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So right now I am trying to build a balanced list that involves Old Witch and Alexia-Risen. I like this theme because it involves two spellcasters who benefit from death in a way that doesn't step on each others toes.

I am kind of annoyed with this because the khador side of the two player box gives me a lot of stuff that, according to other players, doesn't make a lot of sense with pSorscha or Old Witch.

In order to run this list I need more bodies, probably twenty.

Now most people say something about a WGI deathstar. I just don't want to do this for a couple of reasons.

1: Money, its an expensive unit, and I am already worrying about putting money down on Alexia's extra risen that I found out she needed.
2: Its fairly popular and common, and I woild like something more unique.

So I saw a cheeper (moneywise) unit that looks cooler and that is the Winter Gaurd Rifle Corps. They don't have attatchements and they only seem to be good at killing infantry, but that is not some terrible in my opinion, as long as I have other good anti-heavy stuff.

So right now my question is:

are two warjacks being ran by Old Witch good anti-heavy? What about with Iron Fang Pikeman Support?

And:

How do you know you have devoted enough stuff to one problem, should you just do it by points down the middle like "I have ten points on anti infantry, and ten on anti-heavy, and 15 on other."

are you just starting warmachine? old witch is one of our more challenging warcasters to grasp. that being said she has one of the best scenario feats that khador has to offer, it basiclly halts enemy enfantry for a round and gums up other charges. her spells and abilities make her more of an anti infantry caster. some things that you can do include using murder of croes to create chokepoints, as well as using avatar of slaughter on scrapjack, have him kill a bunch of stuff then teleport him to safety through unseen path (also can be done with OW to get souls if your feeling ballsy). OW also has iron flesh, one of the best spells in the game. she can apply it to a decent tarpit or to herself.

with all this anti troop stuff built in, she needs punch added to her list to balance. she is usually hungry for focus, so running jack heavy usually is a bad idea with her. most people, including myself, run the behemoth with her, since he provides flexability. he has 2 guns, and with OW's augury ability he can ignore a bunch of stuff when shooting. he can destroy jacks in melee pretty easily as well.

looking past behemoth, its good to have at least one jack with a solid ranged weapon, a destroyer for example. some people like the kodiak, other take other things. this is really up to you. she can even benefit from a self sufficient berserker who rarely needs focus.

looking in on troops, her obvious choice is the WDIDS, but since you want to avoid that unit we can go elsewhere. the WG riflecorp are a fine choice with her, but they do not fix your problem of anti armor. you CAN however double up on troop harming AOE's with the RC. use the OW's spell called murder of crows to stop most infantry from entering an area, then use the RC's ability called suppressing fire to cordon off another area close to murder of crows, and you create roughly an 11 inch zone where most infantry do not want to be.

so lets say you take the RC, and this is a 35 point list. we have alexia as well. while the rifle corp dont have any attachments, they still need kovnik joe to really shine. assuming we are using battlebox jacks let us add the juggernaut and destroyer to the battlegroup. this gives you a ranged threat to heavy targets, and a solid melee beater jack that can do heavy damage to anything that gets too close. so far the list looks like this:

Zevanna Agha, the Old Witch of Khador
Destroyer
Juggernaut
Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (Alexia and 9 Risen Grunts)
Winter Guard Rifle Corps (Leader and 9 Grunts)
Kovnik Jozef Grigorovich

this is 28 points. which is a pretty solid chunk of our points. adding to this list i can think of a few options:

wyshnylyr the seeker: a 2 point merc caster attachment. known to most as "wishnailer" this guy was made for khador. he gives OW another free upkeep, gives her more range on her spells and more dice on her first gallows spell each turn.

gorman di wolfe: a 2 point merc that can create smoke clouds, so you have a portable way of creating smoke clouds so OW and scrappy can use prowl to gian stealth without having to caste MoC.

great bears: a 5 point khador unit that involve 3 heard hitting models that can fell a jack with relative ease. handles your anti armor issues in a 5 point package. they love ironflesh, they also like it when you gallows a target into their threat range. a solid unit.

