If you have been charged you don't have to charge back you can move away, charge a different unit or charge the same unit. You cannot shoot though. (for those who haven't played you only fight in melee when you charge, after you've made your attacks the charging unit is moved back 1").
Individuals (characters) don't have a flank or rear so never have an opponent double or triple their attacks against them (same as last edition) but now they don't get to double/triple their attacks if they charge their opponents in the flank or rear.
Cannons get grapeshot (10 attacks at 12" with piercing (1))
You don't "close the door" or realign the charging unit to be flush against an individual, you turn the individual and the charging unit keeps its facing.
Regeneration now just lets you roll 3 dice at the start of the turn to heal. Stops working if you get hit by a breath attack or zap (spell attack).
There are 7 magic items. The last 3 look really good
The website is not yet updated with the most recent rules so I don't know too much about the army lists but from what I have seen warmachines look to have been fixed. They still need high numbers to hit (so will miss most turns ) but the damage output has been cranked
ANOTHER ONE - Cannons can shoot through cover. Soft cover gives no modifier, hard cover is just -1 to hit.
Fail safe goes up on the Galleon taking it to ARM 21. No mechanics (I had thought about switching the Kayazy for Eiryss, Thor and a Blaster and Wyshnalyr). Countermeasures on the Kayazy, and fortune on the Sea Dog Crew. Use the feat to protect all the pirate solos, the underboss (to preserve kill stroke) and Mr Walls and if you want the Lass as well. Lets you keep out all your upkeeps and still get everyone you need in the feat. You can use Jackhammer to make sure the Galleon still gets to use the focus or you can fudge around a bit and still allocate two to it. Jackhammer and Failsafe are what makes the Galleon in this list and the Galleon fixes the biggest problem the list has, the inability to crack ARM. That the Galleon can use it's drag to do that while sitting in multiple scoring zones is not to shabby either.
Problems - expect to see Eiryss a lot. She was in almost every list (except when character restrictions forced her not to be) and she also has her mini-feat (put her within 5" of the galleon and you can't allocate it any focus, it's a "mini feat" because if she's 5" from the Galleon she is going to die). She'll drop fail safe off the Galleon. Also expect to see a lot more purification and hex blast. If you can stop healing (the circle trees or the blood hag) then you can stop the feat and without the solos/officers the list really struggles.
Mercenaries
Most Wanted (Magnus the Traitor)
(Tier 4)
PCs: 50 / 50
22 models
[00] Magnus the Traitor (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[08] >> Mangler
[18] >> Galleon
[05] >> Renegade
[05] >> Renegade
[02] Gorman Di Wulfe, Rogue Alchemist
[02] Saxon Orrik
[06] Steelhead Halberdiers (9 grunts)
[10] Steelhead Heavy Cavalry (4 grunts)
Snipe goes on the Galleon before the game starts (tier 4 bonus), iron aggression on the Mangler. You switch Temper metal to the Galleon after it has given it's first extreme range barrage. And possibly pulled a heavy jack 14" accross the table to be scrapped. The renegades have their massive once a game AOE knockdowns, if they hit a caster you can then put all the Galleon ranged attacks into the caster. Iron Aggression on a Mangler is just silly. I want to take steelhead riflemen as well to increase the shooting you can do on a caster. A lot of people will have ways to deal with the knockdown but if that happens you can always obliterate huge swaths of infantry. Saxon Orrik is there to hand out pathfinder. Gorman to black oil some crap.
Shae wants it too (and you can take it in his theme force), he struggles a little with high ARM and you can hide Grogspar behind it, not going to do his list because he just takes everything in pirates (there's not much there). Fiona can cycle nonokrion brand between it and a unit of long gunners and the results are a little silly (for those that haven't played Fiona that spells allows a model/unit to ignore intervening models so if your caster gets with anywhere near you they are going to cop a lot of ranged fire). That does mean though that she can't afford to take pirates (sad face). I might actually put together the fiona list:
Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant
PCs: 50 / 50
25 models
[00] Fiona the Black (0 / 6 WJ remaining)
[02] >> Sylys Wyshnalyrr, the Seeker
[09] >> Rocinante
[18] >> Galleon
[03] Eiryss, Mage Hunter of Ios
[01] Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator
[02] Thor Steinhammer
[03] >> Grundback Blaster
[02] Bosun Grogspar
[02] Master Gunner Dougal Macnaile
[10] Long Gunner Infantry (9 grunts)
[02] >> Long Gunner Infantry Officer & Standard
[02] Sea Dog Deck Gun
Not sold on Rocinante but it does mean that you have a DEF 18 warcaster who can't be knocked down. It's a half decent warjack too. I've gone for Eiryss1, you almost always want to go for Eiryss2 but you can put nonokrion brand onto Eiryss1 and your opponent is screwed for a turn. Eiryss2 still has more utility but the trick against warmachine (doesn't work on hordes) works so well with her that I'd recommend losing that utility. Deck gun is her cultist unit, it has to move to stay with Fiona so it doesn't generally shoot but it's worth 2 points for an additional focus.
