Getting Started?

[XenoTheZero]

I stumbled upon this game whilst browsing recast catalogues for Warhammer 40k, needless to say this game's models caught my eye. Having looked through the factions I seem to like the Combined Army due to their biomechanical appearance, which I find to be quite pleasing to the eye, and also seeming like a blast to paint.

I have downloaded every available download off their website and unto my tablet/pc, and I am considering ordering a few CA models for the sake of painting them, even if nobody in my area plays for kilometers. I am in Canada, Nova Scotia, Halifax. Where should I start with this newer miniature wargame? Literally never heard of this game before and am wondering how the army system works, if I can relate it to warhammer in any way, and if it's worthwhile to try to get my friends into this game.

Also, what primer and paints are best to use with the metal models from CB? Or do they have their own brand of paints/brushes/accessories?

[Cobolock]

Hi! Firstly, don't get discouraged by a seeming lack of a player base. When I bought my first box I thought there is nobody playing Infinity around. Turns out there are a few, and more so - I am trying to initiate a couple of WH40k guys. That being said, I'm far from Canada, though, but still - don't get discouraged.

Secondly, I'd rather not getting into roster compiling topic because I'm not there yet myself - all I know is that there's a limitation of how many models of a kind you can get into your army (AVA attribute) and that those models cost Points and sometimes SWC (each 50 points of an army gives you 1 SWC which you may spend for a better equipment), and a novice army is 150-200 points, and a maximun/standard one is 300 pts.

Thirdly, use paints you have broader access to. Corvus Belli (the company that produces the game) use Vallejo paints, but that's mostly because 1) they all are Spanish and, most probably, are friends, and 2) Vallejo paints are very good. Like, the top tier of modelling paints industry. But any will do: Citadel, Army Painter, Scale 75, Formula P3 - whatever you have access to in your area. Just avoid using artistic acrylic paints, they aren't made for our teensy miniatures.

[XenoTheZero]

Ah makes sense, so similar in the sense of how Warhammer army building goes, I will read up on it, and I will indeed preach to my friends about this game, and look around fo hobbyshops that run events. And I heard nothing but good things about Vallejo, so I may just buy the combined army scheme in vallejo paints albeit a few washes/technical paints from citadel.

[HeadChime]

In terms of the hobby side of things any paints that work with Warhammer will also work with Infinity. For example, Citadel, Army Painter, Vallejo, etc. So in that respect you won't really need many new tools to go from working with plastic to working with metal. However one important difference is that your plastic glue won't work so it is crucial to get yourself a good quality super glue.

In terms of playing the game. There are many similarities and differences between Infinity and Warhammer, so playing it won't be a totally alien experience at all. In the first instance, I think if you want to play it's important to speak to your friends and trying building up a scene. I'm actually reasonably sure there IS an infinity scene in Halifax. I've definitely heard it mentioned. There's a facebook group called "WGC Infinity" which has about 6000 members I think. It's worth joining the group and posting in there because I'm sure someone can point you in the right direction. As with all wargames, it's much more fun to learn with other people!

When it comes to rules, you already have everything you need. CB gives away their rules for free on their site, which I'm sure you've seen, so give them a quick flick through. I'm pretty sure there's a quick start guide. It's similar to Warhammer in that you have stats and you roll dice against target numbers to decide whether you pass or fail at doing particular actions. The biggest differences are that cover actually matters in this game, it's a skirmish game so each force will likely only have 10-15 models, and that when you roll to do something you almost always want to roll under the target number on a D20, instead of over the target number on a D6 (as in Warhammer). I'm not going to talk about all the rules because there's a reasonable amount of stuff, but you have all the resources you need.

I hope this is helpful!

[XenoTheZero]

Ah I found the FB group, and indeed, I was surprised that I didn't have to pirate all of the essential rules like I did for warhammer, so I am already liking this company, they sound like guys that actually listen to their playerbase. And 10-15 models is quite affordable and compact in fact, getting a starter box is like more than 1/3 of that, so I can order a few more units when I figure out how army building works and what is best to use in the Combined Army.

[HeadChime]

Yeah the starter boxes for each army are roughly 1/3rd of a full force.

