Infinity - Escalation League Round 3

Round two of the Vanguard Escalation League has come to an end now (with both a strong victory and a crushing defeat for me) which means it's time to step up to some proper games. This is the first round to be played at a 'normal' points value and with the full rules.

Hacking is the last part of the game to be introduced and has the potential to play a big part in games of Infinity because it serves as a way to keep the stronger units in the game (Heavy Infantry and TAGs) in check. I'm sure all the players will find creative uses for this new suite of abilities.

The round three missions are below.

I don't often just put pics of new releases... but damn I just want to paint this guy! - Image from Corvus Belli

A Change of Scenery

Caught up in a moment of madness I made a dreadful mistake. One that, in the months since, I have come to regret. I based all my Chaos forces using brown flock. What in the Realms of Chaos was I thinking?

The original idea would be to make them seem more 'evil', as if all life near them simply wilted away. But I have quite a gritty (unkind commentators might say 'dingy') painting style as is and I appear to have forgotten how much I needed the brighter basing to make the models stand out.

I also want to be able to freely move models and units between my different armies so having a cohesive basing scheme for all my troops would be beneficial. Especially as  now have some foundry humans that I want to be able to move freely between good and evil forces.

Meet my metaphorical guinea pig, the Chaos Hero Sally Forth.

Sally, say hello to my readers.

Infinity - Escalation League Round 2

The first round of the Vanguard Escalation League has been well received with 8 people having completed the first round missions. It's been great to have people down playing (multiple times) each week and everyone seems to be getting to grips with the game.

A lot was learnt by new and experienced players alike. In particular Stealth and Suppressive Fire have had huge impacts on all of our games and finding ways to to deal with these abilities has been key.

So with the new round kicking off on Monday, I present to you the Round 2 missions.

Two new Alguaciles join the fray and a Spektr lurks in the background...

Painting the Enemy

This is embarrassingly overdue, but I've finally started painting up my Nomads from Icestorm. I want to get the entire force completed for the Excelsior Infinity Day I'll be running on 7th February where it will be one of the available demo armies - along with my Aleph, Haqq and PanO. If you are in the Bristol area on that day then please do come down and say hi!

I started work on the female alguacile first because she has a more 'open' pose, with her arms outstretched. The two male models have their guns held in both hands across the front of their bodies which makes painting trickier.

Sorry that the gun is a little out of focus though - it was a bit of a photography fail and I used terrible lighting. I'm going to get a lightbox of some kind sorted out soon. Also, I managed to leave a horrible mould line on the front of her right boot which I hate myself for a bit...

She needs a name, any ideas?

Medic!

Vanguard's Escalation League is kicking off on Monday which means I've got to get some painting done on the Haqqislam that I'll be using. I want to make a commitment to having a fully painted force at each stage of the Escalation League.

That's a fairly gently pace of painting that will hopefully give me enough time to also paint more stuff for the demo games I'll be running at Excelsior Bristol on the 7th of Feb. I've got a bit of a head start as I have a few troops already painted, but there is no time for complacency.

Haqqislamite doctors are known to be the best in the Human Sphere and so I really wanted her, and her little robot buddy, in my starting force. Hopefully being able to patch up my troops fairly reliably will make up for my lack of Heavy Infantry.

A fireteam of Ghulams on patrol.

N3 Aleph at a glance

The long awaited N3 PDFs have finally been released. Of course the first thing I had to do was check out how Aleph were shaping up in the new edition. I've listed all the profile changes I've spotted below the jump and then I've done a write up of the biggest winners and losers of N3.

Where I don't mention a profile, it is unchanged.

Infinity N3 is here - everyone crash the servers!

List of the Week - No SWC Aleph

Well, it seems like the N3 profiles are a little way off yet so rather than delay this series any further I thought it might be interesting to push some list creation boundaries.

A while back myself and some friends had a discussion about whether lists without any SWC (special weapons cost) were viable. It would have to be a list without any minelayers, hackers, HMGs, Spitfires, Sniper Rifles, Chain of Command, Rocket/Missile launchers and other neat toys that we would otherwise take for granted.

On the other hand you have things like Fidays, Multi Rifle HI, monofilament mines, link teams and most specialists still to work with.

This list has been on the back-burner for a little while, but with the N3 buffs to shotguns and combi rifles I think now might be the time to bust it out...

Artwork from Infinity: Human Sphere