Warmachine: Rules Part 1: Go Big or Go Home!

So, quite a few people seemed interested in my experiences in Warmachine - thanks guys! I know some of you were not so keen on me bastardising this fine blog with non-GW content, but I think only the guest authors will be delving into it and you don't have to read it afterall. I'll try not to let this decrease the frequency of my 40k based articles (which are pretty infrequent, let's be honest).

First of all, my thoughts on the Rule Book. The softback version was just £20 and the hardback would have been £30. Compare this to GW's 40k rule book, which comes in at £35 and the new Fantasy book, coming in at £45. The quality of the book is excellent and I'd probably say slightly better than the 40k one (I have very little experience with the new Fantasy book, but know there have been several comments about the vast quantities on non-rule content)*. It's full colour, excellent quality paper and has great contents. There are rules for the 4 main factions and a couple of mercenary units. I'm not sure why they didn't include any Retribution of Scyrah stuff, but there we go. Yes, that's right, there are mini-codices in the back of each book. ALL of the rules for the models included in their battleforce box sets are in the book, so this is all you need to begin. Nice huh! Well, I think so anyway. For all you fluffy bunnies, there is more than enough fluff in the book to keep you entertained with 21 pages of introduction, 7 pages of fluff for each faction and some added fluff on each of the units included - 15 per faction.**

Turn to page 5. Apparently, this is a well-known part of the rule book, but I hadn't heard of it until I opened the book. It basically says, 'grow a pair, bring your A-game (no, not that A-game!!), and don't whine when you lose, it's a competition of generalship! Oh, and by the way, have some fun!' Now don't quote me on that, I may have misquoted them a little, but you get the point. This is refreshing in comparison to the 'Most Important Rule' imposed by GW, and note, I didn't say better, I said refreshing.

The game is based around a single model called a Warcaster, a sort of über-human that has the ability to control and 'sup-up' the models around him/her and cast spells. The other models in your army are either warjacks (steam-powered dreadnought-esqtue monsters) or non-warjacks (you or I, tooled with the finest equipment the Iron Kingdoms have to offer and occasionally a bit of magic thrown in for fun).

On to the rules. What can I say? I've read the basic rules twice and the more complicated parts just the once so far. At a first glance it doesn't seem as easy to learn as the basic 40k rules, but that may be partly due to my familiarity with GW from my younger years. The WM is certainly not laid out as well as the 40k book, but it is manageable.***

The most fundamental change from 40k is your interaction with models/units. Models and units are activated one at a time. Each 'activation' is broken down into movement and actions. Base movements range from 4 to 8" but this can be increased by a charge or run 'action'. Charging adds 3" to your movement and running doubles it. You may go into base-to-base combat with a run movement, but this does not bestow the benefits of 'charging' when making close combat attacks. Combat is similar to 40k in that you must roll to hit and roll to wound, but this takes a slightly different format as attack and wounding rolls can be 'boosted'. However, it is very different to 40k in that you can only attack in your activation phase, so you don't need to worry about your opponent pwning you before you attack.

The other forms of actions available are ranged attacks and magical attacks i.e. shooting. These again take a similar format to 40k in that you must roll to hit and wound, but again, these attacks may be 'boosted'.

Rather than armour saves (which I haven't come across yet), models have differing numbers of damage points. Non-warjacks models just die when their damage points have run-out, whereas war-jacks are slowly disabled as they lose theirs, losing limbs and movement before becoming a complete wreck. There are many other ways in which a unit can be affected, including being knocked-down, set alight, frozen etc. These can affect the models following activation or simply cause on-going damage to the model.

Line of sight and terrain are also different from what those of you who are making a transfer from 40k will be familiar with. Line of sight is not quite 'True-line-of-Sight', but does have 'get down and have a look' element to it. Models count as solid cylindrical objects that cannot be seen through, but are not of unlimited height and rules for looking over models are included. I would guess terrain has the potential to affect game play as much as it does in 40k, but instead of providing saving throws, negative modifiers are applied to attack rolls. I'll probably do an article on these particulars as they're a big part of game play and strategy. When I start to play more it'll be interesting to see how well they work out in comparison, as I think the majority of people play terrain incorrectly in 40k - everything providing a 4+ save is not RAW - but I'm one of those, so I shalln't harp on about it.

With this complicated sequence of activation, action, interaction and influence, list building and strategy seem to be extremely important. From some of the lists I've been throwing together (albeit at low points levels), you do not have the same ability to spam units like is commonplace in 'competitive' 40k and choice of models is incredibly dependant upon the Warcaster you chose and themes of the list.

I'll stop there for now, but will crack-on with part 2 for tomorrow, where we shall look at model characteristics and perhaps the beginnings of list building. If anybody is up for a quick game shoot me a reply and I'll see what I can do.

*NB: I'm not a GW poo-pooer. I generally think they release excellent stuff, but this is just a mark of the quality of the WM book.

**NB: The quickstart rules are available for free (yep, that's right, FREE) here.

*** note to Privateer Press - next time include a basic version of your Appendix A at the front of your book and some of your 'Rules Basics' are really not 'basics' at all.

Minis by Lobster from Cool Mini or Not