2012 in Review

2012 was a really fun year for my gaming habit. It was my second year playing Warmachine, and my first year playing competitively. It was also the first year in a while that I hardly played any Warhammer 40K all year. Ironically, this blog started as a 40K blog dedicated to a Harlequin army that, thanks to 6th ed 40K, isn't even a usable force now.

I thought it would be fun on the last day of the year to take a look at this last year from a gaming perspective.

Caster Pairings.

For any given Steamroller event, I probably spend as much time building lists and figuring out caster pairings as I do actually playing games. Of course I don't spend that much time planning lists every time I play in a Steamroller, sometimes I use a two-list combo that I've had some success with in the past. but I put in that time at some point, planning ahead for a competitive event.

Recently, I got an email from a reader (I know, shocking! someone other than my wife actually reads my stuff after all) asking about list composition for a competitive event. Do I take two generic, all comers lists? one for scenario and one for assassination? one for alpha strike and one for grind? I thought it was an interesting question that deserved its own article.

As a side note, this article is going to focus on Skorne. I'm still so new to Retribution that I'm barely figuring out casters right now and am nowhere near being able to give advise on playing them in events. Even though I'll be focused on Skorne, the ideas presented should apply to any given faction. the examples will just have to shift to whatever your chosen faction may be.

Oh, and as a warning, this is going to be a long one.

Expand Your Horizons

The Steamroller format continues to be the primary tournament setting for WM/H, but it is not the only way to play. could playing non-steamroller events actually help your game?


I want to start off by saying that I consider myself a competitive Warmachine player. I may be a complete unknown in the National meta, but I've got a few wins under my belt. I play in every tournament I can get to, and I've done well in a few of those events. But Steamroller events aren't the only way to play. In this article, I want to look at a few of the advantages to playing in some of the extra events that Privateer Press puts on for their players.

Every year, Privateer Press puts on a number of special events. Some of these events are to promote a new book release (Domination/Wrath release events, Collosals release events, etc). There are ongoing events like the Journeyman league and this year's War Torn Alliances seasonal leagues. There are some one-off events like the Summer Rampage or the Longest Night event. I think these events are one of the things Privateer really has going for them. Not only do they make a great game, but they support the community through these cool events. But why play in these events instead of just playing all Steamroller, all the time?