Yes. Its the guarantee of FastPandas that make them strong, IMO. Being able to deploy them anywhere in Zone of Control without a roll is huge. Especially if they are attached to an infiltrating or forward deploying model. But if they are on a Deployment Zone model, you have to use more orders and put the user at more risk to get them someplace powerful. Pitchers, while they are reliant on dice, have great range. With an X-Visor, you can shoot up to 24 inches on flat BS. With 12" deployment zones, that means you can shoot a pitcher into the enemy deployment zone with a move-shoot order. They also benefit from link bonuses and can speculative attack. That is why I rate them so well.
Strikes me that a lot of the pitcher/panda paranoia would be nipped in the bud by diligent use of HD msr/ml platforms to prevent moving fragile/expensive/limited carriers of such items from being able to set up as desired with no risk. Dunk someone's repeater carrier for a dozen games and they'll learn to be far more cautious.
I appreciate your work, PhDeezNutz I like the listing of Hacking Devices, deployment options and the graph about repeater carrying units. I am looking forward to your assessment
@daboarder Yes, you can set up traps with hidden deployment against pitchers, but it’s difficult if the attacker knows what he’s doing which he probably does because he has been practicing it a lot. Couple of important important things to remember: - The pitcher is usually the last trooper to deploy, which makes it difficult to deploy against. - Another strong attacking piece is near the pitcher to kill any hidden deployment troopers that reveal themselves against the pitcher. - The pitcher player checks the army list for hidden deployment profiles, verifies their existence (last trooper phase) and makes adjustments. For example if there is a possibility of a hidden deployment trooper in the enemy deployment zone, find a pitcher lane that doesn’t have a LoF to the enemy deployment zone. It’s also possible to manipulate the (Bit&Kiss) pitcher LoF very effectively with (Daturazi) smoke grenades. - Bit&Kiss have cybermask so the can’t be killed by hidden deployment troopers if the combine army player really wants to play it safe. - S-tier pitchers (the cornerstone of all pitcher lists) don’t really have to move from the deployment zone. Haris linked Druzes can put a pitcher 24” away with 2x12 or 40” away with 2x9. Bit&Kiss can put pitchers 24” away with 3x8. There is always a baggage bot nearby to refill if the attempt fails. Watching where those baggage bots are is a key information for your deployment.
I feel this "top ten of hacking coverage" idea is a good one, but that to some degree it shouldn't be focussed on equipment but on profiles. Bit+Kiss! pitchers are not the same beast as Cyberghost pitchers, for example. Nor are regular fast pandas at all equivalent to Heckler pandas. If I were to take a stab at it, it would look like this: 1 Bit+Kiss! 2 Hecklers 3 Morans 4 Core linked pitchers 5 Guilang minelayers 6 Crocman FOs 7 Pathfinder equivalents 8 AD depreps 9 FD repeaters 10 everything else I appreciate it's not as elegant, but it's far more accurate and would avoid false positives (eg thinking that because Pano have FD repeaters, they're somehow equivalent to Morans).
@Time Bandit there are “normal” profiles and “S-tier” profiles. At this point in the game lifecycle nobody really cares about “normal” profiles.
@Time Bandit, I think for the exercise general categories are better than specific profiles. By doing categories, it shows what is available for each faction. Notice that I used multiple ranks for pitchers, deployable repeaters, and Fast Pandas to capture the deployment capabilities of the carrier. Another reason to use categories is that it shows tools that multiple Factions get. For instance, the deployable repeater on an infiltrating model. PanO, Yujing, Haqqislam, and Nomads all have that capability. While each faction carrier units can have difference strengths and weaknesses, for this exercise they all can relatively "safely" carry a repeater into the enemy's half of the table and beyond. Finally, I think that focusing on profiles sometimes blinds us. Sure, some units are really optimized for their mission. But that does not mean that factions without that optimized profile cannot do something similar. Sometimes is just needs to be "good enough."
Might be worth splitting into 2 different categories. If you want to use hacking defensively, or offensively (mainly GML). Offensively, there is no contest with the Heckler (Can extend network to 45" unopposed). Similarly, Hunzakut and Crocman can do a very similar job. Pitchers are good, but they're def not as good to reach deeps. Meanwhile if you want to do defensive hacking, the Morans and Guilangs are hard to beat. Turn 0 hacking in midfield is silly. So like, if a list has no GML, I'd rather have anything over pitchers / fastpanda. But if a list is mostly about GML, I'd never want a Sensorbot and would auto pick pitchers / fastpanda.
You need Minelayer otherwise they'll extend hacking area up to 45" (16 deploy + 8 movmov + 4 mov + 8 zoc + 1 dep width + 8 dep zoc). Similar thing with PanO's Crocman deprep. Unless they have a Mine, the PanO player will be able to extend hacking area up to 45" aswell (24 deploy + 8 movmov + 4 mov + 1 dep width + 8 dep zoc). The crocman is arguably better at it because HD makes it even harder to counter with mines, though it's obviously more expensive. PanO (Crocman) and Haqq (Hunzakut) also discourage massively from attempting to Discover. If the opponent doesn't have multiple ARO at once and tries to Discover, you're nearly guaranteed to unopposed FO them. You can then GML and keep going.
