I was talking about a long range MSV unit, not heavy weapons there :p The main problem is that either we depend wholly on Dakinis (I am waiting for that special weapons box... and they will probably resculpt the starter soon thereafter), or we get a new unit. Maybe we can get some Danavas-based troop (no hack, just weapons, WP 13-14) since the Devas add very quickly to our total of points. Or, as you say, new bots (your line might be... meh. I'd prefer a STR 2 Size 5 big cuadruped mek). I'm against Feuerbachs, however. Too messy compared to MSR. And I'm probably going to paint them in blues, reds and blacks, for a policial feel against that "black ops" you want. At least some of them... (older dakinis might get a repaint from white to darker colours... mmm)
I'm just jumping ship to vedic (after a ~8 year long stint in the NCA) That really sums up for me a major issue with Vedic, nothing long ranged to take out camo (unless you're talking Marut).
K1 sniper ? The weapon itself is plain bad, that's all. It would probably be worth 1,5 SWC, and even at 1, i still think it would be too expensive for what it does. The dakinis have already the far superior MSR. K1 combi would be nice through, but i would rather see nano or breaker combis, that would feel more "hi-tech" and less "murder". Vedic would still be in a real need for efficient ARO pieces. For now, only the HRL MK4 is a decent ARO troop.
As ARO troop I really like the Zayin with supportware; it solved me a lot of situations. By the way, I am coming back to the hobby after almost a year. Do we know which will be the release period for Vedic?
Not every sectorial needs the same tools to deal with Camo. We have plenty of infiltrators and durable MSV units, plenty of Nanopulsers and high WIP to make use of them. If we could get AVA 3 Lamedhs we could spread very nasty anti-Camo net as well. There's also pretty cheap Deva with Sensor. K1SR is a bad weapon on troops that can't dictate terms of engagement. On Morat Vanguard it sucks. But in hands of Zerat, which can effectively flank armored targets, it'd be another matter altogether. Unit with Marksmanship, like my idea for a combat drone, could use it effectively as well.
Even so. When you have access to MSR, you are basically making the bet your opponent will take an ARM 8+ unit AND will let your K1 shoot at it, just to have slightly more chances of wounding it - and in exchange, you lose a huge efficiency vs other units. For example with dice calc, i took the agema profile vs a guijia, both with only cover, you have: MSR (AP mode): 32,74W (1W) 4,36% (2W) vs 31,54% (1W) K1SR : 35,29W (1W) 5,26% (2W) vs 31,54% (1W) So on armored target, you have a small increase. But vs anything else (ex missile janissary as a average HI with Arm4 BS13) MSR (AP mode): 40,16W (1W) 6,84% (2W) MSR (DA mode): 47,11W (1W) 20,56% (2W) 4,86% (dead) K1SR : 37,49W (1W) 5,76% (2W) So unless you are expecting a jotum or two, you have no reason to prefer K1SR vs MSR. MSR is far better at killing anything low armored (the most of what you'll face), is far better at ARO duty, breaks even at ARM6 and only fall behind vs TAGs, and even there, it is still not that far. And if you can't / don't want to shoot the TAG, you can use it to shoot at his cheerleaders. Since we have access to very good MSR units (MK2, naga, dasyu, the probable team linked dakini), i don't really feel the need for a K1SR.
Need? Maybe not. Interesting way to differentiate between factions and sectorials? Oh yes. I've made a few more calculations, and my previous conclusion stands. What makes or breaks K1SR is its unit's ability to bypass cover. Hence it'd fare better on unit able to outmaneuver its target. And why give it to a unit that can have access to MSR? For the same reason some units have Rifles instead of Combis, Light Shotguns instead of Boarding ones, Feuerbach instead of Missile Launchers and vice versa. For balance and more interesting gameplay. MSR is a general purpose weapon. K1SR is a specialist one. Yes, I'd field it when expecting to face TAGs. But only on a unit that could make good use of it.
I wouldn't field it even if it was worth negative points. It may be somewhat useful against that one TAG, but otherwise it is actively worse than even a Combi Rifle. If they want to give Vedic some interesting weaponry, Feuerbach is always welcome! :) As is Vulkan Shotguns for some fun. But mostly, I'd like more Breaker (or even just Nanotec) Combi Rifles - if they want interesting, give us Viral Assault Pistols. Or, even more interesting, give us another Smart weapon and more access to SatLock. I've been hankering for a SatLock Dakini since forever.
But this is the core of the problem. K1SR is ultra specialised. But when you play an elite army, you need polyvalent troops, because you don't have that many troops to begin with. If you field a specialised model, then that model may prove itself useless. If it's a low cost model in a horde army, that's fine, but this would not be the case in Vedic.
In theory, yes. In practice, most of the time there's no trouble when 1 or 2 of your troops have a specialized loadout. Consider Agema ML. It's a very specialized unit as well, and in sectorial more than vanilla centered around pricy elite characters. Still, it has its place. A 30-something pts TAG hunter would be useful, especially since Vedic troops lack AT.
Kinda, but not really. Vedic can deal easily enough with TAGs via good hacking options. Besides, K1 weaponry is not AT, K1 is just bad. And very, very sad. Besides, Vedic is mirrored in Shasvastii or Aspect-based Combined, not in Morats. Give K1s to ASS.
