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So I got my Cygnar 20 point army to start with but I was curious, What should I get next..? I got the Battlegroup box (Commander Coleman Stryker, Ironclad, Charger and Lancer) Aswell as a box of Arcane Tempest Gun Mages and a box of Sword Knights but, What would you recomend I get next..? I want to play fairly balanced, Able to handle melee aswell as range..

Do you have the gun mage officer? If not make him a high priority buy.

Other than that a squire would be the only model that will really universally help you out. It may be time to buy another warcaster or two.

Nope, Dont have any officer for the gun mages. As for casters, The two I like the best is Captain Allister Caine and Captain Kara Sloan..

You will want that gun mage officer for sure. He gives the unit an extraordinarily ability and he is one of the best jack marshals in the game.

If you get either of those two casters get the mercenary goblin, Reinholt. He is almost mandatory with both of them. You also might want to get some more jacks to try out after you get your next warcaster(s) for the sake of variety.

Both those casters kinda of like Long Gunners as well

Squire. Journeyman warcaster. Great for almost any list

 Talamare wrote:
Both those casters kinda of like Long Gunners as well

I dunno, what does eCaine offer Long Gunners apart from maybe Blur?

 motyak wrote:

 Talamare wrote:
Both those casters kinda of like Long Gunners as well

I dunno, what does eCaine offer Long Gunners apart from maybe Blur?

Absolutely nothing, eCaine is a greedy man, with no interests in buffing his army

Thats why he requires strong infantry that can work without support

Long Gunners are a perfect example of this, ~10 shots at 14" weapons with Rat9 and Pow12, and they can shoot thru other infantry

I guess. I just like gunmages with him too much, especially with gunfighter and what not.

Alright, So Long Gunners and Gun Mage Officer aswell as Kara Sloan or Captain Caine.. Is there anything else I should look into getting? StormBlades or StormGuard mayhaps? Are they good? I want some good or atleast acceptable melee to go with the ranged stuff. And what does the Goblin Prospector do for your warcaster? Also, For Warjacks I realy like the looks of Thunderhead and Minuteman. Any other jacks that are recomended?

Reinholdt the Gobber speculater gives you an extra shot. He has other abilities, but with those casters? Extra shot.

Stormblades are good, but tricky to use. They also, IMO, really need the UA, which gives them assault.

Longgunners are good, but almost need to be full size, and are way, way better with Snipe on them. Keep in mind that pCaine has snipe, although eCaine does not.

As for jacks, the ones that I rely on the most are Defender, Rowdy, Hunter, and Stormclad.

 Polonius wrote:
Stormblades are good, but tricky to use. They also, IMO, really need the UA, which gives them assault.

Longgunners are good, but almost need to be full size, and are way, way better with Snipe on them. Keep in mind that pCaine has snipe, although eCaine does not.

As for jacks, the ones that I rely on the most are Defender, Rowdy, Hunter, and Stormclad.

Polonius has very sound advice.

I'm not sure long gunners are must-haves but they exert some reasonable board control since nobody wants to walk within their firing range, which prevents them from killing much but is also good in its own way. Use your own judgement on if you think you can handle a static unit with very low mobility.

Stormblades can run without their UA but not as a front line. They need their guns and movement to make an impact other than as casualties or a a countercharge unit. Not that 5 points for the vanilla unit is bad for a countercharge threat. Playing the full unit as a combine arms threat can be very fun too.

Since we are listing units: the Black 13th should be mentioned. They are a very good run and gun unit with a couple of extremely valuable tricks.

I would also add the minuteman to the list of jacks above. It is a great light.
I LOVE the thunderhead, but it takes some major finesse and babysitting to get a big impact out of. Save it for the next time you want to expand and you will be ready for it.

P. S. Seriously, don't forget Reinholt.

Thanks for all the tips! I realy like Warmachine so far, It's a fun game ^_^ I'l buy a few things at the time and slowly build up my army ^_^

Surprised nobody brought this up: Black 13th

I say no on the Long Gunners with eCaine.

Yes they do not need support to CRA but there are much better options for the points.

These are my recommendations for playing eCaine.

- Gun Mage Officer
- Rangers - These guys are essential to effective eCaine play because of their boost to his RAT making it nearly impossible for him to miss pretty much anything.
- Boomhowlers - Excellent tarpit unit which eCaine needs to keep enemies away. Give them Heightened Reflexes and laugh with a 4+ tough.
- HHFG - Great second rank unit that can put the hurt on some stuff.
- B13th - These guys should be considered in ANY cygnar army they are just too good for 4 points to pass up.
- Ol' Rowdy - This is the best jack for eCaine to take because he can pretty much be by himself and still do work. All other jacks require too much focus in order to truly be effective.
- Reinholdt - I wouldn't consider him a auto include but he is definitely on the list of very very good supports for eCaine. If you have an extra point it goes to him no questions asked.
- Nyss Hunters - Great unit for dealing with pretty much anything and don't need any help from a caster who hates giving out his focus.
- Gorman DiWulfe - eCaine loves models that make him hit stuff easier. Drop Black Oil on an enemy caster and the game is over if Caine is in range.

There are other units that might work well but these are what I personally would consider the top choices for running with eCaine.

The only time I use StormBlades is when I bring StormClad and UA as well, and if we are doing that, might as well bring 3 StormGunners as well

and suddenly you have 21 points in your list

 Talamare wrote:
The only time I use StormBlades is when I bring StormClad and UA as well, and if we are doing that, might as well bring 3 StormGunners as well

and suddenly you have 21 points in your list

The blades don't need to be played with a stormclad. The full unit can be a mean combined arms threat using gunners and assaults with their pow 14 ranged attacks to force the engagement.

