Infinity (wargame)

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Infinity is a game with 28mm high metal miniatures that simulates combat and special operations in a science fiction environment with Manga aesthetics.

Fluff

Sci-fi future. Humanity can travel through deep space via gates/wormholes, and reached out to about a dozen habitable systems by now. Humanity is still balkanized, not just by nation but by corporate allegiances too. There's also contact with another alien culture who want to annex humanity into their empires. Military action is never overt, as diplomats maintain an appearance of civility while "rogue insurgents" are dealt with "police actions" among the colonies, and "unsanctioned criminals" are eliminated with "unfortunately" too little evidence to identify them. While the main powers of humanity fight a constant cold war, an interstellar Combined Army seeks to conquer and assimilate humanity's knowledge and technology.

Factions

The Great Powers in conflict are:

• PanOceania, the Hyperpower: Leadership & Technology. Space-Sikhs and Crusader Knights
• Yu Jing, the Asian Power; Modernity & Tradition.
• Haqqislam, the New Islam: Wisdom & Bravery. And Muslamic Ray-Guns.
• Ariadna, the Lost Colony: Fucking Russians, Werewolves, the French, and Drunk Scotsmen.
• Nomads, the Nonconformists: Rebellion & Resourcefulness.
• The Combined Army, the Alien Threat: Power from Deep Space.
• Mercenaries, the Profession of War.
• ALEPH, who Watches over All.
• Tohaa, Aliens, the ally that you cannot trust.

On Infinity Factions by Ansob

PanOceania is the result of an Australian/New Zealander/Filipino/Indonesian economic alliance buying out the US, EU and India's debts which they acquired when the first space colonisation programme failed and the markets went through another huge crash. They're the most high-tech human faction overall and have a lot of remote-control robots and mechs. They're easily the shootiest faction. The setting itself is in the midst of a both a second Cold War between PanOceania and Yu Jing (who are the two hyperpowers), and a more traditional war against the Combined Army. They are ultra-capitalists who've killed off most left-wing ideologies by worshipping the free market as the ultimate arbiter and the 'fairest' redistributor of wealth, with their democratic system now run directly by corporate/special interest Lobbies instead of traditional political parties. Oh, and they're also fanatical Christians who've allowed the Catholic Church (which re-unified all the Christian denominations and is a major Lobby itself) to have power-armoured knights as its own private military.

Sectorial armies are:

- The Neo-Terran Capitaline Army: Basically the uber-elite high-tech security forces of the capital city of the PanOceania nation. They get better access to high-tech units and field Auxilias bonded with Aux-Bots as their line infantry, or field Australian Jarheads with a propensity for shotguns and bioimmunity, probably because of their Aussie heritage.

- The Military Orders of the Papacy: Basically SPACE KNIGHTS. VERY CATHOLIC SPACE KNIGHTS. Thematically they're all based on the crusader orders of old and then some, except for the Knights Templar who like the real counterparts were wiped out for committing heresy, although in this case its related to breaking the "Don't make AIs" rule, by putting illegal AIs into everything that can hold a microchip. Very small armies, they're not very highly rated in competitive play simply because you have a handful of powerful soldiers that are very close combat oriented and no really way to get them up close. Looking better with the change to magister knights and Jean, although until ITS hits, we don't know shit.

- The Shock Army of Acontecimento: A provincial force based on the jungle planet of Acontecimento, not as tough as vanilla PanO but fields some interesting units including the yet to be released character TAG that functions like those Tachikomas from Ghost in the Shell.

Yu Jing is the result of China, now no longer Communist even in name, buying South Korea's and Japan's post-crash debts. China basically bought the country as a means of vindicating its colonial ambitions and treats the Japanese as second-class citizens. Other Asian countries soon joined the newly-formed "Greater China" and Yu Jing quickly became a hyperpower to match PanOceania. They have slightly less emphasis on remote-control drones and thermoptic camo but are as technologically advanced, just in a different way - they favour elite power-armoured infantry instead (though they also have a piloted mech or two), and have a bit more of an emphasis on close-quarters shooting. They were the first to restart their space programme and as such what little they lack in raw economic technologies versus PanO, they more than make up by having a shitload of land and people.

