Ironhead Station

I finally finished up my full unit of sword knights. I've had eight of the little buggers painted forever, but I needed to finish off the full unit. The UA finally gave me the encouragement I needed to get them done. I also painted up an extra Lancer I had laying around - he got the full Sword Knight color scheme. I like to think of him as a gift to that unit for their outstanding performance in my last string of games. I loves me some Sword Knights.


The captain from the UA was tough, as he's got a ton of filigree on him. You end up making a choice between lavishing a ton of time on him or just hitting him with some drybrushing and washes to pop the details. I chose the latter. Had he been a solo or a warcaster, I would have put the time in, but when it comes to units, I'm more interested in just getting models on the table.

And last, but not least, Bedivere. (Thanks to Losthemisphere for the name!) I really like how this guy turned out. I don't know if I like the scheme as a standalone, but mixed in with the unit, he looks so awesome. I'm starting to like the idea of 'jack marshall jacks matching the paint schemes of their parent units. Now I need to figure out how to make the Grenadier match my trenchers...

I'm trying to get back into the swing of painting. I've been start-and-stop for the last few months as work and other competing interests (including playing Warmachine) have gotten in the way of my painting. I finally got all of my stuff out today and took a quick inventory. Here's where I stand on my Cygnar army and what needs to get painted (not counting any mercs):

Painted Models Stryker Haley Nemo Squire Thorn Ol' Rowdy Ironclad Defender Centurion Stormclad Charger Lancer (x2) Gun Mage Captain Journeyman Stormsmiths (x3) 10 Sword Knights + UA Stormblades + UA 10 Trenchers + UA Trencher Grenade Porter

Unpainted Models Epic Stryker Epic Nemo Epic Haley Darius & Halfjacks Siege Thunderhead Grenadier Arlan Strangewayes Kate Laddermore Journeyman (alt) Maxwell Finn Black 13th 10 Precursor Knights + UA 10 Long Gunners +UA 10 Stormguard Stormlances (x5) Trencher UA Trencher Chain Gun (x2) Trencher Cannon Crew

It's the three big units in that second list that have me scared, but I really want to get the Long Gunners painted, as I tend to use those a lot. Same goes for the Black 13th. I haven't played any cavalry yet, but I'd like to, so they are probably the next big priority, although I sense that is going to be a major project. The trencher stuff can probably wait, as I don't have a real plan for that, I just want to screw around with the all-trencher theme army. Either way, looking at this list, I need to set some goals and get to work...

Labels: miniatures, wargaming, Warmachine

Welcome to this very special “I like to shoot my enemies in the face” episode of Gamehole.com!

I managed to sneak a couple of games in this week, and with a bit o’ dice luck I continued the winning streak. It was another double-header – this time I started out with some “training operations”, pitting my Siege against Epic Nemo. For the second game Stryker squared off against Epic Kreoss. Once again, I’ll file a battle report, and once again, I didn’t take any notes, so this will be about as accurate as my memory. Also – my wife took the good digital camera on her trip to see her sister and left me with an eight year old relic of a digital camera… So while there are pictures, the quality is a bit poor. Yeah, I’m kinda half-assing my way through this one.


Game One: Siege vs. Nemo – Training Exercises
Siege says: “I likes to shoot me some old man in the face.”

I call this list "Boom-boom long time." Here is what the match-up looked like for the first game:

My Cygnar Army (748 pts, 22 VPs) Siege Brisbane Squire Lancer Defender Reinholdt Journeyman 9 Long Gunners +UA 9 Sword Knights + UA 9 Trenchers + UA Trencher Grenade Porter

Jen's Cygnar (747 pts, 27 VPs) Epic Nemo Squire Thorn Ol' Rowdy Thunderhead Reinholdt Journeyman Gun Mage Captain Adept Ogrun Bokur Rupert Carvolo 10 Stormguard 3 Stormsmiths

Turn 1

Me: Trenchers advance a few more inches, and dig in again. Long gunners take up a hilltop position. Everybody else runs. Jr. throws up the obligatory Arcane Shield on the Sword Knights.

Jen: The piper plays Dirge of Mists on the Stormguard, everybody runs. Stormsmith lightning calls on a trencher, and kills him. Her GMCA picks off a long gunner from the front rank. Two can play at that game buddy-boy.



