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Metal and metal pricing are quite the stumbling blocks.

7th edition 40K finally killed it for me. I've been playing 40K since RT and warhammer is simply not what it used to be. It's all list building and very little strategy. So me and MWHistorian began looking for a new game to play. We bought into a couple of Warmachine armies and are loving them. Then we found Infinity and the models were gorgeous, the rules actually demanded strategy and tactics and the company weren't a bunch of #$@&£€₩ money grubbing @#$&€£÷×₩¥£. I bought an entire army for what I received from selling a couple of my 40K units. Thankfully there is an active community here. 40K can suck it, I'm not looking back.

played one game enjoyed it, it was over quickly which could be quite good for get togethers between groups of mates.
The orders system makes things interesting although the ability to "rambo" certain troops i would guess comes out from time to time. I really liked the akira style bikes and landmates(tags) but ended up picking scottish werewolves as my faction!

I played it and.. meh. I like a lot of models and some of what they do with the core look of the game. I liked how the starter sets played and the idea of having models that run/jump/climb/dive and kind of just scoot around being tacticool. However once we added more models soon it became HMG: The Return of the HMG Part II: The HMGing of the HMG.

Maybe it was the specifics of the list my buddy bought but it was basically just a matter of his whole list deploying halfway up the table, exchanging a bunch of fire inside my deployment zone and the first person to roll the most crits having his opponents army retreat. It was totally static and even taking one non-"Firing an HMG" action resulted losing a model for nothing in exchange. If there was counter play to this the time needed to develop the skills to execute it was greater than the amount I was willing to give the game. It basically boiled down to a game of "Who crits first?" once we figured HMGing spamming was the only way to go (at least our entry-level skill level).

Good thing the new edition that releases next month has debuffed the HMG and rebalanced the weapons

 Chongara wrote:
I played it and.. meh. I like a lot of models and some of what they do with the core look of the game. I liked how the starter sets played and the idea of having models that run/jump/climb/dive and kind of just scoot around being tacticool. However once we added more models soon it became HMG: The Return of the HMG Part II: The HMGing of the HMG.

Maybe it was the specifics of the list my buddy bought but it was basically just a matter of his whole list deploying halfway up the table, exchanging a bunch of fire inside my deployment zone and the first person to roll the most crits having his opponents army retreat. It was totally static and even taking one non-"Firing an HMG" action resulted losing a model for nothing in exchange. If there was counter play to this the time needed to develop the skills to execute it was greater than the amount I was willing to give the game. It basically boiled down to a game of "Who crits first?" once we figured HMGing spamming was the only way to go (at least our entry-level skill level).

So you consider the game to be meh because you refuse to find any counter-tactic to the first perceived "OP" list that you ran across?

You're right, that is completely the game's fault that you refuse to develop or even look for tactics to deal with a new situation!

PhantomViper wrote:

 Chongara wrote:
I played it and.. meh. I like a lot of models and some of what they do with the core look of the game. I liked how the starter sets played and the idea of having models that run/jump/climb/dive and kind of just scoot around being tacticool. However once we added more models soon it became HMG: The Return of the HMG Part II: The HMGing of the HMG.

Maybe it was the specifics of the list my buddy bought but it was basically just a matter of his whole list deploying halfway up the table, exchanging a bunch of fire inside my deployment zone and the first person to roll the most crits having his opponents army retreat. It was totally static and even taking one non-"Firing an HMG" action resulted losing a model for nothing in exchange. If there was counter play to this the time needed to develop the skills to execute it was greater than the amount I was willing to give the game. It basically boiled down to a game of "Who crits first?" once we figured HMGing spamming was the only way to go (at least our entry-level skill level).

So you consider the game to be meh because you refuse to find any counter-tactic to the first perceived "OP" list that you ran across?

You're right, that is completely the game's fault that you refuse to develop or even look for tactics to deal with a new situation!

I wouldn't call it "OP" as I wasn't losing most of the time, I had a pretty even chance at winning "Who crits first?" since that's determined by the dice. I would call it degenerate and I did attempt to find counter play. I'd say I wound up buying another ~$70 worth of models based on forum advise, and maybe about 20 games trying to get the game out of that state and it didn't work. Like I said it may very well exist but making it click took more time than I was willing to give them game ($70 20+ matches). I'm not going to keep pouring my limited free time and disposable cash on an experience I'm not enjoying, especially when I had other games that were giving me what I wanted out of them.

