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just want to see what people think....

Well I played an all infantry army last night at a LGS and the player I faced (a good friend) went on about how he thought a jack list was no match for an all infantry list because of the points tied up in jacks vs. infantry. What are some of your observations and/ or conclusions?

Quick Reply: No.

Long Reply: There are a few core abilities which are found on the "good" infantry - (In order of importance!)

1. ARM 16+, (as this alows the models to largely ignore taking damage from blasts) - multiple boxes are usually found on slow models, and as such, clashes with point 2...
2. Superior mobility, having either, SPD of 6+, Terrain Ignoring Abilities or Advance Deploy (or any combination of)
3. Reach - For larger area of engagement
4. Weaponmaster - For hitting harder

Example: The much reviled Bane Knights combine all the above abilities, have a high field alowance, shadow-shift+ignore free-strikes with their additional special rule and are reasonably points cheap, considering their abilities. So, taking the Bane Knight horde in a vaccuum, one might conclude that infantry armies are overpowered...

However...

One might also note, that few other models can claim this skillset... Usually the boys with ARM16+ are elite and limited by FA, or are slow... Weaponmasters are usually limited by FA. Models with reach typically have mediocre DEF and ARM and anybody with <=ARM14 can be easily slaughtered by blasts... so YMMV!!!

Example: Doom Reavers: FA:1, reach, weaponmaster, AD, high SPD, medium DEF and medium ARM.

So... infantry armies, are, on the whole, not "overpowered" per say, but some variants are "very competitive"... (The Bane Knight army probably does not have any right being quite so effective in particular).

Posted By orks gone wild on 05/11/2007 9:11 AM
Well I played an all infantry army last night at a LGS and the player I faced (a good friend) went on about how he thought a jack list was no match for an all infantry list because of the points tied up in jacks vs. infantry. What are some of your observations and/ or conclusions?

YMMV.  I hope your friend knows how the Trample power attack works.  While not the be-all and end all, it is a useful trick.  The following warjacks are fairly capable against infantry:

Protectorate (with obligatory infuse)
Vanquisher - AOE4 for shooting, circular strike for melee
Redeemer - POW8 blasts
Repenter - RAT7 shots with POW12 auto-fire
Castigator - Autohitting combust

Khador
Devestator - Autohitting ROD at POW9
Kodiak - Autohitting vent-steam at POW10
Berserker - Explosivo!

Cygnar
Thunderhead - Front-Arc Frying
Sentinel - Revised Strafe

Cryx
Any Bone Jack + Deneghra
Harrower - Thresh + Reach
Deathjack - Necrovent

Mercenaries
Renegade - One Shot Wonder - POW8 Blast knockdown
Mangler - Circular Strike + Reach
Mule - POW8 Blast

No.

Two major counters to them - Alexia and Croe's Cutthroats.

Well, that's my Merc way of dealing with them. There is also the aformentioned Mangler (with Frenzy) and the Renegades magic nukes to contend with.

orks you should explain your particiular build and how it works because it can be quite abusive after I thought about it. Zealots, Exemplars, Daughters, and the Reclaimer are the core just to give others a idea of what your running.

I got into the game because I love warjacks.  As such I have a strict 'no units' policy that I gave myself, and I stick to it.  Problem is I get creamed by all-infantry lists.  I think jack-lovers are just jealous that they can't beat infantry lists.  I blame it all on number of attacks.  Jacks get two attacks, and then have to spend focus to get another.  My all-jack 500 point army can get a maximum of 9 melee attacks per turn, with another possible 6 if my caster allocates the focus specifically for making additional attacks.  Combine that with the fact that most jacks have to boost to hit infantry, and you just can't kill infantry fast enough with jacks.  I thought the command check rules would help this, but I have yet to see a unit ever flee in 10+ situations.  Trample was also supposed to help this, but since you have to declare a trample in a straight line, it is extremely easy for an intelligent opponent to position his infantry in staggered formation so they don't all get hit.

To answer your question, I personally do not like to play against lots of infantry, but that's the game.  If Privateer Press added a rule where every warcaster HAD to take one warjack I'd be a happy camper, because a warcaster and 40 models is too close to Games Workshop for me, and I'm looking for something different.

- Oaka

Bile thralls melt infantry for the amazing cost of 6 pts / model.  Tell me what you think a stealthed squad of Bile Thralls is going to do to your infantry heavy army as it gets within range...

All of my lists consist of 2 - 5 warjacks, 1 - 4 solos, and 1 - 4 units of infantry.  Sure, some infnatry is great, but you almost always need jacks to counter other jacks.