The new plastic box comes with three gunners anyway so they will be available, and that isn't the worst 21 points you can spend by a wide margin either.

Yeah, its not a bad block. that Stormclad is getting for all intents and purposes 2 free Focus a turn. 3 if you have Arlan use Power Booster on it.

Sure its going to be half your army, but thats half your army including a Jack that doesn't need Focus.

My biggest problem with bringing Stormblades is that without something like Arcane Shield on them they are screwed.

I think that is why with certain casters they do not work. Boomhowlers and HHFG don't need much help to not die to breeze.

Gun Mages are hard to hit and that is what makes them good with eCaine add the UA and they are completely self sustaining. If you want to Blur them then go for it.

Storm*nouns* I feel do not flow well with eCaine.

Sloan can do things to help them out more however but it still won't increase their survival rate which you will need when playing a ranged focused caster.

Just my opinion of course. With other casters though like the Strykers they can be exceptional.

I'm surprised so few people have mentioned the defender and no one has mentioned the hunter. Those two models are often my MVPs, and with the gun mage officer jack marshalling either of them the rune shot ability can become stupid good. Add in Arlan strangeways and you now have a warjack with rune shot, a boosted attack/damage roll, a focus per turn, and someone that can heal said jack. Then when using a hunter and you crit on the brutal damage it gets hilarious against enemies on multi-box or damage grid models on medium or large bases.

Gun mages w/ officer and a jack are good in any list. IMO gun mages are better than long gunners as they offer you more options and can deal with a much wider variety of enemies. Long gunners can be cool, but what happens once you encounter one of the plethora of ways to stop their shooting? Gun mages ignore stealth, menoth choir, incorporeal and a few other things. All things that are not uncommon and make the longgunners twiddle their thumbs.

Not to mention better RAT, ignore some common defenses, more mobile, better DEF, push/knockdown shenaningans and excellent jack marshal.

 Mordekiem wrote:
Gun mages w/ officer and a jack are good in any list. IMO gun mages are better than long gunners as they offer you more options and can deal with a much wider variety of enemies. Long gunners can be cool, but what happens once you encounter one of the plethora of ways to stop their shooting? Gun mages ignore stealth, menoth choir, incorporeal and a few other things. All things that are not uncommon and make the longgunners twiddle their thumbs.

Not to mention better RAT, ignore some common defenses, more mobile, better DEF, push/knockdown shenaningans and excellent jack marshal.

They have CRA, making better RAT moot, They have much higher damage output, and B13 can draw out stealth while handling the few rare incorporeal

Long Gunners CRA can damn near wreck a Heavy, You are not going to see that from Gun Mages

 Talamare wrote:

 Mordekiem wrote:
Gun mages w/ officer and a jack are good in any list. IMO gun mages are better than long gunners as they offer you more options and can deal with a much wider variety of enemies. Long gunners can be cool, but what happens once you encounter one of the plethora of ways to stop their shooting? Gun mages ignore stealth, menoth choir, incorporeal and a few other things. All things that are not uncommon and make the longgunners twiddle their thumbs.

Not to mention better RAT, ignore some common defenses, more mobile, better DEF, push/knockdown shenaningans and excellent jack marshal.

They have CRA, making better RAT moot, They have much higher damage output, and B13 can draw out stealth while handling the few rare incorporeal

Long Gunners CRA can damn near wreck a Heavy, You are not going to see that from Gun Mages

While it is true that that Long Gunners have CRA you are only going to damn near wreck a heavy if you have a max squad. That is 10 points for a unit that can take 2 shots (if your lucky) with a max CRA on a heavy for 10 points. That is of course you don't pick up the UA which gives them Ranked Attacks which makes the likely hood for a full CRA possible so let's assume for max potential of the unit you get the UA as well.

Now lets look at what the ATGM can bring to the table. For 6 points you get 6 guys who effectively have the same range as long gunners with their snipe ability. Thunderbolt is an amazing utility spell especially in scenario games and with Deadeye you get Crit. Brutal Damage on them. Now add in 'The Dude' for 2 points more and they now ignore stealth concealment and camo. We are only at 8 points for being able to fill more than one role. Park them on an objective and with DEF 15 a lot of people are going to have a hard time hitting them. Give them blur and it basically becomes impossible outside of specific units that ignore that. Now add in the fact that they are some of the best Jack marshals in the game and give them a Hunter for 6 points. You now have a 14 point unit that has the range of the long gunners. Heavy destroyer in the Hunter, Board control with thunderbolt, harder to hit, ignores stealth conceal and camo.

I am not saying that Long Gunners do not have their place. But for the points that they take up in a list for the very limited amount of work they can do there are better ways to spend the points. They suffer from being overcosted in my opinion (even though I do own a squad). For the same amount of points as Long Gunners you can get Nyss Hunters who give you CRA and give you a multitude of other utility over the Long Gunners for the same point cost for a full unit.

All that being said point for point Gun Mages are much better than Long Gunners especially considering Cygnar has much better options available to obtain CRA in a 10 point unit.

what he said. I think he lays out the reason why the great majority of people prefer Gun Mages over Long Gunners. Or even Nyss over long gunners.

If Long gunners work for you, great. I don't like static units and they don't bring anything to the game that I feel I can't get more bang for my buck from other units.

Longgunners are also a big liability in steamroller play. Having a 10 point unit that wont' be moving into the objective zones can really limit your tactics.