Christmas Loot: One thing

Well... it's this time of year in which all good bloggers share the treasure trove of models they accrued during the Christmas holiday.  Reading blogs has illustrated how important holiday gift giving is to most gamers.  This year, I too, received some Privateer Press.  My vast addition to my treasure trove: Rhupert Carvolo. Yeah, I only got one thing this year, but that's life sometimes.  Real life is more important than gaming....yeah I said it.  Thus, I made this one small addition to my collection.

That said, I think Carvolo is a huge addition to my Menoth army in terms of what he brings to the table.  He is a veritable tool box of useful abilities from granting tough to pathfinder.  I think that Carvolo's best use is in buffing our tarpit units, namely Temple Flameguard.  He provides Temple Flameguard with all they need to get into position, jam a section of the table, and hold it for a long time or cause your opponent to allocate an inordinately large portion of their army to getting rid of this unit.

Pathfinder goes great lengths towards getting your Flameguard to where they need to go.  It also lightens the deployment burden on terrain heavy tables.  These all help a great deal in providing pressure on your opponent to deal with your army instead of actualizing their own plans.

I will be the first to admit that I don't see tons of merit in Carvolo's +1 DEF and terror song.  Terror is highly situational and statistically unviable.  The +1 DEF can be helpful, but only with high DEF units/models.  Of course, it becomes much stronger with a caster that can throw out defender's ward.  The best unit for this particular song, in my opinion, would be a unit of Daughters of the Flame. If DW is cast on them followed by the dirge of mists, you are looking at an insanely hard to hit 18 DEF!  Yikes.

Lastly, you have the bread and butter of Carvolo.  Heroic call grants fearless and tough.  This really makes Flameguard shine as their primary missions are usually to tarpit and hold objectives.  In shield wall, you are looking at DEF 13, ARM 17 with tough.  Throw in the UA and for one turn you are getting DEF 13 ARM 21 with tough.  If you are like me and like to play Flameguard with pSevy, you can bump those stats up to 15 and 19/23 respectively with DW.  Then on that magical 5+ they stay put to annoy your opponent for another round.  Insanely good.

The obvious answer to this situation is to kill off Carvolo and with a CMD of 8, he has to stay close to your units to help them out.  His stats are great, so screening and hiding behind terrain are going to be a must.  If you can accomplish that, you will dramatically increase the effectiveness of our infantry, Temple Flameguard being the biggest recipients, in my opinion.

Now, I have to get Carvolo glued together and painted.  Since he is a Merc, I really want to make him look different from the rest of the army to show that status.  My pEiryss and Gorman both have a lot of green, a color which doesn't appear in my red and white Menoth army.  This provides a bit of visual contrast for the army, so it isn't constantly a sea of similar colors.  I'm thinking of painting in greens and blues for Carvolo and I love some of the models out there that are showing him in simulated plaids.  So, hopefully, he will be up on the table soon and ready to play shortly thereafter.

Thanks for reading.

Why'D You Pick That? Vanquisher Heavy Warjack

Howdy folks!  I'm back with another installment of my series on why I choose the models I have for my Menoth army.

This time around I am going to talk about the Vanquisher Heavy Warjack.  It's generally accepted that our best all-around Warjack is the Reckoner, which I don't generally disagree with all that much.  However, I really have been enjoying the Vanquisher.  It provides a lot of utility to our army in the way of shooting and anti-infantry ability.  So, let's break it down.

My Vanquisher, ready to rumble.

The Vanquisher will strike most players immediately as an obvious choice for clearing infantry out.  The Flame Belcher cannon is a flaming, continuous fire 4" AOE at POW 14.  This will effectively kill most infantry and solos outright despite armor and defense buffs.  The large AOE means that even on misses, clumps of infantry will get hurt badly and at very least, they will be set on fire. The POW 14 also means that you will have a bit of warjack damaging ability.  With a boost to damage you can even put a significant dent in heavies, though there are better targets for this gun.  The fact that the gun is a 4" AOE also means that you don't have to fear those high defense and stealth models so much.

If that weren't enough, Vanquisher's blazing star melee weapon is P+S 16 and has thresher meaning that if this 'jack can get into melee range of several infantry models, he will start clearing the field quickly.  I like pairing him up with a Vassal of Menoth so that I can get into melee, clear some models out, and then use Ancillary Attack to get off an out of activation shot on additional models that might have been previously blocked.

If that weren't enough, I think that the Vanquisher could be a sneaky heavy killer.  It couldn't necessarily take out a heavy warjack on full damage, but it could certainly finish one off with a complement of focus.  With a choir buff (which you will take if you play any competitive Menoth list), you are looking at P+S 18 for the blazing star.  On average dice you will take about 6 boxes per hit on a heavy.  With boosting, you can take out whole columns and then some.  Not to mention that it can handle most warbeasts which typically are looking at slightly lower ARM stats.

I am really seeing the Vanquisher come into its own in my current 35pt eFeora list.  The lists looks like this:

eFeora +6
- Redeemer (bonded) -6
- Vanquisher -8

Avatar -11
Min Choir -2
Full Temple Flameguard +UA -8
Visgoth Rhoven and Honor Guard -4
Vassal of Menoth -2

The bonded Redeemer get continuous fire on all of its shots and with some focus from Feora, can pump up to 3 shots out in its activation.  The Vanquisher will normally merit the use of the Vassal as I mentioned above.  This means it can fire twice per turn early in a game or make additional melee attacks if need to clear out infantry.  The Flameguard provide me with some tough denial ability while the Avatar is my main beatstick.  Rhoven is there to provide an option against stealth and protect my backfield.

So, there you have it.  The Vanquisher is a spiffy warjack and one that I find shines time and again as a reliable staple for my Menoth lists.

What are your thoughts?  Is the Vanquisher capable of playing an all-around role?  Do you mainly use it as an infantry clearer? Is that a better option in the current meta where we are beginning to see a lot more infantry?  Let me know.  Thanks.

War Room is Here!

http://privateerpress.com/war-room-now-available-for-download

As I write this, War Room is downloading. Expect a review soon.

Am I Crazy? A Different Look at pKreoss' Feat

Alright.  I'm going to start this out and admit that I am not anywhere close to a knowledgeable Warmahordes player.  In fact, I am relatively new and still learning quite a few basic dynamics to the game.  That said, I may be seeing things differently (and perhaps incorrectly), but I wanted to throw out an idea that I encountered a game or two ago when I played a pKreoss list.

Everyone knows pKreoss' feat.  His feat gave rise to the term "pop and drop". Thus, it is widely accepted that pKreoss' feat is an assassination feat, a game-ender.  I want to suggest something else in this post.  I believe that pKreoss' feat can also be an insurance policy.  It allows you to play your army aggressively and then retract before a decisive counterattack can occur.

