BR: 35pts eCaine vs. eDenny

First game of Warmachine in a long time and boy do I miss it.  This game was a standard 35pt caster kill game vs. Cryx and overall, I think it went pretty well.  I'll tell you one thing though:  I was definitely pretty rusty.  Let me elaborate on rusty for a second; if you don't a wargame in a while, you start losing some essential things that makes you a good player.  I second judged my ability to guess range, double-checked on multiple activations and played a little slower than I usually do.  These are things you get from playing the game, and I feel bad for not playing my beloved Cygnar for so long.

Anyways, back to the game.  How did this game go?  First, the list:

Points: 35
Captain Allister Caine (*5pts)
* Ol' Rowdy (9pts)
* Squire (2pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Hunter (6pts)
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
Rangers (5pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Gorman di Wulfe, Rogue Alchemist (2pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)

This is one of my many eCaine lists and this is the one I used today.  I also took the first turn and deployed my forces pretty close to eachother.  Rangers led the way as usual (AD'd), the ATGM stayed by a piece of cover/linear obstacle and Eiryss floated around the left flank.  Caine was deployed pretty offensively next to Ol'Rowdy and the B13 w. Gorman hung out to Caine's left.

My opponent's deployment was Nightmare and Deathjack to my left flank w. Cankerworm and his unit of Bane Thralls and Tartar floated around his right flank.  His infantry units were pretty far away from his jacks and were posted facing my ATGM.

Now for my abridged battle report:

• Both armies moved up towards each other with eDenny sitting in the back in fear of her life.  The Cankerworm peaks his head out a little too much and is in range of a Fire Beacon from Lynch.  With the help of a Ranger, he posts it right on the worm's head and the B13 open fire for some damage.  The Hunter, now seeing his prey, moves up and fire for some solid damage.  To finish the disgusting creature off, Caine puts himself out there and boosts his POW12s for a dead worm.
• I noticed my opponent had his Deathjack and Nightmare in pretty close proximity to each other.  I also noticed my Eiryss was deployed pretty aggressively.  I thought hmm.. why not?  She runs bravely through the terrain and within 5" of both jacks.  Defiantly, she stares them down as they ponder her actions.  After doing this, I ran Ol'Rowdy further up in "optimal" position.
• My power play played off and I baited my opponent's Deathjack into swinging at her.  She and her buddy Ranger goes down but not before I buy myself another round of shooting because no one ran.  Well, her Bane Thralls and Tartar ran, but without the support of their jacks.
• This is the power play that I intended with Eiryss.  She will die, yes, but in doing so it will force his jacks to either engage her and kill her or let me pick at his caster with Eiryss.  If he gets antsy and advances his Thralls without the help of his jacks, it'll be a turkey shoot because I can shift my ranged attention to one direction instead of two.  If my opponent moves up with his DJ to kill her, he will be range of Rowdy's charge next turn.  If he moved up with Denny and try to kill her with spells, but in doing so would risk her life in range of Caine's guns.  Either way, she needs to be dealt with because of her presence and no matter what decision my opponent made, I would of benefited somehow.  The best chance he had would be trying to kill her with Nightmare and then the free focus on DJ to apply pressure with his Thralls.  This didn't happen.
• Next round, I focus all my shooting at his Bane Thralls and stuff dies left and right.  Rowdy gets 3 Focus from Caine and he dismantles the Deathjack after the Hunter boosts damage on his face.  Caine moves over and shoots Tartarsauce in the face and Ryan puts up a Magestorm to block further Thralls from charging forward. More things die on his side and the damage is done and irrecoverable:  More than half the Banes were dead, Caine was completely safe (due to positioning and clouds), he lost both Canker and DJ in exchange for Eiryss, and Tartar was dead with Caine still having Feat.  We call the game here.

Post-game thoughts:

• Power plays are one of those things you do that forces your opponent to scratch his head in a thousand different ways.  He knows that whatever he does, something is going to happen and it's not going to be good.  Move Denny closer and she dies, move DJ and oh god Rowdy's right there, keep your army together and give me another round of shooting, or try to kill Eiryss with Nightmare needing 8s and if you miss, it's another round that you're behind.  I guess in a way, what I did was force a "check" like you do in Chess.  Eiryss and Ol'Rowdy being the key pieces.
• My opponent should of kept his army together and have them support each other.  If the jacks are one direction and the infantry in another, that's already a problem because there's not enough combined threat.  I was able to focus my attention to the left first, dealing with the jacks, before switching attention to the right, to annihilate all the infantry.  If my attention was split at a central force, there would of been a lot more difficult decisions to make.
• Another thing to note here is that if his infantry was closer around his jacks, he could of activated his Thralls to kill Eiryss instead of sacrificing actions on his jacks.
• This game just shows you that if you make one mistake, whether it was deployment or movement, you risk the chance of getting stopped cold in your tracks.  If your opponent is a good one, he will capitalize on your mistake and make you pay dearly for it.