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How is your local BS ARO meta evolving ?

Discussion in 'Access Guide to the Human Sphere' started by LeGweg, Feb 22, 2023.

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What are your two favorites Ballistic Skill ARO tools ?

  1. Long range rolls: ML, MSR, HRMC, Panzerfausts..etc (long range + heavy ammo)

    33 vote(s)
    80.5%
  2. Medium range rolls: Akrylat, Ojotnik, Marksman Rifle..etc (closer range + heavy ammo)

    4 vote(s)
    9.8%
  3. Peripherals / Mines: AuxBots, DevaBots, Sidebots..etc (no order loss + template)

    11 vote(s)
    26.8%
  4. Speedbump units: Morlocks, Imandhinos, Raveneyes, Monks...etc that (potent CC + templates)

    15 vote(s)
    36.6%
Multiple votes are allowed.
  1. LeGweg

    LeGweg Lucky dice roller

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    Hey,

    Yesterday I was talking with my gaming group; we established that our current meta has fewer and fewer classic AROs (long range sniper in Hidden or in a Core).
    Instead, our games tend to rely more and more on close templates and disposable bodies (peripherals, mines..etc)

    Indeed, those are quite effective against alpha strikes, and the "throat punch" style vanished quickly from our games. Now, the meta moved to a more objective-oriented approach, with a lot of order attrition with micro-economy.

    We think this is due to several things, globally:
    1) Most of alpha strikers troops are HI, and we tend to use more hackers since N4. Finding an alpha strike unit IMM or Isolated after 4-6 orders spent isn't especially efficient. It's better to spend points somewhere else
    2) Most classic ARO's are denied by smokes, cautious moves or HD+.
    3) Close range AROs always land and need more orders to be reached
    4) Peripherals and mines do not remove orders when lost

    And others things, locally:
    1) We use dense tables with various elements (saturation in jungles, white noise on radar towers, smokes on factories, hackable doors..etc)
    2) No Combined Army or Tohaa player (but I'll play Onyx soon hehehe)
    3) We play few missions focused on killing only

    Now, we see some games with no long range ARO at all, the shooting is limited to our half of the table / DZ. The "Hidden MSR/ML" is less affected, but also declining in popularity. This is not a good or a bad thing, just a thing that is happening here.

    We were wondering if this is a consequence of our local tables, armies and player or if this tendency was felt in other gaming groups, more tied to current state of the game.

    Do you also tend to use closer-range AROs with disposable units and less elite long range shooters ?
     
  2. Tanan

    Tanan Well-Known Member

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    Infnity is all about playing safe and maximizing opponent risk.

    High armour TAGs grind enemy ARO pieces to dust unless the ARO piece has hidden deployment or high armour with burst2. This has led to ultra safe hacking game where burst2-3 pitcher is the king.
     
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  3. QueensGambit

    QueensGambit Chickenbot herder

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    There's some useful info on meta lists in the Infinity Global League (IGL) here: https://forum.corvusbelli.com/threa...-for-2022-onwards-lists-and-discussion.41862/

    Steel Phalanx is doing long-range AROs (Phoenix), and so is Kosmoflot (Volkolak). Yu Jing is bringing Long Yas. The meta Nomad list is the only one with maybe no long-range AROs, but presumably it can put out the Szally if needed. Even Vanilla Haqq, which isn't known for its long-range weapons, is often bringing a Nadhir and occasionally Armand.

    I would agree that long-range AROs are only effective if they're (a) extremely strong (Pheonix, Volkolak) or (b) have Hidden Deployment. Camo can be alright too, especially if it's cheap (Daylami, Long Ya), although you won't be happy when your opponent brings a Charontid. Anything else is just giving your opponent a free kill.

    My unsupported, totally subjective impression is that the pendulum may be swinging back towards long-range AROs again. A lot of AROs got nerfed by the Raveneye fireteam changes, and null deployment became popular. But players are now building lists designed to crack null deployment, and it's become pretty dangerous to put up no AROs at all.
     
