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I've been dabbling in Warmachine on and off since it was first released. I even took part in the tournament scene for a good while, but one thing has always stopped me from being able to really invest (financially and in hobby terms) in the system: the inability to make my own Warcaster! My games always felt that I was telling someone else's character's story, rather than creating a narrative of my own.

So, what I'm wondering is: at any point has someone come up with a system for creating your own Warcaster? If so, can someone point me in the right direction? I can't imagine anything like this would be tournament legal, but it would help to capture my interest in the game for longer than a month or two at a time if I could at least create or customise a Warcaster of my own for friendly games at the local club

Alternatively, did anyone ever come up with an experience system where you could start with, say, a Journeyman Warcaster type and gradually build them up into a new, full Warcaster by earning and spending experience points?

I'd love to hear about it if anyone has.

Oh, I agree 100% in a tournament environment like the game was created for. But in a simple pick-up game at the local club or in a friendly campaign it would be an interesting and (for me at least) attractive new dynamic.

I almost never use Special Characters (to use a 40K term) in any game system I play (except at the tournament level) and the fact that every Warmachine/Horde's list needs to include at least one special character type model is a major turn off for me. It's the single reason why the game hasn't been able to hold my interest for more than a few months at a time.

Hi Platuan4th, thanks for your comments. I've considered doing just that. I have a converted Hayley miniature that I've been considering re-painting and using as a stand-in for Magnus (Magnette? :/), Ashlynn or Damiano for the better part of a year. I might very well just go with that option.

I'd just been wondering if there were other options though. I vaguely remember a conversation I had a good few years back about starting off a campaign using Journeymen Warcaster level 'casters for each faction and gradually buying other faction spells and new focus points using XP as the campaign went on. Wasn't sure if it was something Privateer Press had created rules for (in No Quarter maybe?) or just some idea's that my mates and I had been tossing around in the pub after a game.

Thanks guys for all your input. I'm going to take a long serious look at the IK RPG system and see if there is some way to go about combining the Prime Book campaign rules with the Iron Kingdoms RPG system. If I can get a workable system out of it, I might start an Iron Kingdoms "Journyman" Warcaster campaign where the Warcaster's get to spend XP on improvements from game to game.

I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that some of the players will be able to create throughly broken Warcasters. But, if I limit players to giving their 'casters spells from their own factions spell lists, it should cut down on the brutality a bit.

If I ever get the concept of the ground, I'll be sure to start a blog here on Dakka featuring the campaign rules, as well as a report on the campaign itself.

@ Dreadknight: I appreciate your thoughts, but I have to disagree on one vital point: While no-one outside of my little gaming circle might ever get excited about the exploits of Phineas Egg, a Journyman Warcaster who progressed from a 3 Focus nobody to a 7 Focus powerhouse in a year of campaign play, I can guarantee that absolutely everyone inside that gaming circle will get more excited about his latest exploits than they ever will about Styker's. Or those of any other pre-generated setting character. All the more so if everyone in that gaming circle has similar stories about their own home-grown war-casters. Just as my oldest gaming buddies and I still laugh about the exploits of Capo Shotgun, the Orlock Ganger who never missed in a shot in six consecutive games of Necromunda, or the Black Legion Sgt with the Powerfist who survived every game of 40K he ever appeared in for the whole of second edition. Sure, you'll never get excited about them. Nor will anyone else outside of that small circle of people who know about them.

But that being said, nearly twenty years on, my old gaming buddies from high school and I still sit around the pub whenever we can get together and laugh about the exploits of our home-grown "special" characters. No character created by anyone else -not Styker, not Rocky, not even Luke Skywalker- will ever get the same emotional investment out of me (or any other like-minded gamer) as a character I've created myself.

I agree it's all about perspective. But my perspective just happens to be vastly different than the perspective of most war-machine gamers. I even have trouble getting invested in computer games where I can't create my own character.

Yeah. How to balance it? By allowing other factions to create equally broken characters or by introducing a points system more complicated than 3xp= gain a 3 focus spell.

