Introduction

Another chance came up to attend a tournament at Patriot Games in Sheffield, a venue which is just about in range for me, and is one of the biggest Infinity-playing venues in the UK (it is running one of the Satellites next year). They always have great terrain, most of it personally provided by the organiser, as well as plenty of space and an attached cafe, so it was a pleasure to attend. Everyone playing was even given a couple 3d-printed civilian models (relevant as HVTs in the mission set) and a nice smoke/QAZ template as gizzits. I had signed up for this event in the hope it would be my first N5 tournament, a mere 5 days after the planned release. Unfortunately that has not yet come to pass, but even in its last month (fingers crossed), Infinity N4 is maybe my favourite game and well worth playing.

The Missions and Lists

Given that this would be my last hurrah of N4, I decided to play vanilla Nomads – they are losing some profiles I really enjoyed playing with, so I wanted to take them for a spin. I have also been painting Nomads/Corregidor models, and I’m really hoping for more organisational changes to Corregidor and how I can build lists for them, so I wanted to put them off until I can play Corregidor N5-style.

The TO wanted to avoid using Classified Cards for this mission, so went with Decapitation, ‘Black Bag’, a custom version of Firefight with Civevac-ing HVTs replacing the classifieds, and finally Unmasking. My usual mission analysis led me towards making one list purely for Unmasking, which has an exclusion zone and needs good specialist coverage, with a hacker bonus. The other two missions are both highly aggressive, with 16” Deployment Zones (DZ) and Decapitation requires no specialists while Black Bag actively punishes them (like Firefight, there are 2OP on offer for killing more Specialists than your opponent).

List 1 – Decapitation/Black Bag

Accordingly, I went with an approach I used in Firefight before – I eschewed the normal Nomad approach of Moran Masai, Jazz, and maybe other hackers and repeater spreaders. Those elements are all too vulnerable to getting killed, and it’s all or nothing since their combined synergy is so high. My logic was that if I did take that setup, I’d be losing 2OP and giving them to my opponent in Firefight, unless I absolutely rolled over them. Instead I filled my list with cheap warbands and attack pieces. A good method in all missions with ‘kill more army points’ as a primary objective is to find cheap units that can go forward on attack runs, so that when they get killed by AROs and counter-attacks you can still hope to pull ahead on points. Both because they’re leaving generic Nomads in N5, and because they’re good, this meant a Digger and a Motorised Bounty Hunter with red fury. The latter especially is just so useful as a fast moving midfield shooter. Theoretically I should pick a tough, safe Lt in Decapitation, where their identity is open information. But I played around with some formats – a Mobile Brigada, a Kriza Boracs – and didn’t like the impact on the rest of the list. I just took the standard Moderator and decoy, trusting that I could deploy them in safe spots and defend them with other pieces.

A couple Morlocks also went in, as did a Puppetmaster minelayer with one marksman rifle Puppetbot. These are very handy defensively; the mine can cover the Lt against certain suicide attackers in Decapitation and the Puppetbot, as well as being a useful backup gun in the active turn, is an efficient disposable ARO. A Reaction Zond completed the defensive suite, while for my primary guns I chose a Gecko, a Rounder, and Knauf. This is a combination I’ve played with before and enjoy – the Gecko can brute force certain things in Active within 24” and delay non-AP enemies in Reactive. The Rounder is good against a different target set and can use NCO. Knauf is good at swinging modifiers and can pick off targets at longer ranges. So I find they complement each other well. Of course Nomads are also losing Knauf, which sealed the deal.

I put in one Tomcat engineer, as the only Specialist in the list. This wasn’t just because I’d only finished painting him last week. He let me control those 2OP in Firefight. If I couldn’t kill more than one enemy Specialist, I could bring him on somewhere totally safe, and not have them scored against me. He also provides emergency revival to the Gecko and Reaktion Zond, or even the Puppetbot – I consider reviving models to be an important tool in ‘kill-more-points’ scoring missions.

My final pick, and something of a vanity choice, was Perseus. He’s just so cool and I’d painted a proxy model for him that I was very proud of. Theoretically these are missions he should be good at – a 16” DZ is very helpful, and with smoke and all his shooting and fighting skills he can get to and kill a Lt or a Designated Target. He is quite expensive, 4-4 Move and squishy against anything with Shock ammo, so I admit he’s not a regular competitive choice. I did have a spare point at the end, so I took his Super-Jump profile. Surely a cool, recently painted model wouldn’t let me down?

List 2 – Unmasking

My Unmasking list did include the Corregidor/Nomads stalwarts of Jazz, Billie and two Morans. Even with an exclusion zone, it’s too strong a capability to leave behind. I took a pair of Puppetbots, the AP Marksman and shotgun FO, since they’d be useful in defence, attack and could activate consoles. I also reached for the Uberfallkommando, probably the strongest unit I don’t regularly take, just because I’ve never appreciated them enough and I didn’t fit them into the other list, where they really should have gone given the missions! But there are no missions where you can’t use Eclipse smoke and 3-Peripheral melee shenanigans. I retained the Rounder and one Morlock as simply being useful pieces and squeezed in a Marspider paramedic, because it’s a fun piece that can push forward, assault things and also activate objectives, which can be efficient in Unmasking. Similarly I took a Heckler Killer Hacker. He is reliable at activating the consoles, can start at the edge of the Exclusion Zone in camouflage, and if I have to push him on to attack the Designated Targets, he packs an assault pistol, which is great at reliably putting them down. 

The real star of this list is the Gator, which is very much a staple of mine in Nomads (or Corregidor) over the last year. I finished painting the model less than a week before the event and was very happy with it. Here I used it in a Group 2 which I’ve played many times before, alongside the Morans and two Transductor flash pulse bots. This lets me spend up to 7 Orders on the Gator (and I can only be stripped down to 6 if going first, thanks to the Puppetmaster’s Counterintelligence) which is usually enough to break open any enemy AROs. As the game becomes more about objectives, I can usefully spend a few Orders on the Morans, or even use them in tandem with my firepower models to set up forks on enemy AROs with crazy koalas. 