  4. LeGweg

    LeGweg Lucky dice roller

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    This is interesting considering the fact that we have no Combined Army players and that the Aleph one is only playing OSS.
    Maybe that the impossibility to build lists of multiple rambos is what allow our current meta to hold without much long-range AROs.
    Otherwise, we do have the bears issues and Guided Missile strategy roaming freely around the table.

    I think that the current situation of the game is still fine (it's great compared to GW balancing), but CB should definitely do something about overoptimized profiles that are becoming auto-includes. I hope the army update of March will solve this.


    Anyway, the early results of the poll shows that the disparition of long range AROs is indeed a singularity of our gaming group.
    Thanks for the votes guys !
     
  5. psychoticstorm

    psychoticstorm Aleph's rogue child
    Moderator

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    When I first start reading I thought "they must be using dense terrain tables" terrain plays much more significant role in the gameplay and units actual performance than people realize.
     
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  6. Jericho

    Jericho Well-Known Member

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    Depends on the faction I play.
    With O-12 it's a combination of long range ARO pieces ( Gamma with Feuerbach, Epislon with MS, Milicent) plus speedbumps (Team Sirius, Gangbuster)

    TAK ist mostly speedbumps in form of Streloks with mines and decoys.
     
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  7. Rejnhard

    Rejnhard Well-Known Member

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    I like the fact that they are consistently inserting discount chain rifle HI in more factions as an alternative to a tower sniper.
    What I would wish is if they inserted more and better medium range alternatives, which to me seem the most strategically interesting.
    long range sniper you usually put in the highes most visible spot (though not always)
    speedbump goes around a corner
    Mid-range aro is where it is the trickiest. (and thus nobody's choice in the above poll)
    Since mid range aros are the most difficult to use they would have to be significantly powerful to compete.
    Imagine that all the TR drones got a spitfire version with dogged (or maybe mimetism). HMG without, Spitfire with. Now it is a choice.
     
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  8. Amusedbymuse

    Amusedbymuse Well-Known Member

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    We already have CA bot with mimetism, they also have short range version with mimetism and HMG is by far more popular.
    I myself almost never use TR bots, but if I could take mimetism for 1 point that would very likely change. But hey, Im spoiled with Long Ya's stacked with Hundun in my main faction.
     
  9. Rejnhard

    Rejnhard Well-Known Member

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    My point exactly. If both versions have same skills, and the only difference is the gun, then people will choose the longer gun.
    But if mid range option had more, better optimized skills it would be competitive. Same goes for say Sin Eaters. The spitfire one would be more interesting if he had dogged or msv1 (and only him).
     
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  10. SpectralOwl

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    I can say that my most recent games, admittedly months ago, made good use of long-range AROs. Playing NCA, I deployed a Bolt Core aggressively to use the Sniper's scary reputation to draw key enemy assassins into a trap- the Swiss Guard Hacker Hidden Deployed right behind it accounted for several Oniwabans and a Sphinx over a few games. After they wasted their Orders on the Bolt I'd use the Fusilier Haris Sniper to lock down an objective visible from long range, denying it to the enemy's short-ranged guns, and contest the others with the Swiss and a Hexa.

    The trick with long-ranged AROs is to make the enemy deal with them inefficiently, or ideally even underestimate them and lose a piece. This is a lot easier with Hidden Deployment and other deceptive abilities, but sometimes simple unfamiliarity does the trick- two of my opponents, both veteran players, lost pieces easily to the Fusilier Sniper due to underestimating what a Burst 3/2 in ARO MULTI Sniper can do to a unit in a bad range band.
     
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  11. RobertShepherd

    RobertShepherd Antipodean midwit

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    Long- and medium-range AROs have re-emerged as an essential tool locally to contest close assaults or pitcher strikes. Even just the modest Total Reaction Bot is re-emerging as an extremely useful element. It's very difficult for a TAG to put one all the way to dead, so it tends to be easier to repair it than it was for your opponent to kill it, and that recurring "you must first overcome this piece before you get to fuck around in my deployment zone" is very strong.

    Also, B4 means they're bloody luck magnets.
     
