Starco Expedition and Retrieval Taskforce ────────────────────────────────────────────────── 9 1 1 EMILY (Chain of Command) Combi Rifle + Light Grenade Launcher (Normal and E/M), Nanopulser / Assault Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 35) KNAUF MULTI Sniper / Heavy Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 32) UHAHU Hacker (Hacking Device Plus. UPGRADE: Icebreaker) Pitcher, D-Charges / Assault Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 25) MOBILE BRIGADA Lieutenant Boarding Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 33) MOBILE BRIGADA MULTI Rifle + Light Flamethrower / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 39) BRAWLER Doctor (MediKit) Rifle + Light Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 20) BRAWLER Heavy Rocket Launcher / Assault Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 18) IRMANDINHO Chain Rifle, D-Charges, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW. (0 | 8) ANACONDA (Fireteam: Duo) HMG + Chain-colt, Panzerfaust / CCW. (2 | 64) OPERATOR Spitfire / Pistol, Knife. (- | 0) BRAWLER Engineer Rifle + Light Shotgun, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 20) ZONDBOT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3) ZONDBOT Electric Pulse. (0 | 3) 6 SWC | 300 Points Open in Infinity Army So, this was my list for my game tonight, against Tohaa. All in all it performed well, the Anaconda and Brigada link team rambo'ed up the board and locked one of his Triads and his Engineer down with the TAG's chaincolt, whilst the Brigada kept a lookout for any sneaky veggies trying to sneak up behind it, and dealt with them swiftly. The Brawler HRL got jammy with some dice roll's and managed to survive a direct hit from a guided rocket and the Emily/Uhahu team was most certainly good. The Irmhadino was made slightly redundant by the MSV2 snipers covering the board, so he relegated himself to the roll of a portable turret, sitting midfield in cover and blasting the enemy with his chainrifle when they tried to pass him. Overall it was a good list, and I am liking Starco. My only gripes are the lack of major big hitters and the lack of infiltrators and mines, though I guess as a Nomads player I am a bit too used to having these.
ARM4 HMG (B4/5), ARM6 HMG for direct FTFs. With access to White Noise if your opponent loves MSV. MSV2 Sniper (with smoke) as a LR scalpel. Absurdly good oblique/indirect attack options (Emily, Raoul) coupled with merely quite good options (Bandits, Al Hawwa, Hellcats). I don't find it lacking in 'punch'.
I definitely feel like with StarCo you have a great selection of troops which can hit harder than their weight suggests, through using cunning tricks. Like, putting loads of orders into Tsyklons with MML2, or MSV2 Brawler shooting through smoke, or a linked Alguacile HMG through Uhahu's White Noise zone, or Spector dropping into and putting Drop Bears around the corner before popping out with a BSg, or Emily spec firing an E/M LGL across the board etc etc etc. Like, when you build a StarCo list I feel like you really go for breadth of cunning tactical options, deploy chaff to blunt the enemy assault, and then essentially broaden your various types of attack to the point where your opponent can't cover against all of them, then exploit the hole. MSV2 Brawler picks off the troops covering a board edge, allowing Raoul to drop in and circle through the backline, that sort of thing.
I've found that I almost landed in a rut with list building. I like the Brigada link (mostly because they look cool) and I've been taking the Brawler sniper + Harris as well every game. That eats up most of your points and all your SWC with very little variation possible. To try something new (but not too different) I took this for two rounds of Safe Area against NCA. It plays very similar to my Corregidor Brigada lists but with the benefit of a couple more orders (and a Spector!). I was curious if the lieutenant in the link would be a liability and it turned out ok. He never got targeted as the missile/HMG took all the flak. I usually felt brave enough to leave him out for deployment zone ARO defense. Spector was the MVP both games, killing a Squalo in one and an Aquila in the other, both times with shotgun rather than close combat. His drop bears didn't do any damage but gave all sorts of annoying options to tie up a fusilier link, in the first game, and a bolt link, in the second. He's almost too good in that he eats all my orders and then I don't have enough to move up the Brigadas. As the Brigada were at long range for both games, Massacre had limited input except for a key eclipse grenade which allowed the missile launcher to get to a juicy spot to bomb a link team. Very handy tool to have. The mid-field Bandit and Al-Hawwa were adequate for grabbing consoles but didn't have any battle input. They're expensive models for console grabbers but it's tough to fuel both Spector and a bandit in the same turn. The jaguar panzerfausts had no impact both games. I was too timid to peek them out in the first so they had no AROs and in the second they got mulched by HMG. Starco. Free Company of the Star ────────────────────────────────────────────────── GROUP 1 8 2 1 MOBILE BRIGADA HMG / Pistol, Knife. (2 | 42) MOBILE BRIGADA Missile Launcher / Pistol, Knife. (2 | 40) MOBILE BRIGADA Lieutenant MULTI Rifle + Light Flamethrower / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 39) SEÑOR MASSACRE Boarding Shotgun, E/M Grenades, Eclipse Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW, E/M CCW. (0 | 26) DAKTARI Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 14) JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10) HAWWA' Hacker (Assault Hacking Device) Boarding Shotgun, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 26) JAGUAR Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 10) IRMANDINHO Chain Rifle, D-Charges, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW. (0 | 8) SPECTOR (AD: Combat Jump) Boarding Shotgun, Nanopulser, Drop Bears / Pistol, E/M2 CC Weapon. (0 | 33) GROUP 2 2 1 BANDIT Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Light Shotgun, Adhesive Launcher / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 25) JAGUAR Adhesive Launcher, Panzerfaust / Pistol, DA CCW. (0.5 | 13) JAGUAR Adhesive Launcher, Panzerfaust / Pistol, DA CCW. (0.5 | 13) 5.5 SWC | 299 Points Open in Infinity Army
@SuperD I think people need some time to adjust to Spector he is really dominating but he certainly has counters. As someone used to AD and Bandit a time will come where you simply can't get through their defense without the use of the token state, the Bandit should have it's day. Unless they never figure out countering Spector... edit: with 3 orders he will always just be a specialist. But swapping with Hawwa means dealing with the Irregular order. Bandits can be a pain. If the Brigada Core doesn't need to advance it doesn't need to. When the games come where your skrimishing troops can't cut it your next turns will still be powerful. Until then the Brigada are still having a powerful effect on the table I'm sure. If you have Alguacilles instead not only are things tough if you need to fall back on them, but they have a much lighter presence on the table while they aren't being actively used. There's a balance with a link, they almost never want to be used much turn 1 because all your opponent's tricks are still in the sleeves. But if the rest of the force is in skirmishing forces you might not want to use them until they are depleted, and then you'll be low on orders for them. Anyways if Spector can do everything while the Brigada are acting like backup... it's working. You don't need to mess with that. As far as the Panzerfaust Jags go, getting blasted with and HMG is okay IF they needed to spend orders displacing them OR deploy them to counter the Jags (also displacing them). They're 100% skillful deployment based so they are really touchy to use. In this list the tactic should probably be "if they find a way around my Brigada where would they end up?".
The other thing to remember with Jags is that you're in your positive range band so absent massive mod overkill (which they'll dodge still on 10s) there's a fair chance of shaving away some of the hits, allowing you to go Dogged. B4 Shock is still relatively rare outside of expensive HI/TAGs: and fighting a Panzerfaust Jag is asking for a AP+EXP or ADHL to the face (they're on >5% odds most of the time).
