I know the lore of it. Qapu Khalqi is the merchant fleet of Haqqislam, they work closely with the Nomad fleets and mercenaries to hunt pirates while guarding the shipments of silk. This motley crew of soldiers, caravaneers, and outlaws may be guarding cargo one day and raiding rival corporations the next. It's a really neat combination of two factions into a fluffy force. I'm a big fan of sectorials that show off cooperation between multiple factions, like Starmada or Imperial Service. I just want to make clear that I don't question their pairing on their fluff, just their units' actual role. In the current gameplay meta, in N4 post-fireteam changes/post-Blackwind, what is even the point of those nomad units? What do they bring to QK? It feels like you could remove both from the faction, and it would change literally nothing about QK. I haven't seen anyone bring them, or even mention, really. I thought it might be worthwhile to whinge and maybe see what others had to say. Alguacils. Just... why? Ghulam are already some of the best basic infantry around, and unlike MRRF you don't need it for the hacker profile. The Ghulam hacker is actually a lot better, and not significantly more expensive. Their only unique quality is their MULTI sniper but it can't be in a pure link with Ghulam to actually use it meaningfully. You can get a Hafza HRL for the same cost, better BS, and full link benefits instead. Maybe it's not as good as a Multi Sniper, but you would actually be able to hit with it. Or just invest a little more for a Kaplan sniper or Djan sniper who has more tools and can be put in a haris? The lack of (Ghulam) is holding them back, but even then, I still would only use it for the sniper. Mobile Brigadas seem kind of... Bad? You can only have one, It can't be in any fireteams, and their weapon options aren't impressive over the linkable Janissaries. The only interesting profile is the hacker with the tinbot, but he can't be in a core link for Sixth Sense like a ghulam hacker or go into camouflage like the Hawwa. He's also rather expensive to sit back behind a meagre repeater net. To make the most of it you would need a druze haris for launching repeaters and you can do a similar job much cheaper with a ghulam hacker with some friends. Maybe if they could fireteam with Janissaries it would be an appealing addition to a haris? I just don't get it. No complaints on the Iguana. It's weird and maybe suboptimal, but it has its own fun and unique gimmick that separates it from Scarface. It does its own special thing, and I respect that. It's not like the Alguacil where I think "oh but I could take a ghulam instead." Also unrelated side note, shouldn't the Hortlak be available in QK? QK uses Janissaries and hunt slavers, the Hortlak is a Janissary who is trained to hunt slavers, it just seems like a good match... Also the Sunduqbut, with it being a cargo-disguised robot for the cargo moving faction, but that's more of a joke idea.
I know in MRRF I used the Alguacil Hacker as much for its unique-for-the-faction Combi Rifle as its Hacking Device, but you'd miss those a lot less in Haqq with the ubiquitous shotguns. Another way an Alguacil might come in handy over a Ghulam is in a Haris- they're marginally cheaper filler and the Discover bonus isn't always important. If you expect to primarily be using the Medkit, the Paramedic is a full 3pts cheaper than the Ghulam Doctor, and the MULTI Sniper can take chunks out of big, armoured units like TAGs where a Sniper can't and a Launcher is more dicey in active turn.
With the new editions, I think some units profiles has lost his primal use. When no have 15 minis cap, alguacil were cheap monkeys order or can ser tu fill the list downgrade a ghulam. Sometimes I see some list with one HI, who where brigada hacker. So you can have HI specialist and not bad troop. I think QK need a rework, like Militar Orders to give them some uniques that they lost with time and rework some profiles. Despite that, QK can be fun for play. Cheers.
Aggies? Not much. Brigada? Tinbot -6 Hacker profile coupled with Druze with X-Visor pitchers spreading the net for him. It's actually pretty damn good. It's pretty easy to justify sitting back when you can just drop a missile on most things that annoy you.
