Considering to bring IA to a local tourney. One of three missions will be Deadly Dance. Considerable threadspace on these forumparts has been committed to the Guijia, and how subpar it is compared to other tags, as well as compared to in-sectorial alternatives. Yet I own the model, love the model, and think - if it is to shine at all - it should shine in Deadly dance. I do have trouble actually creating a list though: adding Guijia eats into to the available points and SWC, and adding enough anti-tag (missiles, AHD) in a list with Guija is difficult (if not impossible). Might it be that even in Deadly Dance it's just better not bring the Guijia at all, and just focus on our excellent Fireteams, adding the Shang Ji AHD and extra missiles as counter-tech for this specific mission ? Or should I throw caution in the wind and this bring something like this: Invincible Army ────────────────────────────────────────────────── 10 DĀOYĪNG Lieutenant L2 Hacker (Hacking Device) Boarding Shotgun / Breaker Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 29) GŪIJIĂ MULTI HMG, Heavy Flamethrower / AP CCW. (2 | 88) GŪIJIĂ PILOT Light Flamethrower / Pistol, Knife. () TAI SHENG Mk12, Chain-colt, Stun Grenades / Heavy Pistol, Knife. (0 | 45) ZÚYŎNG (Fireteam: Duo, Tactical Awareness) HMG / 2 Breaker Pistols, Knife. (1.5 | 38) PANGGULING FTO (Repeater) Light Shotgun / Electric Pulse. (0 | 13) ZÚYŎNG (Fireteam: Haris, Tactical Awareness) Combi Rifle + 1 TinBot B (Deflector L2) / 2 Breaker Pistols, Knife. (0.5 | 34) SON-BAE Yaókòng Missile Launcher / Electric Pulse. (1.5 | 17) PANGGULING FTO (Repeater) Light Shotgun / Electric Pulse. (0 | 13) CHAĪYÌ Yaókòng Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8) MECH-ENGINEER Combi Rifle, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 15) 6 SWC | 300 Points Open in Infinity Army Your opinion and advise is appreciated !
The problem with Deadly Dance, even for the best TAGs, is that people go in preparing to face TAGs. This makes TAGs a considerable liability for Deadly Dance. My advice for Deadly Dance is what people around here, regardless of faction, does: don't bring a TAG. (Edit: well, that's not entirely true, but the top scorers tend to not bring TAGs.)
Generally agree. Although I can recommend going second, which mitigates this somewhat, so does using a Sphinx (which obviously isn't an option here).
I would rather say : if you know really well how to play a TAG, bring one. If not, don't. @Arkille1 doesn't have problem to bring his Marut in this scenario but he really knows what he does. A lot of players I faced who played a TAG weren't that stellar at playing it, so don't bring one would have been maybe better for them. So, yes, if you don't know how to operate a TAG, don't take one.
Deadly Dance wants the 50-60pt TAGs, not the expensive ones because you can be forced to overextend to score based on the random starting location of the zones. So your TAG needs to be expendable. Just bring your normal quadrant control list with potentially an AHD in there just for laughs.
I like Deadly Dance, it's one of the few chances I can justify taking the Guijia for a spin. Personally, I think IA is prepared really well for this mission. You get the TAG (Gucci-boy), the anti-TAG options (linked SML with AF, both linked and/or TO ML, Monofilament dudes) and the anti-anti-TAG options (linked Haidao MSR, Hac Tao HMG, Zhencha, Liu Xing). A comment on SML vs ML: SML has a better chance of scoring wounds against TAGs than the ML has. That's because the SML has an AP+DA template, whereas the ML has to choose between the template EXP and the AP+EXP. The extra dice is worse statistically speaking than negating half the TAGs armor AND the cover. Plus, you have no bad ranges. Give it a try!
I agree that if you like it, take it! When they say the Guijia is sub-par, they are talking against other TAGs. It’s still going to out class everything else! Don’t try to kill their TAG with yours. Kill everything else if you can.
There's a them and a different them. I say the Guijia is too expensive for the amount of work you can do with it, so I'm absolutely part of one of those "them", but that said you can do good work with it. One of my favourite lists is a vanilla Guijia with a Guilang sniper and Armand. I still wouldn't use it in a TAG-oriented mission because the number of AHD increase notably in tournaments with those missions and for the Guijia to shine you need a playing field reasonably clear of AHD. I say start experimentation on missions like Decapitation or Supremacy.
If you go for the guija, and actively want to play it, i think you'd better stay in vanilla than going for Invincible army. There's much better TAG support unit in vanilla (like guilang, ninja KHD, warbands, etc...), and you can still use a lot of IA's good units, albeit at reduced AVA but since you probably couldn't fully exploit their AVA in IA to being with...
The emphesised quote is also my main concern with this. I'm in the same boat while trying to write a list for Show of Force. The only thing Vanilla can't do at the moment is having a 2nd Chaiyi remote, but I can easily switch that with a Libertos and play Vanilla. The list below started with the Guijia, obviously. Next I wanted to have a durable, CC capable datatracker, so I took the Hulang. In every IA list so far are two Chaiyi, a Weibing and the LuDuan. With having 4 repeater bots in there, I like the option to have burst two at the start of the game with the EVO and when I have the EVO, I might even take the Liu Xing too. Round the list with a Mech Engineer and the best in whole YJ, the Daoying (for killing TR bots), not even as an LT. But as you can see, nearly nothing prevents me from just playing vanilla and switch to a Libertos for 8 or even 10 pts if I drop the LT on the Guijia. Show of Force v3 ────────────────────────────────────────────────── 10 GŪIJIĂ Lieutenant MULTI HMG, Heavy Flamethrower / AP CCW. (3 | 88) GŪIJIĂ PILOT Light Flamethrower / Pistol, Knife. () LIÚ XĪNG Hacker (Assault Hacking Device) Boarding Shotgun / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0.5 | 38) HÚLÁNG (Fireteam: Duo) Combi Rifle + Light Flamethrower, E/M Grenades, D-Charges / Pistol, Monofilament CC Weapon, Knife. (0 | 44) PANGGULING Hacker (EVO Hacking Device) Electric Pulse. (0.5 | 25) CHAĪYÌ Yaókòng Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8) CHAĪYÌ Yaókòng Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8) LÙ DUĀN Mk12, Heavy Flamethrower / Electric Pulse. (0 | 21) WÈIBĪNG Yaókòng Combi Rifle, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 16) MECH-ENGINEER Combi Rifle, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 15) YÁOZĂO Electric Pulse. (0 | 3) DĀOYĪNG (Minelayer) MULTI Sniper, Antipersonnel Mines / Breaker Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 32) 5.5 SWC | 298 Points Open in Infinity Army
Thanks guys for all the suggestions ! Since I'm absolutely new to Tags I think I'll take the advice to just use a non-tag list for Deadly dance, and start Tagging in the more killy missions were the Tag is not forced to move halfway up the board through x-numbers of repeaters and hidden ahd's just for a chance to get an extra point in. I guess IA can do well enough in Deadly dance with a heavy fireteam, and some extra anti-tag (but otherwise also useful) load-outs. Much appreciated !