IMO overall Nomads gained huge buffs, Corredigor the most of the three(obvious next battlepack candidate) well Tunguska went up the ladder quite a bit. The wildcards options are very good so is much, much more flexible than before. Some hidden buffs not mentioned are: Spektr MSR which saw a huge 6 points drop(39>33). Grenzers gained Shock immunity. Too bad for grenzer Spitfire I can't percive some of the price rises. Zondnautica Bording shotgun went up for a whopping 5 points! Why ? Spitfire 3 point. Kriza HMG no price drop while every other HI lost points. Why is no one talking about prowlers? Camo, Hidden deployment, surprise atack, mimetism -3, Infiltation, shock imunity, stealth, specialist operative.. This is a beast of a unit! I actually like more Prowler spitfire ( Hidden deployment ) than Sombra red fury.
OP mentioned the hidden deployment (he said "HD" which is easy to gloss over I had to think about it to get what he meant). I agree thats also a big deal, and all profiles gaining spec. op. is very good too.
Here's some more, hopefully not too much overlap with what others have posted: Hellcats jump in on PH15, and that stacks with Controlled Jump for PH18. Iguana gained BTS3 and 4-4 MOV on the Operator, and now generates Smoke when the Iguana itself goes down, and has ECM: Hacking -3. And, as that's not a Firewall, it will then stack with an EVO running Fairy Dust, for an effective -6 WIP and BTS 9 against Hacking. Meteor Zond gained a Boarding Shotgun option. Massacre got a massive boost in CC, as he got MA3 alongside NBW, and his EM CCW is is a bit like an N3 DA CCW and EM2 CCW rolled into one. Against enemy CC specialists he gained +4 CC, +1 Damage, and i-Kohl L1 compared to N3. Mobile Brigada, on top of ARM5 and 6-2 MOV, got a Hacker with Tinbot: Firewall -6. Moderators gained +1 WIP, +5 CC and PARA -6 CCWs, all for no points increase, and the Pitcher option dropped to 0 SWC. The Hacker is one of the cheapest standard Hackers in the game, while still having WIP13 and BTS3. They're now capable enough in CC that they have a reasonable chance of holding off high-tier CC specialists like Ninjas (assuming they're in a Fireteam for Sixth Sense, the Ninja will be on CC20 and the Moderator on CC15). Zoe gained BTS3, and Bioimmunity means that's effective ARM3 as well, and Zero Pain on top of that makes her much better defended against enemy Hackers than before. +3 CC and a PARA-3 CCW also make her slightly more resilient against enemy CC troopers, but only slightly. Custodiers gained extra Burst on Carbonite on some options, making them even better at active turn Hacking. Healers gained +3 CC, taking them into the realm of being competent CC units as they now have CC > 20. They also stayed the same price while most MI went up. Sin-Eaters dropped slightly in price, while most MI went up. That's not particularly important, but the HMG dropped to 1.5 SWC which is a big deal in Bakunin. Taskmasters retained Stealth, while most HI outside of Yu Jing and JSA didn't. Bran do Castro gained Specialist Operative on both options, while seeing the Combi option go down in cost by more than 10%. Überfallkommando with 3 Pupniks went down by 20% without losing any effectiveness in her Grenades (compared to Smoke Grenade Warbands), and gained +3 CC and MA2. This now puts her on CC27, -6 to the opponent, Damage 14, and targets don't get to use their own Martial Arts. An Überfallkommando and Pupniks can reliably kill Achilles in close combat, with Burst 4 CC27 against Burst 1 CC18. Morlocks kept EM CCWs on their 'cheap' options, while all other Warbands with EM had it moved to the more expensive 'real gun' options. As with Massacre, this means a Morlock with EM CCW that crits is potentially causing three wounds, plus Isolated, and potentially plus IMM-B. They also gained DA CCWs on all the 'real gun' options, instead of AP CCWs. Miranda got a MULTI Rifle, Wildcard, and an additional -3 to CC targets.
I just want to pip and and also point out that SWC tax on the meteor also was cut from 1 to .5. That makes it a lot more pallatable to me.
Meteor will be a nice cheap midfield specialist for Tunguska since It doesn't have one. Vostoks are such a tour de force (amazing unit + wildcard) that's why I'm scratching my head when I look at the Tsyklon Sputniks...they even went up in price.
I've already lost all 4 wounds on an Iguana to a pupnik attack in one order, now that's not as lucky. Let the bad times roll.
Ooh, at some point I'll have to try a Moira Core protected from DTWs by Chimeras and Pupniks that no longer have to Impetuously run away from what they're guarding!
So the Mobile Brigada LT profile has a light grenade launcher in army. Is it supposed to be a light flamethrower or a grenade launcher? There is no light grenade launcher that I can see.
It's supposed to be a Light Flamethrower. :-( In Spanish it's Lanzallamas and Lanzagranadas, which are a bit too similar...
