Andy takes a look at an awesome Mercenary Army List for Warmachine which is full of Dwarves and Pirates!

1^st Battle Group (50pts) – Rhulic Force

General Ossrum – Warcaster (WJP+5)

• Avalancher – Heavy Warjack (9pts)
• Blaster  – Light Warjack (3pts)
• Blaster  – Light Warjack (3pts)
• Ogrun Bokur (3pts)

Thor Steinhammer – Solo (2pts)

• Avalancer – Heavy Warjack (9pts)
• Orgun Bokur (3pts)

Highshield Gun Corps – 10 man Unit (8pts)

• Highshield Gun Corps Officer & Standard – Unit UA (3pts)

Highshield Artillery Corps – 3 man Unit (3pts)

Highshield Artillery Corps – 3 man Unit (3pts)

Horgenhold Forgeguard – 10 man Unit (8pts)

Total = 50pts

2^nd Battle Group (50pts) – Pirate Force

Captain Bartolo Montador  – Warcaster (WJP+5)

• Galleon – Colossal (18pts)
• Galleon – Colossal (18pts)

Master Gunner Dougal McNaile – Solo (2pts)

Sea Dog Deck Gun – 2 man Unit (2pts)

Sea Dog Deck Gun – 2 man Unit (2pts)

Sea Dog Crew – 10 man Unit (8pts)

• Mr. Walls, Sea Dog Quartermaster – Unit UA (2pts)
• Sea Dog Rifleman – Unit UA (1pt)
• Sea Dog Rifleman – Unit UA (1pt)
• Sea Dog Rifleman – Unit UA (1pt)

Total = 50pts

3^rd Battle Group (50pts) – Magnus Traitor Force

Magnus the Traitor – Warcaster (WJP+6)

• Mangler – Heavy Warjack (8pts)
• Renegade – Light Warjack (5pts)
• Renegade – Light Warjack (5pts)

Orin Midwinter – Solo (2pts)

Kell Bailoch – Solo (2pts)

Croe’s Cutthroats – 6 man Unit (7pts)

Long Gunner Infantry – 10 man Unit (10pts)

• Long Gunner Officer & Standard – Unit UA (2pts)

Trencher Infantry – 10 man Unit (10pts)

• Trencher Grenadier – Unit UA(1pt)
• Trencher Grenadier – Unit UA(1pt)
• Trencher Grenadier – Unit UA(1pt)
• Trencher Officer & Sniper –Unit UA (3pts)

= 150pts

Tactics

I've tried to make the three parts of my force focussed on different things. The Rhulic force has Fire for Effect (FoE), with the fantastic new Warcaster General Ossrum. He does a lot of stuff that Supreme Komandant Irusk does for Khador, but the Rhulic forces he’ll be dealing with is inhereantly tougher and more accurate, hopefully making that FoE spell all the more destructive. As you can see I've included two of the massive Galleon Collosals in my list. While it might be an idea to use FoE on it… Galleon shoots multiple AoE shots… it’s probably more effective to use that spell on the more accurate Highshield Artillery Corps.

Other than that, the Dwarves have some long ranged shooting with the Avalanchers and then some devastating short ranged sprays (can’t wait to drop FoE on those!) from the Blasters, making them flexible and deadly.

The Pirates are doing what Broadside Bart does best… firing loads of cannons! The two Galleons can each fire up to 6 (POW:13) cannon shots per activation (9 if you fire one weapon again with Bart’s Broadside spell). However, they  also have a Harpoon Cannon with all the abilities you've come to expect from harpoons (like those on the Cryx Harrower)… firing that with the Broadside spell, might create some interesting results!

Dougal McNaile is almost obligatory with the Galleon, those rerolls on AoE scatter will help to thin out soft infantry and dent light warjacks before they get to my lines… but I need to place McNaile so that I can get as many of the AoE shooters within his Command range to get the most out of him.

Snipe (from Ossrum & Magnus) will definitely help the Galleon, giving it a range of 18” on it’s main guns, but the Artillery Corp and Avalanchers need it more during the Turn 1 and 2, so they can pick off tough targets.

The Magnus section of the list is mainly defensive, there’s the Renegades with their rockets to slow the enemy advance (with some big AoE knockdown) and Orin Midwinter can be used to mess with spell heavy warcasters… just remember to activate him (and use his Void Staff) after you've cast all of your spells… unless you want to power up a big Chain Lightning shot (that was a fun trick!).

The big part of the Magnus list is the Trenchers. I’ve pumped the maximum amount of Trenchers I can get into the single unit I'm allowed, both to get the maximum protection out of their smoke screen and so that they can be a bit better at holding objectives, along with their opposite number the Highshield Gun Corp from the Rulic section.

As a little addition to the Magnus section, I’ve added Kell Bailoch (whom I can’t speak more highly off) and Croe’s Cutthroats… Croe and his motley crew are there, no only because I like them, but because they’re particularly good at dealing with Warbeasts and Heavy Infantry… they’re little more than an irritation most of the time, but I’ve won games with them and in this size of a game, the chance for that sinister Backstab + Poison combo is too good to pass up. Still I'm not mad, so I only took a small sized unit of them, no sense in wasting points.

The list includes the points reduction on the Renegades for the Magnus themed force. However, it's not entirely clear whether that works or not. If not, then the decision has to be made to lose either Kell Bailoch or Orin Midwinter... a though choice... what would you do?