Just because I'm not the Press Ganger, it doesn't make me the wench

Best gaming face ever!

Well just because I'm not a press ganger doesn't mean I can't force my friends at sword point to start playing the game or else.

Well, I didn't really do much asides from talk..... at length ...... non stop .... whether anyone wanted me to or not.... about the game for a good solid 6 months.

I think they had to join or go mad, one of the two.

Fortunately they appear to be enjoying both the hobby aspect of the game and the game itself (Which while we liked painting space marines, non of us had played a game in 5 years)

One of my friends even rebranded his Ultramarines blog so he could write about Warmachine instead. Now that has to make you feel good about the hobby (An your amazing ability to whine until you get what you want)

The three chaps have decided to play Khador, Menoth and Mercs (With a Rhulic leaning) which is pretty cool. I even helped organise their first purchases, which makes me feel like a crack dealer..... PUSH PUSH TAKE YOUR PRETTY MODELS! THE FIRST TASTE IS FREE

It felt good to have my own shops worth of models for a day, until like locusts my friends picked up their orders. 

Our bumper order

The astute amongst you will notice that a fair few of those boxes are blue. That's whats on my "to do" list right now. First up on the table is my Storm Strider.... who is rapidly approaching completion. I hope to have some pics up by the weekend.

Having the lads playing is great, it means I can share my hobby with my closest friends. It also means they wont glaze over when I wax lyrical about Feat X or Warjack Y.

The Home Shopping Network

UPDATED 29 May 2012

Well, considering that Wargames supply is no more, and the only place to shop for modelling stuff in town is the local games workshop, I thought I would revisit this article.

Where to buy stuff for NZ gamers?

First up is Mark One comics and games (http://www.mk1.co.nz/). Hamilton's local gaming store, I've spoken about them before and they were the store I grew up going to. I still shop there on occasion because they have good retail prices on comic books (And I buy a lot of 2000AD) and they have competitive Warmachine prices as well. Free delivery within NZ is a plus, the website doesn't have a basket so you will need to email your requests. They may not have what you want at the time, but if they do its the quickest way to get something at a good price. They also do orders. Mention the blog when you email them, Chris is always looking for new customers and may do you a first time shoppers deal.

The new comer to the list is Jambo Games. You may notice the shop is called Jambo Hobbies, well they are transitioning from one thing to the other and currently have two stores. Don't worry, the link to the store will work.

For Warmachine, these guys are the stockist in New Zealand. A great selection of product in store and they are supplied really well (They even had T-Shirts and Wreck Markers). A little light on board games and other stuff that Mark One would stock, but a very good place for Warmachine.

Prices are very competitive and delivery is free (or very cheap, I got it free at least). Also, the store is doing a lot to support the local hobby and that gets a big plus from me. If you are going to ahve gaming in store, do it properly.

Trade me is NZ ebay. I think we are one of the few places where eBay doesn't have a strangle hold on online sales. A lot of stuff pops up on trademe, mostly second hand, but a lot of people buy models (and entire armies in some cases) and never paint them, so you can get a deal if you have patience.

It's also worth noting that there are a number of people who are importing Games Workshop product from the US or the UK and reselling it online. They are selling unopened boxes for about 20% less than retail. A good business model for them, and a nice easy way for you to get your purchases for less without having to resort to international shipping.

The book depository isn't an obvious one to go to. I have to thank my friend Andy for pointing this one out. They sell gaming books and boardgames, the entire fantasy flight games range is available through book depository for a lot cheaper than I can get it in store at my local games store. Free delivery within NZ is another bonus. You have to know what you are looking for on the site, and sometimes they seem to have completely wrong images for books. I've had positive experiences ordering from here before, so I recommend it (never got games from here before, but that may chagne shortly)

Warstore is an American games reseller,  and where i got my big bulk online order from. Pretty speedy delivery and very good pricing. The range of models and books they carry is impressive as well. Everything I ordered was shipped right away and arrived in NZ about 1 week later, very well packed and no damage in the slightest. My major concern with these guys is the cost of shipping from the states, meaning you have to do a very big order for the cost of delivery to negate the savings.

If you want GW products you can't order via the basket,  you have to download an excel sheet and send them an email. GW is making it difficult for others to resell their product to OZ/NZ and this is just one of the tactics being employed to keep our market isolated and prices artificially inflated.

