Naffatun are a long-standing troop in the Haqqislam rooster - and a part of the Ramah Task Force. However, as it was recently discussed in the Haqq Discord, they are not a popular choice, especially not since N5 dropped. Also, RTF is not considered to be a strong army - it seems to have a number of weaknesses. So, I propose running a thought experiment: what would you do to make the Naffatun actually good, useful troops? Troops you'd like to include into your list? Note - we're taking a tabula rasa approach. A blank page. Toss out of the imaginative window everything you ever knew about Naffatun in Infinity, save for these few facts: They're called Naffatun (a reference to the Arab warriors of old that used incendiary weapons) They're Haqq/RTF troop They tend to have incendiary weapon as their distinctive piece of equipment. Everything else is a blank canvas for you to paint on. Unit type, classification, statline, skills & equipment, battlefield role. Fluff-wise, assume that the Naffatun regiment got reformed, retrained and reequipped for whatever role you devise for them.
When the revised models came out years ago, they seemed bulky. I thought they would be great to be revised as Medium infantry with the associated heavier armor. Make fire grenades (Continuous) available on every profile and lean into them being combat engineers. Bonus, it would great if they had Deactivators.
Fire grenades. The fetish continues. First post. Le sigh If a mostly complete rework, I'd keep the rifle/light flamethrower/grenades profile, and the rifle/heavy flamethrower profiles. I'd add d-charges to the heavy flamethrower profile, engineer variant to the r/lft/g with deactivator. Lastly I'd add a feurbach as a support weapon
I took at it from a different angle: Make Naffatun Minelayers. Ramah doesn't have much of that (only Touareg and Al Fasid, neither of which can be used in significant numbers). For flavor, give them Continous Damage Mines (historical examples of remotely-activated, stationary flamtehrowers used for defensive purposes do exist), albeit it is not a must-have. To match the Mines, make the Naffatun Camo (Mimetsm -3). Can be one-use-only, and can do without Surprise Attack. This gives RTF a "Turn Zero" defence they have a problem with nowadays. Statline - I'd keep the current one, more or less. The unit shouldn't bloat in cost, unless necessary - RTF doesn't have much in terms of inexpensive troops that can actually do something. To keep the cost manageable, downgrade from the Rifle to some more budget-friendly firearm - SMG or Light Shotgun, most likely. I wouldn't be adverse to some form of Forward Deployment. +4" should do just fine. With that... we could make some profiles. The Camo Minelayer is one, possibly default - but not necessarily. Engineer, or at least D-Chrges option wold be nice, to keep with the "assault engineer" theme - and give Naffatun a Specialist option. Flammenspeer makes for a thematic long-ranged option. Albeit nicking Panzerfaust (Continous) from Haytham is tempting as well. Of course this means they lose their Fireteam capability, but honestly, they weren't gaining much from it with N5 changes to Fireteam rules. @Papa Bey the Feuerbach? I mean, it is an excellent "can opener", but it is expensive, and IMO not a good choice for a troop with basic BS 11 (unless you intend to boost it, but then, it would cost...). Also, unless we nick the Azra'il's incendiary ammo, it is not Continous Damage. If you want a support weapon on Naffatun, I believe a Rocket Launcher (Light or Heavy) would be more fitting. That's where my Flammenspeer idea came from (since I wanted to keep it budget-friendly ;) ).
At the risk of making them slightly more expensive I'd look into making them a more capable speed bumps, corner guards, and pointmen. BS Attack (+1 SD), Immunity (Continuous Damage), Dogged, Forward Deployment (+4") SMG, LFT (PS6), Grenades (Continuous Damage) SMG, LFT (PS6), Flammenspeer SMG, LFT (PS6), AP Mines (Continuous Damage) (Minelayer) SMG, HFT (+1 B) BSG, GL (Continuous Damage) Immunity is there for fluff reasons only, a rational choice would for it to be Immunity (Shock) If I were to really go to town with them I'd remake them into either another Haqq supersoldiers (Project Ifrit), give them BS Attack (Continuous Damage) to begin with, and get more creative when it comes to weapon choices
Agreed, Immunity: Continous Damage is merely an ornament when on a 1 W, non-NWI troop. BS Attack +1 SD... it doesn't help DTWs, so it applies only to the BS weapons. A possible road for them to go, although in my eyes, RTF already has quite some supersoldier types (with associated supersoldier points cost) - they don't have much choice in terms of inexpensive (say, up to 15pts) models that could also do something interesting. So, not exactly the road I'd follow.
It does help somewhat in allowing to activate Dogged. +1 SD helps to deliver Grenade or Flammenspeer more reliably Agreed, which is why I went the cheap route. Another possibility I can see is giving them some shotgun options: BSG or VSG, which would help a BS 11 trooper. These could be a cheap spearhead troops. And yet another option would be to give them a loadout with CrazyKoalas, which would further help them in the speedbump role.
I'd say they are not longer Naffutun if you start blank. Could be anything then. I think they just need more than three options. Their background has them "Naffatûn are a specialized unit of the Ghulam infantry corps trained in the handling of incendiary armaments." So I would give them BS Attack (Continuous Damage) on all weapons. This would give it to their Rifles. I'd also add a HRL version. Grenade Launcher sounds good too.
