Just Play's ITS.

So I am back after a two week hiatus. A quick bit about myself as I never really introduced myself on this blog. I have been unemployed since last November so have had all the time in the world to do all of the Infinity related projects, build a table, paint a table, do two entire factions fully painted up, go to every tournament I can get to and of course keep on top of this blog. In fact, to post every Friday was this new year's resolution and I am normally pretty good at keeping to them. I am currently in the recruitment process of joining the Royal Navy's diving squadron. I quit my last job working at Yorkshire Water in November 2015 so I could train for my diver assessment, but didn't hit it hard enough and on the trip away to sunny Scotland I failed my BFT ( Battle Fitness Test ) by 13 seconds god damn it! I totally blame the 3 week holiday to Japan right before. Japanese eat pretty healthy but being the big stupid giajin that I am, I was having about 5 meals a day so it didn't really balance out! Anyway I got my papers from the MOD through in the post and my next assessment is in October. Being so far away I went and got a job. My previous employment was shift work so I still got a lot of free time but this new gig is 9 to 5. HOW THE HELL DO PEOPLE DO IT?! Its an alright job but does not leave much time for Infinity between working and the gym. I have also been playing as much Infinity as I can recently as I seem to have stumbled onto some good tactics and am doing quite well on the international rankings. I keep getting 1st then this Epsolon921 keeps snatching it back. I will find you Epsolon921 and I will settle this once and for all! Anyway, point is I am back and will hopefully be getting a post out every Friday if I can. I have lots of things to talk about, new Morat force I wish to discuss, lots of events planned including a tournament I am putting on myself, new units and of course all the new rules.

That's me with my new book.

Back to the recent event we went to. I went to Liverpool with Laina and Pete. Also known on the forums as . . . Laina and Lilith. This was a small event put on by the guys who run the gaming store Just Play. A few familiar faces and really good tables. They had been in contact with some of the guys who are putting on the Northern Open and decided to run the same missions so we could practice. I was in two minds about this as I will never turn down practice but this did also mean that if anyone went to both events they would see my list. But kind of didn't matter as most of it is in camo anyway and I am also really predictable so what ever.

Missions:

* Seize the Antennas
* Cold Sleep
* Emergency Transmission

As you can see all these missions are about grabbing objectives, so a lot of specialists are needed. Normally I would post pics of my list but as I said don't want no sneaky sneaky research by the enemies of the superior Aradinian empire snooping about.

Game one: Seize the Antennas

First game was against a lovely chap named James Hilton-Scott with a rather nicely painted force as you can see in some of the pics. I had seen him about before at other events but not had a game. He was running a fun list and using the original pain train, that's right 5 Brigada stomping about as if they owned the place. James chose to go first so I chose sides and set up. This was perfect as I pretty much always want to go second in a mission like this so I got everything I wanted. His set up was short. 3 wild cats and 5 Brigada all behind a building. Simple enough, he was going first and knew no templates could hit him right away. I had a lot of camo so did the standard thing of having all my line troops hidden at the back covering every approach, few snipers on rooftops and about a bajillion markers scattered about the board. James' first turn was not surprising really. He moved his 5 man link from hell up the table. The hardest part for me was holding back and restraining myself from shooting back. He took out my grunt sniper quick time with his HMG, then wasted an order to try and discover one of my markers but failed. Realizing I was not going to  be silly and reveal everything at one time, he dropped his Tomcat onto the board now that the sniper was not watching certain sections. I did get a free shot with a metro and missed. He then tried to run away and he was getting dangerously close to my LT so I had to pop out a Chasseur and blast that bad guy away. After this failed attempt at taking some orders away the pain train moved forward but this time I was ready. I waited until he was right in the open. A mine triggered two hard cases shot, a Chasseur and a Cateran. The mine took off a wound, the two shot guns did 3 wounds with their spray and the Cateran missed. Now he was standing in the open facing 4 ARO's and two more camo markers still hidden. After this his LT broke away from the Link to try and take down the Cateran but I was lucky and got a crit and took him out with one precise shot to the face. 

