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Hello everyone, I am new to warmachine, trying to make a new mercenary army, specificaly highborn covenant, using Madhammer as a warcaster. Here is the list:


Faction: Highborn Covenant
Casters: 1/1
Points: 35/35
Durgen Madhammer (*6pts)
* Wroughthammer Rockram (8pts)
Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (Alexia and 9 Risen Grunts) (5pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Mule (8pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Steelhead Halberdiers (Leader and 9 Grunts) (6pts)
Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile (2pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)


The plan is making a first line with the steelhead, casting primed on them, but keeping them a bit separated to avoid being tagged by blasts. When possible, they would charge in, spreading out when going against infantry or going toghether to get the CMA against heavyer targets. Next oponent turn would possibly involve explosions if he killed the halberdiers, fueling alexia for the next turn, getting a lot of new risen, to repeat the primed tactic. While that, the gun mages with the mule would be taking out warjacks/warbeasts out of the way, possibly throwing the enemy into his own army. The idea for this army is combining a hard artillery with some explosive front line. I have choosen the Wroughthammer Rockram over other options for its high pow singe target cannon, that can be cast explosivo to make it aoe, and because it is also viable on melee, specialy if it gets a crit.

The solos would be to complement on the strengths of the army, instead of trying to fix weakness, because if you are going out, at least go on a boom.

I made this army to make it fun, after all, that is what matters, but I want some tips on what could be exchanged, there are tons (probably, everyone here) of people with more experience then me, so i would like to ask what would you do with that army. What would go out, and what would replace it?

Thank you very much in advance, and every form of criticism is valid. If you think this concept is just pure crappyness, just plainly tell it.

First off, welcome to DakkaDakka. Its a fun place.

It looks like a fun list. I think you will have issues dealing with high armor or a Colossal.

The beauty of WM is that just about everything is good or can be made good. It's all about player skill.

I generally don't recommend new players start with Mercs but to each his own.

I would say play the list a bunch of times and see how you like it. See if it matches your play style and if you can make the synergies work for you.

In this list I would probably swap MacNaile for Gorman, and see if there is a way to squeeze eIris in as well.

Losing the buffs from Doug would be a significant loss for Durgen and Herne. I would recommend swapping the rockram for a driller to get the two points for Gorman. The driller will crack armor just as well as the Rockram since Redline will boost both it it's weapons up to 19 and 18 POW, whereas the rockram only gets an increase on one of it's weapons. Plus you get sustained attack on the big drill and an open fist instead of some crit effects.

Gorman's blind grenade is pretty much worth anything to get it into your list, as it is considered the best debuff in the game and nothing can remove it.


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You will likely end up relying on Durgen to assassinate, but he does it extremely well with reinholdt and Doug. Threat range of 19" dropping 2x POW14s with bonus die, plus the extra AOE 4 blasts with bonus die. If you can catch a caster with little or no focus, then you can basically squash anything...unless its immune to blast damage, thats more difficult.

Also - Keep in mind that any blast that lands on Durgen will now grant him a focus point. You can use Doug, Herne and Jonne, primed explosions, and his own Back Blast from his weapon to keep his focus stacked.


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I would also consider dropping the mule for something cheaper or nothing at all. Its a lot of points and if you lose the OotAR officer then you lose the mule as well since durgen cannot control it. I think you would be better off with a vanguard. It is less points which means less risk if you lose the UA. It can shield the UA for even better risk management and it can still benefit from their rune shots. Not sure if it gets the rune shots on its assault but that would be really cool if it did. Plus, I will behonest here, yout do not need the extra blast. Your list will start becoming vulnerable to enemies that are immune to blast damage and durgen and Herne are more than enough. I don't even rune Herne in my durgen lists as I generally find durgens gun to be adequate.

