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So, I've played 7 games so far with my Nomads against my mate's Pan-O and have lost every time Worse I have inflicted maybe 5 kills total over the course of those games (i.e. I often lose without killing anything!)

I've been playing wargames for 25 years so I'm not completely inept, but I can't seem to find anything that works. I don't know if it's my army selection, deployment or decision making but something is going horribly wrong!

I play Bakunin sectorial and own the following (enough to make a 200 point list if I field everything)

3x Moderators with Combi-Rifles (usually one is a Lt and 1 a paramedic)
1x Moderator with Spitfire
1x Reverand Moira with Multi-Rifle and AP CCW
1x Sin-Eater with Mk12
1x Sin-Eater with HMG
1x Zero Hacker
1x Zero with Combi-Rifle and E/Mauler

I was planning to make a Lizard my next purchase but I I want some advice before I spend the cash.

For the record my mate's Pan-O usually has lots of fusiliers (one with HMG and one with Grenade Launcher), order sergeant with flamethrower auxbot and a TO-camo sniper (he has a large colection of models so he can mix-and-match more than I can).

Anything you can suggest for army make-up, deployment or tactics would be really appreciated. Help me get a win!!!!

Are you using the full link team rules for the Moderators? Otherwise you've got no hard-hitting high-burst attackers which means you can't be aggressive enough.

Basically, you need something nasty in the active turn to complement the Sin-Eaters in the reactive turn.

Try proxying the Moira as the HMG version.

Also, could you give us a few examples of how things go wrong?

Camo snipers are hard on Bakunin, as they can pick off a Sin-Eater without him being able to retalitate from camo, recloak, and do it to the other sin-eater.

Is there a lot of MSV around in his lists? Because you probably could do a lighter version of the same to him with your Zeros if you can get them into position. And your Moderator Link Team has Sixth Sense L2 if you have four of them, which at least means they get to shoot back at the sniper. Get another one to get BS+3 and the little runts can be pretty nasty. Sin-Eaters won't do much good, though.

Maybe you are only playing kill em all instead of scenarios.

Since I've started playing with scenarios I've only played "kill em all" for demo games.

Imagine a cage with a small agile fast guy vs a 200 pound MMA fighter... of course the small guy is going to get creamed.

Now change the situation...and make it a building where you have to steal a document from a locked safe...the small guy can use stealth and skill to get to the document and the fighter will try using brute force to get through security and grab the documents...who will win? this would be an interesting match wouldn't it?

I don't view infinity as a slug it out force on force match...otherwise we might as well include tanks..land raiders...and field mass troops.

There is a reason why this game is focused on a small group of people or squad....clandestine, black ops, covert missions...seem to match this idea. So I suggest playing a scenario with limited game turn where if the objective is not met, the game is a draw no matter who has the most troops left.

Plus scenarios like this add spice to the game.

There is no reason not to scenario things up, but no matter how much he is playing secret agent man it will still suck mightily to have an invisible (at the start of the game not even on the table) magical elf that can kill his non-camo guys on Normal rolls without him having any effective way to cover them as they try to complete their mission....especially when he has invested heavily in models that pay a pretty penny for being good at covering fire!

You've still got a list over tactics attitude here. That's a problem. Infinity is a highly tactical game. You've got to tell us more about what you are doing in the games. Not necessarily a blow-by-blow battle report with photos - though that wouldn't hurt - but at least a general description of your intentions and how they play out.

Thanks for the replies so far:

@IJW - we've just started to get to grips with the link team rules, but in my last two games the moderators were pinned down by HMG and Sniper fire so they've not done much so far.

@Kaptajn Congoboy and Pointblank - we've played a couple of scenarios but if anything they've gone worse than the kill games

@ElectricPaladin - to give you an example from last night the scenario was to shut down a power generator in the centre of the board. The playing area had a road running diagonally across the board past the generators with a crashed shuttle in my opponents deployment zone. I deployed my Sin Eaters on the corner of two buildings giving me good fields of fire down the road as far as the shuttle. The Reverand Moira was deployed with them as a counter-assault unit if things got bad.
My Zeros began the game in camo near the objective with the Moderators between the Zeros and Sin Eaters so they could move up as a link-team.

