Qapu Khalki Tactica

I mostly play Yu Jing, Qapu Khalki and Tohaa. Tohaa is a playtesting army, Yu Jing is my campaign army and Qapu is my principle competition faction (Tohaa struggles in some missions). This is a description of my basic approach to playing Qapu.

I use two lists. One for what I call killing or ground control missions (Annihilation, Frontline, Quadrant control) and one for everything else. My ground control list has an infiltrating, camouflaged hacker, so I use it for supremacy as well, which is basically just Quadrant control with a small bell (beep one of three boops, where hackers get a bonus). This hacker (Hawwa), also carries d-charges and infiltrates, which allows her to score the d-charge classified objective with ease. The utility of this unit in this regard means that my ground control list is extremely light on specialists, but can still score all the points available. My other list is for missions requiring specialists. It has 6—not the highest number—but 3 infiltrate, 2 are in link teams and the remaining is very quick, so they can get to objectives. This is plenty for most missions, but just a touch light for emergency transmission and other missions that require specialist saturation (though there are really only 3 such missions). If a tournament has more than 1/3 such missions, I will adjust my list to have more specialists. I am confident in these missions so long as I am not playing against something that really dominates those games, like Ariadna camo spam (even there, if I have bottom of turn 3 I think I’ll be fine with MSV, a big link team and a sensor bot).

I will discuss my lists in detail below, starting with the kill missions list.

List 1 – Kill Missions

GROUP 1

Janissary with HMG

Janissary with boarding shotgun

Janissary doctor (AP rifle + shotgun)

Hafza lieutenant with shotgun/rifle

Hafza FO with shotgun/rifle

Djanbazan with HMG

Kameel remote (baggage, minesweeper)

GROUP 2

Odalisque with Harris Fireteam, rifle + light shotgun, nanopulser

Odalisque with spitfire, nanopulser

Odalisque with boarding shotgun, nanopulser

Hawwa hacker

Yuan Yuan with chain rifle, smoke grenades and AP CCW

You can do a Sekban link instead, but I found that the points don’t come out quite as I’d like (you end up with 7 points leftover, and Qapu have no cheap fillers for less than 8 points). I think the Odalisque team is slightly more appropriate for kill missions anyway because of their resilience, though a B3 heavy rocket launcher helps a lot for ending enemy link teams. You can change the Hawwa to an FO, the Djanbazan to a sniper and put a missile launcher in the Janissary team and thereby get a Sekban link and even points (you get the 8 points needed for a second remote), but a HMG totting Djanbazan is much more effective smoke attack piece than a sniper. I also just fucking love the concept, art and models of Odalisques. I am still playtesting both. 

Remember that I only use this army in annihilation or ground control missions. People tend to focus on killing stuff in these missions. In fact, the most important thing is to stay alive. Therefore, my first tactical principle with this list is to play conservatively. I spend the reactive turn hiding for the most part. My secondary principles are as follows:

Get the link teams into defensible positions in the midfield. Both links teams are saturated with shotguns, 360 visors and sixth sense lvl2. As such, the best place for them to be is in a building. In such cases, it is hard to engage only one member of the link, and you get to use those sweet shotgun range bands. Both teams have good long range weapons to help them get into positions. The Janissaries have huge base BS, so they have an easier time, while the ladies have to be a bit crafty in how they advance (though B5 is handy). With the link team burst bonus, shotguns, visors and sixth sense, being in a bunker makes both teams almost as good on reactive as active, and they are impossible to sneak up on. The Janissaries have a doctor for powerful healing, and solid armour. These guys die hard.

Once you are dug-in in the midfield you can easily spend a single order to distribute quite a large number of points to different quadrants/sections of the board to claim objective points. Your opponent needs to then come to you to stop you from doing this, which plays into your shotgun totting hands. B2 shotguns on base BS16 are very hard to push through with anything, especially because the Janissaries ignore smoke penalties. Your opponent must nonetheless come to get you, because otherwise you can allocate huge numbers of points across zones and easily win the game without ever attacking. This holds for annihilation as well. These teams must be engaged to win, but they are very difficult to engage once they are dug-in. You might ask how you score your own points if you are hiding. The answer is:

Do your killing with the Djanbazan. Smoke/MSV2 allows you to pick off certain targets and engage only those units you can dominate in face-to-face. In most cases with this list, one of my turns (usually turn 1), will involve the Yuan Yuan throwing smoke as part of its impetuous move, and then my Djanbazan moving out to kill something through the smoke with a strong face to face (typically 12s on 4 dice against ~7 on 1 dice). The Yuan Yuan then uses its irregular order to move again and throw another smoke template, after which the Djanbazan moves forward and kills another target. Finally, they both hide so they can do it again next turn.

