As an aside to this discussion, those are not the English abbreviations for those stats. SWC and WIP are what you are looking for. At any rate, Jaan is indeed oppressive, but not for the reason of being able to deploy him with a 'bomb and 'mate (though it IS very dumb, it requires you to go first and can be countered with mines/HD troops/counter-deploy/whatever). The big reasons to me why Jaan is so stupid is that he's essentially Heavy Infantry with his 2 wounds, which lets him stroll right through some dork with a Chain Rifle to get into a meaty backline where his shotgun, shock mines, and pistols can deal some serious damage. Sure, the Fiday has Smoke and is deadlier in Melee, but Jaan isn't exactly a slouch with those twin pistols either; CC20, burst 2, and imposing a -6 with Surprise Attack is incredibly nasty. He also gets to dodge on a 14, which is pretty nifty. Both are incredibly deadly in the right hands with their own flavor of "no counterplay for you" in either a second Marker state or a second wound, and both earn their reputation on the tabletop.
1- According to that popular dice calculator they are pretty close: I compared Viral Pistol Jaan in cover shooting a simple PanO mook against a theorical HMG armed Jaan also in cover shooting the same PanO mook (this time, the mook in cover), and both are equivalent (Viral Pistol has better chances to kill the target in one action, HMG is less risky for theorical Jaan as he has better chances of not being hurt by the return fire). 2- When you can literally walk through the enemy's back line without care, it's not that difficult to reposition yourself to get the juiciest target and then smoke+engage it (with better skills in close combat). Jaan will risk eating lots of lead if he wants to target anything not just deployed in the border of the Deployment Zone. 3- Agreed, although those two can become roadblocks thanks to Supression Fire if they survive and choose not to Impersonate again. 4- Agreed that Impersonators are cheap considering the tools they provide, but I'd say that Jaan (specially when equiped with a Symbiomate at a minimum of 46 points and 1 SWC, 1/6 of your list allowance) is fair because Imp-2 is way less powerful than Imp-1. Looks like having lost several times Symbiomate-equiped troopers because of a single critical hit makes me value the invulnerability and freedom of two Impersonator states higher than an aditional wound. Wouldn't care if every Impersonator, Jaan included, got more expensive potins-wise.
I strongly disagree with this, having 2 Impersonation states is patently overpowered as it lets the Impersonator get anywhere within 20" on the table with zero risk to the controlling player and zero counterplay available to the opponent. The fact that mines don't have any effect and that IMP-1 state is a -6 to discover for the opponent just makes this a negative play experience.
Have you played against Jan w/ bombs and mates? It's a different kind of uninteractivity to IM2s. Less range but potentially no line of sight needed. I'm not all that fussed about the mates, while they add to his toughness basic gun defenses do work against them eventually. But isolating your LT through a wall is pretty shit.
I think we're no longer discussing Impersonation when we're discussing Jan Staar with mates. I'd honestly prefer dealing with Jan than with Mirage-5 as a comparison. In essence we're now discussing advanced deployed units and when they start creating a negative experience more than we're discussing the state skills.
I think you need to evaluate what all the mates and bombs can give you in terms of toolboxes. For example if Speculo was able to "Oblivion" a tag, without needing to approach it or CC it, wouldn't it be better? If Fiday could drop Eclipse Grenades to walk past a Kamau, wouldn't it be better? If both of them had ARM 9 and ignored the Trait Continuous Damage of a Flamethrower, wouldn't they be better? So, that's Jaan. His versatility together with his toughness is what makes him really hard to deal with. I've dealt plenty with Fidays and Speculo (even the Minelayer ones), and escaped almost unscathed, or at least preventing the trade up from the Impersonator. But against Jaan in the hands of someone who knows what is doing, my first turn is left to pick up the pieces and try to make a new game plan. I think all of the Impersonators are strong, but Jaan in particular got a few too many upgrades with N4 game system. And the "cost" (losing IMP) is not so much of a cost as it is more of a tax. You deploy, you get counter-deployed, you kill the counter-deploy, go IMP-2 state, continue rampaging. He's much more order efficient than Speculo and Fiday because he wastes that many less orders to set up smoke, by just strong arming itself with ARM 9 Total Immunity. And like, what is "counter-deploying" Jaan? I would really, really like to know the specifics.
