In retrospect, we shouldn’t have titled our last piece “A quickie primer on Circle of Orboros,” because it was more a response to a “getting started” article than a faction “primer.” We’ve corrected this titling scheme here, in which we’ll highlight a similar community article. This one’s by a Press Ganger and a vocal authority on the Hordes Trollbloods faction. Titled “Trollblood Toolbox,” PG_theummhmmguy outlines which units a tentative Trollbloods player should think about picking up. It’s the type of article that should be more well-advertised, and allows new players a good perspective into which investments they’d need to make. Ideally, there’d be an article like this for every Warmachine and Hordes factions.

We won’t rehash the whole article, but the gist is simple: Trollbloods require synergy between their units, because by themselves, Trollbloods units aren’t fantastic when considering their base stats alone. Trollbloods shine, however, when unit abilities are used to buff an army, increasing the army’s power, longevity, and speed. By ignoring any of these key buffs, a Trollbloods army won’t perform at peak, and therefore underperform. At minimum, then, a Trollbloods player needs to take key units that buff three stats: damage, attack, and defense. Each of these categories has numerous units that can perform a respective buff, which means that players have some fair selection in choosing which units perform buffing roles (though the Fell Caller is practically an auto-include for most lists).

The article is among the best starting advise for a WarmaHordes player, and was quite helpful in our own selection of two Trollbloods army lists. Given that such knowledge of Hordes MKII isn’t available to the average gamer without buying a faction card deck and an old copy of the MKI rulebook, this information is golden, at least until the Hordes MKII rulebook is released later this month, and the Trollbloods faction book soon thereafter. Even then, there’s no reason summaries like this shouldn’t be more accessible.

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With Privateer Press’ Hordes MKII book hitting shelves later this month, many gamers are scrambling to pick up a Hordes faction to either supplement their existing Warmachine faction, or simply to get started with WarmaHordes. While we previously settled on Khador and Legion of Everblight, we’ve gone back to our original Hordes faction, Trollbloods. That said, we’ve spent time scouring the web on the state of Hordes gameplay, and how the various factions function. Sadly, aside from very general, quasi-fluff-ridden descriptions, understanding whether a given faction’s play-style may appeal to you isn’t easy. Fortunately, there are some gems out there, such as Dark Fledgling’s take on the Circle of Orboros.

…in Circle, our Heavies do our heavy lifting (haha pun). Really though, It is incredibly common to see 2-3 heavies in a 35 point game and often 4 in 50 points with the majority of our casters. The Warpwolf trio is not only amazingly synergistic with each, other but kills what ever you throw at it. Similarly, the WoldWarden, Megalith, and new WoldGuardian are equally baller. Most casters like to take a mix of furry beasts and wolds, with the exception of the Kayas who go all furry (usually) and Baldur going all construct (again, usually).

The differences between furry Circle warbeasts and golem Circle warbeasts are interesting, especially since the latter cannot be healed by every Circle warlock. The juxtaposition between the two warbeast types are greater with Circle than other Hordes factions, requiring specific decisions to be made when building a Circle army. It’s not a concept we spent much time thinking about before we originally settled on Legion, because we weren’t really aware of it. Other factions in WarmaHordes don’t see many differences between warjacks/warbeasts other than aesthetic ones. Sure, some people like to run with heavier units, while others like to run with light ones. Legion was interesting to us because they offered lesser warbeasts, but just as unique a concept exists with the Circle, in that half their warbeasts aren’t made of flesh and blood, and this is more than a matter of fluff: it has gameplay ramifications.

If we had spent more time contemplating this, we may have taken Circle on earlier. Our only real gripe with the faction at present is that we find many of their models underwhelming from an aesthetic perspective (mostly the non-warbeasts). Aside from the Tharn, Circle units simply don’t seem to have much personality.

As far as units are concerned, there are several good ones. Any of the female tharn units are good and all have there uses, likewise reeves, wolves, and woldstalkers also all see play with varied degrees, depending on whom you ask. But, when it comes down to it, the single best unit we got is the Druids. Because our Heavies usually end up doing most of the hard work its our units job to support them, and the druids do it beautifully. Pound for pound, they are what you will go too. For solos, its all about the Lord of the Feast whom can single handily take out entire units in one turn. Strangely enough though, despite how good he is, almost all our stuff sees game time. Blackclads and our shifting stones (I consider them solos, even if they are a unit) both rock, and Morraig can simply destroy anything you throw at him with the proper support. Overall, you will find Circle is one of the more varied of factions out there, with many different playstyles available even with a single caster.