Adding the Nyss hunters takes advantage of Barts Feat. Halberdiers allow you to jam, to engage ranged models on feat turn, to block charge lanes to the Galleon. Bartolo Montador actually has a pretty good control feat, if you advance and end movement in his control area you are knocked down before you can attack. By taking some fast, cheap, reach models you can run them up and engage anything that will be looking to back up or aim.
Mercenaries
Four Star Syndicate
PCs: 50 / 50
21 models
Or with Rocinante. You lose the Halberdiers and one of the mechanics but you gain another heavy, who gives your warcaster +2 DEF, gives you another AOE shot with decent POW, and can take advantage of batten down the hatches to push its ARM up into the difficult category.
So the Galleon is awesome with Bart. He can boost all ranged damage rolls including the blast damage rolls from the 2-6 AOEs this thing puts out a turn and can take it up to ARM 22. I'm just not sure what else to take in the list with it. Lets have a look at what I think should be the core of the list:
Mercenaries
Highborn Covenant or Four Star Syndicate
PCs: 30
So why all this crap? Lets take it in reverse order of importance. Sylys for focus efficiency. Ragman can models within 3" dark shroud, dark shroud means any enemy models within 2" of the Galleon suffer -2 ARM. The big base means he should be able to do this from a relatively safe position. Thor and Meg can repair the Galleon. You might not need both of them but to start off I'm looking at both. The Blaster is there because blasters are awesome and if you are going to take Thor it's probably worth taking something to pronto and tune up. Aiyana and Holt get used mostly for kiss of Lylys but that isn't the main reason they make this list. Aiyana has another ability she can give a model/unit magical attacks. There are a lot of ways you can avoid non-magical attacks, the most common being the choir of Menoth (who can stop all their warjacks from being targeted by non-magical shooting) but there are also incorporeal models, wind wall the spell, etc. If you don't need magical attacks though you can always put the kiss on something. If you combine that with ragman the main melee weapon of the Galleon is hitting at the equivalent of P+S 25 which is pretty good. Lastly Dougal, he gives the Galleon +2 to hit on all it's rapid fire shots and lets it reroll distance or direction should you manage to still miss some how. He can also give all your shooting stuff +2 RNG one turn once a game.
So what else to take? I've used up a bunch of points there but I feel I get for that the ability to both shred infantry, and kill the heaviest stuff in the game. Even Terminus isn't going to be so tough when he's -4 ARM and facing a Galleon. If I was confident of getting multiple drags to work (Bart has broadsides which will let me shoot again out of activation) then I'd want to take something that can take advantage of dark shroud and trash a dragged in heavy. That could be Wrong Eye and Snapjaw. I could then add in a bull snapper and make the Galleon ARM 24. Snapjaw will drop an already damaged heavy with -2 ARM pretty easily. That's 12 points. Alternately I could take Rocinante, it would take advantage of the +3 ARM from Batten down the hatches and guard dog would be useful for Bart as that spell causes him to lose 2 DEF. Plus if I do cast broadsides then Rocinante could shoot twice as well. If I take him in highborn then I can take gun mages, they'll let me push stuff around in addition to the drag which could complement the drag nicely (push screening models out of the way or the target out from behind a wall or use them along with the drag to clear out an objective)...
Mercenaries
Four Star Syndicate
PCs: 50 / 50
15 models
So the rules for all the colossals are out now but this is the first Gargantuan and I'm not impressed. I loved the Stormwall and the Galleon and I loved the mountain king model but I am much less enthused about the rules. It's a point more than the Stormwall but it's got less ranged potential and less melee abilities, significantly less damage boxes and the stormwall has better DEF and better special abilities. Even when you consider the in faction buffs, the mountain king can get rage and the krielstone but you can take the journeyman warcaster and give the Stormwall arcane shield and Cygnar is full of shooting buffs.
That said that spray is going to be very good, spawn whelps looks like a fantastic ability. This thing is going to be good with epic Doomshaper. It needs wild aggression in order to be able to function but then it will kill anything it touches, he can put rage on it for free and the extra threat range he provides is going to be pretty essential, when you take into account the spray and the special shooting rules for colossals it's going to be a serious threat. It might be useful with some other casters, trollbloods have been crying out for a reach heavy other than Mulg...
The thing is without help it can only just destroy a Cygnar heavy in melee (meaning close to half the time it won't), and it's not going to be able to scrap a cryx heavy without some kind of buff (DEF 13 means 8s to hit, which means boosting to hit so only 3 good attacks). It has a lower damage output than Mulg (big difference between MAT 7 and MAT 5) only 14 more health and it's special abilities are not as good. Maybe I need to have more of a think about it and maybe see it in play but from looking at it now I think I'd rather have Mulg regardless of points cost and there is an 8 point difference there.
I may just need some more time to think about this. That spray is pretty good... I'll have more to say on this.
