I chose Kastore and the Returned keyword. Ancient vampires? A flying sword? What's not to love? James answered by bringing Seamus and the Redchapel crew, a master I'd barely encountered before. I had no idea what to expect, which in Malifaux usually means you're about to learn something the painful way.

By the time James arrived, the table was ready. Wooden houses lined the dusty streets, the saloon waited for its next inevitable bar fight, the gallows stood as an encouraging reminder to behave, abandoned carts littered the roads, and my freshly painted market stall proudly took its place among the scenery. Seeing painted terrain actually being used always feels strangely satisfying (the density is still not sufficient though, progress needs time).

The first duel went James' way, making him the attacker while I defended. Our strategy was Informants, with Runic Binding, Harness the Ley Lines, and Detonate Charges available as schemes. The Flank deployment immediately promised a very different game from the straight-line brawls I was used to.

Having only played Kastore once before, I knew mistakes were inevitable. And mistakes there were.

The first was forgetting to resolve Hunger tokens at the end of activations. Kastore was probably looking at me with centuries of disappointment while I quietly skipped one of his defining mechanics. The second was spreading my crew far too aggressively during the opening turn. I was so eager to occupy the board that several models wandered outside the range of abilities that rewarded staying together. It turns out that "divide and conquer" works much better when you're the one doing the conquering.

For my scheme, I chose Runic Binding. The objective is very thematic: place three Scheme Markers to form a magical triangle, then trap enemy models inside it. In my enthusiasm, I overlooked one tiny detail: the markers must all remain within fourteen inches of each other. My triangle was less "ancient ritual" and more "ambitious civil engineering project." To make matters worse, my final marker was placed by the last model I activated that turn. Since the scheme only scores at the end of an enemy model's activation, I'd missed my opportunity entirely. A perfectly avoidable mistake, but an excellent lesson. Despite that, the first turn wasn't without success. Both of us concentrated on the strategy, and I managed to score the opening victory point by controlling two Informant markers. I also received my first practical demonstration of just how much ground Seamus can cover. Watching him disappear from one part of the table only to casually reappear somewhere completely different is unsettling enough in the lore. Experiencing it across the tabletop is even worse.

Turn two became an exercise in damage control. I repositioned my Scheme Markers to create a legal triangle, finally bringing Runic Binding online. At the same time, Kastore and Seamus decided that diplomacy had failed and settled matters personally. Elsewhere, poor Gwyn found herself on the receiving end of Seamus and Madame Sybelle at the same time. Surviving that encounter felt like a victory in itself. While I slowly lost control of the strategy markers and was forced to retreat, I finally completed Runic Binding and scored two victory points from it. James answered by claiming another point from the strategy, leaving the game nicely balanced.

By then it was clear we wouldn't reach the end of Turn Three before the club closed, so we packed away the models and spent some time discussing the game instead. Practice had been the goal all along, and on that front the evening was a complete success. I'm still spending more time reading character cards than making brilliant tactical decisions, but every game makes the rules feel a little more familiar.

Most importantly, it reminded me why I enjoy Malifaux so much. Every crew feels wildly different, every master brings unexpected tricks to the table, and every game leaves me with a list of ideas to try next time. The Breach has finally reopened. And somewhere in the darkness, Kastore is still thirsty.

The game never ends, only pauses. I'll see you at the next move.

Custodian Hargrave

Explosives, paperwork and academic murder

Malifaux has been whispering to me for months.

Unfortunately, life (mundane, daylight, alarm-clock life) kept interfering. The friend who first pulled me through the Breach lives many hours away, which means our battles are rare and carefully planned like secret rituals. My local friend has also been busy, which left my crews gathering dust and giving me accusatory stares from the shelf.

So when James from the local club casually mentioned he might be getting a Malifaux crew, I felt two things at once: excitement… and responsibility. Because when someone steps through the Breach for the first time, you want their first experience to be magical, mysterious and just dangerous enough to make them want more. We need fresh souls in this hobby after all.

We scheduled a game to coincide with the long-awaited faction card release. And then, in true Malifaux fashion, the release was delayed. Again. I had preordered the Guild and Neverborn faction packs back in November, when January seemed certain. Since then, that date has moved more times than a Gremlin with sticky fingers.

With no physical cards in hand, I relied on the official app to track my crew. In hindsight, I should have printed the cards. Using the app felt a bit like trying to conduct a duel while reading the rulebook on your phone mid-swing. Functional, but not elegant. Lessons were learned.

On the day of the game, I arrived early at the club to prepare the battlefield. I laid out my western-themed terrain (the only set I currently own) wooden buildings, dusty streets and the gallows casting long shadows. In my mind, it was no longer MDF and paint, it was a frontier town on the edge of something unnatural.