Turn 2

Me: My trencher sniper shoots and kills one of the Stormguard. Not so fun getting sniped, is it? I pop off a couple of three-man and one four-man trencher CRAs to take out 3 more Stormguard. That’s not going to be enough – I can tell now that a lot of trenchers are going to die next round. Long gunners advance behind a hedge and split targets – five of them CRA the GMCA, the other four shoot the Stormsmith. Both die. Long gunners feel avenged. My defender comes forward with a couple of focus on him and blasts Thorn, doing moderate damage, but more importantly taking out the arc node! Siege moves up and throws a ground pounder into the backfield, putting some damage on the T-Head, killing a Stormsmith, and boosting to kill the Stormguard unit leader. At least there won’t be a charge. The Sword Knights can smell the ozone gathering on the T-Heads lightning coils… rather than lose 'em all on Jen’s turn, I decide to back them off and position them to countercharge the Stormguard.

Jen: Thunderhead moves up and pulses, but has some bad rolls – doesn’t manage to catch Seige or Reinholt, but does take out the squire and a fair amount of trenchers. Then the Stormguard advance and decimate what was left of the trenchers. Her last Stormsmith takes out the sniper from the supposed safety of his grassy knoll. I now have 1 trencher left - that’s is what you call a 179 point speed bump, ladies and gents. The neutered Thorn decided to try and earn his points by charging the Defender – and he manages to take out the defenders cortex and disrupt him. Nemo advances, and builds a wall around himself with Reinholdt, the Squire, a Bokur and Ol’ Rowdy.

Labels: miniatures, wargaming, Warmachine

I'm thinking about making some changes around here. I created this blog back in February of 2006, and at that point I envisioned a blog where I could talk about all the different games I enjoyed - video games, card games, pen-and-paper roleplaying and miniatures gaming. Over the last three years I've posted on all of these topics, but in the last six months, I've really started to focus more on talking about Warmachine. Since then, the site has really seemed to find its own voice and audience and taken off. In fact, in that short time my traffic has almost quadrupled, and I've started to make connection with some really cool people.

That tells me that when it comes to blogging, a narrower focus is probably better than a broad one. With that in mind, I'm thinking about making a few changes - first off, I'll probably be putting up a second blog where I focus on roleplaying games. While Warmachine will remain the focus on this site (and always will be), roleplaying games are really my first love. My interest there is really pretty broad, and I enjoy playing a lot of D&D, Pathfinder and d20 Modern, and we are starting to dabble with games like Star Wars, Dark Heresy, Serenity and Shadowrun. I'd like a place to deep dive into that stuff, but doing that here just feels like I'm splitting the audience. So, for those of you that have some interest in that, I'll keep you posted when that site goes up.

Next up, I think I'd like rename this site. "Gamehole" was a domain name I'd had laying around, and it made sense back when I was thinking about a site for all things gaming. With the decision to have a narrower focus, I'll probably be moving this blog off of my own server and back to Blogger so I can take advantage of some of the nice community features like "follow this blog" and the dynamic blog roll. Before I do that, I need to come up with a new name. I'd like to come up with a name that does a better job evoking the idea of miniatures or Warmachine, but to be honest, I'm drawing a blank. So, put your collective brains together and help me come up with some ideas, and post them in the comments. I might even come up with some kind of prize for a winning entry.

Thanks for reading,
dangerfish

I managed to get in a double header this week, playing against both Trolls and Menoth. I was going to be a good blogger and take notes to do a fancy battle report, but... well, I didn't.

Game One

First game was my Nemo vs. Jen's Trolls. This is a variant off of an earlier list that I really enjoyed playing, but beefed up a little bit this time around. Here is what it looked like:

My Cygnar Army (746 pts, 25 VPs) Nemo Squire Thorn Centurion Thunderhead Journeyman Warcaster Captain Strangewayes Sword Knights (x8) + UA Rupert Carvolo Long Gunners (x8) + UA

Jen's Trolls (750 pts, 23 VPs) Epic Hoarluk Dire Troll Mauler Dire Troll Mauler Earthborn Dire Troll Earthborn Dire Troll Kreil Warriors (x10) + UA Gatormen Posse (x5)

The idea behind this list is to surround Nemo with spell casters and turn him into a focus battery, and then use that focus to either spam chain lightning or load up some heavies and jack up your opponent. With Strangewayes and Jr. casting spells each turn, and then having Nemo pull a focus off the Squire, the old man can have 10 focus for three rounds in a row starting on turn two. If you can somehow fit in Ayana & Holt into the list, you could get that up to a fearsome 11! That translates into the ability to put 5 focus on to your heavy of choice, and still having plenty of focus left over to play around with.

As for the rest of the list: The Thunderhead provides a nice threat with a potent ranged attack, strong melee, and the ability to clear out infantry in a hurry. The Centurion is less of an all around threat, but he's hard as a tack, stops charges, and his reach allows him to engage several enemies at once, setting the Sword Knights up with flank. Finally, Thorn is there to deliver the surgical chain lighting strike before yo-yo’ing out of harm’s way.

