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As the title would suggest, I'm interested in joining into warmachine currently. I enjoy pirates (love those jacks looks), Cygnars range, and many of both factions casters. Though here is the problem, I also enjoy Cryx's glass fist approach (enjoy it but not well suited from a personnel playstyle). So I am at a loss, I play Tau, guard, and Thousand Sons currently.

I lack any melee heavy armies but while lacking a warmachine rule book to explain what has a chance of killing what, from the lowly long gunners and trenchers to the minuteman and the cankerworm. (I have studied a bit of battlecollege but most is alien to me)

So here I stand, I know Cygnar specializes with range and can still tote itself about in melee, Cryx are a glass cannon in most respects, and Telion.... I have no idea about but I do understand their rather weak in tournament play so advice is appreciated.

Cryx also tie in my love of zombies and some ranged so now I am definetly at a loss.

 BunkerBob wrote:
As the title would suggest, I'm interested in joining into warmachine currently. I enjoy pirates (love those jacks looks), Cygnars range, and many of both factions casters. Though here is the problem, I also enjoy Cryx's glass fist approach (enjoy it but not well suited from a personnel playstyle). So I am at a loss, I play Tau, guard, and Thousand Sons currently.

I lack any melee heavy armies but while lacking a warmachine rule book to explain what has a chance of killing what, from the lowly long gunners and trenchers to the minuteman and the cankerworm. (I have studied a bit of battlecollege but most is alien to me)

So here I stand, I know Cygnar specializes with range and can still tote itself about in melee, Cryx are a glass cannon in most respects, and Telion.... I have no idea about but I do understand their rather weak in tournament play so advice is appreciated.

Cryx also tie in my love of zombies and some ranged so now I am definetly at a loss.

Talion Charter means you're limiting yourself to three specific warlocks: Shae, Fiona, Bart.

Shae has a nice infantry game that involves bumrushing somebody on his feat turn.

Fiona...not sure how she plays.

Bart likes shooty 'jacks. Sometimes.

However, Talion Charter is a subset of mercenaries.

I'd say, if you like mercenaries, then Talion charter might be a good starting point.

However, if you only like the pirates, then maybe play cygnar as they're more likely to get expanded.

Cryx can also be good with the Talion Charter. You just can't using any of the 'casters in Cygnar or Cryx.

Talion is also a bit of a house of cards. It heavily relies on order of activation and key solos. As solos get removed, they become less effective, and you can shoot yourself in the foot by not placing correctly.

Example: Lord Rockbottom can give the Sea Dog Crew the rule Tough (Feel No Pain in Warmachine). He can only move four inches, and the unit has to be in his command range. If they moved up too far with their higher movement, then Rockbottom might not be able to get close enough to give them Tough. Then, it's a sad day for the Sea Dogs.

Cryx are definitley NOT glass cannons. Cryx specializes is debuff's / friendly buff's to enhance their ability to fight on their terms. Their jacks have high defense, fast / mobile, and lots of interesting rules which make them deadily. Their casters are highly survivable, many with incredible defensive abilities to fight on their terms.

Cygnar is not just about shooting. They can really mix it up when they want to. They have one of the fastests / largest threat ranges in Epic Strykers Rollign thunder feat turn assassination run which can kill any caster / lock in the game. Cygnar also has lots of melee attacks that generate lightning attacks which are just bonus / gravy. They can be very very durable in the jack front, but lack and medium based infantry.

Talion / pirates is the most restrictive army out of the 3 you mentioned. They need synergy to be effective. They may not look awesome, but when you combine gang attacks with volume of models you can bog and opponent down easily.

If you play Tau / Thousand son's and prefer to shoot instead of fight, you might want to go check out Retribution. They are truly Glass cannons. With lots of interesting ignore line of sight abilities, lots of assassination and movement tricks, and some of the most competitive lists in the game, they are excellent, but you really need to know your own army in and out to be successful.

njpc wrote:
Cryx are definitley NOT glass cannons. Cryx specializes is debuff's / friendly buff's to enhance their ability to fight on their terms. Their jacks have high defense, fast / mobile, and lots of interesting rules which make them deadily. Their casters are highly survivable, many with incredible defensive abilities to fight on their terms.

Cygnar is not just about shooting. They can really mix it up when they want to. They have one of the fastests / largest threat ranges in Epic Strykers Rollign thunder feat turn assassination run which can kill any caster / lock in the game. Cygnar also has lots of melee attacks that generate lightning attacks which are just bonus / gravy. They can be very very durable in the jack front, but lack and medium based infantry.

Talion / pirates is the most restrictive army out of the 3 you mentioned. They need synergy to be effective. They may not look awesome, but when you combine gang attacks with volume of models you can bog and opponent down easily.

If you play Tau / Thousand son's and prefer to shoot instead of fight, you might want to go check out Retribution. They are truly Glass cannons. With lots of interesting ignore line of sight abilities, lots of assassination and movement tricks, and some of the most competitive lists in the game, they are excellent, but you really need to know your own army in and out to be successful.

Wow, you think Ret are bigger glass cannons than Cryx!? While yes, you can mix it up with most of the factions I think I would disagree for the most part. Could just be my experience playing my cryx vs ret, but I would say my ret friends tend to tougher lists and mine are definately glass cannons. Though I could see your point if you see alot of Terminus lists.