Give the high reclamer a ton of focus and an excuse to use his feat...LOL

This is why I like the Hordes rules system more than the Warmachine one. In Warmachine some casters are almost rewarded for not taking jacks (they are more efficient with their own focus than if it were spent on jacks). But in Hordes you have to take beasts for the simple fact that if you don't, you won't have any fury, and nowhere to sink any damage you might take. If Warmachine adopted something similar in terms of warjacks/focus I think you'd see a lot more jacks on the table. Ah well.

Years ago, when Warmachine first came out, I really liked the idea of big stompy steambots tearing across the field, but as more and more armies went infantry heavy, I lost interest in the game. Luckily the Trolls came along and fixed me of that problem. Big stompy trolls > steambots.

Heavy Warjack armies still scare me. Particularly those
evil Khador ones....

I had only one warjack in my ekreoss list this weekend, but then again it was
the Avatar and my leader was eKreoss, so that's pretty understandable.

Also, watch out for medium bases. They very easily become slambait or throw bait. I played against trolls the other day, with a horde of infantry against my 3 Jack Khador force led by sorshca. Here were the lists...

Sorscha
Destroyer
Juggernaught
Man'O'War Kovnik
Marauder
Sniper dudes (I forget their names)

Grissel
Dire Troll Blitzer
Troll Impaler
Troll Axer
Fell Caller
Kriel Warriors x6
Blunderbuss dudes x6

Aside from me forgetting to pop sorscha's feat after I had knocked down both Grissel and the Blitzer and had taken them both down to two life boxes left....

The poor troll infantry suffered horrendously against my AOE Bombard targetting whatever my Marauder had just slammed. Combo slam a kriel warrior in such a way as to place him closer to the rest of his unit, so I could target him or whatever he hit with the Bombard. (Making tough rolls was actually a disadvantage in that case for the troll player!)

When my marauder did get engaged with a horde of kriel warriors, the Kovnik was able to Drive him to slam a bunch out of the way and then make an extra attack against another! Needless to say, in that case, I didn't have any trouble taking out his infantry. My Jug was about to get some throwin' action in, but the game then ended after sorscha bit it, and the regenerating dire troll ate the poor Kovnik!

Now, it would have been different if they were all small base infantry....

This topic seems to come up periodically on the PP forums.

Infantry, point for point, will get more attacks than a jack. They're also, generally, much more fragile and can't boost to hit or damage.

Balanced armies will generally fair better than armies that are all infantry or all jack. Just as a balanced ranged/melee/magic attack army will generally fair better than an army based on one of those points. The Haley turtle comes to mind - great ranged ability, but based on fragile longgunners. And, if it comes up against something like Siege's Illumination or an enemy smoke wall, will fall on its face.

If you're running an all jack army with any but Darius or Karchev, that's probably the source of your trouble. High FOC casters (Haley, eHaley, Severius, Coven, etc.) can potentially run an all jack army, but they will do better with some infantry thrown in the list. Ad Raza could run an all-jack list, but the PoM infantry is so cheap, and solos so good, he does better with a number of jacks and a few units and solos.

A well played Darius list can be all-jack and do fine. What are you playing?

Well Orks has really posted my beef ... thanks to me being a whiney and poor sport duing a game this sat. (my fault entirely ... and not an attitude I am proud of in retorspect).

He has 40 some protectorate infantry including 2 units of grenadiers, the monolith bearer, daughters of the flame, 20 some knights this and knights that, the flametrhower guys, The high reclaimer, and several solo types.

He puts 90% of them in a wall in front of his caster and sheilds them with the reclaimers ashes cloud effect spell. If I can see anything its a unit of grenadiers just hoping I kill the monolith bearer so they can run and throw their grenades.

My list: Haley, Ironclad, Journeyman Warcaster, Centurion,Lancer, trenchers +lt and sniper.

I don't want to invest hundreds of extra bucks having every unit in the cygnar army, so the only other models I have are Mccain, Eryis, a Sentinal, a 2nd Ironclad, and a Charger.

So far in our games I have managed to kill the daughters and one unit of grenadiers. (which of course The reclaimer was more than happy to bring back with his feat). Orks is a great guy and very friendly player and moved the reclaimer into charge range of a the lancer once, however even had the lancers attacks been succesful it really would have only been a win because of his good sportsmanship. with the amount of troops I have to kill he could leave the reclaimer safely behind his ranks of shield wall knights and I would never ever get line of sight on him.

So, Since I am determined not to be a pissy little skunk the next time we match up here are the challenges that the all infantry list poses:

1: Ashes block line of sight to his entire army: Can't shoot them because they can't be seen, and my army has no AOE weapons to use even if we could get a line of sight on the eges of his ashes screen.

