Mission 011 Report: Third Time’s the Charm
Another busy month at Bromad Academy with the Rose City Raid, so not much time to chat with our participants, sadly. Thanks again to Luke, who wrote our mid-mission update.
Congratulations to Matt, you’ve won a blister of your choice! You can thank random.org for your luck!
Before we get into the content from our respondents, I want to make a few points about this mission. I’m of the philosophy that vanilla factions are the “strongest” in most cases because of two reasons:
- They give you access to a deep and varied pool of different tools on many different chassis. In other words, the biggest toybox.
- You are rewarded for deploying with close to uniform threat density, i.e. your troopers are deployed relatively far from one another. This lets you cover a good deal of the board and focus your attention/effort on where you need it most as the game develops.
In contrast, sectorials (with NA2 being a notable exception) limit your access to troop profiles and encourage you to take link teams, trading board coverage for raw power. In the past, link teams were basically limited to a group of the same troop type with mostly similar toolkits, but that’s no longer the case with the huge amount of “counts as” and wildcard troopers many factions have access to.
So, why do the 3-trooper core? Well, let’s start with statement that you don’t need a link to be effective. A solo BS11 combi-rifle will kill stuff just fine, even in “bad” range. Solo pieces demonstrably work in vanilla, so why wouldn’t they in a sectorial? And yes, I’m including the humble line troopers–those of you who have read my battle reports over at MercRecon.net have seen the work “mere BS10” Metros and Keisotsus can do alone.
I’ve also observed this “need” to link things. A particularly degenerate example is a Karakuri Haris. It’s a lot of points, and you’re not really getting much in terms of extra capability by doing so. By all means, take multiple Karakuri, but it seems more valuable to me to have one on the left and one on the right so you can push the right and left buttons!
So why link at all? Well, Infinity is a game of shooting and dice, so more burst with your gun means less variance in your results. It’s also a game of resource (order) management, so getting “free” movement for some of your troopers is also enticing! SSL2 and +3 BS are great. They make you more survivable, but only just. You’re paying for them in points as well as the opportunity cost of not having those points elsewhere on the table. It’s a tradeoff, without a clear winner.
Personally, I value the ability to choose the spatial distribution of my threat at deployment, which causes me to dislike the 5-man core. Undeniably powerful, but also limited to an 8″ bubble of deployment and awkwardness in movement.
So, back to the 3-trooper core. I find it very attractive for several reasons:
- You are rewarded with movement efficiency and an improvement in dice variance for playing a sectorial over vanilla.
- The degree of threat concentration is not as high as a 5-man link.
- The ease of movement is significantly improved over a 5-man link–two less models to try to get into cover and stay within 8″.
- Much better flexibility in swapping link leaders. Instead of trying to solve some complex geometry problem during movement, just keep everyone within a 8″ equilateral triangle (and you said math class was boring in school!).
There is a time and a place for the 3- and 5-trooper links. You can have the best of both worlds too, by taking two defensive troopers and leaving them out to ARO/die then soldiering on with the remaining 3 members. In some cases, like the E/M LGL strategy out of Druze and StarCo, it’s clear why you want the 5-trooper core, but as we said in our mission statement, the point of this whole effort is to get people to try different things and grow as gamers!
You can reference the initial mission statement as well as Luke’s thoughts for some more detailed discussion of potential 3-trooper cores, but I’ll leave you with this thought: in most cases, if you drop two troopers from a core, you can afford another camo infiltrator, and who doesn’t like those?
Good hunting, Bromads. See you next mission.
–WiseKensai
Matt
Infernal Machine
When I first announced I would be playing the Academy mission with a three man core, it was met with the response ”why would anyone just play a 3 man core?”
“Dunno, that’s the mission. I am sure there is a circumstances where it would be a good idea.”
Editor’s note: Here’s a guess at Matt’s list:
Jurisdictional Command of Corregidor
MOBILE BRIGADA Lieutenant Boarding Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 33)
TSYKLON Feuerbach, Pitcher / Electric Pulse. (1 | 34)
SEÑOR MASSACRE (Fireteam: Haris) Boarding Shotgun, E/M Grenades, Eclipse Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW, E/M CCW. (0.5 | 27)
JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10)
McMURROUGH 2 Chain Rifles, Grenades, Smoke Grenades / Templar CCW (AP + DA). (0 | 32)
INTRUDER HMG, Grenades / Pistol, CCW. (1.5 | 42)
TOMCAT Engineer Combi Rifle + Light Flamethrower, D-Charges + 1 Zondcat / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 26)
9
1
1 | 5.5 SWC | 299 Points | Open in Infinity Army
Perhaps I have found such circumstances. This days mission was going to be a Limited Insertion match of Supplies. My opponent was playing Tohaa and I was rocking Corregidor. Corregidor has gotten some love recently in the addition of mixed fireteam options. A Tsyklon can be considered a Mobile Brigada and up to two Brigada can go into an Alguacile link. This being an LI mission I chose Brigadas.
Let me back up and express my love for the Tsyklon, particularly the Fuerbach load out. Ever since the intro of the EVO and the Overclock program, I have found every chance I could to exploit the extra burst ARO on the blast mode. Making an opponent roll six saves make me warm and fuzzy. Now with the option to add to a fireteam, the EVO is unnecessary. The burst bonus is now available in both active an reactive. Rolling two dice explosive or three dice AP+DA in the active turn gives lots of options.
Now for this mission I had points to play with so we brought a Brigada HMG and the Brigada LT. with Multi Rifle and Flamethrower. Now the beefier options were great, but the purpose of this link is get the Tsyk the three man bonus. Twenty points of Alguaciles will do the trick just as well.
My opponent went first. He used Neema in a Triad to grab the center box. He then set himself up to make a run on the next turn for the box on my left. He positioned a Gorgos on that third of the table to try to discourage any movement in that direction.
On my turn I started with McMurder whom I had reserve deployed in the center of my zone. He made a bee line towards Armand LeMuet positioned on a rooftop in the far right quadrants. Dogboy and Berneice were able to lay down a solid smoke wall allowing my Tomcat to walk on the right side of the board. The zondcat was able to move over and pick up an HVT classified and the engineer opened and retrieved the supply box before heading for safety.
The HMG Brigada and Tsyklon moved into position for eyes on the last Tech Coffin . A set of heated exchanges brought down both the Gorgos and the Tsyklon. Neema’s group made a move and procured the last box. The HMG Brigada was able to run the Triad back into a building for safety.
The Zondcat was able to cover ground and under a cloud of Jaguar smoke picked the Tsyklon back up. The link reformed and the Tsyk was able to catch a keyhole lane, drop Neema’s counterparts and force her to take cover farther in the building. It was then up to Senor Massacre to take his Haris link and dig her out.
But that is a tale for another time.
In summation, this core lite link is all about maximizing the Tsyklon. With the Alguacile and Brigada variations there is a plethora of options. How effective was it? My Intruder never activated or came out of camo. Nuff said.