I was fairly happy with both lists – they are not quite the meta Nomads which cause eye-rolls, and I’ve stopped using Guided Missiles for the moment. I found that as well as being less fun for my opponents, they were starting to bore me – increasingly I felt that to get full value from them, I had to default to using them in an immediate alpha strike. Start the game, deploy pitchers or fast panda, hammer through a Spotlight roll, send the missiles. This can be effective but I find it makes games feel very ‘same-y’ and it is intensely un-fun for many opponents. But a note for anyone reading this report with a competitive mindset, the Unmasking list would probably be better if it swapped the Rounder for a Vertigo Zond. 

Round 1: Decapitation

Deployment

I found myself drawn against vanilla Yu Jing here, against an opponent I hadn’t played before. He promptly won the roll-off and chose to go first – absolutely the right choice in Decap! The table was fairly dense, with buildings that were almost devoid of any ladders or other ways to climb up and down them. My opponent deployed relatively few models, as Yu Jing is wont to do. He had a Camouflaged Lt (i.e. a Daoying) right in the far right corner (from my perspective), with a pair of Camo markers which were clearly a Long Ya and its mine guarding it. He placed a Shaolin Monk also guarding the approach lane to them, and his both DTs were tucked into that same board edge on my right – the only position where they had total cover and couldn’t be outflanked at long range. That gave me a pretty clear target area to attack into. In the centre, he had a Mowang in a Duo with a cheap Bounty Hunter, who rolled a dud melee weapon on Booty, another Monk and a Bao Troop, but one armed with just a combi rifle. Clearly I was expecting some significant units both as his reserve and in Hidden or Airborne deployment. 

I deployed spread across much of the board, and was fairly aggressive with AROs, which might have been foolish, given that I hadn’t seen his main firepower, besides the 24” effective range Mowang, which was behind a Quantum Anomaly Zone I thought would also inhibit it. But I was more concerned with a Su Jian running right in and locking in the OP for killing my Lt, while the Daoying sat smugly in Camouflage mocking me from the corner. Yes, I have played against Yu Jing in Decapitation before, why do you ask? So my Reaktion Zond was out, my warbands spread out, prone behind cover but ready to template any attackers, my flash pulse bots and Puppetbot were peeking out from near my board edge, as was my Gecko. I covered the Lt himself with the Reaktion Zond, the Puppetmaster, his mine and the Motorised Bounty Hunter (who rolled MSV1 as his Booty – this would be important). Not ideal, and I was a bit worried about a suicidal Liu Xing drop simply decapitating my force in the opening moves. But there’s really nothing to be done about that beyond taking a tougher Lt. I put one DT on my far right, the other side of a small building from my opponent’s DTs, and the other on my far left. 

My opponent’s reserve, predictably, was a heavy shotgun Su Jian, which went on my extreme right, clearly looking to run right down the edge, past one of my DTs and toward my Lt. In response I placed Knauf on a tall building on my left, looking at a lot of the table opposite and across my DZ. This was a very bold move – I worried he would get swept up immediately by a Hac Tao HMG – but I thought the risk was worth it to hold back an immediate bum-rush. 

Round 1

My opponent declined Impetuous Orders, which would have brought at least one of his Shaolin Monks into full view of my total reaction bot. He then began, naturally enough, by making a run with his Su-Jian. My Moderator Lt, right over on my right flank, was open information, and would no doubt have a hard time taking Burst 3 heavy shotgun rounds in the chest. My opponent used a Monk’s Irregular Order to lay smoke so the Su Jian could get past a long fire lane covered by my Gecko and some other models. This let him Cautious Move it 8” into total cover, and move again to kill one of my DTs – not a good start for me.

My opponent was then on the edge of my DZ, and could move a tiny bit closer, but was in ZoC of some of my models, so could no longer Cautious Move. Basically, this meant he needed two 8” moves to get in place to shotgun my Lt, but both of those moves would provoke a lot of AROs. Leaving that, he spent NCO orders repositioning his Mowang in the midfield (he didn’t fancy a direct fight against Knauf, which would have been over 24”, so -9 in total, and through a Saturation Zone) and putting it onto suppression. After considering all the possible options, he Move-Dodged his Su Jian against a total reaction HMG, a panzerfaust from the Gecko, a breaker rifle from Perseus, a DA shot from Knauf and two flash pulses. He only took one Wound! I was taken aback, because he could now take a further, suicidal Order into my Lt . . . but my opponent announced that he’d run out of Orders at this point. I mopped up my relief sweat and prepared to hit back. 

My first priority was to deal with that Su Jian. It was in a little sheltered nook inside my DZ, where it couldn’t easily be shot. Using my smaller Group, I climbed an E/M CCW Morlock up to threaten it, and tried to blind it with a smoke grenade. This worked, but in retrospect was a very poor move. I had one Order left in that Group to use the Morlock against the Su Jian, but I think I would have been a fraction too far away to get into melee combat. Fortunately, my opponent elected to Dodge, moving nearer my Lt and out of the smoke, to ensure he wouldn’t get taken by the Morlock. This in turn put him out of cover and in clear sight of Knauf, so I was able to use my last small-Group Order on him. This was a great chance against an already-wounded Su Jian (3x 16s against a 14 to Dodge), and in fact I crit twice and hit once. 8 saving rolls later, the Su Jian’s threat was ended. 

Time to go on the attack. I unleashed Perseus, who boldly ran forward and leapt up and over a building…straight into a Hidden ARO from the classic Hundun Heavy Rocket Launcher. This wasn’t a terribly certain roll (shot on a 10 while he smoke-dodged on a 16), but my opponent had his revenge with a crit of his own, burning Perseus to ash on the spot. Boooooo.

