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Hey guys, my LGS has noone playing infinity and I'd like to change that. I have a good amount of Nomads . The owner tried to get infinity going but noone seemed interested but I want to try it again and see if I can get people to play.

I've never demo'd a game before so I really don't know what to do or go about teaching someone the game, I've downloaded the quickstart rules and it looks very helpful. I also don't have a second faction that someone could use but my LGS has 2 opened and assembled starters of Haqqislam and Panoceana for cheap but I don't know which one would be more appealing for people wanting to get in (I'm only getting one of them).

So any tips and advice would be helpful!

Most demos need to show the very basic rules, so set aside things like LoL and all that. Use 3 Light Infantry and one Heavy Infantry models per side, and a simple mission, like retrieve a container in the middle of the table, on a 3'x3' table. Limit it to 4 turns. Let the player to whom you are demonstrating 'win'. Or get 2 to play while you referee. The point is to show the move and shoot, ARO and order mechanisms first.

Get the Haqq starter. Those old Pan-O fusiliers... not the best.

Hmm... how to be helpful...

1) Terrain - Make sure you have a LOT of stuff for the Demo. A lot of guys come from 40K and Warmahordes, so terrain tends to be blobs on the battlefield, and not THE battlefield. Make sure you have a lot of stuff ot hide behind and move around. Movement, positioning, and ARO's are really important, and (I think) are what make the game shine. Being able to showcase being rewarded for smart use of terrain is a great way to hook people.

2) KISS - No crazy special rules, don't worry about Loss of LT. Focus on the points that make the gameplay fun and different from all the other games they play. Models die fast. ARO's are useful and reward intelligent positioning. Cover is important. Etc. They need to fall in love with the Rules, because if they had fallen in love with the minis then they'd be playing the game already! (That's how I ended up playing).

3) The Rules - They're free. Tell them this. Tell them they can download them for free. And about the free army builders. Show em' if you have an ipad or something. This alone makes most 40K players go into shock.

4) Have the Rulebooks Anyway - They look good, they have a lot of fluff that suckers like me like, and they'll allow you to show off the artwork and the statlines.

5) *Controversial* Throw the Game - If you're going to be showing them how to play, set yourself up to lose to the guy trying it. People like winning. If you feel that this is a gakky sort of way to do things? Don't do it. You're going to be likely demo-ing to guys who you know already, and they'll probably catch on if you do something stupid just to give them a clean shot. I just put this in there because that is how we did things at Games Workshop... you ran people through a little Demo, hacked up the rules a little (but kept the basics), and let whoever you were demo'ing win. (Then you tried to sell them a starter kit). And I'm not saying make up rules or anything, just keep in mind that people will probably want to play more if they try it out and win, as opposed to them trying it out and getting their ass kicked by the guy showing them how to play.


Hope that helps!

The main concern I have is that all of the store's terrain is made for 40k and WM, would it still be ok to use? How many terrain pieces should I be shooting for?

All of them.

When I first started playing at my store, I had to run around to all the tables (like 9 of them), and steal all the 'Cities of Death' terrain that was available, just to fill up a 4x4 table. Scatter terrain was practicaly nonexistant. In 40K it seems that 'scatter terrain' is lines of sandbags and broken walls.

Scatter terrain is going to be a big concern. As is making sure someone doesn't get a sniper up on some big tower that can shoot anyone on the board.

 Chemical Cutthroat wrote:
All of them.

When I first started playing at my store, I had to run around to all the tables (like 9 of them), and steal all the 'Cities of Death' terrain that was available, just to fill up a 4x4 table. Scatter terrain was practicaly nonexistant. In 40K it seems that 'scatter terrain' is lines of sandbags and broken walls.

Scatter terrain is going to be a big concern. As is making sure someone doesn't get a sniper up on some big tower that can shoot anyone on the board.

That's what I fear, could I use things like walls and forest's to help out? Also I haven't read up on any of the rumors about a 3rd edition and was kinda hoping you wouldn't need so much terrain to play.

Not gonna happen. Infinity is ALL about Terrain. If you don't have enough of it, everybody dies on turn 1 and nobody has any fun.

3rd Ed will be changing some core rules, but it won't be changing the importance of terrain. The system is just way too tied to it.

There are rules in the books about how to use forests and the like, but that can get a little confusing sometimes. I tend to recommend good solid cover. Walls would be excellent. Good way to break up line of sight and move people around.

Biggest suggestion I can give is get the quickstart rulebook (there's a new one coming soon), and buy a couple of the forces from it.

For example, the Haqqislam Quickstart list can be had with 3 blisters - the rifle Jannisary, the Hawwa sniper and the Ghulam 3 pack. Leave one Ghulam out, and you've got the quickstart force. Other factions have this same set up.

The quickstart rules are great for introductions, which is the whole point. They start you out with small forces, a few special rules, and none of the full games baggage that can confuse a new player like Loss of Leuitenant, Retreat, hacking, etc.

For terrain, a very basic setup I have found useful is divide the board into a 3x3 grid. Then place one largeish bit of terrain in the middle of each grid square. A building, a forest area, a large vehicle, etc. Line of sight blockers. For forests, you might want to house rule that you can't see through them. Then get a few bits of scatter terrain like boxes and place them in the spaces between the terrain. This gives you fie lanes with cover and line of sight blockers that let you actually move.

my LGS actually has one of those 40k trench sets which I forgot about could that work for infinity? I think it might be kool for mission since its the one with turrets and a giant laser cannon.

I'd just like to add to this that you shouldn't *throw* the game, but rather simply not try all that hard to win and give your opponent a lot of advice (a lot of us moving over from GW games will be stuck in the mindset that there are only 3 actions, move, shoot and hit it with your sword).

To be fair, for your intro games, you're mostly going to only be moving and shooting. The big things for ex-GW gamers to wrap their heads around are going to be the Order pool system, the ARO system and the sheer lethality of the game.

People think 40k is a lethal game because D weapons remove squads at a time. They don't know what lethal is until their badass heavy infantry of doom with a HMG walks out into the open and dies to ARO fire from a couple of line grunts with rifles.

I think the week 1 scenerio of the escalation league would be a good demo game. 120 points a side, deathmatch, no hacking, no Lieutenants, no retreat.

If they like it you can do more complicated games with them later on.

Also make sure to explain what you're doing. Another piece of advise is (and only if the opponent is ok with it) kind of ask them what they are trying to do with their turn, then explain some of their options. Don't tell them what to do, just say stuff like "my sniper rifle has a long range and is nasty in reaction orders, so advancing up that lane here ion his line of fire might not be a good idea. You could try flanking around this direction if you wanted."

Well yeah. The slow grow escalation ITS scenarios are designed specifically for introducing people to the game. It starts small and gradually increases in size, eventually adding LoL, Retreat and hacking.

Though I'd still recommend starting with a few games from the quickstart guide, if only because it gives each player a distinct 4 models and specific rules to learn.

For example, the Haqqislam list introduces heavy infantry (Jannisary), Doctors (Jannisary), Camoflage (Hawwa) and Infiltration (Hawwa). The Yu Jing list introduces heavy infantry (Hsien), multispectral visor (Hsien), TO Camo (Ninja), Infiltration (Ninja) and Martial Arts (Ninja).

The lists shouldn't really be considered balanced, but they're close enough and give a good idea of each faction.