What is the best way of dealing with an Avatar when playing NCA, what units should I have in my list? I was told that it is the only TAG in the game that can't be hacked.
It can't be possessed. Different from can't be hacked. IMM and Isolation works on it. Isolation in particular is very nasty. You can also find ways to burn off his ODD with attack runs by Auxilia. Or bring on Aquila HMG to ignore that ODD. E/M grenades are also nasties.
- Auxbot raid to burn its ODD off, then attack with any AP weapon. - Garuda or Bulleteer raid to cull its order pool. Uhlan's Feuerbach is great for the task; outmaneuver the Avatar and shoot it in the back and out of cover. With its cost it won't have much of a support to guard its flanks and backs, and Uhlan has Stealth.
As usual, Aquila Guard MSV3 is a clear counter to the Avatar (AND the Sphinx). If you manage to use the Soldiers of Fortune extra, pairing the Aquila with some Yuan Yuan so they move+smoke in front of him will be a great help (plus the Bashi Bazouk with E/Mauler profile, or Emily as CoC for those speculative fire with EM grenades). Oh, and if you go for speculative fire, the BSG bolt with E/M grenades (19 pts, PH11) is another option.
Auxilia. As mentioned use Auxbot to burn ODD but use Auxilia Forward Observer attack instead of combi (quite uselles against ARM9 guy), if you happen to actually score a hit with FO you will make other troopers life's easier when they will try to finish Avatar. Also remember auxbot can do a electric pulse (Hexa also have electric pulse!) to IMM Avatar for 2 turns!
The squalo HGL is also a good treat, has the weaponry and ARM to fight the Avatar in active and shrug its ODD and EXP ARO, and can threaten its order pool
I took a brief foray into vanilla Combined Army earlier this year specifically to play the Avatar, and of all the lessons I learned, the most important one is this: playing a big scary stompy model like the Avatar forces your opponent to play better. When you are in a game against the Avatar, you can't half-ass it. You can't just hope and pray that your random Panzerfaust ARO is going to deal with the problem. You can't attack the Avatar without a plan, without flawless execution, without the right tools. It natively covers too many of its own weaknesses to just hope and pray. And with the right army support (Strategos Speculo, Q-Drone, M-Drone, EIKHD, Ikadrons...) you may have to fight through multiple layers just to get at the Avatar itself. The biggest things the Avatar worries about: 1) losing its ODD. Suicide flamethrowers like Auxbots are the worst things to worry about. 2) multiple hacking AROs. Against one regular HD, the Avatar's player may elect to just tank it on BTS9. But multiple AHDs trying to Isolate or Immobilize will give the Avatar pause. All it takes is one unlucky dice roll and the Avatar is as good as a brick. 3) smoke, especially Eclipse. Either as a delivery mechanism for close range units (hello Uberfallkomando!) or other factions using the Smoke+MSV trick, the Avatar doesn't like to see smoke. Obviously this bullet point is less relevant for PanO unless you like your GdA or you are playing with Yuan Yuans. 4) having its order pool gutted. The Avatar is probably in a single combat group list, as it's hella expensive and the other models you bring aren't cheap, either. If the Avatar is bunkered up (mines, Q-Drone, Ikadron corner guards, Suppressive Fire, etc) it's probably the right call to go after the orders. You'll probably see remotes as the main order fuel, usually well hidden. A Bulleteer that can cross the board will absolutely gut an army like this. If you have speculative fire handy and the orders to do so, it's a seriously good plan that can eliminate remotes with little risk to you. Squalo HGL as Daboarder mentioned, Montesa LGL, Emily (although with anything E/M you might as well just go for the Avatar, the payoff is much higher as you isolate and immobilize the Avatar AND send them into LoL). If I'm going after an Avatar, it's usually a concerted effort. You have to prep a turn in advance by moving the relevant pieces into position. Have an Auxbot nearby so you don't have to run it across the board. Deal with the Speculo pre-emptively (I mean, this should be your first concern anyways!) and keep your important pieces safe. On the turn of, have backup plans in place in case something goes awry. If you are using a close range trooper (say, Swiss AHD with MULTI Rifle) for God's sake stay out of Sepsitor range!
Just want to say thank you all for your feed back, I always forget I can burn the ODD off enemy troops that have it, I got to keep that in mind.
I have only faced an Avatar once, so take this with a grain of salt. My advice would be to play the mission! You don't have to kill the Avatar to beat the opponent. It's so expensive that they are likely to have a smaller toolkit of useful units to win the mission, which means you have less targets to disable before they can't win. Running away and hiding is fine, if the Avatar comes chasing you can kill it in close quarters like everything else (Multirifle, hacking, CCW, electric pulse, E/M, just engaging it is good enough - just send someone without a cube...) If the Avatar doesn't come, then who cares what it's doing? Yes, it can dominate one, maybe two fire lanes. What do your opponent's do when you deploy a Dragoe? They hide and work around it. The Avatar is just an expensive Multi-HMG, don't get shot by it and it's not that scary.