Having already spent two Orders on that abortive run, I discarded the idea of attacking into the Lt/DT area this turn, and went to deal with the Hundun. Knauf was out of Orders. My Rounder was also on my left, and could see the target, but would have been just out of range. I could have used smoke to get closer, but that would have meant risky FtF rolls from a Morlock against the Hundun. I decided to use my MSV1 Booty result and brought the Motorised Bounty Hunter zooming round, and in two FtF rolls I did take the Hundun out. With this done, I used the Rounder’s NCO Order to move up before Discover-Shooting a Camo token, which turned out to be a Beasthunter and died. Finally I repositioned a few things into relative safety. Not a terrible turn, I was building up an advantage in VPs, but much more about regaining the initiative than actually making progress toward the Lt and DTs.

Round 2

Slightly on the back foot, my opponent was casting around for a way to start killing some of my models, which had escaped almost unscathed (sorry Perseus). He decided to bring on a Tiger Soldier spitfire in a combat jump, on my far left flank, where he could threaten Knauf, the Rounder, some warbands and my other DT. I thought this was a potentially very dangerous move that could have got him right back in the game, but fortunately for me he failed the PH12 roll and had to deploy near his own DTs.

This left him in a bind. I think he spent most of his other Orders on a Ninja KHD which appeared in the centre, moving around cover with some difficulty, since it was facing AROs from all angles, before moving suicidally into the open and into a QAZone to try a tactical bow shot at my remaining DT. Unfortunately it failed the roll. Any other orders were just spent shuffling some defenders around his DZ. 

I felt in control of the game starting my Turn 2, and just wanted to clear up some outlying models efficiently so I could drive in at the DTs and towards the opposing Lt. I took my Impetuous Orders freely, and then used an Irregular on my Morlock on the left flank, trading him for a Bao Trooper. Then I decided to get a bit clever with LoF. My MBH was in the centre, to the left of a large platform terrain piece. I spent 2 Orders climbing to the top (dismounted), and then moved across the platform top to engage first his Shaolin Monk, then his Tiger Soldier, with a diagonal line of fire that was just within 24” range. In retrospect this may not have been any more efficient than driving 8-6 back round the terrain. The Monk went down immediately, but I spent 5 Orders, the rest of my main Group for this turn, hammering the Tiger, who passed 8 save rolls before giving up the ghost. A red fury is not a great weapon against ARM3 in cover. In further retrospect, while keeping this fight going was understandable, I should have used a method that would develop my models closer to the DTs – the Gecko. It could have moved up, and although it wouldn’t have had as strong a FtF roll against the Tiger, it would certainly have brute forced the issue in a few Orders, and then it would have been positioned much closer for a Turn 3 push.

With my main group spent, there was still one other Shaolin Monk covering the DTs. I got greedy and decided to use my Tomcat engineer anyway. Brought him on, used climbing plus to walk over the building immediately behind the DTs, took a chain rifle from the Monk in the face while spraying the DTs with combi rifle fire – but failed against both, while going down against the chain rifle! Womp womp again. The curse of the newly painted. Yet another moment of blinding hindsight – I could have brought the Tomcat on, used the Puppetbot in that Group to advance and try to kill the Monk, and had more Orders to make certain of the DTs in Turn 3. Hell, I probably could have brought the Tomcat on a bit further back, and with climbing plus found a place it could shoot the Monk itself from outside chain rifle range. But no, I had to get greedy.

Round 3

With mounting casualties and no attacking pieces left which could break through – the Mowang would still have to fight Knauf at a heavy disadvantage, and/or try to batter through a Reaktion Zond and Gecko – my opponent decided to spend his Turn 3 blocking off his DTs and Lt. He moved his Long Ya to directly cover the only realistic approach lane, down my right/his left flank, and brought the Mowang and Bounty Hunter across as well, although the Mowang was too far back to see much. 

I realised at this stage I was short on reach to get to the enemy Lt, but I was certainly well ahead on overall casualties and could probably get the DTs. My main piece to do this was the Gecko, with the E/M Morlock in Group 2 to help it clear the way. The latter used his Impetuous Order to move up and nail a smoke grenade on an 18 (thanks Metachemistry +3PH), charged through that smoke, and chain rifled both my opponent’s shotgun Bounty Hunter and Shaolin Monk. The Bounty Hunter dodged but the Monk went down, with my heroic Morlock tanking his own save. He went on to spend his last available Order killing the Bounty Hunter in melee. The way to the DTs and Lt was clear.

Gecko time. It had to spend a couple Orders move-moving up the table, then slid through the smoke into cover, and blasted the Long Ya. Another short move brought it in sight of both DTs, but the rolls didn’t work out and both survived. Vexing. Another move, forward towards the enemy Lt, while firing sideways at the DTs, finished both of them off. This last bit brought the Gecko through and past the Mowang’s LoF, and the uncontested ARO fortunately missed. This left me just barely within reach of his Lt before the end of the game. I had to move-move then climb to get atop terrain looking down at the camouflaged Daoying. The very last Order of the game was me declaring Intuitive Attack, while my opponent wisely chose to Dodge (this makes it a FtF roll, my WIP13 against his PH10) since it was the last order anyway. I failed the roll. Can’t say I didn’t try.

