How to jam

[KingArthur]

What is jamming? How do you pull it off effectively? What Protectorate models are good at it?

[darisus]

Jamming is getting your troops jacks whatever across to your opponents side of the board turn 1 or 2, and pinning him back there.

Pulling it off is both easy and hard at the same time. You want to use fast models, but also survivable ones, plus having AD helps. The difficult thing is to have the unit stick around once it is in and not to just feed people your points. Depending on the unit taken will determine the best way to jam with them and also what you are using them against.

I use Duaghters, Idrians, and KEE most of the time to jam. All of these units have AD and some sort of survivabilty either through high Def or tricks to let me get them across the board fast and keep them there.

There is a quick rundown on Jamming...

[Other_Mike]

Jamming is a strategy that can be successfully employeed mainly by running infantry into an enemy model/unit so that they have to deal with you (attack you, trample over you, walk away and take a free strike, etc) instead of having a clear charge to some unit/model that you don't want them charging or engaging in return. If you can charge the model/unit that you want to jam, that would be ideal but most of the time they will be far enough away that you need to run. Typically, higher defense infantry are the best to jam with and speed is important so you can reach the enemy to engage. Daughters are great for this as they can run 14" and engage and have high defense. Errants and Temple Flameguard are also pretty decent at this in my experience.

[ZealousJohnny]

Jamming (as far as I'm aware) is the act of using a unit or solo in a very aggressive, throw away manner to block your opponent's advance and just generally annoy him.

In my experience, the Protectorate had quite a few good jamming units. My two favourites are Daughters and Zealots.

With the Daughters, I take one of our casters with a defense boost (Kreoss1, Sevi1, Sevi2, Vindictus, or the Testament), buff their defense up to an effective 17, and run them into my opponents lines. Def17 pushed them from the 'hard to hit' zone to the 'you'll have to really try hard to get rid of them'. Be wary of CMAs and anything that can boost to hit, but most other things are fair game, and if you spread the girls out enough you can reduce the effect of CMAs. I dont worry about getting the charge, just running them into contact is enough to force the enemy to deal with you, and if they can't acrobatics means you can run straight passed them next turn into the squishy things in the backfield. They really are a top notch jamming unit. I'm in love with them

Zealots are bit more simple and one shot. Run em up and use Greater Destiny in the first or second turn, depending on how things have panned out. They're difficult to deal with and really can deal out quite a bit of damage to most targets. Even jacks have to worry about pow14 ranged attacks.

I can't get Errants to work no matter how hard I try, but as they have advanced deploy, and seem to be a good Defenders Ward target, as well as being able to halt tramples and close charge lanes with Self Sacrifice, I reckon if you're less of an idiot than myself they'd make good jammers.


This game is often about being very aggressive and forcing your opponent to play in a way he/she doesn't want to. Jamming is a really good way to put yourself in the driving seat early on. I'd highly recommend it


Edit: Beaten to it twice

[jandrese]

Daughters are the best, since if they live they can then charge off wherever they need to go. Ironically, one of the safest places for a Daughter is right in the middle of some enemy unit, since then they'll be very difficult to shoot (in melee) and dangerous to try to AoE to death (friendly fire). I like running them up to ranged units if I can, since they tend to have very poor melee abilities (MAT 5, P+S 8 is common, 10s to hit, and 5s to kill). Daughters also buff well, with everything from Defenders Ward to Holy Ward to even Dirge of Mists helping out a ton. Their only downsides are their strictly average CMD stat and inability to grow the unit past 6 members.

If the enemy is busy dealing with the girls, he won't have a chance to stop the bulk of your army from claiming most of the good terrain pieces.

[jandrese]

I can't get Errants to work no matter how hard I try, but as they have advanced deploy, and seem to be a good Defenders Ward target, as well as being able to halt tramples and close charge lanes with Self Sacrifice, I reckon if you're less of an idiot than myself they'd make good jammers.

Self Sac can't do anything to stop tramples. The most you can do is move some Deaths around so a soul collecting model (like the Deathjack) is out of range of the guys who actually die. Errants are really pretty squishy and kind of slow. I wouldn't really think of them as jamming models. Self Sac is certainly helpful for preventing the enemy from opening up a charge lane, but they won't last long in melee with just about anything. Defenders Ward certainly helps them a lot though, as does both of Rhupert's defensive songs.

The best Self Sac can do is prevent the enemy from opening up a charge lane and forcing the model to trample instead. If you force a heavy to trample, it loses about half of its damage output against whatever it originally wanted to kill, for the cost of a few dead troopers.

[Errant_knight]

Vindictus works wonders at jamming enemy lines. Def ward daughters speed boost gets them into enemy lines turn 1 if they had AD and turn 2 for sure. Follow that up with zealots with GD or vindy's feat up. You can flood the board really quick if you bring a lot of infantry.

[PG_Steampunk Jim]

The jammiest of all the protectorate lists:

Missionaries of War, tier 4
Vindictus
Reckoner
Reckoner
Reckoner
Choir
Errants+Ua
Errants+Ua
Errant Seneschal x2
Zealots+UA

Everything has pathfinder turn one, you get +1 to your starting roll, and all your jacks get advanced move. It's quick. You can sub a few of the reckoners out for sanctifiers once they come out.

[maddermax]

Daughters are my jamming crutch at the moment, with defenders ward and Rupert carvolos dirge of mists, they are super quick, super hard to hit (def 18) and they can terror bomb opponents! So not only Jammy and difficult to remove with quite a bit of effort, but also if a single enemy unit fails a terror check, it can swing a game.

[KingArthur]

Ok. Thanks guys. This should help quite a lot

[Crimzzen]

I've been enjoying Zealots + UA with pSevvy. Cheap at 8 points for a full 10 and UA. I give em defenders ward first turn and run them at the enemy. When one of em dies they're 14/18. Mini-Feat to walk out of combat and toss Rat 7 Pow 15's at whatever you need to kill. Then cycle defenders ward onto something else.