Let me explain by telling you what happened in my last pKreoss game.  I was playing a Circle player who was running pKrueger.  He had several feral warpwolves, shifting stones, gallows grove, and wolf riders.  After only a turn or two, we had begun to engage with me really making the first concerted effort towards hurting his army.  It was at this point that I realized that I was a bit overextended.  I did this because I felt that he would be on me the next turn if I didn't try to bloody his nose and blunt his assault quickly.  Thus, I moved pKreoss up and popped my feat. In doing so, I knocked down the vast majority of his army.  This immobilized the wolf riders and knocked down two warpwolves among other things.  In his turn he had to expend quite a bit of fury to get his warbeasts up and then to get their animi cast and them attacking.  This in turn meant that while they did some damage, it wasn't nearly as bad as what they could have done had they not been hindered by the knockdown effect that I threw out.

So, my question here is, can Kreoss' feat be used defensively?  Is it possible to use it to invalidate the efforts of your opponent in one turn and then use that chance to continue to build momentum and bull doze his army?

I agree that the straightforward nature of Kreoss' feat lends itself, without any imagination, to getting that caster kill, but I think it can also be used defensively should you find yourself overextended and needing some way to soften the impending blow of your opponent.

I would love to hear some people's thoughts on this subject.  Maybe I'm just a noob and completely inexperienced, but this seems like a valid, though less optimal, tactic to be used.

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Why'd You Pick That? Exemplar Bastions

I'm back after a couple weeks and I wanted to talk about one of Menoth's two medium based infantry, Exemplar Bastions.  Bastion are, in my opinion, pretty sweet models and reek of high fantasy.  Models encased in huge armor wielding magical, blessed halberds. 

Let's talk statistics.  Bastions, like many Menoth modes, aren't all that special as far as stats go.  They are terribly slow for infantry, going only as fast as a Crusader heavy 'jack.  Their MAT is decent, but not great, hitting def 14 on average rolls.  Speaking of which, their defense is fairly low for infantry at 11, but there ARM is a bit better ringing in at 16.  

Bastions start to get good with their weapons.  They tote magical, blessed, weapon master halberds that have reach.  This boils down to P+S 12 attacks that deal damage with 3D6 (4D6 on the charge).  That averages 26 on the charge and 22 when stuck in.  This is easily enough for a unit to handle light/medium warjacks and warbeasts. Reach means that they are a great defensive screen (more on that below) and can threaten models that might normally be though of as safe.  Their magical nature means that they can harm incorporeals which can really help some of our lists.  Finally, blessed on the halberds means that defensive buffs to enemy models mean nothing.  These guys will slice through like a hot knife through butter. 

What makes Bastions super cool is their innate unit ability, Sanguine Bond.  When a Bastion is hit, it can split the damage done amongst the other models in the unit.  This is especially good when you consider that each Bastion has 8 damage boxes.  This means that an opponent may hope to clear a lane through your Bastions to a caster behind, but won't be able to because the damage dealt is split between the models in the unit keeping the model alive.  A full unit of Bastions (5 models) has 40 damage boxes (more than a heavy warjack). 

Bastions are great as defensive pieces and their stats dictate this rule. They will usually be behind the rest of the army due to their speed and they can soak damage like none other.  Bastions can use their medium bases to block LoS and charge lanes to your casters and support. Then as your opponent gets closer, they can serve as an anvil unit for a countercharge by a 'jack or unit.  I actually like Bastions as a bodyguard unit for a warcaster.  They and Cinerators are the only infantry that can even block LoS to Reznik. Overall, Bastions play a very interesting role in our army as defensive pieces that can pack a wallop when they need to as well.

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
That.Was.Awesome.
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Why'd You Pick That? Temple Flameguard

Ahh.  Blogging.  I remember being able to post once every day or two.  Those were the days.  Nonetheless, it feels good to be on the laptop typing away again.  I'm hoping to put some more content down in the near future starting today.

I've been thinking a lot lately, with 6th edition 40k imminent, about how Warmahordes has achieved a startling semblance of balance.  Most factions not only have lots of good units, but in most instances, the factions contain nothing but useful units even though some have less overt uses than others.  So, I thought it would be cool if I took a look at the reasons why I have chosen the Menoth units that I have.  I don't have them all, but I tried to purchase models according to their usefulness (at least perceived on my part) and how I could use them in my armies. Thus, today I will start with the lowly Temple Flameguard and their UA.

My Temple Flameguard with UA

Temple Flameguard are nothing special to look at.  They boast decent speed, decent MAT, and somewhat decent DEF and ARM.  Their spears are P+S 10, so they will damage infantry if the unit hits, but nothing special after that.  Temple Flameguard really shine to me through their rules and the inclusion of the UA. 

First of all, Temple Flameguard have the Shield Wall order.  This is an excellent rule that allows Flameguard to buddy up and receive a +4 Arm bonus.  This makes Flameguard a right pain to get rid of.  In terms of synergy, if you take pSevvy of pKreoss (and Vindictus, I think), you can drop Defender's Ward on them giving them an really good DEF/ARM rating (15/19).  This makes Temple Flameguard an excellent pressure piece in an army.  They can hold a piece of terrain or move down a flank advancing in shield wall and force your opponent to handle them or get flanked. 

Second, Flameguard have combined melee attack (CMA).  This allows them to buddy up for a combined attack in which each additional model in the attack grants a +1 to MAT and the strength of the attack.  This means that a full unit of Flameguard can even do damage to 'jacks or beasts.  They can also pose a threat to warcasters/warlocks if they can get close. 

Third, they have set defense which makes charges, slams, and impact attacks harder to land on them. 

Finally, a fully unit of 10 models is only a paltry 6 points to bring to the game. 

But they don't stop there.  I personally think that if you are going to take Flameguard you need to auto-include their UA.  The UA includes an officer (increased MAT and CMD and 5 boxes) and a standard bearer.  These two models bring some amazing tools to the game with your Flameguard.

First, the UA grants two full time effects, Ranked Attacks and Menoth's Howl.  Ranked Attacks grants you the ability to allow FF models to gain LOS through the unit.  This makes Flameguard a great vanguard unit for a Reckoner.  They can line up in front of the Reckoner allowing it to use its reach weapon across them while they benefit from it's Ashen Veil effect. Awesome.  Menoth's Howl is a great ability.  It grants Terror and gives their spears the Fire continuous effect.  This just makes Flameguard more dangerous.  If they don't end up killing models, the fire will. 

Lastly, the Flameguard UA gives the unit a one time mini-feat called Iron Zeal.  For one round, it grants +4 ARM and prevents stationary and knockdown.  So, if you are in shield wall and have defender's ward up, you can have a possible DEF15/ARM23.  A great tactic for the mini-feat is to jam your flameguard forward and mini-feat causing your opponent to have no choice but to allocate lots of attacks to dealing with the unit when in most cases they won't hit or won't scratch them.  Then, in subsequent turns, the flameguard can move to a flank and allow a second wave of attackers to advance to trash anything in front of them. 

The UA costs an additional 2 points yielding a 12-man unit that costs 8 points and will pose a real problem for many armies.  They are the ultimate speed bump/meat shield unit and even possess the ability to do a little damage back instead of just taking punches. 

