For Your Listening Pleasure

Something that's helped maintain my sanity during painting sessions is podcasts. I know it's nothing new, but it's one of those things I just can't recommend enough for anyone with free time and a desire to learn more about a subject. Tonight I'd like to share a few of my favorite Warmachine podcasts that you may also enjoy.

Muse On Minis (MoM)
This has to be the first one mentioned for several reasons. They're located in Iowa, and many play at my local shop. They started the "Mayhem Cup" tournament, which is basically a travelling trophy currently residing in Texas. Keith is a highly skilled player (whom I've played) who will be representing America in a national Warmachine competition. And of course, everyone on the podcast is knowledgeable and entertaining to listen to.

This is a very long podcast, usually closing in around 90-120 minutes. A good amount of time is spent on rabbit trails, but for the most part I think they use their time well. They talk about anything related to Warmachine - tournaments, new models, tactics, forum whining, etc. After listening to every one of their 48 episodes, I feel like I've slowly grown as a player. Even their most boring segment, Battle Reports, gives me tips and insights in to how the pro-level players operate.

The Muse on Minis guys really deserve a lot of respect. They do a lot to promote and unify the Warmachine community, they have an excellent blog with several authors, and are the guys hosting the Play It Painted challenge I'm doing this year. If you only listen to one Warmachine podcast, it really should be this one.

Chain Attack
Chain Attack took awhile to grow on me. This podcast is all about verbal battle reports. Each episode they take two casters, play a game with them, then talk about the battle. After that they all discuss the caster's ranking and tips on playing them. When I first discovered the podcast, I went a bit catatonic because I was still fresh to the game and had no idea what I was hearing. But now I have a firm enough grasp on the game to really appreciate what the podcast does.

You can expect this show to hit just over an hour each time. It's very focused and rarely gets off the point of the show. The guys on there know what they're talking about, and are pleasant enough to listen to, although the shows to-the-point nature doesn't let personalities get out too much.

I wouldn't recommend this to beginners, although I would suggest listening to any show featuring a warcaster/warlock you're interested in. I've learned a good deal about several casters in factions I don't even play, including how to play against them. If you know the game well and are interested in learning about casters from all factions (or you just want really detailed battle reports), then this is the show for you.

The Prime Generation
I just discovered these guys, but they've become part of my regular rotation. The guys have fun personalities, and they seem to be rather beginner-friendly (though perhaps not family friendly). They seem to podcast similar to the way I blog - you never know what each episode will deal with. Something I've found is that the guys aren't afraid to disagree with one another. It's not that any of them are ignorant of the game, it's just that they can respectfully disagree on tactics and such, and it's really interesting to hear how each person can approach a situation completely differently.

Team ATL
These guys are part of the Muse On Minis podcast network (you can find all of them at the top of this page). To be honest, I've only really listened to their faction podcasts where they spent the entire episode talking with someone experienced with that faction, and breaking down every model in it. It's a bit hit-or-miss on quality, but worthwhile for anyone trying to learn more about their faction.

Road to War
These guys are also on the MoM site, and started out similar to Team ATL. Their first episodes go faction-by-faction, breaking down each model released at that time. Since then they've become similar to Muse On Minis itself, covering the competitive aspects of gaming. This is probably my second-pick podcast for Warmachine because they offer a different feel from MoM while still covering similar content.

As a side note, these are also the guys who stole the Mayhem Cup from us recently, so boo on them!

Grumpy Wargamers
These guys are only 1 episode in, but I really liked what I heard. Rather than covering Warmachine, they tackle gaming as a whole. Their first episode is a very focused 2 hours talking about whether Kickstarter is good for the community. From beginning to end it was an intelligent, mature discussion that really got me considering my stance on the issue. I'm excited to see where these guys go, but I think they'll certainly cover my fix for intelligent discussion.

Trollblood Scrum
And last is the podcast I listen to when nothing else is new. This is all about Trollbloods, which is the one army I want to play simply because of the models. Trolls and Menoth are the two armies I've always wanted to start up, but haven't felt comfortable enough with the heavy reliance on support (says the Circle player) to really make that investment. However, Trollblood Scrum gets me my fix of Trolls while educating me for my eventual delve into an army that doesn't believe in small-based models. If you're a troll player, listen to them. If you're not a Trolls player... well, I'm sure you're just as jealous as I am of those who are.


So there you have it, 7 of my favorite podcasts! There are so many more out there to listen to that I haven't mentioned here simply because they never clicked with me. So get out there, get listening, and prepare for you Warmachine and Hordes skills to improve without even picking up a pair of dice.

See you tomorrow, and don't forget about my giveaway!