Privateer Press @ TempleCon 2013: Convergence of Cyriss and other news

Grab a seat, take a breath...

  Only minutes ago, Privateer Press did their keynote presentation at TempleCon 2013. And boy, did they have a few surprises for us! New Warmachine faction is coming out, a new combat deck-building card game, new stuff for Level 7, and news for Organised Play.

  Excited? Well you should be! Information are not plentiful at the moment, but nonetheless let's take a look at each piece of news

 High Command: Warmachine & Horde

  The impression I got from the presentation is that High Command is something of a combination of a CCG with Warmachine/Hordes on an epic, army level, rather than the, relatively, small battle group level we get in typical Warmachine/Hordes games. If you know of Games Workshop's Warmaster and Epic Armageddon, imagine something of that scope as a deck building game. 

  You get in your deck three (yes three!) warcasters/warlocks, each coming some specific and flavourful options, preferences, etc. Using those are your basis, you build your deck and go to battle! High Command takes the scope of the typical Warmachine/Hordes game and turns in up to eleven! Now, you are no longer of control of a single caster with a small force fighting skirmish battles. Oh no! You are now a High Commander, hence the title, controlling multiple casters and their forces, fighting other area and/or objectives of strategic significance for your faction (presumably).

  For some people used to having miniatures representing their armies, moving to, effectively, a card game, might be a serious let down. However, on the bright side you can enjoy Warmachine and Hordes on a completely different (see epic) scale, without spending bucket loads of money to collect new miniatures and also time, to assemble and paint them.

Convergence of Cyriss: New Warmachine Faction

  Yup, that's right a (yet another) new Warmachine faction. Their name, Convergence of Cyriss. Those of you that have followed Privateer Press since their first years, the name will sound familiar. The Temple of Cyriss was a major part of the D20 RPG adventures in  The Witchfire Trilogy (I think in Part II: Shadow of the Exile ). Cyriss is known as the Clockwork Goddess, the Maiden of Gears, the Mistress of Numbers.

  The presentation mentions they are humans inhabiting machines. They view machines, not just as tools. Rather, for them, they are a piece of art, a form of being of a higher order, combining the physical strength, that such constructs have, with a mathematical perfection transcending the pitiful human intellect.... or something of that sort. However, they are not purely mechanical, somehow they retain, at least a portion, of their consciousness. 

  From a gameplay perspective, they described literally as a clockwork army, in the sense that the individual elements of an army work like individual gears in a machine. So expect lots of synergy within the faction. Each warcaster, comes with his own field marshal ability, giving models in your group a specific ability, like making them arc nodes, or giving them Shield Guard.

   Warjacks, are known as Vectors. One ability that distinguishes them is something called an Induction Node. What that does is each time a vector spends a focus, once per turn, that focus can be passed on to a nearby vector. From the presentation video, it seems that this particular focus can be passed on to multiple vectors. For example, vector A has one focus and spends it to run. This focus is then passed on to nearby vector B, that uses it to, say, run as well. Again the focus is passed on to Vector C, that uses it to charge. Unfortunately no more details (eg how close the vectors have to be, whether they can used additional allocated focus apart from the one passed on to them and so on) are available at the moment.

   The Vectors stats, and quite possible true for the units and the faction at large, seem to be low/mid SP, low to very low DEF, high Arm. Another unique feature is that vectors do NOT have a set MAT and RAT. Instead, they have the same MAT and RAT as their warcaster. So in essence, the same vector under different warcasters becomes a completely different beast...  I mean warjack!

  Level 7: Omega Protocol: Space Hulk ala Privateer Press?

   In Level 7 [Escape] you were a frightened human trying to escape from a research lab facility, hunted by aliens and other baddies. Now in Omega Protocol, a squad of special ops troops are send in to destroy everything that remains in the facility... sounds a bit familiar doesn't it? So now you are some elite special ops commando badass, going in to blast stuff to bits. Presumably their will some sort of objectives, like shutting down part of the facility, retrieve stuff, set explosives and whatnot.

Organised Play 2013!

  Warmachine/Hordes was always open on its nature as a strong competitive game and of course their organised tournaments are some of the best around, probably are the best actually. And now, we will be getting lot more new formats!

  As their upcoming novel are released, their going to be special one-day scenarios, presumably connected to the story of the novel being released. Details are sketchy, but seems like you can go to participating stores and join in somehow.

  Iron Arena will make a come back, bigger and better as they claim.

   We also get a new league called Machinations. To be honest that sounds totally awesome. This going to be something like a long campaign with a overall storyline, in which players can participate (maybe contribute?). As it progresses, the story progresses. It is possible that it will be connected to book releases, but at this stage who knows?

  Of course we get Steamroller 2013, but that is no surprise really. Expect some minor changes, but not anything major.

   'Hardcore' is yet another competitive format. It is 1 caster, 1 list, fast paced format. In addition, there a Masters format, something like Steamroller turned up to eleven!

