Yes, but given white noise is not an ARO program a "white noise but for hacking" program will have difficulty to be implemented reactively and as an active program will give limited functionality, definitely not stopping the enemies active hacking activities. Something that has Climbing Plus, +1 BS and BS attack AP, but not for +18 points. in my opinion a B3 contender at damage 16 is not as effective as a B4 spitfire even if it costs 0SWC, that alone stops Vostok from been a solo or duo attack piece and bounds it on at least a Haris. Svalarheima Winter Force and to a lesser extend Military orders rework has introduced far more significant units for PanOceania than what has been added to the Nomads with the equivalent sectorial updated they received, the same goes for the reinforcements update, blockes and blades are a superior update to what Nomads received and Squalo MK2 is a cheaper platform for the same firepower a normal PanO TAG can introduce. Zellenkriegers were introduced to two sectorials and matter only to the last one, Tunguska, Bakunin does not care about Zelenkriegers, Morloks are a far superior choice, mind you Zellenkriegers are not cheap, far from it and it is in line with the rest of Tunguska. If you think an extra engineer option, with tactical awareness, that can be attached to many duos including TAGs and Bulleteers (also in generic and SWF) is just an extra order to Bolts you are mising the impact Blades have in PanOceania, Blockers are great additions as hackers too. NCA and other sectorias (including generic Panoceania) have been boosted to a significant degree with the various additions PanOceania has received, maybe not as spectacularly (and insignificantly) as Bakunin getting Zellenkriegers, but mechanically important for the faction.
Albedo was only pointless because the straight cudgel of the mimetic -6 one existed, again, that profile causes awful internal balance for the faction. I've straight up won games on the back of hiding Albedo units in reserve, and then having them just literally into my opponent's DZ and gut it because 3 out of 4 meaningful hard ARO pieces were packing MSV and couldn't see shit. You think that because you have next to no understanding of how the game works, nor the capacity to fact check yourself by checking the actual statistical output on units. Both units are within 1-2% odds of each other for the most part, even when armour is as low as 1. Once you reach ARM5 (so 2+ cover) the Vostok pulls ahead, so in meaningful face to face rolls with actual frontline combat units (read not gunning down cheerleaders in the open) the Vostok is the statistically better option. This lead expands as ARM climbs because the DMG16 is statistically better than having +1B on a Spitfire. This is completely putting aside the fact that in the meta of DTWs bloody everywhere, part of a being a meaningful attack piece means being able to shrug off hits. There is a reason the majority of favoured attack pieces in N4 have both 2W and some modicum of armour. On top of that it packs C+, which means it's better at prosecuting attacks than a Bulleteer and terrain doesn't pose much of a defensive obstacle It shoots better against enemy combat units It takes hits better and keeps fighting longer It has better mobility so it takes fewer orders to get into position to attack Guess what, all of these things make it a better attacking unit than a Bulleteer. Trying to argue otherwise is being willfully ignorant of straight facts, which in fairness is your schtick, but as always I will point that out.
@Triumph while I agree with your analysis, don't be rude. There are ways to criticise someone in a civil way. @psychoticstorm both Remotes are also one order away from getting Marksmanship, which makes Triumph's calculation slightly off, as the ARM doesn't get that high so quickly.<- brainfart moment, please ignore. But his point about durability is very important. Both Armbots are fragile, particularly when opponent gets into DTW range, which is easy these days. I see Vostok pretty much on par with Rudra; the former has better defense thanks to Mimetism and AP Immunity. The latter has slightly better ARM and more versatile weapon choice. Both are excellent attack pieces, and don't need a fireteam to perform. Now, back to PanO: if you were to change their Remotes, either by modifying existing ones or adding a new unit, what would you do?