A huge testament to Circle is the number of capable units available, letting a player at least choose the better-looking models (which still offer benefits in gameplay). More importantly, though, is the idea of switching play-style not only by swapping out one’s warlock, but by being able to dynamically switch play-style mid-game, or simply with the same army build once the next battle starts.

We’re quite happy with working on a Trollbloods army for the moment, but wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Circle as a faction to anyone. The guerilla-like play-style, with units jumping around the board for hit ‘n run tactics, sounds quite fun, and the thought behind warbeast selection adds just another layer of strategy that we’re keen on.

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Awhile back, using data from the Privateer Press Forums, we compiled data on which Warmachine/Hordes (WarmaHordes) factions were the most popular. This was when the release of the Retribution of Scyrah first began, so the data has obviously changed since then. Still, the afore-linked spreadsheet remained a good indication of WarmaHordes faction popularity.

iBodger, meanwhile, is a fantastic iOS and Android app for tracking WarmaHordes armies, and the software compiles a list of user-supplied armies and units, data for which is published online as the iBodger Web Service. We’re guessing that this data isn’t updated in real-time, but even if it’s only monthly, the data is very interesting, and is similar to what we compiled previously.

iBodger has about 300 more entries than our own data, but faction breakdowns among Warmachine armies, or Hordes armies, is fairly consistent. However, there are some obvious distinctions: among iBodger users, mercenary armies are much less popular (by about 10%), the difference for which is almost made up by the increase in Retribution players. Interestingly, Retribution remains the minority major faction in Warmachines, despite the fact that it seemed many players were building Retribution armies after faction units became available for sale. Apparently, space-elves aren’t that popular after all.

The Hordes numbers aren’t quite as consistent as the Warmachine ones, as our own data suggested that all factions were within 6% of one another. The iBodger data puts Skorne players 14% behind the leader, Trollbloods. Also interesting since Trollbloods are the faction generally assumed to be the worst Hordes tournament faction. Circle, often considered the best Hordes tournament faction, falls third at only 2% more players than Skorne.

When looking at the totality of WarmaHordes players, our numbers finally diverge a bit more from the iBodger numbers. The percentages aren’t off by much, but the order of factions does shift, with Mercenaries dropping from tied-at-the-top on our list to third least-popular faction using iBodger’s stats. Similarly, Circle, tied for fourth on our list, dropped to tied-for-last on iBodger’s list.

Aside from the evolution of the game (primarily because of Warmachine since moving to MKII rules), one reason for the difference in numbers can be attributed to the iBodger user-base; are iBodger users more selective than usual forum-goers, or less so? More into the tournament circuit, or less so? We imagine that iBodger users have a higher median age than most forum-goers, since using iBodger requires a somewhat expensive mobile device, whereas anyone with an internet connection and a home computer can jump on the forums. Similarly, making a forum post to chime in one what faction one plays takes little pre-planning, whereas iBodger users are investing time for a purpose: building an army. As such, forum posters may seek to play a particular faction, but may ultimately steer away from this decision, whereas iBodger stats are based on actual ownership of units.

One solid take-away from all this is the difference between a vocal minority and actual popularity. For example, Skorne players are very vocal about their faction, but it’s actually the least popular faction (tied with Circle). And, surprising to us, is that “non-tournament-capable” factions are still getting love from players. Aesthetics over gameplay, perhaps?

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Late last year, we jumped back into tabletop wargaming, and though we mentioned this pursuit earlier, we didn’t clarify what game in particular we opted to invest in. We’re still not at the point where we can field a solid (and finished) army, but we nonetheless find ourselves casually plowing through Warmachine/Hordes material, from the fluff in the books to the routine updates in No Quarter magazine. For those considering the hobby, here’s a brief writeup of why we picked Warmachine/Hordes, and what we learned about the various factions.

Why Warmachine/Hordes?

