Warmachine/Tactics/Searforge Commission

Why play the Searforge Commission?

Because you fall into at least one of the following categories:

• You like dwarves. I mean, you really like dwarves. Like, you will kinfe-fight a dude in a bar over dwarves. Like, you have a tattoo of a dwarf or something dwarf-related on your body. Like, you've played Dwarf Fortress longer than some people have played their World of Warcraft characters. Basically you really like the alcoholic midgets is what I'm getting at here.

• You have a fondness for/masochistic tendencies towards hard luck armies (Sisters of Battle, Blood Bowl stunty teams, Dan Hibiki, and so on). The idea of playing a faction whose best matchup is better than a 4:6 is violently offensive to you.

• You are the best player in your meta to such a degree that you need to find ever more inventive ways to handicap yourself to keep things interesting.

So anyway, if the above didn't tip you off Searforge is a hard mercenary contract to play. While you get some pretty strong benefits for taking this contract, you're giving up access to some of the best pieces in Mercenaries in order to do so and what you're left with doesn't necessarily have particularly strong internal synergy with itself. Dwarf infantry also tends towards being very slow (SPD 4 is your baseline, with SPD 5 being above average and SPD 6 being "holy shit slow down" fast) and low DEF with high ARM, attributes that aren't particularly ideal for single-wound infantry units. Recent releases have gone some ways towards rectifying this, but accept that some matchups (read: pDeneghra) will be nearly auto-losses unless your opponent is a complete spud or you are willing to branch out into the more general merc contracts. Still, if any of the above points apply you probably find this appealing: if that is the case, gird your balls of steel and read on.

The Basics

• A Searforge army can contain only mercenary Rhulic and/or Ogrun models and units. The FA of all non-character models and units in the army is increased by 1 (so FA 1 becomes FA 2, FA 2 becomes FA 3, and so on).
• Your deployment zone is extended 4" forward.

The big bonus here is the extended deployment: given how slow your army is, getting what is essentially a free advance before the game starts is a pretty big deal. The FA bonus is largely situational, since there aren't going to be a lot of things in Searforge you would want to max out at their default FAs, much less their FA+1. This does, however, allow you to take 3 Earthbreakers with Gorten at 50 points (who has just enough warjack points to do so): should you be able to borrow your friend's Earthbreakers (or have that much money to piss away) it's worth playing this list at least once for the lulz.

Strategy Overview

Mercenary Meta advantage: In Two List format events only take 1 Searforged Comission list. Mercs can field such a diverse set of models that being able to present two completely separate lists royally pisses off those guys who want to run the same list twice.

First and formost related to the Contract itself, Searforged do not get Assassination Runs. You have nothing conducive to it, you cannot make it happen. On the flipside only Garryth has an even remotely possible chance of assassinating you, and you're going to make him sweat an ocean to pull it off. General Ossrum and Durgen Madhammer are unreasonably tough, whereas Gorten Grundback is tied with Karchev the Terrible for hardest motherfucker in the Iron Kingdoms. The other cool part about this is that assassin lists are a wet dream come true, who the fuck is dumb enough to just hand your their models for you to butcher, seriously if they go for the kill and then get pissy when you dust their prized killer stop the game and ask them why the fuck they are surprised, are they fucking retarded or intentionally throwing the game? As a merc player Searforged make a great 2nd List in events because it lets you say no to all those players that want to have Caine personally kill your warcaster, and by no I really mean "DIE LIKE THE BITCH YOU ARE!".

Second is the cause of the first; mobility. You have none. You don't even get boosts like the Russians do. Skorne and Trollbloods are almost faster than you by dint of them having cavalry. This means some objective missions are a massive pain the butt and Circle are fucking infuriating as they will ideally be putting as much terrai in your way as possible.

Third point is being an army of pure rock hard nuts. Dwarves do not give kills easily, almost all dwarf units have decent to great armour stats meaning that combats will turn into tarpits for non-weapon master units. Note that this applies to dwarves not Ogruns, who are mostly subpar for cost with some exceptions. This has negative effects, like your Highshield Gun Corps gets charged by something, the highshields won't kill anything, but neither will they be killed which means if you want some other unit to engage it you will still have Highshields in the way.

Unit Overview

Warcasters

- Gorten Grundback: The hardest caster to kill in the game, bar Karchev the Terrible. Gorten is something of an all-rounder, with a bit for everyone, his most infamous trick is to use his Strength of Granite spell on a Ghordson Driller for P+S 21 drill attack, or in other words raw dice for damage against most Khadoran heavies, although I prefer to go for the boost and apply 21+3D6 to the squishy warcaster's cranium. Also this Gorten's main way for dealing with himself or Karchev.

- Durgen Madhammer: BOOM BITCHES!!! I normally play this guy in Highborn because his feat works well with Sea Dog Deck Gun Crews, that said you can use Ogrun Assault Corps as stand-ins in a Searforge list.

- General Ossrum: Interesting, he's infantry focused in a faction where infantry aren't hugely competitive.

Units

Ogrun Assasult Corps: Coming soon.

Hammerfall Highshield Gun Corps: Cost efficient medium range infantry. Assaulting with these guys is bad, but charging at the unit is a wasted endevour for your opponent as they are bloody hard to kill up close.

Hammerfall Highshield Gun Corps Officer and Standard Bearer: Because you were never really worried about their ability to hold under pressure Privateer Press decided to make an attachment to further push them towards being unbreakable without slapping fearless on them.

Horgenhold Forge Guard: Coming soon.