This Hat is Russian

by Ishamael

Well, my particular position as a Khador player has given me a new model to be excited about, this horse-drawn carriage with guns! This week has seen the unveiling of a new unit type for WARMACHINE: The Battle Engine. All we have right now are just a couple pictures, and the promise of them being useful, yet they will not eclipse jacks and Warcasters. To quote from the Privateer Insider for Jan 4, 2011:

"The next hurdle was that early incarnations of the battle engines had too many support abilities, often far-reaching in their effects. During one round of playtesting, some playtest games revolved around the battle engine more than the warcaster. This was certainly not the desired effect, and each support ability was carefully reassessed when the offending ability was removed. Some were tweaked and others were replaced with abilities for the battle engines rather than the army."

So, I'm going to be awaiting the release of the rules for this particular model. It will be fully resin, so that carrying case won't be getting any heavier! While I can't say much about it without the rules and statistics of the model, its size could lend to giving just about anything a unit to hide behind. Liberal application of Behemoth or Destroyers could do well here. Arcing fire is pretty sweet. Now, firing behind other models brings me to my next topic for Khador: the much-maligned Zerkova.

So, the last few games I've played, I have used Zerkova as my caster. This decision came about partly because I thought the model was pretty cool, and also because in my forum-cruising over at the Privateer Press website revealed that the Khador community there doesn't like her. Apparently she's something "un-Khadoran." I have no conception as to what this means. Maybe it refers to her virtual lack of ability in close combat. At any rate, she is exclusively a spell caster. At this point, I'm going to list a few virtues she has over most other casters:

7 FOCUS, with the ability to use her Focus Sphere to reduce the COST of a spell by 1
She has an artifact called the Ghost Stone, which makes her front arc 360 degrees, allows her to ignore LOS in her control area, as well as ignore Stealth.
She has 7 spells to choose from, ranging from a basic offensive spell like Razor Wind, as well as the capacity to control enemy warrior models for one attack, cast a unit-wide Ice Cage, or even push a model back with Force Blast.
Her feat is fantastic for a turn where you need to get close. Enemies in her 14 inch control area lose their initial ranged attacks, can't run, charge, make special attacks, give or receive orders, or make special actions.

These are a few cool things about her. Of particular note is the combination of Razorwind and the Ghost Stone, allowing her to fire a Pow 12 at anything within 10 inches of her. I've used this to ninja-kill other casters that got too close. The Stone can also be combined with her Twister spell to harm formations.

To close this preliminary on her, her spell Banishing Ward is fantastic. It makes it so your enemy cannot cast spells/animi against them, while you remain able to buff them. Using this and giving a unit multiple Blizzards helps them survive far more than they would be able to otherwise. I use a full unit of Rifle Corps w/ Uncle Joe and a unit of Ternion to Blizzard them up, and cast Banishing Ward on them. Fearless, Tough, def 14, and immune to enemy spells, as well as the capacity to use that nice big template of "no light infantry allowed," yes please!

Next time I'll be going over some combinations with her, as well as a list I've used to try and take advantage of her abilities. Hopefully more rules will be revealed this week about the Battle Engines, so I will be reporting on that as well!

I loves me some cone of cold,
Ishamael