Summary

This was a good game! My opponent was a lovely chap to play against and we had great fun throughout. Since I had more army points and both DTs, while he nabbed one of my DTs, and neither of us got to an opposing Lt, it finished 7-2 to me. I had 231VP and my opponent somewhere around 100VP. Like most players I prefer to go first in Decapitation if there’s a choice. But with this table and match-up I think it worked out better for me to go second. While I could have pushed hard for his Lt Turn 1, presumably Perseus would have met the same Hundun fate, and a lot of his points were off the table, while a Su Jian is a very tough target to assault at full reach, so maybe I simply would have left myself open to counterattack. My opponent struggled to crack my very wide spread of AROs, and to be honest (no shade to him) a more optimised army list might have helped. He was short on Orders, and the Mowang, his most expensive firepower, really struggled to get into the game in a meaningful way. While my initial, shallow thought at the end of the game was wishing I’d passed my final Intuitive Attack, in fact I was lucky to get as close as I did. I erred in Turn 2, using my MBH to slog through that Tiger Soldier instead of pushing my Gecko into a more forward position, and sacrificing my Tomcat for no gain. Those mistakes directly led to me not having a better chance at his Lt in the endgame. To be completely fair, I also made a fairly big mistake in Turn 1, trying to take out his Su Jian, and only came out OK because my opponent made a mistake dodging it into Knauf’s sights while getting away from my Morlock. 

Round 2: Firefight

I was lucky enough to draw against the guy who would go on to be voted best painted of the event (richly deserved) with his spectacular Dashat Company. So this was a visually rich game, especially as we played on a vibrant table. It looks very open in these pictures, but the alien fungus-trees on big circular bases were played as blocking all LoF if you were fully on the other side from the target – similar to Obscuring terrain in 40k (I believe), you could shoot into or out of them but not clean through. They were Difficult Terrain (Zero-G) and low visibility and Saturation zones, and even has an extra zany rule: any model which went Prone inside one of these ‘faerie rings’ would gain Targeted at the end of the Order. Zesty! The smaller stands and lines of alien foliage were played as solid walls to further block LoF, and the large building complex was played as ‘into but not through’ for LoF, so actually the table was relatively dense. 

Deployment

Well I lost the roll again, and my opponent again made the objectively correct decision to go first. I’ve not played against Dashat company that frequently, but I knew what everyone knows about them, they have McMurrough and up to 2 Libertos, so I was expecting a template rush. My opponent deployed two 3-model teams. One, on my far left with a Zuyong ML, a TacAware Zuyong multi rifle and Tinbot, and Valerya Gromoz. The other, behind the building in the centre, was a TacAware Zuyong HMG, a Rui Shi and a Digger. He hid Fiddler with her two Jackbots – a very dangerous assault piece – behind the building on my right, and had a Kum Biker on my left, while two Camo markers (clearly a Libertos and a mine) covered the midfield on my left. He had a couple flash pulse bots scattered around, and a Ghulam Lt and decoy Ghulam both tucked into total cover right at the back. McMurrough was conspicuously absent.

I once again went fairly aggressive with my AROs. I felt the Gecko would be relatively safe tanking shots from the Zuyong HMG or Rui Shi which were the main active turn firepower threat, so it peeked out from cover, looking at their approaches through the building. The TR bot found a position where it could hold back any Kum biker push on my left. This firebase was then screened by my Digger and the Puppetmaster’s mine – I expected McMurrough to try and rush the TAG – while I placed the Puppetbot centrally as a sacrificial ARO in front of the Gecko, where it could see into the building and down my right flank. I was slightly worried about the enemy missile launcher on my left, but it could only see narrow lanes at long range, due to those ‘faerie ring’ circular forests blocking LoF through them. I placed a Morlock, Perseus and the Rounder red fury all prone on my left, to have options for attacking towards it. My own flash pulse bots and Lt/decoy found safe positions towards the back.

My opponent placed McMurrough as his reserve, on my far right, where he could advance along the building before bursting into my DZ. Looking very carefully at the angles, I placed Knauf on a tall rock formation in the centre, between my TR bot and Gecko, but Prone. It’s hard to tell in the pictures, but this protected him from the Zuyong HMG and Rui Shi easily getting LoF, but still let him see McMurrough if the dog-warrior chose to jump over terrain. As before I was a bit anxious using Knauf in this way, but I thought if I made him awkward enough to reach with long-range fire, he could do well holding back close assault pieces.

Round 1

I docked two Orders from McMurrough’s Combat Group, as it was largely Irregular, and I wanted to limit that reach. This gave my opponent more Orders to play with his Fireteams (the bulk of power in the other Group) but I thought they would find it harder to maneuver forward, and if they did at least I would have better targets to counter-attack into. The opening Impetuous move from McMurrough was contested by my Puppetbot, who could just see the top of his Silhouette over the building. McMurrough failed his smoke (on 19) by rolling a 20, while the bot rolled a 1 and hit home, wounding the beast. He Guts Rolled to Prone and parked that for a while. McMurrough would either have to contest multiple AROs to assault anything immediately, or spend too many Orders moving and throwing smoke while Prone.

Instead my opponent reached for his Active turn firepower Haris, climbing up onto the building in the centre and trying shots at the Gecko. It took 1 wound in the first exchanged, but I passed Guts and decided to hold my position, absorbing 3 Orders in all. During these FtF rolls my opponent brought his Rui Shi into the central building on the ground floor, aiming for a Morlock poking out of cover – but he was just too close, and I ARO’d with a chain rifle, knocking the Rui Shi out, while the Morlock got splattered. This forced my opponent to bring Fiddler over, successfully repairing the remote and reforming the Haris. His last Orders in that Group were spent using the Rui Shi to take out my TR bot, which fortunately only dropped Unconscious. 

The final play of his Turn 1 was moving a Camo marker through the upper floor of the central building, threatening the Puppetbot and Knauf. I split my AROs to Discover and Hold, and what turned out to be a Hunzakut FO moved again, close to the Puppet but still out of cover. This left my opponent with some choices. Knauf might have been close enough for the shotgun template to cover both targets. But that would mean moving the Hunzakut into multiple other AROs, and nearly certain death, with Knauf, the most important target, free to Dodge normally. My opponent elected to stay in cover inside the building, provoking AROs from Knauf and the Puppetbot only, but this kept him outside effective template/shotgun range from Knauf. He also elected to split his two Burst between Knauf and the Puppet. A mistake in my opinion, he was only on a 5 to hit Knauf, and while he beat the Puppetbot, it is effectively 2STR and survived. Converting an Irregular Order with a Command Token, his final action of the Turn was a suicidal charge towards Knauf – fortunately I made my Dodge and other AROs took the Hunzakut down.

