Mammoth Batreps, Part 1 - pMakeda

I finally picked up a copy of the new No Quarter magazine at our game store last night. Of course, as soon as I did I got the update to warroom as well. in any case, I now have the stats for the Mammoth in a fully usable format, and it's time for some play-testing!

My goal is to run the Mammoth with every one of our casters between now and the end of March when the Mammoth is released. I'll be posting battle reports here, focused on the performance of the Mammoth. Last night I got my first Mammoth test game in. Of course, if I'm going to play every caster, might as well play them in alphabetical order. First up is Archdomina Makeda (or pMakeda if you're not familiar with our titles!)

Game 1 was against my usual Cryx opponent, but this time he was trying out his new Gator army with Rask.
my list:
pMakeda
* Mammoth
* Gladiator
* Krea
Marketh
Agonizer
Willbreaker
Hakaar
Master Tormentor
Max Nihilators
min paingivers

Road to Adepticon 2013

For the last couple of years, Adepticon has been one of my favorite events of the year. in 2011, it was my first con out of the state. That Adepticon was actually what inspired me to create a blog. I built and painted an 1850 point Harlequin army between January 1st and Adepticon in mid-April. Somehow I got it all done and showed my progress on this blog. Of course, in the end that Adepticon also marked the end of my 40K days when they handed out free battleboxes to every con attendee. 2 months later I had my first 15 point Skorne army.

Last year, Adepticon was my first large event for Warmachine. Before that I had played in maybe 3 local steamrollers and one release event. I got to meet (and get stomped by) some of the bigger names in the national meta, like Jake Van Meter, Hollywood and Kieth. Once again, the fully painted rules at Adepticon forced me to paint frantically for a month or two before the event, getting multiple 50 point lists completed and my hardcore army fully based with my first green-stuff sculpting (very basic, but still a first).

Unfortunately, this year I will not be able to attend Adepticon. Schedules just didn't work out this year. As much as I love Adepticon, I think that might actually turn out to be a good thing. I was planning on hitting 2 out of state events this year (plus as many Texas events as possible), and one of those was going to be Adepticon. Not going frees me up to go to some more Warmachine-centric events. This year, the plan is to hit Lock and Load in May and Warmachine Weekend in November. So instead of going to a mainly 40K convention, I'm going to have a chance to see both of the "main" events for Warmachine in the country.

Of course, this also means that my "con season" doesn't start until the end of May. Once May hits, things will pick up quickly, with Lock and Load and Wargamescon on back-to-back weekends. Then the assortment of Texas mini-cons starts up with events like Coal and Claw, the Alamo, Clash for the Cure, and any other events that come up this year. So what am I doing in the meantime?

Those Last 2 Points

Skorne is a bit spoiled for choices when it comes to cheap solos. Once you've filled out your battlegroup with our awesome beasts, and brought along your screening infantry unit and paingivers, what choices do you take to fill out your roster? Between in-faction models and various minions, Skorne has plenty of options for filling those last 1-6 points.

This article is going to focus on the wealth of 2 point solos we can take. There are of course other options for filling lists, like taking another unit of paingivers, or bringing 3 point solos. there are really too many options to cover in one article. In my opinion, the 2 point solos are where most of my decisions are made. I'm going to roughly list the models in order from the most used to the least used, based on lists I see people posting on the Privateer forums

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?

Zombies!!

So recently someone posted a challenge on the Privateer Forums. The challenge was to make a 50 point list that could handle a 150 point list consisting of nothing but Mechanithralls. That's 300 mechanithralls. Obviously this was meant as a thought experiment, but I took it a step further and put it together on Vassal.

I won't give a step by step "battle report", but I did take screenshots of the vassal game as it progressed. I think just the pictures and some captions will be enough to get a feel for how the game went down.