Sectorial armies are:

- The Japanese Sectorial Army: Pretty much a military division of Japanese Yu Jing citizens who are driven by the blatant stereotype of Japanese culture being obsessed with war and HONRAR. Very high tech and close quarters oriented to the point where they can break shooting stalemates by assaulting and relying on their better CC stats. The tradeoff is that they suck really bad at a distance. But they have ninjas with stealth suits and monofilament katanas, power-armored samurais and the biker gangs from AKIRA so who cares?

- The Imperial Service: Inquisitors, Police Special units with shady reputations at best, convict soldiers and Security Service Agents. Overall it plays similar to the Vanilla, tends to run lots of Hsien Lts for the added Heavy Weapons.

HaqqIslam are followers of a new branch of Islam that preaches tolerance and scientific enlightenment, based on the Islam of the Golden Age. They're absolute masters of biotechnology and have a monopoly on a substance called Silk which allows for mind uploads/reincarnation, among other purposes. As such, they're financially secure and no one faction can really afford to take them out since they're officially neutral and sell the Silk to everyone who can buy. They have more of a reliance on light infantry than the first two factions, but this is compensated for by their more expensive troops having funky abilities thanks to bio-engineering and a lot of their infantry are religious fanatics which means their army stays on the table longer. They are also a shooty faction, but this is the norm rather than special.

Sectorial armies are:

- The Hassassin Brahim: Remember those Hassassins from the first Assassin's Creed? Them, but in SPACE! With genetically engineered supersoldiers backing them up, and shitty tribal guys. Very interesting force to play, one of the hardest sectorial lists for newcomers, capable of very nasty alpha-strikes but you can build them around a number of playstyles, they just excel at alpha-strike better than any other list at the moment.

- Qapu Khalqi (The Men At The Gate): Essentially an alliance between PMCs, large Haqq based corporations involved in the Silk trade, Pirates willing to go Privateer for the Haqqislam government, Corregidor mercenaries and the Security & Counter Terrorism Services of the Haqqislam Nation. Very competitive and somewhat demanding, QK can run 2 Linked Fireteams instead of 1 like other factions as well as field tons of Hafzas who let the Haqq player run a shell-game with their Lts making the assassination option difficult to play against a QK player.

The Nomads are the inhabitants of three huge spaceships that declared their independence from Earth in the early years of the relaunched space programme. They bunched together because it was that or be easy pickings for ALEPH and its PanO/YJ puppets (so they say). They're a collection of misfits, criminals and people with weird fetishes, and generally the last refuge of all the kooky stuff you could think of - basically, the Internet as a nation. They do bio-modification for fun, have all the best drugs and throw the best parties, and you can even buy sections of Bakunin where you can have the laws be anything you fancy (as long as they don't jeopardise the ship itself), so if you're really interested about making your army fit into the fluff you can do all sorts of fun stuff (I imagine there are communists and Nazis and every other extinct(?) ideology you can think of with a semi-autonomous module on Bakunin). They even have Anarcho-Feminists. In terms of the actual game, they focus on being a pain in the ass to the opponent, with a good mix of TO, drones/mechs and elite medium/heavy infantry plus among the best hackers in the game.

Sectorial Armies:

- Jurisdictional Force of Corregidor: A former prison ship, full of African and South-American convicts turned mercenaries. Somewhat of a generic version of Nomads.

- Jurisdictional Force of Bakunin: Similar to the Corregidor sectorial there isn't too much of a big deal to Nomad sectorial lists except maybe less access to the elite toys like TO or Hacking Device Plus. If you want to field an army of mutants, gene-modded furfags, weird cultists and literal feminazis this is the sectorial for you.

