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Having now settled into playing Cygnar, I have been mulling over the leaked Mk3 cards, no smartphone to use war room . I want to play a shooty warjack army with supporting jacks and infantry to fight in melee. The following discussion is with a 75 point "standard" army in mind.

I think I am going to buy Artificar General Nemo and his apprentice FInch for my warcaster. I really like the amount of d3 lightning strikes he can toss out, as well as Finches' ability to add an extra focus to the warjacks in his command range when Nemo spends one. Also when FInch upkeeps magnetic field for free, YAY. The only thing is eye of the storm does not seem particularly useful, without the accompanying lightning dealing models.

Still the extra FInch focus points makes me think I'll be able to only spend a few actual points (on top of the 1 free focus for warjacks) on warjacks to run/power strike, etc. . . leaving Nemo free to use his Chain Lightning and Lightning Strike range attack every turn. (I can magic and shoot in the same turn right?!?!)

The shooty battlegroup jacks I think will work well are Cyclone, Thunderhead, and 2 Firefly's: for 3+ lightning attacks (2 arcing, one sustained), 2 x d3 cyclone attacks or 2x walls of covering fire for defense. I am pretty sure that jacks don't need focus to basic shoot, so aside from running into position these guys wont soak up too much focus in their primary role. The Firefly's are not horrible in melee when that happens too. Thunderhead also plays double duty with its two lightning attacking melee attacks with sustained attack bonus. This uses all 25 warjack points and 24 more points.


This leaves 51 points to spend on melee focused jacks and infantry. I think the Sword Knights look good as a melee support to the warjacks in general. The Lancer looks like a good melee deterrent to enemy jacks with its shock shield, and it comes in the battle box . The Hammersmith catches my eye, the chance to push an enemy away so I can shoot it later, maybe with a couple Arcane Tempest Rifleman.

I am also into the synergy of 2 Grenadiers with a Journeyman Warcaster, and a sooped up unit of trenchers. Running around lobbing 6 template attacks as well as the trencher shooting.


In reality though I cam not quite sure what else to spend points on. First because I don't think I have seen all the cards for Cygnar yet. And second because I have never actually played a game yet!




My question after all that is this. Is the Artificar Nemo a good shooty warcaster, with the idea of spending focus on the melee warjacks more than the shooty ones. To that end, do shooting warjacks need a lot of focus points?

You need something to crack armour, which you don't seem to have (although the Hammersmith will help).

Storm Knights may also be valuable over Sword Knights, since you want to run Nemo3.

The cool part of Nemo3 now is that Finch is a part of his unit, now a character attachment so you can take a squire as well.

A couple of things to think about

Rather than the Cyclone look at Dynamo. Dynamo on Nemos feat turn can shoot a heavy off the table fairly easily.

Stormtowers are fun, and they're fairly cheap.

If you want a melee jack look towards the Centurion. Polarity field, magnetic field, and Electrify gives you an ARM 23 heavy that can't be charged, pushed, placed, knocked down, moved by a slam, and anyone who actually does hit him gets pushed 1" directly away from the Centurion.

Jeratoll, does it seem excessive to have the Dynamo and Thunderhead in the same army. That is a lot of lighting coming out of them. Do warmachine lists get too cheesy like in 40k?


Centurion does look good. Paired with the lancer I think it makes for a unmoving wall who can directly hit cortex damage squares.

Somewhat, but not to the same extent. In most(90-95% of all) tournaments/events you bring two different lists and choose which one you drop after looking at your opponents two lists. So you can spam something in one list, your second list has to make up for its weaknesses. The reason you're bringing lightning jacks with Nemo3 is that he is a jack caster and brings lots of warjacks, and his feat gives an additional dice to lightning damage rolls. Dynamo and Thunderhead also have very different rolls on the field. Dynamo is for cracking armor and killing other warjacks/warbeasts, maybe even their caster if you get lucky. Whilst the Thunderhead is for clearing out infantry and is really good at doing it. It's a good list, and a good combination. So you've got a good balanced all round list that can clear infantry, crack armor, hold zones, and on feat turn just wreck pretty much anything you hit. That said can never play this list against another Cygnar player or a Circle Orborus player because they'll bring a lot of lightning immune models. Circle Orborus is particularly nasty since Krueger2(one of Circles strongest, if not their strongest warlock) makes his entire army immune to lightning damage.