Yes, I think the Prowler buff is my favorite change in whole N4, because it makes Prowlers interesting. IMO the only meaningful upgrade to Bakunin in N4. Great summary of changes, thanks for this. Only a few points I don't agree on. The changes to Observance troops, while they might be / are there, don't change anything IMO. Regarding Custodiers it remains to be seen if there will be any active turn hacking in N4 at all, in N3 there was almost none. And they are freaking expensive ... Healers are still way too fragile to be worth more than 30 points. Even in Bakunin there is Avicenna, which is several points cheaper. And Sineaters ... one point less (MSR 2 cause MSR itself got cheaper) is no real reason to take him, when stuff like the Sujian drops 5 points (or a Szalamandra 18 ...). Regarding the upgrade of CC-Specialists, like Massacre, Uberfallkommando, Perseus ... it's like ... well... Overkill. Like in N3, when Hippolyta was just Perseus+1. Better yes, funny yes, but of any use? In 95% of all situations not. Most of the time the stats of Perseus are enough and it's better to save 4 or 5 points. But maybe it's only because I hoped for something else. Edit: This I don't fully understand . I tried to read it from the rulebook but wasn't successful (maybe it's too late). Morlock has E/M CCW, means, with B1 the enemy gets to roll 1 Normal Ammo Save and 1 E/M save, which are 2 BTS rolls that are non-lethal, causing Isolated. Now if he crits, I assume the target has to roll a second Normal Ammo save. How does this cause potentially 3 wounds? Maybe I am missing something.
Su Jians and Szalamandras are Hackable and don’t have Stealth. They got big price drops for a reason. Reverends and Sin-Eaters are not Hackable. It matters. The Healer is expensive because she’s much much more combat-capable than Avicenna, and combat doctors are Order-efficient as solo units*, or she’s in a Fireteam anyway. Regarding CC, you want to save 4-5 points on an Überfallkommando after they already dropped four points as well as getting much better? Or did I misunderstand? And for the Überfallkommando it’s not overkill anyway, because against lesser targets she can take someone on solo while sending Pupniks after other targets in the same Order. *Because every Order spent advancing/attacking is also repositioning a Servant towards a downed Trooper, or bringing a Servant along with the Healer to give her extra Burst in CC. You’re automatically bypassing the usual inefficiency issue of spending Orders on a Doctor just to get a misplaced Servant into the right position. Well, yes. That’s what happens when you start wish-listing.
Okay, let's wait a year and take a look at the pickrates. No, I just meant that most of the time it's not necessary the CC-specialists become even better. If I had the choice between N3 Perseus and N3 Hippolyta, I'd take Perseus (4 points difference). And for our MI it's the same. Piling special rules onto them to keep the price above 30 points (Moiras) isn't solving their problem Funnily I did not even have an exact conception what I wanted from N4 regarding Observance, just ... that I wanted something. Yes, like I said above, some special rules were piled on top of the Observance MI but they did not become worth 30+ points. Sineaters didn't get anything. And I don't know why all other MI would have to get more expensive, like you mentioned. Were they OP in N3? I would have assumed MI needed a buff, not a nerf. But maybe we are playing in completely different metas.
Custodiers are something I liked before and still like now. They're expensive as hell, but can be your LT and can always be doing something impactful with that order; White Noise, Pitcher and even just walking forward to shoot light opposition. Their ability to slot into a Moira fireteam now means the Moira Hacker will be played exactly never. I have mixed opinions about Moirae, on the one hand they have powerful Zappers and are able to efficiently use the LT order, on the other they're still costed like solid gold thanks to having the 4-point NCO skill on Rifle profiles and Number 2 is a total waste if you're running them solo. The Vostok is also unwelcome competition in the Moira's space, being a Wildcard ODD with none of the difficulties dealing with Shock. The E/M Grenade Launcher is a pure buff, though, with extra 0 range compared to how it was before and the ease of applying Spotlight. I'd strongly consider running a Haris of Moirae, but never a Core- they're just too vulnerable to extremely common and cheap options. The fact that they don't need a specific Haris profile anymore is a godsend for Haris teams in general, Moirae can now take something like HMG/EMGL/Rev. Healer instead of having to waste a space on a plain Rifle.
NCO is 2pt on units like Moirai. It’s 4pt on TAGs. And Number 2 is ‘free’. I’m still undecided on whether I like the updated version of them, but at least they have more adaptability.
Yeah so many good changes. Some of the MI still seem very expensive for a squishy chassis (Wildcats, all types of Reverends). Custodiers in particular still get screwed over by NFB (White Noise turns off her Mimetism), and White Noise isn't an ARO anymore (but at least they cleaned up the interaction a bit). And there is so much good stuff. @ijw Do you know if it's deliberate that I don't think you can make the "Golden Haris" Of Kusanagi, Healer, Custodier anymore? They can all join Moiras, but that would leave no Moiras in the Moira link, and Healers can't join Custodiers. Also I'm pretty sad about losing an Intruder Lt profile. Camo Lt was very useful for some missions (primarily assassinate the Lt ones), and felt super cool and fluffy. The KHD marksman is pretty cool tho. With 4-4, I can see him as a midfield camo sweeper.
Massacre as a wildcard has great applications, mostly for stapling eclipse to a gecko. Picking up mines on the HMG was a good change and helps with DZ defense, and being able to go in RG teams is a massive change for them. Given how late into N3 TJC was released I have a feeling that they were designed with N4 in mind and were essentially in a long playtest. As for general N4 rules; The +1B ability annoys me, mostly that it stacks with fireteam bonuses (which is dumb), and that it doesnt apply during ARO (which is incredibly disapointing), if it did it would be an interesting change and would have allowed for vanilla factions or stand alone pieces to actually be able to play the hard ARO game.
