BR: 35pts eHaley vs. Xerxis

I played a game vs. my friend Skorne tonight and it was pretty educational overall.  It was the first time he played against eHaley and it was not a game that he'll forget in the near future.  This BR will be written in  my classic bullet point format and it will highlight the important plays.  Overall, I wasn't really happy with my performance but it has been a long while since I played Haley.

My list:

Points: 35
Major Victoria Haley (*5pts)
* Thorn (8pts)
* Stormclad (10pts)
* Squire (2pts)
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
Stormblade Infantry (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
* Stormblade Infantry Officer & Standard (3pts)
* 3 Stormblade Infantry Storm Gunner (3pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord (2pts)

His list:

Points: 35
Tyrant Xerxis (*5pts)
* Bronzeback Titan (10pts)
* Titan Gladiator (8pts)
Bloodrunners (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Cataphract Cetrati (Leader and 5 Grunts) (11pts)
Paingiver Beast Handlers (Leader and 3 Grunts) (2pts)
Agonizer (2pts)
Orin Midwinter, Rogue Inquisitor (2pts)

• Turn 1 was pretty average.  I made him deploy first since I won the roll and he setup across the table for me in standard castle formation.  Xerxis casted Defender's Ward on the Bloodrunners and they went around flanking my B13 on the left.  Everyone moved up with the block of Cetrati in the middle in Shield Wall, the Bronzeback on his left and the Titan on his right.  Everyone else was behind him.
• Turn 1 for me was just moving all my dudes up.  Lynch lit up a Bloodrunner with Fire Beacon and Ryan dropped a Magestorm on him.  I placed Watts in front of Ryan so she wouldn't be charged next turn.  Thorn ran and arced a Time Bomb into to Cetrati and it didn't scatter too well.  eEiryss flanked his army on the right.
• Turn 2 saw his entire army moving up some more.  He upkept Defender's Ward on his Bloodrunners and they charged Watts.  Only one was in reach to hit him and he missed with his attack.  He had a crap ton of Fury on his Agonizer and that was just short of touching Thorn.  With his army up mid-field, I knew next turn was going to be big.
• Turn 2 my turn saw Haley pop her feat, covering his entire army in a Temporal Shift.  She put Temporal Acceleration on the Stormclad and made the Gladiator turn around with TK.  Haley put 3 focus on the Stormclad and 1 focus on Thorn just in case I needed to get somewhere.  At this point, I was noticing the rust in playing eHaley because I had to constantly look at her cards for a refresher.  I didn't play this as good as I should of, but in the end, the Stormclad charged the Bronzeback and stuck his sword up his spine.  The TK from Thorn (should of been Deadeye) on the Stormblades who assaulted the Cetrati and shot, but missed a few shots.  Even though they failed their charge, they still got their shots off and are in charge range of next round.  Thorn used Reaction Drive to move into charge range of something, but I had no good targets because the Cetrati didn't die as much as I wanted.  The B13 also shot and killed some Bloodrunners and Ryan shot a Magestorm into the Cetrati, but missed, scattering a little on top of the Cetrati a little in front of my Stormblades.  Eiryss moved into position to shoot at Orin but she missed with double 1s.
• Turn 3 for my opponent was really my extra turn.  I moved his army around in ways he didn't like and he couldn't do anything but take a beating next round.  He got in BtB with everything for the most part and then popped his Feat for +2 ARM.  In addition, he casted Defender's Ward on the Cetrati and Shield Walled with them for a ridiculous 24 ARM.  He also casted Inhospitable Ground and that left him with no Fury to transfer to.  His Gladiator also walked into combat with Eiryss, which should of never happened but I got too greedy at killing Orin.
• Turn 4 my turn was more difficult than it should of been.  The B13 killed more things, Ryan shot another shot into the pack of dudes but it didn't do anything.  My Stormclad was in range of his Agonizer and he couldn't be allocated focus.  Thorn was still good but he quite far away from the Stormclad.  I put a focus on Thorn to run and Haley kept everything for herself.  She TA'd the Stormclad through Thorn (who ran into range), arced a Time Bomb into the Cetrati and tried to boost for damage but got no results.  Eiyrss tried to leave combat but got hit by a free strike and died horribly.  The Stormblades assaulted and killed off 2 Cetrati despite their ridiculous armor and the Stormclad moved in range to swing at Xerxis' face for the game.  I rolled really high with the first two sword swings and that was enough.

Normally, I'm pretty good at this game, but in this particular game I think played like fucking sac.  Yes, this is my second game with Cygnar in 5 months, but excuses is for bitches.  I'll go over why I think this here:

• Instead of casting TK on a Gladiator (which was absolutely useless btw), I should of casted Deadeye on my Stormblades and focus fired on the right most Cetrati in front of me.  This would of hopefully produced more damage to take them down and then I could of charged Thorn into that god damn annoying Agonizer.  That would of put my Spear with reach in range of a lot of his models and only one Cetrati would be hitting back.  With that single move, I would of swept away one of his heavies, had another round of full focus on the Stormclad next turn, been in a good flanking position with my Stormblades should he turn his back on me to engage Thorn (the majority won't be able to attack me cause of Feat), and I would of gained a much larger lead.  That would of been the optimal choice of activations, but I went ahead and fucked it up.
• Oh, and I would of never lost Eiryss.  I got greedy, gambled and rolled double 1s.  That's what I get for gambling instead of playing smart.  He would not have Defender's Ward up if she was alive.
• Overall, sloppy ass game.  Even though I still won, I'm still pretty bitter because there was so many mistakes. If I played with the right activations, this game would of been more decisive.

Random thoughts and overtime

It's been a year now since I started WM and I must say that things have changed for the better.  Since I started learning the game, I must say that Warmahordes (Warmachine and Hordes) is just very solid.  In many ways, it takes me back to my Starcraft days where if you mess up, you're done.  The game is very precise on execution amongst other things and the competitive atmosphere is fantastic.  It's basically a game I wished 40K was since I'm not super happy about Steam Punk stuff compared to GW fluff.  I basically only play this game because of the game rules and playstyle is everything a competitive gamer hopes for in a table top.

