Prowler Surprise
I played this game about three months ago at time of writing. For some time now, writing about Infinity games has become more of a chore than anything else. I took the sunset of my podcast with co-host TheDiceAbide, Late Night Wargaming, as an opportunity to just step away from Infinity in general for awhile.
The break has been kind to me. It’s allowed me to just enjoy games for being games instead of them turning into work. In the interim, a few things have changed about my relationship with Infinity, so I’ve been inspired to finish this last battle report that has been in the queue for months. It was against Obadiah (Nehemiah), and you can see his lovely Officer Coffee conversion below.
I don’t think I’ll be doing many Infinity battle reports in the near- to mid-future, for various reasons. The simplest one to explain is that I’m just not playing games competitively (in general, not just Infinity) at the moment. I don’t have the time to grind a game to get reps, and these days I’d rather spend a Saturday with the family than playing some (often literally) sweaty games at a tournament.
Overview
- Mission: ITS16 Evacuation
- Forces: Jurisdictional Command of Bakunin versus O-12 (300)
- Deploy First: O-12
- First Turn: O-12
I’ve sold a lot of my Infinity now. I only have Nomads, vanilla Combined, Oban for JSA, Ikari, and Druze left. Oh, and ForCo, because I couldn’t bear to part with the fully painted ForCo army that I won at Shitshow 2:
While I will miss Ariadna, the loss of Merovingia and Caledonia sort of killed my desire to play them, and one of my biggest complaints about the Infinity design space is that aside from Ariadna and Tohaa, all the factions are starting to feel pretty similar to me. This may be because I’m a huge reductionist and tend to oversimplify unit profiles to ease memorization and decision making, but in a way getting rid of so many factions has really reduced decision fatigue in terms of selecting a faction to play.
In other words, I think with my current level of engagement with the game, I think having only 1 full faction (Nomads) will be more than enough for me. I mean, if being mono-faction is good enough for Polynikes, it should be good enough for me!
I chose to play some Bakunin for this game, mostly because at the time I was walking through all the Nomad sectorials to prep for a future show on Late Night Wargames about the various Infinity factions as they’ve been updated in N5 (no longer necessary!). I decided to take the following filth:
Bleh
KUSANAGI (Lieutenant) MULTI Rifle(+1B), E/M Grenade Launcher, Zapper / Pistol, Shock CC Weapon(PS=7). (+1 | 34)
PENITENT (BS Attack [Continous Damage]) AP Spitfire / AP Heavy Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 37)
SIN-EATER (Marksmanship) MULTI Sniper Rifle / Pistol, CC Weapon. (1 | 28)
MARSPIDER (Engineer) Heavy Flamethrower(+1B), Flash Pulse, Panzerfaust / Assault Pistol, DA CC Weapon(PS=7). (0 | 22)
STIGMATON (Hacker) Heavy Flamethrower(+1B), Heavy Rocket Launcher(+1B) / E/M CC Weapon(PS=6). (1.5 | 56)
REAKTION ZOND Thunderbolt(+1B) / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 19)
ZERO (Minelayer) Boarding Shotgun, Shock Mine, PARA Mine / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0.5 | 18)
PROWLER (Hacker, Killer Hacking Device) Boarding Shotgun, Nanopulser, D-Charges ( ) / Silenced Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 30)
10
1 7 SWC | 300 Points | Open in Army | Copy Code
It originally had dual Stigmata, but I had to shuffle things around to make room for the Penitent, and boy am I happy I did. Obi is rolling with O-12, which just has so many tools and minelayers.
Obi (Nehemiah)
GROUP 1
ALPHA (Lieutenant [+1 Command Token], Strategos L1]) Light Shotgun, Nanopulser / Pistol, DA CC Weapon. (0 | 24)
FUZZBOT (Hacker, EVO Hacking Device) ( ) / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0.5 | 14)
GROUP 2
OMEGA Heavy Machine Gun / Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 42)
JACKBOOT (Engineer) AP Submachine Gun, E/Mitter, D-Charges, Armed Turret(Thunderbolt (AP)) ( | GizmoKit) / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 28)
2
CYBERGHOSTS (Hacker, Hacking Device Plus) Combi Rifle, Pitcher ( ) / Breaker Pistol, PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0.5 | 21)
RAZOR (Minelayer) Boarding Shotgun(+1B), Monofilament Mine / Silenced Pistol, CC Weapon. (0.5 | 31)
MOONRAKER (Minelayer) Heavy Shotgun, Adhesive Launcher Rifle, Shock Mine / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0.5 | 15)
STORMBOT Heavy Rocket Launcher(+1B), Pulzar / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (1.5 | 31)
VARANGIAN Submachine Gun, Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Heavy Pistol, Trench-Hammer, AP CC Weapon(PS=6). (0 | 13)
6 SWC | 299 Points | Open in Army | Copy Code
Deployment
I took deployment so Obi took first turn. He stacked up his Omega/Jackboot link on the right, the Varangians in the middle, and the Stormbot and Cyberghost in on the left.
The Razors and Moonraker just littered the midfield with mines. Rude. I set up my Sin Eaters to have shallow angled shots into the midfield, with the Reaktion set out to fight most of the world. The Sigmata and Marspider were out to fight the world, with the Prowler (incorrectly labeled Spektr).
Turn 1
Top of 1 – O-12
I’ve set up a lot of nasty AROs with my TR bot and Sin Eater, so Obi needs to get some smoke down to move safely into good rangebands for his Stormbot. He’s got a pair of Varangians that get it done across two orders.
The Omega starts moving, dragging the Jackboots with him.
Obi’s worried about my camo token, so he attempts (and fails) a discover with the Omega on it.