So, if you haven't figured out, Flameguard work really well with pSevvy and pKreoss for their ability to synergize with Defender's Ward.  They also work well in an eFeora list due to their ability to set stuff on fire.  Overall, they present a great middle ground infantry unit for Menoth. They aren't as elite and dangerous as the Exemplar units or Daughters, but they are stronger and provide better staying power than Zealots or Deliverers.  Ultimately, Flameguard will see quite a bit of play in my lists, especially when I get around to playing in some 2 list tournaments. 

I'm looking to do several of these articles.  Hopefully, next I will take a look at a few of the 'jacks I have.  Thanks for reading. 

Other Menoth articles of Interest:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, Grand Scrutator Severius
Finally, pKreoss is Ready to Fight
Menoth Bastions Model Review

Raising an Impervious Wall: Using Paladins and Vilmon

Well, with all of the reporting on Lock and Load, Colossals, Gargantuans, and other goodies, the bug has really hit me lately.  At least hard enough to do some blogging myself.  IRL I'm still training hard for my new job, so posts aren't regular by any means, but I really wanted to talk some Warmahordes. 

My birthday is coming and up and I received a bit of cash, so I decided to make a purchase for my army that I have until recently been wanting but haven't manage to get around to.  Namely, I picked up a Paladin of the Order of the Wall and High Paladin Dartan Vilmon. I'm really excited about these two guys as they are perhaps some of the most decent defensive pieces in the entire game.  They operate around being able to negate offense through raising ARM or outright preventing damage at all.  This ultimately means that they can hold objectives, block lanes of attack, or protect flanks with relative ease.

Menoth really centers around the concept of synergy.  That's their schtick.  If you have seen pSeverius run an Avatar supported by a Vassal with Eye of Menoth up and a Choir singing Hymn of Battle, you know what I mean.  It's ugly.  Paladins are no different.  Here's my philosophy on them.  They bring a few things to the table.  1) They bring a magical, weapon master P+S 14 weapon with critical fire. That can do damage.  It will smack around even warbeasts and warjacks.  Couple that with a high MAT and you have a fairly offensive model.  "So what?" I hear you say.  Plenty of models have killing ability.  Not many have the defensive capabilities of a paladin.  2) In their turn, they can forfeit their regular movement or action to add +5 to their ARM (Stone and Mortar stance) bring them to a whopping 21.  Yeah. That's nice.  So, how does this work?  Move the paladin forward each turn putting up Stone and Mortar Stance in lieu of action to give them the ARM boost. When they get into contact with a unit and can tie it up, they can then switch to forfeiting their movement and taking a swing at models while maintaining the nice ARM 21.  With MAT 8, they will have a fairly easy time hitting things.

Here's where the synergy comes in.  High Paladin Dartan Vilmon has the ability Impervious Wall.  This allows him to ignore continuous effects and all damage and effects from nonmagical attacks. He is also immune to knockdown.  This operates similiarly to Stone and Mortar in that you must forfeit movement or action.  Additionally, Vilmon gives Impervious Wall to all paladins in your army.  This is where you options get good.  The most obvious use is to run your paladins into things you don't want getting to your army.  With Impervious Wall, the models simply cannot hurt your paladins.  Again, once you are in combat with them, you can forfeit your movement to attack.  Remember that this is a great tactic for tying up jacks and warbeasts.  Those P+S14 weapon master attacks will bring the hurt over time and your opponent won't dare to try and sneak past a paladin when he freestrikes your models with P+S14 + 4D6. 

You can also, albeit be a bit risky, get into range of a caster or warlock and put up both Impervious Wall and Stone and Mortar stance.  This will prevent mundane damage altogether and will limit most magical damage with ARM 21.  Ultimately, it will put pressure on your opponent or box him in so that you can get the kill on his caster/warlock.

The bottom line for me is that if you take a paladin, you simply have to take Vilmon.  He makes paladins sick.  This does mean a minimum investment of 5 points, but it also means that your paladins are a threat and so highly resilient that they will simply piss off your opponents in most cases because of their ability to hold up a disproportionately larger number of points worth of models.  These guys are excellent anvils.  If you position some combat units behind them for counterattacks, you can cause some serious damage with little risk to your army. 

Paladins bring great defensive options. They present a threat that can't be ignored, but most of the time can't be easily dealt with either.  This will cause your opponents headaches.  That's why I have decided to add these guys to my army. 

In other news, I'm still trying to offload some more of my models.  I have some Space Marine/Space Wolf/Black Templar stuff up over at Bartertown.  Take a look at my listing.  Thanks.

Flexibility, One of your Best Allies

Hey folks.  It's been awhile.  Real life has definitely taken a priority lately and between responsibilities and other work opportunities, I haven't have much time to paint or play. 

However, business took me to my LGS tonight and I got a chance to play a small, 15pt. game against a Trollblood player. I was able to do a pretty good job smashing my opponent and easily took Madrak down with an elementary pop and drop using a pKreoss list. 

The game changer for me was a simple inclusion.  A min choir.  At 15 points, I had pKreoss, a Crusader, Reckoner, Repenter, and a min choir.  I was pretty stacked, but the thing that won me the game was the choir's ability to bring me some flexibility.  From turn one, my opponent had no answer to the Hymn of Passage, giving my 'jack wall immunity to mundane ranged weaponry.  His impalers couldn't do much of anything to me.  Then when the time came, the choir was able to shift gears and give my 'jacks bonuses to attack and damage with the Hymn of Battle. 

Towards the end, pKreoss simply had to use purification to nullify surefoot and pop his feat.  This allowed my reckoner and crusader to trample over his beasts and into range to pound madrak into the ground. 

Nothing overly tactical happened to give me the win.  I wasn't operating on some higher strategic plane than my opponent.  I simply had more flexibility.  The choir won the game for me. 

Flexibility is a huge necessity.  It allows you to change gears and apply different threats to a situation where you normally wouldn't.  Menoth has quite a few models that can add layers of flexibility to your army.  This makes the army seriously dangerous if well played.  It also allows a relatively small number of models to handle a wide variety of situations.  Flexibility is a must.  How are you adding it to your armies?  What models allow your army to take on a variety of situations? 

Warmachine the Way I See It: Synergy...Ad Naseum

Yeah, I know.  I've mentioned synergy quite a few times in regards to important parts of the Warmahordes dynamic.  It's quite obvious.  However, I really found this out from a practical standpoint this week in my games at my FLGS. 

My example:

Temple Flameguard aren't all that flash when sizes up.  MAT 6, P+S10.  Their greatest asset is shield wall.  This gives them a respectable ARM 17. Add to them the UA and you have terror, fire attacks that give out continuous fire, and minifeat that yields a one turn additional +4 to ARM.  So, where's the synergy? 

This week I played a pSeverius list.  I found that Eye of Menoth and Defender's Ward are worth their weight in gold.  +1 to attack and damage rolls for the entire control area is great.  +2 to DEF and ARM for a unit is also great.  pSevvy synergizes so well with these guys.  He makes them more efficient at handling other infantry.  On top of that, Defender's Ward is great on jacks, but amazing on units of infantry.  If you steadily move forward staying in shield wall, you are adding an additional +6 to ARM (19) at DEF 15.

