Taking a look at Fireteams

With Human Sphere N3 right around the corner and the Onyx First Contact Force rapidly approaching, I decided that it would be nice to at least give a basic primer on how I like to construct Fireteams and what considerations I take into account when I build them.  Now, Onyx is more like a “normal” sectoral for me, as the other factions I play are Steel Phalanx (who can get as many fire teams as they have points for), Tohaa (who can also get as many fire teams as they have points for), and Vanilla Nomads (who can’t form Fireteams).  As a result, I’m not quite as accustomed to regular 5-man Core Fireteams and Haris Fireteams, as Onyx will be the first time I have access to these more “normal” style Fireteams.  That being said, all of the concepts that I take when I build Enomotarchos and Triads still apply to Core and Haris Fireteams and I hope that this will be helpful for those of you who are still trying to wrap their head around Fireteams.

Roles of Fireteams

There are a variety of roles that Fireteams can fulfill.  When I’m thinking about what I want to use a Fireteam for, the first thing I think about is how many points I want to sink into it.  The more points I sink into the Fireteam, the more it needs to be a multi-functional Fireteam.  The general uses of Fireteams is split into 2 major types: the button pushers, and pain train Fireteams.  As we go through these, recognize that some of the various types of Fireteams will have some overlap in terms of roles, and the higher you go in points, the more important this becomes.

Button pushers are teams of multiple specialists, oftentimes only taking a single heavier weapon to ensure that they aren’t completely worthless in a firefight if they need to go in and get work done.  Cheap Forward Observers and Paramedics are oftentimes the primary unit types taken in these Fireteams due to being able to get a number of cheap specialists into a very order efficient team.  With HSN3, Hackers will become more attractive in Fireteams due to being able to hack without being kicked out of the Fireteam, but you still do pay a premium for most Hackers that are linkable, likewise with Engineers, I don’t find myself too often linking Engineers unless they have a secondary role due or I’m fielding a lot of TAGs, HI and REMs.  That being said, there are some Hackers and Engineers that are in excellent point brackets and for the “button pushing” support Fireteams, it is not unusual to have 4 different specialists and a single big gun.  Here are some examples of button pushing Fireteams:

• Nesaie Alke (Enomotarchos), Thorakitai Paramedic, Thorakitai Paramedic, Thorakitai Forward Observer – 67 points, 1.5 SWC.
• Acmon (Enomotarchos), Dactyl Doctor, Dactyl Doctor, Dactyl Engineer with Flammenspeer – 97 points, 0.5 SWC.
• Myrmidon Officer Chain of Command with Boarding Shotgun (Enomotarchos), Machaon (Enomotarchos), Myrmidon Spitfire, Myrmidon with Chain Rifle – 120 points, 2.5 SWC.
• Nexus Operative with Spitfire, Umbra Legate Hacker, Unidron Batroid Forward Observer, Unidron Batroid Forward Observer, Unidron Batroid with Plasma Sniper – 123 points, 3 SWC.
• Nexus Operative Hacker, Unidron Batroid Forward Observer, Unidron Batroid Forward Observer, Unidron Batroid with Plasma Sniper, Unidron Batroid with K1 Combi Rifle and Tinbot A – 96 points, 2.5 SWC.
• Makaul, Kosuil Assault Pioneer with Boarding Shotgun, Aelis Keesan with K1 Combi Rifle – 69 points, 1 SWC.

These are all solid examples of Fireteams where the main point of them is to push buttons.  Many of them are more defensive or supportive in nature as opposed to offensive in nature, being able to act as a defensive core until they are needed to push a buttons, oftentimes later in the game, and at which point, you can take advantage of their order efficiency to go and accomplish mission objectives.  When picking the “big gun” for the button pushing Fireteams, I like to go for high burst assault weapons like Spitfires, Boarding Shotguns, Plasma Rifles and Plasma Carbines, as you will typically be in closer ranges with these Fireteams when you are moving up to complete objectives.

