Warmachine/Tactics/Convergence of Cyriss

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Iterative successes converge towards our inevitable victory, bitches.

Why Play Convergence?

Fluff-wise: it's a religion full of scientists, engineers, and steampunk neckbeards who transfer their souls into clockwork bodies and talk to their science moon goddess through the inconsistencies in the output of a giant calculating machine. They're also working to prepare the world as a vessel for her to inhabit, regardless of the desires of all those Philistines who don't think turning Caen into a giant sterile clockwork utopia is totally awesome.

Crunch-wise: the Convergence can play a 'jack heavy game on par with the Protectorate. Between unique rules, plentiful access to Repair and/or Bodge as well as a support solo or two many Convergence warcasters can build perfectly viable 'jack heavy lists. Supporting your 'jacks are a variety of troops who have all the advantages of being non-living models without the taint of ridiculous bullshit, who are in turn supported by solos who can bring back destroyed warrior models over and over to really piss your opponent off. Also markerlights flares.

Much like their fluff this is very much an army where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Each gear may not be particularly outstanding on its own and your order of activations will be very important, but when things go just as planned your Rube Goldberg army will grind your opponent's army into clockwork kibble between their teeth. Basically, if the statement "Warmachine is just Magic: the Gathering with models" doesn't send you screaming out of the room, you'll probably find something to like in the Convergence.

Our Warjacks are Different

Because the rules for Convergence vectors (warjacks) are so important to how the overall army functions, it's worth briefly discussing the differences:

• The Interface Node: The cortex equivalent for vectors, because the Convergence doesn't believe in building machines with an artificial intelligence. Basically a cortex for all intents and purposes (if it's crippled, you can't allocate focus to the vector), but any rules that specify the cortex specifically (e.g. Domination, the auto-cortex damage on the Lancer's shock shield) don't apply to the interface node. Spells and abilities that specify the cortex aren't overly common (relegated to Cygnar, mostly), but it's worth keeping in mind so that you can tell that eHaley player to screw off when she tries to Dominate your Cipher.

Additionally your warcasters can reactivate vectors within 6 inches without having to be in base contact and vectors cannot form bonds (since they don't have cortexes), but this probably won't come into play much unless you play a lot of multi-warcaster games or your group makes heavy use of the warjack bonding rules.

• MAT and RAT scores: Unlike other warjacks, vectors do not have innate MAT or RAT scores, instead using their controlling warcaster's current MAT/RAT values. Vectors are also immune to any abilities that increase or reduce MAT/RAT unless their warcaster is affected, which means that a vector ignores things like the MAT penalty from Gorman's Black Oil bomb (although the other effects will still apply). Anything that adds or subtracts from an attack roll still works normally, however, since it's not directly affecting the vector's MAT/RAT score.

With the current stable of warcasters, this rule is something of a mixed blessing: with the exception of Syntherion (who has the most well-rounded attack scores at 6/5) every warcaster in the Convergence has either a below average MAT (Directrix) or RAT (Aurora somewhat, Lucant and Axis particularly). The low average RAT scores is particularly painful given the number of vectors that have ranged weapons: while you can use Flare support to compensate somewhat, trying to make heavy use of non-Cipher or Diffuser shooty vectors with someone like Axis and his asstastic RAT 2 will probably be a fool's errand. This in turn will heavily affect the rest of your army's composition, as the value of certain models and units will vary considerably from warcaster to warcaster based on their ability to cover areas that a vector may not be able to adequately handle.

• Focus Induction: the big ability that gives vectors their spice. Once per turn when a vector spends focus, it may allocate a focus to another vector within 6 inches: a vector can receive multiple focus points this way, although it can't exceed normal allocation limits.

Unique to Convergence, this gives vectors a degree of focus efficiency that is not present anywhere else in Warmachine, because the efficiency of a point of focus increases when there are more vectors that it can be passed around to (as opposed to normal Warmachine factions, where too many warjacks will otherwise strain a warcaster's focus without some sort of mitigating spell or ability). You'll run into diminishing returns if you take too many focus-hungry vectors (e.g. ones that are going to spend 2-3 focus per turn, but who can only pass along one due to the induction rules), but you still get more effective focus to work with regardless.