Maelstrom Games is the last place I will mention and I have heard mixed things about them. The pricing is very good and they do free shipping if you order a reasonable amount. The range is good and they offer a GW basket which is interesting.

The issue I have heard is that if they list an item as out of stock it can take an age for them to get it back into stock. I'm wondering if this is specific to Warmachine considering the supply issues Privateer Press have had the last year or so keeping people supplied due to the massive upswing in demand. My order from these guys did take awhile, but it was well priced .

Miniature Market is very similar to Warstore. Both US companies, both good pricing but you pay through the nose for shipping. I got a big order from them and it turned up in good condition. Honestly, just do a price check between Warstore and Miniature market and pick the cheapest one after shipping.

Stormwall - Data card

Ok, so PP released the Stormwall data card today.

Lets have a look at what it has (Click on the Image below to view card full size)

Lets look at the unimpressive stuff first.

The Suck

Armour 19 is a little surprising, While as a Collosal it has a lot of damage boxes I was actually expecting the Stormwall to have 20 or more stuff first. I'm guessing this is because Arcane Shield (+3 Arm) is going to be cast on the Stormwall in every game it plays and they wanted to keep that under control. To put it in perspective see the picture above, the warjack to the right of Stormwall actually has a better armour score. It also has less than double the damage boxes of a Cygnar heavy.

Metal Storm guns get a solid "meh" from me. That's the cyclones weaponry system and Cygnar has plenty of access to low power guns with covering fire templates (Cyclone, Long Gunners, Trencher chain guns etc). As a secondary anti infantry weapon system is looks alright, but its not bringing anything new to the table.

The ok


The big guns are a solid weapon system, good power and a reasonable range on them. A little surprised they have less range than a Defender and a bit surprised they have no AOE. Still, no one should complain about two Pow 15 guns


The Awesome

Hand to Hand. I haven't seen the other collosals but I am expecting them to be just as rude, if not nastier in melee. Pow 20 attacks, with open fists, a thresher power attack and the ability to punch someone into the next year. Oh yeah, and the fists have electro leap as gravy. Once this thing is engaged in Melee it will seriously do some damage.

Lightning pods, I am assuming there are more rules for these guys once they land in play. But the simple fact you can pop one out to 10inches, draw a line between the pod and the Stormwall and auto hit everything in that line is great. I like the precision of this power, and the fact it seems to ignore stealth and LOS. Sounds like a great way to do a little bit of spot removal.

Verdict

I still don't know about Collosals, its a lot of points in one place, and hes not as tough as two Warjacks it seems. Admittedly you can pour all your buffs onto one model, but then your opponent can do the same with debuffs. I am intrigued enough to think about using a Stormwall, but not busting down the doors of my games store to preorder one.

Forbidden temple - A tale of two days (A how to lose at Warmachine special)

Game one - Vs Khador (Campbell)

Welcome back to "How to lose at Warmachine", my ongoing report on how badly I suck at this game and how infuriating it is to get beaten all the time. Learn from my mistakes and bathe in the wisdom of defeat!

The forbidden temple in sunny Napier was the first "away" tournament I have been to. Astute readers will note that it is also only the second tournament I have been to. Last time I placed 20th out of 28 people, so I was eager not to do any worse.

The venue was fantastic, Jambo games (If you are in NZ I recommend checking out their site) had enough tables in the store to host the tourney and gave everyone a 10% discount on their already very reasonable prices.

The List

Well, you may have noticed from my two previous posts that I had planned on taking a certain list, and that I had changed it the night before and had to do some quick painting.

I finally settled on

Siege, with Minuteman and Centurion
Journeyman with Defender
6 Sword Knights

The idea was the Centurion would anchor the line (With polarity field and arcane shield) while Siege and the Defender shot things up. The Sword Knights would counter attack and the Minuteman would be my fast moving reserve. The list actually worked as planned and I thought I had a pretty good tourney.... but on to the matches

DAY ONE - THE DAY OF AWESOMENESS

Game one - VS. eSorcha (Campbell)

First up, let me say that the tables looked good, but the scenery in most matches meant diddly squat. The two pictures above show that nicely. From the models perspective all you can see is WIDE OPEN SPACES. I would not have wanted to play Circle on these tables.

