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http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Warmachine_Mark_II_Field_Test_Changes

Update: Thanks for all the work, guys. Looks like Cryx and Khador, and Mercs need doing. I'll
start on the other Protectorate stuff tonight if no one goes for it.

One of the big changes that will probably spark endless rant and discussion is the new way in which units move combined with their formation rules.

The core of it is this:
Formation is based on the unit commander's CMD stat. If you are within the CMD stat in inches, you are in formation. The commander is always in formation.

combined with this:
When advancing (any type of movement during activation), if a trooper is out of formation it must advance toward the commander.

At it's heart this is something truly new to Warmachine. A model can never leave formation intentionally, even during movement.

And the key complaint so far has been in regards to charges. Basically, since a grunt has to advance toward the commander while out of formation, this effectively means that the commander must lead from the front and be the first model to execute his charge. Otherwise, a grunt will automatically fail his charge if attempts to charge and reaches the edge of the commander's CMD range.

From my point of view, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is a very different way of using units from what currently exists. Officer attachments are now serving on the front lines and their survivability just dropped. Its definitely a change that will take some getting used to.

wow, i got quoted.
After some sleep, and looking over things again, and giving it some more though, the only thing that bums me out is that my swordknights are now even more of a cheap speedbump.
Other then that, i can handle symbols, i like the changes to the core rules, and maybe i can get a cheap cryx army on ebay to paint.

I welcome the rules but, can anyone confirm whether comprehensive (permenant) updates for Mk1 will be available for download.

It is one thing for Gw to change the rules and force me to rebuy a codex or two, for PP a rule change would mean rebuying every book. As PP books are also much more expensive I am not really up for that.

I bought them once and if the whole damn lot is obsolete I will be very tempted to look for electronic versions.

blue loki wrote:One of the big changes that will probably spark endless rant and discussion is the new way in which units move combined with their formation rules.

The core of it is this:
Formation is based on the unit commander's CMD stat. If you are within the CMD stat in inches, you are in formation. The commander is always in formation.

combined with this:
When advancing (any type of movement during activation), if a trooper is out of formation it must advance toward the commander.

At it's heart this is something truly new to Warmachine. A model can never leave formation intentionally, even during movement.

And the key complaint so far has been in regards to charges. Basically, since a grunt has to advance toward the commander while out of formation, this effectively means that the commander must lead from the front and be the first model to execute his charge. Otherwise, a grunt will automatically fail his charge if attempts to charge and reaches the edge of the commander's CMD range.

From my point of view, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is a very different way of using units from what currently exists. Officer attachments are now serving on the front lines and their survivability just dropped. Its definitely a change that will take some getting used to.

But surely only a complete knobend of an opponent would pull that one on you half way through a move? Word of the rule is one thing, but the spirit here is pretty damned clear.

After all, all Wargames are representative. Your spods most certainly do not charge in one at a time in WM, 40k, or any other Skirmish. They call charge together. You just struggle to move them all accurately.

If someone pulled that on me in any wargame, they'd soon find their troops out of formation/coherency by virture of some being rammed up his chuff.

Oooh, thats twice I've used that phrase tonight.....

It's fair to hold yourself and your opponent to correct unit formation. If someone wants to charge
but they've trapped their Unit Commander behind a wall, there are only so many configurations
they can end up with. Letting them "make room" by charging with a front liner so that the Unit
Commander can move the Command Bubble up would kind of be cheating.

I think I know where you are coming from.

Certainly in competitive play I can see careful positioning before the charge being right and proper.

But what I was getting at might have been me getting the wrong end of the stick from blue loki's post (my fault not his!).

You see, I thought he was meaning TFG could, feasibly, and possibly within the scope of the rules, force you to always charge in with your unit leader. Now, your example (Malfred that is should someone post whilst I'm typing) is of course a fair point. But it could be used to prevent a charge when my infantry are bunched up, with the commander in the middle, to prevent an otherwise perfectly reasonable charge just through sheer dickery.