I was lucky to come out of that first rush losing only an expendable Morlock and a repairable TR bot. My priorities for the turn were to get control of the longer ranges so I could stave off the remaining close assault threats. I was also very conscious of the OP scoring. With the Hunzakut FO dead, I could afford to lose my Tomcat as long as I killed one more Specialist (Valerya or Fiddler). Attacking enemy Lts was a distant hope, but I also wanted to target some more expensive models. My first move was to mantle the Gecko up over terrain into a commanding central position, where it could see the Rui Shi. This was a straightforward gunfight and the Rui Shi went down in one Order, luckily.

Next I thought I would use my Rounder on the left to deal with the enemy ML. I considered Perseus, but I would have to throw him far forward, exposed to counterattack, and it would have taken more Orders. The Rounder moved up into a ‘faerie ring’, which meant attacking the ML within 24” (good), through a Low Visibility Zone which its MSV1 ignored (good) and a Saturation Zone which reduced my Burst to 3 and the ARO Burst to 1 (worse for him than for me). What I didn’t consider, in this apparently attractive FtF roll, was just how hard it can be for a Damage 13 weapon to get through ARM3 in cover. I spent 6 Orders killing that Zuyong ML. Just as the MBH/Tiger Soldier interaction in the previous game, I wasn’t making a huge tactical mistake – the odds favoured me, my opponent’s save rolls were unusually lucky, it was low risk – but this wasn’t very strategic play. I wasn’t doing anything to improve my wider board position. 

Trying to make something of the turn and generate some momentum (and enemy casualties) I decided to bring my Tomcat straight on, behind Valerya and the TacAware Zuyong, who now lacked any Fireteam bonuses. At this point it became clear my opponent didn’t know the Firefight mission removes restrictions on Parachutists entering via the opposing DZ. That is a very rough thing to not be prepared for, and I was apologetic, but he was a true sportsman about it, telling me to play it as normal and refusing to complain. But this meant my Tomcat could move into cover and shoot at Valerya, who went down cleanly, and then again into the back of the Kum Biker, who also dropped. The icing on the cake was that while moving into cover, his Zondcat servant, which deployed on my own board edge, moved up to my TR bot and revived it. This play was exactly what I had the Tomcat for, so he redeemed himself after a miserable performance in the first game (which was in no way my fault as his commander). I left the Gecko on suppression fire to complicate any direct attacks on my opponent’s turn. 

Round 2

My opponent’s casualties were mounting, but he still had three very dangerous pieces: McMurrough, a Zuyong HMG, and Fiddler. McMurrough was the first choice, but my opponent didn’t want to lose him against my Digger, or the Gecko’s suppression fire, before he could get to the juicier targets. Some Prone movement and smoke-throwing got him close enough to jump atop the terrain, just short of melee combat with the Gecko. He took multiple AROs, and elected to lay both chain rifle templates over the Gecko and damaged Puppetbot. The TAG took a second wound and the bot went down, with McMurrough also going Unconscious in a hail of bullets. There was some play through the central building on the ground floor; if I remember correctly, the Digger survived against one Jackbot and died against the second, taking both Peripherals down with him. Finally, with few other options left, the Zuyong HMG climbed right atop the central building, spraying rounds at the Gecko and Knauf while taking other flash pulse AROs on the chin. He took a wound and Knauf went down. My casualties were mounting too, and the Gecko looked vulnerable – the situation in the centre was still unresolved.

The remaining play of my opponent’s Turn 2 was to send his TacAware Zuyong in after my Tomcat, which was understandable – it was a credible threat to his Lt, and having enemies in front and behind you makes defensive positions untenable – but I was fine with, because Tomcats have flamethrowers. The Zuyong came round cover, I flamed away, the Tomcat went down instantly but in a stroke of luck, the Zuyong failed two continuous save (needed 11+ to pass) and went down as well.

My main goal in Turn 2 was to push my MBH, who had rolled MSV1 again, up around the right flank and toward the enemy Lts. To do so he had to engage the Zuyong HMG – another favoured gunfight with a red fury against an ARM3 target in cover. Despite being wounded already, this Zuyong took 5 Orders to put down. I have got to learn some day. Adding insult to injury, I had just enough gas left afterwards to get the biker onto my right flank and shoot at a flash pulse bot, who survived and Guts Rolled into total cover. Not really the finishing blow I was hoping for.

Seeing the end of the game in sight, I used the NCO Order to push my Rounder forward into cover on my left, ready to score a Panoply and/or CivEvac an HVT. My smaller group only had a Puppetmaster and flash pulse bot surviving, and it was impossible to shift either into the main group because the only casualty in that group, the Digger, was still Unconscious. So I actually walked my Puppetmaster forward to get nearer the Panoply and HVT on my right flank.

Round 3

My opponent surmised, correctly, that he was far behind on army points and Specialists killed. He had collected 1 item from a Panoply in a previous turn, and determined that his best chance of scoring was to push Fiddler to one of my HVTs and try and end the game in CivEvac. Now the custom mission rules allotted 1OP for ending with at least one HVT in CivEvac; 1OP for ending with more HVTs CivEvaced than your opponent; 1OP for ending with at least one HVT CivEvaced with a Specialist. So Fiddler could potentially score him 3OP here. Aristeia’s Ex-toymaker promptly climbed onto the central building, faced down my Gecko and blasted him. This was pretty lucky for my opponent (Burst 2 on 12s against my Burst 3 on 10s) but fair enough, the wounded Gecko went down. Fiddler tanked a red fury shot from the MBH while doing this, then ran out of cover to get inside her good range, and killed the biker as well. Things were starting to get out of control!