Because of how induction rules work, you're generally not going to want to fully load down one vector with 3 focus during your main allocation, as is typical with most Warmachine factions: instead you'll probably want to spread the focus around to vectors with lower overall focus consumption, activate them first and then pass along the focus to the vector you want loaded for bear. This will allow you to do more with less focus, but requires you to plan out your turn farther in advance than you might have to with other factions to make sure that the focus points are where you need them when you need them. Take this into consideration when building your lists: vectors who are going to sit back and plink with their guns can probably get away with one or two focus a turn and will probably be the start of your induction chain, while melee vectors who are going to be smashing heavy targets will need all the focus you can give.

Unit Analysis

Warcasters

• Aurora, Numen of Aerogenisis:
• Axis, the Harmonic Enforcer:
• Iron Mother Directrix:
• Father Lucant, Divinity Architect:

• Forge Master Syntherion: Fluffed as a savant completely disconnected from his humanity that hates leaving his workshop and ruthlessly disposes of any who fail him, making him the steampunk robot equivalent of every engineering professor you've ever had. Syntherion is a 'jack heavy warcaster in a 'jack heavy faction, and it's not hard to see why: between an array of strong vector-centric upkeeps (that he can upkeep for free thanks to Resourceful) and minimal support for infantry, you generally want to load up with as many vectors as you can feasibly run. This isn't to say that infantry don't have a place, but Syntherion's ability to cover many of his bases with the best overall offensive stats for a Convergence warcaster (6/5) and the various tools provided by his vectors means that taking them is more down to taste rather than necessity. Keep in mind, though, that an army full of SPD 4/5 vectors will not be beating anyone to objectives or zones, so you will generally be building around assassination or grinding it out rather than hoping to sweep your opponent by scenario.

Field Marshal [Auto-Repair]: Models in Syntherion's battlegroup heal D3 every turn. Simple and effective, this allows you to shrug off incidental damage advancing up the field and turns your vectors into pseudo-warbeasts (where any vector that isn't dead is only 1-2 points of healing away from being a significant threat again). Note that this happens after focus allocation, so you won't be able to directly allocate focus if a vector begins the turn with its induction node disabled: given the various ways you have to move focus onto vectors though, this is no great loss.

(Feat) Technological Superiority: models in Syntherion's battlegroup can charge for free and gain Weapon Platform. In case you were confused by the roughly half-dozen variants PP has for "you can shoot your gun in melee", Weapon Platform allows you to target models in your melee range with ranged attacks, but you still suffer the target in melee penalty against them. You'll generally want to use this rule to shoot at targets not engaging the firer, unless you ignore the in-melee penalty (Prime Axiom, for being a colossal) or you don't care about directly hitting (Cipher). Also remember that you have to use ALL your initial attacks (both ranged and melee) before you buy additional attacks, or you lose them. Finally, you still have to do everything in order, so no fire gun->charge target->melee attacks.

Despite all this, this feat is deceptively powerful. Free charges are always nice, but Weapon Platform is amazing given how many vectors have guns attached to them. Critically, Weapon Platform makes being engaged in melee mostly irrelevant for your gun-vectors: the Monitor can still snipe that critical solo and the Cipher can use its Bombardment shots to clear the chaff humping its legs or flare the target it's going to punch. A Prime Axiom becomes a ballcrusher under this feat, as it can make a whopping nine attacks (3 shots from the Accelespiker, two tow cable attacks and their follow up melee attacks, THEN its two initial melee attacks) before spending a single point of focus, which will reliably skullfuck anything unfortunate enough to be in tow cable range. The best time to pop the feat will depend on opponent and your build: in general you'll want to use it when you're bogged down by the opponent or you're about to get stuck in, but you can do some fun tricks (e.g. charge a target, THEN use the extra distance you got from the charge to fire your gun at another target your opponent thought was too far away to get sniped) where you may want to keep it in reserve.

Spells:

• Convection: a 2-cost spell that does a single POW 12. Meh.

• Hot Shot: Target battlegroup model gains boosted ranged attack damage rolls. Works on any ranged vector (or even Syntherion himself), but you'll get more mileage out of a target that can force multiple damage rolls every turn. Ciphers are probably the best choice by default, as the ability to throw out two 4" AOEs with fully boosted damage (even if only POW 6 base) will go a long way towards keeping all but the most heavily-armored infantry in check. Assimilators are good targets as well, though you trade the Cipher's quantity for the flexibility of Ground Pounder. Cycle this spell between two Ciphers and watch light infantry everywhere piss their pants.