The second type of Fireteams are pain trains.  These are highly offensive Fireteams that are centered around causing as much as damage as possible, while still having a specialist in order to accomplish mission objectives if need be.  Your weapon range bands are extremely important for this type of Fireteam, as always being in a favourable Range Band is highly beneficial for trying to get the most damage output during your active turn, as well as giving you extremely favourable AROs on the reactive turn.  These Fireteams are usually highly mobile, being able to rapidly reposition into favourable firing positions as needed.  Here are some examples of “pain trains”:

• Hector Lieutenant with Plasma Rifle (Enomotarchos), Phoenix (Enomotarchos), Myrmidon with Chain Rifle, Myrmdon Assault Hacker – 158 points, 2.5 SWC.
• Hector Lieutenant with Plasma Rifle (Enomotarchos), Phoenix (Enomotarchos), Machaon (Enomotarchos), Myrmidon with Chain Rifle – 165 points, 2.5 SWC.
• Nesaie Alke (Enomotarchos), Thorakitai HMG, Thorakitai Feuerbach, Thorakitai Paramedic – 84 points, 4.5 SWC.
• Umbra Samaritan Assault Hacker, Rodok HMG, Rodok Missile Launcher, Rodok Paramedic, Rodok Paramedic – 140 points, 3 SWC.
• Umbra Samaritan with Breaker Combi Rifle, Rodok HMG, Rodok Missile Launcher, Rodok Assault Hacker, Rodok Paramedic – 141 points, 3.5 SWC.
• Umbra Samaritan Assault Hacker, Xeodron with Red Fury, Xeodron with K1 Combi Rifle – 161 points, 1.5 SWC.
• Mobile Brigada Hacker, Mobile Brigada HMG, Mobile Brigada Missile Launcher, Mobile Brigada Multi Rifle, Mobile Brigada Boarding Shotgun – 197 points, 4.5 SWC.

These are all solid examples of Fireteams where their main role is to attack.  The presence of the Assault Hacking Devices in a lot of these link teams is not just to provide a specialist presence, but to provide an offensive specialist for the list.  Any non-assault Hackers are there to provide supportware such as Fairy Dust or Assisted Fire to act as support for the heavy firepower brought on by the “pain train”.  Doctors and Paramedics are also excellent in these Fireteams as they will be able to help keep your big guns up and running, and it is not unusual to have 1 or 2 Doctors or Paramedics in these Fireteams as well.  Once you have killed what you need to do with the pain trains, the specialist will be there to complete 1 or 2 quick objectives to get you some objective points.

All of these Fireteams are good on both offensive and defense, having good weaponry at every range band and different ammo types for different situations that may pop up.  If you are using a big offensive Fireteam, it is very important that it is flexible and can deal with any threat that your opponent can bring to bear against you, while still being able to push a button if it is all you have left on the table.  You need to very strongly consider having armaments that are useful in both active and reactive turn with offensive Fireteams so that the crux of your offensive capabilities isn’t restricted to just your active turn.

Range Band Stacking

This is a very important concept for building Fireteams, and something that is extremely easy to overlook.  This is something that we all do for lists as a whole, and is a concept that you need to apply to any Fireteams that you build as well in order to maximize their effectiveness.  This is even more important in lists that run multiple Fireteams and is something that you need to really pay attention to in order to make sure that you aren’t handicapping yourself unintentionally.  The more Fireteams you run, the more complicated your range band stacking becomes.

One thing that we all do when we build lists is we make sure that we have all of our range bands covered in our lists.  That way, we aren’t completely handicapped at range bands that a canny opponent can easily exploit if you don’t have them all covered.  When I build Fireteams, I like to ensure that I have at least one mid-to-long range gun, one mid-to-close range gun, and at least one mid range gun.  Occasionally, in 5-man links, I like to have a long range gun as well to cover even more range bands.

There is one particular weapon that covers so many of these range bands, that it is my personal favourite weapon when used in a Fireteam, the humble Spitfire.  Spitfires are the perfect weapon for acting as the “glue” for a link team.  It has high burst, and a range band that is very easy to work with to ensure that you don’t have any blind spots (the other one that is a personal favourite of mine is an X-Visor Plasma Rifle, but only 1 model has that combination of equipment).  Combi-Rifles can also help cover the close-to-mid range bands, and are about as standard of a gun as you can get, while HMGs are excellent at covering the mid-to-long range that Spitfires can’t get into +3 range.  For covering the close range of a Fireteam, I personally like using either Direct Template Weapons or Shotguns due to the extremely likely chance of hitting at those ranges.  Once again, this covers one of the only blind spots that the Spitfire has and is an excellent support for when people get too close to your Spitfire.

At long range, there are a wide variety of weapons that are excellent, ranging from Missile and Rocket Launchers, Sniper Rifles, and depending on the role that you want that Fireteam to accomplish is something that you may or may not need. For example, in a button pushing Fireteam, I rarely find the need to include a long range weapon, as the Fireteam is usually so close that it is simply not optimal to include them.  In these Fireteams, Spitfires, Feurbachs and HMGs will make up the maximum range of the weapons that I include as they are not needed to operate outside of the 36″, and in many cases, the 24″ optimal range of the Spitfire is more than enough.

