So, I actually played my second online mission. It was against a guy running Yu-Jing. He went first, and deployed first. It didn't click what the piece was on the side of the table when he said Su-Jian. I set my Ryuken9, prone on top of a bld, and my Core Fire team on that side, as well as my HVT. I'm sure you can see where this is headed. When that Voltron Changing MoFo came barrelling up the table he killed so much stuff. It wiped out most of the Fire team, pinned down my Kuroshi Rider and wiped out my Ryuken 9. What do we have to answer that? Any pieces in ARO? I feel the best answer would have been to put my Oniwaban in infiltration, right next tot that thing and traded pieces. i lost 2-10, I didn't expect to win, but didn't expect to lost about half my orders before I even moved. TM ────────────────────────────────────────────────── GROUP 1 10 1 KUROSHI RIDER Lieutenant Combi Rifle + Light Flamethrower / Breaker Pistol, AP + Shock CCW. (0 | 33) KEMPEI (Multispectral Visor L2) Shock Marksman Rifle / Pistol, CCW, Electric Pulse. (1 | 25) KEISOTSU Missile Launcher / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 14) KEISOTSU HMG / Pistol, Knife. (1 | 17) KEISOTSU (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10) KEISOTSU (Forward Observer) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 10) RYŪKEN (Forward Deployment L2, ODD) Submachine Gun, Antipersonnel Mines, D-Charges / 2 Breaker Pistols, Knife. (0.5 | 24) ONIWABAN Submachine Gun, Nanopulser / Pistol, Monofilament CCW. (0 | 37) NINJA Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Tactical Bow / Pistol, DA CCW, Knife. (0 | 29) TOKUSETSU EISEI Doctor (MediKit) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 14) YÁOZĂO Electric Pulse. (0 | 3) GROUP 2 3 1 1 KEMPEI (Chain of Command) Boarding Shotgun / Pistol, CCW, Electric Pulse. (0 | 21) KEISOTSU Hacker (Hacking Device) Combi Rifle / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 17) HÙSÒNG Yaókòng HMG / Electric Pulse. (1.5 | 25) YOJIMBO Contender, Nanopulser, Smoke Grenades, CrazyKoalas (2) / Pistol, DA CCW. (0 | 21) 6 SWC | 300 Points Open in Infinity Army
There's a reason I usually run both Saito and an Oniwaban in most of my lists, theand park them in the midfield. Makes it easy to go after any enemy heavy hitters once their turn ends. Very few things can keep out or TO Camo CC fighters, and the Su Joan is just as vulnerable there as anything else. Just be sure to add smoke to the mix, or come at it from it's rear arc. Other than that, it can outshoot most of our ARO troops if we haven't had a chance to get Suppressive fire up, so hiding is always valuable. If it charges you on roodtops, linked Keisotsu should be hitting on 16s, so you have a good chance of defending yourself and slowing its ability to plow through your whole backline before it's turn ends. Yojimbo's Koalas are also helpful vs a turn one rush... The Su Jian can Dodge easily, but ever Order spend Dodging is an Order it isn't killing.
Yeah, he ran right thru my Anti-personnel mine, shrugged off the damage with a nicely spiked roll. The amount of destruction that model can deal out is glorious and frustrating at the same time. I did mess up and plant my Oniwaban on the other side of the board. He held the Su-Jian for last, i didn't do that w/my Oniwaban.
I hate to say this without seeing the board, but this sounds like you had a lot of models exposed. Yes, I know transformer kitty can do some weird shit coming off the walls, and takes a LOT of killing (more than those geishabots, the Karakuri). But this really sounds like you deployed poorly and he took advantage of that.
What hurts me the most is comparing Su-Jian to Daiyokai :-P But yeah, Su Jian is crazy good....Domaru + Tanko fireteam worked for me, but that requires a kind of crazy opponent...
When I rambo with Su-Jian I usually end up in the opponent deployment zone unless there's a sufficiently dangerous ARO piece (like a TAG with plasma sniper rifles). Su-Jian aren't naturally stealthy, and you're criminally low on hacking for taking on Yu Jing (whose HI are no longer saturated with Stealth). A Chaiyi and a Weibing for Repeater coverage and an extra AHD and you should be able to stop it or at least force it to Cautious Move. Taking out a Su-Jian can be as costly as most of your orders and a Ninja, depending on if you really need to kill it or just want to bind it, spending on extra order on the Ninja to walk into the back arc to avoid the flamethrower could be a good idea. Engaging isn't a bad idea, especially the travel form is a mewling kid in CC and JSA in general is more along the lines of an elder dragon in CC, though the Su-Jian does have Climbing+ so make sure you both are 100% on how the Engage placement is meant to work. Also, those Keisotsu should be a pain in the arse for the Su-Jian to handle if you can set them up far back and defensively. Particularly the MSR and ML will give a Su-Jian pause, 'cause they haven't got that much ARM that they can just ignore two DA or EXP shots at high DAM.
Yeah my deployment was not great I did not have that wide open lane covered properly. I honestly have been reading up on that model for my YuJing army, but when he was going over the models, it just didn't click over. I did have the Keisetsu Team behind cover, but not enough. My buddy told me after our match, hold the Oniwaban as my last model, and after he had placed Su-Jian as his last model, I should have placed the Oniwaban on that side of the table, so I could reveal behind him, and kill it with the monofilament blade. Like place it about ten inches up the board on that side, in cover, and after the Su-Jian ran by it, take it out. Image shows deployment...also, huge mistake having my Keisetsu Missile Launcher start in prone. My buddy said he should be up, to throw down an ARO to slow down Voltron cat.
To be fair though, Anti HI Hacking isn't exactly JSA's strong point with the Ninja being brutally expensive for it...
Expensive yeah, but when you hack a dude virtually and then hack him apart in quick succession, you realize it's probably worth it.
Wip 12 Keisotsu isn't a great option, and unless you get some repeaters out there, you'll need to have a clear lane of advance for that AHD Aragato to get to that TAG....which usually isn't that easy, and way harder than most other options other factions have out there (mainly infiltrating Camo options and the likes) I'm not saying it can't be done, but I'd say it's not exactly JSA's strong point.
I love cheerleaders with repeaters and troops with AHDs as an added layer of protection. Preferably AHDs in marker state. If my opponent is going to Rambo with something terrible it's usually hackable. Some factions simply don't have the ARO power to straight up stop certain tactics.
Your buddy is right on. Your Oniwaban should almost always be a reserve model if you're taking it, and you should be deploying him to punish overextending rambo pieces if you're going second. (If I was going first and I saw a Su-Jian going down, I would do whatever I could to surprise attack it to death on turn 1.)
A great thing about this game, you get smashed by something once, you remember, and try and nullify it next time you see it. Of course that doesn't mean something else won't' pop up and smash you in its place. I told myself not to be too critical of my own play, give it at least 6 months of just learning the game, my army, and what I see across the table. Then maybe ratchet it up, depending on comfort level.
The 'appropriate level' of self-criticism for me is not repeating whatever I did that got me stomped last time. Your level may vary, but anything more self-negative than that is definitely counter-productive. And I strongly recommend playing a few 300pt focus games, where you take all CC models on both sides and no heavy weapons, or you take lots of electronic hacking and repeaters etc. Besides, Domaru or Daiyokai beating on Ajax or Achilles is great fun.