With her last Order, she swept by an HVT, tucked into cover, and rolled for CivEvac, needing 17. Failed the roll on a 20. Oof. Even worse, this last move allowed my Puppetmaster, who was just out of sight, to pass his Dodge (at -3) and move closer to a Panoply. 

With the Gecko gone, I was very aware that my army points remaining were only narrowly above my opponent’s. But I did have that edge, and the 2OP for Specialists, so to increase my score I needed 2 items from the Panoplies, and to CivEvac one HVT. Time for the Rounder to shine. He moved up on my left, grabbed an HVT, failed to grab a Panoply. Fortunately the remaining Morlock was close enough, and he looted the Panoply. My Puppetmaster did the same on my right flank.

This would have given me a 7-0 win. But I had a bright idea! I could move my Rounder into the centre of my opponent’s DZ and just see one of his two potential Lts at long range. Half chance to lock in another 2OP, right? What could go wrong? My bold NCO ran along, dragging a protesting HVT in his wake, took a shot at long range, and the enemy Ghulam crit on an 8. The Rounder went down on his arse and I was back to 5OP. Adding insult to injury, my opponent informed me that the Ghulam wasn’t even the real Lt. Womp womp again.

Summary

This was an absolute banger. Firefight is always a brawl and I liked the custom twist of HVTs. Having 1OP that needs a Specialist to score is a fun tension when there are 2OP for having more Specialists killed than your opponent. Both of us were having a real laugh throughout, and though my opponent struggled to break through my defence, I think the game was quite close in terms of total casualties. There were some real risks being taken as my Gecko, TR bot and Knauf defended my table half throughout the game. I was again left kicking myself that I had spent so much of my Active maneuvering blasting red fury rounds into armour, but even so I might have had his Lt if not for Fiddler going mental at the top of Round 3. Going into the last game of the day, I had won decent (5TP) victories but was lagging behind the frontrunners in OP score. I had a feeling I would miss those 2OP I’d lost along with my Rounder…

Round 3: Unmasking

Deployment

I got to play a third super nice guy, Ben, who I have played once before. This time he was using Foreign Company, and they were another gorgeous set of models (he would come 3rd in the painting competition). It was also a neat table with some container-building towers and a spaceship unloading area. As soon as he knew I was using vanilla Nomads we started joking about a two-Uberfallkommando game, and that would come to pass. I won the roll-off, and actually picked deployment. I was sure Ben would use a Bolt fireteam, which means a castle with an MSV1 Marksman sniper. I wanted to counter-deploy, and also wanted to force him into the side with slightly more restrictive vantage points. Beyond the Uberfallkommando, I was relatively sure that with an Exclusion zone I could stave off any first turn alpha strike from ForCo, and playing second can be helpful in Unmasking to flip consoles back from the opponent, so I was fine with that.

Ben set up some unimportant supporting models – two Securitate hiding inside separate buildings, two unarmed remotes hugging the back edge – and 3 camo markers spread across the midfield between his DZ and the Exclusion zone, presumably Zero Specialists to activate the objectives. He then put 3 Bolts, including a sniper, and Valkyrie, around a building on my far right. He spent a Command Token to hold two models back. I was sure one was the Uberfallkommando, but couldn’t guess the second. Perhaps a Kriza Boracs, since he didn’t have many points on show. His Decoys were all well sheltered from my table half, but looked like they could be outflanked; one behind a tall building on my left and the other two more on the right behind the spaceship terrain.

I deployed spread out and head down, not wanting to have anything picked off by that Bolt sniper. My HVTs were one Decoy on the left board edge, the real one behind a building in the left-centre, and another Decoy on my far right. My Puppetbots were very slightly peeking out on my left between a crate and a tall building, defending my Marspider paramedic and Rounder red fury. That tall building also housed a Moran Masai, as well as a flash pulse bot, Puppetmaster and decoy Moderator in more secure positions, so it was defended by a crazy koala and mine. In my centre, I had my own Uberfallkommando, with the Chimera behind solid cover and the Pupniks spread widely around to Dodge or Discover in ARO and waste my opponent’s time if he was silly enough to spend Orders shooting at them. Jazz was also central, with the second flash pulse bot watching my board edge. Billie was behind the building on my right, which housed the Moderator Lt. I was hoping that by making that flank completely innocuous, he wouldn’t go after it.

My opponent deployed his Uberfallkommando on my left, ready to run up between the tall buildings into the denser side of my DZ. Then he surprised me slightly by revealing a second Bolt sniper as his other reserve, and creating a ‘pure’ 5-model Core team with the Bolts already in position. This would be quite tricky to maneuver into attack, as he had two snipers on separate buildings, at the limit of coherency, but it was a beast of a team. 2 snipers, a spitfire, Valkyrie and a shotgun Bolt. In these dying days of N4, I was, as you might expect, overjoyed to be playing against BS16 models with Marksman and MSV1 one final time. The other thing to celebrate was that my opponent had only 14 models visible, so I expected something in Airborne or Hidden Deployment – I really wished I could remember what Foreign Company had in their roster! I deployed my Gator conservatively behind cover in the centre, being very careful that the Bolts couldn’t possibly gain LoF to it from their table half. I had the inkling of a way to deal with them if I could get to my own Active turn, but I had to avoid getting drilled in Reactive. The Gator could see out to the alleys on my left flank which the enemy Uberfallkommando had to cross to reach my DZ.

Round 1

I stripped 2 Orders from Ben’s main pool, which held the Bolt team and the Uberfallkommando. His small Group was really just the midfield camouflage stuff, and I assumed they would focus on activating objectives, which was less of a worry. The Uberfallkommando promptly sprinted down my left flank, with the Gator trying and failing to nail Pupniks – it had two shots, it missed one and a Pupnik simply saved against another. This brought Ben into contact with my Puppetbots.

