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I have decided I love the Combined Army. Their elite feel and almost being analogous to Halo's Covenant make them just too cool. Also, one of the things I love about this game are that you can literally play with as few as 6 models per side. Allows me to focus on each model heavily and makes for easy transportation. Now, which of these sectorial forces experience better play? Morat Aggression or Shasvaasti? I personally like direct and blunt figures that are simply tough. To put it in layman's terms; I like Khorne cultists (because they get to the point and get it done!).

Would someone be so kind as to comment on the model support each sectorial receives, how prevalent each is, and the real crunch in their play styles?

You want the Morats, their tactics are commonly referred to as being hit in the face with a brick.

The Shasvastii are a very sneaky faction, where you are going to have to perform a lot of underhanded trick to win, not very straightforward.

You know you don't HAVE to play sectorials? For starters it's almost always recommended to start with a vanilla force because they have more options to choose from, and linkteams are very hard to use well.

According to what you like, I'd recommend the morats, IF you decide to play sectorial anyway. They hit hard, hit many times, and keep hitting until every last one of them is dead. No retreat for them. And, seeing as you're coming from 40k (like most of us on dakka do...) 'They're made fer fightan an' winning!' I'm not quite sure on 6 models per side though, especially in higher point games. For 300 points the bare minimum is 7-8 orders.

Go Morat (caveat: I have no idea what I'm talking about). Why? They have an awesome starter box, add in a Raicho, and maybe some Yaogat, Surgat, Sogarat, etc. You have a bunch of awesome sculpts with some great equipment and rules, that hit like a brick gak, whats not to love?

I really want Morats...

bahzakhain wrote:
You know you don't HAVE to play sectorials? For starters it's almost always recommended to start with a vanilla force because they have more options to choose from, and linkteams are very hard to use well.

According to what you like, I'd recommend the morats, IF you decide to play sectorial anyway. They hit hard, hit many times, and keep hitting until every last one of them is dead. No retreat for them. And, seeing as you're coming from 40k (like most of us on dakka do...) 'They're made fer fightan an' winning!' I'm not quite sure on 6 models per side though, especially in higher point games. For 300 points the bare minimum is 7-8 orders.

Sectorials have become such an integral part of the game that you basically should be starting your demo games with them now.
Link Teams are something else entirely, but you don't have to use Link Team rules from the start. You can introduce those slowly.

With that said, I'm going to echo the sentiment of Morat. You have a gorgeous starting product(the Morat Aggression Force starter) which allows you to add a second box(the Hungries) that lets you expand your starter very naturally. Then of course there's going to be new Morat releases to "redesign" the line over time meaning more releases.

Shasvastii are cool with the sneaky mentality but it is a pain in the butt actually finding/suggesting starter products because the Shasvastii Expeditionary Force box is terrible.

mmmhhh....

As a Combined Player myself, I think there could be no more different armies than Morat and Shasvastii. Like said before Morat are more bricks in your face, Shas are sneaky little bastards using hiding and hitting your weak points. I love them both because of this difference. If you go for playing a lot of ITS games there´s a discussion Morat are not good for scenario games. They are fighters. I would go for the models you like most. In my case I started with Shas and then turnend to Morat and the freaking EI stuff, the elite Anathematic and so on. For a beginner I would use Morat, the Shas have a LOT of crazy rules, like vampirism or starting the game in eggs. They are far more challenging in gameplay terms. Normally Morat are more a good and solid infantry army, the models are a bit more expensive because of the Morat rule and you´ll find any Camoflage over mimetism level. But you´ll also find 5 point models (Hungries) in the list...spam 8 Hungries against your enemy, they will "love" it...

Link teams aren't THAT hard to use, and have become almost mandatory as well - at least eventually in a 'competitive' environment, and almost certainly against someone who is using them.

Also, for example:

A five model link team performs a move-move order: how many orders does it take for all five to move?

And how many AROs do the five models provoke?