See I don't care when people make an honest mistake. On the flip side you have Storm who for what's going on what, nearly seven years I've seen him post here? Never even bothers to pretend to check facts before he says something both outrageously dumb and easy to disprove. This is the same person who would not drop arguments such as "Bipandra is fine" and "Ninjas are just as good in a fight as Kitsune." People with eyes could see the first one is wrong, and 5 seconds with a calculator can tell you the other one is wrong. Now we're onto his latest clown rodeo of... hang on, let me fetch the quote here. "I do not see it as a Bulleteer equivalent, a bad but more resilient copy maybe, but not equaling the offensive power of a Bulleteer," Ok, Mr. Trump, whatever you say I guess.
I know, I also find this constant "I see no issue" approach annoying to discuss with, as arguments just bounce off. Still, there's no point to be rude. Moral factor aside, it makes any onlookers disinclined to listen to our arguments, and it's easy to just write all of it off as angry whining. Seriously, let's get better.
THIS. Most of the good threads I've seen that wound up getting locked usually got taken over by two people arguing at each other and everyone else just petered out. That said, a lot of that was someone angry bouncing off someone who was completely insistent that there was no problem at all rather than engaging- and just about the only feedback metric that customers get 100% right is "do you like this".
I have no idea what this is supposed to be referring to, unless Robin Hook really is just that groundbreaking. Maybe N4? It's pretty clearly a moot point, however, when it was obviously inadequate compared to the insanity of the Bakugon and MAF overhauls. In any case, you can add any number of garbage units like Knights of Justice, but if all of them add no value to the army, the impact is still smaller than just adding Cenobites, Dokkobei or Dartoks. Yes and being good at TAGs was essentially the one thing you weren't worried about. The Squalo 2 will still eat shit in all of the same situations as any other TAG. You just have to hope that the extra mulebot was really worth it in that case. Or you can cut your AP ammo and then accept that your TAG + Support package now isn't an answer to enemy armor. It's a tradeoff you might want to make sometimes, but that doesn't compare well to just getting loads of free power from MODS and Upgrade programs. By that, if the Squalo 2 were a Nomads unit it would have a Marksman Rifle, BS attack (AP), and BS Attack (+1 B) and be like 47 points. Seems like a pretty trash version of the Dartok. No Vetran for Oblivion immunity, no pitcher, no dogged, no free Trinity, no free upgrades to the free trinity, about the same linkability, fewer pure link options. Exact same price. Are they? It's a bit weird how cheap morlocks are - I'd say nothing should be that cheap, honestly - but they have to give up the DA CC weapon in order to have the ability to fork people at all, they don't get Beserk (which is a very good skill on units which are favorable as 1:1 trades into almost everything), and the value of the MetaChem re-roll is hard to quantify, but raises the odds of landing something transformational like NWI or move 8-4 & C+. The Zappenwaffen is also much better at melee FtF rolls, with the power creep package of CC 23 + NBW + static MODs making it better at countering enemy melee troops. They also get 3 extra BTS, which isn't usually something I like to see on account of cost, but it's clearly very cheap here, and nanopulsars are a type of weapon this unit does have to worry about. Is that worth 2 points? I don't know. Both (especially Morlocks at the same price) compare favorably to Shaolins, for example, who can't fork at all on their comparably priced profile, don't have power creep CC or any MetaChem, and only really have Stealth to offset that, which looses a lot of value on a non-hackable model. But this is missing the core of the problem - one army is already given the options to turn up it's nose at a unit like the Zheltwerfer, whereas it would be an auto-take in every panO sectorial for want of any comparable options. Some armies already have have everything. The extra wound is also a lot more valuable on a Remote Presence unit, which is a lot less likely to get blown off the board in one hit - 2 STR + RemPres means you can only ever loose the unit to single EXP shot on a crit, if you are reduced to 1 wound you still never loose the unit to 1 DA hit, and you have to take every hit and fail every save to loose it in one HMG burst. Engineers are also better than Doctors, as they can heal you to full. So while I've spoken critically on the value of the second wound on HI in the past, it's better here. I think a new 2W chassis is probably a good idea, but there's room to work with the other models. In particular, what I think everyone has been asking for is more auxbots with a greater variety. A lot of "Budget" weapons could potentially have legs. Light shotguns are an obvious route, being less destructive than flamers but creating a greater range of options in terms of forcing ARO forks in support of the master's attacks; just having the auxbot stapled to a unit that's actually capable of doing things would offer a lot of utility. Like it does in O-12, since they stole them. There more esoteric options - light rocket launchers are (I think) cheap enough to be an Auxbot weapon, and could offer some interesting options as either a throwaway or supporting ARO piece. A Flammenspeer would follow the same theme. Depending on where the price ended up, you could give it mimetism to make it better at stalling on account of the lower BS. A KHD would be a bit more of an off-the-wall option, basically as a lighting rod to try and attract hacking attacks away from the user - you might need to find some rules contrivance to give it extra burst in ARO to make up for the terrible WIP - maybe Neurocinetics to reinforce its roll as a defensive piece. As far as full REMs go... the Vostok is pretty much it. The weapon isn't the one I'd pick for an independent gunfighter, though given that it's a wildcard, B3 isn't really a deal breaker. Given that the Mine Dispenser is already taken... Minelayer, maybe? No sure on which one.
