5 Man Tournament

Today we played a 5 man tourny, involving my Khador, Henk's Legion, Johns Protectorate, Stephens Skorne and Richards Circle.

We each managed to get at least 2 games, and a few of us got 3. (Me and John i think)

Was a great bunch of games, took about 3 hours total to finish up, due to it being 350 points only. Which is a relatively quick game. They took 45mins on average, with the exception of the final between me and Henk which took about an hour and a half. (That game definitely dragged out :P)

First place went to the best player, *achem*, myself of course :D. Second place was taken by Henk, and third place was John. I was able to win 3 games in a row, against Richard, Stephen and then Henk.

The army I had with me was Vlad + Drago + War Dog, then an Ogrun Bokur teamed up with Gudrun the Wanderer. For support, I brought Aiyanna and Holt, and the Greylord Ternion. I had really wanted to bring in the Koldun Lord, but couldnt spend the points.


The first game I played was versus Richards Circle, led by Baldur. He had with him the Lord of the Feast, a Woldwyrd, the new Minion Warlock with the Tzatzlwyrm or whatever its called, a sentry stone and an Argus.

It was going relatively well for Richard, killing the Ogrun Bokur and planting annoying forests in the way of the rest of my army, and using his feat with Baldur. However, Baldur had forest walked into close combat with Aiyanna and Holt,
who were at that point invisible. Needing 12's to hit, he attempted 3 times to smack Aiyanna in the head. Missing each time, and having no fury to transfer, an enraged Holt shot Baldur (who had harm on him) in the face, and killed him, giving me the game.


Second game I played was against Stephen and his Skorne, led by Makeda. Not having played against Skorne before I saw a couple of new things, like Savagery -> running and being able to do attacks after having run!! He had a Titan Gladiator, a unit of Paingivers, a unit of Praetorians, a Cyclops, and an Ancestral Gaurdian. We had a mexican stand off for awhile, with me taking a few potshots and killing unit leaders and the like, until Stephen advanced into range. Taking my oppurtunity, I had Vlad boost around the flank to kill some of his Praetorians, just as the Greylords were able to Ice Cage the Titan, stopping him in his tracks for one turn. Gudrun bravely charged the Guardian, needing to do 2 damage to kill it and prevent it retaliatory striking. He did 1 damage, and got smacked upside the head for his trouble. After taking some damage in the next turn, nothing critical except for the Greylords lost one member, meaning no more Ice Cage shenanigans.

Next turn, i saw an opening as Drago was in the perfect position for a slam attack on the Titan, which i knew I would have to get rid of anyway, and slammed him right over top of Makeda, knocking her down. Now, Ninja-Vlad (what I name his Defence 20, Armour 19 form) charged 12" to get into contact with Makeda, and proceeded to push 4 focus into extra attacks, and she was not able to transfer enough to survive. Ninja Vlad claims another victim!


This put me into the finals for 1st place against Henk, with the evil witch known as Saeryn. Last time I faced her, things didnt go well for Vlad as high defence is no match for Blight Bringer! (Which reminds me -> I have two further games vs Henk that I should write up)

So, knowing the high threat from Blight Bringer meant I needed to protect vulnerable solos like Aiyanna and Holt and the Greylords, I kept a defensive line in front consisting of the high armor models I had, knowing that Blight Bringer wouldnt be able to kill them. Henks army had his unit of Swordsmen, a Seraph, 2 or 3 Shredders, and the extremely annoying Nephilim Soldier.

Advancing with Wind Wall meant that the Seraph was not able to hit anything, while being in a perfect place for an early charge with the two Ogruns and they finished it easily. I had taken down a Shredder as well with Vlad, meaning he had 2 Warbeasts down. Drago ran up in his grill, threatening Saeryn early on. With the Swordsmen, he ran them and ended up pulling off Blight Bringer, killing A+H and damaging Vlad. He then popped his feat, possibly the most annoying feat ever, making all his models immune to Melee attacks. He had killed Aiyanna, which was my backup against this feat, as she can give a friendly unit/model Magic attacks, thereby getting around that rule.