As long as your second list has little to no lightning damage in it, you should be perfectly fine.

Edit: Also reading over your original post you can use magic and shoot on the same turn. Though you'll want to keep a couple of focus on your caster to help mitigate damage.

Pancake5765 wrote:
Jeratoll, does it seem excessive to have the Dynamo and Thunderhead in the same army. That is a lot of lighting coming out of them. Do warmachine lists get too cheesy like in 40k?


Centurion does look good. Paired with the lancer I think it makes for a unmoving wall who can directly hit cortex damage squares.

The game is built around using as much synergy as you can. If you want lightning buffs then get plenty of things that will benefit from it. Think of list building more along the lines of Magic than Warhammer. You want things to all play together nicely while also minimizing your weaknesses.

Ok, so I like the MTG analogy. 40k does not have the same level of interconnected unit synergies from that point of view. But those warjacks really do compliment their castor I think I have a solid concept for this list, so here it goes. 75pts with Nemo3 (25 warjack pts)

Nemo and FInch

Firefly 8
Lancer 10
Stormclad 18
Dynamo 18
Thunderhead 20

Battlegroup total: 74 - 25 = 49 points


Stormguard Infantry
Leader & 9 grunts 15
Stormsmith Storm Tower 4
Captain Arlan Strangewaves 4
Field Mechanic Unit
Crew Cheif & 3 grunts 3

Infantry total: 26


The general plan is to move and shoot bouncing lightning damage for as long as possible, scenario willing. Stormsmith Storm Tower can sit a bit back with range 14", the pow 14 blast is not too shabby with a boost too. The lancer stays out front, deterring melee with its cortex damaging weapons AND arc-noding Nemo's lightning strike spell. The other jacks are all happy to shoot away, until they hit melee. Stormguards of course near their buddy Stormclad. Capt Arlan Strangewaves and the Mechanicks hang behind the jacks, adding DEF and repairing what they can.

Melee, being Warmachine, should be an insane bloodbath! Stormclad and the Stormguard can make a couple big damage attacks, or a lot of electro leaping smaller hits. The other jacks seem less specifically paired with anything in melee. Dynamo hunting big things. Firefly and Lancer can be more of a time/unit waster for the enemy to deal with while my big Jacks TCB. Thunderhead will be used more solo as an infantry hunter and zone clearer, using his energy pulse ability and thrusting him into more suicidal roles as the game turns progress.


All of the shooting with this list is Lightning damage. Like it was mentioned before, a lightning resistant enemy will not feel a single shot. HOWEVER most of the melee damage is generic, the Thunderhead magical! So even against a lightning impervious enemy, I can rush into melee and get around their advantage. Not the most ideal situation of course, but not impossible either.

Having never actually played before, I am trying out the Mechaniks and Strangewave for their repair ability mainly. I want my jacks to last the whole game, and am willing to pay 8 points to ensure it!


Thinking on my 2nd list, which I need to play in tourneys apparently Magelock weapons and quake effects (ranged and melee) look like a fun list theme. Hmmmmmmm

One combo that I love with Nemo 3 is a Hunter with Lightning Shroud upkept, with Reinholdt attached to Nemo.
The Hunter has extended control range, is going to be in range of the caster ~28" most of the time. The idea is that you can use the Hunter as a lightning rod for the Lightning Strike. Run it close to an enemy unit\model, hopefully roll at least a 6 (backstrike your hunter) and fry the enemy with its electro leaps. Reinholdt and Eye of the Storm can make that ozone-y goodness more fun.

So you mean hit my own model to trigger an electro leap? I like the idea, but I'm not sure I get it.


EDIT nevermind, I reread the rules. Cool

also, for sheer utility, a full unit of Tempest Blazers is always useful. Just 2 of its runeshots would be used 99% of the time - Brutal Damage shots (not Critical Brutal like the ATGM) and the electro leap shots. The fact that they have gunfighter means that they are still at full efffectiveness in Melee as well.

Lastly, I was going to suggest a unit of Forgeguard with Murdoch. A bunch of tough as nails guys with high elite MAT with weaponmaster reach weapons make for a terrific roadblock. The unit brings the melee ability that is rarely seen in Cygnaran infantry, and Murdoch unlocks all the faction specific buffs as well (not so useful with nemo3, but definitely usable with other warcasters).