Speaking of which, there are also rumors of 6th Ed. Warhammer 40K coming out in 2012.  What are some improvements you want to see?  TLoS was the big thing in 5th Ed and I'm almost 100% certain that it's here to stay.  Here are some things I'd like to see for 6th Ed. 40K:

• Cover system tweaked, 4+ cover on everything everywhere is just too generous.
• Remove wound allocation and bring back torrent of fire.
• Maybe a consolidation roll after vehicle kills or bringing back massacre rolls to go back into combat.
• Bring back vehicle destroyed results on the glancing chart.

On another note, I'm doing overtime again, hence why you see very little posting.  What's funnier is that last year, at around the same time I got into Warmachine, overtime hit me in the face too.  Awesome.

Circle and other news

I finally decided to pick up Hordes.  Since there were no Circle players in my group, I'm officially the first Circle player!  This actually means two things:  One, I picked up Circle obviously, and two, I've put my Grey Knights on hold for now.  Many of you are probably wondering why I put my GK on hold and the reason is quite simple:  The new GK book is not the same army I fell in love with those many years ago.  It was a tough choice, but in the end the dudes are going to sit there until I feel the urge to build the entire army up from scratch.  After all, I have Dark Eldar, Blood Angels and Space Wolves to cater to, and some say that's enough armies already!  I'll still play games with the GKs though, I have a ton of friends that started the army as well.  Bandwagoners.

Now that that's out there, let's talk about some other random stuff.  First, I'd like to say that I'm going to be doing a Podcast per week on miniatures gaming.  Most of the time, it will be about 40K but every now and then I'll throw in a Warmachine or WHFB segment.  My friend and I were discussing the finer points of wargaming and we dawned upon something invigorating and fun.   I've seen other videocasts before like Beast of War or some of the battle reports on BoLS and frankly, I'm not too impressed.  Beast of War is too nerdy and loaded with false hope and information and BoLS lacks the tactical acumen that I desire.  That said, I think I'll do my own thing and talk about the finer points of tactics, army lists, metagame and strategy.  I picture this kind of like the Day9 dailies of wargaming, except it'll be weekly, hopefully.

The idea right now is to have a podcast a week and maybe someday expand to video capture where I can show you guys how I play an actual game.  All I do is blog about how to play and why certain things are better than others and I think it'll be awesome if I can actually "show" you guys.  This is the goal, I don't know when that's going to happen, but that's the goal.  Also, keep in mind that I have barely anything painted.  I moved to Cali from Jersey 3 years ago and I've been working ever since.  The job, the wife and the free time I have is dedicated to assembling models and getting them to the table ASAP.  In short, I haven't painted shit in years.  Besides, if you're coming here to see painted models, you're coming here for the wrong reason.

With that said, let's move onto another agenda.  My blog recently hit 300k views and that's pretty bad ass!  I would like to say thank you to all my viewers and I appreciate all the comments and feedback (both negative and positive) so far.  I'm a big fan of honest opinions and I love direct feedback.

I know I'm jumping around a bit here, but some of you may remember that failed blog post I did a while back called "You're Doing It Wrong".  Well, the podcast will be similar to that but with a lot less of me being a dick but a lot more knowledge packed into each session.  I plan for each segment to run 30 minutes or so per episode and it will touch upon everything strategy and tactics related.  This will include how to build a successful army list, how to read your opponent and how to defeat your opponent.  All these things will be good advice for newer players and veterans alike.  Just keep in mind that I can't help but curse sometimes to get my point across.  I view wargames as a man's game and if your virgin ears can't handle it, don't listen to it.  I'm bold, I'm direct and I call it like it is.

Alright, now let's talk about my Circle army really quick.  I plan on running eKaya and my current army list looks like this:

Kaya the Moonhunter & Laris (*3pts)
* Pureblood Warpwolf (9pts)
* Warpwolf Stalker (10pts)
Tharn Bloodtrackers (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Nuala the Huntress (2pts)
Druid Wilder (2pts)
Lord of the Feast (4pts)
Totem Hunter (3pts)

The entire army is stealthed and I have all the tools I need to take down jacks, beasts, infantry and whatever else I want.  The Bloodtrackers can Prey something and do B13-like damage from the same threat range and the Lord of the Feast is just a god in melee vs. packed infantry.  The Totem Hunter shares some love with enemy Eiryss and other solos gets hunted down as well.  Kaya is the big player in my list along side her dogs Laris, Pureblood and the Stalker.  With Forced Evo, the Stalker can reach insane POW20 with 9" charge and 2" reach.  Its DEF16 because of Forced Evo, bringing it on par with most Legion elites.  The Pureblood is in there purely as a toolbox beast since he can give Ghostly to the Stalker or Blessed to its weapons.  Of course, the RNG10 POW14 magical spray is also a very welcome addition.  Either way, I got a Feral just in case I need a beast with MAT7 and I feel like I need more anti-big stuff.

That's all I got for now guys, let me know what you think about the podcast idea.

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.

WM: Cygnar Tricks

This will be the first of many mini-articles that I'm putting out for Warmachine.  The purpose of these articles is to teach players all the "tricks" that each faction can put out.  Keep in mind that I'll only speak from the factions and warcasters that I have experience with.  By experience, I mean combat experience either on the table or in Vassal.  You won't find any theory hammer here.

Oh and yes, I'm also going to need your input on how I can format this better.  For now, I'll start with the warcasters and what kind of units you'll see with them.

Siege
Playstyle: Massive ranged damage.
Feat: The first time a model takes damage in his control area, it's at half armor.
Gimmick: The complete and utter destruction of the opposing army on feat turn.
Units: Defenders, Stormclad, Rangers

On feat turn, Siege and his army can wipe out an entire opposing army.  Every single model taking damage will be at half armor means that ATGM will be doing straight dice to Khador 'jacks.  A Stormclad will be hitting at dice +9 and each POW10 Electro-leap will be killing any infantry around him.  Ground Pounder will also do massive amounts of damage to infantry coming in range of Siege and on feat turn, it's going to absolutely destroy shield walls.  Due to Siege's fantastic assortment of spells, he can make Defenders do magical AOE3 shots and give his ranged army constant cover and immunity to blast damage.  Mage Sight reveals stealth and Foxhole can drop enemy 'jacks into a hole and open LoS to the enemy caster for ranged assassination.

