Husband, Father, and Computer Scientists here jumping into Infinity in middle TN. I'm starting to jump in by reading whatever rules and fluff I can get my hands on including just having finished Outrage. I have a few questions about some items I've been googling but not yet found sufficient information on: (1) How much fluff is in the various physical rulebooks? I love to read fluff so have been quite curious about these; basically was (or am?) THAT guy who got each Army Book (back in my WHFB days), mainly for the fluff. Anywhere else I should be checking to make sure I don't miss something good? (2) How do you counter someone rambo-ing ? I'm sure there is a guide or so somewhere but my google searches for "Infinity Counter Rambo" and similar such searches haven't landed me much success. So far I've seen "ignore the rambo and kill their other stuff to starve their Rambo of orders," but I'm curious what else there is. I like to have multiple ways to counter something since if you only have one trick for countering it makes it harder for the counter to work since your opponent catches on to how you try to counter them. (3) Currently, I believe I like the most Ariadna due to their unique fluff, looks, tricks, etc., except I'm curious how they handle what is apparently (from what I've read) their biggest weakness, smoke bombs and other anti-vision tools. I'm not a big fan of having a weakness that I just have to suffer through, and, from what I've read so far, that seems to be the case. If that's the case with them, then anyone have suggestions on how best to suffer through it? Or perhaps I should pick a different faction that has an answer to anything thrown at them ... at least to some degree. Bonus points if they have 2+ at least potential options for anything. I love having options. (4) I was wanting to create a spreadsheet of all the units and their stats (I love to crunch numbers, etc.). I stumbled on some discussion from around 2017 about being able to grab JSON that contains it, but with the two endpoints I tested with the various words seemed to be in Spanish instead of English and I haven't found any discussion yet on grabbing the English version of the JSON (assuming it exists). If anyone could nudge me onto the right path there I would appreciate it. If that's not an options, then perhaps extracting it somehow from the Army Builder app or anything other than me looking at the army lists and doing data entry by hand. Thanks in advance!
1) The fluff is *only* in the physical rulebooks. The two main rules books (Infinity N3 and Human Sphere N3) have ~150 page fluff books and the new trilogy (Uprising, Third Offensive, Daedalus Falls) are probably like 70% fluff? The game has a (somewhat) living ruleset model, so the online PDF version / online FAQ continue to be updated. 2) There are lots of ways. Strong AROs, indirect threats like camouflage and impersonation, just throwing enough chaff at something that eventually it gets crit, deploying in a way where the rambo has to deal with scarier things before it can deal with weak things, hacking, etc. Some rambos you basically have to let wear themselves out (Achilles, for example) but the stronger the rambo, the bigger the hole you'll leave in the opponent's list. 3) The thing about Infinity is that most armies do most things. Ariadna doesn't have MSV2 (which allows you to see through smoke), but they have loads of camouflage options, parachutists, smoke, and AP/T2 weaponry that other factions have less access to. Ariadna can still deal with smoke though. Every faction has enough tools to deal with every situation. I don't play Ariadna though, so someone else will probably have more answers for you. 4) https://github.com/Kurolox/infinity-api/tree/feature/flask-api
I would suggest to ignore the physical books, and grab the RPG ones from Modiphius (conveniently available in PDF, so easier to carry in a Ebook reader or tablet). After you finished with those, there is Daedalus' Fall (Uprising and Third Offensive are... lower narrative & gramatical quality). Each faction has ways. Players who use a single Rambo and all the rest are just cheerleaders tend to not last long in the table. Nomads have, for example, the classic "Moran nobody can see, with CrazyKoalas that will hug you to death", plus enough "WiFi coverage" to turn anything hackable to a blind vegetable. And glue. Haqquislam have the infamous Jammer-carrying Muttas, a 5pt crazy guy that can send you to Isolated without seeing you... so no rambo. Aleph has enough quality, very little can be used as Rambo against them without facing complicated odds all the time. Combined Army can kill the rambo before he starts moving (Speculo Killer!) etc etc... Also, all factions have troops that can enter from a side of the table, and take out those units whose only purpose is to give fuel to the rambos (cheerleaders). Go the Nomad way. Tons of dirty tricks, several ways of playing, wildly different units, good enough TAGs (Ariadna has none) and Hi-Tech looks vs the Ariadnan "we look like pre-21st century soldiers". Regarding how to take on smokers, Ariadna has its own ones, and melee specialists that advance under cover of smoke, or camo state.
Wow, thank you for the quick and helpful replies! How does the fluff in the rulebooks line up with the fluff in the RPG books? I'm amused you suggested Nomads as I had read this article about the factions and from it the other two factions I think most interest me are Nomads and Haqqislam given they have some nice tricks of their own and as well as strong board control. Haqqislam's holoprojectors and impersonators definitely peaked my interest as some unique abilities as well. I had read that with one or both of those abilities that only Haqqislam and CA have access to them. I had also read about Nomad players covering the table with control zones for hacking. I haven't thoroughly read about hacking other than high level of what you can do, but that seems rather appealing as well. However, being largely unaffected by hacking (as I hear about Ariadna) seems appealing too ;-) This is the link I was reading from about the various faction: https://www.thediceabide.com/blog/2018/8/3/infinity-which-faction-is-for-you I may just have to proxy some and continue reading and watching battle reports before I figure out which is the most appealing to me. Too bad the three I'm interested in are in separate Operation:* boxes. Will probably just result in more "gotta collect them all" feelings. Anyone around the middle TN (Nashville) area?
The rulebooks are official and approved, getting out slowly because CB reviews them. Until now, they cover the situation of the Human Sphere until the Uprising, Third Offensive and Daedalus' fall books, those three being the "plot advances" ones. As for how is each one... Uprising is something like the 8th season of Game of Thrones: all "actors" (this being nations, intelligence organizations, etc...) forced to behave so the desired end is reached whatever the cost (the Japanese secedes succesful from YJ, which required the WHOLE human race siding with JSA against YJ in one measure or another). Third Offensive is like the book was half the size, then someone went again over it adding "but... " to all paragraphs, most of which starter in a positive mood for that faction, so it's like reading about coiutus interruptus every few seconds for hours. Daedalus' Fall seems the best of the three books, but I'm still in the reading process. The Camà ign System is a bust, however, since its the same from the N2 Campaign Paradiso book with slight nerfs to two precise bonuses (a free merc unit turned into 60pts for a single merc unit, and +1 STR to all troops with such attribute to +1STR to a single type of troops, for example only Dakinis). CA has access to almost anything, being another "Alien Sphere" dedicated to the expansionism. That being said, Nomads can deploy all manner of nasty tricks, but only in Vanilla, with Bakunin having the second place for sheer number of options. Haqquislam has another playing style, with tons of Holoprojector N2, elite options in both Hassassin and Ramah, but spammy with Qapu and Vanilla. Their "hat" however is that of fragile units hitting well above their weight, so they go for assymetrical exchanges. Bottom line, Nomads play the tech game and can pull tricks, with the best parachutist troops and Medium Infantries, Haqquislam is closer to Ariadna in tech level (sans biotech, of which Ramah has gone nuts with).
I have all the RPG books I could grab (Up to Ariadna and Haqqislam), and I even run a RPG game. The books are pretty much 75% fluff. Even the rules have a lot of fluff in them. So if you really want to know the universe, the RPG books are very useful. The books specifically about pre-made adventures aren't necessary unless you want examples of what can happen in the Human Sphere. All in all, I'd suggest the Core Book if you seek lore. There is even info I think is unique to the RPG!