Among approaches I tried were going prone and using indirect weapons, using my own infiltrators, a TO stealth guy, the most mobile HI I could take in my faction. This stuff didn't work or it didn't get a gratifying game experience in time enough to keep me from getting turned off. The problems really felt like they were in the core of the engine:

First,fhe "Burst" mechanic felt fairly dominate: Without any kind of centralization, strong cover mechanics and swingy crits being able to throw down the most dice felt very important. In terms of shots per point with good modifiers and versatile ranges, I didn't find anything that could top the HMG.
Second even going well above/beyond the terrain density guidelines the volume of models available that could centrally deploy with few restrictions meant it was hard to construct a board where his entire list couldn't get LOS to the majority of my deployment zone short of doing something very contrived: Putting either no tall buildings anywhere near the center line, or putting an artificially high wall just on my side of the center line.


Again it's not this was "Unbalanced" at least in a broad him vs me sense of the word - I won games. It's just that the game wasn't playing the way I wanted. I bought into the game because I loved the idea of highly dynamic, highly mobile, building-to-building fighting, with models using a lot of special abilities and position changes. What I got is a static board with us throwing a lot of of dice and modifiers at each other.

 Chongara wrote:

Again it's not this was "Unbalanced" at least in a broad him vs me sense of the word - I won games. It's just that the game wasn't playing the way I wanted. I bought into the game because I loved the idea of highly dynamic, highly mobile, building-to-building fighting, with models using a lot of special abilities and position changes. What I got is a static board with us throwing a lot of of dice and modifiers at each other.

That is a different problem from what you've said initially.

I found that every game that has ranged combat as a central theme will have very little movement unless the game forces that movement on the players, otherwise the game will degenerate into both sides finding their respective optimal fields of fire and just throwing dice at each other.

Infinity also suffers from this problem if you don't use the missions system to force the players to manoeuvre around the board. Were you guys playing with missions or just "kill each other" type of games?

PhantomViper wrote:

 Chongara wrote:

Again it's not this was "Unbalanced" at least in a broad him vs me sense of the word - I won games. It's just that the game wasn't playing the way I wanted. I bought into the game because I loved the idea of highly dynamic, highly mobile, building-to-building fighting, with models using a lot of special abilities and position changes. What I got is a static board with us throwing a lot of of dice and modifiers at each other.

That is a different problem from what you've said initially.

I found that every game that has ranged combat as a central theme will have very little movement unless the game forces that movement on the players, otherwise the game will degenerate into both sides finding their respective optimal fields of fire and just throwing dice at each other.

Infinity also suffers from this problem if you don't use the missions system to force the players to manoeuvre around the board. Were you guys playing with missions or just "kill each other" type of games?

I stand by the fact I'm describing the same problem in both posts, albeit with a bit more detail in the second:

1-) No movement or dynamic play.
2-) HMG Trumped all other options.
3-) Game outcomes largely decided by landing crits.

We tried at missions, initially our own and then downloaded a couple of the fan ones. Though by the time I got that last step (fan missions), my interest was already waning and I only got in a few games. I found they made no difference. As one side or another was generally either tabled, or in retreat by the middle of the 2nd round at latest. Missions never had any time to enter the equation. Taking actions that weren't firing a weapon resulted in model death, since you didn't get cover while moving if any part of the move took place out of cover.

This was a game I really wanted to like and the initial starters left a great impression. The HI in the start packs are resilient enough against the rifle-y weapons to actually take a hit or two and the low model counts meant it was impossible to cover every enemy model with one of yours. The first 3-4 games I played (with the starter packs) were awesome because if you wanted to make an asymmetric trade with your opponent you could take risks and back-and-forth maneuver.

I'm not saying the game is objectively bad and that it's wrong to like it or anything. However, when it comes to "Your experience with Infinity...?" meh, sums it up. Some good ideas, solid visual presentation but the execution just didn't click for me.

Ok, sorry that you didn't get what you needed out of the game then.

 Chongara wrote:
Taking actions that weren't firing a weapon resulted in model death, since you didn't get cover while moving if any part of the move took place out of cover.

Can you elaborate on this? Because this part goes against everything that I experienced in Infinity: how did any type of movement resulted in a dead model? A model doing an ARO shot will only have B1 and even if we don't factor any type of cover for the model that it is moving, the chances of it hitting and killing its target are usually below 50%, especially if you are making an action that turns that ARO shot into a FtF roll.