This makes Flameguard amazingly resilient.  On top of that, with Eye of Menoth up, you can generally pose some sort of threat to enemy infantry and casters. This is where the synergy makes Flameguard great.  They won't scratch a jack unless you throw down a massive CMA, but they do pose a threat to everything smaller.  Because of their resilience and threat to infantry, they become what I call a shepherd unit.  They corral those smaller units by spreading out and moving forward.  In a turn where you are preparing for that calculated strike, they can go into shield wall and pop their mini-feat, you are looking at DEF 15/ARM 23 models.  Not much will punch through them and then, when your turn occurs you can go for the counterpunch. 

The point:
Alone Flameguard are underwhelming.  Through synergy, they become nigh impossible to completely remove.  In both of my games, they were impossible to completely destroy and did a good job of being cast out as a net to entangle and cordon off areas to my opponents.  They even killed a few things including nihilators in one game and Harlan Vesh and some gun mages in my second game. Furthermore, they provide Menoth with something that it lacks in general, an anvil unit.  Thus, the unit contains its own forms of synergy, but also provides synergy for the entire army on the battlefield. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
That.Was.Awesome.
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Game Night: One Win, One Loss

I got over to my FLGS tonight to play some Warmahordes and got in two great games.  The first was against the local pressganger, a Skorne Player.  We played a 25pt. Killbox game.  Again, since I am learning quite a bit, we played pretty loose and my opponent was super cool about the game while still not pulling any punches.  He had:

eHexeris

-Titan Bronzeback
-Titan Cannoneer
10 Nihilators
4 Paingivers
Agonizer

I took:
pSeverius
-Reckoner
-Vanquisher
min Temple Flameguard +UA
min Choir
Covenant
Vassal
pEiryss

This game was a fun one despite facing a vastly more skilled opponent.  The game hinged around a critical setup in the middle of the field where I moved up my Reckoner to receive the Bronzeback.  I gave the Reckoner enliven and cast vision on him along with using the covenant to prevent knockdowns.  Unfortunately, my opponent had his Nihilators close enough to get a few into combat with him.  They were able to do damage to him triggering enliven and then the Bronzeback came in and tore him apart.  This signalled a huge shift from things looking to go in my favor to significantly in my opponent's favor.  I didn't have anything to jam up lanes to pSevvy at that point and so went in for a desperate assassination attempt on Hexeris and simple couldn't convert.  The Bronzeback summarily beat down my Vanquisher and then threw him into pSevvy for the kill. 

I learned a few things in this game though.

1) pSevvy really has some nasty spells.  Defender's Ward and Eye of Menoth are huge. 
2) Consequently, a unit of Flameguard with Defender's Ward and shield wall is annoying.  Adding iron zeal makes them horrendous to get rid of.
3) Ashes to Ashes is deceptively good, but suffers from low POW.
4) pSevvy really likes an arc node.  I kept wishing I had my Revenger out to play.

Game 2 was another killbox scenario.  My second opponent was open to a 35pt. game. 

He took the following Cygnar army:

Kara Sloan
- Defender
- Hunter
- Hunter
Gun Mages with officer
-Cyclone
Reinholdt
Harlan Versh

I took another pSevvy list:

pSevvy
-Reckoner
-Vanquisher
Avatar
min Choir
max Flameguard + UA
Covenant
Vassal

This game was interesting to say the least.  Turn 1 saw my opponent move up and wait.  Chiefly, he swung his two hunters around on my right flank which diverted me a bit.  In my turn 1, I moved up and tried to potshot his hunters.  My Vanquisher missed, but deviated onto a gun mage.  My Reckoner shot a nasty shot into one of the Hunter severely damaging it.  Otherwise, I put up Eye and Defender's Ward on the Flameguard where they held my left flank facing off against the Defender, many of the gun mages and Harlan.

In my opponent's Turn 2, he popped Sloan's feat and went to town on my Avatar.  Unfortunately, I lost him.  However, it took the whole turn.  My only other casualties were a couple Flameguard. In my turn, through some snazzy movement, I was able to charge the damaged Hunter with Reckoner and destroy it.   My Vanquisher dropped a template on the other Hunter and did a few boxes of damage and set it on fire.  My Flameguard were able to get into combat with Harlan, but couldn't charge his gun mages due to some cover fire from the Cyclone.  They ended up doing 2 damage to him.

In turn 3, he began to go to work on my Reckoner and while really damaged, it survived and still posed a threat.  It was at this point though that my support began to get whittled down.  I lost 2 of 4 choir and my Vassal.  It was looking harsh, so I knew I needed to work something out quick.  In my turn, I moved my Reckoner out to tie up his Hunter, but didn't accomplish much with my club arm damaged.  My Flameguard, charged a few gun mages and killed one I think.  pSevvy stepped though and did some real damage by casting Ashes to Ashes on his Cyclone and using it to blast 4 gun mages including the officer.  I also popped feat which would make my opponent's next turn really hard.  Finally, my Vanquisher got lucky and missed a shot on the last gun mage which deviated onto Reinholdt and Sloan.  Reinholdt died and Sloan took something like 2 damage and caught on fire. 

At turn 4, my opponent started to feel the pressure.  He knew he had to do some damage to pSevvy.  Everything moved up to try and kill him.  Sloan plinked off about 7 boxes, his Cyclone stepped up and rolled all 6 of its shots and left me on a single box!  At that point, with the failed assassination Sloan was hung out for my Vanquisher to charge in and smash her face with his blazing star.  Victory to Menoth.

This game was sweet.  I could not believe that last turn.  The Cyclone needed 8's to hit and couldn't do much since Sloan had no focus.  It was a nail-biter.  I think he hit 3 or 4 out of 6 shots, but not being able to boost meant that he had a hard time getting past ARM 14 + 2 camped focus.  It was tough seeing the Avatar go down in turn 2, but seeing him withstand so much damage including out of activation shots due to Sloan's feat was awesome.  By soaking damage, he really saved my bacon.  Again, my Flameguard were aces.  At one point, I had Defender's Ward, Shield Wall and Iron Zeal up.  I think they had DEF 15 ARM 23 and that simply made them heinous to do anything to. 

Warmahordes is really growing on me. I love the fluidity of the gameplay.  Having so many options available in an army, different combinations of activations, and synergies from multiple effects really adds to its depth. I got a real sense of how out-of-my-league I was in playing despite making some decent decisions along the way.  This game is really going to be a sweet learning experience. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
That.Was.Awesome.
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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More Progress: Menoth Vanquisher and Eiryss, Magehunter

I have taken the weekend to get a few more Warmachine models done.  Friday night and some of Saturday were used to lay some paint on a Vanquisher and pEiryss.  I really like these models and am already pondering how to get them into my lists.    Here they are:

Ladies first.  I really like the dynamic pose on Eiryss.  It screams the Matrix to me.  Very cool. 

