Monstrucker Malfeasance

Life has settled down a little, which means I can get to game nights more regularly… we’ll see how long that lasts. I’ve been discussing Ramah with some buddies so I figured I’d take them for a spin, especially since I just put together my Khawarij and Zhayedan. We’ve also got a new player who just moved into town, Marko, who’s been playing since the release of N3 and plays primarily Nomads, so I threw down against him in a game of Highly Classified.

Overview

• Mission: Highly Classified (Hard Mode)
  • HVT: Identity Check
  • HVT: Retroengineering
  • Mapping
  • Test Run
• Forces: Ramah Task Force versus Nomads (300)
• Deploy First: Ramah
• First Turn: Ramah

Highly Classified

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GROUP 1 | 9 1

GHULAM Lieutenant HMG / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 20)
KHAWARIJ (Fatality L1, Multispectral Visor L2) Mk12 / Pistol, AP CCW. (0.5 | 36)
GHULAM Doctor Plus (MediKit) Rifle + Light Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 16)
GHULAM (NCO) Rifle + Light Grenade Launcher (Normal and Smoke Ammo.) / Pistol, Knife. (1 | 16)
GHULAM Sniper Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 16)

FASID HMG + (Smoke and Normal) Light Grenade Launcher, Antipersonnel Mines / Heavy Pistol, Knife. (2 | 53)
LEILA SHARIF Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Shock Marksman Rifle, D-Charges / Breaker Pistol, Knife. (0 | 20)

NAHAB Red Fury, Nanopulser / Pistol, Viral CC Weapon, Knife. (1 | 36)
RAFIQ REMOTE FTO (Fireteam: Duo) Red Fury, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0.5 | 22)
MONSTRUCKER Submachine Gun, Chain Rifle, Drop Bears / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 13)
NASMAT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3)

GROUP 2 | 3 1

FANOUS REMOTE Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
FANOUS REMOTE Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
NAHAB Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Submachine Gun + E/Mitter, Nanopulser / Pistol, Viral CC Weapon, Knife. (0 | 30)
WARCOR (360º Visor) Flash Pulse / Stun Pistol, Knife. (0 | 3)

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6 SWC | 300 Points | Open in Infinity Army

I went back and forth on a few different list compositions, all with the Ghulam Doc, Ghulam NCO, and the Khawarij Mk12. I took a Ghulam HMG Lt because it’s awesome, and a Ghulam sniper in case I went second and needed a sacrificial ARO.

I wanted to include a Tuareg, but it was pretty difficult to fit one in with all the other stuff I wanted to try out, especially the Nahab. I’m not particularly interested in running Tarik. I know he’s good, which makes him a little boring to me. I also wanted to try out the new Rafiq profile, which is just awesome.

Nomads

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GROUP 1 | 9 1

ALGUACIL Lieutenant Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (1 | 10)
ALGUACIL Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10)
ALGUACIL Missile Launcher / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 15)
ALGUACIL Paramedic (MediKit) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 12)
LUPE BALBOA Combi Rifle, Nanopulser, Panzerfaust, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, CCW. (0 | 23)
INTRUDER HMG, Grenades / Pistol, CCW. (1.5 | 42)
REAKTION ZOND HMG / Electric Pulse. (1 | 26)
INTERVENTOR Hacker (Hacking Device Plus) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 25)
MORAN (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle, CrazyKoalas (2) / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 22)
BANDIT Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Light Shotgun, Adhesive Launcher / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 25)

GROUP 2 | 5 4 4

TOMCAT Engineer Combi Rifle + Light Flamethrower, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 22)
DAKTARI Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 14)
JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10)
JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10)
JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10)
MORLOCK Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 6)
MORLOCK Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 6)
MORLOCK Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 6)
MORLOCK Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 6)

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6 SWC | 300 Points | Open in Infinity Army

Marko’s list looks an awful lot like that of a Corregidor player who just bought into vanilla Nomads. It’s a got great stuff in there, but it’s a bit odd. I’m not a huge fan of Algauciles outside of a link, and I’d prefer to spend the 1.5 SWC from the Alguacil ML on Jaguar Panzerfausts, but that’s just me.

