A third ever game of Warmachine

Hi all,

Phil and I got together last Saturday to have another game of Warmachine. This time we decided to push the limit out to 30pts. I can just about make 15pts with my newly purchased Mercenaries mini's, so I allied them with 15pts of Phil's Menoth. My list was this.............

Army Name: Menoth & Merc

Protectorate of Menoth
30+11 points, 13 models

High Exemplar Kreoss  +5 points
* Crusader  6 points
* Revenger  6 points
* Vanquisher  8 points

Magnus the Warlord  +6 points
* Freebooter  6 points
* Mariner  8 points

6 Croe's Cutthroats  7 points

Phil ran this list..........

Khador

30+11 points, 20 models
Koldun Kommander Aleksandra Zerkova  +6 points
* Behemoth  13 points
Kommander Sorscha  +5 points
* Juggernaut  7 points
6 Assault Kommandos  5 points
* 1 Assault Kommando Flame Thrower  1 point
4 Battle Mechaniks  2 points
Gun Carriage  9 points
Widowmakers  4 points

I took a couple photo's of the deployment but got so wrapped up in the game I forgot to take any during it. It got fairly tense a couple of times so I suppose it is only to be expected!

Overview of deployment

Sorscha with her Juggernaut and a Gun Carriage

Zerkova and her battlegroup 'Big B!' Along with a squad fo battle commando's

Oh my side of the table, Kreoss and his battlegroup; Revenger, Crusader and Vanquiser

eMagnus and his battlegroup; Mariner and Freebooter (the whole battlegroup mysteriously missing their arms!)

Croe's Cutthroats advanced deployed in the Graveyard.

And Phil's widowmakers did the same in the wood

Turn 1:

I got first turn and moved my whole army forward. I wanted to see could I get a shot off with the mariner against anything in the Khador army but unfortunately I had made the mistake of moving the Mariner before eMagnus so there was nobody in base contact to load the ship cannon. I'd imagine I would have been out of range of everything anyway. When Magnus did active he moved into base contact with the Mariner again and cast Bullet Dodger on himself and on the two jacks.

On the other side of my line everything also moved forward and Kreoss cast Defender's Ward on this battlegroup. With that my first turn ended.

Phil also moved everything forward, the Juggernaut moved into the tree's that were in front of him, the widowmakers took a few shots at Magnus' battlegroup but protected by Bullet Dodger they only succeeded in drawing the warjacks closer. The Gun Carriage on the opposite flank shot at the Protectorate Jacks but Defender's Ward negated a lot of any potential damage.

Turn 2:

Once again I moved everything forward, The Revenger running to try and get in contact with the Gun carriage. The Crusader got a shot off on the Carriage and took around 8 damage points off of the rolling fortress. Kreoss used his focus to upkeep Defender's Ward.

Magnus moved first this time then followed by the Mariner, who did get a shot off on 'Big B' knocking a point or two damage off of him.

Phil moved his Mechaniks  to repair 'Big B' which they did successfully. The giant warjack then shot at the Mariner who was protected from the worse of the damage by the Bullet Dodger spell. The Gun Carriage continued to pound the protectorate force but was finding it difficult to get past the Defender's Ward enchantment. The Assault Kommando's advanced in the shadow of the Behemoth.

Turn 3:

This is the turn that I attempted to go for broke! Firstly I moved Kreoss into the middle of the board and popped Menoth's Wrath, knocking down all enemy model's in his control range, which included the Juggernaut in the wood, all the Assault Kommando's and the Behemoth. Then I activated Magnus and used Kill Box before charging the knocked down Kommando's with him. The charge I really wanted to get off though was to get the Freebooter into close combat with the knocked down Behemoth and had loaded him up on focus for just that purpose. Unfortunately my distances were just out by about an inch, even with Magnus casting mobility! Of course I forgot about the Jury Rigged special rule until about 2 turns later which would have easily gotten me to where I wanted to be. So despite all my careful planning to get rid of the Behemoth early in the game I only succeeded in killing one Kommando. The Protectorate Jacks succeeded in taking another couple of damage boxes from the Gun Carriage but they were not able to get a charge in due to the craters it's huge guns left behind.