Her cape is massive! I'm surprised she doesn't trip on it.  Still, the flowing nature of the cape looks sweet and adds to the elogence of the model.

And now the big guy with the big cannon.  I'm excited about having the Vanquisher.  I think he will be a great addition for sorting out infantry problems.

A side view and good look at blazing star his chain weapon. 

Again, I love the look of the steam engines.  You have the front which is all armor plating and veneer and then the real guts of the warjack is in the back.  The Vanquisher even has a temperature/pressure gauge on his steam engine.  I thought that was cool touch. 

And the cannon.  I'm excited to see this guy drop AoEs with impunity.  I think my Vassal is going to be great friends with the Vanquisher. 

That is for now.  The list of unpainted models is getting smaller, but there is still a ton to do.  I am currently working on my Covenant of Menoth.  Just need to finish a bit of basing before I move on.  My next big project is going to be getting a unit of Knights Exemplar together.  They are a super nasty counterattack unit and I'm excited to get them done and on the field. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, Grand Scrutator Severius
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, Grand Scrutator Severius

I'm moving on with my warcaster studies, but still hanging around with Menoth.  It makes sense that this happens as I'm growing in experience with the faction. 

My take on pSevvy

Grand Scrutator Severius.  The Big Cheese.  I actually tried to look up the word scrutator and found that it is someone who scrutinizes.  All of the fluff makes Severius out to not only be the undisputed head of the Protectorate of Menoth, but a scary dude who can look into your soul to discern whether or not a person is worth living and dying. The dude's fluff makes him out to be scary.  Consequently, he is a very handy warcaster for the Protectorate. 

Grand Scrutator Severius or pSeverius for short, is a great all-arounder.  He has pretty terrible stats with the exception of his focus, being 8, among the highest in the game.  What you take pSeverius for are his feat and his pretty stellar toolbox of spells. 

Let's talk about the feat first.  pSeverius' feat essentially shuts down an opposing warcaster for the next turn.  When in pSevvy's control area, models with the arc node ability can't use it and models with focus manipulation can't replenish focus for their the next turn.  This provides multiple threats to an opposing warcaster. First, the obvious effect is that you cause a caster in your control area to have no focus in the next turn.  Jacks won't have focus to cause trouble, spells can't be cast or upkept, and ARM can't be bolstered.  This is great.  This means you have a turn to get into position and possibly throw down a solid assassination attempt.  Even if you can't get to the caster, you have a full turn to position to hold objectives, clear enemy models, and strengthen fortified positions. 

We can't stop there though.  pSeverius has a great toolbox of spells.  He has two decent offensive spells and four upkeeps that can seriously bolster the efforts of your army.  Ashes to Ashes and Immolation can deal damage at alarming rates.  The fact that Ashes to Ashes also harms D6 enemy models within 5" of the intended taret means at you can clear out infantry fairly well.  Immolaion is a fairly standard ranged magical attack with the added benefit of occasionally cause the fire continuous effect on a model. 

The real stars of the game are pSevvy's upkeeps.  Eye of Menoth an Defender's Ward as insanely good.  Eye of Menoth gives a buff to attack and damage roles for models within pSevvy's control area.  This naturally synergizes with the Choir of Menoth's Hymn of Battle.  These two effects create some of the most destructive warjacks in the game.  Defender's Ward goes the the other way and provides a bonus to DEF and ARM for a model/unit.  This can make infantry units incredibly hard to shift or heavy warjacks nigh untouchable.  The Avatar of Menoth with Defender's Ward up has an impressive ARM 23. 

Alongside these two impressive spells come Death Sentence, a reroll for attack rolls.  This can make going for an assassination attempt more of a sureity. Vision is a really interesting spell that can be pretty situational, but at the same time, great if used in the correct situation.  A great example of some great synergy with Vision would be using it on a Revenger or Blessing of Vengeance.  Their repulsor shield rule states that if hit, after the hit is resolved, the model hitting is pushed back 1".  Coupled with Vision, you can prevent models without reach from even damaging these jacks which makes them incredibly resilient.  It can also help protect models with higher DEF since many hits miss anyway.  Vision provides extra insurance.

pSeverious also has a magical reach weapon with a P+S of 13, but if he is in combat, he is going to die.  Finally, he has an interesting ability called convert that is highly situational.  It basically states that when used, an enemy model in pSevvy's CMD range must pass a command check or become a friendly faction model for the rest of the game.  This sounds great, but it only works on a single model at a time and the model has to be a trooper.  Again, if you are close enough to use this, you are probably either about to win or you are going to die.

So, pSevvy has some great things going on.  He synergizes well with a variety of warjacks, units, and solos.  I think his feat works alongside pEiryss very well.  If you pop his feat at the right time with pEiryss positioned well, she can get into position to shoot a disruptor bolt for an added turn of your opponent's warcaster having no focus. 

As far as warjacks go, pSevvy really likes Blessing of Vengeance.  It is his signature warjack and can make his offensive spells hit harder.  pSeverius also work well with the Avatar.  Being able to put up Eye and Defender's Ward makes the Avatar a beast.  Couple that with a Choir and you have add +3 to attack and damage rolls to a model with P+S 19.  Watch heavy warjacks and warbeasts crumble to dust with this combo.  pSevvy has quite a bit of focus and 6 warjack points so he can handle a few more jacks as well.  I think he makes for a great ranged assassination caster and as such really likes Repenters, Reckoners, Redeemers, and Vanquishers.  Being able to strip a warcaster of focus and then pummel him/her/it with ranged attacks means that unless he is far back, there isn't a safe place near pSeverius' battlegroup.

Defender's Ward also means that strong infantry choices can be made even harder to shift.  Temple Flameguard with UA and Exemplar Errants with UA make a great core to your army. 

Support for pSevvy comes in the form of the usual suspects, Covenant, especially with multiple warjacks, Vassals of Menoth especially if using ranged warjacks, and the Choir.  I also like the spice that such units like Rhoven and pEiryss bring since they can offer additional options. 

Whatever you do, you will more than likely find pSeverius operating from the back using his impressive control area to send forth his army.  This means that he needs some thoughtful placement and protection, but if you can keep the pressure on your opponents, you may never need to worry about him.  pSeverius is certainly one of our best warcasters.  He provides answers for just about any situation and though he is fragile, he can threaten most opponents through good use of the tools he provides. 

Other Warcaster Studies:
The Harbinger
High Exemplar Kreoss
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Fire of Salvation Conversion, Building Complete

Last week I wrote a post about the the difference in converting Privateer Press models and other gaming miniatures.  In the past, I have done extensive conversions in my Warhammer Fantasy and 40k armies.  However, I have been really interested to find out that converting models for Warmahordes isn't necessarily look upon as good.  This kind of boggles my mind. 