2: Ashes block line of sight, therfore they prevent chargeing which by default prevents trampling. In order to engage the hidden troops my jacks have to be within 4-6" of his front line in order to make any attacks against his knights etc that are blocking the way to the warcaster.

3: Even when all three of my jacks engage units the other 9 units sweep around them. Also, with 40+ models they are more than willing to sacrifice a member of the sqaud to move away and attack my warcaster, or disengage to throw grenades of Jack doom. Even focused up (no spells, no temp barrier, My jacks are only looking at an average # of kills to be 6 or 7 kills since they either need to bost attacks to hit defenses of 12 -14 or spend extra attacks compensating for unboosted misses.

Also since 90% of the enemy is not visible beforehand the turn I kill the 6-7 models every one of my jacks is in the face of the 32-33 angry menothites, their caster is right their to bring dead models or units back and since Haley is behind my jacks they ignore my jacks and go for her (espescially if I have killed the monolith bearer and the grenadiers are running and throwing grenades after being brought back by the feat within his control area.


4: This doesnt even consider any of the other special rules that each menoth unit has ... the rest of the unit getting better armor as I kill them, them being untargetable by attacks becasue of songs of one sort or another, the reclaimer and the solo caster with him both getting focus for models that die in their control radius(which is where almost all of the models are).

So, if anyone is still reading this, I am not complaining about these abilites, etc. (actually have traded for a menoth army so I'm sure I will appreiacte them just as much when this leage is over with) I just don't have any kind of tactic for dealing with them and it has caused me a great deal of frustration.

So if anyone has suggestions on how to deal with such a monster all infantry Menoth army please feel free to suggest away

Back on topic to Orks gone wild post : The other all infantry army that did severe damage to all I have seen go against it :

Cryx, coven as their caster, stealthing bile thralls, large unit of bane knights, gorman, and another solo, 4 arc node ripper type Jacks. This one has the same problems for a jack heavy list as the menoths above. Stealthed units that can't be targeted, and as you kill them they get better and get free chances to kill you(bane knights). This one combines you cant touch this with extreme speed, espescially in the league games where there is always soem hindering terrain, usually around objectives.

It is my general belief that infanty + special abilites do not have equtable points cost. Thus an all infantry army with units that add up to 20, 50, and 80 points on average, plus 1-4 solos all of which almost always have 1-5 special rules adds up to a foce that a regular mixed or jack heavy list has very few means to deal with.

Anyway, enough of my ranting: Orks gone Wild you are a great sportsman and I really am sorry I had such a pathetic attitude during our games this week. You are a great American!

Everyone else: I appreciate the feedback you have given regarding the post topic and I look forward to any other suggestions opinions you guys have. Dakka is a wonderful place to get useful and specific input from great players.

Meph

Alexia and Risen might be the way to go to stem some of that tide. I know
I can't stand to see her on the table when I'm running infantry heavy.

How to get around the ash clouds:

Jr. Warcaster casts Arcane Shield on your Ironclad. Ironclad runs INTO the
ash cloud, but tries to avoid engaging any models. Lancer follows, and Haley
casts two chain lightning spells at the ironclad. I believe it's a simultaneous
effect, so casting it once will drop about 3 zealots on the first cast, maybe
2 more on the second cast (you get a backstrike bonus to hit your ironclad
too!)

Remember if you pop the monolith bearer, they are no longer fearless! Try
to get the priest first, though. Without the monolith bearer or the priest,
Zealots are command 4 or something like that. Running and fire-bombing?
They have to pass that CMD check first!

If the Monolith bearer makes his tough roll, shoot him again with Chain
Lightning. You're almost guaranteed to hit, and then chain lightning finishes
off more enemy models around him.

Chain lightning works on the Knights in the same way.

Meph:  I think you just need to sit back and think about it a little.  Silent Bob (The High Reclaimer) is arguably the weakest of all the Protectorate casters.  I also run the human-horde and here are its weaknesses:

1.  Silent Bob is slow.  He's got base SPD5.  This is his biggest weakness!

1a.  Burning Ash has range 8.  That means that all his boys are bunched up like crazy if he wants to protect them.  If Bob's rolling smoke that means that his army is stuck advancing instead of running.

1b.  If you kill half his army and he's out of position, other than crazy ash-spam or crazy overcharge, he's wasting all that soul-powered focus!  This is doubly true if he didn't bring a Revenger.  (I usually don't because the Revenger = 6-10 more bodies for the soul-furnace.

