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New player Dealing with Smoke grenades

Discussion in 'PanOceania' started by Domino25, Jul 18, 2019.

  1. Domino25

    Domino25 Well-Known Member

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    I had my first encounter with Smoke grenades, specifically thrown from Shaolin Monks. They are cheap and can easily put down 2 templates each per turn. I went into it knowing that would be pretty strong, but it still had an impressive effect on the match. The obvious solution seems to be MSV, and I'm tempted to trash half or more of my list to fit a FTO Aquila Guard in, or move to VIRD and lean on the Kamau sniper in link. However, before going to those extremes I'm curious if there are other effective solutions to smoke. Even taking an MSV would cover a limited portion of the board and be vulnerable during ARO. I'm working with NCA mostly, but open any Pano style tactics.

    Here is the list I used, it is intentionally skewed towards hacking as I made it to "see how it feels" vs Invincible army and Nomads. I've enjoyed using it though so I'm inclined to make a few edits and keep going. Namely getting a better anti-smoke plan and a trauma doc in:

    NCA 6/6/2019
    ──────────────────────────────────────────────────
    GROUP 1[​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]9
    DEVA (Assault Hacking Device UPGRADE: Lightning) Boarding Shotgun, Nanopulser / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 28)
    MULEBOT Hacker (EVO Hacking Device) Electric Pulse. (0.5 | 25)
    FUSILIER Hacker (Hacking Device) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 18)
    AUXILIA (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle + AUXBOT_1 / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 15)
    [​IMG] AUXBOT_1 Heavy Flamethrower / Electric Pulse. (- | 4)
    AUXILIA (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle + AUXBOT_1 / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 15)
    [​IMG] AUXBOT_1 Heavy Flamethrower / Electric Pulse. (- | 4)
    CLIPPER DRONBOT Smart Missile Launcher / Electric Pulse. (1.5 | 18)
    SWISS GUARD Missile Launcher, Light Shotgun / Pistol, AP CCW. (2 | 69)
    FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
    BULLETEER Heavy Shotgun / Electric Pulse. (0 | 17)
    GROUP 2[​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]6
    FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
    PATHFINDER DRONBOT Combi Rifle, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 16)
    FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
    BULLETEER Spitfire / Electric Pulse. (1 | 23)
    FUSILIER Lieutenant Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10)
    PALBOT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3)
    MACHINIST (NCA) (Bioimmunity, Veteran L1) Combi Rifle, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 16)
    PALBOT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3)
    6 SWC | 300 Points
    Open in Infinity Army
     
  2. ThananRollice

    ThananRollice Your Friendly Neighborhood Locust
    Warcor

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    What smoke tactics are you struggling with most? Is your opponent shooting through it with MSV? Are they using it to get close to you? In order to come up with a game plan, we should first figure out what is causing the most trouble.
     
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  3. Domino25

    Domino25 Well-Known Member

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    Ah, I think my problem is somewhat general. In this case they used it to get close to me and screen the rest of their troops. They used it to get somewhat free movement on their turn to reposition and to doctor etc. I'm also anxious about taking MSV shots through smoke, though that didn't come up. Another concern is how smoke would help them in area control, since it might force me into template range where trades would not be in my favor.

    My plan was to use Fugazi's to get repeaters & Sniffers near big threats and then drop hacks or guided missiles. I set the Swiss up as a surprise ARO that I could move offensively and had the bulleteers in mind as additional attack pieces for cleaning up weaker threats. I think there's a lot of room for a better list/plan but I want to address the "it's me, not the list" else I'll be playing a wack a mole game with my lists using hard counters against what I saw last match.
     
  4. Seraphin

    Seraphin Well-Known Member

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    You could include some Bolts or Black Friar (which also has MSV2) and throw around some dropbears. Those will react to troopers even through smoke (as long as they are in the range of small teardrop template).
     
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  5. Stiopa

    Stiopa Trust The Fuckhead

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    1) Mines. Smoke does squat against mines, and they restrict safe routes for Monks and other warbands. Get some Drop Bears, spread them out, and place some bait for Impetous units to go after.

    2) Deployment. Position your units in a way that forces enemy to throw multiple Smoke Grenades, instead of bypassing your AROs with only one. This will make this tactic more order intensive, blunting any assault.

    3) Intuitive Attacks. Preferably with disposable Auxbots.

    4) MSV. It's a go to tool against Smoke. You don't need to roll out an Aquila. Get two Devas with Spitfires, they'll cost as much as one Aquila. Put them in Suppressive Fire in a spot Monks will have to advance into.
     