This list gives Nemo enough focus to run two heavies effectively, forcing your opponent to make some hard choices. The Sword Knights are fast becoming a staple for me, and with the UA they are absolutely sick. Five damage dice against a heavy 'jack or 'beast is a thing of beauty. Add in the Piper, and they can get off three attacks on that critical turn, and then be tough on the next turn if they are still engaged. Finally, the Long Gunners give some ranged punch with a POW 19 CRA, plus using suppressing fire early in the game is great for channeling your opponent's army. The long gunners end up being especially strong against the medium- and large-based troll army, as line of sight is abundant.

I'll admit I was pretty put off by the wall of dire trolls I was facing off against. I wasn't exactly sure how I was going to get through all of that. Plus, having Epic Hoarluk in the backfield meant that there was a potential 15 inch charge range waiting back there... truly frightening!

The first turn we both just advanced without much drama, but on turn two it got a little weird as Hoarluk’s bonded Earthborn caught up to the back ranks of the Kriel Warriors and began picking them up and throwing at me. Thorn took a nasty hit (forgot to yo-yo him after a failed chain lighting attempt) and three long gunners died to flying trolls. If I was going to survive, this was going to have to stop!

While I completely expected the trolls to get the massive charge off, they didn't through some stroke of luck, and I ended up getting the first charge off at the bottom of turn three. I lead with the Centurion, setting up flank, and then charged in with the Sword Knights. Hoarluk's bonded Earthborn didn't even survive the Major’s charge. Every time something would drop, it opened up new firing lines for the Long Gunner, who would then pound the next thing in the backfield.

After the initial clash, my dice finally started to warm up, and I was able to chew through the second earthborn with surprising speed. The Sword Knights killed off some Kriel warriors, leaving half the squad out of formation. I had broken through the first wave, and things were definitely looking up, although a pair of Dire Trolls and a unit of Gatormen is still something to be concerned with.

Around this point, things started moving really fast, and I lost track of what happened on which turn – I just remember rolling forward in a blue tidal wave, carried on the back of outrageously good dice rolls. In about two turns there was nothing left between my army an Hoarluk except for a single unit of gatormen.

My Cygnar Army (499 pts, 16VPs) Siege Brisbane Squire Defender Journeyman Warcaster Reinholdt Sword Knights (x8) + UA Trenchers (x9) Trencher Grenade Porter

Jen's Menoth (500 pts, 19 VPs) Amon Ad-Raza Castigator Castigator Castigator Choir of Menoth (x6) Allegiant Allegiant Exemplar Seneschal

Normal deployment, with the dug-in trenchers in a wide-spread formation at the advanced deploy line. My mistake the first time I played this list was trying to play Trenchers like Long Gunners. This time their job was to slow the enemy's advance, get in pot shots where they could, but most of all make sure that my Sword Knights got off the charge. To this end, I made sure they were deployed with enough space in between them that my knights could easily filter through them.

Siege finally clicked for me in this game. I was too focused on the AOE aspect of Siege the first time around, and using the feat with ranged attacks. This time I had an almost a perfect feat turn, combining Siege’s feat with (you guessed it) a Sword Knight charge! I scrapped one of the Castigators, got another within two points of scrap, and did some damage to the third. Unfortunately, I lost about half of my Sword Knights to the 'jack's Combustion effect, but that was okay... their work here was done. I almost killed Amon during the feat with a boosted ground-pounder, but rolled shit on the damage. I did manage to kill one of the allegiants, which gave me a warm, happy feeling.

Turn 3: Amon stepped up and tried to sandblast Siege, but couldn’t get the job done. Casigators moved up and did some more combusting, killing even more sword knights. On my turn I hit Amon with another ground pounder (he was tough) and missed with the rocket (provided courtesy of Reinholt). Now the trick was finding a way to finish him off. Jr. took a boosted hand cannon shot, but couldn't get it done. Finally, my Defender stepped up and shot him for an insane amount of damage. This time he rolled a 1 on his tough check, and that was game.

So, it was a good day for me. I feel like I'm finally coming into my own with my army, and I'm definately getting a handle on how to deal with big, tough targets, which is something I struggled with early on. I'm really enjoying trying out different units as well. Every time I play this game I'm amazed at the depth and variety that I find. When people describe it as "easy to learn, but hard to master" they aren't kidding around... Great stuff!