Unfortunately, this was not the case. I had failed an attempted Assasination run, and was facing a tricky decision. Keep Vlad in, use him to try and kill Saeryn and possibly get killed next turn, or lick my wounds and hope my army doesnt die in the next round. I chose the second option, and was able to retreat. In the next round, Gudrun and a Greylord were killed, which wasnt too bad, thanks to some wiffed rolls by Henk. Drago had taken some serious damage however, but still had all systems intact.

Next round, and with that annoying feat gone Vlad was back in business. Saeryn ran past the Bokur to try and kill Vlad, taking the free strike. This was a bad idea, with a lucky hit the Bokur inflicted some major damage on Saeryn. After dancing around with the damn respawning Niphilim Soldier, Vlad was safe with Blood of Kings and the Wardog keeping him up. Drago was enraged at Saeryns antics, and risking a free strike from the last remaining Shredder (which very nearly took off an arm) charged over to Saeryn and in her back arc sliced her to ribbons. (Needed a 9 to hit on 3d6 dropping one, then minced her on damage.)

So - was some good games, only person I didnt play was Johns Menoth, but I am sure I will see how his games went on Johns Blog.

Hopefully we will hold this once a month, maybe next time Henk will beat me right at the end :P

Tactics of Warmachine : Part 1

In order to concrete ideas in my head, I have started a new thread of posts on the tactics of Warmachine. To start off, I will begin where it all begins - List building.

Most games of Warmachine are at 4 point limits; 350, 500, 750 and 1000. Important things to note here are 750 allows you to bring an Epic Warcaster, and 1000 allows you to bring 2 Warcasters, one of which can be Epic. The other point limits only allow one Warcaster.

When choosing a point limit, it is important that when building an army, you can go under the point limit as much as you want but you cannot go over it. Due to the rather inflexible point denominations of Warmachine units / characters, it is often tricky to hit the point limit exactly. So dont stress too much, anywhere up to 5 points under is relatively common.

With Warmachine specifically, there are two major types of armies that you can build, Warjack heavy and Infantry heavy (also known as Infantrymachine). There has been a recent trend with expansions favouring Infantry over Warjacks, but with the release of Legends Warjacks are now back up to par, with some excellent choices available, specifically for Khador Drago and the fearsome Beast 09.

Warjack heavy has its advantages - depending on which types of 'Jacks you go for, you can have a solid mix of anti-infantry, anti-jack and anti-caster options. Your overall theme for the army should be a solid wall of metal backed up by support casters and supporting ranged or melee troopers. When focusing on Warjacks, your army is slower, stronger and tougher than if you went Infantry heavy. Most Warjacks are ideal for killing enemy Warjacks, and are so tough that Infantry have a difficult time killing them. Example: Khador Juggernaut, PS=19 Ice Axe minces Jacks, and ARM 20 means only a few infantry (exceptions being Weaponmasters and specialist anti-Jack infantry) can even put one point of damage on it.

Infantry heavy also has its advantages, with many more options available you can create a much more diverse force. You will almost always have numerical superiority, and can have a lot of varied units to perform different tasks. Unlike Warjacks who can have multiple roles, infantry tend to do one specific task much better than any other, like anti-infantry infantry, who cannot kill a Jack even if they tried. When focusing on Infantry, you generally have a quick, mobile and flexible army. Infantry can kill any enemy, as long as the specific unit is tailored for that role. Example: Widowmakers, excellent at killing single-wound models, but have a tough time killing anything else without buffs or feats.

I will go into more detail into synergy between your units, and the unholy mix of Jacks + Infantry in the next exciting episode!!

2 Wins against Menoth Last Night

Well, had 2 quick games against John last night. 500 points first, which took about 2 hours, then a 350 point battle which took 30 mins.

It was good fun, ended up taking Vladimir for 500 and Karchev for 350, Vlad took along the Behemoth and Drago, a unit of Widowmakers, Greylords and 2 Mortars to round out the list.

The first couple of turns being uneventful, John cleverly positioned his army away from my Mortars, making them end up doing practically no damage to anything except for a few points of damage on Kreoss in endgame.