The only good use I could get out of them would be defensive- sitting on their butts, providing orders and sending a hell alot of fire into anyone poking his head around the corner. The rest would just be one dude carrying hyper-expensive powerups on his back that can be easily targeted. As for order efficiency, you can use coordinated orders. No coherency rules and they don't even have to be from the same unit!

EDIT: nevermind, noticed that coordinated orders aren't that efficient at all! Apparently you need to spend an order per mini.

I play CA but have a lot of shasvastii and only a few morat.
Based on what you said. I would recommend you look at units in both but weighted toward more morat units. (i went the other route)

Morat are straightfoward (more shooty, less camo, less special rules like promethion, automedkit, shasvastii) and direct confrontation oriented approach and have some decent 2 wound heavy infantry.
Shasvastii use seed pods which hatch in 2nd turn and pass from unconcious to spawn so the enemy will require extra orders to go and finish them off.

Why not build mostly morat troops and add a cadmus or some shrouded or a malignos or speculo killer into the force also?
Also shasvastii have a couple of options for less camo more confrontational style: gwailos are pretty neat and they just got a new model with RL. But its really not their thing.

The new morat aggression force starter pack is released (awesome models ). You could start with that and proxy in some other models to see what works as you go towards 300 points.

I think standard CA is as good as any sectorial (actually mixed CA is freaking awesome): You can combine both and have a very difficult army to beat: morats have higher retreat threshold, plus shasvastii spawn embryos have to be killed to count towards loosing troops, plus an EI like charontid (Mnemonica) and you wont suffer from LOL. And you could make a powerful link team morate: sogarats, suryats, yaogats at its center.
Its also possible to not bother with link teams and put in 2 of the EI aspects: anethematics hacker plus charontid.

I have played against and with both armies and at the end of the day if played well they are both hard to handle. (eg: one of my friends just doesn't know how to deal with shasvastii for certain objective missions, too many mine layers, camo markers and pods does his head in).

 Kanluwen wrote:

bahzakhain wrote:
You know you don't HAVE to play sectorials? For starters it's almost always recommended to start with a vanilla force because they have more options to choose from, and linkteams are very hard to use well.

According to what you like, I'd recommend the morats, IF you decide to play sectorial anyway. They hit hard, hit many times, and keep hitting until every last one of them is dead. No retreat for them. And, seeing as you're coming from 40k (like most of us on dakka do...) 'They're made fer fightan an' winning!' I'm not quite sure on 6 models per side though, especially in higher point games. For 300 points the bare minimum is 7-8 orders.

Sectorials have become such an integral part of the game that you basically should be starting your demo games with them now.

While I don't disagree, vanilla lists definitely still have their place for recommendation. Sectorials theming a list and offering link teams is great, but there's options in Vanilla that just aren't available in Sectorials. For example, if I play my Hassassin Bahram, I get zero ability to run Odalisques, Hafzas, Kum bkiers and more. If I ran Qapu Khalki, I gain Odalisuqes and Hafzas, but still lose Kum Bikers, all Hassassin units, Asawira, and more. Both lose Haqqislams hidden gem of a cheerleader, the Naffatun.

Vanilla has its place, and it's a good starter suggestion due to not having units entirely removed and why I recommend it. Not everyone wants to immediately theme their list. Some like to start with a general list and expand, which is why I always recommend starting with a general list. Especially in a game like Infinity - it's easy to see something like Hassassin Bahram and thinking you really want to play an army of all badass hassassins, only to buy them all and find out how limited they are once you have a better grasp of the system. If you start with a general list, then decide you want to go for a Bahram list, you've already got likely got some models to bring over.

Morats sound like my kind of guys. Brick to the face and a bee-path to you are my playstyle. No funny business, straight to the point.

Also......they could or could not be Khorne cultists. And I do love me some Khorne.

Peanut butter and chocolate together?

Awesome.

40K and Infinity?

Not really.

I am specifically choosing Infinity because it is not 40k.