Rocinante

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Rocinante Mercenary Character Heavy Warjack

Mark IV Status: Prime - This model is available in one Prime Army, Soldiers of Fortune. It can also be used in the Unlimited game mode. You can view the other Mk3 models that made it into a Legacy Army at this page. Note that the rest of this page is about the model's Mark III rules.

An old warjack that has served the Damiano family for generations, Rocinante takes to the field once more alongside the Steelhead Captain Amador Damiano. Amador's appearance is blurred to Rocinante, and as far as it's concerned, he is none other than the same Damiano who was the first to take it under his control. Rocinante has developed a few quirks over the years, one being an interest in children, and another being its 'watch dog' attitude toward anyone who appears remotely hostile toward Damiano. The warjack protects its allies while laying about with its weaponry amidst the enemy.

Basic Info

Rocinante
Missing Info
	COST {{{cacost}}} UNIT SIZE {{{casize}}} FA {{{cafa}}} Warcaster 0 BASE Large SPD 5 STR 11 MAT 7 RAT 6 M.A. N/A DEF 10 ARM 18 CMD N/A ESSENCE {{{essence}}} FOCUS N/A FURY N/A THRS N/A HP 30 F. Field N/A WJP {{{wjp}}} WBP {{{wbp}}} IHP {{{ihp}}} FA C UNIT SIZE N/A COST 15 N/A N/A N/A Warcaster 1 COST N/A N/A Understanding the Statblock

Warjack - All warjacks share the same set of special rules. Most notably being big and stompy. Click here for a newbie-friendly recap, or click here for the full rules.

Abilities

• Construct
• Bond [ Damiano ] - If this model begins the game in Damiano's battlegroup, it is bonded to them. This model is not considered to be bonded while under your opponent's control. While this model is bonded to Damiano and in their control range, Rocinante gains Quick Work. (Quick Work - When a model with Quick Work destroys one or more enemy models with a melee attack during its Combat Action, immediately after the attack is resolved it can make one basic ranged attack.)
• Defensive Strike - Once per turn, when an enemy advances into and ends its movement in this model's melee range, this model can immediately make one basic melee attack against it.
• Guard Dog - While this model is within 3" of its warlock/warcaster and isn't knocked down or stationary, its warlock/warcaster gains Parry and +2 DEF against melee attack rolls, and models attacking the warcaster/warlock do not gain back strike bonuses.
• Tried & True - When this model is affected by a Repair special action, remove 1 additional damage point from it.

Weapons

Cannon
		RNG			ROF			AOE			POW
		14			1			4			14
Powerful Attack - When attacking with this weapon, this model can spend 1 focus point to boost all attack and damage rolls for the attack.
Battle Blade
		RNG				POW				P+S
		2				7				18
Powerful Charge - This model gains +2 to charge attack rolls with this weapon.

Theme Forces

• When taken by Damiano
  • The Irregulars
  • The Kingmaker's Army
  • Soldiers of Fortune

• When taken by anyone else
  • Soldiers of Fortune

Thoughts on Rocinante

Rocinante in a nutshell

Rocinante is a Nomad with a very effective and focus efficient gun - all the damage rolls in a 4" AoE are boosted as well as the attack itself. If attacked by another heavy in melee Rocinante folds like a cheap tent - but fortunately he gets a lot of work done with no focus investment while hanging back round the warcaster. Cap it off with an extra point of MAT and RAT over the standard merc heavy and you have a winner. An excellent choice in Soldiers of Fortune. It really is a great heavy.

Combos & Synergies

Damiano1

• Captain Damiano gives it Quick Work, allowing it to shoot its AoE deep.
• Magnus the Warlord gives it Unyielding, making up for its low toughness. It stays near him most of the time allowing him to mix Guard Dog with his Escort spell to make him hard to assassinate while being able to use its gun without needing to be fed Focus.
• Captain Bartolo Montador likes good guns to broadside with and appreciates its focus efficiency.
• Lieutenant Crosse, Resistance Fighter likes focus efficent jacks and can increase its range to 16" with Fire Group. He also reaches DEF 20 under Guard Dog and Dark Blessing.
• Caine's Hellslingers are also fans of good guns, especially guns that have powerful attack and up to pow 10 blast damage on feat turn. Caine also doesn't mind the extra defence for if something does make it into melee with his fragile statline.
• Models with Repair, especially the cheap Gobber Tinker, can keep it alive even better thanks to Tried and True.
  • This goes doubely for Widget, who can not only repair it, but also give it an out of activation shoot.

Drawbacks & Downsides

• He's sold as an "upgrade kit" - you need to buy a normal Nomad model for the main body, legs, etc.
• DEF 10 and ARM 18 means it is one of the easiest to kill heavies in the game. Fortunately Rocinante can stay back for a while and use focus-efficient shooting.
• With Captain Damiano Quick Work encourages you to play this squishy heavy forward where it can be turned into scrap metal.
• If you aren't getting many rounds out of the shooting then there's very little to justify the additional cost over a standard Nomad.

Tricks & Tips

• Fire until you want to walk Rocinante into melee. He's still doing work when he's shooting and won't survive in a brawl. Fortunately if he walks into combat and beats the enemy with the Battle Blade the enemy will probably not survive.