Ariadna is a nation formed by the descendants of the Russian (Cossack), French, UK (Scottish) and American colonists who were on the aforementioned space colonisation programme. When they were sent through the wormhole to the planet Dawn (the discovery of which prompted the second space race and the first colonisation programme) they set up a base on Ariadna (an alternative name of the planet, named after their ship, and after which the faction is named). Unfortunately, when Earth tried to send a second ship through the wormhole the wormhole collapsed, causing the market crash on Earth and stranding the Ariadne on an inhospitable planet. They quickly antagonised the sentient, dog-like native Antipodes and ended up at war with them for the better part of a century while intermittently going to war with each other, since each nationality had decided to set up its own base to maximise survival chances. Eventually, with the whole colony on the brink of collapse the Russians/Cossacks (who are ultra-capitalists and other oligarchs which Putin likes to try to kill every now and again), who had about twice the population of every other colony, just declared themselves the planetary government and started flexing their military muscles to make sure everyone focused on fighting the natives instead of each other.

Eventually, the planet was rediscovered first by PanO then by YJ at which point everyone discovered that this odd metal the Ariadne had been using since they got there was actually something called Teseum, which is harder than diamond yet easier to shape and is also the primary component in advanced building materials, so both of the hyperpowers rushed to exploit a technicality in interplanetary law by claiming that Ariadna only owned part of the planet and that the other 75% that didn't have any settlements on it belonged to the original nations that had financed the colonial mission (by now absorbed into PanO/YJ) and was up for grabs by anyone. They started paying corporations to land on Ariadna and claim ownership of the bits of the planet, which obviously pissed the Ariadne off (who had been abandoned and left to die by Earth, from their point of view); the ensuing Commercial Wars were fought by Ariadna on one side with training and weapons provided on the cheap by the Nomads (acting to protect their interests as a minor power by making sure the hyperpowers didn't establish a precedent of violating sovereignty) against the PanO- and YJ-backed and -equipped corporations on the other. Eventually, the Nomads/Haqq managed to ram a bill through the O-12 (the "Organisation of 12 Planets", basically the Space UN) that established Ariadna's sovereignty over the whole planet and recognised them as an independent nation.

Needless to say, this didn't exactly sit well with the Ariadne who now have a major grudge against PanO/YJ (though fabulously rich from the sale of teseum to them), but are bros for life with the Nomads and Haqqislam.

Oh, er, yeah, gameplay-wise, Ariadna has cheap light infantry, no heavy infantry at all (the closest they get are the dogfaces/dog-warriors who are pretty much the only things with multiple wounds in the Ariadna list; consequently their elite dudes are really cheap, though more fragile, by the standards of the other factions), a shitload of troops with Camouflage (but no TO) and Infiltration (meaning they start in your table half disguised as counters that your models can't see without wasting orders detecting them). They (with one exception) also cannot be hacked because they're using early 21st century equipment in the 23rd century and generally work best as a guerrilla army, setting up traps before the game begins and dropping out of camo to take shots before hiding to go back into camo. :fidel: Sectorial Lists:

- Merovingian Rapid Response Force: Pretty much the French colonists have tactical doctrine that enables police, military and paramilitary units to operate in an integrated fashion in the event of an emergency. Quite a mobile force, it doesn't run as much camo as normal but brings some good elite light infantry with the Loup Garou link team. One of the most competitive Sectorials at the moment as short of hacking and Smoke+MSV2 it can do everything, they even have access to mercenary hackers and TAGs.

- Caledonian Highlander Army: Fucking Psychotic Scotsman. Practically a 40k army with most of their units having an unhealthy obsession with beating shit to death with claymores in a setting where guns are more than just practical. Runs a fair number of camo units, Cameronians (Werewolves that only fight in their fuck huge angry form), Wulvers (children of normal humans and Cameronians--arguably the better of the two as they can play as melee or elite shock troopers), infiltrators and some interesting regular units. Move forward, throw smoke, charge and shoot if you have LoS/survivors, this is a very simple army and splits between whether you want to charge forward really fast with berserker units that can smoke for cover or whether you infiltrate forward with semi-elite infantry, get the drop on them for easy kills and then charge forward like the berserker units do while using smoke for cover. Also home to the loathed 4X SASCRAP cheese, SAS elites that can just popup next to your opponent's units and rape anything that isn't a TAG, except times by 4. They can field the mercenary Tearlach McMurrough as in-faction when they want a Cameronian that can takedown TAGs or Achilles.

