Nice question. If the scenario is particularly demanding, or if I feel like I need more Orders, I'll often crush my two SMG Helots into one Red Fury Helot. As @Teslarod mentioned, it can be a fantastic surprise. Opponents who are expecting a Burst 2 weapon at 24 inches will usually take their chances with gunfighting. When that Helot reveals to be Burst 4, it can be a really dangerous surprise. I have a hard time with the Shock Marksman Rifle, because the upgrade of 9 points to 13 points, *2, is one more Fugazi or Minesweeper Mule as a Regular Order. As a result, I usually give the Marksman Rifle a pass. It's always been SMG + LRL, or the full Red Fury.
On the sculpt part, I feel like they will either be a Camo token or dead, so the model being WYSIWYG doesn't seem to necessary. The variety will make them more fun to build and paint.
Do you know what makes low BS better? Higher burst. There is a place for Marksman rifle and Red Fury and I've always been happy with the results when I bring them. It also means that active turn players may spend extra orders positioning around a template weapon and peak out with only one model leading to better odds of success.
Yeah, I think the Sniper is a surprise tool to use as a "sometimes food". It's also a good way to hide your SWC expenditure and make your opponent think there's something around (like a Croc Sniper, or an Echo Bravo Red Fury) that there isn't. Ditto the Marksman Rifle is a great way to hide a LACK of SWC expenditure. If you opponent is used to you tying 1.5 SWC up in Helots every game they are going to get a nasty surprise in the game where that SWC is actually sitting on a pair of Echo Bravo who walk on to ruin their day. But, to me, the SMR and SMG/LRL are interchangeable dials (one up on points, down on SWC, the other the opposite) which I use in list tuning to free up whichever I need for the other elements of the list.
I don't mind the SMR – after all having higher burst means a higher critical chance which I find the helots ride on pretty hard.
Nah, IMO that's point/swc overkill. But i love to run two kamaus HMG (one in haris with Patsy, one in core fusilier link with Kamau MSR). And yeah, i don't leave my home without three LRL Hellots. Just in case :D
Is that worth it though? I haven't face double sniper team so far, but from my epxerience, once you drop the first guy and you lose the +3BS bonus, the rest of the guys drops like flies. Unless you're using 1 Sniper as ARO, the other as Prone and reformed to a full link, with a reserve fusilier/wildcard on active/ARO.
I would ask a questions is enemy has 2 strong "linked sniper killers". Usually you want those 2 snipers cover different angles/lanes so that enemy cannot easily move his linked HMG to kill both MSR. Though personally I always take TO MSR, for that sweet option to chose when I want to ARO (not to mention Proxy Mk2 bonkers OP stats).
They're more than good enough to serve as Active Turn killers and ARO presence just gets better the later you still have it. Most armies should be able to drop one Kamau Sniper. But he will only have one piece that can pull it off reliably. Sure the 2nd one will not have a +3 anymore but will still be annoying and locks down a different firelane. So if he wants to drop both his piece will have to use a couple Orders moving in LOF. At some point it gets tricky chewing through Fugazi, Helots, Warcor, Midfield Presence and 2 Kamau Snipers. So you're stalling the game, make life hard for Impetuous stuff and waste a while bunch of Orders. Thanks to being Shock immune and having an ample supply of linkable troops odds are you will have a Kamau left for the later turns of the game, when it will be significantly harder to get past him or to hide from him. On top of that most impetuous troops can manage to stay hidden Turn 1, not so much in Turn 2. Wouldn't do it if the Kamau Sniper couldn't give the HMG a run for its money, (the usual Sniper vs HMG active turn problem) but fortunately he can. Varuna has some neat low SWC killers to make sure the SWC are available - although I can never manage more than 2 Helots with 2 Snipers.
Bit of a late reply, but the far left model has a knife on the lower left leg that the far right one doesn't have. I think they might be 4 unique sculpts this time. Either that or the repeat bodies are very well hidden.
Maybe they went Ghazi way. They have 2 different bodies with 1 leg, but 4 different second legs. Makes it look like you get 4 different sculpts. Similar thing done with new Posthumans.