Deployment

Marko rolled a 14 and told me it was a failure, so I knew immediately that he was running an Alguacil Lt after he deployed. I didn’t know that during my deployment, of course, because I had to deploy first after taking first turn.

I put down the Fanous remotes in what I hoped were annoying places, encouraging Marko to shoot them so I could get Test Run. The Warcor covered the middle of the field as well, and then it was time to deploy the rest of the stuff. I put my link on the left, tucked behind the building that the Ghulam sniper was on (this is a picture from a few orders in because I was busy chatting with Marko).

I stuck the Rafiq all the way on the left, intending to run it along the board edge to get Mapping, and then anchored my right with the Fasid and Leila. I held the Monstrucker in reserve due to HVT: Retroengineering.

With so many warbands, Marko had a pretty full deployment zone. He left the Alguacil ML, the Reaktion Zond, and the Intruder out to ARO. Lupe covered his right table edge, the Bandit went in the middle, and the Interventor went on the right.

I brought the Monstrucker out of reserve on the same side as the Rafiq, ready to make a run on Marko’s HVT, and he put a Moran on the table to pin my Fasid. That was fine with me–I wasn’t planning on moving it unless something needed to get deleted on the right, and there wasn’t anything particularly important over there that I wanted to push through the Koalas for.

Turn 1

Top of 1 – Ramah

Marko docks me two orders off the bat. Makes sense. I know the camo token in the back is hiding an Intruder, so I don’t form the full 5-man team and just do the Ghulam NCO, Doctor, and Khawarij. The NCO sets up smoke (after failing the first time), and then the Intruder reveals to face to face the Khawarij. I force him back into cover and then use the smoke to KO an Alguacil and force a Morlock into total cover.

I keep shooting, this time going after the Alguacil ML. He passes three ARM saves against DAM 16 and drops prone. UGGH. The TR bot isn’t so lucky and gets knocked out.

I’ve got a few more orders left in my second pool, so I bring on the Nahab KHD to take out the Interventor from outside of 8″ and grab Net-Undermine.

With the last order in the pool, I take out the nearby Morlock and tank the chain rifle.

I push the Monstrucker forward and hide it atop a shipping container, covering the board edge against AD with its chain rifle.

Bottom of 2 – Nomads

One of Marko’s Morlocks runs towards the Nahab, but I beat its smoke with the Nahab’s SMG. Sadly, the Morlock passes ARM.

A second Morlock beats my Ghulam sniper with smoke…

and the Intruder hits her three times. I make three ARM saves and drop prone. The Intruder takes out the Fanous on the left though, which is a good thing for me.

Marko tries to remove the Nahab with his Alguacil Paramedic, but I successfully E/Mitter it.

The Moran pushes its Koalas forward, not far enough to let me get a grenade off with the Al Fasid though.

Marko pushes the Bandit up, and the Warcor discovers her. Another order takes out the Warcor at extreme range with the LSG…

and Marko gives me a second Test Run target by taking out the last Fanous with the Bandit.

The Morlock near the Nahab pushes forward and finally does a wound, and I fail guts around the corner.

Turn 2

Top of 2 – Ramah

Now that the Intruder is in the open, the Khawarij finally takes him out.

I start a run to get Mapping and HVT: Identity Check with the Rafiq. All I have to do is get past Lupe. I have great odds to win,

64.50

18.75

16.75

and even if I lose to Lupe’s Panzerfaust, I only have a 3.53% to have the Rafiq fail all three ARM saves, which gives me a nice easy target for Test Run on my engineer’s run up the table. Of course, I lose the face to face and fail three ARM saves.

I assuage my frustration by super jumping the Khawarij and killing the Bandit from behind.

With the Warcor and both Tranductors down, I use the Nahab’s order (the only one left in the pool) to take out the Morlock, and again tank the chain rifle.