Then there's the Combined Army, an alien faction. What recently arrived in human-controlled space ("the Human Sphere" as it's called) is the very tip of the Combined Army's scouting forces and yet humanity is already losing badly against them, barely holding them back. They actually have one of the cooler backgrounds in a sci-fi setting I've seen: some aliens figured out the heat death of the universe was eventually going to shit all over life so they built an AI that could figure out how they could be elevated to beings of pure energy and leave the material world behind. Unfortunately for them, that AI found the solution, promptly concluded that its creators weren't fit to receive that knowledge, then ascended itself.

The creators then decided to built a new AI, but this time, make it think like them so that it would obligatorily give them the secret to ascending to a higher plane. Unfortunately, the fact that it thinks like them is exactly what prevents the second AI from ever finding that secret, but the creators don't know that, and the irony inherent in the fact that they're on a total fool's quest is pretty hilarious - or would be if humanity weren't about to be flattened like pancakes unless they can close off the Human Sphere. Unable to find this secret, the AI concluded that what it needed was more computational power, and the easiest way to get that was to conquer new systems and turn them into computronium. Thus, the Evolved Intelligence began conquering the universe. Those species that would be good fighters (aggressive, loyal, survivalists) were included in the Combined Army; the species with mastery of science were told to build AIs of their own to work in parallel with the EI to increase the number of thought patterns that were working on solving the ascension problem; and the species that had absolutely nothing of worth to offer to the EI just had their solar systems deconstructed and turned into thinking matter to increase the EI's capacity.

Game-wise, the Combined Army is one of the most elite factions - high point cost per unit but good stats and equipment. Don't expect to field more than 6-8 models in your average 250pt game, but what they lack in numbers they make up in being very good. Their technology is alien and does funky stuff like allow them to not die, or transfer their mind from one body to another if the original host dies, or shapeshift into enemy units, and their weapons include plasma guns that disable equipment and damage enemy units in a blast area as well as nanoviruses that can target cyberbrains and overwrite/destroy them. Sectorials:

- Morat Aggression Force: Pretty much all the SPESS MONKEES in the CA operating as an autonomous division. Close-quarters and very aggressive, not as melee based as the Caledonians but able to challenge them for the title. MAF is similar to the Steel Phalanx but with more of the CA's brand of trickery than ALEPH's.

- Shasvastii Expeditionary Force: The Shasvastii are basically creepy lurkers with some stealth and trickery. Now you can field a whole list of the pricks. Loses in straight up battles with the aggressive lists (Hassassins, MAF, JSA, Caledonians and Steel Phalanx) but if you play these guys in straight up battles, YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG. Also by taking this list you can build a whole list of the Seed Soldiers which is something that Corvus Belli wants to happen, in the same way movies studios keep trying to make Jayden Smith happen.

Also there's ALEPH. These are the very-much-GitS-inspired dudes who work for the Human Sphere's super-AI, which regulates the minute details of life in the entire Sphere. ALEPH runs the banks, the stock-markets, the Internet, the Circulars (special ships fitted with technology that allows them to pass through wormholes without causing them to collapse) and the infrastructure for pretty much everything, and basically controls the Human Sphere - the only thing is that it operates under mandate of the O-12 and there are safety protocols in place to (supposedly) prevent it from doing anything except run things efficiently. To get around this, ALEPH has its own special force made up entirely of post-human field agents supported by the most advanced drones you can make with human technology. I've not really looked at their army list, but from what I've heard they use a fair bit of retro-engineered alien tech and They are a very points-heavy faction like the CA, relying on expensive but well trained and high tech soldiers and with a heavy emphasis on drones, they also have blood-frenzied Greeks and excellent Hackers as well. Like most factions, the ALEPH fluff is deliberately ambivalent, the AI could either be our new overlord in the making or a true caring ally, time will tell. They were released with the first expansion book "Human Sphere"

Sectorials:

- The Steel Phalanx or Assault SubSection, also the Homeridae: The great AI has basically creating artificial vat grown humans and conditioned them to be inspired by the Odyssey and Iliad. Led by Achilles who is basically a TAG that is human sized, this is a very aggressive list with some seriously nasty units. Losing units is quite painful but the Homeric units are pretty hard to kill and bring some seriously nasty pain when they get to hit back. The biggest, most obvious, eye-catching point is pretty much Achilles who is mandated by Corvus Belli to be the nasty motherfucker on the table. If you see an Achilles on the other team you need to have a plan for him with your list as he is basically a TAG that can take cover and can't be hacked.

