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So I am getting back into warmachine, and I am kinda on a budget. After careful examination, I figured that with the starter box and a plastic heavy box, I can pretty much proxy most Cygnar jacks by putting on the appropriate weapons.

While this is obvious for the Cyclone, Ironclad and Defender, my question is, will I face a problem also running my Ironclad chassie as a Centurion, or a Hammersmith? I can put the Lancer's Shield and Spear on my Heavy for a Centurion, and the Shock and Quake hammers on the arms for a Hammersmith.

Similarly, I can easily put one of the Cyclone's Chain guns with the shield on the Lancer to get a Sentinel no?

Do people have a major problem with not having quite the right chassis as the corresponding jack, if I have the right weapon types on them? Particularly since most Cygnar jacks kinda look the same, except the Thunderhead.

In addition, how do people feel about running the Lancer as Thorn, and the normal Ironclad as Ol'Rowdy? I can take the Stormclad's buckler and put it on the ironclad to achieve the appropriate effect if necessary, though I doubt it's needed.

In a related question, how do people feel about running a different caster evolution with a different model? For example, Nemo looks almost identical in every iteration, so why not just use Nemo 3 for all three? Similarly with pCaine and eCaine, or pStryker and eStryker. p and eHayle might be a bit of a stretch, as their poses are very different.

Finally, if the above is ok, does anyone know where I can get some Warmachine bits in the UK? Privateer Press's bits service does not really work well for EU. I kinda want the Hunter's weapons, as I doubt I'll even run more than 2 lights. Tho I'll probably bite the bullet there, as they are pretty cheap.

You MIGHT be able to get away with the ironclad chassis Centurion in some cases, but even that is stretching it. The rest are pretty much definite no-nos. Thorn and Old Rowdy have vastly different and recognizable sculpts, so unless you heavily converted the models, that'd be right out. Using epics as different iterations thereof is also right out, without drastic conversions.

Even the Centurion chassis is pretty easily distinguishable from the Ironclad, so that's probably going to be pretty hard to get to fly, too. You'd be better off just picking up a second plastic kit to magnetize for the appropriate chassis.

Typically, unless it's instantly recognizable as the appropriate model, proxying/"conversions" aren't going to fly except in the most casual play.

Cyclone chaingun on a lancer chassis is actually a pretty good idea, though. You'd want to make sure to magnetize the arc node, however.

If you are playing tournaments proxying wont work.

That being said If you dont play tournaments why dont you ask that question to the people you play with? In the end if they are okay with it youre good to go. In a friendly club game i wouldnt mind but i'd expect people to get the apropriate models over time.

I'm kinda surprised that people can actually tell the different chassis other than the weapons. They all look the same to me, other than that some jacks have 4 stalks instead of two.

Still, damn. Ol' Rowdy is particularly aggravating, cause it's a REALLY good jack that is supposed to be an Ironcald, but I cant use an Ironclad model for it. Ridiculous. And thorne is pretty silly as well.

Anyways, for the Cyclone, I will just magentize the shield and put it on the Charger instead, with the Chaingun, so I avoid the Arc Node problem.

My general rule on conversions is this,


Take the model to a player that is familiar with the army in question. Plop the model in front of his face and ask him "What is it?"

If he doesn't get the right answer in 3 seconds the conversion is not a good one, or he just doesn't know the army.

 Grey Templar wrote:
My general rule on conversions is this,


Take the model to a player that is familiar with the army in question. Plop the model in front of his face and ask him "What is it?"

If he doesn't get the right answer in 3 seconds the conversion is not a good one, or he just doesn't know the army.

I do that to TOs all the time.

An extremoth isn't hard to identify, though.

If you talk to your opponent and say 'hey, I'm testing out a few models that I don't have yet to see what I'm like' most player will be fine with whatever you bring to the table. However, if you want to permanently or semi-permanently convert a model, or want to take it to a tournament, Grey Templar's guideline is THE MINIMUM that you will find acceptable. Privateer Press actually has formalized conversion guidelines to follow for competitive play. I'll paraphrase them:

1. The make up of a model MUST consist of at least 50% of the parts from the model it represents (ie, by content a converted Ironclad must be at least half of an Ironclad model)
2. All models MUST be on the correct base size.
3. If an upgrade kit exists to make a character, the ENTIRE KIT must be used on any relevant conversions.

As far as warcasters with multiple incarnations are concerned, I only buy my favorite sculpt and then use it interchangeably for whatever version I want. If you tell your opponent that your pCaine model is representing eCaine and your opponent tells you "no, eCain's guns have to be pointing opposite directions", he's probably not someone you want to play with. Just remember that some casters get different weapons when they change incarnations.

If you only play with friends and they have no problem with you using a Coke can for a Hammersmith than go for it. Playing with friends, none of your proxies should be a problem provided they know what they are.

As far as "official" play is concerned, it does get a lot more strict.

That doesn't work for casters that are way different between their incarnations. Kreoss, Irusk, Morghoul, etc are all very different from their other versions.

Correct, but not really an issue for Cygnar, which is the OP's army.