Across the table from me was Campbell, who seemed like a very nice chap who had only recently started with the hobby. He was fielding a big unit of winter guard, three heavy jacks and a Manhunter. A lot of armour, even for Mr Siege to deal with and attrition looked like it would not be a good idea. I figured my best option was to move onto the edge of the objective area, park and shoot. I was hoping that eSorcha would come within 17" of Siege so I could shoot her in the face.

Fortunately for me this is exactly what happened.

Three turns into the game Campbell advanced his jack wall towards the Centurion (Being unable to charge it he was hesitant to run straight at it). Sorcha stood behind this wall of jacks thinking they would protect her.

One spell later and Sorcha's jack wall was sitting in a fox hole not blocking her. Siege used his feat, fired a rocket and nearly killed her outright. An aimed shot from the Defender and she was toast.

So a quick win by Assassination to start the day. I always feel a bit bad winning with foxhole as it seems a bit cheap. But a fair win is a fair win.

Game Two - VS. Scaverous (Mike O)

Mikes custom bases are amazing

Game two and Mike quietly informs me he on a losing streak of about 30 games. This makes me feel quite confident, that was my first mistake.

Mike is fielding Scaverous, A Reaper, A Seether, a bonejack, a witch and a big unit of Bane thralls.

The game starts well for me with some good tactical shooting that removes the bonejack and a rather unimpressive feat turn from Scaverous.

The Centurion is proving once again to be a pain and comfortably shrugs off an attempt from the Reaper to harpoon him. Scaverous ends up exposed and I send the Centurion in to give him a beating.

This is when things go belly up.

The Centurion does little (One hit from 4) and the Seether proceeds to rip my Minuteman to shreds. Bane Thralls and Scaverous rip the Centurion to pieces along with my sword knights. The Thralls also engage my Defender.

So all of a sudden Siege is left with a Defender and Junior and is charged by 5 Bane Thralls (4 of whom get in range). Needing an 8 to hit with four attacks Mikes dice desert him and Siege is left feeling rather healthy, only taking one hit.

Next turn Siege kills all the Banes (7 Attacks!) and frees the Defender up for a boosted shot on Scaverous.

BOOM, nothing but net.

For a guy who said he 'play and lost so many games in a row, he should have won this one. The dice gods conspired against him at the worst possible moment. (I can report he did not go winless through the whole tournament though)

Game Three- VS. pKaya (Adam)

There are some match ups that just aren't good for one player or another. Adam was playing a high mobility hit and run force with Warpwolves and teleporting stones. I was running a Centurion with polarity field and a Defender that really hates teleporting stones.

I parked in his objective and sat comfortably behind the Centurion. I was doing my own hit and run with the Minuteman who killed the Gallows grove and damaged one of his wolves.

In the end, after much manoeuvre (met by Defender fire) the wolves just ran into melee with the Centurion, where Sieges feat and flanking Sword knights chopped them into bloody piles of dog meat. The game ended with Kaya being charged by the Centurion after every other model had been killed.

In this case I was lucky to have the perfect rock to go against this set of scissors.

Game Four- VS. pVayl (Marc)

In case you don't know, I hate playing against Legion. I find legion to be the force that has an easy answer to just about everything I do. They seem to be able to out manoeuvre, out shoot and out spell me. I mainly blame Chris P for this sense of impending dread when I see legion across the table from me.

As far as legion match ups went I thought I had a good one here. The Raptors relied on shooting and I could grant my infantry cover. If I could pick them off one by one I could use my Jacks and Knights to bring down the Beasts.

As you can see from the pic to your left the Centurion stayed way out in front while everyone hung out in Sieges fox hole. Mr Minuteman was on hit and run duties and accounted for at least one or two Raptors.

The plan worked really well. With the Raptors picked off by shooting I really had to deal only with the beasts and the caster.

It was all looking good until I over extended myself and the Angelius swept down on Siege. I thought I was toast as the Angelius smashed into Siege doing 17 points total damage.