Now, it's been some time since I played WM (4 years at least. Not my bag but thats not the point of this!) and I cannot for the life of me say whether there is any advantage to protecting your unit leader in the way I mentioned above (get the grunts to surround him) so my example may not be especially common, but even so.

People will want to protect their Officer models, since they cannot be replaced. However, Unit
Commanders can be field promoted amongst the grunts (a new term for troopers who are not
Unit Commanders).

Thing you might be missing is that models can't cross other models' bases for voluntarily movement
without a special rule of some kind. So it's not like a blocked in leader isn't being moved first because
the player would prefer not to move it first, it's not being moved first because it physically can't
be moved first. It's an abstraction that's used to keep things clear, kind of like the 1" rule in
40k and FB.

Okay doke. So unit commanders are like Standards and Musicians in Fantasy, in that should they be sniped, someone else picks up the Banner or Instrument and fills in. Cool. With that now.

Now, your second one (and apologies for semi-derailing the thread. It is sort of about the topic. Well. Ish.).

So the base rule means that should, for whatever reason, I form my unit into a concentric ring formation, with the unit leader in the middle, I would have to open a path up by moving the outer models first before he can move. That I get.

But my concern about the wording of the rule as mentioned by Blue Loki (I'm assuming it's accurate. Not one to download the rules as I don't like Steampunk) is that using the above formation (or a broadly similar situation where it is necessary, due to where models are, irrespective of cover*) to move the rank and file into combat first, that a particular litigious opponent could force a failed charge should one of those models move out of the command range.

I think it's clear that the rule intends that you cannot cause the unit to be out of coherency via movement deliberately, but that this does not extend to when you are actually moving the models. I may be wrong, others might have a different opinion, but I feel that in a rules set seemingly respected for it's tightness, that it really needs to be stated clearly, even if it's just in brackets to reinforce it one way or the other.

Sorry about the semi-derailing!

We're trying to figure that out now. They've already said in the Field Test forum that they
realize that this part of the rules need clarity given the amount of time spent trying
to work it out.

Ah fair enough then!

Definitely one to be tightened up, as read anally it can cost someone the game, but read loosely, it requires less careful positioning, which as a primarily Fantasy player, I can't say which would annoy me more.

Vanquisher not having reach and losing the range isn't great. But the boost to POW is nice...

Oh, and I noticed the sword knights taking the nerf-bat to the face. Bah; they had been a favorite unit of mine, just for flavor. Now...

yea, in between a thankfully lessoning amount of doom on the cygnar section of the pp forum, people are trying to figure out why the sword knights got nerfed in the face like that.

i hear the cryx board's become a cult of doom, but i'm afraid to check it

Asmodai wrote:

syr8766 wrote:So here's something I noticed that is more an aesthetic/topographical issue than rules per se (and I'll post this over there as well): I hate symbols representing special rules. I hated that in Heroclix and was always going back and forsee myself always going back and looking up what the iron cross, two swords, dying baby or whatever other icon they provide. Just put the special rules in bold and list the page numbers on the card if you want to save space. Really.

I've mentioned this myself. It's one of the major reasons why Confrontation failed. It really raises the barrier of getting into the game. Having to do the additional task of memorizing icons on top of learning the system makes it that much harder for new players to get into it (and experienced players will know the unit's special rules anyway).

Once a player memorizes those symbols, one can simply look at an opponent's cards and see what abilities most units have. What was really killing WM/H, IMHO, was a new player coming into the game and being blind sided by five WM and 3 Hordes books worth of special rules for eight (10 with mercs and minions) different armies. Especially when there were several different phrases for the same rules. I'll take the symbols any day of the week honestly.

Though I do think that some units got too simplified. And Cryx players are always doom and gloom, so it's really no surprise that they are even more doom and gloom now.

Orlanth wrote:for PP a rule change would mean rebuying every book.