Phil's movement was seriously curtailed as Magnus was standing awkwardly right in the middle of the table. But the Gun Carriage was out of Magnus control range so it reversed backwards towards the Mechaniks who were crabbing toward the battle machine. Phil used his focus to stand up his behemoth and Juggernaut and sacrificed his movement for the Kommando's to stand back up. The Behemoth, the Widowmaker and Zerkova's shooting did little to no damage.

Turn 4:

I knew that now was the time I had to make popping both my feat's last turn pay off as Phil could move normally in his next turn. Magnus was dangerously close to the Behemoth, but I decided to ignore him and focus on the slightly softer target of Zerkova behind 'Big B'. I charged her and knocked her down with Magnus' Mechanical Arm. Then I proceeded to chop her apart using several of his Foecleaver X's Armour Piercing Attacks. (Yes, yes I do now know that this was cheating in two different ways! Using a special attack on the charge and using the special attack more than once in an activation. Both Phil and I completely forgot/didn't know about these limiters on special attacks, it was only our 3rd ever game of Warmachine remember! But we both commented on the time how super powerful Magnus seemed to be) With Zerkova taken out, her associated Behemoth powered down. On the same flank the Mariner charged into the Widowmakers and Croe's Cutthroat's shot at the Kommando's doing no damage.  On my other flank Kreoss charged at Kammando's and killed three. While the Revenger made a last desperate charge on the Gun Carriage to attempt to destroy it before the Mechaniks could get to work which didn't work. The too heavy Jacks continued to run toward the Carriage. I have to admit after this turn I was feeling confident. I had basically destroyed one flank of Phil's force and had the other side on the run.

But Phil played a blinder in his turn! He activated Sorscha, moved her past my Protectorate Jacks closer toward Kreoss and popped Icy Gaze making Kreoss stationary. He then cast Boundless Charge on the Juggernaut in the woods, who proceeded to charge Kreoss and chopped him into tiny pieces, thereby completely inactivating the Revenger, Crusader and the Vanquisher, with about three full damage boxes between them! The Mechaniks completely fixed the Gun Carriage and with that one turn Phil completely turned the game in his favour.

Turn 5 and 6:

I knew I was now in serious trouble but I  was determined to go down fighting, I charged the Juggernaut (who had charged and killed the Freebooter) with Magnus and completely destroyed him in one turn (using the wrong rules!) Phil used the Gun Carriage to blow away the last of Croe's Cutthroats and slow down the Mariner. Eventually the game came down to Sorsha blasting Magnus out of his boots with her Hand Cannon and so ended the game!

Wrap Up and Comments:

That game was one of the most singularly enjoyable war games I've ever played. Down mainly to the swings in fortune. I thought I had the game wrapped up by the end of turn four,  I had the majority of my force alive and kicking apart from one dead Cutthroat, while Phil had one dead Warcaster, an inactivated Behemoth and a seriously damaged Gun Carriage. But with clever use of his feat and magic and me leaving Kreoss wide open for a charge from the Juggernaut (which I honestly had nearly forgotten about hiding in the trees) Phil swung the game dramatically in his favour with one ballsy move. Completely taking out half my army in one swing of a giant axe. It was always going to be a struggle to come back from that blow but if Phil hadn't managed to kill Magnus with Sorscha, she was about to get a faceful of a very angry former Cygnar hero in the next turn. As we were using the incorrect rules it would have been quite probable that Magnus would have chopped her down where she stood.

So if you've made it through that wall of text, congratulations. If you've noticed anything we were doing wrong (apart from the obvious!) please let me know as we're still finding our way in the game and we'd love to her from more knowledgeable players.

Until next time............