Below are two battle reports for the game that is “The New, but Old Hotness”, Warmachine. I’m really enjoying playing this game again, like I did back in 2003 (or was it ’04?), which is pretty awesome considering I came to a point where I hated playing the game.

Last Wednesday I finally had the opportunity to play Dave in a game of Warmachine. Up until then, I think we’d only played a couple of games of Legend of the Five Rings and a “demo” game of Uncharted Seas. We decided on 50 points for this game as I wanted to test out my Old Witch list that I made up and started painting over the last few weeks. This being my second ever game of Warmachine using Khador, I figured I’d probably lose badly. Dave has been playing Retribution over hte last little while and seems to be enjoying them and had yet to play against Khador with them.

His list went something like this:

• Adeptis Rahn Shyeel
• Gorgon
• Hydra
• Phoenix
• Dawnguard Invictors (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• Dawnguard Invictor Officer & Standard
• House Shyeel Battle Mages (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• Mage Hunter Strikeforce (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• Mage Hunter Commander
• Stormfall Archers (Leader and 3 Grunts)
• Arcanist
• Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios
• Mage Hunter Assassin

My list:

• Zevanna Agha, the Old Witch of Khador
• Destroyer
• Kodiak
• War dog
• Greylord Ternion
• Iron Fang Pikemen (Leader and 9 Grunts)
• Iron Fang Pikemen Officer & Standard
• Kossite Woodsmen (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• Widowmakers
• Man-o-war Kovnik
• Berserker
• Manhunter
• Widowmaker Marksman

Dave had the table already set up by the time I arrived. He used lots of terrain, which I like. The center was dominated by a ruined building with a forest inside, there were his on either side of the table with a forest or two near each deployment zone.

As usual, I don’t remember all the details, but here are some highlights. Manhunter does nothing as he leaves the safety of the forest and gets shot to death. The Greylords nearly wipe out a unit of Mage Hunters with sprays and the Ternion ends up losing one of the three to the Battle Mages. The Kodaik nearly gets wrecked by the Phoenix. Kovnik gets charged by the Mage Hunter Assassin and survives with 2 boxes left. The Widowmakers pick off a few Invictors. The IFP move up the center with Weald Secrets on them and get owned by the Stormfall Archers setting them on fire. The Widowmakers get in the way of the Berserker charging the Phoenix. The Kossite Woodsmen show up behind the Battle Mages and kill all but one of them. The Destroyer works on the Gorgon, but fails to do much. The Berserker gets charged by the Hydra. In the final turn, Scrapjack uses Avatar of Slaughter to go through a bunch of his troops to end up in front of Rahn. The Old Witch uses Unseen Path to be placed next to Rahn and proceeds to attack. She does some decent damage but fails to kill on rolling triple-ones for damage. In return, Rahn attacks the Old Witch, leaving her with 8 boxes prior to his last attack. Dave decides to boost the attack and then damage to kill her.

A really great game, where I felt like I did a pretty decent job of making him work for his victory. Dave is a really awesome opponent who is cool helping out people who may not know all the rules inherently.

Thursday I played another Warmachine game using the Old Witch. This time against Joel’s Mercenaries. We’d agreed on 35 points for this one.

His list:

• Fiona the Black
• Mangler
• Mariner
• Long Gunner Infantry (Leader and 9 Grunts)
• Sea Dog Crew (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• First Mate Hawk
• Lord Rockbottom
• Master Gunner Dougal MacNaile
• Rutger Shaw
• Taryn di la Rovissi

My list:

• Zevanna Agha, the Old Witch of Khador
• Destroyer
• Kodiak
• War dog
• Iron Fang Pikemen (Leader and 9 Grunts)
• * Iron Fang Pikemen Officer & Standard
• Kossite Woodsmen (Leader and 5 Grunts)
• Widowmakers
• Manhunter

The real action in this game didn’t happen until much later in the game where the Kodiak charged the Mariner standing toe-to-toe with my final IFP a few inches in from the two lines of Long Gunners. The thought was to do his Smash and Grab to throw the Mariner into the Long Gunners and hopefully kill a few. The first attack worked fine, the second whiffed when I didn’t boost to hit ( I was saving one in case I felt the need to boost damage on someone else). The following turn, the Kodiak managed to wreck the Mariner instead. In the final turn, the Scrapjack mowed through seven Long Gunners, opening things up for the Old Witch. The Old Witch used Unseen Path to teleport next to Fiona and kill her.

Another really fun game and I feel like I’m starting to learn my Khador army pretty well. I look forward to playing again, hopefully in the Shattered Grounds league up at the Game Preserve – Keystone.