• Magnetic Hold: -2 SPD and DEF for the affected model/unit, and friendly constructs gain additional movement when charging an affected model. Would be worth it just for the SPD debuff alone, as being able to deny a unit of weapon masters the charge makes your vectors that much more survivable. The obvious downside is that this spell costs half of Syntherion's focus: boost or Flare your target to ensure that it sticks, because you don't want to be casting it twice if you can help it.

• Reconstruct: the Warmachine version of Saeryn's spell, slightly better as most vectors have more systems than warbeasts have aspects. As with Saeryn you don't want to plan too heavily around this spell: while in some cases your vector might die on the very last attack and heal up without threat of further damage, in just as many the spell will trigger and your opponent will use one more attack to destroy it anyway. Still, with all the Repair in Convergence it doesn't hurt to have it up if you can spare it: Syntherion's field marshal ability plus the large amount of Repair in faction means that your vectors can come back from near destruction to somewhat-pristine very quickly, and if nothing else this will force your opponent to commit more to destroying the affected vector than he might otherwise have been willing to use.

• Synergy: While it's tempting to look at this spell and decide to RUN ALL THE GALVANIZERS in imitation of eVyros or Amon Ad-Raza, resist the urge. While Syntherion may have a superior mechanic in focus induction, Vyros and Amon have both better lights (compare the raw combat ability of the Galvanizer to a Griffon/Repenter/Dervish) and non-Synergy damage buffs (Arcanists, Choir) that allow them to run a herd of light warjacks that don't need to rack up a huge synergy chain before they can even hope to begin penetrating heavy targets. Instead, view this as a nice passive ability that you get for free (since it is the only upkeep that Syntherion can have on himself, unless you give him Hot Shot for some odd reason): most of your SPD 4 walkers and the Prime Axiom come with strong melee weapons by default, so you only need a couple Synergy stacks before they reliably start trashing most targets in melee. Bringing a Galvinizer or three for the Synergy boost isn't necessarily wrong, of course, but make sure you're getting enough utility out of them otherwise to justify not taking another heavy instead. Also remember that Syntherion is a part of his battlegroup, and so benefits from (and can count towards) Synergy in a pinch.

Vectors

Light Vectors

• Corollary: Yes.

...sorry, the tactica? Okay. A Squire pumped up on steroids, and the model that makes vector heavy Convergence armies so deadly. At its most basic the Corollary is a focus bank: you can dump focus into it (that won't go away at the beginning of your next turn), which it can then pass to one of your other vectors. If this doesn't sound particularly interesting so far, consider this: a Corollary can get a free focus by activating near your warcaster, and its focus passing ability counts as spending focus and thus triggers induction (allowing you to allocate another point of focus in addition to whatever you just transferred). What this all adds up to is a potential for an additional 2 "free" focus (one from being near the warcaster, one from induction) per turn, or up to four if your Corollary starts fully loaded from a previous turn. It can also be an efficient way to "recycle" focus, as your other vectors can use induction to pass focus back to the Corollary, which in turn can pass it back to them next turn with no input otherwise from your warcaster. And if getting gobs of free focus for 3 points still isn't enough to convince you, it gives your warcaster an extra 2" to their control area just like a Squire.

So yeah, pretty good. The only real reason you're not running this yet is because it doesn't have a released model.

• Diffuser: Has a slightly inferior hand cannon weapon as its primary armament (because prime numbers), but you're not taking this to play a ghetto Charger. The big money here is Beacon, which gives friendly models additional distance when charging the target and lets your vectors charge for free: the free charge is always nice, but the extra 2 inches of movement are critical given that your heavies are almost all SPD 4/5 models without reach. You can also reroll misses on the shot, meaning that this vector is actually a viable choice even with the Convergence's low RAT warcasters (to put this in perspective, a Diffuser under Axis taking a boosted shot at a Warpwolf will hit roughly 60% of the time, which is pretty impressive for RAT 2). How critical a Diffuser is will depend on your army composition: if you have some infantry units to tarpit/tie up enemy heavies and use yours in a counterpunch role then you can probably save the 3 points, but if you're running infantry light you'll almost certainly want to take at least one so that your heavies can do the giving as well as the receiving.

