Hi everyone, During Black Friday a buddy of mine and I could buy the Red Veil+expansion very cheaply and we started playing Infinity. As you (well; I) do I bought a fair bit of extras to have more variation. (Celestial Guards/Hac Tao+HMG/Su Jian/doc+engineer specialists/2 extra Tiger Soldiers/Yan Huo+2ML/2nd Guilang) With the new Kuang Shi release pending I am pretty close to happy with my Yu Jing for new and am I tentatively looking around for a 2nd faction. I'd like a 2nd faction in order to be able to demo the game. (eventually. Need to get a better grasp of the rules still) But also I'd like this second faction to play quite differently to the Yu Jing I have. (Plus I need to like the models but have not found many models I did not like to begin with...) tl/dr: What would you recommend as a 2nd faction after Yu Jing and why?
It depends on what you have and how you use it. How do you usually play? Do you want to keep the demos simple, or more challenging? EC: Morat & Onyx are quite simple: advance and kill, then do mission objectives if any. Onyx uses more hacking, however. Generic can go the assault route, or the less direct one, but it's more killy than Generic Aleph. Aleph: the greeks are like Morat, harder to hit but with less armor/wounds, and full with characters (in fact, most lists are already made, and are character-heavy). Vanilla is a toybox of several options. Nomads: generic can be heavy hacking-dependant and will combine that with midfield control, Corregidor is very simple (be a rock, and crush your enemies with clever applications of the basics) controling the midfield with morans and geckos, Bakunin is a mixed herd of cats able to go simple, go hack, or go middle table control easier than Corregidor. Of them all, Corregidor is the most "noob friendly" of all, but it can become old quite fast. Ariadna has almost no hacking, but can play the guerrilla game (all camo units on the table), the berserker melee way (Wallace on Caledonia) or the forgotten way (Merovingia... seriously, don't bother there); then there is USAriadna, which is a mixed bag. PanOceania: melee HI on Military Orders (kinda like JSA), supertech with Neoterra, or dirty jungle fighters with Acontecimiento. They all boil down to good shooters, bad battlefield recovery. Tohaa: wouldn't recommend it for demos, since they have too many custom rules and triad building is as stale as the greeks lists. Haqquislam: very likely THE polar opposite to YJ: tons of cheap irregular troops, few heavy troops (and of those, the S5 tend to be the best), best medics on the game, few reasons to buy an engineer, and QK can pull even more shenanigans with fireteams than IS. "Must have" troops tend to be Al'Hawwa, Muttas (if generic or Hassa), Djanbazan (only MSV2), Farzan (same as Muttas) and Hafzas (if generic or QK); it's one of the cheapest factions to get it: for QK, two boxes give you a working army of odalisques with hafzas. NA2: the Druze. Grab some remotes, grab some Haqq troops, and have fun. Useful for cross-gaming with Qapu (Scarface, Druze, Bashi Bazouk, kameel remotes...)
Two options: - The one that you like the models more. - The one that has the most different playstyle. Given that Haqq has received lots of renewed models recently and the playstyle is very different, I'd recommed that. But your friend already has that, so maybe not a good choice if you want to play using different armies. Being the low-tech, no-hackig faction, maybe you could try Ariadna. You could maybe find for cheap the USAriadna box and quickly collect the Sectorial because it has very few released models. Later, if you like it, expand to vanilla Ariadna.
Tohaa because they are the coolest army around and you might still be able to get the 300 point box (which is a steal).
Also, consider sectorials. When I was looking for my second faction I was after the most different gameplay as well, and had chosen Shasvastii over vanilla CA. No regrets.
I'd ask, "What is your favorite thing you've encountered in Infinity so far, and which faction has it in spades?" I started with Haqqislam, I loved all the infiltrating units. I got into Ariadna after that for all their fun camo infiltrating shenanigans. I don't regret it.
I've got a near complete set of Yu Jing and I'm glancing at other armies myself. I'll echo both Haqq and Tohaa. They play very differently compared to Yu Jing and are solid armies. Personally I'll stay away from Tohaa because they are essentially Infinity's elves and I really need to break my pattern of playing elves, but you're not me and Tohaa aren't really elves only kind of elf-ish. I'll also make an honourable mention of Druze and Aleph (Vedic side) since they have a lot of shared miniatures with particularly ISS.
Elves wish they could survive as much as Tohaa does. Tohaa wish they could shoot as well as elves. Very different playstiles.