"deal with it with good hacking options" is the Nomad's shtick! Aleph has good hackers... but hacking requires coverage, meaning orders, meaning you need some degree of spam... and the cheapest non-posthuman hacker is the Danavas at 23 and 25 points (seriously, it's hard to not choose the 25 pts H+ option), and EVO at 25, Naga at 30, Deva at 31... So yeah, good WP value on our hackers, but no cheap option outside the 14pts mk1 hacker/21pts Mk2 hacker posthumans. K1 weaponry is THE Anti-TAG weaponry, it's just that DA gets better odds of inflicting a wound until you reach ARM7 targets (both AP, DA and K1 suffer the ARM bonus from cover, so it's moot to include it in the comparison) when fired from a Dmg15 Sniper rifle. And at ARM 5-6 they are at the same level of efficiency (meaing "expensive" HI and Achilles mostly...), where K1 has a 50% chance of causing a wound per bullet, while AD goes down... and AP covers the gap (Dmg 15 means K1 only wins against Multi Sniper Rifle on ARM 9+... so superheavy TAGs). Essentially the problem is that K1 is fixed at Dmg 12, but costing 0.5-1 SWC when a Dakini uses it I find it interesting, since SWC is hard to come by on Aleph. Were it to cost 1.5 SWC, then it would be fielded only against Jotums, Maruts, and other 90+ pts TAGs (but not the Avatar, considering how the Dakini woud roll at BS 5 due to ODD...). As for saying what vedic is a mirror of... We should wat and see how bloated it gets in the end, since right now it has much more variety than Onyx or Morat, and more or less the same as Shasvastii without being able to field as many camo units.
I refuse to consider Danavas an Aleph unit as she doesn't even have Dogged, much less NWI like real Aleph units. And I'd claim Aleph is on par with Nomads for Hacker quality; we just don't have the coverage or cheapness. But more to the point, to counter a single TAG you don't need best Hackers. You can even do a bit without coverage, since there is a single quite large target to worry about. But that is similar problem faced by K1 weaponry; you still need to maneuver around to get to good angles and good ranges and not to be seen by other enemies, etc. This is especially exacerbated with K1 weaponry since you cannot reliably deal with anything else. Yes, I know the statistics, but they only tell you ideal targets ranges (plus DA still has chance of doing 2 W, while K1 is only ever 1W). I would not field K1 weaponry even if I knew my opponent was bringing double TAG list because it is a pretty useless weapon against EVERYTHING else. That was a minor comment, and it is a mirror in sense that they bring Camo and we bring MSV. But it really isn't much of a point, I admit.
Yeah, DAM12 really hurts K1SR. The Combi version gets a better part of the bargain. But still, it's a tool that has its uses. In the end however the sectorial will be constructed it'll be balanced. We'll just have to wait and see which weaknesses will stay, and which will be removed.
Give her dogged... and she goes to nearly the same cost a Deva Hacker has, sadly. I was hoping for a cheap KHD (18-20 pts), mostly because of the SWC cost... In the end, Vedic has only the Nagas and Dasyus as SWC free hackers -.-U As for the second paragraph, my point exactly. Let's hope that, if the Nomads get new remotes with Zondnautic, we get some new ones too (S5 "microTAG/HI remote", at least).
There is another problem here, the fact that K1SR is stilll a B2 weapon with only 1 wound per dice and about the same range bands as a standard TAG (if you can shoot at a TAG from more than 80 cm, then there is a mistake somewhere). K1 ammo may be designed to kill TAGs, but K1SR is still a very poor design (K1 combi is a good design through). AP HMG, Feuerbach, linked ML, are far better at killing TAGs due to sheer damage potential, meaning less orders spent and less risks taken. And you should take cover into account, because of the simple fact that armor gets better the more you have it, so weapons with the least damages are the most affected. That's why now i prefer using a spitfire to kill TAGs. Yes it seems a poor weapon for that task, and indeed it is, but if you can use it ouside of cover (even if it means you get no cover yourself), you have great chances of winning the f2f AND getting some wounds (around 50% to get at least 1W for Asura vs a Guijia, goes up to 67% with smoke and into 20-40cm).
If K1 is bad with SR, why not a K1 spitfire ? There is at least 1 spitfire with special amo (the gorgos I think with AP) so it won't be too strange and spitfire is one of Aleph standard "heavy" weapon It would be efficient but I don't think it would be overkill. Put on a REM platform (some kind of S5 daikini), it would allow MM lvl 2 supportware making it a very efficient HL/TAG hunter.
I'd go for a lighter chassis for the weapon, though, since a HI remote is already tough enough to give it a 50% of wound on everything if it manages to impact... even at BS12 (low end for HI) we are talking about a troop that, with the expenditure of a single order, gains shock and ignores the -3 to BS from enemy cover... Granted, the shock part won't be very useful, but it would be a MI killer by himself... Besides, I'd prefer a close weapon for a 3 or 5 "man" link, kinda the way of the K1 combi Unidron. The S5 remote would be a lone troop, and I like the idea of going the other way most factions go (S5 HI are the obsolete HI), kinda like YJ with the Yan Huo as a superheavy weapons platform.
I’d love to see a Vedic CC specialist - as I admittedly have the hots for cyberninjas ;) Something unique like a TO infiltrating (or AD) TAG with a couple of G:Sync cyberbeasts (Yeah, I also find the Guardian rule pointless), and give it a K1 Spitfire to boot. Call it Rudra, then make the G:sync cyberbeasts ‘the roar of the storm’ and the K1 Spitfire could be ‘lightning’. And have it whispered, that ‘once the storm hits, the battle is over’.