eHaley
Playstyle: Using spells to move units into advantageous positions.
Feat: She controls the order of activations of enemy models in her control range.  Those models effected have to forfeit their movement or combat action.
Gimmick: Jack Bullet or Bullet Jack.
Units: Defender, Stormclad, Stormblades, Lancer

eHaley has the ability to inflict massive damage to your opponents and then deny them any chance of retaliation.  Her Feat allows her to control the order of activations for your opponent's models and they have to either forfeit their movement or combat action.  That's absolutely huge; especially if nothing is in combat reach.  You can also use her feat to completely deny your opponent's chances of an assassination or successful jack kill.  With Telekensis and Temporal Acceleration, she can launch her Stormclad at her opponents with a threat range of 16" with Reach.  This is her ideal jack bullet and her other is the Defender.  By casting TA on the Defender and moving stuff around with TK, the Defender can claim a aiming bonus with two boosted shots at the enemy warcaster for an assassination.  Haley also likes to run with Stormblades because she has access to Deadeye and can increase their chances to hit dramatically.


eCaine
Playstyle: Ranged assassination and massive single-target damage.
Feat: For each shot that hits, Caine gets +1 accumulative damage to his POW12 guns.  Models that are boxed explodes for AOE3 POW10 blast damage.
Gimmick: 19" threat range from clear line of sight or 18.5" without for his ranged assassination.
Units: Rangers, Reinholdt, Squire, eEyriss

There's a lot of eCaine lists out there that play differently from each other.  Some take advantage of knockdowns to open up a shooting lane and others compensate Caine's shootiness with melee.  Whatever it is, the list almost always feature Rangers, Reinholdt, Squire and eEyriss.  The reason why is because Ranger's mark boosts Caine's RAT to an appalling 11 and eEyriss makes sure focus camping warcasters are no problem.  On Feat turn with 10 shots thanks to ROF Infinity guns, Caine can move 7" and shoot 12" for massive amounts of damage on a single-target.  It's pretty much capable of killing anything in the game with average dice, no exaggeration.  If line of sight or shooting lanes isn't an option for Caine, he'll just charge up 10.5" and then Gate Crash teleport 8" into your hiding warcaster's face.  Sure, it takes some focus to do so, but 7 shots with Feat is still enough to kill most warcasters in one go.  With this in mind, nothing in the game is truly safe from Caine as long as he's alive.

eStyrker
Playstyle: Infantry heavy, combat assassination
Feat: After everything activates, models in control range can advance 3" and make an additional melee attack.
Gimmick: 17" charge range, Positive Charge, Rebuke
Units: Ol'Rowdy, Stormclad, Lancer, infantry by choice

eStryker plays very differently compared to every other Cygnar warcaster.  He prefers heavy infantry lists, close combat warjacks such as the Stormclad or Ol'Rowdy, and frequently likes to assassinate in close combat.  With Velocity and a clear charge lane, Stryker has a 17" threat range with Overcharge.  Overcharge allows him to roll 1-3 D6 and exchange HP for raw damage.  With 2 dice, he's hitting for POW22 and using his focus to boost attack rolls on the enemy caster for an an easy kill.  Positive Charge makes the Stormclad MAT9 with POW21 and infantry models within the Stormclad's reach gain the same +2/2 bonus.  For this reason, you'll see eStryker lists running Sword Knights, Stormguard/blades and Precursor Knights.  It's quite easy for these infantry to charge in and do massive amounts of accurate damage when in range of a jack.  In terms of jacks, a Lancer is a must for Rebuke since denying enemy orders to a unit for a turn can be game-changing.  Ol'Rowdy is also a fantastic buy for a melee jack because of Stryker's affinity.

Kara Sloan
Playstyle: Accurate ranged superiority.
Feat: Everything in her control range gets boosted ranged attack rolls and models in her battlegroup gets to make additional ranged attacks.
Gimmick: She's RAT8 with a RNG14, POW12 Weapon Master weapon that can be extended to 16".
Units: Defender, Cyclone, Hunter, Stormblades

The first time Kara hits home with a shot, you're going to feel it.  Her POW12 Weapon Master gun can be boosted for 12+4d6 worth of damage.  With Reinholdt, she gets 2 shots of these from up to 16" range thanks to Fire Group.  The Defenders and the Hunters in her battlegroup can claim a lot more opportunities to shoot thanks to the extended range and on feat turn, they're definitely going to find their mark.  Kara's feat also allows everything in her battlegroup to make additional ranged attacks that can pummel enemy jacks into oblivion.  The rest of her army comp is pretty standard; ATGM with a Cyclone UA'd, B13 and/or melee units like Stormblades to take advantage of Deadeye.  With RAT8, Deadeye and Feat, Kara can preform a high-powered ranged assassination from even greater distances than Caine.

eNemo

Playstyle: Buffing his jacks to unbelievable levels.

Feat: Each warjack in Nemo's battlegroup in his control area gets up to 3 focus.

Gimmick: On feat turn, all of his jacks go buck wild with Energizer and plow through things.

Units: Hammersmith, Stormclad, Ironclad, Thunderhead

eNemo is THE warjack caster in the Cygnar army.  His Energizer can make all the warjacks in his battlegroup advance an extra 3"; his Fail Safe can make warjacks with disabled systems ignore their handicaps; Polarity Shield can keep enemies from charging and Lightning Sword turns any jack into a Stormclad with +2 STR and Electro-leap.  On feat turn, Nemo gives all his jacks 3 focus so he can have up to 9 by himself to do other stuff; like re-arranging all his upkeep spells and use Energizer.  To make things even more interesting, Nemo can allocate focus during his activation and retrieve any focus he put on his warjacks.  The applications to this is near endless as it gives Nemo plenty of spell versatility and strategy on how he wants to execute his turn.  To keep things even more interesting, Nemo's basic ranged attack now functions the same way as Voltaic Snare (as pNemo).  This in itself can cause massive problems for opposing jack armies.

Alright mans, this is all the experience I have with Cygnar warcasters.  Most of my experiences come with eCaine, Siege and eHaley  but I've recently been playing with eStryker and Kara Sloan.  I like them all a lot, but I find the first 3 to be my favorite (especially Caine).  In terms of power, everyone except for Kara is considered to be Cygnar's "Big 4"; meaning they're Tier1 casters.  Kara is viewed as a weaker version of Siege but I don't see it that way.  I think she brings a lot to the table and her playstyle is truly unique.