PhantomViper wrote:
Ok, sorry that you didn't get what you needed out of the game then.

 Chongara wrote:
Taking actions that weren't firing a weapon resulted in model death, since you didn't get cover while moving if any part of the move took place out of cover.

Can you elaborate on this? Because this part goes against everything that I experienced in Infinity: how did any type of movement resulted in a dead model? A model doing an ARO shot will only have B1 and even if we don't factor any type of cover for the model that it is moving, the chances of it hitting and killing its target are usually below 50%, especially if you are making an action that turns that ARO shot into a FtF roll.

As we understood the cover rules a reaction model could take their reaction at any point in model's movement. This means that even if you began and ended your movement in cover, they'd still be taking the shot at the point you weren't. So let's say I was in my deployment zone behind Chest High Wall A. I think it'd be fun to move from there down the street so I could get at an objective or behind some enemy model. To get there I have to move from Wall A, over to wall B then into a building and out the other side. It's a total distance of about 12-14", with two points of noncontagious cover.

Depending on the model, I"m going to need to use 2-3 orders, two of which (moving from wall A to wall B, and then from wall B to the building) are going to take place in LoS of at least one enemy model. Since I'm out of cover for at least part of each of those moves, I don't get any cover and I'm (as always), in the ideal HMG bandwith.


Compared with standing in place firing an HMG with burst 4. It was just a no brainer. Keep in mind "Always" is obviously a bit of frustrated hyperbole here. Certainly there were occasions where I moved a model and it didn't die (my opponent never really tried to move his models). However I quickly found it to be an almost universally sub-optimal choice, that made it far easier for my opponent to make asymmetric trades on me. I certainly did lose models far more often trying maneuver them than I didn't. When I stopped trying to maneuver my models I started winning.

I understand it now, thanks for the clarification.

Like I said earlier, games with such a great emphasis on shooting will degenerate into the type of gameplay that you've experienced unless the game itself forces the players to manoeuvre. Infinity has solved this problem with the introduction of the tournament missions (and with some of the player made mission systems that were the current system genesis), that prevent the player from winning the game if he doesn't fullfill the mission parameters. Using these systems, even if one player manages to completely destroy his opponent the game will end in a tie if he didn't accomplish the mission.

These missions put a much greater value in mobility pieces, in "order sink" pieces and in the so called specialist models instead of just letting the players focus on raw firepower to the detriment of everything else.

I bought a good amount of Nomads which I am currently painting. I fully intend to start playing.

@Chongara

How much terrain did you place? Does your faction have smoke / AD options too? (albeit certain HMG models work very well with smoke, and AD HMG as well).

Also, a rifle with B3 in the active turn will still be advantageous an ARO HMG firing B1, especially if close.

@PhantomViper

I found Infinity has plenty of movement even with 'Kill 'em all' games, albeit it depends on the terrain setup.

 Daba wrote:
@Chongara

How much terrain did you place? Does your faction have smoke / AD options too? (albeit certain HMG models work very well with smoke, and AD HMG as well).

Also, a rifle with B3 in the active turn will still be advantageous an ARO HMG firing B1, especially if close.

Based on some guidelines I found online : Terrain was placed such that any one terrain piece was within 7" of at least 3 other terrain pieces. Terrain pieces were split roughly evenly between simple cover (wallls, barrels, rubble) and line of sight blockers. Line of sight blockers were placed such that no line could be drawn from one point on a table edge to the opposite point without hitting an LOS blocker. Buildings* were a mix of heights, and about 50% enter able.

Every model in my opponents army had some type up-the-board deployment mode, so he'd deploy everything on the 2-3 highest buildings hat wound up near the center line. This wasn't typically sufficient to get LoS to the whole board, but it was sufficient a that he had LoS to every model in my deployment zone with at least one of his. This kept everything locked in a static fire fight.

A lot of his dudes also had rules that said they were always in cover if they didn't move so he didn't move them.

I was playing a mix of nomads, he was playing Ariadnne (sp?) specifically i think the french dudes(?). I still have the models sitting primed in my Warmahordes bag in my car. I could probably figure out the exact model mix I had if I went to go look.

He also had a fair number of dudes with a rule that had some kind of dig-in token that gave them permanent cover so long as they didn't move (he never moved them). Again none of this was OP, I did win at roughly even rates. It just made game really static and super tedious/frustrating.


*A lot of these were printed paper buildings, or shoe-boxes. So some of the "terrain" was pretty janky. Infinity required a lot more than we had on-hand from Warmahordes.