I'd ask then - what does a Naffatun make? In my eyes, that's exactly what I pointed in the opening post: being a reference to the naffatun of old. "Men of the naphta" specializing in incendiary weapons, tossing pots of naphta and manning "greek fire" devices. I assume that's how Infinity Naffatun came into being - someone needed a good name for a regiment of flamethrower operators in the Sword of Allah. That's what the fluff says - but the fluff can be altered. A unit can be re-trained, and reassinged. The fluff of Naffatun didn't change since N1, after all. And that's quite some years by now. If this is your idea, this is your idea. Personally, I think it wouldn't differ them enough from basic Ghulam. Not enough to make them interesting & a worthy alternative. Also, current Fireteam rules go against the Naffatun fluff: they do count-as Ghulams, while the fluff says no-one wants to be near those guys.
To me, they are a Ghulam with the Flamethrowers and cheap Lt. So they are not far off from what I already think of them. I'd say they are MORE different from Ghulam now, considering Ghulam lost all of their shotgun templates. True but how many times have you seen them change fluff on a troops like this? I'm just thinking of the things that would make me want to take them or scary to play against them. Lol just because they don't want to be near them, doesn't mean they are allowed to be away. Also, if you are wanting them to be really different from Ghulam, are you prepared for them to no longer count as Ghulam for fireteams?
Thet's what they are today, indeed. Does it make them enough to show up in your lists? Not often, indeed. But I have put that down in the "blank page" approach, so we wouldn't be too limited in our thought experiment. And it is an opinion as valid as any other we got on this topic. it is, however, a very rare opinion, as far as I can tell. Very, very few voices saying that Naffatun are, essentially, good as they are. Absolutely, yes. As you can see above, my idea was to make them Camo, which automatically excludes the unit from being linkable at all. I honestly don't see the point in including a Naffatun in a RTF Ghulam Fireteam. Not a big difference in points, no specialist options, not much difference in statline (Naffatun gains BTS 3 instead of Ghulam's BTS 0), and swapping your LSG for a flamethrower (and grenades, with LFT). Nope, honestly, not interesting enough. If I'm to boost a Ghulam fireteam in RTF, I'll add a Zhayedan as a "Ghulam on steroids". Leila Sharif. Maybe Namurr, as a tip of the spear, using the Ghulam Fireteam as a delivery vehicle.
I also want to mention we shouldn't be too dedicated on the current fluff for Naffatûn. If we did, they should have had Explode since 2 ed and CB ( very reasonably and for obvious reasons) chose not to give them that rule. Right now, IMO, option, the pricing is very weird for Naffatûn in comparison to basic Ghulam. Ghulam trade their light shotgun and get: A PS 6 light flame thrower. Grenades BTS 3 It is wonky. For RTF and vanila Haqqislam, i use them instead of basic ghulam. The only reason to not take a Naffatûn LT over a Ghulam is the + 1 Command Token profile. I agree that Naffatûn should be more distinctive that Ghulam. IMO, they should be MI combat engineers that fill a niche between ghulam and Burkuts.
Let's stop playing it safe, then. Doing away with the notion that they need to be cheap because Ramah needs their low end troops; this niche can always be filled by something else. Even basic Ghulams if need be. MI, BS 12, PH 12, ARM 3 Immunity (ARM), Dogged, Forward Deployment (+8), Terrain (Total) Fireteam Duo/Haris Vulcan Shotgun (+1B), LFT, Grenades Rifle, HFT (+1B), D-Charges (Engineer) Rifle, HFT (+1B), Medikit (Paramedic) SMG, LRL, Crazykoala (Continuous Damage) Rifle, Flammenspeer, AP Mines (Minelayer) Rifle, LGL (Continuous Damage)
I'm in agreement with Immunity (Continuous Damage) which would be an easy change and make their current armor make more sense. The only armament addition I would give them is a Heavy Rocket Launcher or Light Rocket Launcher, keep them as Ghulam with special Incendiary weapons training. The wackiest I'd go to is to give them a Sensor option, playing into their rear-guard roll more.
Once again, that makes sense fluff-wise. But I'm afraid it doesn't game-wise. Not unless you have more than 1 W somehow. Otherwise it looks like that - you get hit with an incendiary weapon. No applicable immunity - you take an ARM test. If you pass, everything's fine. If you fail, you take a Wound (into Unconscious) and roll again to check if you have burned to a crisp. With applicable Immunity - assuming you have failed the roll - you avoid the follow-up roll, but you are still Unconscious anyway. Same as getting Immunity: Shock on a model that has 1 W and no NWI / Dogged or at least Regeneration (like Hakim). So you have taken a hit, failed your roll and all the difference the skill made is that you are Unonscious rather than Dead. Chances you're so important that Orders are going to be spent to get a Doc/Paramedic to you and try to heal you are, well, neglible in a standard game of Infinity - because these Orders are badly needed elsewhere.
There's no shortage of 1W troops with Shock Immunity in the game, but I agree that it's not an optimal combination. Though isn't this less of an issue in Haqq, with its range of reliable Doctors? I think it's more likely that you'd 1) have one at hand and 2) won't have to spend Allah knows how many orders to get a wounded trooper back up.
Fluff wise, for 1 wound infantry, i put them explosion and some kind of foward deployment. They will lost fireteam options. The start point should be ghulam profile. If we need the cut some points, lost bst armour. Equip them with weapons with continuos damage. Cheers