It all stems from the fact that I want to create a Tier 4 eKreoss list.  eKreoss can put out an insanely wicked beatdown when coupling his feat with a ton of Exemplar weaponmaster attacks.  That said, to attain Tier 4, I need the Fire of Salvation heavy warjack.  Unfortunately, Fire of Salvation costs like $52 retail.  So, I have decided to convert up my own.  Fire of Salvation is based on the Crusader chassis, so I think it should be fairly easy to convert.  I even scored a classic Crusader for $12.  In fact, I decided to go a step further and convert the Fire's weapon using the sword from Scourge of Heresy.  The sword gives a more exemplar feel to the jack. Furthermore, if you look at Fire's card, there is nothing special about his weapon except it's ability to give the fire continuous effect. So, here is what I came up with.

So, as you can see. Here he is. You can see his sword complete with flames.  I also made my own back banners for him.  They add a bit more dynamism to the model.

Here's a side view.  Again you can see the flames on the sword blade and the back banners.  The spears come from a GW Warriors of Chaos Marauder Horsemen sprue.  You can also see that I added some extra armor plates to the backs of Fire's hands.  On each is a single greenstuff spike. 

The rear view.  You can see a greenstuff parchment on his right arm.

And the left.  Here you can see an added embellishment to one of the back banners.  I will probably paint it gold.

Here is a closeup of the filler around the menofix.  I tried to replicate it from a picture of Fire. 

So, after posting my conversion article and talking to some other players, I decided that I needed an out should a TO want my Fire's weaponry to look right.  Thus, I broke out the pin vice and drilled out the hand so that I can swap weapons.  For most games, I will shoot for using the sword as it fits the exemplar theme.  Otherwise, I can swap the weapons out for the mace for pickier TOs.

Another view of the mace.  You can see the flames a bit better here.  I think I might need to beef them up a bit.

So, there you have it. Does this look like a suitable Fire of Salvation?  I plan on painting it as it looks in all of the official Privateer Press pics.  Anyway, after seeing the model with the sword, would you allow it?  Do you think it would it be contentious with a TO?  It is obviously not a Crusader and also not Scourge of Heresy, so I thought it would pass well.  Thoughts?

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Warmachine the Way I See It: Ingenuity and Risk

I have been doing a lot of research lately, watching a lot of battle reports online.  Youtube truly is great.  I have noticed an underlying theme to Warmahordes games: ingenuity and risk.  The game is structured to encourage these things. 

I've played lot of strategy games from board games to card games to tabletop wargames and most games do not inherently encourage these things.  As a WFB and 40k player, what you find happening more often than not is actually the opposite.  You get into a routine.  You build your army to win in a certain way and you execute.  I think this happens because units are more structured, game play is more regimented, and overall your options are limited.

Warmahordes isn't this way.  Units are less cohesive with individual models in units able to operate far more independently, and models and units go through a complete activation from movement to action before the next unit goes.  Because of the endless variety this bring turn to turn, each player is freer to adapt and come up with interesting solutions to help them win.  For example, I haven't heard of another game where a model can charge its own units to move further or even to enact some effect that could change the game.  The rules of Warmahordes are created to encourage ingenius solutions to problems.  I think this is something that has gone lacking lately in GW games.  There are a small selection of tactics that generally work (WFB= devestating magic spells cast with loads of dice and horde units, 40K= min/maxing to control the board and torrent shots into your opponent). 

Another awesome thing that dovetails nicely with ingenuity is risk taking.  I'm not talking about careless risk taking.  I'm talking about crazily concocted assassination runs that look like longshots, but end up working.  I'm talking about building odd synergies that allow you to take down important models.  Taking risks can yield huge payoffs in Warmahordes in a way that is unique to it due to it's more chess-like approach to tabletop wargaming.  Because a caster kill means a win, this is always a viable solution to any problem.  Taking risks in order to kill a caster or warlock is more common because of its result and thus risky maneuvers that attempt such an outcome are encourage by the game's design.

This creates a truly unique and engaging experience that is unique to Privateer Press games.  I have learned this first hand in my inaugural game with Menoth.  It definitely has me intrigued and I think it will provide some great experiences in the future.

Here are some other Warmachine articles:

Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Ah, the Learning Curve is Back

If you read my last post, I had a great time playing my first game with my Menoth army. It was a blast, but it reminded me of something.  The learning curve. Ugh!  I forgot about this guy.  I have been playing Warhammer Fantasy for 8 years and 40k for about 2 1/2 and they are very similar.  I totally forgot what it's like to not know something about everything in the game (note I didn't say everything about everything).  I feel I have a reasonable grip on the rules, though I need a ton of refining, but knowing all of the faction specific rules and styles, the various warcaster/warlock effects on units and armies, and just the special rules for every model is incredibly daunting.  In my game last night, I basically played according to what I thought were solid choices for my army and the situation at hand. Past that, I hoped and prayed my opponent did smash the crap out of me with impunity. 

Luckily, he didn't.  Aside from the extraordinarily lucky turn of events that lead to an easy road to the caster kill and dominance of the game, I really didn't have a solid knowledge foundation to stand on and that reminded me that I am once again a small fish playing in an extremely large pond. 

So, my thoughts on this:

1) Read, read, read.  I hope to get my hands on as many copies of rules as possible to read up on the various factions and their models.  I also will make some stops to Battle College for information. Information gathering is going to be a key to success.  A large part of playing Warmahordes is knowing what your opponents can throw at you.  Thus, I need more information.

2) Play more games.  I love that Warmahordes on average takes far less time than 40k or WFB.  That means that in a given night at a 35pt. level, I can get in around 2-3 games, especially since I am a noob and will get my butt kicked fairly easily. 

3) Watch games.  I am loving youtube right now.  There are tons of games online that I can watch and learn from.  I have watched quite a few Menoth battle reports, but I need to start watching battle reports from other factions to see what various players do.  This is definitely next on my list. 

So, the road has started.  I am pumped.  This game rocks!  Now I need to do some homework.

What other things should I consider when prepping for upcoming battles?  What are those key pieces of information that will give me the edge?  I'm interested to hear from some readers out there. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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That. Was. Awesome.

So, it happened.

I finally got in my first game with a full painted Menoth Army.  Not only that, but I got to experience a really interesting scenario. 

I came into my LGS to try for a pickup game tonight and found out that they were wrapping up an escalation league.  There were perhaps 12-15 Warmahordes players present.  So, I watched for a bit until the store owner noticed I was there.  I do a lot of commission work for him and he knew I wanted to get in a game tonight, so he asked a player if he could spare some time.  We were about to start a game when I was instead invited to be a part of a special scenario game meant to cap off the league and man was it a scenario.

The league organizer developed a scenario where a giant monolith dominated the center of the board.  It was on a very large base, perhaps a an inch of radius or so bigger than a battle engine base.  It had quote a few super nasty stats include 120 damage boxes. Three players deployed in corners of the table and had the task of destroying the monolith and acted as friendly faction models for the task.  The monolith had some punishing special attacks that used energy, not focus or fury, so it couldn't be stopped in any way.  The only issue is that it didn't have enough energy to do enough damage to all of the forces arrayed against it and it's seemingly large quantity of damage boxes went pretty quickly when a fully charged Mulg got swinging on it.  The other interesting aspect of the game revolved around the list.  Each player had two warcasters or warlocks and they shared a 15 point list + their jack/warbeast points. 