I’ve got a two orders left to get Test Run, so I climb the Monstrucker off his perch and back towards the Transductor on the roof while moving his Nasmat into base to base with the other Transductor. Of course, I roll two 18’s. I totally forget that this causes wounds and I also forget about the ability to re-roll with command tokens. This tells you how much I engineer things in this game… Anyway, I’m out of orders and pass the turn.

Bottom of 2 – Nomads

Marko spends a bunch of orders getting a Morlock around the corner to chain rifle down my Khawarij. I do manage to take out the Morlock though.

A good chunk of his remaining orders are spent on a Tomcat, who comes onto the table and tries to gun down my Ghulam NCO. I assumed Marko was going to flamethrower me, but he puts three combi-shots into the NCO to get a face to face roll against my shot while the Doctor dodges. I lose the face to face but somehow manage to pull two ARM saves out of nowhere.

Finally, Marko tries to remove my Fasid with the Moran, first putting the Koalas into standby. I crit with the Fasid’s LGL, taking out a Koala in the blast.

Finally, Marko tries to take out the Nahab. He tries first with the Alguacil ML, but I E/Mitter him. The Paramedic is able to finish off the Nahab though, at long last, with its lone irregular order.

Turn 3

Top of 3 – Ramah

I need to clear out some AROs so I can try to get some stuff done. I bring in the Red Fury Nahab and take out Lupe in one order.

I have a gut wrenching moment when I push the Nahab into view of the Algaucil ML and roll four misses, but Marko rolls a miss for the Alguacil as well, and another order sees me shock the Algaucil off the table.

I sink the rest of my order pool into trying to get Test Run with the Monstrucker and the Nasmat, again forgetting that it causes wounds when fail, and that I can re-roll. I roll another 18, a 12, and a 14, so I fail to get Test Run.

Bottom of 3 – Nomads

Marko tries to set himself up to get HVT: Identity Check by picking up his downed Intruder. A Jaguar sets up a ton of smoke for the Daktari to long-skill climb up there, but when she does, she kills the Intruder with a botched doctor roll with no command tokens to spare.

I’ve only got my secret classified, making it a

2-0 Ramah Taskforce Victory!

Post Game Analysis

Well, I need to remember the rules of the game, for starters. At least I didn’t get Test Run, because if I had it would’ve been cheating. I did have a bunch of command tokens left at the end of the game too, so I could’ve at least tried a few re-rolls. Bah.

Hard Mode Classifieds in Highly Classified are, well, hard. I definitely need some specialist redundancy, particular in the forward observer department, were I to do this more seriously. Losing the Rafiq was a big hit. I didn’t feel under-gunned though. In fact, I had more guns than I needed.

I was pretty pleased with my choices this game as well. Using the Khawarij to tackle the things left out to ARO went reasonably well, sans the ridiculous ARM saves, and the Nahab KHD ate a ton of orders after getting me an objective, which was also a good plan.

I think I timed things well by running the Rafiq up when I did, but it’s a dice game and that ended poorly, as did my attempts to get Test Run. So really, all in all, I was happy with my play this game. One thing I would like to see improve is my deployment though. I think that the Ghulam link could’ve been deployed better to let me reform the link to 5-man once I forced the Intruder back into cover.

I could’ve even done the fun trick of shooting smoke then activating the link with the Sniper as leader, and then SSL2 shoot back at the Intruder when he tries to get a free shot through smoke as the other guys advance into place.

The list could use some work as well. I kind of wanted a AD troop with shotgun to take advantage of Marko’s very clogged deployment zone, but I think that’s just a knee-jerk reaction to this particular game.

Regarding Ramah, I think that they play pretty differently than the style of Haqq I’m used to. Much more elite units, much more dangerous gunfighters, and not a lot of access to cheap, throwaway units. They play similarly to vanilla Nomads so far, but with some links. Way too early to form a strong opinion, but I like them. They don’t fit like a glove like vanilla Nomads do, but they’re fun. I look forward to trying out some more options from their lineup, particularly the other super soldier profiles like the Namurr and the Muhktar.

In any case, welcome to Portland, Marko! Looking forward to getting in more games with you!