The decision to go with Privateer Press’ games wasn’t too difficult to make. For one, we wanted to pursue a fantasy game, and Warmachine’s steampunk world (the Iron Kingdoms) was quite attractive. We found the factions rather interesting, didn’t feel that the miniatures were too “cartoony,” and generally considered the sculpts to be excellent, with (mostly) flexible painting options. Since Warmachine and Hordes are new games compared to the reigning king, Warhammer, there was the added advantage of having a smaller unit and rulebook selection. Plus, the Warmachine rules were well-recognized as being fast-paced with numerous combat options, where players tend to field much smaller armies than what Warhammer is known for. With Hordes as a compatible game, there are effectively nine factions to choose from, with a 10th on its way (and arguably an 11th, too), which only adds to a player’s flexibility to choose a play-style.

The core mechanic (if you want to call it that) behind Warmachine/Hordes mirrors the background story arc of one of our own preliminary game designs of yesteryear, albeit with some modifications. In short, central to every army are powerful spell casters (“warcasters” in Warmachine, and “warlocks” in Hordes). These spell casters are tied closely to large behemoths, with which they have an almost symbiotic relationship. In Warmachine, warcasters generate focus (ala mana), which fuels steam-powered mecha called “warjacks.” In Hordes, warlocks “leach” fury (again, like mana) from hulking “warbeasts,” which they use to fuel their spells. (In other words, warcasters are to warjacks what warlocks are to warbeasts.) While these units are central to an army, there are also numerous supporting units like infantry and solos, which round out a particular force.

A nice aspect to the reliance on warcasters/warlocks is that they are interchangeble. That is to say, an army list is built around a particular warcaster/warlock, and simply swapping one caster for another can drastically change how a given army is played. So while each faction may be geared towards a particular play-style, that play-style can be modified in subtle, or even drastic, ways. This flexibility is a particularly alluring element to a game with fairly unique lore that doesn’t entirely rely on the “traditional” fantasy races and background.

The Factions

Deciding to move ahead with Warmachine/Hordes, we came upon the typical struggle of deciding on a faction to play with. This was troublesome in itself because all the Warmachine/Hordes factions are attractive in their own right, so we had to balance aesthetic tastes with typical faction strategies/play-style, knowing that the latter could be adjusted somewhat based on our caster choices. Our understanding of the various factions, summarized, follows.

Cryx: It seems that almost every fantasy wargame needs to have an undead faction, and that’s the role the Cryx fill. Their fluff includes something about a dragon powering their undead ways, and this fantasy element is perhaps more intrinsic to the Cryx than to other Warmachine factions. This is most obvious in the fact that their warjacks are not just steam-powered machines, but are undead monstrosities borne of both metal and bone. Overall, their troops are among the most fragile of the Warmachine factions, but their reach across the battlefield is unrivaled among them as well. Using “arc nodes,” Cryx warcasters can “channel” their spells through distant warjacks, effectively extending a warcaster’s spell’s range considerably. This is important, because the Cryx rely on magical attacks more than the other Warmachine factions. Often describes as the “dirty tricks” faction, Cryx armies are known for their ability to debuff enemies, deny opposing strategies, and conduct “assassination runs” against enemy casters. On the tabletop, Cryx models include rather top-heavy warjacks that are known to often detach from their bases. That, and the fact that their theme makes customzing their colour scheme a bit more difficult compared to the other factions, is why we didn’t choose to play a Cryx army, even though their units do look awesome, and play even better.

Cygnar: The protagonist faction of Warmachine can best be defined with the phrase “high-fantasy meets steampunk.” The Cygnar are half knights, and half steam-powered gunsmiths. They somehow got a tesla influence too, which means they have electric-powered ‘jacks, and Force-lightning-like powers. It all makes for a catchy aesthetic that’s clearly based on medieval Europe with a touch of cowboy, and wholly defines what steam-powered warmachines are all about. Overall, Cygnar are a solid mix of melee and ranged units, and appears to be a very flexible, baseline race, ala the “human” archetype of most RPGs. That said, they’re not entirely a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none faction – they’re the top single-target ranged threat in Warmachine overall, and both this fact, and their baseline flexibility, makes them a solid faction to play.

Khador: If you took the Soviet Union and imagined them in a steampunk setting, it pretty much sums up what Khador are like. Tactically, Khador are all about brute-force, blitzkrieg-like strategies, and in this respect, they have a very “German” mechanic to them as well. Rather than field light warjacks at all, Khador rely on heavily-armored warjacks that plow through enemy defenses. They have no arc-nodes to speak of (with one exception being for a particular warcaster), which speaks much to the Khador attitude; even Khador warcasters are comfortable mixing it up in melee, and though complimented by select, powerful ranged infantry units, the Khador are a predominantly melee-themed faction.

