Hey hyperpower I have a a couple questions for you guys. With looting and sabotaging what are your thoughts on the montessa? Hes our only da ccw in the sectorial but I wonder if it's better to rely on patsy/vird engineer to use the d charges or try to use infiltrators to grab d-charges from the panopolys and then move up and attack it? Also with helots what are you guys liking more, decoy limited camo?
Up front, I have not played Looting and Sabotaging with VIRD. But I have tried to go the D-charge route with a Guarda in SAA. The lesson I learned from that is the DA CCW is the way to go, you have unlimited swings, no -3 for using d-charges in cc, the possibility of a crit, and you can’t miss. Couple that with the fact that he takes fewer orders to get up the board and you have the firepower in VIRD to knock out pesky AROs and to me the Montesa is the clear winner. That said, I’d bring a Patsy haris as a plan B. And limited camo for me. I tend to use them to obscure my ZC LT first turn, and then move them into the midfield to cover objectives and lains in their camo state. And they just eat orders forcing discover checks.
I'd say the Montesa is a great option for this mission. I played the mission last week and the Montesa ended up destroying the AC2 in only about 4 swings! It helps that you can't miss, and have additional chances to crit against that heavy armor.
What you really want for that attack run is unhackable attackers. That doesn't mean the the Montesa isn't a great tool to bring, you just want to make sure you have alternative options. This means Varuna are still pretty terrible at L&S, unfortunately.
Every Mission where you have to destroy objectives in CC are terrible for Varuna, like the Grid and Frostbyte.
Grid's doable with range weapons, and for the other ones you've got an option at least with Biker Montessa DA CCW and +3 PH from MA2. The Montessa's not bad for a turn 3 turn around using his speed to charge onto a heater and destroying it to swing a game. Better off than USARF anyway.
Yeah I got a tournament Saturday with looting and sabotaging as one of the missions. I made a list with the montessa and a patsy Harris to back it up. My opponent in our practice game figured the montessa was my main objective attacker and and made sure to deal with him but patsy was able to come through and save the day. I've had the montessa do serious work for me in other games and I truly like the profile but theres just something about it when I'm building for varuna. I think it must be because it just feels out of place with the navy seal feel of the sectorial and hey here's this knight on a bike lol. I love him in MO and vanilla. Might be because I'm using a yojimbo model which doesnt really fit the aesthetic either. Anyway the other two missions are unmasking and supplies. Since supplies has a bonus for doctors/paramedics I plan on bringing him to that mission as well since he can zoom across the board. I think my strategy has to be to lean on the kamau sniper in a 5 man link to take out the serious hitters then let the montessa go to work.
Looting & Sabotage is an ugly mission. Patsy Haris with a VIRD machinist does pack quite a few D-Charges. Patsy plants hers on 13s (not bad) and the VIRD Machinist on 10s (meh.) It's far from ideal, but it would get the job done unless your luck is seriously poor. The Montessa would quicker in reaching the target, though the DA CCW vs ARM8 still means you're spending huge piles of Orders to get through all that ARM. I'd have to look at the other missions in the lineup before committing to one choice or the other. I use the Patsy Haris + VIRD Machinist a lot, so they're quite easy to fit into any list I bring. For the Helot, Camo or Decoy depends a lot on the mission and the matchup. I've started using Limited Camo more and more, just because it keeps opponents guessing about what's under each Camo token. This is doubly true if you hold back a Zulu Cobra to standard Deployment, rather than using FD L1. Not knowing if something is a Jammer or a neurocinetic rocket creates a lot of indecision in opponents.
In general what are your thoughts on two kamau msv2? One in a 5 man and the other in a harris. I'm playing around with some lists that have 2 kamau hmgs and 2 kamau snipers. 1 for a normal 5 man link and the other for a patsy harris. If I go 2nd I will set them up in defensive positions and have options near by for both to reform the links for more offensive maneuvering. I too like the patsy machinist harris and find the kamau hmg to be the natural 3rd man for that fire team. Is that who you usually put in there for the 3rd member?
Is Kamau (Harris) + Machinist x2 a legal Fireteam? Because a specialist who can shoot, with Mimetism, for only 17, seems bloody fantastic. And linked is even better.
It's certainly good if you want to double down on MSV2. Personally I favor the HMG or HRL for that Haris... The HMG's monster Burst really help muscle through tough threats, while the HRL's template, Fire, and backup SMG are also really nice. But double Snipers is no joke. @Lieutenant Interesting notion. I'd be cautious of running the all 1-Wound Combi Rifle Haris, just because it's fragile and limited without a heavy weapon, but it's certainly good for moving Specialists around, and not being Hackable is great. I played Patsy Haris in 5 out of 5 missions at Las Vegas Open last week, and I developed a really fine appreciation of what that Haris can do... Patsy's extra durability, Specialist and ammo types really help.
Yeah, Patsy might be better than the Kamau Haris here, but I would still be slightly worried that the Haris might run into things it just can't deal with well. Yeah, I can see a setup like this being strong... just SUPER vulnerable to a run of bad luck on crits. 'though... Shock immunity helps to keep you in the game as long as that Trauma Doc isn't too far away (in body or remote). Something like this might be actually pretty interesting to put on the table: Varuna Immediate Reaction Division ────────────────────────────────────────────────── GROUP 1 10 KAMAU HMG / Pistol, Knife. (1 | 28) FUSILIER Lieutenant Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10) FUSILIER Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10) FUSILIER Hacker (Hacking Device) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 18) FUSILIER (Forward Observer, Deployable Repeater) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 12) KAMAU (Multispectral Visor L2) MULTI Sniper Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 32) KAMAU (Multispectral Visor L2) MULTI Sniper Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 32) KAMAU (Fireteam: Haris) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 21) MACHINIST (Varuna Div.) (CH: Mimetism, Stealth, Aquatic Terrain) Combi Rifle, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 17) TRAUMA-DOC Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 14) PALBOT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3) GROUP 2 4 4 PATHFINDER DRONBOT Combi Rifle, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 16) FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8) FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8) KAMAU HMG / Pistol, Knife. (1 | 28) HELOT MILITIAMAN Shock Marksman Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 13) HELOT MILITIAMAN Shock Marksman Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 13) HELOT MILITIAMAN Shock Marksman Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 13) WARCOR (Aerocam) Flash Pulse / Stun Pistol, Knife. (0 | 3) 6 SWC | 299 Points Open in Infinity Army
@AdmiralJCJF A list like that is actually closer to what I originally thought VIRD would look like, when we were all speculating 12 months ago. If you took some of those Kamau and Helot points and folded them back into Croc Men, that looks identical to what my speculation lists looked like in early 2018. That was before we found out about Zulu Cobras, ORCs and Wildcard Kamau. The name "Echo Bravo" has been swirling in the rumor dialog for 2+ years, but we had no idea what they would be until right before VIRD's releases. Since I don't think anyone anticipated PanO getting wildcard Kamau, I was expecting Kamau Core, Haris, or solo unlinked Kamau to be staples of VIRD play.
Yeah, I remember. And the thing is, I think it's still pretty solid. I mean, yeah, I'd run that. But it certainly has some fragility issues.
So can you run a fireteam of Patsy, Kamau HMG, and Machinist VD as a Haris or would that have to be your core? Apologies if this has already been covered.
