I know people have been saying that since forever... but did anyone actually run the numbers on Atalanta? 2 dice on 17s are pretty sweet for a Sniper that is facing a Dodge or BS AROs in negative Rangebands most of the time. Effective WIP17 Discover+Shoot with a MSV2 from your DZ is next in line after MSV3 and Sensor. Honestly, she really is just a Nisse+. 2 dice on natural 20s is pretty neat vs Impetuous/out of cover stuff. While her ARO game is rather unsatisfying with HMGs around, she is pretty likely to survive till turn 3. You'll be satisfied having her out against Rifles, Shotguns and Warbands to defend an objective. Tagteamed her 5/5 games with Achilles in a tournament with a Doctor bot nearby. She was probably worth it by simply sitting Prone on a roof and passively creating a kill zone. VS stuff that relies on Smoke for AROs, Atalanta gives HMG Swiss Guards and Achilles a run for their money in FTF roll odds. You're still right that a Core Linked Kamau will smoke her odds in a pipe for breakfast, but she is pretty deadly in Active Turn, with or without Smoke. Alternatively she makes rather nice bait to set up a couple TO AROs. You can almost guarantee someone will bring a HMG out to try blow her off the roof. That HMG would hate splitting B against her, a Croc TO BSG/MSR in positive Rangebands or Hacker. What she is really bad at is facing Linked Snipers or MLs in +3. TR Bots are manageable with a Doc around.
No complaints here. I continue to like her, and would enjoy having her in PanO. I think it's mostly just that I have a hard time using a unit that's simply better in other armies for free. It's more a protest on sheer principal. But yes, a unit that shoots like that can definitely have a strong impact in the right hands. Now I think I'm even more sad that she didn't get added to a PanO Sectorial, though I know a lot of people hate it when Sphere powers borrow ALEPH units.
I guess it depends how much CB wants Varuna to be an expansion pack for Vanilla PanO, in the same way that TJC was a big expansion for Nomads. If they want to majorly build out Vanilla PanO, then Varuna will get a big pile of interesting new PanO units. I'm in favor of this, because I think Vanilla PanO needs help. If they want to give Varuna interesting capabilities but not have them spill over to Vanilla, then I expect a lot more in the way of ALEPH and Merc additions. Helots as Mercs, for example, would be a way to give Varuna smoke without giving it to the rest of PanO (I don't think this is likely btw... It's just a possible design avenue.)
The jokes on us. Varuna will have one more order of knights. Water knights They will be around 40 points have a spitfire, medium cc and water terrain. They will then call the sectorial done
Given the previews for TAK and OSS, and the TJC sectorial only profiles, Id hope to see some really interesting things in Varuna
If we're going along the cynical route then you should mention the bit where they attach chunks of reef to each miniature as tactical junk to keep the aquatic theme running. Get this man a sword and Wip 12 and he's ready.
IS does the right thing with ALEPH troops You make a regular Sectoral, which is full of cool and exciting troops, and then you add some ALEPH stuff on top. And sure the Sophotect and Garuda fill vital tactical roles, but it doesn't ever feel like IS needs those troops to be fun or engaging. For specialist legwork, they are quite important, but other than that there's lots of exciting stuff in-faction going on. Comparatively in SAA I sometimes think, like, there's so few in faction options and the ALEPH options are so good and viable that they definitely seem to overshadow a bit. I'd say that SAA needs to be built up a bit anyway, but it definitely didn't need doing that through more out of faction troops coming in, lets say. It already has... Regulars, Bagh-Mari, Akalis, GdA, Tikbalangs and Dragao as it's only Sectoral unique troops, everything else can be found in other Sectorals. That's pretty lame, Steel Phalanx has the same amount of Sectoral unique troops... and then all the characters too.
It's weird how on ASA there are no skirmishers, troops that can hide in the jungle and whatnot, so Pano has to rely on Aleph to provide some Naga, because we can't handle that shit with two whole jungle worlds.
It's super lame, and it's the reason why in three years of playing PanO I was never tempted to touch Acon. If I want to play those cool Aleph troops, I can--in Aleph. *shrugs* Right now, this is my favorite forum post of the year.
Acon Regulars and Tikbalang are great reasons to play Acon. @daboarder Agreed on the interesting concept of those sectorial-only profiles. If Spektrs can get a Sectorial-only KHD profile, it's feasible that Crocs might too. That's something I'd like to see. I'm more curious about the ORC's Varuna-only profile too. It sounded interesting 6 months ago, but now that we've really seen Sectorial-unique profiles in TJC, it makes me wonder what CB has in mind for ORCs.
The Tikbalang is actually pretty cool. If they added a infiltration specialist to SAA i would probs start that sectorial.
I don't play PanO to field Aleph units. I mean i like the aleph stuff being in our sectorials as options (fits the lore as well). But it feels compulsory for me to field them whenever i try to built a solid SAA list.