Yep Siege survived on one damage box. Vayl unfortunately got pinned in melee by Sword Knights and hacked into tiny cube chunks of blight. Marc played very well and deserved to win this game, but as Baker says "If in doubt, steal a win"

Another game where dice came up good for me.... however my luck would soon change

Game Five- VS. Xerxes (Daniel)

Fantastic paint work

This list of Daniels must have been a nightmare for many of his opponents. A Bronzeback, a big unit of super tough heavy infantry and an Archidon for speed. It was a big nasty wall of death.

Our forces met around one objective (The other saw a strange aerial fight between the Minuteman and Archidon that ended with the Archidon frenzying and charging his own dudes) and locked into combat with the Bronzeback holding back.

This was a close game, and really I lost on a rookie mistake. I needed to do two more boxes of damage to one of his infantry, which would have freed up my Centurion to slam his Bronzeback off the objective for the win.

In my stupidity I forgot they had reach and ended up being pinned in melee.

Then Daniel pulled a move for the ages. The Bronzeback charged Xerxes and used his animus to move around my Centurion to attack Siege. It was a thing of disturbing beauty to watch this Bronzeback run amok. What was a desperation move on Daniels part proved to be an absolute game winner.

A great game that was sadly let down by the dumb scenario that neither of us liked. It's hard to cover objectives on two sides of the board with 25 points.

Game Six - VS. Kallus (Rob VDW)

My punishment for losing was to play Legion again. WEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

This is the game of the weekend where I really feel I was out played and totally deserved to lose. First of all I didn't read the scenario well enough and didn't realise that you could only score off each objective once. I tried to hold both with split my forces.

Secondly, I wasted my feat leaving Rob in a good position to counter attack.

Thirdly, Rob used his feat well. He got up in my grill early and said "go on, kill my troopers, I dare you"

I even did some mediocre sportsmanship and wouldn't let Rob take back an action (Admittedly he had declared a charge and measured it before remembering he hadn't cast a spell on his previous activation). This was a charge attack that would have won him the game so I didn't feel too bad about it.

The key lesson for me in this game was read the damm scenario. If I only had to hold one objective to stop him getting two points I would have bunkered my Centurion down on one obejective as opposed to splitting up and trying to cover both (as shown in picture)

Game Seven - VS. pSeverus (Alex the lucky bastard)



First up, look at this picture. See that body of deep water? That was in front of my deployment area, the only time terrain had an impact on a game and it was freaking deep water right in front of the objectives. 




This picture is the aftermath of what must be the most tin ass ending to a Warmachine game ever. By all logic I had Alex on the ropes. His infantry unit had 2 guys left (passed a morale check), his caster was wounded and pinned in melee by a Sword Knight and a Centurion. His Guardian had 4 or 5 damage boxes left and all systems crippled except cortex. His Repenter was out of position and Severius was injured.

My Centurion was undamaged, as was the Minuteman. Siege was in cover with 10 health and my Jnr had lost his Defender but was 100% fine. Sevy had used his feat and Siege had 0 focus.

Here is how his turn went.

Assign 1 focus to the Guardian and Repenter, keep the rest on the caster.

Guardian attacks with its crippled pike and boosts, getting a double and throwing the centurion away
Repenter flames Severius, missing him and killing the Sword Knight pinning him
Zealot run near to Siege
Severius casts ashes to ashes on his own guy, damage arcs to Siege and he boosts rolling a 16, the exact amount required to kill him

Funny sunny stuff.

You don't mind being beaten by one in a million shots and Alex promptly exploded into laughter (The good kind, not the a**hole HAHAHA I BEAT YOU kind)

Stuff like this is why you play the game!

Alex was also a hoot to play against, probably the most fun game of the weekend.

CONCLUSIONS

I had a blast and I really enjoyed the format as it created a whole new set of issues to deal with and you had to pick a  list that could take on all opponents. Some of the scenarios and table set ups leaved a lot to be desired, but that will get better next time I'm sure.

The games were good, the company was good and overall a great time.

Special thanks to Chris O for organising the accommodation and travel and to Tom for doing all the driving! Cheers guys!

The 90 Minute Minute Man (Speed painting challenge)

Travel tools!

Well, I went away to Napier for the Highlander Tournament. Being a fool I decided to

A.) Change my list the night before the tournament

and B.) Buy and paint a new warjack the evening before the tournament started.