He first tried to take them out by moving his Bolts laterally, gaining LoF from the building in the middle of his DZ, but both Puppetbots survived to duck back out of sight, with one being damaged. So Ben threw Eclipse smoke with the Chimera and used it to move just outside of melee range – but my Puppets Dodged back. We were now in one of those complex situations which always arise with the Uberfallkommando. Ben could get into melee if he chose with both Puppetbots and the Marspider. But to reach either the shotgun Puppetbot or the Marspider he would have to leave the smoke, and that meant they could both template the Chimera and 2 of the Pupniks. After some hesitation, Ben moved the Chimera into one Puppet, 2 Pupniks into another, and the last Pupnik into my Marspider. I decided to fight with the Marspider (I didn’t want to lose him), and template with the shotgun Puppet. Final result: both Puppetbots dead, Marspider killed his Pupnik, another Pupnik went down, and the Chimera tanked the shotgun hit. Tense. With one last Order, the Chimera went into the Marspider and the last surviving Pupnik got into my Moderator decoy. I ARO’d with the Marspider’s flamethrower and both went down to hell together. The Moderator, as it’s actually quite likely to do with its PARA(-6) CCW, beat the Pupnik into submission.

This was a real mind-bender of an Order/ARO process, at the end of a long day of Infinity. I wonder if Ben should have Dodged once I declared AROs with templates, but while that would have probably kept him safe in either Order, it wouldn’t have killed any of my models, and if he had run out of activations, I still could have dealt with him easily in my Active turn. He probably did the right thing by pushing his luck, and I only came out OK by virtue of having template models to defend with. If Ben had had a tiny bit more reach, he could have gone after the Moderator, Puppetmaster, and most critically the Rounder, who was sheltering behind that building.

I thought I had ridden out the storm, but there was another squall coming. Ben used an Irregular Order in his smaller Group to peek a Camouflage token out at my Gator. It was around then I remembered that ForCo has access to Beasthunters. A Gator is at a slight disadvantage in this FtF thanks to Mimetism-3 and Surprise Attack, and sure enough, the Beasthunter planted a panzerfaust in its grill and took 2 Wounds off it! As I bit my nails, he activated again and fired the other panzerfaust barrel, on even odds. I lost again, but this time, to my immense relief, I passed all 2 saves. This was a real make or break moment; I didn’t have an engineer and if the Gator had gone down I would have been in deep trouble. But with his explosive ammunition expended, Ben’s fantastic Beasthunter (modelled after BA Baracas) retired into total cover. 

Ben’s Bolt Fireteam of doom repositioned, so that they had one sniper atop the central building of his DZ, one sniper in front of it atop the spaceship roof, and the other Bolts and Valkyrie in the ‘valley’ between. Both snipers could see huge sweeps of my DZ, so that was the problem I had to unlock in my first turn. His last Orders were moving a Zero Killer hacker up to the central console, activating it, and revealing the Decoy on my right. 

I planned to do things the normal way I try and kill MSV AROs – White Noise covering the Gator. This wouldn’t give me any great advantage in FtF rolls against the Bolts, since the Fireteam gives them Sixth Sense, but it would let me engage them one at a time, and it would let me use the Mine Dispenser to set up a fork. Jazz got the White Noise down in two Orders, and the Gator moved up into it, taking out a Warcor and then landing two shock mines covering the forward Bolt sniper, and finishing in partial cover on a shipping container. At this point I hesitated. My Gator had one STR remaining and it was my key piece. A FtF would be on 4x 14s, against my opponent’s 2x 19s. Yes, the shock mines nearly guaranteed the Bolt would die if it shot back, but Ben could take the shot and win. If I had no Gator left, and he still had one Bolt sniper, things were going to be very difficult.

I cast about for another solution and went to the Uberfallkommando. They could get up to the spaceship terrain, while staying in its shadow below the Bolts’ LoF, although the leftmost Pupnik got shot. Eclipse smoke then got them through the craft, right into the lee of the building where the forward Bolt sniper stood. I brought two Pupniks up to the edge of the building in a smoke cloud. Now at this point, my indecision cost me – using Sixth Sense, that forward Bolt sniper could Dodge on an unmodified 10, clearing my shock mines. She also used the Dodge movement to try and get a bit further from my Pupnik. Bit of a risk for Ben, but he was right to take it, since it made my next steps much trickier. A Pupnik charging into melee with a pure-team Bolt actually doesn’t have good odds. The Bolts can fire pistols at Burst 2 on 19s – shotguns are on 22s!

In retrospect, I had a couple Orders to play with here, my Gator being in a separate Group. Perhaps I should have been patient and tried to Speculative Shot Eclipse smoke (on a 10) to cover the shotgun Bolt on the ground, and then murk him with the Chimera. Instead, I sent one Pupnik into the Bolt on the spaceship roof – any chance is better than none – while the Chimera and other Pupnik attacked the shotgun bolt. This made the Chimera good enough at combat to overcome the shotgun model, so Ben wisely templated, and my Chimera went down. Not a very productive trade for me, especially since the Bolt sniper heroically crit twice on 19s and dispatched her Pupnik in style. But, by taking out that one shotgun Bolt I had knocked the Fireteam bonus down to +1BS, and critically, the front Bolt sniper had moved out of cover while trying to avoid the Pupniks.