Hello!! About the "main theme" here we could be talking days without reach any consensous, but to keep it short: "don't forget that SWC is a tool to put a limit to some things, not only to the big guns". This kind of game boundaries are effective to modify how some profiles behave in play, even an entire "army". This probably will be the main reason why. If we take the long answer... Don't forget about the low BS in most haquisslam armies, with a few exceptions: n4 Jennizzare, Asawira, Maggie, Shasku with 14, a few with 13 and a majority of 11-12. Yes, in HB we can have (now) a cheap full core with an asawjra AP spifire... with an effective range of 60 cm / 24', any HRL,ML or Snipper with any mimetism will be something hard to deal with even with the asawira. If we talk about any in that list... placed into a five member fireteam. Probably you could try to catch "the good spitfire range", or maybe not... because the table, because the "visor" which do uneffective the smoke... in that, not a strange one, case the odds drops dramatically... So, we have to put into work the fiday... I think this is one of the main reason behind the "no swc" for the haquiss impersonators. But not the only one. It is almost a constant in haquisslam the SWC spare, not only in impersonators, but too in minelayers. Yes, it is an advantage others armies don't have, but those armies have other tools, other good tools or skills, which haquisslam/HB don't have. It is more like a "design" decision. Nobody denies that right now HB is in a good place with a lot of options to make your lists, so good place that you don't really need the asawiras to have a good list, even a competitive one. I find myself making list with 0 CAP which are amazing for "zone control" missions. Impersonators are strong in game... Yes!! But not more than many other things. When people talk about the two discover rolls it looks like they forget that after a impersonator is discovered it has "no penalty" to be shooted. Even when a impersonator make "surprise attack" imposes only -3 and maybe -3 for covert, nothing more, making him less effective than most skirmish. Yes, two different rolls to discover it, but after that you will shoot the guay as any other "plain profile". Why other impersonators cost SWC and Haquisslam doesn't...? Design rules. The same reason why CA has a lot of Lt choices which can't almost no suffer of "loss of LT". Are the fiday "umbalanced"? No. Are an advantage?Yes. Same as profiles with "extra rules" in other factions. Are OP? As far a the most plain profile with l.shotgun, chain, etc. can easily bring to the down with a "template hit" the answer is not. Discuss about why fiday don't cost SWC isn't the mos useful discussion I'm afraid. But to talk about the differences between all the others impersonators, advantages and disavantages, etc, it will be a truly productive chat.
Symbiobombs and Symbiomates are literally one-trick-ponnies, and the Symbiobombs in particular can fail and be spent without even working. If your whole attack plan is based around... - Winning the Lt. roll to pick first turn -> about 50% change - Then trusting that the enemy will choose a list with a obvious Lt. - Trusting that it won't be protected by other troopers. - Trusting that your oponent won't deploy a layered defense keeping watch of its own Deployemnt Zone. - Then using Mirrorball or Endgame (about 66% success chance against basic mook). - And then moving against your target while surviving any ARO. ... then you you are trusting way too much on Lady Luck. Counterdeploying against Jaan or, in general, against any army capable of using Impersonators, starts by not using a totally obvious Lt. and protecting your Deployment Zone accordingly with mines and/or teamplates. For example, if I were to play against Shasvastii, I wouldn't choose a list with a Taqeul Lt., because it being WIP 14 makes it a very obvious target (unless I'm playing mind games and deploy the always forgotten Gao-Rael Lt.). By the way, Symbiobombs don't work against TAGs, and Fidays' grenades are not limited to one dice roll per game. I do agree that the being able to entrer Imp-2 while still having Symbiobombs/Symbiomates attached is a glaring hole in the rules, something that clearly goes against the spirit of the rule, and I hope it gets eventually fixed.
I'd pull a pun about it being a Pigpode, but that might land poorly due to different onomatopoeia. I don't think you really need to stab me in the back over a number like this, no need to get physical over it as we will simply have to roll with it. As neither you nor I brought mates to this fight, I'm sure it'll be a more fair one, but I'm worried you're only pretending. What's sure is that I'll be keeping an eye out in all directions, keeping my reactions primed and totally ready. Yes, it's all puns. All the way down.
You and me both, I've yet to see a deployment that hinder Jaan enough where he's not going to be traading up. The deployment you're describing with templates and Mines isn't counterdeploying for Jaan, it's literally just a standard deployment. And the issue with Jaan is exactly that templates and mines aren't very good versus him. The Mates and Bombs being usable 1 time is plenty, a Fiday is rarely going to ever throw more than 1 grenade anyway, and a speculo is rarelt ever going to CC more than once. Both of the 1W models also get hard countered by Crazy Koala / Fast Pandas and Mines, trading with them as they reveal, whereas Jaan shrugs the first one off and can tank another one. Jaan will also disband any Fireteam on the first order he engages one of the members because of the ARO forks he can impose due to the Bomb, Template and regular BS Attack. I think this is one of the biggest problem about Jaan. Especially if the LT is part of the fireteam. Getting within 8" of a LT is also a lot easier than getting into btb to CC them. I don't understand the not-using Taqeul if you're facing Shasvastii either. I would not change anything about my regular list building and make sure to keep my Taqeuls if I was facing Shasvastii personally. Speculo and Fidays are laughably uneffective vs Tohaa. Being able to go back to impersonation is prob overlooked, but I rarely ever do it until I've expanded the symbiofriends anyway, and think there are more problematic things about the profile. On the nose, I think the deployment aspect of it is the biggest issue. Having your Rambo piece save the equivalent of 4-5 orders (and not getting ARO'd on the way) to get to the enemy DZ is the strongest aspect of it. Mirage is a great example here, but it's also much easier to deploy against than against impersonators imo. You can easily have the sides of the table covered without exposing yourself to the enemy's side of the table. Having the entire front of your DZ covered (especially when the impersonator can deploy prone and have a smaller footprint) is much harder imo.