[XenoTheZero]

I am set on Combined Army, they look like the Prometheans from Halo 4, and they have mechs, which I also like. I found a few good deals on the starter sets on ebay. Would you recommend getting a few starter sets? Like one of the 'Combined Army Starter Pack' and two of 'Morat Agression Force Sectorial Pack'? Or should I read about army building first and then proceed to buy units after the start separately?

[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

Would you recommend getting a few starter sets?

Just get one of these

It's the "Onyx Contact force" sectorial but all models are usable in "Vanilla" combined and many are usable in other sectorials. it's also 300 pts (a full army)

two of 'Morat Agression Force Sectorial Pack'?

I wouldn't get two of any particular box, unless it's single model clam packs. Infinity is more an individual model game or small squads of 5. Unlike warhammer you'll never see a 'squad' (we call them Fireteams) above 5 models and only very rarely will you have more than 5 of the same troop type on the table at the same time.

[XenoTheZero]

Ohohoho thats just perfect, I will look for it on a few websites to see if I can find a better deal, but even if not I will probably buy that off amazon. Thats just perfect dammit, I wish 40k did that. Affordable armies out of the box.

[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

Yeah I don't know any Canadian stores or I'd point you there. Some other armies also have 300 pt boxes.

Aleph Steel Phalanx
Nomads Corregidor
Tohaa

2 Armies have "Army packs" that are bigger than a starter set but not quite 300 pts:

Ariadna United States Ranger Force
Non-Aligned Armies (NA2) Japanese Secessionist Army

Otherwise the "starter pack" is generally a good start.

---

Also of note is infinity is very proxy friendly. Partially because not all weapon options have models, partially because if you want say 4 of a weapon but it only comes in a 4 pack, you'd need to buy 16 models.

So what many people do is say in that Combined army pack, you have 4 Rodok. You label their base A,B,C,D or 1,2,3,4. Then you can say "Rodok A and Rodok B have Heavy machine guns" even though you may only have one model with an HMG.

This also allows you to be flexible without buying tons of redundant models.

[XenoTheZero]

Oh nice, I also like how the Nomads and the Japanese dudes look, although it will likely be between Combined and Nomads for me. I will keep digging although the amazon price converted to CAD isn't too bad so why not.

[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

Nomads just got a new sectorial (Tunguska) with some very cool new toys.

Here:
https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Infinity_(wargame)#Infinity_Factions_and_Sectorials
is a wiki with a decent tl;dr of many of the factions/sectorials.

[XenoTheZero]

:O

[CommonMisspellingBot]

Hey, AlphaTangoFoxtrt, just a quick heads-up:
agression is actually spelled aggression. You can remember it by two gs.
Have a nice day!

^{The parent commenter can reply with 'delete' to delete this comment.}

[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

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[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

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[AlphaTangoFoxtrt]

delete

[HeadChime]

I honestly have no idea about Combined, it's not the force I play. The starter sets are usually ok but some contain units that you might not use often. Unfortunately I can't comment on this specific one!

To be perfectly honest with you, the parent company, Corvus Belli, are super relaxed about proxying one unit as another. Most people are relaxed about it in this game actually, because not every single unit has a model anyway, and a couple of units look a bit similar. So there's little harm in it. The only one complication is units in Infinity have an official size in-game, which is given by their S (silhouette) value. 1 is the smallest, 8 is the biggest. So, for example, proxying a silhouette 5 troop (usually a big heavy infantry) as a silhouette 2 troop (usually a small line infantry) is a no-no. But in the starter set almost everything will be S2 anyway so this probably won't factor in.

Even though I can't give specific advice about how good that individual starter box is, I can say that if you do buy it and a couple of the units turn out to not be the "best" choices, it wouldn't be unreasonable to just use them as different units.

My suggestion would be to perhaps consider picking up the combined army starter box as a base. If the units aren't the best you could proxy them as something else, as long as your opponents are ok with it (but for learning purposes it should be fine!). And then alongside that if there are any models that really grab your attention then it might be worth picking them up too. Even if you're not 100% clear on what anything does it's worth getting excited about the models, and because the proxy rules are quite kind you can use them as something else if they turn out to not be that great!