Depends on what setting you're lifting your elves from. I think the original idea where Tohaa As Elves came from took the interpretation of them being the setting's resident seemingly benevolent alien arrogant twats. Skill at shooting not withstanding and elves as fragile creatures is more of a GW sort of thing. Tohaa wish they were as resilient as Tolkien or Pratchett elves - especially the latter of the one :)
I second this - or the other way around. I started out as a Steel Phalanx player because of models and fluff. But as I learned the game and found my playstyle. I discovered, that they weren’t an army for me, and were simply too limited in scope. But changing to Aleph suddenly allowed me to play very differently, and still use most of the models I enjoyed the most. - I’ve got an itch to start most of the human armies - and shasvastii, if they’re ever redone - but more as a modelling/painting thing, than getting a diverse collection. Doing various 300pt concepts to introduce opponents to the game or just play with the rules. My to-do list goes something like this : Aleph (pretty much a full collection) Ragtag Nomads (WIP) Spetznaz Werewolves Ninjas and biker gangs Hassassins and the Maghariba The Anaconda and Friends (Mercs) Unseen Shasvastii Although, I just got sidetracked by another game.
You lot are not helping to make it easy. Would have been to easy if everyone voted the same faction I suppose...
I know you're saying that you moved from a sectorial of an army to the full scope of that army (vanilla) to achieve gratification, but I have a sentiment that is similar but it involves going from a vanilla army to a sectorial of a totally different army. I started off with Vanilla Aleph for several reasons: Resilient, Low Order Count/"Elite" Vanilla Army, Less Offense/More Specialists, Aesthetics. I wanted to stay away from fireteams as a beginner. I am 100% certain I made the right choice for me starting off and could be content playing Aleph for years to come; however, I have been quickly expanding into my second army, Hassassin Bahram. If I had started in Hassassins, I do not think I would've been happy or even enjoyed playing them. Because I spent so much time in Vanilla Aleph, I can appreciate Hassassin more. Just like you, I wanted to experience the other side to my play style while keeping some familiarity: Focus on Light Infantry (less resilient), High Order Count Sectorial Army, Glass Cannon but maintain the average 14 WIP on a smaller choice of specialists, and the Aesthetics. For the OP: One thing I'd like to see you do is list what you really like about Yu Jing. What were the attractions for you to play Yu Jing? Have other people do the same for the factions they're familiar with. Compare your lists to their lists and find the army that offers few similarities, but also maintains attributes you aren't willing to give up. Just like my example above, I was unwilling to give up a 14 or 15 WIP average. I think this will be more helpful to you than a vote. Edit and my last aside: Part of me still hopes for a Svalarheima sectorial that enables me to run an awesome 2 Jotum list. Something about Jotums...
Just join us in Haqqislam, we have Mutts,viral weapons, impersonators, Mutts, the only Fatalyty Lv2 profiles in game (for now), Holoprojector shenaningans, Mutts, and Specialists with WIP 14. Heck, Doctors that cure on 17s or less! Did I mention we have Mutts?
This is a good point but my answer might not be all that helpful. It simply was the matter of a friend approaching me and asking if I wanted to split the contents of the "Red Veil+expansion" meaning I got the 10 models of Yu Jing because he had a preference for Haqqislam. I liked all models I had seen so did not care either way. Basically; pretty much random I ended up with Yu Jing... As for what I like while playing; (warning; still pretty limited experience&limited models atm!) -The Daofei (mildly proxied as spitfire instead of HMG) has been amazing in my games. -I really like the Guilang a lot. (cannot wait for the non-sniper version showing up) -Tiger soldier (light flamer/combi) has failed once spectacularly but overall very good value for points. -Hsien with HMG has performed well. As you'd expect of a very expensive model. My Yu Jing models: (basically Red Veil+expansion+Yu Jing support pack) Hsien + HMG Daofei + HMG Guilang+multi sniper rifle Zuyong+multi rifle Ninja + tactical bow Tiger soldier+combi/light flamer 3x Zhanshi+combi Zhanshi doc Zhanshi engineer 2x Yaozao remotes On my painting table: -Tiger soldier with spitfire -Tiger Soldier with boarding shotgun On its way: -Hac Tao+HMG -Su Jian -Guilang +combi rifle -Yan Huo + ML -Celestial Guards (boxed set) I intend to buy the new Kuang Shi when released along with the Rui Shi, Kanren and Oniwaban . All this will be bought and painted roughly in the next 2 months.
Then is it fair of me to ask if you've found the primary faction for you? Maybe it's going to end up being that Yu-Jing is your secondary faction and you would have a better time somewhere else.
I simply do not know yet. I *think* I like Yu Jing a lot because they are very flexible. But I have not seen a lot of Infinity in action so odds are there is something which would fit me like the proverbial glove...