Sorry, but that's genuinely NOT true. Warmachine Mk. II will feature Prime Mk. II(with Prime units) followed by 5 Faction Specific Forces of Warmachine Books(like the Pirates book) and Mk. II System "Decks", so unless you play every army, you only need 2 books and a Deck minimum(really only Prime Mk. II and a Deck as no rules aren't included on the cards).

They are not reproducing Escalation, Apotheosis, Superiority, and Legends as Mk. II books.

Oddly, I don't feel that Cryx was nerfed too badly. Then again, I haven't given the units a complete run through yet. I always played jack heavy armies with my Cryx. I actually took Slayers and Seethers. And all the jacks got better. So people must be complaining that units got nerfed. Which is good, because the game needs to focus on Jacks more, imo.

Some thoughts on Cryx Jacks from what I read last night:

Slayer: MAT 7 and PS 16 on the claws. That's a huge improvement.

Reaper: I was hoping for RAT 6 on the harpoon. The one point increase really isn't enough to make it worthwhile. I didn't look to see if the range went up, but if it did, I might consider getting one.

Seether: My baby. MAT 8 and a chain attack that let's it do any power attack. No more Ld tests to see if it goes crazy. Still has Soul Drive. I can't wait to field it with Mortenebra.

Deathjack: Didn't really look at it; don't field it as I don't like the model. The fact that it doesn't go crazy anymore makes it super focus efficient.

Nightmare: Didn't really look at the rules, but I did see MAT 8. Still looks to be a good choice.

Leviathan: RAT 5, while sucky on the Reaper, is a big bonus on the Leviathan. I think it got a range increase too. I think the claw went down in strength though.

Harrower: Also went to RAT 5. The new rules for Thresher make it nasty in combat.

Deathripper: Slightly better MAT. Still the workhorse of the army.

Defiler: Increase in range and RAT makes them worth taking now, especially since they're the same point cost as the Nightwretch.

Nightwretch: Slightly improved. Still have a place in the army.

Stalker: The caster killer it was always supposed to be. Ignores the armor boost from focus, and makes models unable to transfer, and heal for a round, as well as losing tough for a round. Expect to see more of these.

Helldiver: Slightly improved.

Cankerworm: Lost a lot of its special rules (Meat Grinder will be missed.) But it got Armor Piercing. 'Nuff said.

I only looked at a few Casters, but I like what I saw:

pGaspy: Kept his feat and sustained attack. Shadow Wings is now teleport, which lost some range, but it's still useful. Scything Touch grants Critical Corrosionaddition to +2 STR, which is nice.

pDenny: Pretty much stayed the same, and kept Crippling Grasp and Venom. Feat stayed the same too.

Coven: Lost a lot of their spells, and Stygian Abyss was completely reworked. (probably a good thing) Shadow Bind isn't a bad effect by any means.

pSkarre: Skarrebomb was nerfed. I might consider buying the model now.

Terminus: His major flaw was fixed; on his feat turn, soul tokens add to his armor. No more dying after popping the feat because he got too close to the other army. I think he's worth running now. And Ravager is an awesome spell.

Mortenebra: Pretty much stayed the same, which considering the bonuses Jacks got, makes her even better. Deryliss can get soul tokens from 5 inches away, doesn't lose them at the end of the turn, and can use them to boost spells. Huge improvement.

I want to be optimistic about this. But it really, really looks like Cryx got nerfed to hell ... and that's my main army.

There's no reason to take Overlords any more. Soul Hunters got nerfed to Light Cav. Darren Wrathe isn't worth taking as far as I can tell. Bile Thralls got helluva expensive for some reason.

The Coven ... what the heck am I supposed to do with them now? No Stealth and Stygian Abyss got nerfed hard. And ... No Stealth. At all. Are you kidding me? They just became the easiest warcasters to kill.

