Angry Mob or Menite Party?

Privateer Press has tightened up their forum policies since the the Warmachine field test and are currently in the process of updating their forum software.  Whether or not that means they are more hardline regarding doom-saying and complaining on their forum will be seen soon but the forums will definitely be busy for the next few weeks.

I've discussed the optimism I have towards the new rules before, and that still holds true.  I'm going to be going through at the very least the Legion of Everblight, my own faction, to compare changes but only so far as to keep me from trying to play MkI rules and styles in a MkII world.  Then the glorious re-education process begins.

To our players:

We have decided to do something radical. We’ve been paying a lot of attention to our forums and talking with our players at the conventions this summer and it’s clear that the anticipation for MkII is driving everyone a little batty. Many are excited, some of you are a little afraid, but the suspense is killing everyone and the speculation is killing us! So after a great deal of deliberation we have decided that the best thing we can do for the mental well-being of our community is to completely change our plans and do what we said we wouldn’t: we’re going to put all of the MkII rules and model information online as PDF downloads, because four more months is just too damn long for everyone to be holding their breath.

There are some disclaimers and explanations that need to accompany this.

First, the rules and stat info are final. While the books and cards are still in layout and will be for the next few weeks before they go to press, this is the final form this information will take. So you can be confident that nothing you see here will change between now and when the rules come out in book form unless we find an editing mistake at the last moment that needs to be corrected. But our development on this is locked. You have the final data.

Second, as the book and cards are still in layout, and because we want to give this information to you now, you’re getting the no-frills version. The rules PDF is the book layout but does not include any backgrounds, art or diagrams. And in several places, you’ll note that icons are displayed by name rather than their graphic (these are waiting to be plugged in) and there are many instances of ‘see page XXX’, which is a placeholder for a page number that gets filled in as the very last thing we do in the layout process once we know that nothing is shifting around in the layout anymore. As well, the model info is being taken directly from our development files, so they’re not nice, neat little cards. Each model’s stat info is on a separate page as just the data with no graphical layout or whatnot.

So while this is an unpolished, un-beautiful version of what will be found in the final product, and while you’ll have to read around the ‘XXX’ and icon names, it IS the final information, and we know that’s what everyone is dying for right now anyway. Think of it as seeing a movie before all the special effects, color correction, sound track and sound editing take place. It’s the movie, just not how it’s meant to be presented.

A few final notes; once again, we want to thank our community, all of you players, for your involvement and feedback in shaping the MkII rules. While we know that this has been an inconvenient transition, we do believe that all of the changes made in MkII will improve the play experience for the community as a whole, and we also believe that this process has yielded the best possible final product. We hope that you will see the impact and the influence that your feedback has had on what MkII has become.

While you will no doubt be eager to take everything for a spin, please be aware that our ‘official’ events will continue to be supported with MkI rules for the remainder of the year. Naturally, what you do in the privacy of your own game store is up to you and your opponent and the event organizer, but as far as we’re concerned, MkII will not be supported in organized play by Privateer until January when the book comes out.

And a final word to our Hordes players who still have a much longer wait ahead of them; please know that we are working very hard to put out the Hordes MkII field test as soon as possible. Because of what we have learned through the MkII field test, we believe our first public draft of the Hordes MkII rules will much more closely resemble what the final rules will look like. Because of that, it is our intention to make the Hordes MkII Field Test rules official upon posting so that Hordes players can continue to participate in our organized play events alongside WARMACHINE players until the Hordes MkII book comes out next summer. The caveat of course is that things WILL change, but probably much less dramatically than some of the WARMACHINE changes that we observed.

Thank you all for your patience, your feedback, and your continued support.

And play like you’ve got MkII…

Matt Wilson
Privateer Press
Chief Creative Officer

*To download the files, right-click, then save as.

Here is the link.

Privateer Press has already stated that when Warmachine MkII is released, the Hordes MkII Field Test will begin.  At GenCon they confirmed that the Hordes MkII Field Test will be essentially "tournament legal" and that MkII will be the supported format.  And that's when I get my new faction.

All of the doomsaying aside, most people are expecting some fairly significant change to the Legion of Everblight come MkII.  If Terminus is any indication, wings are expected to no longer evade free strikes; a major blunting of the Legion's maneuverability.  Other models - like the Seraph, Incubi, and Raptors - have a reputation as being overpowered or open to abuse and are expected to be rebalanced.

I'm not going to whine about the changes.  I'm fully ready to adapt to and embrace the new play-style, but that's ultimately my point - the Legion is expected to play differently.  The magnitude of this change is still up in the air, but in all honestly I'm excited about it.  I get to take the models I really like and the army whose fluff I dig, and experience them from a new perspective.  In addition, it will hopefully mean hearing less whining about facing the Legion as well, which will make playing them an all-around better experience.

Once I started looking at Legion MkII in this way I realized there wasn't a need to go looking for the new hawtness, the new hawtness is coming to me in just a few months.  The Retribution is still interesting, but the temptation isn't as strong as it was before.  Maybe at the end of 2010 when all of MkII has been released and we've played with the final version of the MkII rules I'll revisit the idea of expanding to a new faction but for now I'm ready for some MkII Blightning.