a WIN!

Played a game of warmachine yesterday, with my first outing with Strakov. I was playing against Nick, another commitee member down the club. He was running his circle force with Moshar as warlock. I hadn't played against Moshar before, and it was my first outing with strakov, so I was a bit worried. Gringo at Cafe Turbo will be posting up a full battle report, which I suggest you check out, but here is my list of points from the battle and what I learned, a conclusion if you will.

Here is my force:

Strakov
-Beast 09
-Spriggan
Wardog
10 Kayazy Assassins
-Underboss
3 Demo Corp
Drakun + Dismount
manhunter
greylords
koldun lord

50pts

I pulled of a bottom of round 2 win with some clever manovuering and the spriggan's wonderful bulldoze. I set it up with an overrun to position the spriggan, then feat, then a spriggan (with superiority) charged with three focus and bulldozed the gorax out the way (yeah, no reach is great) to lay it down. Here is what I learned

• Superiority is amazing. I have to get used to having a MOV 6 jack, since it makes it so much easier to line up charges. Even my opponent misjudged how much he could move by the exact amount of superiority, so it can surprise as well.
• Bulldoze is very handy. You need to be able to line it up right, which can be difficult, but it just lets you glide past those other models.
• Overrun is amazing for positioning models. Also, if you use it on Strakov to shoot then you get the D3 attacks from rapid fire, which means you normally end up with a good chance of hitting the target to activate it.
• Strakov is very good. all his abilities stack really well, and he has a lot of flexibility. The only problem is that he has to play forward for his feat. If you do not win on feat turn then he can be vunerable to assassination next turn. I am thinking of trying to get him some fast moving escort to make sure he is safe. they just run into position around him to act as a meat shield. A wardog is also pretty good to have along side him since its counter charge and return can be very handy for blocking charge lanes.
• I need to practice against hordes more. I decided to enjoy my turn and leave the spriggan till last. I charged the great bears into the feral warpwolf to kill him off since he killed beast 09 last turn, but ended up giving Moshar 2 fury, which almost cost me the game (it came down to the last roll for damage, which ended up been, luckily, very high)
• Nick is an exceptional player. his familiarity with his force is recognisable. he stacked all his abilities very well, which showed when he killed Beast 09 (with only 1 damage point) with 4 attacks from the feral warpwolf. If I had not pulled the assassination off then I think I would have been screwed.
• Druids are horrible. The ability to mix all their abilities is amazing, with no spells in a big radius, immunity from fire, cold and electricity and a bunch of clouds I had real problems with them.
• Sprays in the new rules are VERY good. I had a surrounded drakun with bloodweavers. 3 sprays later they are all dead, and he is free to run around causing havoc. 
• I wasted the Kayazy with my deployment. They were in totally the wrong position. I must get better at deployment.

Thats all I can think about for now. I was thinking about composition and I might cut the  KA down to a min unit with the underboss since it is difficult for positioning with them. I then drop the GB since in the ETC we can only have one on the team, and Gringo wants them. This gives me enough to buy Fenris and Yuri, which will be good for more scary threats.

I have a feeling with Strakov that you want a wide spread line so that the enemy does not know where the charge is coming from. I would have the Drakun and Fenris at the ends, Strakov centreish, then spread our forces around. You are going to be putting Strakov somewhere the next turn to act as the centre point which everything is going to be drawn to. If you scare the opponent enough then they will go defensive and try to block charge lanes. Next turn you either find/make a hole, or you just mash the whole of the front line with your force. If you do the latter then I am thinking of keeping the kayazy as a second line charge so that they can mini-feat where they want and kill the caster, hopefully. I think I am going to call this the Dragnet.