With the new upcoming Tunguska, how do we defend against a hacking overload? Do we take both BnK and Kerr-Nau? Or do we take exclusively take things that cant be hacked?
Nexus hacker with Nullifier seems quite interesting to me... But yeah, Bit & Kiss and Kerr Nau will be even more must have. Consider however that there won't be much of a change against what we have today: Generic Nomads can deploy 2 Interventor AND Uahu, so they get up to 3 H+ (or 2 KHD with Lightning and 1 H+! With NWI!!), and they still have the same Repeater coverage as before. The real problem is that Onyx has no access to the Avatar, who is the only TAG that can more or less ignore enemy hackers (yeah, IMM-1/Isolated sucks. Posessed sucks even more). I hope for a Haris of Rodok and/or Nexus/Umbra + 2 Unidrons.
I actually had this problem about a month ago. I was playing vs. Nomads who was hack-heavy and he had a Pitcher Zond that tosses a Repeater across the board. He'd go into Impersonation and hack my stuff to death from the other side of the table and there wasn't much I could do about it. Some options: Put your hacker in a link. At 4 he gets to ignore Surprise Shot (or hack). You also have access to the E-Drone who has Kaleidoscope. Which you can cast turn zero for a command token if you're going second. Another choice is using Fraacta and shooting them in the face from the board edge.
Maestro + Deflector Level 1 through a Firewall: +3 Attacker, -9 Opp. That'll even make Interventors blush.
Yeah, that's why I'm always trying to find the 0.5 SWC for the Tinbot/Deflector if I'm putting a hacker (possibly LT) in a link. Also remember KHD ignores Firewall mods. Not that Interventors are KHD.
About half of them are. But in that situation they'll be using Lightning. So it's -6 to them, -3 to you. Which means that the odds are in the favour of the active Hacker. Notwithstanding Kaleidoscope or other EVO tricks. Actually 'take an EVO' is sound advice if you're worried about massed hackers. The ability to re-roll failed Hacking rolls is huge. But the point isn't to fight their KHDs. If you kill all their AHDs/HDs/HD+s and then die to the first order they spend on a KHD, you're still up: because you're worried about your REMs etc not your hackers so much. To do this use your own repeaters resist the urge to go for the 'quick' option by exploiting an enemy Repeater. Inevitably a Hacker heavy Nomad list will have 1 or more KHDs. If you put your KHD in their repeater ALL of the KHDs will ARO to make certain that you have only 1 opportunity to kill their primary Hacker: usually Interventors / Custodiers have better than even odds of surviving a single attack. Linked Kerr-Nau with pitchers is the best option going for this.
I think I may have mistaken your meaning, but I just wanted to point out that the Avatar is immune to possession.
Against infowar games, with CA now you have this options: - Bit&Kiss first option. And cheap KHD on all CA armies. - E-drone, kalidoscope and reroll failed/low dices. Also Reboot works well too against Resets. And runing coordinated hacking attacks. - Kerr-Nau, on Onyx works very nice with Sixt Sense2 bonus on Rodoks/Unidron core, but that deflector on unidrons are circumstantial and very strong against all hacks attack. - Deployable repeaters from Pitchers; Bit and Kerr. - Vanilla profiles if you run, you can add IE aspects like Anathematich followed by these ppl. - Umbra H+ are an option too in Onyx, but, he is so expensive than Kerr-Nau for bring 1 thing; White Noise. Also, he didn't have bioinmunity against KHD program like Trinity, Kerr-Nau its a nice add for this, but the Umbra got Stealth, but care of this... - A lot of repeaters, from Firewall bonus cover from AH and others H/H+ ranges, Ikadrons and R drone are you best shields for def/attack. And other support hackers, in Onyx, you can take Nexus and bring the Nullifer if its going to wrong. All AIE/H+ profiles on CA they can made a hidden bonus programs to ours normal HackerIE, on Onyx you have like the Malignos AIE, Rodok AIE and a Fraacta AIE, you have access to: Expel and Oblivion on the HackerIE profiles if you bring 1/3 of this AIE in your list, you can gain this 2 extra programs only including an AIE or H+ in your list and your Nexus can go as a mixed Hacker than the others. Other way to counter the A,H/H+ you can go with a couple of Suryats with Tin botA and Fairy Dust, Overdron too but he are a TAG. Or just, go to hunt hackers with a Fraacta or Rodoks Team.
With the two khd options I really think CA can play the hacker game as well as nomads now. Anathematics /charontid+Kerr nau/bit&kiss +evo drone is as good if not better than the usual combo most nomads will run. It's really a game of waiting or positioning. If you can get their hackers through your repeater net an Anathematics hacker can sucker punch their interventor at a -9 to the wip roll. -12 if you kaleidoscope first. Just be patient, try to identify their hackers first and see how you can handle them. Don't be afraid :D
Precisely, my point is that Onyx TAGs can't ignore any enemy AHD, hacker or H+. The Avatar can "risk" doing so, since the worst that can happen to him is Isolated (in which case you can run a wormbot to repair it ASAP). The problem Onyx has is that the troops carrying the Pitcher (Kerr Nau & Kiss, both KHD) are NOT the troops able to cast Exorcism or even Overlord/Total Control, so you would need another hacker on top, meaning that the best combo is still Bit + Umbra H+ (less points, more tools...) if you carry a TAG, specially since Kerr Nau counts as a Nexus (cheapest hacker non-KHD on Onyx, I think). I would still pick a Samaritan H+ instead of Kerr-Nau IF I'm carrying a TAG on the list and can fit Bit&Kiss, because of Exorcism... (and Cybermask) Carefull with the Nullifiers, I never saw them on the table but I can bet gold against sand that most of us will forget it also makes a "dead zone" for Technical Weapons (no Forward Observer / Flash pulse crossing through!) To an extent. Nomad's game was never about "we have the best hackers zomg!", but "we have the best specialized hackers with the best repeater coverage net of all armies!". Uahu as a mercenary is another point of warning, since she is essentially a third Interventor when Mercenaries are available. Sure, she is squishier with BTS 3, but she has NWI and a Pitcher.
With the addition of Bit and especially Kerr-nau, I don't worry about enemy hacking games as much. If the opponent wants to waste orders tossing hacking attacks at Kerr-nau protected by a Tinbot, and possibly with Kaleidoscope up, let them. That's really suboptimal. You can spend your orders doing stuff with a much higher chance of success.
@Styx Deflectors work vs KHDs. I think you were saying that they don't? Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk
Yeah, srry. Always i confuse the same rules from firewalls on tinbots. Deflectors always applies that -3WIP. Anyways, CA on hacking game are strong for now.
