AT43 Addict

Col. Stark and his Copperhead bring command and control to the UNA. With a leadership of 9 no UNA army will be wanting for LP while he is on the board. His Cobra Snake “Copperhead” gives him some extra protection but also makes him a bigger target.

It is not his weaponry that makes him useful though. His special abilities permit any unit that can see him to automatically become valiant. This is especially useful when using Special weapons teams / MedTec as they must roll to activate every turn since they have 3 or fewer models even at full strength.

Stark is also a must have in a Morningstar List as their disadvantage limits the maximum rank officer they have access to (heroes being the exception to this).

Another Special ability is that for 1 LP he can look at which card his opponent will activate next on his own activation. This gives a UNA player a heads up as to what their opponent is planning and therefore room to make adjustments to counter.

He does come with a downside though. He must deploy first on the battlefield. This makes him a big target at the start of the game. It is best to deploy him in cover somewhere initially since he will have to endure an entire round of fire otherwise.

Stark must also be careful of the Red Blok’s Sgt. Timofiyeva as she can move any card in her opponents activation. If the Red Blok win authority on the first turn this can mean she can move Stark to the very end of the activation sequence. Since he must deploy first, the other UNA units may not enter the battle field until the second turn.

In order to avoid this problem you may place Stark somewhere else in your activation order (perhaps second) and then use 1 lp to move the first card so Stark can deploy as normal. This makes sgt timofiyeva a little less dangerous but still a threat, so watch out.

Stark brings some great abilities to the UNA and some great leadership. Whether in Copperhead or on foot Stark is a great asset to a UNA list.

So you’re a fresh Therian commander and want to know what the deal with Hekat summoning is. This ability will cause much frustration for your opponents as you are potentially able to bring a new type * AFV onto the board each turn.

For the cost of 4 LP you may take a type * AFV model that is not currently a part of your army and place it next to the Company Commander where it will be able to activate on your next turn. Only the Company Commander can use this routine so it is not possible to spawn multiple Type * AFVs in a single turn.

The spawned Type * AFVs are not alphas so they do not have any access to routines themselves. if you want to be able to use the rush routine with them the Company Commander must be the one to do it. Similarly, these summoned Type * cannot repair themselves, instead relying on the Company Commander’s routines. Remember the Company Commander is the only one that can use routines on other units in the army.

Another thing to note. If you are going to be summoning type *’s, having Sigma Urash around is extremely useful. Sigma Urash is the only Therian capable of using fusion on 2 afvs of different units. This means having him around will let you fuse those 2 half dead Hekats into a Type ** AFV of your choice.

A question that gets asked alot by new UNA commanders is which are better, star or steel troopers. There is no clear cut answer but I hope to show the role each play in an army so a new commander can make good tactical decisions.

Star Troopers are the type * infantry of the UNA. They have a higher unit size than the Steel troopers, their guns are one less strength as well as their armor. They do get a reroll on their weapons though which is a big advantage in addition to having access to the all powerful flamer. This unit is really at home putting a large volume of fire on the enemy as it advances on or holds a position. Dude to their high numbers they are ideally suited to holding points especially in a morningstar list which gives them 3 medics. They can sustain 7 casualties before you are forced to remove specialists. this gives them a greater effective staying power than their steel trooper counterparts. The star troopers are also the only UNA unit with access to combat engineers which let them destroy terrain elements in order to advance quickly under fire.

Steel troopers have longer range, one more strength and armour but 3 fewer numbers. They are best used to back up an assault, firing from range with missile launchers/Laser guns. Because they have fewer numbers they can’t take as many casualties before you have to start removing medics/engineers/heavy weapons. In fact in a max sized unit with special weapons, medics/engineers and an officer there are only 4 standard fighters that can die before you are forced to cut into your specialists. The big advantage they do have is Engineers which are there to repair AFV’s. It makes sense that they are set up to fight from range where the majority of UNA’s AFV’s are going to be.

So there you have it. One troop type is not better than the other, when used for the purpose they are inteded they will shine, but dont expect a unit of steels to be on the front line, or a unit of stars to do well at the back of the field.

Urod for the Red Blok is quite a power house. The Hetman is quite a capable Type 2 AFV, but give it 2 repairs and it becomes very hard to take down. This, in a nutshell describes Urod. With high leadership, high armour and the long range AT-Cannon it is best used to pick off battle suits initally as it charges towards the enemy. The Medium Rocket Launchers have limited range so in order to get full use out of this AFV, it needs to keep moving towards the enemy.