My own wishlist: Peacemaker reworked into heavy Remote; it already has "doorkicker" written all over it. Give it ARM 3, BTS 6, STR 2, BS Attack (+1 DAM), exchange Spitfire for Multi Rifle and Chain Colt. Bulleteer bumped to BS 13. After all slightly higher than average BS is PanO thing, right? New combat Remote; current Armbot stats, but MOV 4-4 in exchange for S 3. Hidden Deployment, Surprise Attack, Mimetism (-3), but no Camo, MSV1/2, Repeater. Two loadouts, one with Forward Deployment (+4"), Multi Rifle, Light Shotgun, second one with MSR and Blitzen (+1 Burst)
Albedo is pointless because the faction has such abundance of HD+ that creating a white noise zone on the unit is a trivial matter, having it either saves an order or safeguards the Vostok if the player played second. sigh please do try for once to behave in the forums... All these things make it a unit that costs 18 points more than a Bulleteer, climbing plus is unwieldy when in fireteam that does not have it and a higher burst gives a better opportunity to hit, more important than what damage will happen after the unit hits, ultimately I would rather have the Mashinist and his Palbot for those 18 points than a lower B weapon with higher survivability that has climbing plus. Other than that, if you try to behave in the forums it will be for the betterment of any discussion you are involved in. Contemporary political discussion is prohibited on the forum, also this is the third time I write in this post about your posting behavior. Otherwise out of context quotes for something I may have said (I really do not recall what you said about the ninjas and in what context it was made, if it was made) for something I said an edition or two ago, for a unit that has since changed her loadout, I am not even going to bother and give the context of the discussion, this is just sad. You can see the units added with the introduction of SWF and the MO reworks, they are not insignificant especially for the faction, you need to stop thinking what other factions have and contextualize within the faction and what capabilities the faction has and gained. Picking a unit and a cost is the worse way to compare things as it strips context and capabilities and limitations from the entire equation. See, this is sensible, keeps in line with what PanO design is and does not go out of its way to find out what other factions have and demand the same, more of this less of the other.