Menoth: The Protectorate of Menoth is an inquisition-themed army, making use of similarly-medieval-themed warjacks bent with holy guidance. Menoth troops excel at ranged area-of-effect damage, and can sacrifice their own troops to bolster their fighting prowess. By many, this Warmachine faction is considered the hardest to play, but has some of the coolest-looking units in the game, too. The Protectorate is known for its ability to steadfastly hold ground, which is great for scenario games where objectives must be held.

Mercenaries: Describing the mercenaries as a faction is only a half-truth. In reality, the mercenary umbrella consists of numerous units (warcasters, warjacks, infantry, and solos) that can be used with other faction armies. However, each mercenary unit can have faction restrictions regarding who it will work for, so while some mercenary units will work for every faction, others may only work for one. That said, players can also opt to field an all-mercenary army, but for balancing purposes, fielding such an army has obvious restrictions. The fluff explanation is simple: not all mercenaries get along, so philosophical agreements determine “sub-factions” within the mercenary population. So, just as every mercenary unit may have restrictions on which of the four major factions it can work for, every mercenary unit may have restrictions on which mercenary “charter” it can be part of. Effectively, a charter determines which mercenary units can be used together to be played as a faction. Privateer Press has published all the approved charters to date, and there are currently about a handful of them to pick from, each of which has a general play-style with a unifying aesthetic, just as with any of the major factions. Since Mercenary units pretty much fill the spectrum of play-styles, they’re good to pick up both to field as a faction, or to compliment another faction.

Retribution of Scyrah: One of the nice things about Privateer Press is that they’re working hard to better their games. This is embodied in their recent beta test of new Warmachine rules, which will be published in 2010. In short, the new rules address the fact that Warmachine has, in the recent past, become very infantry-specific, and the new rules hope to bring balance back towards the warjack side of the house (like Hordes and its warbeasts). In addition to these new rules also redefining some of the old unit abilities/functions, comes a new Warmachine faction known commonly as “the Retribution.” Unlike the other factions, which are primarily human-populated, the Retribution is made up of what can best be described as high-elves, albeit with somewhat of a science-fiction aesthetic welded onto the typical magic-wielding-elf archetype. Though we’re not personally fond of the new aesthetic (thinking it’s too far from Warmachine’s steampunk roots), it certainly offers more flavor to the Iron Kingdoms. Retribution rules are already available from the latest two editions of No Quarter magazine, and faction units will be available for sale next month, along with the Retribution faction book. Early reports suggest that Retribution armies are quick to traverse the battlefield, and great at assasinating casters.

Circle or Orboros: The Circle embodies the shamanistic, druidic approach to faction design: it’s units are comprised of druidic spell-casters, monoliths brought to life out of sticks and stones (which, ironically, break bones), and other beasts like werewolves and satyrs, as well as human cannibals known as the Tharn. The Circle is the most magic-using faction in Hordes, and is strategically founded on hit-and-run tactics. This guerilla warfare strategy is aided through the Circle’s high levels of mobility, made possible thanks to units that enable teleporting on the battlefield, and the fact that all Circle units can traverse rough terrain unhindered. Like the Cryx, the Circle is generally made up of fragile units, who need to avoid direct, prolonged combat, but can adequately approach this restriction by using terrain to their advantage. Also like Cryx, the Circle’s movement advantages make them effective at assassination attempts.

Legion of Everblight: If an undead faction is a necessity, then shortly thereafter must come a demonic faction, and to this end, Everblight fits the bill. Like the Cryx, the fluff here is based on a dragon lord, but this time around, it’s the spirit of a dead dragon that has “blighted” denizens and made them servents of Everblight. Accompanying these corrupted souls are what can best be described as dragon-spawn – eyeless monsters that make up Everblights warbeast population. Unlike what we might expect from dragon progeny, however, Everblight warbeasts are mostly smaller in stature, and even include “lesser” warbeasts designed to swarm an enemy force. This means that Everblight forces are very fragile compared to other factions, and rely heavily on a “first strike” opportunity. Everblight armies tend to excel heavily in ranged attacks, and this, above anything, is their forte. Because of how quickly they can (and must) traverse the battlefield (thanks in part to winged creatures), Everblight armies are also known to effect successful assassination attempts. Rounding out the draconic units are blighted elves and ogrun, though we wouldn’t be surprised to find other blighted races represented among Everblight units in the future. It is often said that Orboros and Everblight tactics can be similar at times, with the main difference being that unlike Orboros units, there is no significant synergy between the abilities of Everblight units, as they tend to act alone, albeit as part of a larger war machine (pun intended).