The activation of Urod becomes very important as using his repairs at the right time is essential. Make no mistake, your opponent will throw everything they have at this guy and he will go down eventually, but this will buy you enough time to move the rest of your forces into position.

Backing up Urod with a min sized squad of krasnye with mechanics will increase his survivability, giving him 4 repairs a turn. This becomes even more feasable with Urod being given shield formation in order to protect the delicate repair unit.

Urod with his range and repairs makes for a highly survivable AFV commander, in a frontline list he becomes almost a must have and there is hardly a time when taking urod is a poor tactical decision.

For any Therian player, Atis-Astarte is a must have model. Being the leader of a grim golem unit, she has the ability to teleport the entire unit into combat with any unit she can see. There is no range limitation to this ability either.

This becomes extremely useful for dislodging units from cover and removing infantry that pose an immediate threat to your other forces.The ability is not cheap though, it costs 3 LP, so don’t expect to be creating hekats, teleporting and giving all your units combat drills at the same time.

The downside to this is that if some of your models cannot be placed in contact with the enemy and maintain cohesion, they are immediately eliminated. This gives an interesting defense against this very powerful ability.

By grouping your infantry together and against some sort of cover, you will ensure there is as little space as possible for Atis to teleport into. Therians do not have any long range indirect fire weapons so there is little to fear from using a tight grouping.

Atis is a powerful hero for the Therian army and the benefits far outweigh the costs of taking her.

Edit: Thanks to Blue Dane for clarifying an error, the post has been updated to reflect the proper rules.

Lets face it, stealth is a real pain. Not being able to achieve any hits until you are within range 1 can put a damper on anyones day. There are ways of dealing with it though, some obvious and some not so obvious.

First up the standard stealth detection units. These units can hit stealthed units as normal. They include Red blok Dragonov Kommandos, Red Blok Zviezda and UNA with triple lens helmets.

The important thing to realize though is that ALL units can “see” stealth, they just can’t see them well enough to hit them. This makes any unit with a template weapon capable of inflicting damage on a stealthed unit. The two types of weapons are indirect fire weapons (grenades, grenade launchers, mortars etc…)  and flamers.

We’ll cover the non flamer weapons first. If shooting at a unit that has stealth that is outside range 1, all your shots are counted as missing. This means that the blast deviates a minimum of 10 cm and scatters as normal. If the opponent’s unit is sufficiently large and/or your blast template is sufficiently large you will still hit the stealthed unit. This makes the 7 cm blast weapons from the Cobra Snake and the 10 cm blast from Dotch Yaga especially dangerous.

Flamers are unique as they do not require a shooting test to hit. They may be fired at their full range of 25 cm even though this distance is outside the range 1 band for being able to shoot a stealthed target without missing.

As a side note. You can still teleport with Atis into a stealthed unit, you can see them just not very well.

So there you have it, even the armies without stealth detection can still deal with stealthed units. mortars, flamers, grenade launchers are all effective at hitting stealthed units outside the range 1 band.

The Karmans have a wide array of Buggies available to them, knowing when to take the right tool for the job is paramount in being successful with the Karmans. Breaking down each buggy, it’s strengths and weaknesses, will help a Karman commander decide what the best buggy to take is.

King Buggy

Weighing in at 400 points this is the cheapest option available to the Karmans. Don’t let its lower point cost fool you though it is a very capable unit. Armed with twin ZZ Cannons and Twin Flamers this unit is used best when pushing towards the enemy. The nice thing is that this guy tends to attract fire away from your other units. No one wants those twin flamers to hit their troops.

Pros:

• Low Point Cost
• Flamers for dislodging infantry

Cons:

• Must get in close for maximum efficiency, otherwise it is simply a jungle trike with more Frame points

Jungle Buggy

The Jungle buggy is an AFVs worst nightmare. with 4 zz cannons putting out 8 shots, this is enough to ruin most anyone’s day. Those extra ZZ-cannons dont come cheap though, weighing in at 525 points its more than half the cost of a jungle trike over the king buggy. This guy does best sitting at the back of the field laying down a lot of accurate anti afv fire. It will become a very high priority early on as it will completely dominate firing lanes, making any afv or battle suit wary to poke its head out.

Pros:

• 8 ZZ Cannons will melt anything that gets in its way

Cons:

• High Cost

Thunder Buggy

The Thunder Buggy is a blend of both king buggy and Jungle Buggy. With 2 ZZ cannons and 2 Drum Guns it can deal with infantry, battle suits and lightly armoured afv’s. Weighing in at 425, I find this buggy excels at dealing with UNA. The drum guns can wound toads on a 5+ tacarms on a 4+. if you are hoping to hurt anything with armour greater than 11, consider paying the points to take the Jungle Buggy or save yourself 25 points and take the flamers on the King buggy and get in close.