The Omega then slides into cover, giving me an out-of-cover shot with my TR bot. The odds are strongly in his favor, and the dice follow the odds.
The Jackboots cluster up with the Omega and discover the mine, putting out a turret on the way.
The Varangians post up to the midfield to be a nuisance later.
Obi’s been trying to get his Cyberghost upfield to get a pitcher down, and he’s got smoke where he needs it, so he throws a pitcher out to annoy my Penitent.
With that, he passes turn.
Bottom of 1 – Bakunin
My plan for the turn is to get out of my deployment zone and attack Obi’s order pool and try to stabilize board state. The Penitent handles the turret without difficulty (thankfully).
I keep pushing up, taking out the repeater on the way.
Obi’s Cyberghost is slightly exposed and I find an angle, taking it out.
I take down one of the Varangians and retreat, dropping a speedball on the way.
The Stigmata gets a Nanoshield…
and the Penitent gets the auto-medikit (this was before the change) and goes into suppression watching the Omega’s approach.
Turn 2
Top of 2 – O-12
Obi reveals a Razor and starts pushing forward in hopes of mucking with my Stigmata.
I take an incredibly long discover from a Sin Eater with no luck.
The Jackboot Paramedic revives the Varangian that the Penitent KO’ed.
This lets Obi get some smoke down to get the Stormbot into position without having to fight the Penitent in suppression while the Stormbot is in the open.
The Stormbot attempts to take out the Penitent and almost succeeds. I pass enough ARM saves and with the auto heal (that is gone now), the Penitent goes prone and stays alive.
The Omega takes out the mine in the midfield…
then snags its own auto-heal kit.
Obi resets the link’s positioning and passes turn.
Bottom of 2 – Bakunin
I make a move with the Stigmata, hoping to get the Razor to reveal itself. I fully expect Obi to place a mine, but instead he dodges, revealing himself. I don’t want to give him an opportunity to plant the mine, so I just move really far away.
I’m tall enough to see all of the Razor, and it’s certainly a problem I’d like to deal with soon. I decide to use the Stigmata to do it, although in retrospect probably the Marspider is a better option (and certainly more fun). I’m not on great odds due to being within 16″, but the burst gets me there, killing the Razor.
This frees me up to go for the civilian, or so I think. When the Marspider climbs up to the civilian, one of Obi’s Moonrakers takes a long range shot. I pass ARM against the shotgun, but I’m sort of stuck there now.
I figure I can clear the Moonraker with the Stigmata, but the stupid Moonraker crits.
Well, that’s decidedly uncool. I have a few orders left so I stand the Penitent up and start blasting.
I start by splitting burst on a revealed Razor and the Stormbot, killing the Razor but failing to drop the Stormbot.
I push further and try to clear the Moonraker, which dodges, and dump most of the burst onto the Stormbot.
It takes one more order of shooting, but this time I KO both. Unfortunately I’m out of orders to do anything with the Marspider.
Turn 3
Top of 3 – O-12
Sadly, Obi immediately fixes the Stormbot with a long-bomb Gizmokit. What is this nonsense?!
He has to fight past the Penitent, who gets hit but passes ARM…
Then splits burst against the Penitent, Stigmata, and Marspider. I prone the Penitent, the Marspider dies, and the Stigmata’s dodge is canceled. Rude.
The Jackboot/Omega team grabs the nearest civilian, so I dodge the Penitent back standing.
Obi just lets me shoot the Omega, and I whiff.
The civilian-carrying Jackboot manages to get to the console but is out of orders to send the civilian on their way.
Well, that’s frustrating for Obi, certainly!
Bottom of 3 – Bakunin
I just need to clear the way. I try to split burst with the Penitent, and it goes horribly.
I reveal the Prowler and sneak behind the Omega, then try to get rid of the Omega with an E/M grenade from Kusanagi and get crit. Awesome.
The Prowler gets Sabotage, and somehow survives getting shot by the Omega.
I start making my way towards Obi’s HVT to cancel secure the HVT.
I keep fending the Omega off with shotgun slugs but eventually it doesn’t go my way and I lose the Prowler.
Obi’s invincible Stormbot is parked on my HVT, meaning if I want to make it a win instead of a tie, I have to take it out. The only tool I have left is a Sin Eater, which fails to down the Stormbot, and that’s a tie game.
1-1, 192-170 Tie!
Post Game Analysis
Well, I really liked my list, and need to play it (or something similar) some more. I think I was too careless with the Reaktion Zond, and probably could have hid it better–I was hoping to be able to pick it back up but the Omega just hit it too many times. The Penitent was amazing this game. Very impressed with that profile, and I will be using it more in Bakunin. I’ve come more around to vanilla being what it is in N5–it really does make for some variety. I think I was just mourning the loss of my favorite tools as someone who played mostly vanilla.
I do think that the mission is significantly better than the old ITS15 version, so kudos to Corvus Belli for improving the mission so substantially. It’s still quite order intensive if someone brings a bunch of tools to lock down the board, so there’s some consideration there. I dunno. I don’t think I did a particularly bad job at this game–I locked the board down with 3 Sin Eaters and a TR bot, and Obi had a bunch of mines, some of which were monofilament which I couldn’t ignore, so we just gummed up the works for each other. Obi took some big risks that paid off, and I didn’t have the tools to get the job done. I think 3 Sin Eaters is probably a little too meme-y, and I need to include some more shooting beyond just the Penitent–the Stigmata is more of a bully than a real shooting platform in my mind. Anyway, when I play Infinity games for fun, I might continue these battle reports. We’ll see. Thanks for reading.
