When the Manowar Kovnik goes through CID....

As if he is a melee monster? I don't think that his melee prowess is good that much. Also you will not want SPD 4 solo missile even if you don't have Manhunters.

If I can add something, then I will add Veteran Leader[Man-o-War] and Tactician[Man-o-War], making him the better supporter and allow Man-o-War groups to work well with each other more. I think that Desperate Pace is already a good addition to them, but Tactician makes Demolition Corps easier to deliver(yes, if you also bring the shocktroopers to shield them, though), and Veteran Leader makes the shocktrooper's effective RAT by 6 so they can hits the enemy units by their gun as well, and also helps Bombardiers too.


Flank[Man-o-War] seems also good to work with the other Man-o-Wars, either join the charge of fellow shocktroopers/demolition corps or helping jammed Bombardiers. Although Slam already serve the similar role.



Of course, Desperate Pace should be keep. Or they are toooooo slow especially for the shocktroopers.

I should probably point out that I've been happy to pay 5 points for the Kovnik in Mk3. 4 points feels too cheap for a tough solo who can do some work personally and provides an excellent buff. I don't think he needs to be changed.

(1) Jack marshalling by the Kovnik has never made that much sense to me (or been given much of a fluff justification), so I'd be happy for it to go. If he has to keep it, change Assault to something like the marshalled jack is able to slam (and trample?) without using Focus? Would work really nicely with a Devastator and parallels his personal ability too. He'd be Khador's bowling champion.

[As a side note - jack marshalling is a really problematic ability in a game focused on Warcasters. The whole point of warcasters is that they are meant to be able to use jacks more effectively than jack marshalls, so a caster run jack should perform better if you want to keep the IK feel. But then why bother with jack marshalling? It would work better if PP had a game that didn't revolve around casters, or where casters were less central to it.]

(2) I like him having the slam ability, as it plays into the feel of MoW as mini-jacks by giving them jack abilities. It doesn't come up often, but can be handy in a pinch.

(3) I don't want the Kovnik to have too much support for MoW, beyond Desperate Pace (which was so useful). In general I think Khador is less about solos which are only about support - they give some useful abilities, but also pull weight on their own (the Iron Fang Kovnik is a good example - nice abilities, but a pretty good combat model too, especially in LoS; similarly the Forgeseer - buffs jacks, but has a good magic missle with an unusually high POW). So making him heavy on support isn't the right Khador 'feel'. If he were to give support, I'd like it to be something that isn't replicated elsewhere in Khador (like tactician is in Irusk2, or the various means we have of giving Pathfinder). Maybe confer a jack-like ability on the units? Tramples or slams could be interesting. Not game-breaking, but interesting. 

I understand the Veteran Leader approach, that type of ability risks closing off the space for new developments by providing a generic buff, so I'd rather avoid it. Even with the MoW models which currently exist, it risks making MoW very accurate melee infantry (MAT8!), making it considerably harder to jam them reliably. Drakhuns could get to MAT9 with the cavalry charge bonus too, meaning even the highest DEF models would be at serious risk of being hit. I'm not sure that's something PP would want. There might also need to be careful balancing/wording to handle the veteran leader ability in relation to a MoW typed Battle Engine. Frankly, Veteran Leader would be a way to try and resolve the issues that Demo Corps and especially Bombardiers have, but without really getting to the heart of the issue in either case. It's bad game design to approach the issue from that perspective. When/if the Kovnik goes into CID, it will probably be at the same time as the rest of the MoW, so it would be better to try and fix those units directly.

(4) I'd rather go with something that ups his personal melee potential. Flank or Gang
would work. That encourages you to use him in melee once the rest of
the MoW are engaged and makes him a pretty decent end-game
threat.

Yeah no, no way they're giving shocktroopers slams. They're already really strong into scenario, that might push them into OP.

Reach on his weapon is something he was missing since mk1. I would like to see added. Also a hurry rig of sorts. +2spd and d3 damage would be cool.

Make his Jack marshall not completely overshadowed by Seer's. Year later and still nobody can make sense of Assault on Khador jacks. The only one that can meaningfully use it already has it by itself.

Back in MkII I kept trying to get the MOW Kovnik to work (even though he never did). Why? Simple: MAT 8 P+S 15 Weaponmaster. No matter how crappy he was, at least I knew that if he got into melee, he was going to do some damage.

In MkIII he got better in many ways (though not as a jack marshal): more initial attacks, much better synergy with MOW, arguably a tiny bit cheaper; overall I get the impression that he sees much more use. But I don't like him anymore, for the very simple reason that he lost Weaponmaster. Yes, it's stupid, but I just liked the idea of that one massive hit that no-one short of a Butcher or a Stryker could match.

So personally, unless they give him back Weaponmaster, then he's dead to me.

Other than than, either drop Marshal and make him 4 points (so he's just there as MOW support); I don't think he's overpriced compared to the Forge Seer at that point, or give him an actual useful Drive - although it would have to be VERY useful to make him worth taking as a Marshal over a Forge Seer, so honestly I just don't think that's the way to go anymore.

If they gave him Reposition, would he be worth taking for caster-independant Kodiak cloud-walls? Right now I can't tell if that would be over-costed or over-powered.