BR: 35pt eCaine vs. pGaspy

OK, a quick BR on a 35pt game of WM I played last night.  It was standard caster kill format with my eCaine list vs. Chad's pGaspy.  This game showcases the options offered in a Cygnar list and all the different tools a player can use to his disposal when fielding eCaine.  Even though the assassination run didn't go as planned, careful target priority on feat turn can still make for a devastating turn.

My army list:
Points: 35
Captain Allister Caine (*5pts)
* Ol' Rowdy (9pts)
* Squire (2pts)
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
Lady Aiyana & Master Holt (4pts)
Rangers (5pts)
Captain Arlan Strangewayes (2pts)
* Defender (9pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)
Stormsmith Stormcaller (1pts)

His army list:
pGaspy + Scarthrall
Full unit of Bane Thralls + UA
Spray Chicken
Cankerworm
Seether
Tartersauce
Small unit of Mechanothralls and Necrosurgeon

My first game back from many many long months of OT and boy, does it feel good to play again.

The gist of the game goes like this:

• Caine casts True Shot on himself and enables him to see through stealth, camo and concealment.  He upkeeps this the entire game practically vs. Chad's stealthed dudes.
• Turn 2 my turn is where the game actually began with the two forces ready to do battle.
• Rangers run order into range and Lynch Fire beacons some Cryx dudes.  Ryan Magestorms and kills a bunch of dudes (Chad not rolling enough Tough), and Watts kills one himself.
• Aiyana and Holt casts and shoots, but isn't very successful.
• Eyriss disrupts the chicken on his side and the Defender puts heavy damage on it.
• I forgot that Chad's dudes can just auto get up on his turn because of some special rule and Aiyana and Holt gets charged by angry Thralls and dies horribly.
• Some combat also kills a Storm Smith.
• His Seether moves up behind some of his remaining Thralls and his Warcaster sits behind the Seether.  His Cankerworm runs up to my right flank by the B13.
• Eiyriss moves up and attempts to sap Iron Lich of all his focus and fails to hit (needing a 6).
• The B13 mows down most of the remaining Bane Thralls and opens up a charge lane for Rowdy.
• Rowdy charges the Seether, boosts to hit for crit KD and isn't able to.  He inflicts a good amount of damage on the Seether.
• Rangers run into position for marked targets, doing else all game but redirect charge lanes and this.
• At this time, I know the assassination isn't going to happen so I change my plans to something more acceptable.
• Arlan PB's the Defender and the Defender aims and shoots at the Seether in combat.  He's essentially RAT10 with aiming bonus and Ranger's marking so his boost hits the 7s needed.  Arlan's JM bonus boosts the damage and the Seether takes another batch of damage.
• Caine draws focus from the Squire, Reloads from Reinholdt, moves up slightly and shoots 9 shots with Feat up.  After only missing 1, I kill the Cankerworm, the Seether in combat, Bane Lord Tartersauce and the rest of his Bane Thralls.  Caine was RAT11 with the Ranger's marks.
• Next turn, Chad's damaged chicken tries to arc stuff into Caine, just to run into Magestorm, takes POW12+10 and dies.
• Chad kills the B13 with his Iron Lich, pops feat to get all his focus back.  His normal Thralls attack Eyriss and fail to kill her because of her DEF16.
• The game is pretty much clean up from here with most of the Mechanothralls dying to Arlan's spray + Ranger's mark, Eyriss dying from a Mechanothrall after trying to move out of combat, and despite Iron Lich camping full focus, combined boosted damage shooting from the Defender, Caine and Ol'Rowdy wailing on him, he goes down.

Post-game thoughts:

• Aiming and Rangers' mark allow most of the Cygnar army to shoot into combat without penalty.
• Rangers are absolutely vital against high DEF armies because it allows all of you guys to shoot more reliably.  RAT11 Caine guarantees results.
• If you don't have an assassination lined up, or the risk is too high, always go for the max amount of damage on his army instead.  Most people think Caine is just assassination and that's it.  As long as you do irrecoverable damage to the rest of his forces in any given turn, it's just as good.
• After I knocked down the models in front of A&H, I thought I was safe from retaliation.  Too bad those Bane Thralls just got up right after and charged them.  That was bad play from me and they did not make their points back.  This just means that I have to know my opponent's units better and understand what they can or cannot do.

Article: Do or Die Scenarios are Bad

Here's a teaser of an article I wrote recently for Bell of Lost Souls:

Warmachine is a game where if you play carelessly with your warcaster, you can lose the game immediately.  When I read battle reports from other players, I shake my head every time I read the dreaded "do or die" scenario.  What does this scenario mean?  It means that if you don't do something big this turn, you will lose the game.  It's literally do or die.  This is exactly the type of scenario that you should avoid.

Recently, I read a battle report where someone got himself in close proximity to pButcher.  He was trying to pull off a kill on pButcher but when all things failed, he figured his warcaster should go try!  Now I don't know about you guys, but I can't fathom why you would ever get anywhere near a MAT9 Reach POW16 Weapon Master.  To make matters worse, you're not running eEiryss and the Butcher is camping focus with Iron Flesh on himself.  For those of you that are not familiar with Warmachine, pButcher is a slaughterhouse on two legs.  He's the size of most armies' light 'jacks and his melee swings as strong as most heavies.  Under no circumstance you should ever be near him unless you're prepared.  If you're running a melee beast warcaster yourself, you still might want to invest in another strategy since going up against Butcher with camped focus and buffs is going to be tough.  If you're ranged or a spellcaster and you're going for it, you're doing it wrong.

You can find the rest here.

My Tier2 Rahn list

Cygnar is a great faction and I love playing with them, but sometimes you just need something different!  That's why I chose Retribution as my second army.  Nobody around here really plays them, no one understands them and the rarity of the faction is what really appealed to me.  Just because no one really plays them (there's like 5 Cygnar players here) doesn't mean they're bad.  In fact, I find Retribution to be one of the trickiest factions to play against.  They have strong shooting in the form of Invictors and MHSF, powerful melee thanks to Sentinels and Halberdiers, and ridiculous manipulation in the form of Battle Mages (mittens).