  6. Ayadan

    Ayadan Knight of the TAG Order

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    I think your approach is too Nomadish to fit PanO and NCA ways to fight. First, as you start, I would suggest you to use the Fusilier FT with a ML in it. It is standard but your opponent will regret to not play Hsien or will force him to use his Rui Shi from the start, with the order cost it implies.
    Second, NCA provides you a lot of active solutions. Drop Bears, Devas spitfire, Auxbots, Black Friar, Swiss, ORCs, Bolts, Aïda...
    It is more about what you're doing with your tools rather than what tools you have. NCA is now really nicely equipped to face any faction so, you shouldn't have problem to find the good tools.
     
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  7. barakiel

    barakiel Echo Bravo Master Sergeant

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    The reason I moved from NCA to Acontecimento is that I wanted more mines. 100% agreed with @Stiopa that mines really, really help.

    This was before NCA's reboot though, and they have a pretty decent mine game now.

    One other decent solution is the Hexa Sniper. It isn't a fool-proof smoke tactic, but it's a nice tool to reveal and blow away a warband, which can jam up your opponent's smoke synergies and force them to scramble a bit. It's often easy to catch an opponent on their second short MOV, giving you an unopposed ARO too. TO Camo is a nice check against ultra-aggressive smoke use... Once your opponent grows accustomed to it, he'll be more cautious with his smoke tossers, which will slow down some of the speed and aggression of smoke wielders charging across the table.
     
  8. MrNailbrain

    MrNailbrain Relentless Optimist

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    If your opponent wants to spend orders throwing smoke to move around, I say let them. Contest their smokes with your regular AROs and force them to make risky rolls or throw speculative smoke (aka waste more orders). Every order spent throwing smoke is an order they aren’t using to advance a specialist, kill one of your models, or move threatening pieces up the board. Sure, smoke may enable some of those but it’s still a price paid to do it.

    I’m not saying give your opponent free reign on the board, that’s a quick way to end up with very dangerous models in your deployment zone killing your army. But if your opponent has to throw smoke to do things safely, that means 1) they don’t want to risk fighting you and 2) they have less orders to do it in.

    Set up AROs so that one smoke won’t solve all of them. Lock down impetuous smoke throwers so they have to risk a F2F or spend an order to cancel impetuous. Use mines to control where those warbands can go. Having an MSV trooper is nice, but not always practical or smart. Just setting an Aquila MR out to ARO is an invitation to get shredded by something way nastier, from outside your effective range.

    Having an active turn MSV trooper is nice though, if your opponent starts to throw smoke in his reactive turn.
     
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  9. Dyne

    Dyne Well-Known Member

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    Dealing with smoke grenades is easy, your best tool is a multispectral visor n2 o 3. Put always in your list an aquila, black friar or deva spitfire :blush:

    Ah! And always use a complete fireteam core!
     
    #9 Dyne, Jul 18, 2019
    Last edited: Jul 19, 2019
    chromedog likes this.
  10. daboarder

    daboarder Force One Commander
    Warcor

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    Best aspect of the hexa is it can be used to convince your opponent he doesnt need smoke for the rest of his lost to do itd job. Then when whatever unit the smoke was to protect pops up, you blow its brains out
     
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  11. Urobros

    Urobros Well-Known Member

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    Even having the Aquila Guard, the NCA isn't the best choice to resist smoke in ARO, still you have some options.

    You have good ARO pieces, any fireteam with five members and weapons as MultiSnipperRifle or ML, they can be place far away of your deployment zone limits, close to your border and be effectives. When this happends the smoke will be too far to be dangerous and if you rival place some template wrong you could obliterate some troup "almost" for free. When the things come closer, you can place troups as auxilias, the auxbots well placed are a headhache because an enemy troup can't walk over them, so if smoke he should avoid or fight against the rem, so "pulse electric" could do the trick. At least the rival waste some useless orders. You can use too the Palbots to block some paths or the "fugazzi". With all of this probably most of the troups loose a lot of orders to do "almost" nothing. And the enemy can be hide behind the smoke always.

    All of this if you go second, if you go first you can add to this a lot of dropbears. So, don't worry about the smoke. The only thing to worry about when the smoke comes is that you can't shoot the enemy specialist while they are pushing buttons.

    So, don't panic.
     
  12. AdmiralJCJF

    AdmiralJCJF Heart of the Hyperpower

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    The MSV2 Deva with Spitfire is an excellent hunter to go out and murder these units in your active turn.

    NCA lacks a hard counter in the Reactive turn, but several of the posters above have pointed out valid options to help mitigate the impact.
     
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