I don't think there's much difference, tbh. Covering the entire backfield is typically a good way to let rambos from the front get into your DZ, meaning you're typically relying on low calibre guns to do the guarding. This'll be enough to deter Margot or Van Zant, but not Duroc. Ditto, once Jan is all Mated he's got a similar, if temporary, durability as Duroc, albeit without smoke, worse at dodging, etc etc. Of course Jan can enter into state like a KHD, but he'll be going up against high-calibre guns that are there to slow down heavy infantry-like cores. As long as the IMP doesn't make the WIP roll. Now, I'm not gonna make a lengthy defence of Jan, as for some reason people haven't played him/Tohaa enough in my meta for me to face him, but the other IMP-2s have been quite fine to face and they've been quite fine to play. It's also not like this is a situation that's too much different from most interactions with 'mated Tohaas - unhackable "HI" at the cost of only one of the profiles with Jotums-level ARM buff for practically free. Jan is the most creative use of this I've come across so far, to be fair. I'd argue it's a case of what power level is acceptable for super-advanced deployment units when we're not discussing IMP1 more so than any specific method of getting this deployment.
Although the Lieutenant's identity is private information, the WIP Lt. roll so see who decides initiative/deployment is public information. Tohaa has two WIP 14 Lt.'s, either the Gao-Rael or the Taqeul. The Taqeul also gives you either an aditional Lt. Order or an aditional Command Token, so it is a very obvious Lt. with CC14 that a Speculo Killer can one-shot easly (and a DA CC weapon Fiday has also very good chances).
If you let a Speculo kill your Taqeul you deployed extremely poorly. Considering the best-case scenario for the impersonator, where they managed to smoke the Taqeul. You can simply block the base-to-base path of the speculo with any of your troopers (or the mine from your Liberto) and neither a Speculo or a Fiday will be able to kill your Taqeul. Not only will the Impersonator have to deal with whatever is in front of the Taqeul, but it'll also be challenged by a End-Game (or a Nanopulser). This is disregarding another Taqeul or SymbioBomb within 8" of your Taqeul. (And this isn't even considering the fact that your Taqeul LT can simply have a SymbioMate attached to it) Trying to obfuscate your LT identity is a pretty poor tactic overall. When you look at the profiles that can be LT, it's usually trivial to figure out which one it is, even if you take a WIP13 one.
Shell-game style obfuscation can still work- it's practically the entire defensive kit for most PanO and Nomad LTs. 3 Fusiliers deployed conservatively can force the Impersonator to take a chance... or just kill your key Hacker/gunner and trade up anyway.
Yeah, it works fine for Nomad / PanO without much of a opportunity cost, Tohaa doesn't really have a combination of LT with the same WIP that work well to obfuscate it without overspending for some suboptimal profiles.
Nomads and PanO don't either. Shellgame is a complete waste of at least three valuable troop slots for about 25% more cost than normal (REM) cheerleaders, more for factions like Tohaa or ISS. You do it because you have to, not because you want to- between Pitchers making your HI LTs too easy to Oblivion and your Unhackable options being overpriced or incapable of defending themselves, a lot of factions just have to waste cost on shellgames when they see one of the more infamous alpha-strike factions coming. Impersonators are the worst offender by far, but Andromeda, Mirage-5 and JSA's fancier ninja can all rip a low-quality combat LT to bits without effort. Generally if I don't see CA, Tohaa or Haqq coming in a tournament I'll opt for something more active like a Squalo for a LT, and I still prefer CoC to shellgames when I can get it- it helps that the Bolt CoC in my own NCA is a fairly capable backup gunner and Specialist, though I recall Kaeltar being fairly good support CoC as well.
Considering Tohaa can bring 2 or more CoC profiles extremely trivially, I don’t think going for an LT assassination is a great idea vs them. Kaeltar and Taquel CoC see quite a bit of play.
A Speculo Killer doesn't need to smoke the Taqeul when the Speculo Killer can just leisurely walk there. That's been precisely my point the whole time, Imp-1 allows the Impersonator to freely walk and reposition itself disregarding deployment, atack, and enter again Imp-2. Also... body blocking in Infinity? Are you serious? that's just making life easier for you oponent, a 26 point, 0 SWC Fiday will gladly be traded if it can take out several orders with its Boarding Shotgun Teamplate. Lt. ofuscation is pretty easy for Tohaa as we have lots of WIP 13 Lt's: Kamael, Sakiel, Rasail, Sukeul, Ectros... and all of them are viable on its own merits, my oponents don't even try to figure out what my Lt. is. By the way... Jaan + bomb and mate, two Taqeul, one of them your Lt, plus bomb and mate, a Libertos Minelayer, the two Kaeltar that provide the mates and bombs... that's close to half of your list for one suicide attack piece and a deffensive Lt. It's becoming increasly obvious taht we way you and me play, and how our oponents play, si completly different.