I actually picked up Adeptis Rahn before I knew what he could do.  Maybe it's just my natural affinity for randomly picking competitive casters (like how I started Cygnar with eCaine), but I really liked the fact that he's portrayed as one of the most powerful spellcasters in the world.  As most of you know, one of the reasons I picked up High Elves was because of Teclis.  Thankfully, Rahn isn't as ridiculous as Teclis, but in some ways, he can be just as bad.

Here's my current army list for Retribution.  It's Tier2 Rahn and it's geared towards maximizing Feat turn while maintaining two heavy 'jacks.

Points: 35
Adeptis Rahn Shyeel (*6pts)
* Phoenix (10pts)
* Discordia (10pts)
House Shyeel Battle Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
House Shyeel Battle Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Houseguard Halberdiers (Leader and 9 Grunts) (7pts)
* Houseguard Halberdiers Officer & Standard (2pts)
Arcanist (0pts)
House Shyeel Magister (2pts)

The Phoenix is pretty much a given considering how he's an arc node in heavy armor stats.  With Phoenix Shield, the ability to heal and ARM18 w/ DEF12, he's one of the best arc nodes in the game.  Don't even think you can swarm him with infantry and tie him up, his *Attack Combustion makes sure everything within 2" of him takes POW12 Continuous Fire hits.  Throw in the fact he also has a P+S17 Reach weapon that automatically lights things on fire when he hits and you've got yourself a real winner.

The newest edition to my army list is the Discordia.  He's the newest edition to the Retribution warhost and he's got some insanely impressive abilities.  The stats for him is basically a Manticore +1 MAT/RAT and 2x P+S16 Open Fists.  His ranged weapon is what really sells this 'jack.. considering how Retribution has a overwhelming weakness to stealth and infantry hordes.  The Discordia comes with a RNG10 POW14 Magical spray.  That is just amazing.  His other abilities include being bonded to Rahn, has an Imprint: Kinetic Field that allows him to spend a focus to make this model and other friendly models within 3" of it gain +2 ARM vs. ranged attacks and not suffer blast damage.  Throw on Rahn's Force Field and have him stand next to some Halberdiers in Shield Wall and things get quite ridiculous.

As for the rest of my list, I get a free Arcanist because of Rahn's T2 bonus and I fill in the rest with Halberdiers and Battle Mages.  Two squads of Battle Mages to capitalize on Feat turn and the Magister just because I can.  Believe it or not, but I love the Magister's Combo-Smite.  Being able to charge in with MAT7 and knock something on its ass is just great.  As for the Halberdiers, I think they're absolutely amazing.  Great stats all around and the fastest Shield Wall in the game because of Reform gives me extreme flexibility.  ARM20 vs. ranged attacks with Discordia's Kinetic Field up is just demoralizing to armies like Cygnar.

So what ya guys think?  I'm loving this list.

BR: 35pt Siege vs. eGaspy

The battle begins with a map with a fair share of terrain.  This battle highlights the importance of utilizing knockdown and positioning so Breach turn can inflict the most damage.  By destroying and severely crippling my opponent's warjacks, I can stay ahead in the attrition game and deliver game-winning results.  The guy with the last warjack is always ahead.

My list looks like this:

Points: 35

Major Markus 'Siege' Brisbane (*5pts)

* Defender (9pts)

* Defender (9pts)

* Ol' Rowdy (9pts)

* Squire (2pts)

Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)

Captain Arlan Strangewayes (2pts)

Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)

Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)

Stormsmith Stormcaller (1pts)

His list looked like this:

Points: 35

Lich Lord Asphyxious (*6pts)

* Nightwretch (4pts)

* Reaper (7pts)

* Seether (9pts)

* Skarlock Thrall (2pts)

Bane Knights (Leader and 9 Grunts) (10pts)

The Withershadow Combine (5pts)

Bane Lord Tartarus (4pts)

Cryx Turn #1

He runs his entire army and covers his advance with clouds of goo.  For those of you who don't know, eGaspy has a spell called Caustic Mist.. which he can cast to block LoS to a lot of targets as long as he stacks them next to eachother.  His Reaper sat behind some concealment forest and his Seether sat right behind the Reaper with the WSC sitting close to both.  For Warmachine newcomers, this is the dirty strategy of Dark Industries:  If he manges to gets a hold of any of my jacks with the Harpoon, he can damage it enough for the WSC to turn him into another Seether or something.  His Bane Knights run up my left flank and Bane Lord floats around the right side of the board.  The Nightwrench also hugs the woods with the Reaper for some arc node coverage.

Cygnar Turn #1

On my turn, I moved both Defenders up with 2 focus each.  I put a foxhole on them and hold off on moving Siege any further.  Arlan boosts Ol'Rowdy and he Imprints for Grudge just in case he gets pulled.  Since the mists were up on every location except for one opening to his Seether, I positioned my Defenders and made magic happen.  The Defenders open fire for boosted attack and damage rolls.  Concentrated fire puts serious damage on the 1 and 6 boxes causing the Seether to lose one of his arms.  Eiryss aims and shoots the Nightwrench for Disruption and I'm happy with that.  B13 moves up and attempts to Snipe the Knights on my left flank but only manages to kill one.  The Stormsmith runs up the left flank and the turn ends.

Cryx Turn #2

On his turn, he puts 3 focus on the Reaper, 3 on the Seether and that's it.  I know exactly what he's going to try to do.  Or not!  Instead of harpooning my Ol'Rowdy, he harpoons one of the Defenders out of the Foxhole!  He rolls insanely high and beats the DEF16 requirement and drags one of my Defenders to his doom.  After some serious damage from the Reaper and the Seether that charged in, I'm left with no Cortex Hammer and boxes everywhere.  The moment of truth came with the Seether Chain Attacked with Grab & Smash and I resisted the throw!  Now I'm stuck in there with a half-ass Defender and no targets of opportunity.  The rest of his army runs up close and is now in charge range of my army.