Other

Trivia

• Rocinante is the name of the comedic protagonist knight's horse in Miguel de Cervantes' novel, Don Quixote.
• Rocin means "old horse"; the -ante prefix means, literally, "prior", and has the connotation "better than". Essentially the Knight was trying to give the horse a name that meant something like "superhorse" or "expert horse", but ended up with a name that most people would take to mean "nearly dead horse".
• Having the warjack named after Rocinante implies the warjack's controler is like Quixote; A crazy old man living in a romantic dream, and perhaps drawing others into his dream. As for whom would represent Sancho Panza or Dulcinea in the Iron Kingdoms... that's up to the reader/player.
• Rocinante was destroyed along with the rest of Damiano's army (and Damiano himself) at the Battle of Henge Hold by Zaateroth's forces.

Who can control this warjack

The standard way to include a Mercenary warjack in your army is to put it under the control of one of these models. So first you need to figure out which of these models will work for your Faction.

Mercenary 'Jack Controllers (Human) (Edit)
Warcasters	Ashlynn1 - Ashlynn2 - Aurora2 - Blaize - Caine3 - Crosse2 - Damiano - Fiona - Macbain - Magnus1 - Magnus2 - Montador - Rahera - Shae
"Juniors"	Asphyxious4 - Crosse1 - Nemo4
'Jack Marshals	Colbie Sterling - Dirty Meg - MacHorne1 - MacHorne2 - Raluk Moorclaw - Rutger Shaw - Steelhead Ironhead

Note: Other restrictions may apply (such as 'Jack Marshals can't control Colossals).

Rules Clarifications

Rules Clarification : Warjack      (Edit) The Cortex/Induction core rule means a warjack cannot have more than 3 focus at any time (maybe 4 if they're really special). Many abilities give out focus and don't state an upper limit (such as Convection and Empower). Despite not stating an upper limit, they are always "hard-limited" by the core rule. A warjack can have more than 3 focus during a turn, though. For instance, a knocked down warjack can Power Up and be Allocated 2 focus, then spend 1 to shake knockdown, then another model could Empower it back up to 3. Warjacks cannot spend focus outside of their activation. For instance, they can't boost free strikes or trigger Powerful Attack on Broadsides. (Infernal Ruling) Inert warjacks Abilities that say they cannot be used if the model is stationary (such as Shield Guard) cannot be used while a warjack is inert, either. Refer "Warcaster Destruction", page 59 of the core rulebook.

Rules Clarification : Bond      (Edit) Bonds are ineffective while the model is under your opponent's control. Refer the core rulebook. Bonds & Themes If a warjack/warbeast with a bond is in that caster's battlegroup, they can be taken in any theme force. Refer the core rulebook. This is true even if the caster isn't a full warcaster or warlock (this interaction changed as of 2018.06).

Rules Clarification : Quick Work      (Edit) If you're still engaged in melee when Quick Work triggers, you won't be able to make the ranged attack. Unless you have a special rule that lets you shoot while in melee (such as Gunfighter). (Infernal Ruling) Quick Work specifies "Combat Action" so doesn't work with Impact Attacks or out-of-activation attacks Attack-Generating Abilities (Edit) From the core rulebook: When a model is granted more attacks as a result of an attack it made, it gains only one. If two or more special rules would grant the model another attack as a result of making an attack, its controlling player chooses which special rule to apply. If you trigger two attack-generating abilities (such as Black Spot and Kill Shot) you choose to resolve one and "lose" the other (unless you trigger it again later). If you trigger two attack-generating abilities, and one of them is compulsory (such as Black Spot and Berserk), you must choose to resolve the compulsory one. (Infernal Ruling)

Rules Clarification : Defensive Strike      (Edit) If an enemy doesn't stop in your melee range, but continue all the way through it and out the other side, you won't get to make a Defensive Strike. You will get to make a free strike as per normal, though.

Rules Clarification : Guard Dog      (Edit) If Rocinante is put under the control of a Jack Marshal then he effectively loses his Guard Dog ability because he does not have a controlling warcaster. Simarily, he loses it while under Gastone1's control because Gastone1 is not a warcaster, he's a solo.

Rules Clarification : Tried & True - None yet. (Edit)

Rules Clarification : Powerful Attack      (Edit) If your weapon can make multiple attacks (such as a Charger's ROF 2 gun) then you need to declare (and pay for) Powerful Attack for each attack. (Infernal Ruling) You must declare whether you're using Powerful Attack before making any attack rolls. If you choose not to use it on attack rolls, you can't trigger it on damage rolls. (Infernal Ruling) Exception: If your attack auto-misses, such as an AOE vs Stealth, then you can declare it after deviation but before making damage rolls. (Infernal Ruling) If you declare you're using Powerful Attack, it will apply to to-hit roll(s) and damage rolls. You can't choose to have it just boost the attack roll(s) or just boost the damage roll(s). (Infernal Ruling) The Powerful Attack bonus doesn't apply to "secondary" damage such as Magic Bullet or Electro Leap.

Rules Clarification : Powerful Charge  and/or Brutal Charge     (Edit) If you declare a charge but move less than 3", then the attack doesn't count as a "Charge Attack" and you won't get the bonus.