Finally, there are the Tohaa which is the newest faction. They are aliens with an obsession for the number 3, they have recently allied with humanity against the Combined Army, but can they be trusted? Humans aren't exactly a priority to them. We know that they use advanced bio-tech, viral weapons etc. They rely on units deployed in teams of 3, like the fire-teams of the other factions sectorials. Many of their units get symbiotic armor that protects AND enhances them but is vulnerable to fire. They were released with the second expansion book "Campaign Paradiso".

Somewhat overlooked and frequently forgotten about are the Mercenaries: a mixed up faction. Ordinarily Merc units are available to certain human factions, like say Tearlach McMurrough or Scarface & Cordelia being available to PanO and Ariadna. Mercenary lists are built by picking 3 factions and being able to use a small number of units from said faction, usually the meh ones. Also certain faction units are listed as mercenary which means that PanO can field Highlander Caterans (Irregular Ariadna bandit snipers), Kaplan Tactical Services (Haqqislam Combat Engineer PMCs) or Yuan Yuans (Yu-Jing affiliated drop trooper bandits). There is also a handful of pure mercenaries like Scarface & Cordelia and the Druze Shock Teams who can work in any mercenary company. All of this is to be treated as barely above theoretical because no one actually plays Mercenaries unless they happen to own a lot of models from multiple factions.

There you go. That more or less sums up the setting, and I ordered the factions in a way that gives you the history of the setting as well as each faction. The only things left to add are that Infinity armies usually represent black ops teams advancing their country's interests over that of other countries that they're officially at peace or even allied with. Also, a second rulebook came out recently that includes new fluff and new army lists for what they call the "sectorials," which are basically sub-factions of all the factions - so Ariadna has a French and a Scottish list, Yu-Jing has an Imperial Service one and a Japanese State one, etc. Half of the sub-factions have been covered in this book, and we're expecting a third one covering the other half of the sectorials at some point in the future, but it's not even been announced yet. Sectorials change how many and what type of units you can deploy and allows certain troops to link with each other for more/better dakka. Sectorials confirmed as being in the works and to be released with the next book are:

-Svalarheima (VIKING HYPERCAPITALISTS)

-Huang Di/White Banner (tibetan guerrilla snipers and shaolin monks with assault rifles)

-The Invincible Army/The Emperor's Army (for when you absolutely NEED every single motherfucker in your list to have a suit of power armor)

-Al-Medinat Caliphate (probably lots of bio-enhanched supersoldiers)

-The Khanate (post-apocalyptic wasteland full of neo-mongol bikers and Mad Max wannabes)

-USAriadna (the american colonists on Dawn, operators operating operationally)

-Kazaks (the russian ariadnans)

-Tunguska Jurisdictional Command (the third Nomad ship, brokers in information and hackers)

-Sygmaa (renegade S&M Tohaas that become stronger when they're hurt)

-Unnamed sectorial with the Evolved Intelligence's army of cyborgs and robots

There's also rumors of sectorials for Aleph's Vedic units, the Black Hand (Nomads black ops/secret society), PanO's waterworld and even for Tohaa and mercs.

Hobby stuff

Cost($$$)

Like most tabletop miniature games, Infinity is not "cheap". Some of the large snazzy models such as the Tactical Armored Gear (TAG) , (think Dreadnoughts in 40K or WM jacks) can get quite pricey $ wise (around $40), but the good news is that TAGs are around ~90-110+ points each or 1/3 of your army in a large 300-point game! Each infantry model ranges around $9-15, but some infantry models can be worth 40+ points depending on the model’s stats, weaponry and equipment. All factions and many sectorials have starter packs for ~$50 that have the models to play 150 point games (a good amount for beginner's to learn the rules).