Though I do agree. If you like playing Tau then Ret is a great choice. Cryx probably play more like a Dark Eldar wych army Thoguh they are different games so comparisons aren't perfect..

I do think Ret are bigger glass cannons then Cryx, reasons are based stricly off mid to high level competitive play.

Cryx:
At the med to high level, most cryx players bring a 1st or 2nd list that is made up of a majority of units with the tough ability IE bane thralls with UA, Terminus making everything tough, tough trolls. Usually the "other list" involves a straight up Bane / tough army. This negates their major weakness IE low army. Combine that with the debuffs / buffs they have access to, your army is very very resilient regardless of caster. The identical same list can be used to attrition, assassinate, or play of objectives. Add in their Battle Engine OR Colosall.. and things well get silly. The list i've learned to shutter at the Terminus, full units of banes + UA, full units of Mech Thralls, stitch thrall, whatever jack could fit doesn't matter, Tartar, Slaughter born, whatever you want to use a few points for solo's on. Its fantastic. It takes minimal effort to play. It doesn't need range... however its arm is the suck. So if you gets something with take down into the Banes their game stops there. Its the only time I was happy to have my Durgen blast army.. and took out all the infantry in 1 turn on my feat turn.

Ret:
Overall the army is low to medium armor at best. Most things that are Ret, when hit die a horrible death. They do not have infantry that can stand toe-toe with most armies, and they are not designed to do that. They are fast, mid to high defense with great abilities. Dawn Sentinals unfortunately have great abilities... but are easy to kill. I have never seen anyone in competitive play struggle against a Sentinal Army even when played by top tier players. Most of their competitive tricks are 1 tricks... Mage spam, ignore LOS spam, lots of shots. Ossyran is a interesting caster who all of a sudden changes the playing field. But for the most part have you every struggled to actually destroy a Ret Jack ? Likely not. Their defense is not that high, their arm tends to hover around 18-19 tops. Ret is all about the battle plan, and fighting on your terms. Cryx doesn't need to do that. Ironically they lack what they really really need... medium based, multi wound infantry.

I love both armies. Ironically I currently play neither. I think they are both great for fun, competitive play, and their model ranges are different. I played Ret competitively for 2 years. I did well, but I know what to do, and how to do it. Both lists are Glass Cannon "ish." however Cryx is just more durable due to high defense, and abilities to mitigate damage and loss of models IE tough, rezzing whole units back, Tartar making Banes.. which you have to admit, we are all just jealous of

Well I've whittled it down to Cygnar and Cryx.

Each one sports a focus I love equally and each faction has a certain set of jacks that are just awesome, Minuteman and cankerworm, I've looked into both and I'm still stuck for a loss. I want to be able to charge and get into melee but also want nice range units (long gunners come to mind here, not sure about cryx).

For cygnar it would be built around Kraye (Sloan is possible as I do love me some range) what I would like is 2 minutemen but in order to follow a themed list I can only pack in 1 minuteman and 2 hunters.

Though if I want I believe I'll forsac the list and go with what makes me happy,

Kraye
squire
2 minutemen
1 Hammersmith
1 Hunter
1 Ranger Unit
1 13th mage squad

I have no idea if its legal or not at current but at a guess I think I like it as I chose units that synergy with Kraye as much as I can muster.

Run a Cryx ranged list.

pDenny
Kraken or crab jacks (the 4-legged amphibious warjacks generally have pretty nice guns)
a melee backbone Bane Thrall unit + UA
Ghost pirates

Cryx is going to be a friendlier army to a beginner because you can make a few mistakes and still be okay. Cygnar, especially if you're coming off of 40k and are used to shooting to win games, requires a much more delicate touch [than 40k] and is a lot less forgiving of mistakes. If you've played Tau, you are probably familiar with the 'T1, doing fine, T2, doing fine, T3, WTF where did my army go???' phenomena.

The exception is whether or not you want to buy the Stormwall (the $120 Titan-looking model). The Stormwall really helps to stiffen up the Cygnar army. If that's an option for you, then you can run Cygnar pretty well take-all-comers.

I cannot speak to the legality of the army, as I don't know the points off the top of my head without the books / cards handy. What I can speak to is Kraye is one of the most difficult to learn how to play with casters in the Cygnar army. For a player who knows the rules of cavalry in and out, he is tons of fun to play.

If your going to play him read up on all the benefits of

being "heavy cav" IE
-bonus to charge
-what impact hits are and how they are resolved. HINT "models you base"
-read thoroughly ride by attacks
-movement shenagins.
-read light cav IE for medium based jacks
-then go re-read the minuteman

Then go find a friend or shop owner / press ganger who has been playing a while, verify you are playing it correctly. Once you get it down, you will laugh a lot internally during games as all your heavy jacks basically have a free base strength attack on the charge

Minuteman is full of tricks. If you haven't yet read this: http://losthemisphere.com/blog/14829

He pretty much declares Kraye hte ultimate Minuteman caster.

But so many options and so many rules he will be a steep learning curve. And I think Cygnar has one of the steepest learning curves in a game that has a steep learning curve.

So realise you will probabaly lose. ALOT. I mean ALOT.

That said, from what you described as things you like I think you are heading the right direction. You will be able to smash face and still have some impressive shooting with Cygnar.

I've only just recently begun playing around with adding more shooting to my Cryx list and I am not 100% sure I am happy with it. I've heard people say it can work, but Cryx really leans towards speedy melee and magic. It is easy to play melee only and still win.