Next it was my turn and to cut a long story short I ganged up on the brigade with my Spetsnaz. I say ganged up even though it was 4 against 1 because the Spetsnaz is probably the most powerful unit for his points in the game full stop. OK, a Swiss Guard or Charotnid are better but this dude comes in a 38 points and is one of the few guys who can take on a link all by himself. And he did. And it was beautiful. 

To cut a long game short not much happened for a few turns, but in my next go Uxia ran up the table dropping smoke, then her buddy Chasseur ran up behind her and dropped mines right in front of his few remaining Wildcats. I had all the objectives but one brave wildcat ran at the objective and made a WIP check in the last order triggering the mines but getting the objective anyway. 

I couldn't even get onto the objective with these guys in the way.

That's it step into the open for me!

"Not so tough now you are all by yourself huh Mrs Brigada"

Game 2: Cold sleep

Well game two was interesting. I played a chap named Mark O'Brien, one of the local players and on top of that one of the good ones, so I obviously had to beat the pants off of him. We played on a new themed board that was a sort of supply pick up on a train line. Something rather reminiscent of the first rail roads in the wild west. I lost the roll and Mark decided to go first. He was using vanilla Aleph so lots of hard line troops backed up by two total reaction HMG remotes. 1st turn was awesome for me. I stripped him of two orders and hid like a coward. Except for one unit, my Cateran half way up a church roof. It worked really well as I could see the entire board and having mimitism negated the no cover for climbing up a wall. He literally couldn't do anything. It cost Mark 3 orders trying to spot him and failing. Add this to the 2 he was denied that was half an order pool gone on literally nothing. He did manage to get his Myrmidon with a Spitfire right into my line and took out a 112 and grunt sniper on his travels. After that he went into suppression in cover so I was at -12 to hit it. The mission was very objective heavy but we both put down two camo markers either side of the two main objectives so were both afraid of moving in close.

My first turn was pretty good. I took an Imrandhino to this event. I am really not a fan of extremely impetuous. Yeah you get a free order but you have no control over it and don't ever get cover so whats the point? People kept telling me to try this guy so for 8 points I though I would give it a go as he is an engineer. I was lucky enough to roll for an AP rifle on the booty chart so used him to take out some net rods. I didn't want to lose a specialist but on the same merit I really did not want an ODD Spitfire wielding baddie all up in my deployment, so decided to sacrifice the Imrandhino to chain rifle him... except it wasn't a sacrifice as he got one hit from his suppression that I passed and he failed his ARM roll to a chain rifle and died. GREAT SUCCESS! I then took out one of his total reaction remotes with my Cateran on the roof and got rid of a few order monkeys. I figured out who his LT was right at the back but didn't want to try and brave getting him as he had a remote next to him with a heavy flamer.

Mark was out for blood after this. He had lost a lot of orders to the superior Ariadna gunishment, pumping pretty much everything into his total reaction remote he pushed up the board and took out 4 of my guys. Its all good, plenty more where they came from. After that two guys moved closer to his nearest objectives and secured them.

Ok I did it again. Was so angry at myself the entire way home. My Imrandhino ran over to the Myrmidons corpse and scavenged his spit fire. It really was his lucky day - he managed to get himself an AP rifle and Spitfre for free. I am sure they will fetch a pretty price on the black market. He then ran forward and took out a total reaction bot and another Myrmidon. Next the Spetsnaz burst onto the scene and i'm telling you now HE REIGNED DOWN FIRE! Just destroyed everything in his sight! The idea was to keep a few things alive and just completely mop up in last turn. I had 17 orders left and 6 specialists on the table. One was Uxia right next to an objective. But you know what I did it again. I DID IT AGAIN. I put the enemy in retreat... by 2 points. It was the saddest day ever. 2 points. That was all she wrote. His softec scooted forward and nabbed the main objective putting him in a major victory. Now not to say Mark was not a good player, but he had very few orders and I had 17 regular, 3 specialists in camo by objectives, pretty much complete table control as what he had left was hiding and I also had all my big toys left. When will I learn, right?

