The beast of the black lab (DBS vs. QK)

Since AssaultUnicorn created two custom missions, I took the chance to play the second one 'Praxis Outrage' against the author himself. To keep the rest as regular as possible, he played QK to give them his own good bye for now and I stuck with DBS. Even with all the games done and with the taste of some other factions, DBS still thrills me and feels like one of the best fitting and interesting sectorials for me. Not the best on the horizon, but a nicely designed one.

The mission is derived from Supplies but with additional points to score and a decompression zone in the center. After the first round a so called Praxis Abomination spawns on one side of the table and goes for whatever it can reach with his claws...And his flamer.

 Druze Bayram Security
──────────────────────────────────────────────────

GROUP 1 7  / 1  
 HUNZAKUT (Forward Observer, Deployable Repeater) Rifle + Light Shotgun, Antipersonnel Mines / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 18)
 PEACEMAKER Spitfire + AUXBOT_3 / Electric Pulse. (1 | 27)
   AUXBOT_3 Heavy Flamethrower / Electric Pulse. (- | 4)
 TÁOWÙ (Counterintelligence) 2 Nanopulser, Flash Pulse / 2 Viral Pistol, Monofilament CC Weapon. (0 | 26)
 VALERYA GROMOZ Hacker (Hacking Device UPGRADE: Expel) Combi Rifle + Pitcher / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 21)
 DRUZE (CH: Mimetism) MULTI Sniper / Viral Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 32)
 DRUZE (X Visor) Combi Rifle + Light Grenade Launcher (E/M and Nimbus) / Viral Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 27)
 BRAWLER (Multispectral Visor L2) MULTI Sniper / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 28)
 BRAWLER Lieutenant Rifle + Light Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 16)

GROUP 22  
 HUNZAKUT (Forward Observer, Deployable Repeater) Rifle + Light Shotgun, Antipersonnel Mines / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 18)
 WARCOR (360º Visor) Flash Pulse / Stun Pistol, Knife. (0 | 3)
 BOUNTY HUNTER Submachine Gun, Akrylat-Kanone / Breaker Pistol, Knife. (0 | 12)
 FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
 FUGAZI DRONBOT Flash Pulse, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
 PATHFINDER DRONBOT Combi Rifle, Sniffer / Electric Pulse. (0 | 16)
 SAITO TOGAN (Specialist Operative) Combi Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, EXP CCW, Knife. (0 | 40)

 5 SWC | 300 Points
Open in Infinity Army

The list was designed similar to any other Supplies-list I write with Druze: Two Hunzakuts and Saito as SO to grab the boxes or make a run to recover them. This time the link was a bit more diverse, since I expected a low MSV-coverage, wanted a back-up weapon and thought it would be a nice idea to slam a E/M-grenade on the Abomination. If that is not possible, the ABH should be the alternative solution for this.

 Qapu Khalqi
──────────────────────────────────────────────────

9  / 1  / 1
 IGUANA HMG, Heavy Flamethrower / . (2 | 75)
   IGUANA OPERATOR HMG / Pistol, Knife. ()
 AZRA'IL Feuerbach / Pistol, Knife. (1.5 | 39)
 HAWWA' Hacker (Assault Hacking Device) Boarding Shotgun, D-Charges / Pistol, Knife. (0.5 | 26)
 WILD BILL Rifle / 2 MULTI Pistols, Knife. (0 | 27)
 HAFZA Lieutenant Rifle + Light Shotgun / Pistol, Knife. (0 | 16)
 JANISSARY HMG / Pistol, CCW. (2 | 40)
 JANISSARY Akbar Doctor (MediKit) AP Rifle + Light Shotgun / Pistol, CCW. (0 | 41)
 LEILA SHARIF Hacker (Killer Hacking Device) Shock Marksman Rifle, D-Charges / Breaker Pistol, Knife. (0 | 20)
 KAMEEL (Minesweeper, Repeater) Electric Pulse. (0 | 8)
 YUAN YUAN Chain Rifle, Smoke Grenades / Pistol, AP CCW. (0 | 8)

 6 SWC | 300 Points
Open in Infinity Army

We had dicussed my current QK-list before and since AssaultUnicorn likes the Iguana in the same way as I do, he showed his version of my good-bye list. The Hawwa should grab a box and take his chance on the Abomination, while the Iguana, backed up by the Jannissary-core, goes on rampage. The Azra'il should give them some cover in reactive turn.