Behemoth used his running + Bombard fire to great effect, with a couple of really nice deviations he took out 7 or 8 Temple Flameguard in his second turn. Signs and Portents on Bombards is damn impressive. Mortars trundled forwards, I ended up losing 3/4 of the crew to Kreoss at the end of the game, obviously in retaliation to the 3 or 4 damage they did with blast damage to him.

Drago using his affinity, some focus and a lethal number of attacks ripped apart an entire Reckoner and half a Devout in one turn. After getting knocked down with Kreoss's feat, he took a bunch of damage but stayed up. He then ripped the Devout a new one on his next turn. Kreoss stepped in and smacked him to pieces however.

The Greylords did an excellent job, Ice Caging the second Devout 3 turns in a row. No damage, but that was worth it as they practically took it out of the game.

Widowmakers did well, they pinged the first Devout for a few damage, and did 6 or so damage to Kreoss as well, until an Angry Kreoss charged in and ripped them to bits.

Behemoth and Vlad were the men of the hour however, the Behemoth doing incredible damage to the Menoth army. First, killing 8 or so TFG with the bombards, he then Bombarded the Vassal, which deviated into the Choir killing 4/6 of them. The second Bombard landed on the warpriest, wiping him out. He then charged the stationary Devout in the back arc, and although he missed his initial attack, he crushed it into pieces with his AP fists. After popping his feat, Vlad got him to run 16" right next to Kreoss and point blank Bombarded him, doing a few points of damage. Kreoss backed away into a forest, and the Behemoth was not able to hurt him for the rest of the game.

Vlad however, taking advantage of the lack of Lamentation being cast, S+P and Blood of Kings'ed himself and ran over to Kreoss. Mat 10 + Pow 16 with S+P and charge damage stabbed him right in the head to finish the game.

All the Menites were dead, leaving me with half a Mortar, my Greylords, Vlad and the undamaged Behemoth.

Was a great game!

The second game was a bit more just for fun, I abused the limit by hitting 352 with Karchev and 3 Berzerkers, but it was a great oppurtunity. Fighting against 2 Devouts and the Reckoner, I hit close combat first with a casting of Iron Curtain, Tow, my Feat, Arcantrik Turbine and a hit from Sunder. With this great combo, the Zerkers knocked down all 3 'jacks and smacked the hell out of them. However, I was not able to inflict critical damage and recieved Kreoss's feat for all MY warjacks knocked down this time. I took some heavy hits, losing an arm or two on my warjacks, but they came through ok for my next turn, where I cast Unearthly Rage and chucked 2 Focus on a Zerker.

UR + focus + Berzerkers is so good. Ended up with +5 to hit, +5 to damage by then end, and one very crushed Devout. This finished off both Devouts and did heavy damage to the Reckoner. The next turn, Kreoss cleverly cast Lamentation, meaning no more Unearthly Rage for me :(.

In a crazy move, the Choir charged a Berzerker and along with Kreoss killed it!! However, lacking any other stopping power, and with Karchev and about 1.25 functional Berzerkers left it was all over. A Berzerker loaded up on Focus trampled on the whole Choir and Kreoss, and in an impressive display of cumulative attacks ended up with a huggge Axe hit which decapitated Kreoss.

Good times!! Although I think the Karchev + 3 Zerker list, while over the points limit, is actually not the most effective. Probably Karchev, 2 Zerkers, and a bit of support would be better. Maybe a Greylord Ternion, or a Mortar would be a better use of the points.

To the Army Builder Lab!!!

Circle of Orboros - Models by my wife

Here are a few pictures of my wife's budding Circle army:

Behemoth Completed!

Finally, the Khador military unveil their latest crazy invention, the Behemoth!!

WIP Behemoth

Here we go - a sneak preview at my latest project, the Khador Behemoth. Ive been working on it the last week or so, its probably about halfway done i guess. Without further ado:

Pic of the new Koldun Lord -- looks kewl!

A new Koldun Lord model picture has been found, awesome looking fulla! Ill have to grab one when i can.