Skorne: Often described as the most “Warmachine-like” of the Hordes factions, the Skorne are a well-balanced, regimented force. By “regimented,” we refer to their well-balanced army composition. Indeed, as the “evil-fascist” army in Hordes, the Skorne have good melee troops, good defensive troops, and good ranged troops. In other words, their unit synergies are well balanced, which means they have a very structured attack pattern, with offensive troops ahead, and defensive troops protecting their ranged units in back. The Skorne motif is based heavily on Asian culture, with the core Skorne race looking a lot like nosferatu clad in samurai armour. Perhaps even moreso than the Legion, the Skorne are the “evil” race of Hordes, who have enslaved basilisks, cyclops, and huge titans as warbeasts. Because of their armour, we’d also argue that the Skorne are the most customizeable faction of Hordes for painting, whereas the other races rely primarily on skin-colour changes to customize appearance significantly.

Trollbloods: Here we have the protagonist faction of Hordes, based loosely on a celtic theme. Trollblood armies consist of a number of troll types, from pygmy trolls to huge dire trolls. Aesthetically, we consider the Trollbloods the nicest of the Hordes factions, even if the units are all troll-ish at heart. Trollbloods are said to share the same meta-game as Khador, which means they’re all about rushing into combat and using brute force to dish out the hurt. In this respect, they’re a rather straightforward faction to play, but they are also very flexible. Rather than having to force a particular defensive strategy on the opponent, Trollbloods excel at buffing their units in response to an enemy’s play-style, which means that they can address most threats adequately. Limited in long-range attacks, Trollbloods have enormous staying-power, as most of their units can regenerate health over time. This means that Trollbloods are great at defending a battlefield location, so like Menoth armies, Trollbloods excel in objective-based scenarios.

Minions: Minions are the counterpart to Warmachine mercenaries, and this is the arguable 11th faction we mentioned earlier. Minions aren’t yet playable as their own faction, because there’s no Hordes equivalent to mercenary charters yet. Nonetheless, we can fully expect Privateer Press to develop Hordes minions in this same direction, and with new Hordes beta rules coming out sometime next year, we can probably expect to see all-minion armies then as well. (We may even see a whole new Hordes faction by then.)

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Albeit late, we’re finally coming around to posting pictures of our first Warmachine figure, a Khador Destroyer that we completed in late April to early May. It’s the first wargaming figure that we completed from scratch, and though we can see room for improvement, we’re quite happy overall with how the figure turned out.

For those not versed in the steps necessary to bring a typical wargaming figure to life, each miniature comes in multiple pieces which need to be glued (and sometimes pinned) together after extraneous hang-ons are removed. Gaps in the pieces are typically filled with putty, and then the figure is primed. After that, the figure is ready to be painted, and in our first attempt, we ended up doing a lot of coats since we hadn’t yet worked out the proper consistency for the paints we were using. We even messed up the first paint-job when we first attempted to use a wash to better define the figure’s shadows, resulting in us having to re-base the figure entirely.

With this figure, we attempted to duplicate a colour scheme used on German tanks in late WWII. We used P3 paints, and Yellow Ochre turned out to be a reasonable stand-in for the German dunkelgelb used on the Panzer fleet. Rather than paint on shadows and highlights (which we think gives miniatures a more cartoony look) we opted instead to use washes and drybrushing. Whether this was ultimately the better choice or not, we’re content with the results. Later on, we may attempt to add decals to the figure, but for now, we’re going to place the figure aside and work on the second warjack from the Khador Battle Box, the Juggernaut. We intend to stick with the same colour scheme, though we’ll initially base-coat the second figure with a darker under-colour, which will hopefully accentuate the yellow “final” coat. Yes, we’re still n00bs at painting miniatures.

As though to reassure ourselves one more time, we’ll say again that we’re happy with how things turned out with the Destroyer, and despite our inexperience with this sort of thing, we think the figure looks a million times better than any “pre-painted” miniature, which is relieving. We’ll talk more about Warmachine as a game, and as a backdrop, in the future. For now, feast your eyes on the gallery below.

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