Ah, the mighty army book. We see a lot of them come and go, mostly for Games Workshop games. Today I want to take a moment to talk about the line that brings our Warmachine armies to life, Forces of Warmachine. These books detail all the units used by each of the armies of the Iron Kingdoms in lavish detail.
The books are extremely high quality, printed on nice glossy paper in full color. Each of them is packed with huge and colorful artwork, vividly bringing to life the warriors of the kingdoms. Also included is a more complete background treatment for your force, at least more complete than the ones given in the basic rulebook. There's also a good sized story opening each volume, to get that extra bit of characterization.
One of the best things about this line is that you don't really need them to game. All the unit's important stats are given on it's card, which you get when you buy the model (unless it's second hand or from another edition). Really you want the cards anyway, but the Forces books are nice to have for that extra completeness. There's a wealth of information on individual units that simply can't be put on a card, but none of it mechanical in nature.
This line was also one of the first to introduce the concept of having hardcover army books to game-dom at large. Forces of Warmachine volumes are available in both soft and hard cover formats, which adds a great deal to the value for a lot of folks. It seems to have spread - Battlefront and Games Workshop are starting to turn out better hardcovers, even for the army books and expansions.
All told, if you're considering Warmachine you should definitely pick up the Forces of Warmachine book for your army. The characterizations alone are valuable for our narratives, and the books themselves are beautiful. They look fantastic in a set too, so if you're a collector watch out for these volumes. You might find them slowly taking up more and more space on your shelf...
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