2.  Silent Bob has FOC5 and two offensive spells.  One of which costs "5" due to his inability to hit anything with FOC5 and one of which costs "3" due to his inability to hit anything.  Ashes to Ashes is great if you cast it on one of your own boys, but it will probably kill whoever you shoot at... so usually it'll be a 5 FOC cast.  On top of that, if he didn't bring a Revenger (which from what I gather, he's got the same opinion as me...) then he's got to be right in your face to be able to sling any spells...

3.  His base DEF and ARM are balls.  DEF14 is on the low end of the scale for warcasters.  Other warcasters and utility solos will easily hit him.  An Ogryn Bokur with client bonus will eat him for breakfast if he isn't overcharged...

4.  He can't give orders!  Without Vilmon or a Seneschal nearby, leaderless units can't charge or run!  This is HUGE!  (That's why I always have Vilmon or a Senny in the back to rally broken units, and give orders to leaderless units!)

Getting back on track - here's a few things in Cygnar that will hose the Silent Bob army.  Starting with the ones you already have:

1.  Haley's Temporal Barrier.

2.  Stryker (Did you leave him off your list by mistake?) - Earthquake works wonders on guys that are clustered up.  Running a flank Lancer (or two) will give you that LOS.

3.  Caine's feat hoses infantry.  Nuff said.  The key here is not trying to max out his kill zone.  Just get as many as you can without endangering your man.

4.  Thunderhead.  His super discharge move smites everyone within range in his front arc.  This will easily make many-many fried menites.  Especially if he's hiding behind smoke.

5.  GMCA - Leader killer.  'Nuff said.

6.  Grenadier Warjack pumps out AOE3s with 2 free focus-less reloads from Trenchers.

I assume you're putting all three jacks on Haley (if you're putting any of the 3 on the Journeyman, that's a mistake - he should only have a ranged jack like the Hunter or Sentinel or Grenadier). I also think 2 melee heavies on Haley is at least one too many. You could drop both and do fine, but the Centurion is so nice, it's hard not to include it. The High Reclaimer's moving smoke wall can give a tough game.

I would add a Gun Mage Captain Adept (GMCA) to your army. one of the best solos in the game.

I would consider replacing Haley with Siege. Siege has a spell, Illumination, that lets friendly models ignore cloud effects within 3 inches. Replace the Ironclad with a unit, longgunners and stormguard would both probably work well.

Consider getting a unit of Storm Lances. Cavalry dramatically changes the game. 

Haley gets more effect from her Feat by having lots of infantry. 

If you want to run a jack heavy force, pick up Darius. Here's a pretty solid 500pt list: Darius, Reinholt, Ironclad, Centurion, Lancer, Gun Mage Captain Adept, and 7 Swordknights. It's fairly limited at ranged combat, but the army can work well without it. Throw a Fortified Centurion into his ranks, and it will mess him up. He'll stall to deal with it, and even if he destroys it, Darius's Feat will bring it back. Trample with both heavies, and they can easily take out a dozen bunched up models.

I'm also not sure what point size you're playing, your force (Haley, IC, Cent, Lancer, JWC, Trenchers + UA) comes in over 500 pts.  Cygnar does much better at 750pts.  Because all of Cygnar's units are, generally expensive, the extra 250 pts helps even things out.  You're still outnumbered, but being outnumbered 4 to 3 is better than 3 to 2. 

Thanks for the feedback guys! I was considering a GMCA and a stormclad(for critical chain lightings to help with my kill count each round), but I will have to look into a Thunderhead. I also thought about stormguard (to work with the Stormclad) or Sword knights (two attacks and some special formation rules to get in there and put up a fight with all those infantry).

I will consider Darius and Seige. At least buying a caster wont be $50 bucks a pop and could alter my force mechanics enough to give me a shot. I also thought about Gorman, and Reinholdt to help beef my caster.

My list should be 500 I will check to see if a previous alteration put me a little over.

You guys have given some good advice and several points for me to consider. I really appreciate your specific and quick responses!

A word of warning.  Trample does not work well against an opponent who understands how it works. 

Against jack heavy lists, with Silent Bob, I usually don't bother dropping smoke at all.  Warjacks can't kill my infantry on a charge fast enough, and if I space out correctly, heavy jacks can not trample my formation because I can deny a destination point for the trample - since in order to trample, there must be sufficient space at the end of the movement for the base...  So what usually happens is that I eat a charge, and then I countercharge, or firebomb the offending unit into oblivion.

Also, watch out for Vilmon.  He eats jacks for breakfast and is DEF16 vs spells once he's in melee (unless your spellcaster joins him in melee... which is usually a bad idea).  Vilmon vs. a rusted jack = instant death.

