***WARNING****WARNING****WARNING*** Iron Kingdoms Fan!
I vastly prefer the Iron Kingdoms to Dragon Mech which is way too over the top for my taste. Reminiscent of the old D&D Earthsaker adventure. I just do not buy the idea of humongous humanoid warmachines. At least the ones in WARMACHINE are on a more believable scale. (I cannot stand Battletech for the same reason.) Iron Kingdoms is much more consistent, and has a gritty feeling that I prefer. I like the politics, the fact that the drums of war are only now starting to pound again, and the religious conflicts that drive so much contention. I view the over all culture as a mix of 17th, 18th, and 19th century Europe. I like the fact that arcane magic is distrusted, and as far as item creation goes, all magic is somewhat dangerous. The limits on healing magic and raising the dead give more immediacy to danger.
I will admit that the Mechankal magic item rules are complex, and could have been much better written, but once grasped they are by no means 'weak'. They are a very viable addition to the item creation rules given in the DMG, without suplanting them, it is hard to say which is better, a Mechanical wand or a standard wand, both have strengths and weaknesses. On the Privateer Press website is a much clearer description of the system, though I wish it was not so needed.
The races vary a good deal from the D&D norm, and while I think that there are balance issues with the Ogrun (ogres) I like their friendly relationship with the Rhul (dwarfs). I like the xenophobic elfs, and even the manic Gobbers (goblins).
I like the classes, they add flavor to the setting. I would have liked to have seen more in the Character Guide, but given that it was already massive I can understand the limits they were under.
The cultures in Dragon Mech are at least as contrived as those in Iron Kingdoms, in part because the basic premise is so very, very contrived. (Meteors, yeah, right...) Iron Kindom's cultures are contrived in the sense that they are very loosely based on real world cultures, but do not always fit their environs well. Corvis for example has a climate that is much like Louisiana (complete with crocs), yet every body has British accents and slang.
For a high level game Warjacks are in fact something that the PCs may have access to, even being a Warcaster, ablbeit not one of the named WARMACHINE Warcasters, is possible.
I do have problems with some aspects of the setting, and have cherry picked rules from other sources to cover what I consider problems (guns that cost multiple GP per shot? Yeah, right...) but I would likely do that in any event, the ability to do so is possibly my favorite aspects of D20.
The Auld Grump