Man of the match for the opponents he took on.

Dr. Useless did nothing again except die.

This little guy was pinned down for the entire game by a T2 sniper.

Game 3: Emergency transmission

Having lost and not being put on the top table my last game was chill. I was playing a Pan O player called Andy Phizacklea, who I think had literally played about 5 games before. He worked at the store and was getting into Infinity, so most of the game was us taking it slow and going through rules. I wont call him a cheesy bastard as he was very new but he did run a Cutter, Father knight and Croc man. His cutter legged it right into my lines. and I mean basically touching my back line. He then blasted his HMG over and over and over into 4 of my line troopers and they repeatedly dodged every single shot.

In my first turn I ran a Chasseur behind him and let rip with the flamer. He did pass 4 dodge saves in a row, but as soon as this failed and his bloody TO was gone my Spetsnaz popped out and hit him 3 times. Unfortunately for Andy he failed all 3 rolls and the mighty war machine collapsed. It was pretty cinematic as after this my Imrandhino engineer ran over and pulled all the cybernetic cables out the back of his neck and got me my data card of Coupe de grace. I like to imagine both the Chasseur and Imrandhino standing in front of it scratching their heads then the Imrandhino saying "Sod it yank em all out" then proceeding to pull out every wire in sight.

Andy's next turn was slightly eventful. His father knight ran out only to be confronted by a Cateran. Being new to the game he did not know that in the active turn when you dodge you don't get the 2 inch move so he was stuck in the open staring down a superior warrior! He did fall but made a good effort passing one save and one dodge but eventually falling to the T2 ammunition.

We were running out of time at this point so in my last turn with nearly 20 orders just nabbed all I needed to to get a major victory and we called it a game. I hope to see Andy at next month's event and see how much he has gotten on with the rules, especially as HS3 has just dropped. I didn't get any pics of my last game as we were spending most of the time going over rules and units but I did manage to get some cool shots of others games. I managed to come second in the end. Best loser isn't bad I guess but I am hungry for that Krakot model as I am just starting my Morats and they are AVA 3 so want to scoop up as many as I can!

Liverpool ITS at Just Play Games.

Last week Pete, myself and Oliver got in the car nice and early to check out this new venue 'Just play Games' in Liverpool. We picked up Greg along the way in Manchester and we all went off on our merry way. The event was our second ITS this season so we were all keen to go and kick some butt. The venue was unique as they didn't stock any products; it was purely a gaming space. Located near the city centre of Liverpool it was tucked away on the 4th floor of an office block. The venue was nice and the guys had clearly made a lot of effort with terrain. I did take some photos of the tables but forgot to focus the camera so they were all useless - oops. I took my standard style list that consisted of lots of crap then a few good units and a decent amount of camo. Oliver took his Steel Phalanx, Pete took his Scottish and Greg busted out his Tohaa. I wanted to take some new units that I had not used very much. I threw in Van Sant and swapped out my Tankhunter HMG for an Auto cannon in one game. Other than that pretty samey, except I didn't use many skirmishers like I normally do. Here are my two lists below.