Cygnar Turn #2

Siege is the master of making big turns and that's exactly what he did this game.  I'm not going to take any credit for Siege's masterful execution of tactics and strategy, but in short, this is what he did:  Siege starts by dropping Foxhole, putting 2 focus on the safe Defender, 1 focus on the one stuck in combat and 2 on Ol'Rowdy.  That gives him 2 more for himself since he ate some Squire.  Strangewayes moves up and tries to Evasive the Defender locked in combat but he's just short of range.  No problem, Ol'Rowdy decides he's going to single-handily turn this shitstorm around.  He charges in 8" towards the Seether and Skarlock Thrall and smashes his hammer into the ground.  He boosts to hit the Seether, watches as the Skarlock falls on his ass and knocks down my own Defender.  I use Grudge on Ol'Rowdy and then end his activation.  Reinholdt reloads Siege and the time for action is now.  With a clear line of sight to the Reaper and the KD Seether, Siege walks up and covers most of the Cryx army with Breach.  He starts off and ground pounds 4 Bane Knights into ash and before setting up his 2nd shot.  His next shot hits the Reaper in the face with a boosted attack and damage roll for 16 boxes of damage.  The force of the impact immediately destroys the Harpoon and the movement of the Reaper 'jack.  Seeing the Seether on his ass, the Defender hits his DEF5 target easily and boosts for massive damage.  A total of 19 points of damage is scored and the Seether vanishes from this world.  With no melee weapon and no chance of survival, the Defender takes a chance and moves out of combat with the Reaper.  The Reaper strikes him down easily with the Free Strike and now stands to face Ol'Rowdy alone.  Eiryss moves up and takes a chance with her bow at the now breached Tartarus, hits and rolls laughable damage.  The B13 goes to town with Mage Storm and Brutal Shots and puts down a bunch more Bane Knights.  The Stormsmith epic fails with a 12/8 on his skill check.

Cryx Turn #3

With his army in shambles, the Iron Lich is confused.  He is too far away to pop feat and kill Siege, but he is in range to try and kill the Defender.  Too bad the way I moved my B13 put them as meat shields in front of my Defender so that he can't possibly be melee'd my reach targets.  He decides not to pop his Feat but instead puts 3 focus on the Reaper in a futile attempt to kill my Ol'Rowdy.  With the Seether wrecked in front of his WMC, they cowardly sit behind cover and hit my Ol'Rowdy with magical attacks.  I get hit by one of them for 4 damage while the others bounce off my ARM20.  The Reaper comes up to me and smacks me for some damage.  I smack back with Grudge but roll low for damage so only a few boxes gets filled.  In total, I take something like 9 damage on various locations so nothing critical happens there.  Tartersauce charges Eiyriss and turns her into a Thrall.  The Lich moves behind his WSC and throws up some more mists; one of which lands on Ryan and my Defender and ends his turn.

Cygnar Turn #3

I put 2 focus on my Defender and keep 5 for myself.  Yum Squire.  Arlan moves up and PB's Ol'Rowdy for a Focus and the fireworks begin.  I move Ol'Rowdy into the left flank of his Reaper and tremor everything within 2".  I catch his Reaper and his Nightwrench (who ran there last round) and I spend a focus to bash the Reaper's face with another attack.  The Reaper is now a smoldering ruin.  My B13 cleans house again with Lynch Black Pennying Ryan out of reach of a Bane Knight and Ryan shoots up two more after that.  Watts shoots and misses, but that's fine.  My Defender now has LoS to the Iron Lich's medium size base, aims, boots and scores a hit with a boosted damage roll.  After 12 points of damage is logged on the caster, Siege makes his move.  He moves, Explosivos himself, boosts to hit and hits the Iron Lich in the face.  He boosts for damage and that's enough for the game.  Otherwise, the next shot and the AOE3 would of probably did considerable damage to the WSC near his caster.

Cygnar Wins!

BR: 35pt eHaley vs. pGoreshade

The battle begins with a map with a fair share of terrain.  This battle highlights the importance of Haley's spells in combination with her Feat.  When used correctly, her feat can utterly cripple the opposing army and essentially give Haley's army another turn.  Her two win conditions in this list is the Defender and the Stormclad so both must be protected to make the win happen.

My list looks like this:

Points: 35
Major Victoria Haley (*5pts)
* Thorn (8pts)
* Defender (9pts)
* Stormclad (10pts)
* Squire (2pts)
Black 13th Gun Mage Strike Team (4pts)
Stormblade Infantry (Leader and 5 Grunts) (5pts)
Captain Arlan Strangewayes (2pts)

His list looked like this:

Points: 35
Goreshade the Bastard (*6pts)
* Cankerworm (5pts)
* Deathjack (12pts)
Bane Thralls (Leader and 9 Grunts) (8pts)
* Bane Thrall Officer & Standard (3pts)
The Withershadow Combine (5pts)
Bane Lord Tartarus (4pts)
Machine Wraith (1pts)
Pistol Wraith (3pts)

Cygnar Turn #1

I deploy the Defender behind a wrecked house so he has a nice position to shoot up some 'jacks if the situation arises.  The Stormblades runs next to the Defender as protection and the Stormclad comes up towards its flank.  My B13 babysits my right flank with Thorn and Arlan and the Squire sits comfortably next to eHaley behind the rest of the frontline.

Cryx Turn #1

His deployment didn't have Cankerworm or the Deathjack advance deploy, so I thought that was really odd. What makes it more odd was that he didn't cast Shadowmancer on his first turn but instead camps focus after running with his entire army.  The Thralls are on my right side directly facing my B13 and the Deathjack, his Cankerworm (behind the DJ) and the Withershadow are on the left.  The Machine Wraith is also on my left flank.

Cygnar Turn #2

Haley Temporal Accelerates the Defender after allocating 2 focus to it.  She also puts one of Thorn and sits comfortably after casting TA on the Defender.  I don't want to be hasty and run my army up further than I should.. and I definitely don't want to carelessly lose my only arc node.  My B13 Fire Beacons the Thralls on the right side, Watts misses his shot and Ryan hits 3 Bane Thralls with her Mage Storm.  I roll to kill all 3 but he makes all 3 Tough rolls.  The Defender moves up a little bit after seeing Haley's control area and takes 2 shots at the Deathjack. The first shot misses and the second shot does abysmal damage after boosting so nothing really happens.  That's fine, we'll pretend the DJ had Shadowmancer on.  I kindly remind my opponent and he facepalms in disbelief.  The Stormblades advance cautiously, judging my distance very carefully.