If you can get a few cheap kills with this smoke play while lodging your link teams in the midfield (the smoke screen helps with that), then you’ve pretty much won, because you have a points advantage that will be hard to turn around owing to the toughness of your link teams.

Use the baggage bots to hold the backfield. On the first turn, maybe even the first two turns, you will probably need to use all your orders to kill stuff or otherwise advance your link teams into the midfield. Your link teams do the quadrant control in these turns. Once they are in the front field, your cheerleaders can do a combined order to advance out of your deployment zone to secure a zone. Until that point they are cheerleaders and should be hidden appropriately.

Use the Hawwa to score your classified objectives. The main objective you want is the doctor one, because the Janissaries will almost certainly have an opportunity and the ability to score it. The other ones that you want are telemetry type cards (spotlight program), d-charges and coup de-grace, in that order, because these can be completed by your Hawwa. He can start within a short move of the target building for d-charges and execute the objective in 2 orders. He can potentially start within a short move of the HVT and execute telemetry with 1 order. Later in the game he can move out to something killed by your Djanbazan and cut heads off. He is also your primary means of securing the HVT if it comes to that, followed by your ladies making a long dash (4-4 moves).

And that’s all there is to it. Open a breach with your Djanbzan and push your link teams through it. Find a nice bunker for them to sit in and then wait for your opponent to sacrifice their units trying in vain to break through your strongpoints. Let’s turn to the objective list.

List 2 – Objective missions

GROUP 1

Djanbazan with HMG

Djanbazan with sniper rifle

Djanbazan doctor

Hafza with spitfire

Hafza lieutenant with shotgun + rifle

Hawwa forward observer with boarding shotgun

Hawwa forward observer with boarding shotgun

Hawwa Hacker with boarding shotgun

GROUP 2

Sekban with fireteam Harris

Sekban with heavy rocket launcher

Sekban doctor

Rafiq Remote (sensor bot FO)

Yuan Yuan with shock CCW, smoke grenades

The Djanbazan link is your main beat stick. These guys are epic wreckers of face. Out of your DZ you throw smoke with the Yuan Yuan and then advance with the sniper, then the HMG, then the Hafza with spitfire, then the shotguns. You have every range band, MSV2 and base BS 15, with extra burst. You also have MSV2, WIP14 and the 4-man discover bonus, so waves of camo tokens don’t bother you much. There are no strong points in the game that can stand up to this link team (except maybe an Avatar in cover), especially as you heal units that fall down with your WIP14 doctor. After opening a breach with MSV2 and smoke, make a bee-line to an objective with your doctor, or find a position where you can hide on the reactive turn and then pop out to command the board on your active turn. Don’t forget the Congo-line formation either, which allows your sniper to exploit their range band.

The Sekbans are principally a vehicle for advancing the doctor to an objective, but they also bring some extra utility. The heavy rocket launcher with B3 is devastating to units that don’t have ODD/Camo, like most TAGs and heavy infantry units like the Guardia, and can solve a problematic link team in a single volley with 3 templates. Just don’t try to use these guys to kill something really substantial, like a TO camo HI, because BS12 with no major MODs is not so sexy. That said, if it comes off you burn off their bonuses.

Your main objective grabbers are the Hawwas. You don’t have an engineer, which is annoying because most of the specialist saturation missions have an engineer bonus, but Kaplan’s just don’t bring enough to justify spending a link team on. If they had Harris fireteam they would instantly replace the Sekbans. In middle ground missions like supplies I will do almost all the work with the link team doctors and the Hawwas will just run interference. In saturation missions the link teams will occupy positions overlooking the objectives and provide covering fire for the Hawwas, who will do the heavy lifting. With WIP 14 they are reliable specialists, and the boarding shotguns make them effective at the close quarters skirmish combats that develop around objectives.

The Rafiq remote serves two functions. First, it has sensor for Ariadna. This allows the Djanbazans to go down the strong flank and use the 4-man bonus and MSV2 to discover camouflaged units while the Sekbans move behind the Rafiq sensor down the weak flank. Second, it can grab things around your DZ, for example in seize the antennas. I often use it as a cheerleader until the final turn. In a pinch it can charge forward with 6-4 to objectives.   

That’s pretty much it. The things that both lists are lacking a little are cheeleaders (though the Hafzas and links make up for it) and a TO: camo unit, but they are really not so important compared to two link teams. Qapu Khalki doesn’t do anything fancy. It just puts good units on the board that are better quality than everything else, with all the tools to win.