All New War - Khador Thoughts

With all of the talk of the new edition announcement and what some of the major changes may mean out of the way, I can finally get to the most important topic: how does all of this relate to meeeeeeeeee?

Seriously though, as much as I'd like to go through each faction and hit the highs, lows, and what might/should change, that would take more time than I may have ever had (and is certainly well above what I could pull off now). So I'm just going to focus on the one faction that is weighing heaviest on my mind: those chilly, nationalistic Khards that everyone loves to explode by the dozen.

What follows will be my thoughts and hopes for how the faction will improve in the next edition of Warmachine. I'll refrain from any armchair design as best I can, but I might go nuts and do an entry-by-entry quick review. We'll see how it goes!

New Warmachine/Hordes Edition - General Rule Spoiler Thoughts

Heads are still spinning from Privateer Press' announcement of a rules revision for Warmachine and Hordes, mine included. After having some time to digest the deluge of information we've received so far (most of it from Primecast #30), I wanted to collect my thoughts about some of the bigger changes and what they may mean for WM/H.

Thoughts after the break.

All New War - A New Edition for Warmachine and Hordes

After months of relatively little news and almost no new product announcements, Privateer Press finally dropped the bomb that people have been speculating about for awhile: Warmachine and Hordes will be getting a new edition this year (announcement site).

Full day one info dump after the break (and damn is it a lot more information than I thought we'd have!)

Grolar Thoughts and Theory

Now that the Grolar is, despite the best efforts of Skynet, an actual goddamn model you can buy the list idea gears are stating to spin again. Turns out that the best way to spark a desire to play a game is to release new content for it periodically. Who'd have thought?

Every time I look at this picture I expect the model to slowly
fade out of existence like in Back to The Future

I played some proxy games with the Grolar when the rules first came out (back when I had to use a dinosaur egg as a proxy), but I didn't want to get into an in depth discussion about it until it was actually in hand.

With that long fabled day having finally arrived, lets take a closer look at Khador's "newest" addition to it's warjack stable. Discussion starts after the break.

Size Comparison (Grolar Follow Up)

From Left to Right: Ruin, plastic Juggernaut, Grolar, and old metal Kodiak

Out of curiosity I lined up several of Khador's warjacks for a side-by-side comparison of how the warjacks have evolved across the years.

The plastic Prime warjack kit was a big change when it came out. Literally - for whatever reason (most likely due to the cheaper medium, or possibly the need to size up to maintain detail fidelity) the Prime plastic models were much larger than their metal precedents. You can still see the size difference with the metal Kodiak which was basically a reworked Juggernaut of the era.

Ruin is another step up the sizing chart (I didn't organize this picture quite right in hindsight). I was impressed at the size of the model when it came out, it being a very noticeable improvement over the original Kodiak in size and overall design (looking at them side by side nearly gives me whiplash). I figured it was a good indicator of what to expect from the eventual Grolar/Kodiak kit.

I was mostly right. The Grolar/Kodiak kit shares the same overall design and form factor introduced with Ruin's model, but once again (probably, again, due to being in plastic) the Grolar/Kodiak kit is another step up the size chart. It makes the Grolar/Kodiak kit easily the largest non-Behemoth, non-colossal warjack in Khador's model line.

I didn't think about it at the time, but now I'm interested in seeing how the Grolar/Kodiak kit matches up against the Behemoth in terms of relative size. Makes me more interested in seeing the eventual Behemoth resculpt, assuming that all of the Apotheosis character heavies are getting redone (which seems like a safe bet now that the Thunderhead and the Avatar of Menoth are on the release list).

The funniest/saddest comparison is matching up the Grolar/Kodiak with the old metal Kodiak. You could *almost* fit the Kodiak inside of the Grolar's model (almost). It is a remarkable improvement for a model that is supposed to be a big, burly, bear-inspired brawler. Shame about the Kodiak's rules, but hopefully they eventually embiggen those too.

Plastic Berserker/Mad Dog/Rager Kit Teaser

From of Bell of Lost Souls:

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2016/03/exclusive-privateer-mystery-warmachine-miniature.html

With the added quote of "They say trouble comes in threes..."