I can't speak for SWF because I don't use them, but as far as MO is concerned, the changes turned the sectorial from a flaming shitfest to merely bad. The problem is that with all the rework and new units, they did nothing more than make the new MO exactly the same as the old MO but with a new hat. The important thing is not the scope of the changes, but their real impact on the game. And while the scope of the changes in MO was large with all the reworking of the knightly orders, the impact was marginal. MO won in some areas but lost in others and the final balance is positive, but just barely. Important things like linkability and loadouts were left untouched. In conclusion, all that work, those new profiles, those new miniatures elevated the MO experience to levels that are still far below other sectorials. Again, the MO changes were broader in scope, but less impactful than the changes made to Nomads. Maybe the Nomads changes started from a more solid base or maybe MO's problems were so severe that even with all that work they couldn't get the sectorial to a place that made it more playable. The bottom line is still the impact. Saying that the MO rework was more exhaustive than the Nomads one cannot be an excuse because we, as players, are interested in the final result, not in the depth of the changes. As far as I'm concerned, you can change all the MO units, remove the knightly orders and replace them with houses from Game of Thrones if you want. But if the gaming experience doesn't improve, neither me nor anyone else is going to care how many man hours or how much effort you put into the change because it simply didn't work. As far as reinforcements go, I don't agree that Pano's reinforcements are better than Nomads' reinforcements. I always present evidence with numbers and statistics, but really now I don't feel like doing a profile-by-profile comparison to validate my point if those who say that Pano units are better than Nomads don't do it either. But if they were, they are still units that are outside MO as a sectorial and would only have a significant impact by being an integral part of MO. Additionally, reinforcements are still an optional rule that we generally don't use in our meta for the simple fact that we don't like it. Having to use a rule we don't like just to have access to a set of units that might (or might not) make a difference in our favor seems like an unnecessarily complex way to mitigate MO problems.
Nomad additions so far are good but neither as impactful or as used as some people might think, the most impactful addition Nomads have gotten is Jazz, in the same update PanOceania got Uma our other camouflage model, a unit equally impactful for PanOceania, but not as dominant as Jazz is for the Generic and CJC she is involved in, from usage statistics and discussions no Nomad addition has set the world on fire and remains to be seen for the new additions PanO has gotten, so far there is a positive perception for both Blades and Blockers but almost no practical experience for them. The same goes for the new Yu Jing additions Generic and White Banner got a pitcher, remains to be seen how impactful this will be, or it will be overshadowed by other units or the cost will eventually be considered too big, time will tell. Svalarheima additions to PanOceania are some of the best units PanO has, and the sectorial despite its shortcomings in surprises is one of the best sectorials Pano has giving PanO mobility placement and firepower. I would say MO update is a restructuring update, MO have finally a solid foundation behind them and now people can see and make suggestions on the structure of MO and the individual units, something not possible in the past, MO remains a difficult sectorial to play and a challenging sectorial for a tournament, but now at least it is a solid one, and that is vital.
When MO updated with the action pack I played MO and think the update was actually good. When crosiers couldn't link with teutons and each knight and non-knights had their role, even if it was not competitive. I think fireteam update which enabled teutons and crosiers to link together ruined internal balance between knights in MO. Maybe the sectorial became more competitive. I haven't played MO very much after fireteam update due to some reasons so I cannot tell how it feels on the table now.
Well, considering they are competitively the least performing Sectorial of PanO, any buff would be welcome. Mind you, it’s the sectorial I have most fun with, but it’s still totally a suboptimal Sectorial. Not only it’s the most hacking sensitive sectorial of all PanO, but on top of that it’s the one that shoots the worst… So any help (maybe a bit more flexibility on the Crusade FT? Maybe some small buffs on some units?) is to be appreciated. A bit of veterans here and there, a bit of Tac Awareness here and there. Maybe, and that is going to be bald, but a new warband unit. Who, within PanO, is the most fit sectorial for warbands? MO obviously. Some fanatics, so with Berserk, Impetuous, a good CCW, non hackable. Something like a Lian Kai / Varangian would definitely help, and is definitely needed imho
PanO HI in general could benefit from a broad application of ECM: Hacker (-3) or (-6). They would still play the same, but would be less susceptible to infowar. It also leans into "PanO is a high-tech faction" in a way adding smoke or berserkers doesn't.