So really, in the end it's far far less $$$ for Infinity than for most other things out there. Individual models are expensive, but you only need around 10 in a 300 point game. All rules are free to download from the Infinity website.

The only real downside Infinity has is the game is very dependant upon proxies. There are Models that have been in the army builder for years and have never been released as a model, and even some flavours of existing models that have never seen the light of day - meaning that Nomad Hellcat Paramedic you have in your list is going to have to be a Proxy. Tying into this are that the Unit boxes the game has being rather terrible value depending on what you're looking for - a box may for example have a dude with a Combi Rifle, two special weapons and a hacker version, when all you want is the guy with the Combi Rifle - and you have three of them in your list. The absolute worst of this manifests itself in the form of entire Units that need a box purchase because they've never been released as Blisters at all - if you want Mobile Brigada's for your Nomad force, then I hope you like buying that same Starter Box two or three times.

Scale

Infinity is a skirmish game, so each side consists of approximately 6-15 models. Game size is determined by point values, 150 for small point games up to 300 points for “large” games. Battlefield is fairly terrain dense (terrain should be no more than 10” apart across the entire (4x4 or 4x6) battlefield. Since this is a sci-fi game, there are no unit coherency rules (radio is a marvelous invention). Models can freely climb buildings (if there is a second/third floor), snipe out of windows, flank the opponent, etc. The game follows a fairly strict, "if you can see me, I can see you" rule.

Models & Sculpts

The models in Infinity are top-notch, highly detailed and heavily stylized, however age is catching up on some of the older models - compare an Aridana Line Kazak to a USAR Grunt for example. Everything has a sleek futuristic rounded edge feel to them. Infantry is broken down into three classifications, light, medium, and heavy infantry. There are two other minor categories for infantry, Warband and Skirmisher, but Warbands are basically medium/heavy infantry that like melee combat and assault tactics. While Skirmishers are various kinds of light infantry scouts with some extra options (mines, hacking or sniping etc) that make them good specialists but not something to form the core of a list or the less commonly stealthy medium infantry which are good all-rounders but rare due to the premium for their stealth. Unlike the familiar 40K and PP miniatures, infantry are sleek and slender, and fit nicely on to the base (extremities, swords, guns, etc. do not stick too far off its bases). Heavy infantry are armored with “Power Armor”, but they are nowhere as bulky as Space Marines in 40K.

Gameplay

Infinity is probably the most “different” of all the tabletop games I’ve played thus far. (WHFB, WH40K, Necromunda, WM/Hordes). Units have their standard stats, such as movement (MOV), ballistic skill (BS), close combat (CC), wounds (W), armor (ARM), biotechnology shield (BTS) – aka armor against biological attacks, hacks, etc., will power (WIP), physique (PH)

Gameplay Basics

When a unit activates, you are able to either give your model two “short” orders (either two short-move, or one short-move + one short-action) or one “long” order. Short-move actions are things like, move, climb, prone, etc., and short-actions can be things like “shoot, dodge, hack, etc”. Long orders are actions like: suppression fire, cautious movement, speculative (indirect) fire, etc. Upon activation, you can give a model two short-move orders or a short-move + short-action like “move/move”, “move/shoot”, “move/dodge”, (shoot/shoot is not allowed because you may only have "one" short-action during a single activation), or one long order, such as “suppression fire”, “speculative (indirect) fire” etc.

Movement

Movement stat is broken down into two sets of numbers such as: 4-4, 4-2, 8-6, etc. First number means the distance in inches a model may move on its first move, and the second number is how far the model may move on its second “short” move. So a heavy infantry with a MOV stat of 4-2 is give an order of “move/move” may effectively move 4” then move again for another 2”, or “move/shoot” by moving 4” and firing their weapon at a target. Motorcycles are fast and can move 14” (8-6) a turn with a basic “move/move” order.