some other choices can be made as well. overall i feel that OW has a niche selection of stuff that works very well with her. at 35 points i tend to run:

Zevanna Agha, the Old Witch of Khador
Behemoth
Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
Great Bears of Gallowswood
Greylord Ternion (Leader and 2 Grunts)
Winter Guard Infantry (Leader and 9 Grunts)
Winter Guard Infantry Officer & Standard
2 Winter Guard Infantry Rocketeers
Koldun Lord
Kovnik Jozef Grigorovich

i have a lot of bases covered. what makes the WGIDS so nice is it covers all my bases. i need a viable ranged threat? no problem, they have guns. i am dealing with stealth? these guys have sprays that ignore stealth. i need a tarpit? these guys can gain tough and get to DEF 17 with iron flesh. something heavy in range? i can combine ranged attack for a solid hit. these guys just have an answer for anything.

then the list is filled out with personal favorites. greylord ternion make hard to hit models easier to hit, plus they can make smoke clouds for OW and they have POW 12 sprays to boot. koldun lord gives focus to behemoth early game to keep him running without using up OW focus. the bears, well they are the bears. i use them as a vanguard force, atttacking anything that gets into my lines.

enjoy the old witch!

I have only played one game of warmachine with pSorscha with my roomate who got the 2 player box with me. I honestly don't like how sorscha feels in play (although I think her fluff and model are cool).

What is a good Warcaster for running the models I have? I got into Khador cause I thought "GIANT RUSSIAN STEAMPUNK ROBOTS!!!!". Then I found out they are supposed to be all about infantry.

So I have Destroyer, Juggernaught, Schocktroopers, Alexia-Risen, Widowmakers.

Why should I get the Bears over Iron Fang Pikemen?

(Not that I dislike the bears, I just don't understand what the different units do)

I am fine having an excess of models in this game because it seems like there aren't a tone of bad units, just have to pair up the right people. Unlike that other game where I have 10 hellions who can't accomplish anything (My rage over 40k and its boring gameplay is infinite).

If you want to see Jacks all over the place then pick up Karchev or pButcher they are usually the casters to go to for that. I also think that Harkevich (from wrath) may be pretty good for what you want. But don't be fooled that Khador is all about infantry they use Jacks just like everyone else.
pSorscha can do very well with the Jacks that are in the box but her pet jack is Beast 09 he cost more than either of the other 2 Jacks but, usually, he's worth it. One of the basic tactics to do with Sorscha is to run into the middle of the enemy forces and then feat. This makes most, if not all of the enemy stationary. Then move the rest of your troops into melee with them and clean their clocks.
By the way any army can be Jack focused or Infantry focused it all depends on the caster.

If you want to be really ridiculous with Alexia you can take eIrusk and the Ranking Officer Valachev.



It's an infantry spam list though, with generally like 1 jack. You have the Shocktroopers though which Epic Irusk can make a good use of.

The best part of it is that he confers Tough to the friendly faction infantry within his control which makes an awesome brick. With Valachev attached to Alexia & Risen... well... it's awesome. They have to work to kill your guys, then they have to work to kill your Tough zombies!

If you're running WGRC and Alexia/Risen with Old Witch, then you definitely need a big heavy-killer.

Behemoth. Just do it. Seriously. Behemoth and Old Witch are SCAAAAARY. With Gallows and an arc node she can circumvent a lot of Behemoth's slow speed and low threat.

I would carefully reconsider the WGI Deathstar, however. They cover so many bases for Old Witch; anti-infantry, anti-heavy, tarpit, anti-stealth. It's shocking how well they do with the IF casters.

And that's the second reason. If money is a concern for you, you'll find WGRC to be a marginal unit and you will have to buy a greater array of other units to create well rounded lists. WGI Deathstar+ Joe + Behemoth is a module that works well with all of the IF casters and some others besides.

If you really want to run something beyond the norm, take a look at either Vlad. pVlad has a great offensive with S&P on already-good Khadoran infantry. eVlad has amazing alpha strike and assassination potential with his feat, buff spells, and Uhlans/Manhunters/Drakhun/Doom Reavers.