I'm personally loving QK last set of fireteam changes. Before that I was hoping they would allow all their 'Merc' options to link. But I'd rather keep the current fireteam rules than go back, and patch in that. As for the Mobile Brigada, The hacker is one of QKs best specialists for classified. 6-2 Mov and can complete 14/20 classified. The Druze & Djanbzan hackers can also do 14, but don't have 6-2 Mov. But they do get better link options. Alguacies: no idea why they are in there. Must be a lore reason. I find QK is very playable now, but can still use a little bit of a boost. Fiddler REALLY helped QK. Beasthunter is nice but not really game changing. The fact that the Yuan Yuan got nerfed made QK unplayable until the last set of fire team changes.
Fixes to keep those historical profiles relevant in the faction wouldn't be very hard. Fireteam options would be the easiest way to do it. Letting the MB link with Alguaciles is the clearest/easiest solution. It makes sense both fluffwise and faction wise. Gives basic-ass hackers possible Tinbot support, or a nasty HI shooter at the head of a LI link. Since Alguaciles and Ghulam are in the same link classification, the MB could maybe link with them too: can't see that being overpowered or anything, seems fine. MB with a smoke grenade launcher in the link could be fun. If purism or theme are reasons not to let the MB join Ghulam, add MB-Alguacile links with no Ghulam as another type of link. Again, easy to do. And none of the wildcards would make a Ghulam or Alguaciles link with an MB in there too nasty, from what I can see. Sharif with Tinbot -6 protection seems fine. Hafza pretending to be MB seems like a fun headgame to play. Odalisques... uh, whatever. Iguana plus MB duo links would also be interesting. MB hacker tinbot support could make the Iguana relevant again. Not sure how escape system would interact with a link though. Oh, and adding Nomad clockmakers to QK would be thematic and a nice measure to help even things out a bit, affordably. Fiddler's great but having a cheaper WIP15 engineer option would be useful. Let the Clockmaker link with the Alguaciles and MB, if you want a pretty sweet Nomad merc team that doesn't exist elsewhere. Hell, let Fiddler join that link. Fiddler FTO with the MB hacker and an Alguacile paramedic is another sweet-ass Haris. [Oh and QK, originators of the Haris, really deserves 2 Harises! ]
Oh, two Harises would be really cool. The two weeks they had double Haris before CB took it away had some really cool list building. Could do a cheap Ghulam core and two different harises to be active, customized for the occasion. I don't know why they took it away from QK, it seemed perfect for the Haris sectorial.
When I first saw 2 haris's I wasn't too eager to try it. I regret not getting around to it. Adding a Second haris and adding an MB\Algacile option would make them more interesting. Before the last fireteam revision I was thinking MB\Druze\Kaplan\Alquacile option may be nice counter balance to the 'Haqq Only' ones we had. But I prefer what we got, to that. If QK is to get a reboot, I think something midfield would help. In N3 the 2x Fanous & 2x YuanYuan were how I started my lists. Without the YY the midfield feels light.
QK get AVA 3 Al Hawwas… camo specialists with a boarding shotty and D-charges for 22 (FO) and 26 points (hacker) are not a light midfield. That’s more than most Nomad players field with Zeroes (and way better toolkits). With a Beasthunter, it’s more than plenty, IMO.
Yeah, Hawwa is a surprisingly good skirmisher. Like, not Ariadna level good, but better than a lot of factions get.
Didn't someone from CB in the Spiral post say that they plan on removing all TAG Raid profiles from factions unrelated to TAG Raid, and it was only for last season? I hope the Beast Hunter survives that removal, I use him a lot in RTF, maybe in half of my lists. AVA 3 Hawwas is pretty nifty though.
The Beast hunter is a fun little extra, and I do hop it stays, I like my proxy. As for Hawwas, I'm just not a huge fan of that many irregular orders in my lists. I'll often play 2 just because I need early button pushers. but any more than that and I find I'm a little order starved.
The only reason see is background and that's it. I can't add more on Aggy. The MB at least is good as a LT. In missions like Decap. The hacker is actually pretty good. Fast, 2W, TB-6, D-charges, Veteran so he's pretty good for classified objectives too.