Shooting

Nothing really new here. Roll D20, if your result is less than your BS including modifiers (range, cover, etc.), then you hit your target, and the target must make an armor save. Target’s D20 roll + ARM stat is greater than your weapon strength then the armor stopped/deflected the bullet. Although getting hit by bullet(s) will sometime cause a solder to recoil and duck behind cover.

Close Combat (CC)

Most miniature games seem to have a heavy emphasis on close combat. Infinity is one of the few games that do not glorify CC. In fact you do not get any bonuses for “charging” an opponent. Charging a Yu-Jing (Asian faction) “Ninja” or “Shaolin Monk” with your basic grunt can mean a quick boot to the unsuspecting guy’s face. Of course dice will always play a factor, but know that he has no bonuses for charging. Anyways, I think you get the idea.

GAMEPLAY – Differences

Actions & Activations probably most greatly differentiates Infinity from all other tabletop miniature games. In most games, each unit or model gets one-activation per phase or turn. One move, one shooting phase, and one charge/CC attack per unit/model. In infinity, each model contributes to your army’s activation pool. If you have 7 models in your army, you will have 7 activations, if your opponent runs 10 models, he/she will have 10 activations in his army, and models can be activated multiple times per turn.

So you can effectively activate one model 10 times in one turn and rampage around the entire table! Sounds completely broken, but it isn’t as bad as you think. Because...

For every action there is a reaction. Alright, so it’s not exactly equal reaction, but there are draw backs to sending in Rambo with 11 activations to single-handedly take out an opposing army. Here is why:

Whenever an action is declared, any model within Line of Sight (LoS) of the activated model may declare a response to or against him. For example: if you activate a model with a “move/shoot” command, the instant your model peeks around the corner to draw LoS to my model, then I may declare an Automatic Reaction Order (ARO). ARO is a short order response to enemy model(s). If someone walks around the corner with guns blazing, are you going to stand there and watch? I wouldn’t either.

So when an opposing model shows up, you may fire back, dodge their fire, go prone, etc. Rambo is good, but he may not be good enough to withstand 10 shots fired back from my ambushing squad's ARO action!

Of course there are counters to every strategy. Like bring in the speculative (indirect) fire weapons and rain grenades (templates), etc. onto my pile of infantry, or simply use Suppression Fire from the flank to suppress my gang. While you’re busy handling my pile, perhaps, I will simply “deep strike” some models in and try to take down your inferior infantry on the backlines and reduce your army’s total number of activations. As the remainder of his squad is KO’ed, Rambo will have fewer and fewer actions. This is the tactical beauty of Infinity.

Units with stealth/camouflage can effectively sneak through areas with suppression fire undetected, while deep striking units opens up the board for different flanking possibilities. Bring in too many heavy weapons teams and TAGs, and it will open your solders up for possible hacking attempts which may immobilize or even take over your most powerful fighters.

The automatic reaction order system REQUIRES that that the board has PLENTY of line of sight blocking terrain, if you try to play infinity on a typical 40K board, whomever gets first turn will receive [Enemy number of models here] reaction shots whenever he gives an order to one of his minis. It works for an alleyway with 3 or so participants, or a street with six people in cover, but not for an open field. This is why snipers in a good position are so darn powerful!

Misc

Metagame and Meta Builds

So like all aspects of human interaction, people have found that certain strategies work better than others, as I don't want to go through the effort of making individualised tactica pages for each faction, I'll list common builds from the meta game here.

Metagame advice

• Specialists: Love the FO: So one particular thing is that only specialists can interact with generic objectives and only specific specialists with specific objectives. This is important because its possible to table a player in the final turn and lose because they scored objectives and you just wasted time killing shit. This means playing the scenario takes priority over just killing shit and because of this you need to have a few specialiats in your list.

Chain of Command, Hacker, Doctor, Engineer are fine except they often cost a premium in points or charge ypu precious SWC, the Forward Observer on the other hand frequently comes as a variant of the base version of a unit with no cost or a very minor increase which means you should have at least 1 in a list with one other type of specialist. Also take note of things like the PanO Auxilary FO gives FO to their attached AuxBot which means having two specialists for the price of one.

