Vicarious Competition

Welcome to the world of salt and misery that was my Gencon performance this year.  The US WTC Team chose Gencon as our “practice event” this year.  At our practice events, we typically are bringing our proposed lists for the event and testing them against each other and play a few trial runs into perceived problematic matchups we might be concerned about.  This led to a very high talent ceiling for the event from an excellent pool of players.  One could easily go 0-3 in a qualifying event and not feel too bad about it given the caliber of opponents. Personally I’ve never done particularly well in the first round of tournaments and events.  I don’t wake up well and my auto-pilot doesn’t always protect my fragile Retribution models as well as it needs to.  This is coupled with my own personal unlucky black cloud/tendency to hit some of my strongest opponents also in round one. My lists: Elara2 - DoI - Phoenix Banshee 3x Halbs with UA and Soulles...

Welcome back everyone!  In proper form with my chaotic blend of topics, I wanted to try out a buzz article featuring a hot new topic some folks are getting excited about:  The AiTC lists!  Ret being the most represented faction is super fantastic and I hope our faction has a strong showing! The lists can be found here: https://conflictchamber.com/?event=12 I have precious few Retribution players in my local meta, so there are only a few folks I get to bounce ideas off of and get mirror games in with.  It’s always neat to see what other communities come up with and what combinations they are trying.  Until very recently I’ve always felt like list building was one of my weaker points, but Mk3 has been much easier for me. The one list that has been generating the most discussion from what I’ve seen has been Vyros1- Forges of War with 6 Hydras!!  I’m told it’s very op and impossible to hide from all the Hydra guns.  You just shoot their warcaster...

This season’s ADR gifts us with a questionable stable of Warcasters to try and cobble together into a pair: Magister Helynna; Lord Ghyrrshyld4, The Forgiven; Thyron, Sword of Truth; and Dawnlord Vyros1.  This feels like one of our least exciting Active Duty Rosters since the program’s inception, but I feel like it’s still workable. The frustrating problem of this season’s ADR is not as simple as the lack of strong casters, but more focused on the lack of a strong pairing.  There is a tremendous amount of overlap in Battlegroup diversity, spell kits, and overall functionality/gameplan of what we have to work with. We can start by looking at the two obvious power picks:  Helynna and Vyros1.  Both are very competitive warcasters that have seen consistent play in Mk3 and have the tools you need to place well in an event.  The catch is you only get one of them to work with.  Reason being the overlap in what they do.  Both warcasters want to run a he...

This week’s entry brings us to one of my favorite local-ish stores, Nerdvana Games in Egg Harbor NJ.   https://www.facebook.com/groups/632985093478693  The ownership is top notch, they keep their shelves well stocked, and generally put on a really great show for their Warmachine Community. A close friend of mine, Brad Park of Fully Boosted, has been running their Warmachine events since the store’s meta first began to grow.  It’s since become tradition that when I play at Brad’s events, he selects the warcasters that I need to build a pair out of to add an extra layer of fun for both of us.  This month we had Vyros1 and Ghyrrshyld4.   I modified an early Mk3 list with Vyros1 into a Shadows of the Retribution theme since most of the models were overlapping with what I wanted to bring anyways.  I have been experimenting with Ghyrrshyld using a Nyss-based force in anticipation of a frozen theme coming out in the future.  I mostly want to jam my...