Those of you who play infinity, how do you find it? What do you play?

[Too Bo Coo]

These guys

1 haqqislam Hassassin Fiday - Boarding Shotgun
2 merc  Yuan Yuan
3 yujing Keisotsu Butai - Missile Launcher
4 Kamau - Light GL
6 panoc Auxilia
7 yujing  Domaru Butai - Chain Rifle
8 haqqislam  Najjarun Engineers
10 yujing      Hac Tao - Missile Launcher
11-12 haqqislam hafzas
13 aridna      4éme de Chasseurs (the braid is missing)

[chromedog]

That's an eclectic collection of figures.

Whilst I do have the odd model not a part of any of my armies, they are rare (I've got one ariadnan in a giggle hat and grenade launcher) the rest of my stuff mostly is for the armies I play. 

Except for the TAGs.  I own geckos even though I don't play nomads. 

[nic-e]

totally meh.tried it several Times over the Years it's way to busy,too many too heavily specialised Models.i bought a Bunch Models from a Faction which i liked and ended up with a complete useless/unplayable Faction...

Also the Game is absolutely no Fun.You have to stay focused all the Time or you lose Track of whats going since your Opponent has the Chance to react (Move/Shoot/use Special Gear/Hack)...which Active Turn is it again?

Tons of special Rules,Modifiers,Specialist Equipment with more Special Rules,Game Mechanic Changes during a Turn:One Time you have to roll lower or equal to a certain value,next Time you have to roll over that Value (Armor Roll if i'm not mistaken)

imo i find Deadzone a much better Game also Mercs is very good  

Same here, infinity is a great SYSTEM, but i find it to be a dull game.(i have recently found zombiecide to be similar, great system with some fun moment, but i never really get any joy from winning, it more just feels like a hard tactical slog that leaves me drained)

Deadzone really fills the same niche for me in a simpler , funner way.

[Geckilian]

I'm getting back in to Infinity after a bit of a break (due to a lack of people to play unfortunately) and I'm still enjoying it. I have an unreasonable amount of Nomads, a small force of Aleph Steel Phalanx and an even smaller amount of Combined Army which isn't actually enough to make a list with.

I really enjoy the system. After a couple of small games a long time ago the rules clicked for me, so games are pretty fast now. Must admit I'm not too keen on the ITS system for tournaments, but YAMS (yet another mission system), the fan made objective cards, is pretty enjoyable.

Games can be pretty swingy depending on what tactics people use. For example yesterday at my local gaming club I brought a hacker-heavy Bakunin Nomad list with tons of hacking support and some markers to fire around the board. My opponent used Corregidor Nomads, which unlike Bakunin don't favour hacking quite as much and instead have far more flamethrowers. Turns out his poor single hacker got his brains fried by mine and I went to town immobilizing and taking apart his list neatly with area denial.

The very next game he played another friend who used a camouflage heavy Ariadna list and, while he had to deal with massive werewolves with silly amount of templates, an abundance of flamethrowers was just what was needed!

Each faction can pretty much do any set archetype of tactics so in theory you could run a hacker heavy list with nearly anyone for example, aside from Ariadna anyway, and still do well. The beauty of Infinity to me is if you have lots of different models, or your opponents allow proxies, then game to game you can vastly change how your list works and how the game plays out for you. I think I've only run the same list at most twice, back when I was learning the core mechanics. Constantly changing lists keeps it fresh as there's no real 'meta' or netlist - everything can arguably be viable and you have no real idea of what the opponent may bring to the table unless you know they have a heavy preference.

[chromedog]

It's a game you will either like or not.

I find mercs has models I don't like, Deadzone has rules I don't like and zombiecide has zombies (which I stopped liking when I was still in High School - and I've been out of it for a looooong time).  I got tired of the constant escalation of wallet abuse from GW, too.

Infinity had models I liked, rules I was willing to live with, and a cost that was bearable (and free rules/army lists definitely helped in that aspect).  I didn't need to spend $150 on a rulebook and $80 on an army book BEFORE I even started putting an army together.

YMMV.  It's not a game for everyone.  There's nothing wrong with that. 

[Major_Gilbear]

@ Too Bo Coo

That's a particularly motley assortment of models! I'm not sure that even a Merc list would really be much of an option either.

You might be better off deciding to go with one of the represented factions and picking up a relevant starter to augment them and play with. The other models can then be used as proxy options so that you can see what works for you. I'd suggest that either Haqqislam or Yu Jing are your best bets in this case.

Some models you might want to keep/use as alternative Mercs for your chosen force as well - the Kamau hacker could be your proxy for Valeria Gromoz for example, and the Chasseur girl could be a proxy for Father Lucien Sforza. A bit of fluff, tell your opponent who's who, and job done!


@ Geckilian:

Games can be pretty swingy, but a lot will also depend on whether one or both players build skewed lists or not. Like every game where there is any player choice in forces, unless you both go for a bit-of-everything approach, you will sometimes get rather unbalanced situations.

Even so, with cautious tactics you can often still put a good showing in at least even if you're the underdog - that's one thing I rather like about the game.

As for your Bakunin lists, you can get flamers on Kusanagi, Lunokhod heavy remote, Lizard TAG, and Prowlers, and you get Chain Rifles on Morlocks (which are very cheap and a couple are usually worth a punt). Also, with the Riot Grrls, you get MSV1 which means you can spot Camo more easily and ignore all the Camo penalty modifiers they will have too. Finally, the Chimera has a viral CC weapon and might be worth sacrificing against a Dogface. Tools for the job, man!