It looks like I get to immediately eat my words about waiting until 2017 for the Rager. It might make it out in 2016 after all!

Grolar Unboxing

After almost two years of waiting for it (first announced in Warmachine: Vengeance, released on March 19, 2014) the Grolar is finally out and available for purchase. It has been so long that I have forgotten about this model multiple times, only to be reminded by some random post/comment/army list.

I won't quite say it is worth the wait - 23 months is a ridiculous amount of time to wait for any single model to come out, let alone a non-character heavy warjack - but it is very nice to finally have the Grolar in hand. It has great rules and a fantastic model to go along with it.

Anyone with any interest in the model has no doubt bought one (or two, or three out of disbelief and a fear that they will poof out of existence) for themselves, so if you're a Khador player, you know what's in the box.

That said, I do think it is worth checking out the Grolar's box set to highlight some of the things that probably held up its release for so damn long, the things that make it a particularly remarkable kit for Privateer Press to have produced, and finally to pay tribute to a once great and now largely overshadowed warjack: the noble Kodiak (who shares the box with the Grolar and is very tellingly not featured on the cover despite being the originator of this chassis type).

Breakdown starts after the link.

Weekend Gaming - Irusk2 *hearts* Flag

Every once in awhile my one group of friends manages to secure a weekend to get everyone together to play a couple of games of WM/H (or whatever everyone is in the mood for). Its gotten harder as everyone settles further into grown-up responsibilities (mainly marriage and kids) but sometimes we get lucky and a weekend lines up for enough of us.

This past weekend was one of those weekends and WM/H was the game of choice. I'm still hanging out on the edge of WM/H after burning out hard on it near the end of last year so I don't have many lists that I've wanted to play. Butcher3 and Sorscha2 will always be good, but I want to play something different.

I've been playing Vlad3 here and there and enjoying it, but I have a hard time finding a list with him I really like. Most of the lists I make with Vlad3 at the helm seem like they'd be better under Vlad3, unless I go theme (which is fun but one sided) or more cav focused to get something out of his feat (which leads to pretty much the same problem).

In the week leading up to the gaming day I started to go back over 'casters I liked playing but didn't put a lot of time into and one name floated to the top: Irusk2. I had some lists I liked with him, he's pretty great in general, and there has been some discussion about him recently that motivated me to get him back on the table.

I used Irusk2 for all the games I played on Saturday and really liked using him. I'm not going to do batreps (not quite up for that yet) but I do have some thoughts from those games that I wanted to share. Lists and thoughts after the break.

SmogCon Q&A Tidbits and Rumors

At some point, probably a year or two ago, the Warmachine and Hordes community really embraced social media. Lots of prominent players took to Twitter and Facebook as ways of directly communicating with each other and the rest of the player base.

While that is good-to-great for building a sense of community, it had an effect I never would have foreseen: almost all spoiler talk happens first on Twitter/Facebook, and then we're lucky to catch it on a forum somewhere (usually it's just something like "spoilers on Trevor from Chain Attack's Twitter?") As a social media Luddite, it makes me nostalgic for the good 'ol days of vague forum posts and blog info dumps.

In that spirit, I wanted to collect the set of spoiler-y tidbits and rumors that came out of SmogCon this past weekend, which you can find after the break. If you want to preserve the original means of delivery, only read it 140 characters at a time.

Thoughts on PP's Mini-2016 Keynote

Privateer Press's Primecast podcast was kind enough to offer up a bevvy of spoilers recently, courtesy of Matt Wilson and Jason Soles talking about the next round of 'casters and 'locks, as well some random tidbits for later in the year. 

I put together a quick and dirty synopsis of what was discussed during the podcast here. Now that I've had some time to digest what they talked about, lets kick around some thoughts about what all that info might mean.

Musings start after the break.

PP Mini-Keynote (via Primecast) - New Warcaster and Warlock Teasers

The latest Primecast managed to dump a bunch of spoiler info in the form of a mini-keynote of what we can expect from PP in the coming year. Several teasers about the upcoming crop of 'casters and 'locks, along with what seems to be confirmation that we're getting two new sets of 'casters and 'locks this year.

Check after the break for a quick transcript of what Matt Wilson and Jason Soles revealed.