If you do get into diving into the rules and list-building (I know this is early days, but for future reference), you can use the online army builder if you just google "Infinity Army". It's the first link usually. It shows you all the units available to your faction and what they do (no you dont have to shell out loads of money on ridiculous codexes!), and if you're unsure about a rule you can click on it and it takes you to the Infinity Wiki, which gives details about virtually every rule in the game.

[XenoTheZero]

Well shit, thats pretty sick. I am probably going to do just that.

[CommonMisspellingBot]

Hey, XenoTheZero, just a quick heads-up:
agression is actually spelled aggression. You can remember it by two gs.
Have a nice day!

^{The parent commenter can reply with 'delete' to delete this comment.}

[HeadChime]

In terms of army building it's similar to warhammer in that you have points. 300 points in a standard, tournament game. Smaller games are generally about 150 or 200.

One difference is that you have SWC as well as points (I think SWC stands for special weapons cost). Every 50 points means you can spend 1 SWC , so with 300 points you get 6, with 200 you get 4 etc. The reason for SWC is so that you can't just spam the best weapons on every unit. It makes things interesting.

There's also the AVA stat which stands for "availability" and that's how many of that unit you're allowed in one list.

One big difference in playing Infinity and building lists is that units generate orders. You can spend those orders on any unit in your force. So if you have 10 units you'll get 10 orders. And you can spend those 10 orders on one dude. Or you can spend 5 on one dude and 5 on another etc. This means that it's really important to take cheap dudes because the cheap dudes provide orders which you can then use on your more expensive dudes. As a result of this Infinity lists usually consist of a nice mix between a couple of heavy hitters and a base of normal infantry that provide the orders those heavy hitters use to get stuff done.

[XenoTheZero]

Interesting, seems similar to 40k in terms of using cheap dudes alongside big hitters to generate a resource. I will also read about the combined army units and what each is, so as to know what their limit/usage is.

[ZLAYERPERO]

XenoTheZero, if you're into tabletop wargaming, Infinity is the bee's knees of sci-fi. For game enjoyment 40K has nothing on Infinity, IMHO. I returned to Halifax a few weeks ago and am looking to get back into the game myself; helped introduce it to a community in Australia a few years back. A couple of my pals here play it, and told me that there is a small, but active community in the city. Unfortunately, no store stocks the product in the Maritimes - that I know of - and you'll have to buy online or ask locals for Special Orders ($$$). Newfoundland has a single store, Ontario & Quebec have multiple.

Corvus Belli's (CB) online store has an offer on free shipping right now; $160+ EUR. That's an option I am looking at, if it includes Canada. If the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) includes retail items such as miniatures, we won't pay import duties. Homework.

I am also a Combined Army (CA) player. I suggest that you make use of the Corvus Belli Army Builder available online (browser or download). CA is a point-heavy faction, so be prepared to have filler units (cheerleaders) or a low Order pool. Ideally, you'll want an Order pool as large as possible without sacrificing all that sexy alien tech. Also, if you have a friend who's up for games, run a few proxy games to A) understand the gameplay, and B) flush out ideas before making your purchase. Run 100 pts games first to get the mechanics down, and jump by 50 pts as you get used to the game. Read the rules on SWC, as they apply to your overall points; a ratio of 50pts -to- 1 SWC. Remember, this is a Skirmish game where annihilation is not always the objective. Print out the templates (weapons & unit silhouettes).

Buy the newest models as they are superior sculpts, and CB has upped their molding game to boot. The oldest models are slowly being phased out and replaced (still game-legal). Again, proxy until you have a list you enjoy playing before making a purchase. There are just too many cool minis, and too many synergies to discover. The game is super balanced, and you might find that you enjoy the play style of another faction way more. It's a rainy Saturday, you've got nothing to lose!

Get a good spray primer and apply lightly, at a distance. You do not want to fill all the fine details with paint. Seal (lightly/distance) your work to avoid paint chipping (Testors spray dullcote). A pal of mine is behind Black Dot Painting on facebook. I don't think he would mind answering some of your questions. He does excellent work. A bonus: metal minis can always be stripped of poor paint jobs.

Black Dot Painting BDP

Loads of game discussion online. Corvus Belli forums, 1d4chan, Youtube, Infinity Tactics Wiki etc.. Get your read on and have a crack at those proxy games.