• Galvanizer: A POW 12 melee weapon with legs and a surly disposition. It's also the first warjack with the Repair skill, and while it has a good skill rating to use it with (9), the Convergence has so many models that can repair that this novelty is not a particularly big selling point on its own. No reach and SPD 5 means it's not particularly impressive as a melee light, but it's cheap as dirt and focus induction gives you the ability to run a herd of these things at someone with minimal focus spent(which is funny, if not necessarily optimal). Aurora and Directrix will usually have better ways to spend 3 points, but it has applications with Syntherion (cheap way to get Synergy stacks), Lucant (a shield guard that can keep Lucant or another model's health topped off) and Axis (cheap Bulldozing light that is not hopeless in melee).

• Mitigator:

Heavy Vectors

Your heavies come in two flavors: the SPD 5 floater chassis with pathfinder and the defense stats of a Legion heavy (read: will crumple under any serious offensive pressure), and SPD 4 walkers with Steady and Protectorate heavy stats (read: not great, but not terrible either). The viability and role of each will vary depending on the warcaster, but in general a role they'll always be able to fill is armor-cracking: most of your infantry lack either the raw power or consistent output to carve through enemy warjacks or warbeasts, and so your vectors will generally be called upon to handle the big stuff that they can't.

• Assimilator:
• Cipher:
• Conservator:
• Inverter:
• Modulator:
• Monitor:

Colossals

• Prime Axiom:

Units

Unless you're going extremely vector heavy (e.g. Syntherion's tier list), investing in at least one mainline infantry unit generally won't go amiss. At their most basic, your units can be cheap chaff (Obstructors, Reductors) to tie down weapon masters or other enemy infantry that would otherwise be bogging down/hacking apart your vectors while they do their thing, while some like the Clockwork Angels can give you mobile spot removal that you can't get from any other equivalent model in their price bracket. Like most Convergence models their base stats are rather mediocre at first glance, but Flares can make nearly all your units an impressive MAT 8+ and Enigma Foundries can give them staying power out of proportion to their actual numbers.

The medium based units (Eradicators, Reciprocators, Perforators) additionally come with variable weapons: at the beginning of the unit's activations you choose one of two available rules for either their melee or ranged weapons, which the unit then uses until its next activation. These modes don't change the unit's role dramatically (Reciprocators will usually still be the best at tanking, and Eradicators will generally be better at punching), but they give you some flexibility from turn to turn.

If Convergence units have one notable weakness in particular, it's CMD: while most of your units are constructs (and thus fearless), their slightly below average CMD score limits how far they can spread out. This is mostly an issue for your 10-man small-based units, but remember to keep an eye on your CMD range with units who have a large amount of non-standard or out-of-turn movement like Angels or Eradicators to make sure they don't accidentally derp and wander out of coherency.

• Clockwork Angels: These lovely ladies are Advance Deploying, SPD 7 models in an army that is overwhelmingly SPD 4-5 and not, and so will generally be acting in a skirmisher role. It's probably best to think of this unit as a flying POW 13 gun: their base combat stats are overwhelmingly mediocre (MAT/RAT 6/5, POW 10s on both melee and ranged), but their speed combined with Reform and a high defense against ranged attacks (watch out for AOEs) will allow them to opportunistically CRA snipe valuable support models and generally be a pain in your opponent's ass. They have Brutal Charge on their swords, but this is generally a trap unless you're playing Aurora: keep them at range unless there's nothing left for them to bother shooting at, you have a good chance of killing what you're going to charge, or you need something tied down and are willing to sacrifice your girls to do it.

• Eradicators: The infantry blenders of your medium-based troops, these guys start with two initial POW 12 attacks and Side Step, allowing them to get deep even into the most thinly-spread enemy formations (be careful not to go out of the leader's CMD range, though). Against more dodgy opponents you can use their Accuracy weapon mode for an effective MAT 9, and suddenly you're bitch-slapping Satyxis left and right and even have a decent chance to make contact with Iron Flesh Kayazy. Try not to use this mode if you don't have to, however: without Shields Up they're relatively fragile, since 8 wounds never go as far as you think they should when you're ARM 15. The lack of reach also generally means the unit will be taking charges more often that it leads with them, so models with Repair or an Enigma Foundry to keep the unit topped off generally won't go amiss.