List 1

Order pool 1

 **that Hard Case and Tankhunter are also providing 2 camo markers I forgot to put them down as I was in a rush**

Order pool 2

List 2

Order pool 1

Order pool 2

Game 1: Front line

 First game of the day was front line. This mission is all about points not specialists so I used my first list as it didn't have that many in it. I played a lovely fella called Raja who was running a Morat list. Now I have only played Morats one time and I know they have bugger all tricks and hit as hard as a brick in a pillow case applied to the face. I chose to go second so ended up setting up first. Raja was a little new to the game and only played the same few opponents, but his first force was Ariadna so he had that going for him in this match. I set up first putting everything on roof tops and had them stay prone. Decided he would not have many orders so I could just pop up and blast him from afar when he had to try and creep close. Raja set his models up in a massive clump. When I asked if he was done and ready to start he said "yes" and I thought he was taking the piss. I thought this for one reason: He had everything in a big clump and two Sogarat right next to each other. Little did I know you could take two of the things and link them with a special character. Turn one was good for me - I stripped him of two orders for a start. I also managed to get my Uxia right up in his face prone on a roof top. Having no idea what it was but knowing it could be a flamer, he had to try to do something as his entire force was just sitting right there. Raja moved forward with a Daturazi, then downed smoke to avoid getting a sniper round in the chest. The Daturazi then stood in the smoke and tried to intuitive fire with a chain rifle . . . 6 times. He failed them all but the last. I wanted Uxia alive but I will 100% trade her for 7 orders out of an order pool thank you very much. My turn I didn't do lots. I popped out my Tankhunter, smashed in a few Morats and my Cateran had a sniper battle against something wielding a Panzerfaust. Took 4 orders but managed to clear it off the roof eventually. Turn two Raja pushed forward but didn't have that many orders left. Raja moved his Sogarat link at full strength right up to my deployment and just sat there like a Billy big bollocks! I needed to do something, so blasted them to bits with my Tankhunter. He had previously gone down to a lucky ARO but I keep a doctor spare in each order pool for such an event. I spent about 6 orders running across the table just to get him up but it was worth it. The HMG splatted one of his Sogarat to pieces from behind. Unsporting I know but this was Ariadna turf and the alien menace needed to be eradicated! I then took out his character keeping them together. Then came the most stupid thing I have ever done in a game EVER. I asked Raja how many points he had left as by now he had 1 Sogarat and two line troops. It came to about 80 points so I said "I will stop shooting you there then so I get my last turn and you don't go into retreat" then I went of to get a coffee and must have seen something shiny and got distracted. I then looked down and went "Ooooh I have one irregular order left from my Cateran . . .Fuck it I will shoot your Sogarat. Might as well". I HAVE NO IDEA WHY I DID THIS AS I KNOW I GAVE HIM A T2 rifle so its not like I was planning on giving him one wound to soften him up a little. But that's not even the best bit because right after I rolled I got 2 crits . . . not one but two! So yeah I instantly gave him 4 wounds and he was taken off the table. Then I realized what I had done and the game was pretty much over :( I did get a minor victory as I secured his HVT and had the middle of the table but was not the big win I was looking for :(

Yep, two snipers on a roof with a doctor.

 Briscard surveying the battle field. He did nothing in this game just gave me an order.

 What kind of set up is this? One that's about to blitzkrieg one half of the board.

 That's Uxia on the roof chewing up the enemies orders.

 This guy was the man of the match. He smashed in over half the enemy by himself. I think I am starting to like this guy more than the Swiss Guard HMG.

 Bold as brass! These guys are not something I would run in a list, but they were fun to go up against and I can see the fun in using them.

Nice one Cateran, you lost me the game with your god damn double crits.