Choosing a crew was its own dilemma.

My first instinct was to bring Dashel and the Guards. They've been my reliable enforcers for years. In third edition they were my pride and joy, and in fourth they've lost none of their bite. But that was precisely the problem. Bringing a crew I know inside and out against someone playing their first game felt… unfair.

Instead, I chose Lucius and the Elite.

Lucius, the silver-tongued schemer, master manipulator, surrounded by lawyers, investigators and professional liars. I adore the theme of this keyword. They don't just fight, they rearrange reality with paperwork and polite authority. I haven't played them much, so this was the perfect opportunity for them to leave the shelves.

James brought Transmortis, led by Von Schtook: the professor of unpleasant subjects, accompanied by his academic horrors. I had no idea how the crew worked. I didn't even read up on them. In Malifaux, ignorance is often the first step toward enlightenment or dismemberment.

Since this was James' first game, we opted for 30 soulstones instead of the usual 50. Fewer models. Fewer abilities. Slightly less cognitive chaos.

We flipped for strategy and deployment: Informants with Corner Deployment. James was the defender. I was the attacker.

Our schemes were Detonate Charges, Frame Job and Grave Robbing. I secretly chose Detonate Charges. Because if you're going to introduce someone to Malifaux, you might as well start with explosives.

The first turn was already thick with tension.

 

Lucius advanced toward the center like a man who owns the place, quietly directing Agent 44 and an Investigator to flank the enemy from opposite sides. Von Schtook and Anna Lovelace pushed up the middle, while Students drifted toward my flank like eager interns looking for credit.

Lucius used his authority to reposition enemies away from key areas, because why fight when you can simply tell people to stand somewhere less useful? A False Witness secured one Strategy Marker. A Guild Lawyer climbed onto the gallows to claim another. (There's something poetic about a lawyer on the gallows in Malifaux.)

The professor secured the marker closest to his deployment zone but couldn't quite lock down a second. End of turn: I scored the first point. I also managed to complete Detonate Charges, while James positioned carefully for turn two.

So far, so good. The town still stood.

Turn two escalated quickly.

An Undergraduate "finished his studies" and was upgraded into a Student of Viscera, killing a False Witness in the process. Apparently, graduation in Transmortis involves murder. Efficient curriculum. Agent 44 leapt into the fray, whispering blades doing what whispering blades do best, removing inconvenient people. My Guild Lawyer was challenged on the gallows and nearly paid the ultimate fee for his services.

I lost control of one Strategy Marker, but held onto two, securing another victory point. The board was shifting. The dust was settling in strange patterns.

Turn three became a whirlwind of ability exploration. We were checking triggers, reading cards, discovering interactions. It dawned on me that perhaps running a full strategy-and-schemes game for someone's very first Malifaux match might be ambitious, but James handled it remarkably well. The cognitive load was heavy, yet he stayed composed, asked smart questions, and adapted quickly. Transmortis proved dangerous, once Agent 44 was identified as a threat, he was removed with academic precision. The Undergraduates, with their upgrade flexibility, gave Von Schtook a toolkit for almost any situation.

Unfortunately, time ran out before we could begin turn four. The battle ended unfinished, but satisfying nonetheless.

My first impression of Transmortis? They hit hard, and they scale intelligently. Von Schtook doesn't just teach anatomy, he demonstrates it. More importantly, James played extremely well for a first game. Whether that's credit to him, to the elegance of fourth edition design or both, I'm not sure, but it was impressive.

Malifaux is strange, layered, and occasionally overwhelming. But when it works, it feels like stepping into a gothic western novel where every decision matters and every model has a secret.

The game never ends, only pauses. I'll see you at the next move.

Custodian Hargrave

Spawned

I’ve been wanting to start this blog for quite some time now. In an era where vlogs and YouTube channels dominate, you might ask: why write a blog at all? Well, while watching videos is easy, sometimes all you really want is a quick five-minute read, maybe even while you’re… otherwise occupied.

This space will be dedicated to three of my favorite passions:

• Malifaux – the dark, twisted skirmish game.

• Vampire: The Eternal Struggle (VTES) – the card game of politics and blood.

• Computer games – the digital realms where I spend far too many nights.

I won’t pretend to be an expert, far from it. What you’ll find here are the thoughts, stumbles, and revelations of a newcomer. Perhaps, dear reader, with your deeper knowledge, you’ll smile knowingly and think: I’ve been there, I’ve done that, my sweet neonate. Still, I hope my musings bring you both a touch of recognition and a measure of entertainment.

The game never ends, only pauses. I’ll see you at the next move.

Custodian Hargrave