It'll take a lot of thought

FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs wrote:Maybe have different groups of casters- ex. assassination beatstick, assassination support, attrition beatstick, assassination support. This is based on A) physical stats B) spell and feat stats C) focus limit and D)self contained combos, given combos

Once you have all the information down, you determine its point cost based on which category these stats give you. For example- support caster- buff spells and debuff spells cost less than for a beatstick caster. For example, beatstick defense and armor cost less than for a support caster

Yeah, I definitely think that would work better than having everyone start from the same basic warcaster template. It would also make it easier to prevent broken spell combo's by charging more points/XP for certain chasis types to do certain things. I think you're on to something there.

derek wrote:One of the things I like most about WM is that by and large, I can sit down to play a game, and someone tells me they're running X caster and I generally know what their army does. There is no gotcha factor. I'm not against counts as models (I made my own female eCaine with from an Ashlynn), or conversions, even heavy conversions like AduroT's Cryx. But when you start putting Homebrew characters into the setting, that is something I just don't want to play.

Then don't. No one would force you take part in a game with a home-brew warcaster. It's not as though we're talking about an official rules supplement here, just a set of house rules that players can use if all the players involved agree to allow them.

motyak wrote:

from an Ashlynn

That lady must be one of the most used conversion pieces in the game.

lol, Yeah. I think her unnatural looking pose is probably the main reason for that.

Talamare wrote:It is definitely possible but it would require a lot of 'programming'

I would suggest using a point buy system, but as was said, each faction might need some fine tuning on specific costs

As a core I would suggest a Chassis system

For example, there are 4 Chassis - Assassin, Ranged, Bruiser and Caster

This Chassis you choose determines the base stats, focus, amount of spells

From there each Chassis has a specific spell list, but they can choose any spell found in their faction, but if it is not part of their Chassis they must pay a little bit more for it

In addition, their points can be used to buy everything from higher stats, weapons, abilities, spells, amount of spells, focus, higher warjack points etc

There should also be a depreciating system, in which the more of something you buy the more expensive it becomes. So going from 4 focus to 5 will cost 2, but going from 5 to 6 will cost 3 (5 total), and going from 6 to 7 will cost 5(10 total)... etc

Since you are implementing this system, the most logical thing to add would be XP/Levels, so that as your caster ages he gets stronger

All this is of course all very complex and would require a very fleshed out league system, with everyone willing to play under the league rules. If even a single person wants to play an 'official' caster, they would either be too strong or too weak by comparison

The real difficulty of this system, BY FAR is the Feat
Do we just allow you to buy a Feat that your faction already has? That is kinda of boring
Should we let you use you to create your own Feat? but how do we accurately judge and gauge the strength of your feat

What if you want a character who is weak with a strong feat, or strong with a weak feat (and these characters do exist in the current official game)

Should we make an insanely complex system to buy customization for your feats similar you everything else that is being newly programmed? but the problem with that is that in and off itself it would be as complex as the entirety of the rest of the system! perhaps even more so!

Yes, building on that concept would work exceptionally well. It would take a lot of work, but it would almost certainly be worth if to create one of those campaigns player's talk about for years afterwords. I'm going to go with this idea and run with it to see what I can come up.

 Crazy_Carnifex wrote:


Well, I think what we would want to try would be a layering of spells- for example, Capt. Jeremiah Krayes feat basically allows you to shake knockdown, then casts full throttle (a spell he does not have) for free, and then gives everyone in his battle group +2" charge. I think for feats you would want some system to "buy" spells that the feat casts- basically, they are cheaper than if they were on the spell list and any focus increases needed to cast them.

The feats might be a problem, but I think that by distilling the feats down a bit in the manner Crazy_Carnifex suggested, we can put together a feat using a "chain" effect of spells. The cost system in terms of buying spells and building feats from spells would help to mechanically balance out feats. Using the points method and "spell-chain" feats, we could copy the in-game mechanic or having caster's with great feats but with poor stats or spells and casters with weak feats (I'm thinking MacBain or Domingo here) but great spells or stats.

Now we've all hashed that out, I no longer see any reason why this couldn't work. Provided the customisation mechanics were robust enough to maintain some form of balance. Even if a player did create an uber-spell build war-caster, it should be possible to make him so weak in another area (stats, damage, focus points, feat) that it balances out.

I'm more convinced than ever that this is not only possible, but that it would work very well within the framework of a campaign.