Game two: Supremacy 

Game two I was faced up against Oli. This was a little unfair on him as I know exactly what models he has in his force and he had a butt load of ODD. This is good for most people but I had a few flamers up my sleeve so was not scared at all. Also I had won my game and he had lost his first, so the match ups were a little off. Oli made me go first. I am not used to this but I had to do it with 2 of my games that weekend so was a little out of my comfort zone. This was just one of those bad match ups. I managed to get my USA grunt roll and just plonked it right in front of his ODD link. I knew she would die but was well worth knocking out that link or at least making it easier for someone else to shoot later on. This was a rather uneventful game. I shot then hid, then Oli had to creep up the board. I did now put my Briscard on the offensive and made him run up the table. Usually he just sits on his bum and occasionally gets off a shot or two. He shot at a link of Myrmidons and did naff all, but at least I had him in a better position now. Van Sant ran on the back line and took out a guy with a missile launcher and a little remote generating an order. He then died to ARO and killed exactly the same points he was worth so kind of a waste but also not as I got rid of the biggest long range threat to me. My doctor grabbed a few objectives. I then ran my Autocannon Tankhunter up and blasted at two Myrmidons. I failed both my rolls and he basically got free smoke. I could only see a few guys now so thought "Bugger it I will just knock out what I can to give him as little orders as possible." Then guess what I did . . . Yeah that's right, I put him into retreat and denied myself the last turn AGAIN! I actually feel like such a prick. Two games in a row I did the same thing. I just get excited and go too hard, then scare them off. Its a problem OK! Luckily for me I had just secured an objective so got myself a major victory by 1 point.

 I did manage to get a nice pic of the table. I think it needs a house rule though as I was able to put my LT prone on the tallest roof on the table and make him completely safe.

 One of these things is not like the others.

 This little bugger dropped down and killed my USA sniper. He then went toe to toe in a shotgun battle with my doctor. Luckily for my 112 he had his +1 axe of shooting and won that battle.

 Van Sant was not really the hard hitter I was hoping for in this game. I have used him at two events now and he never gets very far.

 This is a cheesy little trick you can do. Use your HVT as a line of site blocker. Now that the Vet Kazak is prone, it's going to have to take some close quarters fighting to get rid of him. That's not easy when he is as beefy as his and has a flamer. Objective secured.

Back in the box for you you failure!

Game 3: Safe Area

Ahhhh game 3. This was an  . . . interesting game. I came up against Pete. This was not the end of the world but I was a little off for 3 reasons. First off I play Pete like two times a week at least, so was probably as bored of his face as he was of mine. Second he plays a very similar style. Normally 15 - 20 orders and lots of camo. I don't like it when people do things that I do! Lastly Pete is pretty good and know what he is doing. Lots of memorable things happened in this game but I will honestly put it down to a few bad decisions on Pete's side and a few lucky dice rolls. He chose sides and took the one with more cover but less elevation. I instantly put both my snipers on the tallest building prone, giving me cover and complete line of site to basically the entire board. I then passed my USA grunt roll and again plonked it down in front of his link team fronted by Wallace. He had to counter this hard with Uxia as best he could, so she went right down in front of the Grunt to speed bump her and ease up on the flamers hitting his link. This was good for me as I also took Uxia and put her right in front of his lines on the other side of the board. I put her in a place she could get some real good shots off and the only way to stop her was to reveal both his camo units. I wanted them in the open so the Tankhunter could go to work. And he sure did. When everything was tempted out, my Tankhunter ran up the right of the table. HMGs are my fave weapon in Infinity,  Even at short range it's still 4 dice you get and that's enough. He had a bit of a field day and blasted away a good amount of guys and was then in a position to get some good AROs as he was right in the enemy deployment. In Pete's turns he had to just try recover best he could, but knowing I had orders to burn I moved everything forward and put down as many mines as I could. Won't go into much more detail but by the end of it all Pete had left was Wallace on the table and I had managed a Major victory. Check Pete's blog below for his take on the day. No photos of this last game as there was not enough room to get the camera tripod around my side of the table :(

http://straightouttacaledonia.blogspot.co.uk/

So that was that. A good day out. This club are planning on putting on an event every month so will definitely be seeing more of Liverpool in the future. I managed to grab two of those Renegade models in a week so that's always a bonus, as the stats have just been released and they are AV2. Big shout out to the guys at Just Play Games. Here are some pics I managed to get of other forces. Jasper was there (the guy I played in the last round at War zone the previous week) with his nomads. I didn't get any photos last week when we were playing so this counts instead.