On turn one both my Sin-Eaters and the Reverand Moira were splashed by HMG fire in spite of cover and armour. I downed the fusilier who shot them but he was immediately healed by a medic. On turn two I lost all the Moderators to a single speculative grenade shot forcing the Zeros (who by this point were the only survivors) to move towards the objective without support. Before I could get there my opponent had hacked the generator and it was game over.


My main problems seem to be:

A comparative inabilty to hit anything (Pan-O seems to have a much higher BS overall exascerbated by my usual abysmal dice-rolling )

No idea how to get the Reverand Moira into CC (for a model with ODD and ARM3 she seems to fall over in a stiff breeze)

A pointless paramedic (he always kills the patient )

No effective way of dealing with enemy snipers/HMGs or the auxbot (I hug cover to avoid the snipers and then get toasted by the auxbot's flamethrower as whatever my reaction is I still recieve an automatic hit from the template as soon as it comes round the corner).


Any suggestions?

How in the whole wide world do you manage to consistently lose HMG duels with both firing with 4 dice due to Neurokinetics, when the Sin-Eaters are born with BS13-3(cover) vs Fusiliers BS12-3(cover)-3(CH: Mimetism): BS 10 vs BS 6 before range is added in, combined with the Sin-Eater sitting ar ARM6 vs ARM4, assuming both are in cover?

At favorable +3 ranges that is still BS 13 vs BS 9...at extreme -6 range the Fusilier is down to BS0!

Ok, first some generic advice.

I can tell you right of the bat - and this as someone whose faction of choice includes the Myrmidons - that Infinity is not a close combat game. When I hear the phrase "can't get my X into melee" I think there's a problem right there. Close combat is not a game-winning tactic. It's a neat trick to keep in your back pocket. My advice is to run your Reverend Moira with a squad of shooty guys that you want to use as a shock assault team. If they shoot Moira, they're not shooting the guys who are a bigger threat right now, not to mention provoking dangerous ranged AROs from them. If they shoot the other guys, Moira will survive long enough to be shoved down their throats. The same tactic works with Achilles and a pack of Myrmidons, though in that case everyone has an ODD.

Secondly, something I've learned the hard way in my first few games: the catchphrase of Infinity is "cover me, cover me, cover me." You've got to try to arrange your troops so that anyone shooting at one of them will provoke a catastrophic number of AROs. After that comes the outflanking dance, the arrival of troops from airborne and hidden deployment... but that's the start.

Anyway, reacting to what you've written...

It seems like something's off about your deployment. Have you considered deploying a little more cautiously? How was your opponent able to shoot at you turn one? Some of the most successful deployments I've seen involve setting up with most or all of your models either completely invisible to your opponent, or at least behind cover. Some of the least successful deployments (for example, mine in my last game :-/) involve your models being deployed in danger.

Secondly, I think you might be looking at your faction sideways. I don't know much about Nomads, but everyone tells me that they're the "dirty tricks" faction. Lots of good hackers and remotes with neat tricks, not so great at direct assault. Have you considered adapting your list and play style to reflect this a little more?

I hope I've been helpful and wish you luck.

Kaptajn Congoboy wrote:How in the whole wide world do you manage to consistently lose HMG duels with both firing with 4 dice due to Neurokinetics, when the Sin-Eaters are born with BS13-3(cover) vs Fusiliers BS12-3(cover)-3(CH: Mimetism): BS 10 vs BS 6 before range is added in, combined with the Sin-Eater sitting ar ARM6 vs ARM4, assuming both are in cover?

At favorable +3 ranges that is still BS 13 vs BS 9...at extreme -6 range the Fusilier is down to BS0!

I'd assume fussies were linked. Still it required some luck to down a hmg sin-eater with nothing but fussies.
Also, yeah. make your opponent burn orders. If you don't go first don't deploy in the open especially against pano. They are great at shooting, but with little forward deployment, bad at bringing the fight to you, if you hide behind a corner from the get go they will have to burn lots of orders to get to you.
If hiding behind corners gets you flamed with auxobot, use minelayer zeros to mine the road to corners. Or deploy some cheap corner guardians closer to enemy than your valuable troops. Morlocks are good. 7 points, template weapon and you don't care if they live or die.
And get yourself a proper assault troop, like hmg moira or spitfire prowler. Or 5-man link of moderators.