Cryx Turn #2

The DJ moves up some more and is on my doorstep - definitely within charging range of almost everything important next turn.  The Cankerworm sits behind him; waiting for the right opportunity to strike.  The WSC is still floating around behind the Canker and the Machine Wraith moves pretty close to the DJ.  The Bane Thralls run up again and this time, they're literally face to face with most of my B13 and Thorn.  Goreshade moves up as well and casts Mage Blight but Haley's out of range to be effected.  Tartarsauce is also waiting to pounce on some units should they dig through the wall of Tough Bane Thralls.

Cygnar Turn #3

This is a big turn for me.  The Stormclad receives 3 focus from Haley after she eats the Squire and the Defender gets allocated 2.  Arlan moves up and PB's Thorn as he charges into a Bane Thrall and it sits there after making a Tough roll.  It doesn't matter because his true intention was to be revealed shortly.    Haley moves around with her 18" of control range thanks to the Squire and pops her Feat.  The entire Cryx army is now in effect of Temporal Shift.  Her next move is to cast TK through Thorn on the DJ which makes him turn around and block the Cankerworm.  Thorn's Affinity with Haley allows him to Arc Node as if not in combat and his Reaction Drive moved him around slightly to the right of the Bane Thrall.  The B13 moves up and Watts headshots Thorn's Bane Thrall with Black Penny and Ryan Mage Storms again, tagging 4 of the Thralls.  They make 3 Tough rolls.  I rage for a good 5 minutes.  After Lynch shoots another one dead, my Stormblades charged to rest of the Thralls and put a good amount of them down.  Out of the 6 that got charged, only 2 made their Tough rolls.  The Defender charges in at the Deathjack that had his back turned and put serious damage on his cortex and movement.  My Stormclad activates with full focus and charges 5+2 bonded+3+Reach and runs his Generator Blade through the DJ's spine.  I roll pretty high and he dies in one hit.  The lightning arc does nothing.

Cryx Turn #3

Cryx has a sad.  His entire army is slowed by Haley's Feat and they can't really do much to retaliate.  I choose the Pistol Wraith to go first since the map was cluttered with units in combat or out of range so it didn't get to kill that much.  The Bane Thralls went next and they chopped down some SBs but then just sat there.  Tartar was out of range to do anything so he just moved.  The Cankerworm was out of melee range so he just ran away.  Goreshade went next and moved slightly away from the Stormclad and cast Mage Blight again.  The focus he put on his Cankerworm was for nothing.  Everything else felt like time stood still.. which is the beauty of eHaley's feat.

Cygnar Turn #4

I put 4 focus on the Stormclad (since he's bonded) and kept 5 for myself.  The B13 shot down a good amount of Bane Thralls and the Stormblades did their job as well.  An opening lane was made for the Stormclad to Goreshade except for a lone Bane Thrall.  Arlan gives Thorn another Focus and Thorn charges into the Thrall, felling him instantly.  He then Reaction Drives back out of the charge lane after arcing Haley's TK and TA onto the Stormclad.  The Stormclad activates next and charges through rough terrain for 2+3+7+3+Reach into Goreshades face and boosts to hit.  He hits, puts serious damage on the Goreshade and arcs lightning into his undead lover, killing her instantly.  The Stormclad moves so fast with Temporal Acceleration that another hit comes right after the first, boosts for both and Goreshade flops over.

Cygnar Wins!

BR: 35pt eCaine vs. eVlad

The battle begins with a map with a fair share of terrain.  This battle highlights the importance of target priority over the ambition of caster kill.  Sometimes the quickest way to victory is not the shortest path.  By killing key targets and destroying your opponent's ability to maximize his turns, the game can be yours without the need of assassination!

My list looks like this:

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)
Captain Arlan Strangewayes  (2pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution  (3pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator  (1pts)


His list looked like this:

Points: 35
Vladimir Tzepesci, the Dark Champion (*5pts)
* Beast-09 (11pts)
* Drago (8pts)
* War dog (1pts)
Great Bears of Gallowswood (5pts)
Man-o-war Demolition Corps (Leader and 4 Grunts) (9pts)
Widowmakers (Leader and 3 Grunts) (4pts)
Widowmaker Marksman (2pts)

Cygnar Turn #1
The game started out with me casting True Shot on Caine and moving into the woods across from his deployment zone.  Everyone else moved up a bit; most notably the Rangers + eEiryss in the woods, the B13 getting Prowl and the Hunter sitting in front near Caine.  Everyone is ready to go.

Khador Turn #1
On his turn, he threw down Assail on Drago, Hand of Fate on the squad of Widowmakers and Transference on the Demo troops and moved his entire army up.  The Widowmakers go into the building to try to shoot at the Hunter and only inflict 3 damage boxes on him.  Since everything else was stealth or prowl, there was no further shooting from him.  The Bears ran up the flank on the broad's edge on the left side and that was it for his turn.

Cygnar Turn #2
On my turn, I ran a Ranger into 5" of his Widowmakers, moved Caine up a little bit and shot away with Reinholdt's reload and a bite from the Squire.  Caine takes down all the Widowmakers; including the Marksman and Gate Crashes back into safety.  The Hunter aims and shoots with a Runed Snipe and boosts damage for 9 boxes on Drago's right arm.  Arlan had Power Boosted him earlier.  The B13 remain a healthy distance away from the Bears and shoots them from 14" with Snipe.  I do deadly damage to one of the Bears but he just shrugs it off with Tough.

Khador Turn #2
Khador now moves his army up further and is pretty much in range of charges next turn with the help of eVlad's feat.  He, however, did not pop his Feat thinking he still had another turn.  He puts Hand of Fate on the Demos and runs his Great Bears even further.  The entire red army is on my door step.