My Gator now took on that first Bolt confidently (on 4x17s vs 2x17s) – and Ben informed me that he had rolled a 16. With death in my heart, I threw the dice . . . and landed a crit. The Bolt dissolved, and the game opened up. Now vulnerable to the penalties for being engaged through a Zero Visibility Zone, the other Bolt sniper was forced to shoot back on a 10 against my Gator. The crit Ben was hoping for did not appear, and that Bolt was also shot. I had just enough juice left in the Gator to shuffle it into LoF of the enemy Zero KHD, blasting it apart, and back into a dominant ARO position in Suppressive Fire. That left the field clear to move my Heckler KHD, who had deployed in the centre, up to the central console, flip it back to my control, and correctly guess that the real target was the enemy HVT on my left, behind the tall buildings. My last Order was to push the Heckler just slightly further, gain LoF to the spitfire Bolt (no longer in a Fireteam) and gun him down with the assault pistol.

By this point I was looking in control of the board.

Round 2

Ben was not quite done, electing to bring on an Akali spitfire on my left flank. This let him gun down my Morlock, which I’d brazenly advanced into the open midfield, but at the cost of being Targeted via a Transductor Zond’s repeater. Further attacks would have brought him into contact with my Gator, which looked suicidal. Although my TAG only had 1 STR left, it was in cover, so it would bounce a spitfire hit on a 4+, and the FtF roll would have been dangerously even (4x10s for him and 3x11s for me). Ben gamely snuck another Zero KHD forward, activated the console on my right, revealed the Decoy on my left, and used the Akali and Zero to take both Decoys out. I was very lucky here that Ben didn’t guess I’d selected the central HVT as my real target. If he’d revealed it, the Akali could have got it out of cover and nearly certainly taken it out, although it might have sacrificed its own life in the process. Spoiler, that would have made the score dangerously close! Without many other options, Ben brought his heroic Beasthunter out of cover, burning my Heckler to ash (failed his Dodge) while being gunned down by my Gator.

In my Turn 2 I was able to dispatch the Akali with the Moran Masai atop the building on my left. This let me Jump to the central tower, which housed a console on the top floor. The Moran Activated it and revealed another Decoy.

This left the way clear for my Rounder to push forward on my left, sweeping up the real HVT and finished in cover, well inside my opponent’s table half, ready to hunt the Decoys in Round 3. My Gator finished off the other Zero KHD from his elevated position.

Round 3

With the world ending, Ben had no Specialists left to activate another console and reveal my genuine HVT, while he’d already killed both my Decoys. All that was left to him was to make my life difficult. Valkyrie charged out of cover to assault my Gator, which wasn’t on Suppression any more. It took 1 Wound from her as she ran forward, but Valkyrie has Total Immunity and absorbed the below, getting into shotgun range and bringing the Gator low (while expiring to its chain rifle). Ben moved both his Securitate onto rooftops to provide last ditch AROs over his Decoys, and passed the turn over to me.

At this point, beyond the normal brain fatigue, I urgently needed to leave for home (skipping the closing ceremonies), so things were a bit of a rush. Ben really had nothing left beyond those two Securitate, and two Remotes, one baggage and one flash pulse, which couldn’t see anything. I knew I’d won the game, but to score further OP, I had two things to do: activate the third console and reveal the last Decoy, and then kill both Decoys. The first task fell to my right-hand Moran, who was faced with a mine the Zero KHD has placed before meeting his fate. I didn’t have any option but to run forward, failing my Dodge but tanking the save. That let me activate the Objective with one Order spare in that Group – I couldn’t have faced a string of failed WIP rolls.

The Rounder swung round the left flank, killing one Decoy, and then engaging both Securitate simultaneously. I’m aware this was sloppy and dangerous, but I was in too much of a rush to ‘slice the pie’ and fight them one by one. Both went down over 2 Orders, but this did provoke an ARO from the last Decoy, which Dodged Prone. Again, sloppy, but unavoidable. I had just enough Orders to climb the Rounder onto a building in Ben’s DZ, gain LoF with my last Order, and tag that Decoy with a couple of hits. It passed the saves. You have failed me for the last time, red fury!

Summary

Another very tense and close game, this was markedly different to the last one. I felt very strongly that it was all fought for and decided in Round 1. Ben came close to stopping me before I started, not so much with the Uberfallkommando, which caused acceptable losses, and might have done more serious damage without being critical, but with that Beasthunter. I simply did not expect a Camo marker to come so close to blowing my TAG up completely, and that would have spelled doom for me. I would have been bullied by the Bolts all game. Similarly, I had to take real risks against his horrible Fireteam in my first turn, but once they cracked, that was it, I had the whip hand. Once again we spent the whole game having a great laugh, until it became apparent I needed to go. Sorry to Ben for rushing him through the last Round!

Conclusion

Having won all three games, but not scored too well, in an event with 20 attendees, I didn’t expect to win, and in fact my 21OP meant I placed 3rd. The first and second places were both excellent tournament players, on 24OP and 23OP respectively. So my confirmation bias certainly whispered to me that if I had won the roll to Intuitive Attack the enemy Lt in Round 1 I could have scored 3OP; if I had not been crit and lost my CivEvaced HVT at the close of Round 2, I could have scored 2OP; if I had managed to put down the last Decoy with the final Order of the last game I could have scored 1OP. But that is the kind of fallacy that crops up in Infinity. I might have not needed a shred more luck in those instances if I’d played better, wasted fewer Orders and established a better table state going into my final turns. Conversely, I was turning a blind eye to the luck I had enjoyed: in all three games, if certain rolls had not gone my way, I could have gone down to defeat. There were other rolls where I locked in OP by passing when I shouldn’t have, but my lizard brain doesn’t remember those the same way. I’m also sure the other winning players had moments in their games where they could bemoan their luck. So I did about as well as I could, and will strive to do better in N5.

It’s not all about results, and I was very happy to see some familiar faces and meet new people, playing on spectacular tables and against expertly painted models. For anyone who plays Infinity, or wants to, but is anxious about attending competitive events, just do it. The community is overwhelmingly friendly and will ensure you have a good time, even if you’re not immediately ‘in it to win it’. I am looking forward to some more events in N5 and the new year. 

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