If you switch to the vanguard, you will have enough points for Eyriss or a bokur. Either will make your list more competitive. Bokur becomes MAT 12 on a charge if he is in contract range and power 17 or 19 with his pole arm with primed on him. He's not an ideal target but he can drop high DEF war casters really easily if he catches them and he can defend durgen from enemy assassins or eyriss

You also have to keep in mind, I believe Alexia does gain tokens when your primed steelheads blow up as primed says that they are removed from the game.

Ok then, thanks a lot for the feedback, everyone.

The driller definitely is a good option, i know the rockram is a strange choice, but I imagined it would be a good option to have since I could cast explosivo on him, Not that the list doesn't have enough aoe templates on it... So, Driller, it is.

I used the mule with the gun mages because of theyr sinergy, making a warjack/warbeast pinball into his own troops in case of a good crit, but that can be changed as well. If I put the vanguard up, the points are enough to get a decent solo (Eyriss 2 and Gorman), But I don't know if the range on the shield gun is good enough to retaliate anything threatening the gun mages, or anything else that needs protection. Should I keep it near my units just like a protector or should I keep it a bit more to the front, risking a bit more? I guess that depends on how the game is going.

So, the list remade looks like this

System: Warmachine
Faction: Highborn Covenant
Casters: 1/1
Points: 35/35
Durgen Madhammer (*6pts)
* Ghordson Driller (6pts)
Alexia Ciannor & the Risen (Alexia and 9 Risen Grunts) (5pts)
Arcane Tempest Gun Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts) (6pts)
* Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer (2pts)
* * Vanguard (5pts)
Herne & Jonne (3pts)
Steelhead Halberdiers (Leader and 9 Grunts) (6pts)
Eiryss, Angel of Retribution (3pts)
Gorman di Wulfe, Rogue Alchemist (2pts)
Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile (2pts)
Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator (1pts)

The only reason I prefered Eyriss over the Bokur is because I already have Eyriss 2. And I already played with her, and found the results very very very satisfying. Ill try getting the bokur one day, though

Woops, I meant alexia does NOT gain tokens from units exploding from primed.

Looks like a more solid list. IMHO the vanguard is make to tie up infantry models, and take hits for your squishy units. For a 5 point model, it can be pretty tough to destroy for non weapon mastered infantry and it can put down up to 4 enemy troops in the charge. I havent used one with Durgen before, but I would keep it out front of the OotAR to block charges into them. Use snipe to get a shot off a turn before your lines clash (I believe it has a 17" threat with snipe, 20" if you assault).

The Bokur is pretty cool, not as competitive as Eyriss but still a really good solo for protecting your critical models and it can hit like a truck. Its worth trying out sometime. List looks pretty good for the most part, except you may still have issues cracking heavy armor.

Don't get the soul tokens? Ok, got it. Should I consider a different option then? But for 5 points there isn't much more decent infantry like that. I think I will see if I can keep her, against infantry heavy army she will shine a bit more IMO.

Against the high armor targets, What could I do?Durgen can do a bit of damage to them with the armor piercing atack, and with Reinholdt near him, that will be 2 shots per turn. Still, i get What you mean. The driller can help on that as well. 3 focus on a driller, with redline up it can hurt a bit. Any other tips? or should I stick with that?

I think she's still a good target for it. You will replenish souls when you kill opponents and durgen lists are very effective at wasting infantry.

The driller will flatten heavy armor really easily you just need to prevent it from getting retaliated against so that it can survive and keep moving to other targets.

Keep in mind that you cannot fire two special shells each turn with durgen as they are special attacks. So you get one special shot and one regular shot. I don't think I have ever used case cracker before, his carpet bomb is usually better. Also remember that durgens feat grants extra damage to the primed explosions assuming you can blow them on your turn. Makes free striking the primed targets very dangerous


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I think you will just need to devise strategies to preserve the driller which your list should do a decent at since it has so many infantry models. Basically charge the driller into a hard target and scrap it, then run or charge the steelheads and the risen in between the driller and your opponents heavy hitters. Your infantry will likely take a beating but hopefully they won't be able to land much on the driller.


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You could try and fit Thor steinhammer in there somewhere as well so he can repair and tune up the driller