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  12. Skjarr

    Skjarr EI Mouthpiece

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    Especially if there are some negative mods involved, then you're in "inevitable crit" territory.
     
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  13. Savnock

    Savnock Nerfherder

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    1 long range ARO tends to be a decent investment in my current meta (Pacific Northwest USA). There's usually one long lane you want to discourage (or fire dominate if your ARO unit is also a great active shooter). This is useful both to shield your weaknesses, and to channel opponents into traps elsewhere.

    This is despite tables here having about 25-30% more terrain and half as many long firelanes as I saw in Europe during several years there. In that meta, being able to slow advances or gun down overwatchers down 2+ long firelanes was really important. I was also crap at it, and never reeeeally adapted well from American Chainrifle Paradise boards.

    Playing Bakunin this last year or so, a Riot Grrl with missile launcher has been incredibly useful. Successful opponents tend to dice her down with high Burst fire at their good range, but she's still pretty tenacious. That high Dodge value is key, giving you a good option whenever you are caught at bad range (or with Surprise if she's in a Haris instead of Core). When she gets hit and takes a Wound, she very rarely dies outright. She might be useless for the rest of that opponent's active turn if she ducks or goes Unconscious, but she gets back up on my next turn reliably (requiring an order if a doctor is nearby, true).

    This tends to frustrate people a lot (as I often feel with TAGs in cover or Volkolaks). Her value then becomes Distraction Carnifex: people fixate on her, wasting orders and missing the other angles of attack they could switch to when stymied by an anarcho-feminist with an ammo fetish. Really just ignoring her if you can't kill her is the best route, like most other strong AROs. Spending 2-3 orders to realize that is annoying, but better than spending way more to kill her.

    (RiotGrrl Spitfire is a pretty great mid-range ARO too actually. Might just be B2 but midrange with MSV is pretty great. Then you have the Tinbot boarding shotgun girl if the Spitfire dies or ducks and the opponent closes in more.)

    Regarding mid-range AROs, Suppressive Fire does mean that many troops who are not dedicated overwatchers can serve as effective obstacles. Maybe that's why we don't see many units built for this range?
     
  14. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

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    I generally only see hidden AROs making a play since emphasis on smoke grenades/pheroware to make long range AROs a waste of points is too common.
     
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  15. Triumph

    Triumph Well-Known Member

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    All of the above. Everything gets used.
     
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  16. Savnock

    Savnock Nerfherder

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    IMHO still worth having those long-range AROs, to force opponents to spend an additional few orders chucking smoke. I faced a very skilled player using Tohaa in a tourney earlier this month, and turtled against him (I played Riots-focused Bakunin as usual).

    Managed to survive the alphas mainly because I'd forced an extra couple orders on his smoke-chuckers/Mirrorball poofers. Credible ranged ARO threats layered in long, medium, and short ranges were responsible for much of that.

    Definitely don't think smoke makes long-range AROs a waste of points... at least a single ranged ARO threats to force more smoke throws (or investment in high-Burst removal work) is a good investment.
     
  17. RobertShepherd

    RobertShepherd Antipodean midwit

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    Interesting. I generally see long range AROs being used to force orders to be spent on smoke grenades and pheroware rather than efficient move-movement.
     
    #17 RobertShepherd, Mar 29, 2023
    Last edited: Mar 29, 2023
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  18. RobertShepherd

    RobertShepherd Antipodean midwit

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    Exactly this. The second my opponent throws a smoke grenade, I know my ARO elements have impacted the game state in my favour.
     
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  19. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

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    The issue is when the smoke grenade is actually about removing your ARO pieces in an extremely low-risk fashion, and late game those smoke grenades mean that your reactive pieces do nothing and you can't stop them from scoring turn 3.
     
  20. Savnock

    Savnock Nerfherder

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    It can certainly mean that. If you have other elements delaying the smokechucker though, the ARO costs an order which slows an alpha strike.

    For late game also a decent point, but again you should be dealing with those smoke-chuckers using your other tools. The long-range ARO troop's utility stays high if they are still around covering the objectives.
     
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