Toaha listbuilding for a 400 point direct action tournament

Got a tournament coming up. It's a weird one - 400 points and all direct action missions. Frontline, transmission matrix and biotechvore. I note that CA have a massive advantage in this mix. Biotechvore and the high points count mean you really need to bring a lot of link teams, TAGs and HI. But in transmission matrix that means you're going to be getting E-drone exiled all the time. I only have my Tohaa, and this mission mix happens to be quite good for Tohaa provided you don't run into the E-drone. Note that transmission matrix and frontline are both amazing for Chaksa auxiliars with baggage, flamers and sensor for 10 points. Onwards, to my lists!

Totally Crit Open (TCO) tournament report

Went to another tournament last week and managed to bag 3rd place with an undefeated performance (an amazing 2 draws out of 3 rounds though!). It was a limited insertion event with Frontline, Looting and Sabotaging and Decapitation. A classic "joint operations" mission selection that doesn't actually require any specialists (which is fine, just misleading of CB). I did no playtesting for this tournament as I had War of the Worlds the week before. I intended to use this tournament as a chance to get three games in with the Gorgos (hence art below) and try out Neema in decapitation. I ended up using my decapitation list in Frontline as well, so I used her a fair bit. Thoughts below.

Playtesting stuff from Tohaa

These are some things that have turned up in playtesting or that I want to playtest.

Tournament report: War of the Worlds

Played a one-day tournament in England over the weekend (I'm here on a fellowship). Good fun. Was at the top of the table at the end of round 1, on the top table at the end of round 2 after a frustrating narrow victory, and then broke one of my tactical principles and bombed the last round in a mirror match-up to finish mid-table. All the games were pretty interesting and more or less confirmed the direction I've been heading with Tohaa to date. Got another tournament next week that is limited insertion and a great opportunity to test the Gorgos. Will post my thoughts for that in a sec. First, the missions and lists for this tournament.

Thoughts on how to play Tohaa

A brief guide to playing Tohaa

I've now played maybe a dozen games with the artichokes and it's starting to come together. I've had mostly wins (not so much because of sublime play, but because Tohaa are really good) and the last few have started to feel quite smooth. Thought I'd write up my observations thus far. 

Tohaa listbuilding for a one-day tourney

I've got a tourney coming up featuring the following 3 missions with standard season 9 rules: transmission matrix, hunting party and comm centre. I think this is a pretty good mix for Tohaa, but it does throw up some interesting trade-offs. To the analysis!

I have played against this Tohaa army and it is staggeringly beautiful (by Tom Schadle miniatures)

An attempt at an updated list of 'what you need'

When I first got a handle on Infinity I wrote down things that I thought a good list wanted to have. These were pretty vague, like 1-3 principle attack pieces, 2-3 secondary attack pieces, 3-5 specialists (preferably infiltrating with camouflage), MOD stacks (especially smoke shooting), a HMG attack piece, orders, a link team (or two), and a mix of range bands.

This is an attempt to update that list for more advanced play. This is the kind of thinking that I use to inform my listbuilding for tournaments nowadays. I came 5/60 at the national championships this year, only losing to the guy that came 3rd and it really could have gone either way. Other tournament I played I came 3/19, so I reckon I know what I'm talking about. Still a lot to learn though.

Best lists in Infinity

This is a brief overview of what I consider to be some (there are certainly some hidden gems) of the most powerful builds in Infinity.

First, a summary list in no apparent order:

My thoughts on Infinity's 'Intent' pseudo-rule

The notion of "intent" is a dividing line between various infinity communities in Australia. As a TO, I thought I should clarify my thoughts on it. I would be interested in any comments other people have. 

How to XCOM2 (Ironman)

I finished XCOM2 on Ironman (lvl2 difficulty) the other night. It was my third play through. I think I might go for two more over - one more ironman where I try to complete as many trophies as possible (including running an all psi team with no equipment in the final mission) and then once through on the hardest difficulty but with saves. There will probably be a long lag before I try that, so in the meantime I wanted to write-up how I play. A lot of these tips (notably the scout + killzone combo) I oddly haven't come across in many 'how-to-play' guides.

How to play Onyx

When you've got a mission mix that needs a take-all-comers all-rounder list, look no further than the Onyx Contact Force. Straightforward to play, full of nasty tricks, robust to most of other peoples' tricks and capable of winning any mission against any opponent. Here's how I play them, with particular attention to deployment.

First up, the list(s).

Vanilla Yu Jing lists

Got a tournament this weekend and I'm thinking of taking Vanilla Yu Jing (I change my mind a lot). YJ was my first faction and I really want to represent vanilla - I hate link teams; I think they basically ruin the game. YJ is perfect for that because their sectorials suck. They also got huge boosts from the last few mercenary release as they plug YJ's main weakness - shit defence. As such, they take advantage of the vanilla bonus (mercs) better than any other faction. Without further ado, lists! Note that I am writing this before the tournament; things might change.

Some Bakunin playtesting

Strikezone Wotan is in full swing, but we've got a tournament coming up at the end of July (to coincide with the end of the campaign), so being the competitive schmuck that I am, I'm busy playtesting. I want to run Onyx, but my mate is probably going to be using those models, so I will likely be running Bakunin so my Nomads can finally get a run in a tournament. Below I discuss some lists:

Building the Canyon Table

This is my primary Infinity table. Ain't she a beauty? This post will explain how I built this thing.

Preliminary Tohaa lists

Some stuff to start playtesting. I typically build one list for ground control missions and one for missions that require a few more specialists. Season 8 (TAGline) does not have missions that require specialist spam (like beacon race), but it does include highly classified, which requires it's own list.

Esoteric Infinity insights yielded by recent playtesting 1

This is a catalogue of some stuff that playtesting has thrown up lately, just so I don't forget.

Review of Tohaa Units (initial planning)

I'm going to the UK for a few months at the end of the year and need to take a faction that doesn't require a lot of models. I was tossing up between shock army and Tohaa. Tohaa seem more powerful, so I'm going with that. I'm not looking forward to painting these bastards. I thought I'd start my tactical journey by jotting down my initial thoughts on each unit:

Nomad Listbuilding for CanCon

Here is the thinking I used to inform my list-building for Nomads at CanCon2017. I found that frontline, firefight and supremacy went together, so 1 list for them, and separate list for supplies and Antenna field. I found that firefight dictated list building among the first 3, whereas Antenna field absolutely dominated listbuilding among the second 2 missions. Later on I realised that the list that I had for frontline, firefight and supremacy was actually fantastic for supplies, so I ended making a list just for Antenna Field.

Psst...hey kid...want some white noise?