This was met with a chorus of "YOU MAD CRAZY FOOL" by many of those who travelled to the tournament. I was also determined not to miss out on dinner/drinking or socialising.

I left the dinner early and went back to our accommodation to glue the model together. I had brought all the supplies I needed from home and arranged them on a handy table in the room. I had really bad light to work by.






















I rapidly assembled the Minuteman with glue purchased the night before, took roughly 30 minutes to do and was probably the most annoying part of the model. The base is an old 40k land speeder base that I chopped up with clippers and then surrounded with a clump of Milliput.

The base is drilled into the model using a small drill and wire and fixed in place with green stuff. I also grabbed some green stuff and rolled in "jet exhausts" which i fixed to the model. I then went and had some beers with everyone after they got back from dinner.























After 4 or 5 beers I went upstairs and under-coated the model with a brush, which is not the best technique ever, but I didn't feel comfortable using a spray at rented accommodation. The key to the undercoat with a brush was to get it covered without obscuring everything. It took a little retouching (And being able to paint it on the base was helpful). After this I went to bed.

Getting up in the morning I had to at least base coat the model for the first rounds (I didn't take any photos of this though, so all i have are "in game" shots from the day).

Three colours, Tin Bitz, Macgragge blue, and Leadbelcher. The key to painting fast is this stage and it is this.

Don't care about going over the lines.

Just go for it, get the basic areas covered in paint, if you slip up you can always retouch it later. To base coat the model I used a citadel basecoat brush and lathered on the paint (watered down of course.... having a sink in my room was very hand).























After day one was over I really didn't care about finishing off the paint job and spent the evening hanging out with the other tournament go'ers (And having AWESOME BBQ...... yeah.... awesome..... pfffft). Late in the evening I headed off to bed but the local nightclub was still playing music so decided to pain some more.

The pic on the left was from when I finished up, the base and inks are still wet. The key to doing detail quick is wet blending.

Those blue areas have three or four sets of highlights, all done within a short space while the paint is still wet. I simply get a big blob of blue on my palette and do each layer of highlighting one after the other with thin watered down paint. It all blends in and looks very smooth even though its basically cheating.

The metal area are even simpler, one highlight, one layer of ink and one layer of fine dry brushing the morning after (see photo on right).

Having the Minuteman at least basically painted on day one, and almost finished on day two was a good feeling for me. I hate playing with unpainted models, but I also wanted to spend time with the other guys playing the tourney. Painting quickly allowed me to do both, which was great fun.

Oh, there will be a battle report coming soon, Forbidden temple - A tale of two days.

How to make a list - A NOOBs guide to Warmachine

How Most Wargames work

A NOOBs guide to Warmachine - Part Five - Making a list

"Making a list and checking it twice,
Finding out who's naughty and nice
Warmachine is coming to town!"

At some point you will move away from playing battle box games and will start to put together your own army lists to play. This is some of the best fun you can have with the game, the constant thinking and internal debate about what goes with what, and how you can win with it.

I'm not going to offer and extensive guide on how to pick lists because a.) It would fill a book or 10, b.) the game will change faster than I could write it, and c.) I suck at Warmachine and taking actual specific game advice from me would be a dumb thing to do.

Get your thinking cap on

First of all, get to know the models you have. Read about them, play with them, figure out how they work together. There are uncountable synergies in this game and many of them aren't that obvious. Knowing what your forces can do is integral to building a good list.

Your first thought should always be "How will I win with this list". This is the easy part in many ways. Your choice of caster will largely shape how you will go about winning.

Look at your caster, think "What this chap/chapette/abomination good for"? How can they contribute? Is it their awesome firepower, spells, combat ability, feat, what do they do.  When you are looking at a caster you think, OOOOOOO THEY CAN DO THIS, AND THIS, AND THIS, AND THIS!

Then you total up how much that would all take and it comes to around 20 Focus or so. You never have enough Focus/Fury so figure out you will use all the time. some of the time, and rarely.

Also figure out how many jacks/beasts you can run effectively. Too few and you wont be taking advantage of jacks/beast effectively (Probably more important for Warlocks honestly), too many and you wont have enough focus to power them, or FURY to stop them running off.

Once you understand how the caster works, you can flesh out the rest of the force around them.