It shoots the worst because it is meant to be that way. MO is the less PanO of the faction sectorials, yet it still has a considerable amount of firepower. And for a good reason, all knights are super elite profiles. High PH, high ARM and CC skills allow the unit to be self autonomous. They do not have to bother about most of the alpha strike units that deep strike your deployment zone, they can dodge many attacks easy which allows them bigger chance to avoid EM weapons, they can kick doors and hold rooms and they have specialist options in each of their units. Compare that with many other Hi units in YuJing, JSA, even the new O12 HIs. They do not hold a candle to knights. And those stats normally cost a lot. But MO enjoys huge discounts. Each knight with frenzy is discounted 8 pts, Hospitaliers are discounted 5 pts more for a total of 13 pts and impetuous units are discounted 13 pts. That is a lot of points you cheat your oponent with each knight you add. What developers do not want you to do for balance reasons is to be able to have that autonomy and on top of that enjoy pure core bonuses and heavy firepower in the knight links. Knights are supposed to be supported by other units in the army and for that they are given Trinitarians, Tikbalang of Montesa, Crosiers, Crusader Bethren, ... If MO needs more help then maybe some support options could be improved but knights already have too many benefits. However the real problem is the rampaging powercreep the game is suffering. What developers should not have done is to apply the fireteams update just to start adding mixed links with pure bonuses once again with each army rework. Or developers could fix the hacking system which is the source of all pains in N4. ECM hacker is too powerful for "a broad application".
It hasn't. I disagree. The problem (as far as links go) is that the Teutons are the only linkable Knights widely worth taking on their own merits. Hospitallers are heavily discounted and still way too expensive for what they offer, and the KoJ is comically overpriced. The Santiago hacker has some niche roles, especially in light of how weirdly poor the sectorial is in tinbots, but he stufferd a lot from the inclusion of the very expensive 360° visor on a troop that doesn't otherwise have much of a way to make use of it. You could make Hospitallars link with Cossiers, and then you might occasionally see them show up as the point man for a crossier team, but they don't really have a natural place to fit there. An agressive harris is competing with the order economy 3× Teuton or 2× Teuton + Wildcard fireteam, and putting it in a defensive core is either displacing the black friar HRL and making you vulnerable to smoke or making the core really expensive and forcing you to cut something like 1.5 Trinitarians. This is a nice desgin theory but in practice it doesn't work like that. They have no added defense aginst things like pitchers or hecklers settings up hacking coverage T1, which is a common form of alpha strike, and the inflated prices make them more vulnerable to GMLs. They also lack any noteworthy defense aginst conventional alpha strikes, beyind being able to fight non-power creep melee units in CQC. They are not exceptionally durable for HI, nor do they have a notably strong ARO presence. Literally only Teutons. Probably the only S2 knights that can be universally agreed to be in a pretty good place. Every other kinght dodges on the same unmodified PH 13 or 14 as most YJ HI. I don't see it. Knights have generally better CC but lack the powerful options like Tinbot (-6, if they get tinbots at all), TacAware, and Regeneration. That doesn't seem like the clear-cut distinction you're presenting it as; the ancilary numbers being a little better doesn't do anything to solve problem both units have (hacking, trading down) and doesn't have the raw value of order economy. And that's leaving aside the recent power creep Koreans added to WBA, the Dokkaebei especially. Anyway given that both IA and WBA are doing significantly better than MO as per the Infinity Statistics Initiative, there might be something to it. If we're taking tournament stats as useful data, MO is the worst PanO sectorial, and like bottom 10 overall. IF that's the list you're going with, then - no offense - I don't actually think you understand MO play patterns at all. Two of those units are just plain bad, and the way the sectorial plays in practice is that the Trinitarian support the Tikblang, with a Teuton fireteam off on the side. The general knights aren't the boogeymen/good units you seem to think they are. You could delete any of them and it wouldn't really hurt the army as long as they weren't teutons or the bike Montessa, and only the Teutons would be a major impact. This is correct, but the conclusion is different. The price is reduced that much, but the result isn't even a particularly good unit; this seems to indicate that the points formula is badly overcosting HI across the board. Observations bears this out - the HI that are good are the ones cut to the absolutely bone - Cebobites, Teutons, and similar units that are armor 3, Impetuous, and armed with price-cutting weapons like SMGs, LSGs, and templates - or else crammed with value skills such as mimetism, tactical awareness, Regeneration, camouflage, and burst bonuses. Basically if an HI isn't a two warbands in a trench coat or a TAG, it's probably a bad unit. The basic types like Orcs, Invincibles, Hospitaliars, even basic Mobile Brigada get left up high and dry. The fact that Hospitallars aren't even stand-out good in this category is because the stuff they're paying for isn't really worth it. No one would actually choose to pay 6 or 8 points to put Hospitallar CC on a hackable, expensive ORC or Terracotta body in a sectorial without smoke. Stealth is the only extra they get that's probably worth the price, in large part because it's pretty cheap. Absolutely agree. The Observance and Morat fireteams are absurd, and in terms of balance it's useless to consider any update from before the fireteam changes as being equal in value to the ones after it. I agree on hacking, but I don't think ECM hacker is really that big an issue for wide application. Espically if it's only ECM (-3), then it's improving your odds in the FTF rolls, but not to a particularly good place, since you need to win all of them but the hacker only needs to beat your reset once. They are also still controlling your gameplay by either dictating your movement or forcing you to spend lots of short skills reseting. I also don't think it's that big an issue with how much of a problem hacking is.
