Some days I come on the forums and it feels like every non-Tohaa player just wants to toss hate our way. I am sure that many of those players are just having a bit of fun and don't actually mean it seriously. Still I wonder how liked the Tohaa are in general by Infinity players.
I have a love-hate relationship with them; Love the fluff, the models and the way they play but for the love of all that´s holy, I hate painting them xD
I like fighting against them, they are different, Symbiomates can be a little infuriating. I enjoy bullying them though.
Artichokes betray us! Wicked. Tricksy. False. We ought to wring their filthy little necks. Kill them! Kill them! Kill the whole Triad! And then we take their precious Symbiomates and we be the master!
I wish a human faction had a competing bio TAG. I love that so much but I like to play humans aesthetically. I will probably get a small Gorgos focused force some time just so I can say "Deploying Bio-Armor Gorgos! Go!"
At the risk of sounding derivative, I'll offer the following: I don't mind playing against Tohaa. It's one of the more popular factions in my meta and I run into it a lot, so I have had to condition the salt out of the matchup and now I don't mind them nearly as much as I used to. Having said that, I would be much happier with Tohaa as a faction if they got a few new things and in exchange symbiomates got toned wayyyy down, or the units that you could take them with got altered. They are a get out of jail free card like almost nothing in Infinity in that you get to decide to use it after you have seen results. With the obligatory symbiomate complaint out of the way, I like triads a lot as a concept, symbiobombs a lot as a concept, and I think they have some really effective units. I would never play them though, I love hacking too much.
I think you don't have a good scale of bad feelings towards Tohaa. I don't want them to burn, just want them to get mechanics and pricing more in line with the rest of Infinity.
Nah, most people just hate symbio-mates on Mimetism B2 ML or B5 HMG ;P (also eclipse+ CC or Nimbus+ and B2 HFT ;P)
I got over the eclipse and CC combo long ago after I figured out ways to slow it down. That strategy is strong but manageable. I actually don't even mind the symbiomate on Neema or an Ectros nearly as much as I mind it on a Gao Rael or similar. HI being trucks are more reasonable, you probably weren't going to take them down in one shot anyway. They aren't AROing you from outside your good range AND making you win twice to do it.
Better spend that Symbiomate to avoid hurt feelings. As an army, I feel like they are fine, they just have about everything built into them that cancels my favorite playstyle, so playing against them is annoying. Symbiomates on top of Symbioarmor can be very frustrating, especially when you see the points that they are paying for them. They have a neat play style, crazy optimized units, though I'm not a fan of the majority of their models. Had the chance to get their whole range and doubles for super cheap earlier this year, and had to say no, just so I wasn't a Tohaa player. I feel it wouldn't be sporting, don't want to have to learn their names for real, and again, the majority of the models are a real turnoff for me.
Love-hate (I did not vote as none of them quite fit for me). When I was first looking at Infinity, Tohaa were one of the factions I was considering. I liked the concepts behind them and did not mind their minis (I liked them more than most factions). I still think they are a cool concept and I like the idea of having them in the game. Today, I find them a frustrating faction to play against. Every step forward feels like an un-fun, up-hill battle, where I likely take two steps back to achieve it. A 'good' game against Tohaa is where neither of us achieve anything. I feel like HSN3 slightly over-buffed them too. Sure, they are not auto-winning every tournament, but I'm not even playing *in* tournaments. It feels like you are playing a different game with different rules against Tohaa vs everyone else. I am also more than a little sick of the constant "Sakiel box nao!" (why Sakiel over a Taquel anyway, considering you have a couple of Sakiel and zero Taquel?) OK, we get it: you would like some more releases. You are also the faction with the *least* gaps in their roster (you need a new sectorial more than new minis for the existing one) and the constant whining made me lose all sympathy for you a long, long time ago --- it is as bad as whatshisface complaining about Wildcats every couple of weeks for the past however many years. I do not exclusively hate on Tohaa. I like Steel Phalanx even less, as I do not even like their concept or their minis: that sectorial can die in a fire for all I care!
I understand why Tohaa exist. Tohaa are disruptive in terms of playstyle and how you counter them -- it requires players to make sure their list is equipped for a potentially disruptive army, and be ready with specific tactics to play against it. Tohaa almost always require extra orders to kill by shooting (mates, symbiont armor, and being B2 in ARO almost universally are all things that do this) and advantage armies that can just play around them, which I think is one of several reasons playing against Ariadna is so hard for artichokes -- Ariadna also plays unconventionally, and has the least trouble ignoring them, in general (infiltrators with heavy flamers help of course.) This is also one of the reasons I feel like Tohaa tend to perform better in tournament settings than in friendly games. When you know you're going to play against Tohaa, it's really easy to build a list that plays a bit better against them. The problem is that this involves taking units that would be sup-optimal choices in lots of other cases. I think Tohaa players tend to downplay or misunderstand how much of an advantage this is for them in a competitive setting. Always playing in a place where your opponent is playing a suboptimal list to counter you, or playing stuff that isn't good against you, or is playing stuff they aren't very comfortable with. I have some internal design issues with the faction, but primarily my complaints about Tohaa are about what Tohaa does to other armies, rather than internal design. Oh except Sukeuls. Screw those guys.
I have hardly gotten to play against them myself. I really like the symbiomate. It's ok to like something even if it is too strong (which I can't be sure of). I would like them if they are balanced. Maybe not having it on a CoC profile or something would make them better. Or maybe limit them to armor with 2 or more wounds.
Tohaa are a huge chore to play against and practically every unit come with built-in attrition. That little rush you get when you land a hit is gone against Tohaa. That unit is still there and more often than not just as strong as it was. Symbiote Armor needs to be a much bigger part of the units stats. Most of the time it's just armor and BTS. If almost everyone has two wounds then the penalty for losing one needs to be significantly higher. It should be 1 BS, 1 PH, and all the ARM and BTS at minimum. Either that or bring back actual fire vulnerability.