Whyrocknodie created a great map for this mission with some zero-g-terrain in the center. In the upper left was a higher building complex, as well as in the south right corner. Most other terrain consisted of containers, sometimes just floating through the space.

AssaultUnicorn wins the Lt-roll and decides to go first. So he deploys first in the north, since I estimated better defensive positions in the south.

The Hawwa starts on the left crate, overwatched by the Azra'il on the roof of the highest building on the left with a great view. The core-team scatteres behind some containers on the right.

My link should stop the other core and pin down the Azra'il if needed, so it is deployed around the building on the left with Tao Wu as a second ABH in front of them. The LGL here is prone on the rooftop and quite open when it comes to a shoot out to the Azra'il. Here I estimate to scare any activation of him away with two MSRs and the LGL reacting on him. The left is overwatched by the real ABH, the Warcor and one Fugazi, taking care of all landing spots in my DZ, while the center sees the second Fugazi and the Pathfinder. Saito is deployed hidden on the left crate and the Hunzakuts start in cover next to the other crates each.

The Iguana is deployed in the center and my Peacemaker reinforces my left side as an option to get rid of the Azra'il in my turn.

QK 1: A Yuan Yuan lands on the left side and smokes the left crate, so that the Hawwa can grab the box without any problems. WIth that safe, the Iguana starts but gets stunned by my Brawler MSR and retreats. The Jannissary HMG then finishs my Brawler with a crit. Now my Peacemaker is engaged by the Yuan Yuan and dies to his chain rifle, while Saito pins him down in the decompression zone. The Azra'il takes a wound by shooting on my link, so that the Jannissary HMG has to climb up some crates and shoot down the LGL. Wild Bill is out of coherency here. At the end of the turn, the Yuan Yuan dies to the lethal environment.

DBS 1: I need to recover a bit to not get overrun in the next turn. First my MSR takes out the Azra'il, but to engage the HMG, I need to reposition Gromoz and the Lt on the building. This takes some orders and as the MSR is finally shooting on the HMG, some low rolls on my side end this option. Now the central Hunzakut forces Wild Bill into cover and grabs the central box to recover it in the DZ.

QK 2: The Abomination appears and stomps right towards the Hawwa. The Hawwa stops him with a carbonite-program and hands over the box to the Iguana. The link advances a bit, shooting down my Warcor and Leila grabs the last box.

DBS 2: The Abomination is still immobilized and fails to reset. Saito ends this with his sword, followed by the Hawwa. My orders are oddly distributed now and no CPs are there to fix this. So Saito needs to recamo in a bad spot while Tao Wu tries to take a better position against the core-team in the last turn.

QK 3: The Iguana tries to burn down Saito and after the first successfull dodge, switches to the HMG. This is repeated several times until Saito is finally hit by a bullet and goes down.

DBS 3: There is not much left to do, so I start a last attempt with the left over Hunzakut. He manages to shoot down Leila, but fails on the Jannissary.

With this, the game ends 7-3 for AssaultUnicorn with more boxes recovered and more points killed. We both made some dumb and inefficient decisions, punishing our restricted situations, but in the end my units were not sturdy enough to back this up and the terrain denied my last turn approach with a buffed Pathfinder. If Saito would have been able to engage the Iguana, things could have been interesting again. The major mistake was to stun him in turn one instead of going for the ejection directly. After holding the box, there was nothing to gain for me on this TAG: I would have had to chew through the flamethrower just to get the pilot, the box and the points ejected into a safe position somewhere on a rooftop.

The mission plays in a way similar to Supplies but the additions change it in a very interesting way. So it is not only about recovering turn one efforts and trying to hide the boxes the whole game, but also about a well though attack and a solution to a quite fast and scary beast from the black labs of Bakunin. The added terrain-rules read a bit difficult in the first run, but add a lot of flavour to the game. I am really looking forward to the new terrain rules in N4 to make such things more present!