@ chromedog:

I agree, and find:

Mercs - Don't like the rules, don't like that model rules are not in the book. Like most of the models, (those sculpted by Tom Mason really).

Deadzone - Would have preferred fewer sculpts of better quality in proper plastic, with variety coming from spare weapons/heads on the sprues. Rules are okay, but hard to find during a game if you need them. Personally, I think it suffers from being slightly too basic and the special rules don't make up for this neatly enough - our games so far have all felt pretty generic.

Infinity - Poorly written rules, and lax response on addressing FAQ items. Normally, I'm not too bothered about extreme rules instances, but we seem to come up with one in nearly every game we play. Great game balance though, and a lot of action freedom. I love the models, but accept that they are pretty expensive.

WH40k - Sigh. I like aspects of the current aesthetic, and the rules are not appalling, but overall it's hard not to feel cheated by many aspects of GW's offerings. Given how many people complain about other companies' model prices, it amuses me to see how many of them play GW games. Basically though: it's a rules-heavy, tactics-lazy, expensive game for people who like skulls on everything.



Getting back on topic, maybe a quick summary of how the game works (no too detailed, not biased with lots of opinion) might be useful in the context of this thread? I'd be happy to write such a summary if anyone is interested?

[hubbabubba]

Do it, and add it to the neglected sci fi rules sticky at the top of the board

[Major_Gilbear]

Do it, and add it to the neglected sci fi rules sticky at the top of the board

I see looking through the thread that you've already posted a summary there?

Admittedly, I was thinking of writing something a bit more wordy though! 

[hubbabubba]

Exactly, I'm sure you can improve 100% on what I posted

[Major_Gilbear]

 

Fair enough then, I'll get onto it.

[carlos13th]

I would appreciate that too. Thanks

[Vermis]

I avoided it for a long time, viewing it as Malifaux in Spaaace. Then I had a simple demo game which impressed me. Got to thinking I should get into it, 'cos it and Malifaux are the two main games played up at the Belfast club.

Then I had someone laugh at me, telling me it was as full of special rules as Malifaux. So I''m curious to find out just what the situation and comparison is like...

totally meh.tried it several Times over the Years it's way to busy,too many too heavily specialised Models.i bought a Bunch Models from a Faction which i liked and ended up with a complete useless/unplayable Faction...

Also the Game is absolutely no Fun.You have to stay focused all the Time or you lose Track of whats going since your Opponent has the Chance to react (Move/Shoot/use Special Gear/Hack)...which Active Turn is it again?

Tons of special Rules,Modifiers,Specialist Equipment with more Special Rules,Game Mechanic Changes during a Turn:One Time you have to roll lower or equal to a certain value,next Time you have to roll over that Value (Armor Roll if i'm not mistaken)

... aaand that doesn't fill me with hope. Particularly the bolded part.

[Major_Gilbear]

@ Vermis:

It does have a lot of special equipment and rules.

It's also one major reason why the "3-model demo" games that seem to be popular are so crap: it's like teaching somebody Snap as an introduction to Poker.

The equipment, skills, and weapon effects are all integral to the balance of the game. Playing without the vast majority of these leaves you 100% unprepared for how the game actually plays, and is grossly unfair to people trying to learn.

The other side of learning the game is that you get so carried away by all the shiny toys and clever skills, that you actually forget/never learn how to do things like Alert, Cautious Move, Go Prone, Coordinated Order - which are pretty basic actions available to nearly every model in the game, and which can sometimes get you out of tricky situations if you know them.

Yet another thing that's usually fudged or glossed over is the timing of declaring your model's actions, your opponent's declaring of reactions and the resolution of what was declared. Learning this wrong makes actions like Cautious Move pointless, and equipment like TO Camo even more powerful than it already is. Apparently though, people seem to be really uncomfortable with a Poker-style build up of declared actions before resolving them all simultaneously to see what actually happens/succeeds. That the official examples/videos are all over the place in this regard doesn't help either.

Anyway, I am writing a summary of how the game works (well 1st/2nd edition...!), and will post it here when I'm done. I'm aiming for it to be clear and specific, but also don't want it to become a long rambling blow-by-blow account of every rule. Hopefully you will find it helpful.

For now though, I will leave you with this: most of the skills, equipment, and weapon effects are actually pretty straightforward. Also, unless stated, most skills are "nested" - that is, a higher level skill includes all the lower levels of the same skill as well. Finally, skills in particular are an area marked for change in 3rd edition (moving to something that can be represented in a table where possible).

[Vermis]

Ta Gilbear. I have to say you haven't reassured me too much, but somehow I'm still a bit interested. Looking forward to that summary, and whether 3rd is better.

[hubbabubba]

Vermis,, the fancy new Icestorm box is a good intro to the game, if you're prepared to fork out for the hefty price tag.
If not, just the step by step approach of the ice storm rule book should you be able to get a copy
You'd then be able to play trough with proxies and any old terrain you had to hand. The box is very nice though, just overpriced.
However, in another incredible display of forsight on the pasrt of Corvus Belli, they've releasesd the starter box with basic 3rd ed. rules way in advance of the final edition of the 3rd ed. rules being ready for publication. So after your nice gentle intro to 3rd ed. Infinity, if you want to continue playing, you'll have to unlearn the rules from the box set and start with 2nd ed, until the new rules are published, rumours say Dec.