If you're already rocking a 15 order list there's a 10pt cheerleader you can sub-out for a 12pt cheerleader. But yes, it's not worth dropping an order for.
I think we might look at list construction in different ways. I generally don't take line infantry units in Vanilla lists, and I don't think of Jaguars as a cheerleader. So for me it's more like spending an extra 4 points to upgrade a Transductor. The skill itself is really good though, and worth trying to fit in non LI lists. I'm just not convinced you need it in every multiple combat group list.
I'd start the other way: I'd include it and downgrade if it was the only way to make everything else fit. It's 12pts for ~1.5 orders (more in a list you expect to go second with, less in a list you expect to go first with). My view on the hyperbolic 'must take' isn't that they literally must appear in every list, but rather that they always beg the question 'why don't you have x' in this list. But yes, the relative utility goes down for every order over 11 you have.
I had a game with a puppet master hacker, went played first, and my opponent didn't use his command token as he thought taking away only 1 order is a waste of a command token. I think a simple master will make it into a lot of my lists.
When your opponent confirmed they weren't using the token did you take the opportunity to exclaim "Dance, my puppet, dance!" ?
How do people plan on dealing with cheap smoke running up the board, most of the time bringing templates and fairly high CC in tow, both things that Tunguska generally has a hard time dealing with? Overwatch with Grenzers to make sure they can't get a smoke dodge off? Hecklers up board with jammers to shut down advances? How would turn 1 impetuous WB rush be dealt with by the sectorial?
Hecklers are pretty much an absolute must for this. But it needs to be layered with Flash Pulsers / med-long range AROs so you get them to break stealth. Puppets as an aggressive ARO option to act as a deliberate speed bump seems like a useful option. Personally I think Bikes or Uberfalls are serious threats. Let alone Bike + Raoul. Or my local NCA players new favourite tactic of SATLOCK+Squallo (specifically designed to counter Hecklers / Puppets). It's part of the reason the faction doesn't really grab me.... yet.
To be fair, Uberfalls are serious threats to just about everybody. What worries me about Hollowmen specifically is that pretty much anything with a Electric Pulse will tear them up.
Maybe Lunokhods with their Koalas and Flamethrower could be a pretty good deterrent to smoke WB running up the board, but most of the time they have a pretty high PH to dodge the koalas or the flames :/
Thats what the heavy shotgun is for, put enhanced reactions on it for B2, use impact template to try and hit multiple dudes, 18s to hit within 8, 12s to hit up to 16. Id probably only keep 1 koala up front, then keep 2nd koala further back so they cant run through and trigger both in 1 ARO, or bring a baggage bot to restock.
Most of these armies are going to get up the board anyway. I don't think the objective is ever to kill them in ARO, the objective is to slow them down enough so that they can't wreck as much as they want to. A lukonhod (ideally) takes up 2 dodges for crazy koalas and 1 dodge/BS attack for itself. I think the minelayer pupper master is also going to help here a lot, same with grenzer flamers. The other piece is that with super jumping HI's, we aren't really punished for deploying with a "the ground is lava" mentality. We can find ways to eat up WB orders, and that's all we will have to do. Will it be tough? Sure. Impossible? Nah.
A Lunokhod and two Flash Pulse bots with Overclock running, EVO and Puppetactica, Hollow Man link, roboarmy.
So, REMs, Hexa, Zhanying, Moderators, TacPuppets, Cadmus-seed, Father Sforza, Chaksa, Kaauri, Kaeltar, Kerail, and Kempeitai. (searched Army for Electric Pulse) Almost none of which want to be anywhere near CC. Sounds like the only significant worry is the Tohaa. Those troops actually will survive being in CC, pretty much nothing else will.
I sure hope CB releases at least one of the model-less units we have at Gencon, but that snipershot rather reminds me of the Blackjack.