  Last but not least, we have Iron Gauntlet Warmachine & Hordes World Championship!!! This goes way beyond anything else we have seen so far from PP Organised Play. Let me outline some of the features:

• It will start with Lock & Load 2013 (first qualifiers) and end with Lock & Load 2014, when the final will be held
• You get points through a number of global qualifiers. Earn enough and you qualify for the final
• Fully painted armies. They want players to prove their mastery of the game as a whole, including the hobby elements ladies and gents!
• Specialist and character restrictions are baseline... and.... are you ready for it? ......
• Your lists don't have to be from the same faction!

Let me repeat that last one... Your lists do not have to be from the same faction. This is no joke! If you wish, you can bring your Khador and Cygnar lists, your Circle and Trolls.

  I think that about wraps it  up. For more details check out the videos on Privateer Press's site. Hopefully they are going to release some video or doc about the Q&As from the event soon.

  

Hordes & Warmachine: Tacticas and Forums

Don't know how most people approach a new game and what steps they take in order to get into it. Personally, I go on a reading spree. I go on reading all I can about background/fluff, tactics guides, battle reports and so.
It so happens I am at this stage with Hordes & Warmachine by Privateer Press (PP). I have been, in the last few weeks, lurking in the forums reading as many articles of the "How to play Army/warcaster/warlock X" variety. Unfortunately, PP's forums have certain issues and most of the time are unavailable. I don't know, and I don't care about the technicalities behind that. I do care about the fact that I can't access them when I want though.  At first I thought I would just copy-paste the posts  I am most interested in, in a word file and then read them when I please.

...But hold on!!! I got a blog now. One which supposedly is about this kind of stuff. So why not just post them here as a convenient place for me, or anyone else, to read those guides/articles. Therefore, in the following days I will posting several tactical guides from those wonderful people on the Privateer Press forums. I do not wish to get  credit for these guides, nor do I pretend that the posts here are a substitutes for the original forums threads, with their continuous feedback and comments.

  To recap:

• I will be reproducing the tacticas form PP forums here, due to the technical problems with their forums (causing them to be unavailable).
• All credit goes to the original authors. Hats off and respect to the time and effort they put in.
• I will be doing some minor editing and inserting some personal thoughts here and there. Wherever that is done, it will be clearly indicated.
• These posts are not a substitute for anything. Forums threads have a tenths, some even hundreds, of posts with comments and feedback and a continuous discussion which are invaluable.

So without further ado, I will be starting with, the army I have chosen to start with, Circle Orboros, the warlocks that are at the top of my list, currently Kromac and Grayle.

There is NOT only War(hammer) !

Early 90s: How it all started

Enter the board games

My first encounter with Games Workshop's products was though the board games Hero Quest, Space Crusade and later the video games HeroQuest & Space Hulk. So we are talking 1990-1992..ish. During that time noce no stores existed in our area, which either specialised or sold GW's products. I do not count the above mentioned games as strickly GW's, as they were published and distributed by Milton Bradley company and could be found in just about any decent toys store.
 
  It wasn't until I moved to London, as an undergraduate student, in 1998, that I first visited a local GW store that I got into the hobby. And GW has been 'leeching' money from my wallet ever since. Don't get me wrong, I loved the games, from 40k to fantasy, Mordheim to Bloodbowl and just about any video game based on Games Workshop's IP. I was so hooked into Warhammer fantasy and 40K by the time, that I even spend money to acquire the books form the past editions of the game, down to 40K 2nd edition and Rogue Trader.

  However, I am not sure at which point in time  I started to become annoyed (not sure if this is the words that best described how I felt) with GW. It wasn't one specific thing that started it, rather lots of small things which accumulated over time. Partly their business model and strategies, partly the time frame in which updates and new release came, partly the constanly increased price, and later practices and outrageous writing in several products.
  But despite my displeasures, I never really though about abandoning ship. To be honest, I never thought there was anything out there that came even close to competing. And so I never even got into the trouble for looking for other games. I knew of course there were some very good historical war games, but that was never really my cup of tea... although I am in the process of reconsidering even that now.

Searching for something new...

  It was only some weeks... or is it months? .... that I timidly begun looking for other games. Tabletop miniature war games, that is.  And surprisingly I stumbled upon some potential gems. First it was the amazing games from Privateer Press. And I am not talking about Warmachine and Hordes, but also their Iron Kingdoms role-playing game, and their exciting new project/game Level 7 (haven't had the chance to check their other products yet).

Now: How it might end .... ?

  After that I stumbled upon a presentation video of Infity, and sci-fi war game by Corvus Belli. Which again looked very promising (you can find said video here).

  Now, I am not going to do a comparison of pros and cons of between these games and companies, maybe that will be the subject of a different port. But if there is anything that I learnt in the past few weeks is that there are out there great games that are serious contenters in this genre. Having spent considerable money, time and effort into GW's game it is, admitedly, hard to break free from their grasp and most of the times the most difficult obstacle to overcome is our onw 'rationalisations' in trying to defend past habits and 'investments'.
  Well, for my part after struggling with the idea of, not giving up, but at least putting GW and its game in the back seat for a while, I am going to jump into Hordes, Warmachine and Infity and see for myself if they are as good as I am hoping they will be!