• Obstructors: The most "plain" infantry choice, a 4/6 unit whose primary purpose will be (surprise, surprise) to get in the enemy's way. Shield Wall can give them some durability once they're in a zone or on an objective, but the lack of Set Defense means that they're still vulnerable to enemy chargers. Still, a 10-man unit with reach can make a large part of the table a no-go zone, and CMA Chain Weapons give them a decent bite in a pinch.

• Optifex Directive: The bastard love children of a mechanik unit and a Choir of Menoth. Fewer in number than their Cygnaran/Khadoran counterparts at 3 for 2 points, but come with a higher Repair[8] as standard which means that getting a damaged vector back into the fight is much less of a crapshoot than it is with other factions. In lieu of repairing models in the unit can also give any model in your army with the construct rule Pathfinder and/or Magical Weapons for one turn: the value of Pathfinder should be evident in a faction of SPD 4/5 models who are vulnerable to being bogged down by terrain, and Magical Weapons are particularly useful given that even the majority of Cyriss warcasters lack a single magical weapon. Unless you're going extremely vector light you definitely want at least one unit of these guys to keep everything up and running smoothy.

• Recipricators: When you absolutely, positively need to contest or hold a zone, these are your dudes. 8 boxes, ARM 20 under Shield Wall and Set Defense makes these guys fairly resistant to everything short of mass weapon masters and heavy warjacks/warbeasts, and even those will probably have to spend a couple rounds hacking at them before the unit gets taken out of the fight. Have an Enigma Foundry tag along and enjoy your opponent's rage as he expends so much effort trying to kill one of these things only to have you put one back down the next turn, fully healed and ready to go. Do keep in mind that like many medium-based units they suffer from only having one attack per model, so try to make sure they're not stuck trying to clear their way through a cheapy 10-man unit until they've arrived where you need them to be or have other tools to deal with infantry zergs.

• Reductors: Sprays are pretty good, particularly when they're POW 13 and on a unit that only costs 6 points for 10 dudes. Their short range and lowish (decent for sprays) RAT means they won't be drowning the entire enemy army in BEEEEEEEEEEES with their Swarm Projectors, but their low cost means that you can throw them into fights against most other infantry and count on volume of attacks at a relatively low cost to carry the day (or at least bog down or neuter a superior unit). Because they can spray through friendly models without worrying about hitting them, there are two primary ways to run the unit:
  • On their own, run the unit in two ranks (or at least so that some models are out of enemy charge ranges but close enough to support the others). The first rank acts as a shield for the second, blocking enemy charges while the second can use sprays to free up any models in the first rank that survive, allowing them to use their sprays and rack up some kills.
  • Run them behind a dedicated melee/tarpit unit like Obstructors or Reciprocators, freeing them up to continue advancing or tip the odds in their favor. This is particularly handy for Reciprocators or Perforators, since their low number of attacks makes them vulnerable to being swarmed. If you're using the unit in this role decide if you want to go in for the full unit of 10 (making for an impressive, but pricey brick), or if you can get away with the minimum unit and use the extra points elsewhere.

• Perforators: Eradicators are your blenders, Reciprocators are your brick, and Perforators are your somewhat-oddball heavy armor hunters. Each Perforator comes with an Armor Piercing javelin launcher: the base pow of this weapon is laughably low, but halving the armor of medium, large, and huge bases means that you're rarely rolling anything lower than dice - 4 for damage on most unbuffed heavy warjacks. They also have the Assault rule, which allows them to fire their javelins (hopefully using the +2 damage weapon mode), before delivering a charge attack (only POW 12, but still capable of crippling a heavy that's been softened up by the javelins first). These guys are your best non-vector option at taking out heavier targets, but try to get at least one round of shooting in (using the Snipe mode) before charging: these guys run out of steam fast after charging in, since they have the same low number of attacks as Reciprocators as well as the thin armor of Eradicators.
  • Like all models with Assault, remember that the target of the Assault ranged attack does NOT benefit from the target in melee penalty, even if the Assaulting model does not make it into melee with the target. This means that you can Assault at a target you probably won't reach (say, a warjack tied up by Obstructors) and lob off some shots without having to worry about the attack penalty. Situational (since you still have to follow the general rules for a charge, so no "charging" zero inches and firing), but worth keeping in mind.