Labels: miniatures, wargaming, Warmachine

I didn't get a chance to write most of this up while it was fresh, so some of the details are a bit hazy, but the flavor is right on. And I'm all about the flavor. I know Jen took some notes and pictures. If she posts either, I'll come back and clean this up, and maybe add some pics. Otherwise, enjoy it for what it is... (Update: Jen posted her battle report, and I stole her pics! You can read her troll propagandist version here.) Now, on to the gory details:

I'm not sure why, but I had a very difficult time adjusting to Siege, which seems somehow funny because I expected him to be a straight-forward beat stick based on how people tend to talk about him. It's not that hard to understand what he does, but getting the order of operations right to pull it all off optimally without getting in your own way was rough for me this time around. I'm also still struggling with how to best use the trenchers, and I'm just not getting very much out of them. The UA probably would have helped, but I can't figure out what I would have dropped to get them in there... In fact, this list didn't even have a Lancer (probably my first time ever running Cygnar without an arc node) and I really missed it.

Sword Knights: Make it happ'n, cap'n!

Top of turn 4 - amazingly, the last remaining Impaler fails his threshold check again, and charges into one of the Sword Knights that is engaged with Madrak. Amazingly, even with boosted attack dice, he can't hit him. Sword Knight unbolts his back-flap and cleans out a fresh pant load. Then Madrak feats... He kills off all three of the Sword Knights that have him engaged before he runs out of targets. About this time things get really crazy as the Kriels charge the Trenchers, who are bunched up tighter than you can imagine in Higher Ground. Thanks to some rough terrain, only one of them actually manages to make it to the trenchers, but as it turns out, one is all you need. He manages to crusher attack his way through SIX of them before whiffing for the first time. Three Bushwhackers take a shot at Siege, but miss. The other Bushwhackers shoot impotently at the backs of the Sword Knights. The Sword Knights cordially invite the pygs to suck it.

Back to me - I think I have Madrak screwed. He has nothing to transfer to, and he as already used his scroll. I move up just a little, giving myself a clear shot in case my ground-pounder doesn't work and I need to follow up with a rocket attack (courtesy of Reinholt). Siege pulled a focus off the Squire, so I have seven if I need it. Luckily, I wouldn't need it - I managed to land the ground-pounder and rolled high on the boosted damage. That was game.

So, what did I learn?

• You have to have a good sense of the order of things with Siege, and I kept getting in my own way.
• On Siege's feat turn your opponent only has 1/2 ARM on the first damage roll. Have a plan, and make sure you don't waste that on AOE splash damage.
• Don't let your Defender's big gun get blown off before the feat turn.
• Jen plays Bushwhackers better than I play Trenchers.
• I still suck with Trenchers.
• I don't suck nearly as much with Sword Knights.
• Madrak's scroll is the original suck. If you are going to take a run at him, make sure you bring enough to kill him twice.
• Blowing things up is cool.

Labels: miniatures, wargaming, Warmachine

It's been a hairy few weeks at work, and I haven't gotten much done with my miniatures lately. I had to cancel my Sunday games last week, so don't even have a battle report to file. The good news is most of that will be wrapping up tomorrow, and I'm starting to be able to see road out in front of me again.

With some more free time, I'm trying to get back into some kind of routine with my painting. Lately I've been in "burst mode," going a couple weeks without doing anything, and then painting up a warjack over the weekend. It's been great for getting some of my heavies finished and on the table, but it doesn't work at all for finshing units. I'm not quite ready to start setting painting goals in terms of models finished, but I am going to try to make sure I set aside at least 45 minutes to an hour each night (at least most nights) to get some work done.

I've got several full units that need be painted, and to ease back into the swing, I'm going to start by finishing up some of my partially-complete units. Back when I was first starting the game I was just buying enough models to put together 500 pt. lists, and I ended up with some 8-man units. My sword knights are one of these, and now with the UA I've got 8 painted models and 4 primed models. That won't do at all.

The Sword Knights get the brush-love.

Obviously these are a work in progress - I'm just in the "blocking in" stage - no washes or highlights added yet. Oh, and if your are wondering why I haven't painted the swords or the standard yet - it's because my giant meat-fists need something to hold onto while I paint!

Notice the lancer... A long time ago I bought a second Lancer, figuring Haley or Nemo with two lancers wasn't the worst idea... But then Thorn came out, and ended up filling that need, so I've had this lancer laying around in the top of my closet for months. Over the last few weeks I have had such good luck with my Sword Knights that I decided to reward them with their own custom 'jack to marshal - a Lancer fully decked out in unit colors! I'm actually really happy with how it is coming along, and surprised at how well the color scheme works with the model.

The Sword Knights get their own lancer.
Now he just needs a name...

Next up I'm going to take on the trenchers. I've got a full unit of 10 already painted, plus the grenade porter, but the UA is unpainted. Finn is also unpainted, and he's basically a second UA, so he needs some attention. As I was thinking about painting them up, I got kind of interested in building the trencher-themed list (it's a Cygnar right of passage after all) so ended up I buying a bunch more crap: two chain gun crews, a cannon crew and a grenadier. I suddenly have a lot of trenchers to paint...

Labels: miniatures, wargaming, Warmachine