 Daba wrote:

@PhantomViper

I found Infinity has plenty of movement even with 'Kill 'em all' games, albeit it depends on the terrain setup.

It also depends on player mentality.

I only played a few games in "kill em all" mode, but we did find out that some players just built a fortress in their deployment zone without ever moving and just dared the opposing player to come to them.

When we introduced missions we had a very noticeable increase in the tactics used and the enjoyment that we got out of the game.

I intend to start collecting Infinity just to paint. The models look so cool! Unfortunately, I heard they were in metal and they were, so a bit of a bummer but oh well. Pan-Oceania ftw.

Infinity needs missions that require the players to out think and out move the other.
You need hackers to open doors, placing mines, doctors, etc.
One scenario me and Musashi are working on is one in which there are many civilians and security guards and you have to kill the opponent without alerting any civie or guard.

Another scenario I saw was that it was all hackers and one tag. The hackers had to take over the TAG to attack. Good practice for learning the hacking system.

If you're doing all HMG all the time, you're doing it wrong and without imagination. (Or using N2)

From what I've seen of Infinity (which is very little) it's not squad-based but just a handful of miniatures on each side - i want squad-based, period.

There are some 'squad based' options within the game via the Link Team and Fire Team rules - you should check it out!

Other: I own quite a large force of Yu Jing, but it's on the "to-paint" backlog. I've never played it, though it looks fun. My main issue is the blatantly sexist and totally unrealistic sculpts on all the female models. It's just ridiculous.

nekooni wrote:
From what I've seen of Infinity (which is very little) it's not squad-based but just a handful of miniatures on each side - i want squad-based, period.

Huh? There's lots of squads, linked teams is the term you should look for and its quite a large part of the game.

If you're being dominated by HMGs at this point of the game, a few things could be going wrong with your games. Maybe a combination of them.

First and foremost, are you still playing second edition? Third edition gave HMGs a kick in the pants. They're still useful, but only at long range. Their close range potency was reduced a lot by a change to their range bands.

Secondly, and still important, how much terrain are you using? While CB recommend there should still be fire lanes down the table, there should only be one or two. If someone can lock down a table with a HMG, even from an elevated position, then you've got some real issues with lack of terrain density. Not only proper density, but varying elevations. You should have 3 levels of terain in the game, IMO, and not have a single piece at level 3, but multiple. It creates better movement routes while still allowing long range weapons to do their thing. If it's all flat with single story buildings, there's no avenues to move around threats or get different angles of attack.

Thirdly, and this is based on playstyle, are you bringing any counters? Smoke, AD units, snipers, etc. These are the things you should be taking if your opponent loves HMGs. Smoke creates infinitely tall columns of no visibility, perfect for getting closer to a HMG. AD units can drop outside of their field of view and kill them without resistance. Snipers or other long ranged weapons (I like heavy rocket launchers, personally) can engage them in the active turn with higher burst and brute force shots through.

HMGs dominating the game stopped being A Thing That Happens with third edition, and there was much gnashing of teeth and wailing about it from people who didn't want to change.

Er, those comments on HMGs were from a year ago. It may have still been the old rules then

As for the topic of the poll, I only discovered Infinity this week. I am playing a demo game tomorrow night. Assuming I enjoy it (and I expect I will), I will order Operation: Icestorm next week!

Ruleset is complicated but excellent. Models are second to none. Only reason I haven't bought a load of them is their different proportions to 40k heroic scale makes them stand out too much.

...compared to GW's 40K miniatures?

No surprise there, I guess!

I want to get into it, but I hate metal models. Just can't work with them. Maybe someday when it goes resin or plastic.

It won't go resin or plastic for the foreseeable future. CB have said numerous times metal is the material they work with. The only model they're even considering plastic or resin parts for is one of the new TAGs, which has so much metal they're looking at resin or plastic simply as a way to reduce the amount of metal in the model, rather than it being material they actually want to work with.

It's actually my main concern with the game. At this point, they've committed themselves to metal. Their range is so big that if metal prices ever hit an unsustainable level, they won't have the time or money to swap over to plastic. Resin is a possibility, but resin has its own set of problems.

Yeah I know... I researched it in the past. I meant going to plastic/resin as an impossible dream of mine.

Being cheaper than 40k got me into it. I can't play it as much though because a lot of people around me solely collect 40k. But I have some friends across country that play it and we get some games in when we meet up