Bloodgorgers lost their cool abilities. Terminus can't heal himself with soul tokens. Mind you, I don't own Terminus, but I think that was a pretty big part of his playstyle.

Rengrave is completely boring now, as well as useless. And pirates didn't get better. Which means they are still bad.

Jackwise a lot of stuff got better. But the helldiver lost it's AoE, and thus it's only purpose IMO. Cankerworm got the crap kicked out of him. And our arc nodes are now really expensive for some reason.


What exactly is the bright side here?

Noisy_Marine wrote:


What exactly is the bright side here?

no idea really, i suppose you could hope that all the cryx players will submit playtest info in such numbers as to get at least some unnerfing done.
yea, i can't really come up with much better then hoping they unchange some things for you

Noisy_Marine wrote:But the helldiver lost it's AoE, and thus it's only purpose IMO.

The Helldiver now has a different purpose than it did before as Burrow works a bit differently now.

First of all, it's dirt cheap and it still has the excellent damage grid it had before.
Second, your opponent will not be able to do anything to it before it attacks unless you let them.
The new wording of Burrow allows you to full advance and burrow afterwards every turn, meaning it will almost never get hit with anything until after you've charged with it, yet all the while it is still able to advance up the field.

First turn it seems slow, moving a short 5" and burrowing, or running 10" and doing nothing but acting as a target. However each turn after it burrows it gets placed 3" + base size + marker size from its previous position and can still use its full movement, including charging.

This means no more waiting for your opponent to move into range. Now the Helldiver takes the fight to the enemy. It used to be an area control jack with a good assassination tool built in. Now it is purely an assassination jack and has the tools to always get into the proper position.

Like Loki said, things roles are changing. While a glance at a model now may seem "like it's not worth taking" once you start building lists and finding out where you need an extra jack for blocking, or that last 4 points to fill your perfect list, etc. you will discover new roles for models that have changed.

My review of the models so far looks like everyone got hit about equally .. Check how many "loses ability" notes in the article Malfred linked on page one apply to both cCgnar and Menoth. Notice how little in cygnar is now fearless(only a few solos like journyman and laddermore). Cryx can do a lot to cause fear ... and now you can make all those elite units turn tail and run(on CMD 8 and 9 admitedly, but every time you kill half the unit they have to check).

Also, I like how they looked at things and said "what is this model really suppoesed to be doing?" I didn't even remebmer the Thead had a chain attack. WHy, cuase he's alwyas shotting stuff up. Now he lost a bunch of abilities, and his range dropped, but its one roll that can be boosted. He's better at what he does, and that's clearing a 12" swath of troops. Same for the bokur. Bokurs weren't being taken as body guards. They were being taken as super killy assault machines. Now they more reflect a bodyguard and when taken will be used more like a bodyguard(rather than an aimed missile of doom).

Anyway, my suggestion is get in a few games before you decide the whole army is nerfed. I knoiw I and my local group plan on getting in several games this weekend to put our new rules through the ringer.

Meph

Mephistoles1 wrote:Notice how little in cygnar is now fearless

That is one of the major changes, in Mk1 you didn't have to worry about fear as most units were made fearless by standards. Now stardard gives you reroll to failed command tests, which is good as cygnar has 9 or 10 commands but you can still botch those rolls.

I'm more interested in the game changes as a whole. I think it's easy to not see the forest for
the trees when dealing with Mark II, but a lot of the complaints on the PP boards
ONLY deal with changes to their faction.

Some of the people complaining haven't even read the regular rule-set yet.

I don't think you necessarily have to play, but you do have to read the rules set and look beyond
the changes made to your faction to make a judgment.

malfred wrote:I'm more interested in the game changes as a whole. I think it's easy to not see the forest for
the trees when dealing with Mark II, but a lot of the complaints on the PP boards
ONLY deal with changes to their faction.

Some of the people complaining haven't even read the regular rule-set yet.