Thanks for the complements Mephistols... I took Silent Bob for one reason once you get over being scared of my list it will be very difficult for me to win against you; like keezus said he is the weakest of the Protectorate casters. Its like taking guard with doctrines....."I wanted a challenge" I dropped Warmachine because of a lack of challenge and am now just getting back into it and figured it would be hard to win with this list.... I was mistaken. Lol anyway we will play Thursday.... Right?

Beating the HR infantry spam with Cygnar is easy. Haley + Thead pretty much means you win. In fact, I'd say Cygnar probably has the easiest day with this army.

keezus's analysis is spot on. More than any other Menoth caster the High Reclaimer is a one trick pony.

Deitrich has good insight as well.

@orks: Hell yeah! I picked up a few new figs too! Just what I didn't want to do, but now that I have them I'm sure I'll have some new favorites. Plus it will break the temp. Barrier monotony.

I picked up some sword knights(for two attacks good armor and Warjack support since I will always be warjack heavy cuz thats what I like)

GMCA and Gorman so I can have some solo action that is a change from Eiryss.

Brisbane for all his goodness including Illumination (thanks Deitrich!)

And a ThunderHead ( ahh how could I have lived without this Jack? MMM lightning goodness).

I think these give me the abiltiy to switch my mechanics around enough that win or lose I will put in a competitive effort.

Of course most of it can't be used in the prime only tournement this weekend, but hey, I think you will have to do some altering too(daughters monolith bearer, some of the solos, etc) so if you want me to bring any of the prime figs you traded me just let me know.

Thanks again everyone for your input! Silent Bob prepare to meet your doom!!! Well, ok I probably wont get the right approach on my first try while I'm testing out the new guys but at least be ready to watch some of your troops go down! NYAR!

Meph

Stormguard don't get any benefit from the Stormclad; only Stormblades do.

Trample generally only works if:
1) the unit you trample can't really hurt the jack (things like longgunners, zealots, etc.).
2) the jack has a boost. eStryker's Positive Charge, Haley's Temporal Barrier, or Darius' Full Throttle.

I find Swordknights to be great. If you run them with Darius, his half-jacks do count as warjacks and give them the Flank bonus.

Thanks again deitrich. I meant stormblads ... so many cygnar things have similar names I get the ones I don't have confused easily.

I agree with trample ... trampling knights that I can barly hit and that can hit back hard is not quite a sure thing. I will keep trample in mind though, just not the mainstay of my tactica.

I am going to try running the sword Knights with Haley, to make uber use of her temp barrier reducing opponents defense and feat popping them to 3 attacks each. This should let me take down even those pesky knights that get tougher as each one dies. I am still running 3 jacks so they can get in the think of it and use their flank attacks with the centurion and Thunderhead.

I also checked my original list, 499 points. So unless someones point cost has been errattad I was right on.

Posted By Mephistoles on 05/13/2007 10:19 PM


So if anyone has suggestions on how to deal with such a monster all infantry Menoth army please feel free to suggest away

Remember that Eyriss can still Phantom Seeker Bolt Unit leaders through the High Reclaimers smoke.  And Grim Angus will be able to do the same.

Also Boomhowler and Co are quite good at getting rid of infantry.  Boomhowler does a fellcall, unit fails command check, turns round, drop a couple of stink bombs, and wipe them out.

So, ideally, cap the leader with Eyriss, mash them with Boomhowler and Co, the let Alexia bring them back on your side...

When models are hit by trample, even when they don't die they don't get to use their
freestrikes.

Posted By Mephistoles on 05/15/2007 9:41 AM

I am going to try running the sword Knights with Haley, to make uber use of her temp barrier reducing opponents defense and feat popping them to 3 attacks each.

Use that bard guy with them. 3 attacks each, and with Haley , 4 attacks each.

 

But anyway, I love playing against all infantry armies with my Darius list. It has 2 heavy warjacks and one light , and then 2 solo's and a min unit of trenchers. Darius obliterates infantry armies , with those mines and the meltdown spells on your own halfjacks.  Pow 14 aoe 4 attacks with blast damage of 14 , no infantry can withstand that.
For every list , there is one to counter it, and thats what I like about Warmachine/Hordes.

I would also think Caine would have some potential against this army. With all of those infantry packed so tight, you could advance him into the smoke effects. Even with the -2RAT for being inside the clouds, Caine is still RAT6 against mostly DEF12 infantry. Then use Flash to get Caine back behind your army.

Still, the ultimate clearer of large volumes of tightly packed infantry is the Thunderhead (especially when backed up by the -3DEF from Temporal Barrier).