I don't think you'll ever be satisfied with the game, given that very few heavy units are or will be cut to the bone the way you seem to prefer. Hospitallers aren't stellar, but are decent. When it comes to hacking they have Stealth to bypass non-SSense hackers in active, and good BTS and Santiago with Tinbot to fall back on. KoJs are even more resilient at BTS 9, though they are problematic - mostly because aside from slightly better defense stats they don't bring anything significantly different to any team, and you'll almost always be better off with a cheaper option. Between Crosiers, Konstantinos, Black Friars, Crusaders, Trinitarians, and Dart there's quite a few unhackable support pieces that can go and deal with opposing hackers. Arbitrarily declaring some of these bad and/or unusable is simply depriving oneself of options. The biggest problems MO has are 1) the structure of their fireteams; 2) the fact that almost all of its wildcards are very pricy and either don't bring anything new to their fireteam, or are a case of overkill and putting all eggs into one basket; 3) questionable design and value of some of its pieces - I'd say that at least half of its units would need a small tweak, and there are some real headscratchers, like Order Sergeants, Konstantinos, or the fact that Black Friar MSR can't link; 4) extremely bad Engineer support for a hi-tech, HI-centric sectorial. And about MO tournament stats - its also the most popular PanO sectorial, with more presence than the next two, SWF and VIRD have combined. There's a significant number of newbies in there, trying to figure out a sectorial with a steeper than average learning curve. I played MO for a long time, really liked the last rework, unfortunately got too pissed off about PanO design space and left it all behind. But even then I would say that this is the most interesting, even if the most difficult to play, of its sectorials.
What, you mean the way TAGs are? There are issues in terms of being forced to reply on them and lacking good bubble wrap support, but I think TAGs with either a gunfighting MOD, low price, or a useful gimick are in a pretty decent place categorically. If you mean me specifically, anyway, I will repeat my prior statement - HI fall into a large dead zone of getting enough stuff to be expensive and not expendable, but not not enough stuff to actually power over the hill and good back to being efficient. Once again, the assumption that there cannot possibly be a tool to solve a problem that simply isn't as good as most other tools, costs tool much, or has other issues. Trinitarians are good. Dart is good but expensive enough not to work in every list, given how price sensitive MO is. Black Friars are a good ARO piece but only belongs in this context in that the Albeo guy can matchup fish for an enemy where you can walk all the way to the enemy hackers and only have MSV models draw LOS to you. But we live in template hell. Using Constantios as an independent operator isn't something I'd tried before giving up on MO; if I ever go back, I should try that one. Still looks like template bait. I assume Crusader Breathern are here as a joke. And it's the only thing propping up the faction play rate - Removing MO puts the whole superfactiom at a combined 7% pick rate when single popular sectorials are at like 5%. The winrate for some of the others looks superficially better, but there's a lot of vetran players in there distoring the very small sample.
