The question has a lot to do with it, as if it doesn't solve that issue, it's not a good solution to the problem. It's not like Nomads are a rare faction to run into. Broadly speaking, it's noninteractive strategies that are the reason PanO is not good. Hacking is a particularly egregious example, but it also includes things like Pheroware and smoke grenades. High-level Infinity play is about interacting with the opponent as little as possible, and the factions that have the easiest access to noninteractive strategies are the best; I guess the players who picked different factions should just be better and pick better factions.
I responded, I responded even to you who asked for clarification on what table I was saying it can shoot from the deployment zone to the mid table rooftops.
The reason you put Hacking in your list isn't to deal with Nomad hacking, is that what you mean by "solve the issue"? I'm not sure I follow. I don't even think Nomad makes the inclusion of Hacking bad (see my previous posts where I think I elaborated enough), and even if it did, I certainly don't see Nomads enough to where it would completely shape Hacking out of the list. I see other factions where including Hacking in a PanO list gives a significant upside for the ridiculously low cost it takes to include it. I disagree that PanO is not good, but I agree that it's probably not as good as Tohaa. But there is just too much to unfold in that single paragraph. This entire thread is merely just about PanO's hacking, and we're already disagreeing here.
Well if it can't do anything when you're playing against Nomads, then it's a waste of points. Given that you can spend points on other things that are more broadly useful, it isn't a good investment. I don't think you elaborated meaningfully at all. You didn't give any examples of how a hacker really helps against Nomads other than giving up easy kills. I don't see it helping because of PanO's limited ability to project hacking and because most factions are going to be running hacking denial strategies (camo etc).
Do I need to re-explain the idea of low opportunity cost? The investment is insignificant. What you get is worth way more than I explained how very little it actually makes your matchup worse. It's merely 1 order more efficient for your opponent. (Again, we are STILL assuming we're literally only facing Nomads with the perfect answer, which is un-nuanced and ridiculous). Your hacking can just be passive, you don't even need to actively want to hack. If all your hacking did was to put a repeater on top of an objective, or over a corner where they'd want to shoot one of your trooper from, you're getting your points worth. Threatening to Carbonite / Oblivion HI and even just threatening to Target things is a worthy 5 points investment. Especially when you're already taking one of the best Repeater trooper in the game.
Well two hackers and a repeater that cannot be shot by your own TAG in the zone of control of said TAG is a great investment to keep your TAG yours, I swear loosing your TAG happens way too often... So from that perspective 37 points and 1 SWC does not sound that bad...
Do you know how Pitchers work? I'm not exactly sure how "never let them get LoF to a patch of ground near your army with 24" or 32"* range" is really a reasonable tactic. Other than "hope a CA player can't brutalize your hard AROs with the 25 points they're playing down for having taken Bit & Kiss" Incidentally, there is no longer any army that isn't capable of brutalizing hard AROs, unless you invest way more into them than a 21 point Dartok, and even then they're still dicey. *Depending on how you count the effective range, and ignoring the possibility of long-bomb shots things like Bit & Kiss can do I'm unsure what you even mean at this point. Yes, if I sat down with a compass and a protractor, I could maybe create a situation that's hard for hackers to abuse by stacking cars from another box of terrain on top of roofs and things, but it would require an amount of setup time and effort that it's both unreasonable for non-tournament play, impractical for anyone running an event without homogenous boxes of terrain, and genuinely gets to the point where I can't 100% claim that I'm not arranging the terrain for my benefit. If a Haqq player was dumping boxes on the table until there were no sight lines longer than 8", that's obviously trying to play to his template advantage; this isn't as egregious, but I'm still trying to use the table to cover a weakness in my army. Making someone waste time shooting ballistic missiles at linked Fusilier is probably the best you can hope for; rolling a Reset vs B1 Spotlight is just about the best FtF you can ask for under the circumstances, and after succeeding he still needs to spend at least one more order launching the missile. Trinity works much faster; with Fusilier BTS and lack of tinbots, one lost FtF is very easily fatal. What do you mean? The heckler suicide run is purely deterministic unless you can contest it for three orders (discover one order, kill it on the second order, when he needed to spend a third order dropping the Panda). This is, incidentally, enough for a Heckler to put a Fast Panda on the line of your DZ (if so inclined). If that situation makes a lot of assumptions about his ability to move in a straight line, it also makes a lot of assumptions about your ability to reliably provide hard ARO coverage on the line of the OpFor DZ. PanO, incidentally, not being amazing at posting the sort of irregular trash mobs who can be disposable Discover-bots while still being otherwise useful (Daylami, etc).
General questions about terrain and layout, it is easy to say "I used the CB terrain" that means nothing as we do not know how many sets was used, was the tower expansion used, how they were stacked ectr ectr. Terrain and its placement is a huge variable that can change a conversation completely, I have played on tables that Morans would be completely safe if not for Guijia having Super Jump, I have played in tables I could reliably Snipe the mid table rooftops from several locations without any special skills.
I'll retype what I've been typing in lengths here in simple ways. 5 points opportunity cost. Of course the counter to it counters it. It doesn't matter, because you're losing a fusilier that's largely insignificant in your list. If they don't have the counter, or if they fail at their rolls, you get a very significant upside. Because just having a hacker watch over your Hacking area is a great benefit. In short: If they have the counter, it doesn't matter, cause you basically invested nothing in it. If they don't have the counter, you get a lot for your very small investment.
Since you seem to have missed my response, I'll reiterate it in whole. There are positions to gain LoF on these corners, usually from behind them or on the same piece of terrain. By protected, I mean protected from >50% of the table (ie, protected from your side of the table). If you can see into the corner from you DZ, then it is not, by this definition protected. This is not exclusive to rooftops either, they just tend to be the worst offenders; a corner in a wall or interior of a building can be just as much of an issue. It is not exclusive to the midfield, as these terrain features are the same that allow for hiding hackers and misslebots in the DZ. This is where the discussion takes us: The videos I linked show examples of the current default style of table. This style of table is considered ideal by most players and tournament organizers. This style of table disproportionally favors strong hacking lists and GML alpha strikes. PanO struggles to take advantage of these strategies. PanO suffers in the tournament scene and the kitchen table scene, and players are left disgruntled. Eventually, disgruntled players leave the game. There are what, 5 big pieces of CB terrain? Tower, big square with stairs, small square with stairs, medium square with ladders, and shipping cube? That's not many height variations to consider, no matter how you stack them.
Parrots and drop bears don't kick off on repeaters being used. Also if youre spec firing drop bears onto roofs.with morans, you're probably getting spotlighted.
No, we've just been mired in discussing nomads and the moran. I dont think PanO plays into other strong hacking factions much better on the hacking front.