Also the only nomad troop who really wants to be in CC is Uberfallkomando. Everyone else is 99% of the time better off shooting. With the small exceptions of morlocks or bran do castro, who *might* want to get into CC, but most of the time would be better of shooting as well, and their CC ability is more of a detterent.

Im also curious about your terrain....it might be too open.

Also try making multiple objectives in your scenario scattered all round ...rather than just the one objective at the center of the field....this way speed, maneuverability, hacking, using WIP, become just as important as BS and special weapons.

Also as ElectricPaladin mentioned...your figs should not be in LOS. If he has initiative, you should make him spend orders just to get to see your figs.

A game I played recently had 11 objectives scattered all around the game table (even at deployment zones...as there are a lot)

5 objectives had be destroyed by D-charges or teardrop template weapons. Another 5 had to be hacked (if you have a hacker present) or retrieved by base to base WIP roll. the Last is the extraction elevator room in the middle of the field (1 point of each fig extracted)....5 turns only (250 pt game)

As you can see even squad composition is considered as it has to contain specialists (those in charge of destroying objectives and those in charge to retrieving data...and those who will cover them) ...rather than just containing a couple of killers with the big guns.

Just trying to help and give insight...and I wish you a fun next game.

Thanks for the tips, I'll definitely look into more complex scenarios. Might it be worth creating a thread for people to contribute scenarios to so there's a 'bank' of them for new players? I'll start one later if I get a chance.

As for losing HMG duels it may just be my legendary ability to always roll bad dice (I have had games where my opponents start praying to the dice gods on my behalf its so bad lol ).

On a more serious note it looks like I'll have to focus more on my deployment. I have probably been too aggressive assuming that all I need is to be first on a fire-lane to make it work. I'll try something more conservative next time and see how it goes.

Thanks for the help, C_C

My YAMS (Yet Another Mission System) cards are extremely popular as a set of random missions:

http://wargamingtrader.com/infinity/yams_1_0

IJW wrote:My YAMS (Yet Another Mission System) cards are extremely popular as a set of random missions:

http://wargamingtrader.com/infinity/yams_1_0

Yeah I saw that and didn't know you made a new one....now I know and already got a copy

I haven't tried your system yet but i'll give it a shot.

IJW wrote:My YAMS (Yet Another Mission System) cards are extremely popular as a set of random missions:

http://wargamingtrader.com/infinity/yams_1_0

that right there convinced me to play Infinity. very nice

I agree a lot with the others about scenario.

I'll add that if you are not using Linked team rules then don't bother with just Bakunin. Normally I don't like changing lists or anything but the Intruder with sniper rifle is fantastic! He has a X-visor AND MSV L2. This makes him arguably the best sniper in the game.

Like mentioned almost use the Sin Eaters as bodyguards. Use coordinated orders to keep them with the others and he can use his ARO to help the others.

Link team rules are definitely coming into play now that I'm starting to get the hang of how they work. I need an extra Moderator or 2 to get the best out of them (as I only have 4 at the minute).

The intruder sounds nice and I'd love to have one, but Bakunin can't take them - indeed I have very few sniper options and the ones I do have are pretty poor for one reason or another (unless I've missed something, if I have someone let me know! )

The Sin-Eaters I originally intended to go 'on point' in front of my team so that anyone who tried to get LOF to my main force took full bursts, but that hasn't worked so far.

As much as I love the Lizard I wonder if I should skip it in favour of something different to fill up my last 100 points. The only problem is that I know I'm going to be up against either a cutter or squalo in our first 300 point game and would like something heavy to balance that out.

Well instead of sniper options then how about some forward observer fun? I recommend the Stempler Zond with FO, Sensor, and Climb+. That along with the Vertigo and it's GML it can be deadly. The Rev. Custodier is an FO with her Hack+ device along with the Meteror Zond, and Zero. The Custodier can also FO through any Repeaters as well.

Don't forget, going up against a TAG can be scary, but a Link Team with a Missile Launcher can make a TAG nervous.

Unfortunately Bakunin have no links with ML. Alguaciles only.