I'd agree with this, but in the oposite direction; Pitcher tokens are highly expendable, whereas every PanO repeater has a (very expensive, since we're functionally talking about the Peacemaker and Bulleteer) Remote attached to it. A bit late on this, but Linkabilty merits a major consideration here. To name names, the Dartok can pretty much always go in a Pure Mixed Morats core at mininal opertunity cost, which gives him a better-than-X-visor pitcher, if he wants it. +3 BS is the same as the bonus you could get from an X-visor, but also have an 85% chance to nail shots in the good range band. Plus the Burst bonus (this applies to any linkable pitcher) gives you a lot of flexibility in terms of spamming repeaters, and makes using baggage a much better option. It's not like CA isn't going to have Ikadrons around to reload.
And noting that sometimes things just have to be “good enough”, coupled with what other things are available to to the faction, is an important thing. Sticking with the title of the thread, PanO doesn’t need to have Hacking that wins games, they just need to have Hacking that doesn’t lose it. To borrow a sports analogy, a team in football doesn’t have to have a keeper that wins games, just one that doesn’t lose them, provided they have sufficient strength in other areas.
So I played a game today with MO trying to play a hacking list, the game more or less behaved accordingly to some of the things we have discussed here, though it is only a list and a game and I will need to experiment more with the concept to draw any real conclusions. My immediate impression is that, Yes, PanO can actually play a hacking game, but it definitely does not look like what a "proper" hacking faction would play, and PanO Hackers can shoot and can shoot well if needed. So list in question Spoiler Hacking 2 ────────────────────────────────────────────────── GROUP 1 10 PEACEMAKER Heavy Shotgun / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 20) AUXBOT_3 Heavy Flamethrower / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 4) BULLETEER Spitfire / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (1 | 26) KNIGHT OF SANTIAGO (Hacker, Killer Hacking Device) Combi Rifle, Nanopulser, D-Charges ( | TinBot: Firewall [-3]) / Pistol, DA CC Weapon. (0 | 39) BULLETEER Heavy Shotgun / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 21) DE FERSEN Spitfire / Pistol, AP + Shock CC Weapon. (1.5 | 51) RAVENEYE Submachine Gun, E/Marat, Flash Pulse, E/M Mines / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 12) PATHFINDER DRONBOT Combi Rifle, Flash Pulse / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 15) FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 7) MULEBOT (Deactivator, Repeater) ( ) / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (0 | 8) CLIPPER DRONBOT Missile Launcher / PARA CC Weapon(-3). (1.5 | 16) GROUP 2 5 1 TEUTONIC KNIGHT (Lieutenant) Light Shotgun, Panzerfaust / Pistol, DA CC Weapon. (0 | 19) ORDER SERGEANT (Hacker, Hacking Device) Combi Rifle ( ) / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0.5 | 18) BLACK FRIAR FTO (Sixth Sense) Heavy Rocket Launcher, Nanopulser / MULTI Pistol, CC Weapon. (1.5 | 25) CROSIER Combi Rifle / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 11) CROSIER Combi Rifle / Pistol, CC Weapon. (0 | 11) 6 SWC | 299 Points Open in Infinity Army The main idea of the list is De Fersen and Santiago are Duo with the corresponding Bulleteers an they walk themselves and the repeater network as they advance. As a proof of concept it worked, the initial repeater network setup caused the opponent to spend orders to avoid it when it was not possible models got targeted, on the active turn the repeater network advanced while long range shooting was done and forcing enemy hackers to defend themselves through your own repeaters gives an edge. But I would attribute the performance today to the novelty of the situation, it was a hacking list and a Military orders list on top of that, not something one should necessarily expect to see. Game table was nothing special N3 paper terrain, the opponent was Shasvastii with a decent amount of hackers.
I know this wasn't aimed at me, but I put them at 4th in my ranking, just behind Bit+Kiss, Hecklers and Morans. Much heavier investment, and liable to counter by breaking the team, but still enables a top-class network, where and when you want it, in an order or two. In fact poor old Druze - it's hard for them not to bring a GML list, given that their pitcher game is so outstanding! I play a lot of FoCo and they're in the same boat, really. Not bringing GML is an act of rebellion :D
Interesting list Also interested knowing what the opponent list was. But I’m also interested in the fact you used a Clipper. How did it perform? Where you able to use it? Did you win? Care to develop a bit more about the flow of the match?
Mission was capture and protect, I will have to reach my opponent for his list, I do remember a Sargosh Jayth Haris, Sheskiin and two camouflaged hackers but I am not sure I recreated it from memory correctly. To not clog this thread I will create a new one later today to chart the games I try to play with PanOceania sectorials with hacking in mind.