I took: pSeverius and pKreoss with the Avatar, a Crusader, a Revenger, a min Choir, and 3 Wracks. 

So, the three allied players, a Trollbloods player, a Skorne player, and my Menoth managed to easily take down the monolith in two turns.  However, the twist came when the league organizer revealed that once the monolith was destroyed, the three allies cut all ties and sought to destroy each other's casters with only one army left standing.

This is when the series of events swung severely into my favor. 

1) The monolith had a power where if it made its attack rolls, it could take over the movement and action of the model hit in its next activation, even if destroyed.  It managed to take over both a bronzeback and Molik Karn from the Skorne player.  In his second turn, the Skorne player suicided his Naaresh and then his other caster, both out of spite and to prevent the monolith player from using his own warbeasts on him.  This effectively took him out of the game immediately. 

2) We took turns in a clockwise fashion and the monolith was destroyed on the Skorne player's turn, which meant that he eliminated that threat and himself right before handing the game over to me. 

3) The Trollblood player moved forward aggressively to help with the monolith exposing his two warcasters to my army.

4) My army was delayed due to an attack from the monolith that created impassable terrain features.  This caused me to have a fairly good line of sight and distance to the Trollblood player's army.

So, in my turn, I had a full army, unmolested, ready to beat face.  The Avatar and Crusader both had defender's ward up, one from Kreoss and one from Severius.  I also had Eye of Menoth up on my battlegroup. 

My first move included bestowing hymn of battle on my battlegroup and the Avatar.  Then, Kreoss moved forward and feated, knocking down everything in the Trollblood army, but his warlocks.  His army included: eDoomy and Borka, Mulg, a Mauler, and an Impaler.  Kreoss' feat knocked down the keg bearer, Mulg, the Mauler, and the Impaler.

I was then able to charge the impaler with the Avatar, knocking off quite a few boxes and using his reach to smack Borka pretty hard.  I then moved my Revenger in to poke at Borka and after passing a tough roll, ended him.  I then arc noded off the Revenger to do some damage to eDoomy and set him fire.  The Crusader then charged in to Impaler and wiped him out. 

In his turn, my opponent had some hard decisions.  First, the fire on eDoomy went out, much to my Chagrin.  Both Mulg and the Mauler were knocked down.  They both had also maxed out on fury to help destroy the monolith.  Due to this and because eDoomy was camping fury, they both had to take frenzy checks.  Mulg passed, but the Mauler didn't which ultimately meant he could get up from being knocked down.  Mulg then got up and moved to get into range for primal shock against my warcasters.  He took a free strike from the avatar and was knocked down to three boxes. It was then that my opponent remembered that Severius can't be affected by spells.  He instead went after Kreoss and killed him with some impressive rolling and two primal shocks.  With that done, my opponent had to hand it back to me. 

This was it.  I had both the Avatar and the Revenger in range to smack eDoomy while the Crusader could handle Mulg for his last three boxes and the Mauler was still knocked down.  I walked the Avatar forward and took a mighty swing with his sword and boxed him.  He was unable to make his tough roll and I walked away victorious. 

Wow!  What a fun game.  Not to mention, I got to play against some really cool guys with amazingly painted armies.  Events transpired perfectly for me to win this game.  Had the Skorne player not lost control of his two warbeasts, things would have been different.  The Trollblood player would have been easily crushed from both sides and then I would have had an uphill climb against a very canny opponent in the Skorne player who would be relatively unscathed as well.  Luckily though, that didn't happen.  Likewise, the turn sequence and positioning of armies allowed me to be in position to feat with Kreoss and cut out his warcasters with ease.

I definitely learned a thing or two from the players and found that I had a fairly decent handle on things despite being relatively new to the gaming system.  Having wargaming experience really helped me out here.  I was glad for that. 

Warmahordes is fast and brutal and loads of fun.  I can't wait to add a few more units to my army and get into some more battles!

If you are an experienced Warmahorde-er, leave a comment a share your first experience with the game.  I would love to hear how things have gone to others. 






Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Finally, pKreoss is Ready to Fight

That's it!  I finished the last bit of work on a Vassal Mechanik tonight and I now have a playable 35pt. pKreoss list.  I'm really excited to have the whole thing painted, based, and ready for action.  I have a ton more to paint, but I also have everything assembled that I own assembled, with the exception of the Fire of Salvation conversion I'm working on. 

I chose pKreoss because he is a fairly straightforward warcaster to play with.  His spells cover a wide variety of situations, both providing potent offensive spells and some excellent upkeeps as well.  Defender's Ward has to be one of the nastiest spells out there right now in terms of making already scary warjacks (Avatar) even scarier. 

That said, his feat is also very straightforward.  On his feat turn, he knocks down all enemy models in his control area (unless they are immune to knockdown, that is).  Simple. 

So, here is the list I have concocted using the models I have completed.

pKreoss +5
-Crusader -6
-Reckoner -8

Avatar of Menoth -11
Max Choir of Menoth -3
Max Temple Flameguard + UA -8
Vassal Mechanik -1
Vassal of Menoth -2
3 Wracks -1

Honestly, I think this list is a bit too reliant on the warjacks, but this is what I have painted. Honestly, I think an improvement would be to drop the avatar for a unit of Knights Exemplar as second wave counter-attackers and possibly a cheap light warjack like a revenger to give pKreoss some added threat range.  That said though, I think it has enough threats and support to make it quite nasty and it accomplishes this in a fairly focus efficient manner.  The Avatar and Wracks go a long way in helping stretch pKreoss' focus pool. 

If I have too hard a time of it, I do have a backup list with pSeverius.  It replaces the Crusader with a Revenger and Repenter, min choir and no wracks or Mechanik. 

So please, send me some feedback.  Do you think a beginner with this list stands a chance of putting up a fight?  Is it a good learning list?  I know there are glaring weaknesses, but I don't currently have the painted models to remedy it.  Thanks!

Other Warmachine articles:

Warmachine the Way I See It: The Intro

Crusader Heavy 'Jack Completed

pKreoss and pSeverius Done!

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Conversions and Warmachine

If you follow my blog, it's obvious by now that I am a commission painter. I also convert models, especially my own.  However, when I get into a new gaming system, I am tentative.  Being new to Warmachine, I am a bit edgy about performing in big-time conversions, but at the same time, I want to add a bit of character to my armies.

The crux of the matter is that I don't know how significant things like weapon swaps are in this game.  In my experience with GW games, conversions aren't too big a deal if they reasonably approximate what they are representing, i.e. a bolt pistol shouldn't be counted as a meltagun. 

So, here's the idea.  As part of my eKreoss Tier 4 army I need to add Fire of Salvation.  Well, I have a few issues: 1) The model is like $50 NiB!  I don't like that at all.  It is just a Crusader heavy variant, and I was able to purchase a Crusade for $12.  2) The mace that Fire of Salvation carries isn't all that flashy.  I have ordered Scourge of Heresy's sword as it looks more Exemplar themed and will use it and perhaps greenstuff some flames onto it.