I don't think you necessarily have to play, but you do have to read the rules set and look beyond
the changes made to your faction to make a judgment.

Or the part in the instructions that asks people to not post wishlists, or complaints about changes to their faction? It's really sad and immature. Heck there might be some legitimate complaints, but if I was Jason, I wouldn't want to wade through the huge number of whiny bitches to find it. He's really put a ton of work into this, and he reward is a bunch of complaints. Way to turn up the negative re-enforcement guys!

Same problem GW faces I'm afraid.

Rather than use the new rules to refine old tactics or discover new ones, certain people will simply complain about nerfing and post up unreasonable demands (look at most fan made Codecies, or proposed 'fixes', all of which seem to involve dropping points, upping stats etc)

Still, as long as even a handful of people give them the feedback they actually need, all will be good.

Free Strikes- A model can make a free strike if an enemy model leaves its Melee range and/or Line of Sight. So, a model can no longer avoid a free strike by moving behind an intervening model.

Woah... does this change godhead + Menoth's Gaze?!

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Same problem GW faces I'm afraid.

Rather than use the new rules to refine old tactics or discover new ones, certain people will simply complain about nerfing and post up unreasonable demands (look at most fan made Codecies, or proposed 'fixes', all of which seem to involve dropping points, upping stats etc)

Still, as long as even a handful of people give them the feedback they actually need, all will be good.

Agreed. Our group is going to test these rules extensively(being the junkies we are) and provide a collective batch of useful feedback. We've got players from every faction and while friendly, are pretty competitive players so I think we will push the rules to their limits, find any place that isn't clear or seems clunky and report back to PP.

Meph

Just a quick question for those who have played a bit of the new rules...

I've been looking at the models for Warmachine again, and there are some I like. However, the one thing that turned me off the game in the first place was the way it seemed to entirely boil down to the Warcasters Feat being used at the most opportune time.

Not saying this is a bad mechanic by any stretch, but I'm not a fan of trumps in this way.

So with the new rules, will a well timed Feat still pretty much hand you victory, or is there now need to combine it with other select attacks?

FRAK, I just dropped over a grand on my new IG army and a custom Battlefoam case for it, and now you guys are getting me all exited over warmachine again.

FRAK

Mad Doc: Warmachine is still warmachine. MKII is streamlined, less confusing, a little more balanced, but a lot more focused on Jacks(the way it was when it first came out and the way most of us think it should have stayed along).

Our local players are already finding the new uber combos, like Vlads 14" charge + signs n portents for free after he kills what eh charged, etc. That part of warmachine is still there and strong. Feat timing, movement timing, spell timing are all still the meat and bones of Warmachine. As someone who doesn't do very good at setting up super combos that irks me a little also, but overall I like the way it plays again, and it makes for a good balance to 40K in my hobby interests.

While the test is going on the rules and all the cards for the models are free right now so it would be a good time to download the pdf's and see if it catches your interest. Getting started in warmachine is not that expensive unless you plan on buying every model for your faction (then I think it surpasses most 40k armies in cost .

Meph

Yeah, it is really going to take some relearning as many models have fundamentally changed.

Interesting note on troops- apparently a picket line/wall is no longer possible- at least beyond the commanders' range.

Unfortunately, my Cryx seem to have taken a big hit. Deneg kept her abilities, but assassination with her just got alot tougher. The Coven are laughably bad now. Skarre kept her melee'ish enhancements but lost her ranged strike. PAsph seems okay, as does Goreshade (bane knights are not so sexy anymore). But Cryx support is reeling- expensive bile thralls and arc nodes really undercut Cryx's traditional strength in that area.

Menoth seems to have fared okay, and I like the boosts that jacks will give them (Yay crusader!).

Cygnar seems very full of win, as they have gotten big boosts lately and v2 doesn't seem to slow them down much. The nerf of SKnights was odd, though, as they weren't huge to begin with.

Khador seems to still beat face. Vlad seems as good as ever.