Cygnar Turn #3
Make it or break it, here I go.  Rangers run into place, Caine reloads, eats the Squire and gets ready to go to town.  He positions himself in rough terrain, surrounded by many of his own troops so no charges with reach weapons can reach him.  He then starts the fireworks by pumping round after round into the marked Demos in front of him and Drago with Overkill in full effect.  After 10 shots go by, 3 of the Demos are dead and Drago is missing both of his arms.  The last 2 Demos have a guy left with 1 box after some bad rolling on my part.  The B13 lights up the Great Bears with Brutal shots and he manages to make 2 more Tough rolls before going down.  After 4 shots of Brutal, Volkov stands alone, but bloodthirsty with rage and violence.  My Hunter gets his aiming bonus again and shoots at Drago with a boosted ranged attack (from Arlan's PB) and the ATGM UA's Critical Brutal.  He fails to crit and fails to do any real damage.  My ATGM shoot at the rest of the Demos and at Volkov but fails to do anything.  Ol'Rowdy gets bored and runs towards the flank of the remaining Demos and sits there for next turn.  Eiryss moves in range of Drago and disrupts him for 1 damage.  The turn passes to Khador.

Khador Turn #3
Things are looking grim for Khador.  Drago gets antsy and runs into Ol'Rowdy hoping to tie him up in combat.  eVlad pops his Feat on the Demos and comes closer to Ol'Rowdy preparing to counter-charge him next turn.  Volkov, the last Great Bear, runs into the B13 and murders Ryan but fails to kill anyone else.  The Demos charge into my ATGM and slay 4 of them.  The Beast-09 charges my Hunter and attempts to hack his face off, but ends up rolling pitifully for damage and only boxes his sword arm.  The turn ends.

Cygnar Turn #4
I make my CMD check on the ATGM and the game continues.  I PB with Arlan onto my Hunter and the Hunter parries his way out of combat, dodging all of Beast-09s attacks.  He then proceeds to do a whopping 11 damage on Beast-09 and he gets back in combat with him.  Eiryss moves further away and disrupts Beast-09.  The rest of the ATGM attempt to damage the Demos but fails horribly even with 2 Critical Brutals hitting (thanks to eVlad's feat).  Lynch and Watts finish Volkov and Caine finishes the rest of the Demos with reload, squire, Ranger's marking and boosting for damage rolls.  He Gate Crashes away.. far far away from Beast-09.  Ol'Rowdy pummels Drago into the ground and Vlad looks at him with disdain.

Khador Turn #4
Beast-09 advances and threshers a good amount of my army.  He kills Arlan, a Ranger, a ATGM, the Hunter and almost gets the Squire but misses.  With the Hunter dead, Ol'Rowdy far away and no more Feat, I have nothing that can reliably kill Beast-09.  Vlad charges Ol'Rowdy with reach and full focus and wails on him for a crap ton of damage.  Ol'Rowdy survives with half of his boxes left with his main weapon and cortex still in play.

Cygnar Turn #5
I run everyone away from Beast-09's reach and Reinholdt and a Ranger dies because of free strikes.  The Rangers surround eVlad and the B13 moves into a more advantageous position.  Ol'Rowdy gets 3 focus and he walks over to Vlad and pummels his dog first.  He then buys another attack, boosts and puts 11 damage on Vlad.  My next hit misses and Vlad's not knocked down.  My kill shot came in with Caine getting into range and realizing that I need to hit a DEF21 Vlad thanks to Might of Kings and the fact I'm in combat with Ol'Rowdy.  With my Ranger's help and a boosted RAT shot, I meet the 10s requirement to hit him and boost damage for the game.

Cygnar Wins!

Tried some hardcore

Well, not really too hardcore.  We played 35pts eCaine vs. Kaelyssa with 5 minute turns for a standard caster kill game.  Since we played on our lunch break and this is our first time trying out the stress of "hardcore", we wanted to see what it was like.

Man.. it really IS hardcore.  On my first turn, this is what I did:

1. Squire gives Caine a focus.
2. Reinholdt reloaded Caine.
3. Rangers ran to give Caine the +2 bonus on Eiryss and a Sniper.
4. I casted Trueshot on Caine, killed both with normal shots and then magic bullet the MHSF guy next to Eiryss.  Caine GCs back to safety.
5. Time - My turn ends.

WHAT?!  I was so shocked that that happened.  Maybe I'm getting old or something, but I barely did anything before turn was up.  I literally still had an entire army to move around and position myself.  In short, I wasn't able to shoot with my Hunter, run with Ol'Rowdy or move my ATGM into a more favorable location.

You know that saying "time flies when you're having fun?"  At the end of the game (Ol'Rowdy smashed Kaelyssa's face in), we decided that playing 5 minute turns was a bit too much.  Since we only have an hour lunch, we decided on 7 minute turns next game!  By my 2nd turn, I got used to how fast the turns ran but it still didn't help us in the most important aspect of all:  tactics.  A lot of mistakes were made and once Kaelyssa was exposed in range of Ol'Rowdy because of the mental pressure, I knew the game was over.

I am now officially impressed by the skill and precision it takes to play "hardcore", but I think I'll play something a little more casual.  Like they say.. "I'm getting too old for this shit."

Defender or Hunter?

Here's another one of my army lists based on eCaine.  Unlike my other army list, this one uses a Hunter instead of a Defender.  With the extra points, Caine can take the B13 - which is a great toolbox unit plus the fact they do quite a bit of damage.

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)
Captain Arlan Strangewayes  (2pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution  (3pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator  (1pts)

So I guess the question is:  Defender or Hunter?  The Hunter allows me to make AP attacks vs. Medium-Large base models (halve their armor) and can do the same damage to those models as the Defender.  Add in some Runeshots from the marshaled ATGM UA and you've got the same amount of tricks as the Defender.  The downside to that is that against small base models, the Hunter only does 8 damage vs. the Defender's whopping POW15.  On the plus side though, the Hunter has AD, Pathfinder, RAT7 and DEF14.  Since it can move freely in terrain, it's basically floating around DEF16 and is an excellent harassment tool.

The Defender, on the other hand, has more damage boxes, more armor and a RNG16 POW15 cannon that shoots at RAT6.  He also has a MAT7 Cortex Hammer that can hit for a respectable PS16 and does 1 point of Cortex damage with each hit.  Since he does equal damage all around with his cannon, he can reach out and slap vulnerable warcasters/warlocks for a shit ton of damage.  The 16" range also allows the Defender to aim at most targets for an effective RAT8.

The big thing to note about these two is cost.  At 6 points vs. the Defender's 9, taking the Hunter gives me the B13 or A&H vs. the Defender + Stormsmith.  So far, I've been having good success with the Defender, but I guess I have to play around to see what's good and what's not.