• Transverse Enumerator (UA): Not really a unit in and of itself, but listed here because it's a unit attachment that can be attached to any Convergence unit (bar Directrix and her servitors). 2 points buys you an odd grab bag of abilities, but there are two standouts: the first is a CMD of 9, which allows your clockwork units to spread out a bit further than allowed by their somewhat derpy default of 7, while the second is a minifeat that allows you to reroll all failed attack rolls and skill checks during the unit's activation. This arguably makes the Enumerator strongest on the more offensive Convergence units (Reductors, Eradicators, Perforators), since being able to reroll 2+ attacks per model will go a long way towards upping the unit's killing power on a critical turn (or in the Eradicator's case, enable them to kill reliably without having to drop their bucklers). The UA's personal combat prowess and defensive stats are nothing to write home about, so try and keep him(her?) out of danger until s/he's blown his/her minifeat load.
  • NOTE: Based on the wording the Enumerator gets the benefit of the unit's Variable[weapon] rules, if it has any. This generally doesn't make him/her much better at fighting, but it's better than nothing.

Solos

• Accretion Servitors: 3 for a buck, your default "my list is one point short" filler if you can't justify taking a Dispersion Optifex. That being said Bodge isn't bad: while it only repairs one point, no skill roll is required so it can be more reliable to have a servitor heal the one point needed to bring a crippled system back online rather than trust the vagaries of a skill check (although you'll still probably want to bring a Directive unit for the higher potential healing and other benefits). Strip will rarely come into play, although the time you deliver the killing blow to a Stormwall with one of these little bastards will be priceless.
  • These are your cheapest (and thus, most expendable) way to get more models on the field, so feel free to use them as fodder/targeting beacons for Modulators and the like.

• Algorithmic Dispersion Optifex: Meat Arc nodes, bring at least one if you expect to be doing any serious offensive spell-slinging. Keep them far enough behind your vectors so that they aren't a priority, but close enough to be able to run to where they're needed at a moment's notice. If they survive until your next turn after channeling spells consider it a pleasant bonus.

• Attunement Servitors:
• Elimination Servitors:
• Enigma Foundry: AKA the reason why Cyriss doesn't (and probably never will) have weapon master units. This model collects soul tokens from destroyed friendly models in its command range (everything that isn't a vector or a servitor), and uses them to return friendly construct warrior models to play (up to 3 small-based models or one fully-healed medium based model). The ability to return models to play is one of the Convergence's unique strengths, and can allow you to hold the line with a relatively smaller number of warrior models than other factions might use. Some caveats on how this works, however:
  • The rule says "return" a model to a unit, not "add a model" to a unit (ala the Necrosurgeon and Mechanithralls). This means you can't increase a unit's count beyond its starting size, or return models that have been removed from play.
  • You only get souls from models destroyed by enemy attacks for the most part, so no murdering your own Optifex for their tasty souls.

You should strongly consider taking at least one of these if you're running any serious amount of construct infantry. Do note that this model has to be relatively close to do its thing, and as a large-based model that will be drowning your opponent in robot corpses will draw a significant amount of attention: ARM 18 and ten boxes will allow it to shrug off incidental damage, but it will still fall to concentrated fire or if it gets charged by a serious melee unit. A Conservator makes for a decent Foundry buddy, since it can protect it with Shield Guard and enough things will probably be dying nearby to set Hand of Vengeance off.

• Reflex Servitors:
• Steelsoul Protector: A 2-point Shield Guard/bullet catcher, invaluable in a faction full of models with HUGE GUTS GEARS who will be getting shot at by every Defender, Reckoner, and Ravagore that catches wind of their presence. Durable enough to take a boosted damage roll from the above and have a chance of surviving, so combine with models that can repair (and since this is the Convergence, that could very easily be the model that the Protector is catching bullets for) for a Shield Guard that will not have the courtesy to die. When not busy jumping in front of enemy fire the Protector also has Defensive Strike, and while you shouldn't forget it don't count on a single MAT 6 POW 12 to be a particularly effective deterrent.

Battle Engines

• Transfinite Emergence Projector: