Hey, folks. SinSynn, from the House of Paincakes here.
Say, lemme ask you sumpthin.'
Are you a sci-fi type o' gamer?
Do you get a little excited in your pants when phrases like ‘Optical Disruption Device' and ‘Multispectral Visor' get tossed into the conversation?
Do you wish that somehow, sniper rifles could shoot guided ‘smart bullets' in the games you play, unerringly seeking out their targets and dispatching them while your sniper sits comfortably hidden, relaxing with a cup of futuristic tea, waiting for the next ‘target acquisition' signal to come in from his spotters?
Do you think, ‘Sure, that sounds cool, but why can't I have a rocket launcher that does that, too?'
Do you wish that somehow, some sort of ‘Cyber Warfare' could be incorporated into a mini game? That a model in the game could flip open one of those cool lil' wrist-mounted computer thingies that everyone in the future always seems to be wearing, call up a cool holographic screen and start doing mysterious hacker stuffs on it?
Heck, with one of those, you might be able to hack some of the Guided Ammunition that's coming yer way, amirite?
Wouldn't that be da awesome? Wouldn't it be even more awesome if you could hack, say, some big, nasty trooper on the enemy side, with his super-fancy, ultra high-tech suit of powered armor running the latest Android OS, giving him access to thousands of exciting apps?
Pffft! Chump. He'll never even know what happened, since your hacker is chilling with your sniper, partaking of some of that futuristic tea, like the moocher she is. The lil' Remote Robot thingy she's using to hack through crept in an open window, and is in a room right next door to the poor, unfortunate Heavy Infantry guy, who has no idea it's there.
He's mere moments away from buying the farm, yet those last few moments will be spent watching kitty videos on YouTube. He's completely unaware of the Remote in the other room, and of the group of enemies waiting outside the door of the building he's occupying, anxiously awaiting the signal that will surely come at any second.
The hacker finishes fidgeting with her wrist-computer thingy, and several blocks away a tiny, flashing LED on the metallic dome of the Remote turns solid green.
The Heavy Infantry trooper grunts in surprise as his kitty video abruptly ceases, and is immediately stricken with terror as all of his screens go black. The sheer weight of his armor prevents even the most basic movement, but his training kicks in quickly. He knows he likely has a few seconds, at best, to get his armor powered back up again.
As the back-ups and fail-safe routines begin to initiate, he whispers the hard reset commands to his suit. Although his powerless helmet prevents him from actually hearing the door slam open, he feels the vibrations through his boots. He's deeply regretting getting so wrapped up in the lolcats videos.
They're just so darned cute, though.
Moments later, despite his pleas for death, the aliens proceed to eat him alive, starting with his feet and hands.
Ooooh…that sounds bonkers! If yer a sci-fi kinda Terran, I know you wanna GAME that.
And as a GAMER, I bet you want the liberty of picking whatever army you'd like in a game, based upon any criteria you personally prefer, and be able to rest assured that the army you picked is just as good as all the others. You want to actually play with any given mini available for your army, right? Yeah, I know you do. You don't want to be stuck with a model (or giant pile of models) you purchased because you liked the looks of it, but are loathe to use in-game because for some unknown reason the folks that made it decided to give it a laughable statline.
I bet you don't wanna wait for years to get an update, either, and you wish new stuffs could get added to your chosen force at any time. I'm sure you want to feel comfortable in the knowledge that none of your opponents have an army that's OP, as well.
Maybe you aren't interested in ‘netlisting.' Maybe you wanna do your own thing, in your own style. You wanna do something crazy. Like, say…an all-Camouflaged group of ‘Predator'-type creatures, or maybe…an all-girl battle force of ladies with bad attitudes, like super high-tech ‘Tank Girls,' or maybe you want futuristic space-Ninjas and space-Samurai, or maybe…maybe…
Well, anyway, I'll bet you want BALANCE, and I bet you'd be ever so happy if you knew that, no matter what, you'd always have a chance of winning, no matter what sort of unconventional scheme you're attempting to pull off, if you played smart, and you wouldn't lose games due to failing some random dice roll at a critical moment.
You want to play a game that not only does all the crazy stuffs I mentioned, but you want to win or lose any game you play due to your SKILL, not because you brought the wrong list, or because someone else bought the rock to your face, errr…I mean scissors, or whatever.
And I know this goes without saying, but I have this crazy feeling that you'd like to have not only all the stuffs I've mentioned (cuz we all love stuffs, amirite?), but you want really awesome models, as well. Highly-detailed models are pretty much a must-have for any mini game looking to be successful in today's crowded market. There's a lot of choices out there, after all…
Well, the game I'm talkin' 'bout certainly has great minis. Some of the best around, as a matter of fact. Once you've seen ‘em, it's pretty hard to deny.
So maybe right about now you're somewhat curious, perhaps even interested.
‘So, wiseguy,' you're thinking, ‘Pray tell, what is the name of this miracle elixir…errr, game?'
Happily, friend.
The game is Infinity, and it's my chosen duty today to try to convince you to give it a try. I'll tell you straight up that I'm doing it for no other reason other than I have come to really love this game, and it's been the best thing to happen in my personal hobby experience like, ever.
Basically, I played pretty much the same game that a lot of folks reading this post play, for a long time. There's no need to even mention the name of that game, and I am not here today to talk bad about it, so let's just keep it movin,' ok?
After a while I became dissatisfied, and I decided it was time to move on. A friend introduced me to Flames of War, and I'd happily recommend that game, as well. That's a solid game- just avoid Late, Late War and you'll be fine.
But I'm a sci-fi guy at heart. I needed lazors, and mechs and all the other cool trappings that come with the genre. Like many of you, I had read a few Infinity posts, I had seen the models. I'll be honest- the deal wasn't sealed for me until a friend hooked me up with a starter set, and even then I procrastinated a bit.
Sigh. Gamers…we can be a lazy bunch o' knuckleheads, can't we?
When I finally committed to playing the game, I purchased a second starter set. I thought would be a good idea, since then I'd have a second army at the ready for any random victim I hoped to hook on the game. I got one of my buddies to agree to give it a go with me (Victim number one. Mwahahaha), and together we set about learning to play the game.
Oh- did I fail to mention that all the rules and army lists are available free from the Infinity website? And that there's multiple army builders that print very professional looking lists (and yes, smartphone apps), also free online, as well? Everything you need to play the game, documentation-wise.
All free.
See- here's the thing, though. I can blather on and on about how awesome of a game Infinity is (and I really believe it is, honestly and truly), and I would pretty much receive like, three types of comments down below in the comments section.
The first type of comment would come from fans of the game I used to play. Now, seeing as how I also used to be a big fan of that game, and the company that made it, I would in no way be resentful of these comments. Hey, I'm not here to tell you to stop playing that game, at all. I'm here to tell you to start playing Infinity. Big difference.
‘Oh, I'm not interested in skirmish games. I like my game, cuz it's got tanks and planes and all that good stuffs in it.'
That's a fair thing to say, and I'll address that in a bit.
The second type of comment would come from those already playing Infinity. They already know Infinity is amazing, so I don't have to convince them of anything. But I'll be grateful for their support, and interested to hear how they discovered Infinity, what faction they play, and so on and so forth.
The third type of comment, and likely the rarest, would come from someone who is kinda ‘on the fence' regarding Infinity. Maybe they just need a bit o' convincing…
Ok, to group one, I say this:
I'm not asking you to stop playing your game, nor am I here to say bad things about it, or the company that makes it. Like I said- I want you to give Infinity a try, and like the snake-oil salesman I'm behaving like, I'm here to make wild promises and tell you I've got the greatest thing ever.
But in my case it's like, totally true.
Now, what if I told you you could try Infinity, risk free, not for ten days, or thirty days, but for as long as you'd like, for like a couple o' pesos…or sheckles…or dinero…or whatever form of currency your country of residence employs? Sure, tanks and planes are all fine and good. Nothing wrong with tanks and planes. Infinity doesn't have to replace your tanks and planes, it can live alongside them quite happily. Do you really want to play just one game, forever? For real?
There's something special about a smaller scale game, I believe. When I deploy my ten or so models, I generally break them into a few teams, each with a purpose. I know what each model in every team is capable of, and each one of my ten guys has a variety of skills and abilities, along with the weaponry to make use of those skills and abilities. More than that- I know each one of them personally. I've played so many games with these guys they all have names, and I get psyched when they triumph as well as mourn their passing when they buy the farm. Games of Infinity play like ‘covert-ops' missions, not all out warfare. It's different- it's more intimate, and very tense and unnerving at times (like when your heavy gets hacked, for instance).
Espionage in the future is treacherous, and in many instances extremely dangerous, even deadly… and it makes for one heck of a miniature game.
Look- here's what you do. Go to the Infinity website, and download the Quick-Start rules. Give ‘em a once over. Go watch the introductory videos on YouTube, maybe lurk around in the forums a bit.
You'll need three things to try Infinity:
1) A friend. Hopefully you have a few of these. Find one and twist his or her arm.
2) A few 20-sided dice. You may have to pay for these, I'm sorry. You only really need like three, but two sets of five is ideal. If you know some RPG players, maybe you can borrow some from them? They tend to have more dice than they know what to do with.
3) A bunch of 28mm models to use as proxies. Infinity is played with 28mm models, so is perfectly playable with any old random 28mm models you happen to have lying round. I have this funny feeling that you might have some…
So, if you're curious about Infinity, and you can get the items I listed to a game table, what have you got to lose? Give it a shot. I'd recommend starting with 1oo to 150 point lists, just to get the moving and shooting mechanics down, then adding models while adding game features, like Camouflage and Hacking. Increase your game size as you add more complicated elements of the game, and after a weekend, I'll bet dollars to doughnuts…
Well, the starter kits are an excellent deal, and they're all listed on the website in the ‘models' section.
For those of you in group three, that just needed a lil' push…consider yourselves pushed. Give Infinity a try. Other than a few 20 sided dice, you've already got most of what you need, so what are you waiting for?
Oh, wait- I heard a little voice pipe up in the back…
‘Oh, but SinSynn, I heard Infinity takes quite a bit of terrain, and that it's all expensive and whatnot…'
Sigh. Look, Infinity plays quite well with a dense amount of the terrain you probably already have access to (futuristic ruins with lots o' skulls will suffice for your initial forays into the game), but just in case you're like me, and don't really have a lot of money to throw around, fear not. A little imagination, some cardboard, scissors and tape, combined with a bunch of random stuffs you can find lying around the house, and…
…See? If I can do it, and I'm like the laziest Xeno you'll ever meet, then I bet you can too.
Remember, we're hobbyists. We're supposed to be the creative ones, the imaginative ones. Since when did we ever need a bunch of fancy, expensive, pre-fabricated, manufactured terrain to play a game? CD cases make great walkways between stacked-book buildings, and a few old paint pots lined up makes a decent wall. Having some tall terrain in the middle of the board is important, to prevent snipers from dominating the game- an upside-down cup with ladder drawn in magic marker that takes a ‘Long Order' to climb (We'll get to all of that soon enough…) placed on top of this cardboard building like a futuristic water tower is just the thing!
There are many companies making really lovely terrain for Infinity now, including Mantic, with their recent KickStarter thingy for the game DeadZone, and I'd love to be able to afford a bunch of it. As it stands right now, however, I make due just fine with a bunch of what I call ‘ghetto terrain,' much of which I made myself, and some of which was e-mailed to me by my awesome readers, and I had printed out.
Things like cardboard shipping crates and small buildings with full-color storefronts and whatnot might not be quite as awesome as some of that new laser-cut stuffs I drool over (And one day shall be mine. Oh yes. It shall), but it gets the job done quite adequately, thank you very much.
So don't be discouraged when people try to tell you that Infinity is ‘cost prohibitive' due to needing ‘lots and lots of terrain.'
Cuz I'm here to tell ya, that ain't exactly true. Infinity is best played with a fair amount of terrain (there's an excellent blog post about it here, at Cert’s Tabletop), but that terrain doesn't necessarily have to be expensive.
So, here's what I'll do. I'll just let you do your thing, and give Infinity a try. Then I'll come back and we'll talk some more about it, ok?
Cool.
When I return, we'll discus some of the basic concepts in the game, have a look at the factions involved, the universe they battle in, and maybe even ogle some of the models…because nothing sells the game of Infinity as much as the lovely models designed and manufactured by Corvus Belli.
Here's a peek at one of their new releases…
Here's the links you'll need for your test drive:
Infinity the game (Home Page)
Infinity Downloads Page (All the Rules, Army Lists, Tokens, Templates and Markers, Scenarios and cool wallpapers, too!)
Corvus Belli YouTube Channel (The creators of Infinity include a helpful ‘How to play Infinity' playlist, which covers the most basic stuff. The channel also features ‘fluff' videos for all the factions, showcases new models and other products and Infinity stuffs. We all love stuffs, so…go on, check it out)
Infinity Army List Toolkit (Free to use on a variety of platforms, including cellphones, the Aleph Toolbox is a great little application. Prints a very nice list that puts as much, or as little information as you'd like, right there at your finger or tentacle tips)
Until next time, folks- Exit with catchphrase!
- SinSynn
Mandatory plug for my own corner of the blogosphere-
Be sure to visit the House of Paincakes, the blog network where I'm generally released from my pen every Sunday, and join in the lively hobby discussions that take place each week. The HoP hosts an amazing variety of Blogs (including the aforementioned Cert’s Tabletop and some blog called 3 plus plus something or other, as well), so after you're done calling me a knucklehead on one of my posts, cuz I added one too many scantily clad pictures of Megan Fox (I have a thing…Don't you judge me!), you can browse the links.
Hope to see you there!