Is this acceptable?  Even though Fire of Salvation carries a mace, there aren't any qualities given to maces specifically, so should modelling a sword matter?  Veteran Warmahorders, what say you?  Please leave me some feedback and let me know.  Thanks.

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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Menoth Bastions Model Review

My Exemplar horde is growing steadily each day. I have to get a few more models in the mail and everything will be ready for the great crusade to beat face and light stuff on fire!  That said, today, I received a unit of 5 Bastions and a second unit of 6 Knights Exemplar in the mail, both through an excellent deal I made at Bartertown.  I was so excited about the Bastions that I decided to go ahead and put them together.  After my experience, I thought it would be cool to do a little product review.

courtesy of CMON.com

A new box of Exemplar Bastions comes with a unit of 5 Bastions consisting of you leader and 4 grunts.  You can run them in a group of 3 (leader and two grunts) or the full squad of 5.  This particular box set is a plastic set, the only plastic minis I have collected from Privateer Press so far.  Unlike many, I really prefer metal models over plastic.  I think the detail is generally a bit better and I love the heavy feel they have.  It makes the army feel substantial.  Suffice it to say, I was slightly disappointed when I discovered Bastions only came in plastic as they are going to be the only plastic minis in my entire army as it now stands. 

Down to business.  Bastion models come in 7 pieces and a base.  The pieces are the body, two arms, two shoulder pads, a head, and their halberd.  All pieces have pre-cut holes and posts cut to insure that only one piece can fit any one joint.  This was meant to make the assembly process easier, I'm sure, as it is literally impossible to put these guys together incorrectly unless you cut mounting posts off of pieces. 

Right out of the bag, I noticed that the plastic used by Privateer Press is very hard.  It doesn't have nearly as much give as resin or softer plastics like those used by GW in their plastic kits.  Each manufacturer must have their own proprietary blend. This did two things, one good and one bad.  The detail on the minis was great.  Each model has quite a bit going on and all details including scrollwork on armor and the etching on their blades is definitely of high quality.  However, the hard plastic actually made it harder to get pieces into their correct position.  In many cases, I had to cut down or shave away portions of mounting posts so that the pieces fit easier.  This proved to be a slight annoyance and required some application of strength to get pieces all the way into their fitting (in one case I actually had to clamp my jaws down on an arm joint to get the arm to fully slide into place).  On the upside the design elements used for assembly to add some structural strength to the models.  I am not worried about dropping a mini and having pieces pop off.  These pieces will stay in place.

Another small problem I had with the minis is that many pieces, due to the packaging, were bent.  Several of the halberds were bent along the haft of the weapon.  I have found with resin and plastic alike, the only easy fix is to stick the model in near boiling water, heat the plastic, and then reshape it into its intended straight appearance.  Again a minor issue, but one that takes a bit of time to correct. 

That said, other pieces of the model fit very well with little to no trimming required.  In each model's case, the shoulder pads fit easily into play and on the squad leader, the shoulder pads (coming in two pieces) fit very easily. 

Another great aspect of these models is a noticeable absence of flash.  There were the odd pieces here and there, but for the most part, these models simply didn't have flash on them and in fact, there were few if any mold lines on the minis.  I really like this because I tend to be lazy with mold lines to begin with, so having so few made it really easy to get the models cleaned up quickly. I don't know if Privateer Press has better molds than other companies, but even GW has regularly occurring mold lines on most plastic models. This was definitely a breath of fresh air for me. 

Finally, I want to head back to appearance for a minute.  The models are sweet.  I love them. They are suitably bulky, coming on medium bases. They have the feeling of butt kicking awesomeness.  The models also have fairly decent poses.  Hulking models covered in armor generally don't look terribly agile, but the sculpts, as with many of PP's sculpts, look dynamic utilizing flowing banners and robes and more aggressive stances that make the models look like they are advancing towards you.  PP really knows it sculpting.  I love their stuff.  It simply looks dynamic and epic without looking overly hokey....despite massive shoulder pads. 

So, to run it down for you, the pros are:

- Great sculpt, very dynamic pose and good sense of movement achieved
- High level of detail, even for plastic, makes an interesting looking mini
- Lack of flash and mold lines
- Solid construction through the use of mounting posts at joints means that models won't be losing pieces often
- Easy construction as each pieces only fits in one place unless you cut off the mounting posts.
- Lighter weight than metal
The cons are:

- Very hard plastic.  This makes it hard to trim and shave, it also means those mounting posts sometimes fit too tightly to make pieces join snugly.
- Bent pieces require extra effort to correct
- Lighter than metal (I like metal models)

Overall, I really like the models and would give Privateer Press a solid A for them.  They possess everything you would think a model of their magnitude should have, are fairly easy to construct, and only provide a small handful of headaches to get around (but what wargaming mini doesn't!).  Privateer Press continues to amaze me with the quality of their products. 

Here are some other Warmachine articles:
Warmachine the Way I See It: Warcaster Study, pKreoss
The Harbinger of Menoth: Model Review
How Important is the Front Arc, Really?
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The Avatar Cometh!!

That's right folks, despite going out of town, getting a stomach bug, and making up a lot of work due to aforementioned stomach bug, I was able to finish my Avatar of Menoth.  This guy is a stud.  He is the Menite beater jack.  With an impressive ARM 21 and a POW 19 stubby sword (yeah, not a big fan of the length of this thing), the jack can go to town on most anything.  If you back him up with a choir and can cast defender's ward on him, you are looking at a ARM 23/POW 21 monster!  Top it off with the fact that he generates his own focus and will always have at least 2 focus (D3+1) and you have quite the addition to any Menite army.  Suffice to say that I have been stoked to get to work on this model and get him tabletop ready.  So, without further ado, here is Menoth's chosen instrument of destruction.

A front view of "the Dude".  He has a suitably imposing bulk though I feel his torso is a bit narrow.  I like the hunkered down pose.  It makes me feel as if the jack is about to leap into action. 

I'm really pleased with the paint job on his sword, but I am just not happy with the sword itself.  It really needs some added length, but I am not good enough to add that length and make the sword look decent.  I have seen a whole bunch of conversions that make the sword look great....and they make me envious. 

Rear view.  Not much to be said here.  I do like a good contrast between the white plating on the model's armor/hull and the metallic steam engine pieces in the back.  It's a good contrast.

And the shield. I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  Adding the glowing effects in the center of the menofix really makes it pop.  You might notice here and on that sword that I added blue gems.  I really think this helps balance out the red in the model. 

Well, I have to take a break from painting my models for a bit so that I can do a couple of commission jobs, but my next few projects for my Menoth army will include a few more support pieces like the Covenant of Menoth and the beginnings of my Exemplar horde.  I'm super stoked!

Other Models I have painted for my Menoth army:
Reckoner Finished and a Goal
Vassal of Menoth Complete
pKreoss and pSeverius Done!
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