Picking your list

Writing a guide on this is dumb, as their is WAY too much to talk about, so how about I just put out some ideas to help you focus.

• Will the models I've picked benefit from my casters spells 
• How will I handle Heavy Armour targets
• I will I hit High Defence targets
• How will I deal with my opponents Stealth
• Do I have magic weapons for Incorporeal enemies
• I will I deal with an infantry swarms?
• I will i cope if my opponent drops Cloud effects everywhere to block line of sight?
• Can I deal with rough terrain?
• Focus/Fury (Do you have enough?) 
• How do I stop Enemy Assassination runs (Melee, Shooting or magic?) 
• Can I capture and hold objectives effectively?
• Do the units i've picked work well together? Are their obvious synergies?
• Do I have the right solos? Or am I paying extra points for a gimmick that doesn't help much?
• Will I be outnumbered, how do I stop my key units getting tied up?
• How will I deal with a fast moving enemy that can run, teleport, leave combat, has parry or ghostly?
• What if my opponent has units immune to Shooting/Magic/Charges/Blast damage
• Any other suggestions from the floor (I will update this list as time goes by)

Now don't get me wrong, Not all lists can do all things but you have to be prepared for each of these eventualities. Your tactic for heavy armour might be "Hold it up with cheap models and/or run away from it". You don't need to do all of these things, but you should think about how you will deal with them when they turn up across the table from you.

Case in point Sicarius, who reads this blog, played me in a tournament at the start of the year. He had a number of incorporeal models in his list..... I had 2 magic weapons in my whole force. Needless to say, things did not go well for me that game. 

The last two points here are really personal ones for me and are key for how I look at the game

• Will this list be fun to play? 
• Did I do the thinking myself?

I hope if you are reading this guide you are one of the people who doesn't just copy lists from successful players online. If you are one of those people, I suggest thinking for yourself. Winning with someone else's creation is only half a victory and not doing the thinking into making a list wont make you any better at playing the game. By all means get inspired by peoples thinking online, just don't be a clone. 

Warmachine - It works more like this

Art and stuff

Rock/Paper/Scissors by Eddleman07

llustration of a new Rock Paper Scissors game by David C. Lovelace.

Checklist from here

The forbidden temple - Highlander list

So let me recap what this Highlander Tournament is all about

25 points
1 caster
MUST have 1 solo
MUST have 1 unit
Any number of jacks/beasts as long as there are no duplicates
No models with the character designation of any kind

So what to take?

• Siege
• Journeyman warcaster
• Defender
• Centurion
• Charger 
• Trencher Commandos

WHY OH GODS WHY DID YOU PICK THIS?

First up, I know Siege better than any other caster. He is pretty tough, has awesome personal firepower and a great bags of tricks. His feat is brutal, and with these limitations I expect to see some elite units and jacks on the table, halving armour should be very handy. He can deal with stealth using mage sight and ground pounder, hes hard to kill with his natural stats and foxhole, he has a knockback spell for scenarios and can grant magic weapons to his people with explosivo. In short, he covers a lot of possible threats.

His battlegroup is the Defender and Centurion. The Centurion is the meat wall, the big block designed to hold people up and to screen siege. It's really tough (Should be running at arm 24) can't be charged and hits like a mack truck. On sieges feat turn it can reliably wreck a Khador heavy jack if needed.

The Defender is a natural choice for Siege, a long range gun that benefits from explosivo and the feat and a back up melee weapon. He will be on bodyguard/sentry duty

The Journeyman caster is there to provide Arcane Shield to the Centurion (and siege if needed). Jnr also serves as a back stop as the occasional booster shot at the end of a turn can make a difference. He will also run the Charger, which 9 times out of 10 will operate on 1 focus with one boosted shot. The charger is there to harass, pick off annoying solos and generally be a 4 point speed bump.

The final selection is a grup of trencher commandos (for 5 points, using tier 1). I had thought of rangers as well, but the Commandos may add more annoyance factor. They are stealth, which may be annoying for several armies. They can also harass infantry very effectively with their grenade packs (great for high def infantry with low armour) and their daggers (great for low def, high armour, 1 wound units).

I will be playing this list this week and may include rangers to see how they work. But this is pretty close to what I will run.

Looking forward to my first away tournament, should be fun.