• TAGs define their matchups: This one is simple; if you don't have anti-TAG options built into your list you won't beat TAGs. TAGs are a tradeoff, they cost a lot and draw lots of fire, but are tough and can take out whole teams if they positioned poorly. TAGs can be beaten by other TAGs, but infantry need Adhesive launchers, hacking, panzerfausts, heavy rocket launchers or really high strength AP+EXP weapons to break TAGs. Because you can't guarantee that you won't bump into a Cutter or Scarface, anticipate a TAG list or be prepared to concede.

• Orders equal actions: Basically its important to have order monkeys or cheerleaders; units that are cheap and provide orders for good units to use for multiple activations. Losing cheerleaders means reducing the amount of actions you can use in a turn, which leads to your units doing all the work being less effective. So always have a nice blob of orders on the table in the form of a few cheap regular units. Don't take many Irregulars unless they have Impetuous or other ways to be action efficient. By the same token if you get the opportunity to wipe your opponent's cheerleaders early, take it because its a very difficult position to play from. This is doubly important for Rambo builds with TAGs because hitting the order pool before going after the TAG restricts its ability to back out of crossfire traps. A good recommendation is to have 8+ Regular Orders in your order pool when starting out. Some factions get good filler units, like 4 point Netrods for Aleph, which are an excellent way to squeeze more orders into a list.

• Hacking with a purpose: Don't just throw hackers into a list if you aren't Nomads or Aleph. Hackers are versatile, but having a hacker should be for a reason, the most common reason is for running Remotes without a TAG, the second is to screw with enemy TAGs. But the best reason is to protect your own TAG or other hackable assets from hacking. Hacking is a good way to disrupt an opponent's game plan, so be prepared to face it, especially when playing Nomads as they have some of the most powerful hackers. Also keep an eye for units with high BTS values, eg -6. Having a few hardened units can make a difference against someone with multiple hackers.

• Sectorials are a tradeoff: After the release of Sectorial lists the meta has been abuzz with sectorials with a lot of players neglecting vanilla lists for sectorials to use the Link Team rules. Link teams are very good, this isn't in doubt, but what is overlooked is that vanilla lists have a huge amount of diversity while sectorials run from being just a trimmed down selection with link teams (Neoterran, Qapu Kalqhi) to being tightly restricted and unable to cover some key factors (Military Orders, Hassassins and JSA).

• Recreations are targets: A number of factions have basically artificially vat grown cyborg/androids modelled on famous historical figures, called Recreations. These are pretty powerful units and are also common choices for Lieutenants, with some being pretty much mandatory for Lt. When your opponent sees you have Saladin in your foam box, they're going to start planning to make a beeline for him, even if its just a Hazfa you deploy as Saladin, players who have had their ass handed to them by a recreation are going to make killing it ASAP a priority.

• Have 2 plans: Build a list so that you have a rock solid Plan A and a Plan B that can work if it fails. Have a strong Link team of 5 elite units, but have linkable order monkeys with HMGs who can form their own link and brandish Sixth Sense boosted HMGs should your main link get cutdown. Hackers are a decent Plan B because you only need 1 with decent willpower and BTS to start crippling vulnerable HI or Remotes.

• Remotes are an option: A lot of players ignore remotes because they mandate hackers or TAGs and are vulnerable to E/M and Hacking. However, for some players Remotes are really good. Vanilla Aleph for example can get around their premium pricing by using Dakini TactBots as their cheap Order Monkeys and can use Garuda TactBots for cheap disposable Airborne Deployment units instead of paying for the elite & expensive Ekdromoi. Remotes still produce orders and can shoot things, though they may not count for much in terms of objectives, they can fill holes and let you use them as disposable units compared to more precious models.

Gallery

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  The only comparison you need

• A show of the Two-player box, Operation Icestorm. Also, a perfectly normal small game.

  A show of the Two-player box, Operation Icestorm. Also, a perfectly normal small game.

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  A Nomad Iguana TAG, made of win.