Last night I played my Cryx against Ian. The game was long and by the end rather tiresome. But over all I had a great time because I came away with a lot of things to think about in terms of how to improve my play.
Cryx was never my main army and with all the changes in MKII and new units/models I have assembled (can't paint right now
) I am playing an essentially new army in a game that works a bit differently than my brain keeps thinking it does (ex. I remember knockdown being a LOT different).
All of which made me think about new players who are approaching WARMACHINE (Remember it kicks so much ass that it has to be all capitals) for the first time. Trying to work out their first list/s, figure out the basics, and get some fun in.
We have seen some discussion here about lists. And of course having a balanced list with solid synergies and options for responding to various situations is important. But it is far from the only factor in WARMACHINE.
A larger factor is knowing the the rules... COLD. Both the universal rules, and individual model rules (yours AND your opponents) This is something even our top players at the store sometimes struggle with, especially with the transition to MKII where many rules we knew have changed slightly.
As an example in my game my forgetting or not knowing several rules lead me to make a number of critical mistakes. Since I am new to the combination of Nightmare (a jack) and Denegra (warcaster) I keep forgetting that Nightmare get's stealth when within her control radius. I also forgot (and failed to check on) the fact that my opponent's caster (the Butcher) does not have any speed enhancing spells. Another incident was forgetting that arcnodes can not be used when engaged (a universal rule).
All of these are rules I should have known, and that would have significantly changed the way I played the game.
Was my list optimal? Doubtful. Was that what held me back? No. Not much if at all. But failure to know the rules did, and the more I play with a substantially similar or identical list the faster I will pick up on those rules.
Another factor that I find more important that the details of the list is how good the commander is. This is easy to say and hard to fix. But it is true. Spotting and exploiting opportunities, knowing when to sacrifice units, understanding how place units to protect them against X,Y,Z etc. is just as important (usually more important) than choosing what unit to bring to the table.
Again as an example from last nights game my own tactical mistakes in not being aggressive enough, model placement, threat priority, etc. made more difference than any choice of units that I made.
IMO sticking with your first solid list and playing it a bunch will help you learn the more important factors of the game after which you will be better able to evaluate units on your own.
Gota Jet but I thought I would put down a few thoughts for new players.