Pros:

• Drum guns are great against UNA
• only 25 points more than the King buggy
• Can be effective from medium-long range

Cons:

• Drum guns ineffective on targets with moret than 11 armour (need 6 to wound)

There you have it. All of the buggies are useful in different situations. Depending on what sort of army list you build you may want the overwhelming power of the Jungle Buggy, The Infantry Routing of the King buggy, or the hail of drum gun rounds from the Thunder Buggy. The most important thing is that you have a plan for how you are going to use your buggy to its maximum effectiveness. If you dont then the points are simply wasted.

On first glance there is nothing truely special about the UNA units. Sure they have long range but their weapons, movement, and armour are average, and they get one less special weapon per squad than most others. They don’t get the routines of the Therians, the inpenetrable armour of the Red Blok, or even the overwhelming firepower of the Karmans. What they do get is laser designation. This one thing makes up for all that UNA mediocrity.

The UNA TacArms units can be equiped with laser designators which tag enemy units. Once tagged, any indirect fire weapons and missile launchers may be fired at that unit without requiring line of sight. Snakes, Lancelots, and squads with missile launchers need not reveal themselves at all to the enemy in order to fire. Couple that with the very heavy weapon loadout of the TacArms and the fact they cannot be grounded you see that they are the backbone of the UNA army.

You can see how the UNA like to play. While the majority of the army is hiding from view, the tacarms designate a few targets and the rest of the army unloads their arsenal at them. This makes TacArms extremely high priority targets as once they’re dead it forces the UNA player into the open. With the TacArms down, UNA becomes a much easier nut to crack.

I’ve been playing some games with the available tier 3 units and this week it was the Baal Golgoth. I set up a 2000 point list for either side, the Therians using the Baal golgoth plus some min sized grim golem units and a unit of assault goliaths. On the Red Blok side I ran a standard list Urod, Krasnye soldaty, some RPG kolossus Dragonovs and molots.

The Red Blok list had tremendous trouble inflicting enough damage to defeat the Baal. With 16 armor even the Dragonov at-gauss need 5+ to wound. Atis was very quick in recognizing that the dragonovs were going to be the largest threat and quickly engaged and dispatched them. Urod wounded the baal on a 3+ but for a maximum of 2 damage. The Soldaty took rockets and needed to be in range of the deadly heavy flamer in order to engage so they weren’t much use.

I tried out some bacterial grenades to no avail. Essentially Atis gives the Therians the ability to remove enough strong AT firepower (dragonovs) to make killing the baal extremely difficult. When Dotch Yaga comes along it will be a different story, but I don’t think that Tier 3 should be the only way to deal with the Baal.

Some Quick math came up with the following. assuming that the Baal has no cover and a range of 3.

• RPG kolossus 1 impact (2 damage)
• Dragonov AT-Gauss .83 impact
• Urod .88 impact (1 damage) + .25 impacts (2 damage)
• Kossack .5 impacts (2 damage)
• Dotch Yaga 1.25 impacts (2 damage)
• Soldaty .33 impacts (2 damage)
• Bacteriological Grenades .33 impacts (2 damage)

As you can see nothing comes near the effectiveness of Dotch Yaga in defeating the Baal, there is nothing in the Red Blok arsenal that for equivalent point cost can effectively deal with a tier 3 threat. Which basically forces Red Blok to take a tier three unit because they never know if they will be facing one or not themselves. Even 4 units of min sized krasnye with grenades can potentially put out the same damage as dotch Yaga, but they have to get so close to the baal that its heavy flamer will just melt them.

I recently picked up a Karman army and have been having a ton of fun with Guru Lucius leading a unit of 4 Kaptars. Lucius gives the unit he is leading stealth when they are in cover and given the take cover drill. This gives the usually fragile kaptars a lot more room to step out and fire all their weapons. The other benefit is that Lucius comes with 2 drum guns listed separately on his profile. This gives his unit the possibility of firing at 3 different targets with the split fire combat drill. This is extremely helpful when dealing with a UNA morningstar list as they are able to field a large number of smaller sized infantry units and if you’re lucky they’ll have left the triple lens helmets at home.

I am not totally sold on using diamond over a king buggy though. The flamers seem to be much more useful at clearing out infantry and for AFV killing, nothing beats the jungle buggy. Then again I usually run a Nova list so having a hero in an afv seems like a bit of a waste if they are anything less than a Saint.