Range band stacking also goes into how you position your Fireteam.  Remember that you can be up to 8″ away from the Link Leader.  This means that you don’t need everyone clustered in a line where a single template can eliminate your entire Fireteam.  An example of what I mean is that often, I will deploy Hector and the Myrmidon Hacker or Machaon relatively close, but often with a building separating them so that they don’t get killed by a single template.  8″ in front of Hector, I will put the Myrmidon with Chain Rifle.  8″ behind Hector, I will put Phoenix.  This allows me to have a +3 to ARO from at least 1 of them regardless of what wanders into LOS of my Fireteam.  If I have a Myrmidon Officer with a Boarding Shotgun, I will setup the Boarding Shotgun 8″ in front of Hector. If I have a Spitfire, it will go in the mid range where Hector sits.  Once again, that means that no matter what walks into range, there is always a gun that is at +3 or better to hit.

When you have multiple Fireteams, you want to make sure that not only have you layered your range bands for each of your Fireteams properly, but you also need to check to make sure that you have covered all of your range bands across your list as well.

Deploying and Positioning Fireteams

One of the most important things about Fireteams after building them is how to position them on the table.  Fireteams are incredibly powerful, but it is extremely easy to position them poorly and get them all killed.  Somethings that you need to be very wary of:

1. Do not cluster up your Fireteams.  You have 8″ off the Link Leader to play with, take advantage of it.  Otherwise, a single impact or circular template will kill your whole Fireteam.
2. Don’t deploy or position in straight lines.  You don’t want to lose everything to a single shotgun blast.
3. Be very cognitive of what your next action with your Fireteam is gong to be.  Remember that only models that are within 8″ of the Link Leader are part of the Fireteam.
4. Be wary of any and all template weapons your opponent has.  They can cause serious problems when trying to move your Fireteam, as any models who contact an area the template hits at any point during their move are subject to the damage.

These are some basic positioning things with Fireteams that you want to avoid, because it’s a very easy way to lose a Fireteam if you fall into any of these traps.  While the majority of Core Fireteams are comprised of very similar troops, there are some factions where you can mix up the models in the Fireteam.  These allow you to get into some very interesting positional mind games with your opponent.  For example, a favourite tactic of mine is to put Hector in cover protecting the mid-range band, with Phoenix sitting up behind him 8″ and a Chain Rifle Myrmidon hiding behind a building.  I often do this to exploit poor range bands on the opposing side.  They can’t see the Chain Rifle Myrmidon to shoot it.  If they want to get in +3 of either Hector or Phoenix, they will need to eat a a Chain Rifle or Nanopulsar from the Myrmidon.  Regardless of what the opponent chooses, they are put in a tough position.  They can either shoot at Hector, who will be rolling at 3 over the opposing target number because of his X-Visor always putting him in a more favourable range band than the opponent.  If they win the roll off against Hector, they have to somehow damage Hector who will be in cover, and is ARM5 BTS6, with 2 Wounds and No Wound Incapacitation.  Either that, or they can try to win the Face to Face roll against Phoenix who has ODD, and will be in cover.  This means that they can either try to wound Hector, who is significantly harder to wound, or they can try to somehow hit Phoenix, who is significantly harder to hit.  If they want to increase their odds of even winning the firefight, then they need to also take an armour save from the Myrmidon’s Direct Template weapons (or the Myrmidon Officer’s Boarding Shotgun).

That was only one example of what range band layering can do, but it takes a few times of putting it on the table to get the hang of doing it.  Due to the fact that everyone gets the link team bonuses, you want to ensure that you are maximizing the link team bonuses on both the active and reactive turns, and this is an example of how range band layering allows you to do that.

Dealing with Fireteams

Fireteams are not indestructible.  They have some weaknesses that you are able to exploit. Outside of templates as mentioned above, one common thing that I like to do to deal with Fireteams is picking an ARO target who isn’t the link leader.  This may seem counter-intuitive at first, but rememer that on the active turn, Fireteam members all declare the same second half of their order.  This means that if the link leader elects to shoot, all the other Fireteam members will participate by supporting the Link Leader, since only the Link Leader shoots during the active turn.  You can exploit this by declaring a shoot ARO against someone other than the Link Leader.  What this means is that if the link leader chooses to shoot, then you get a normal roll against the model that isn’t the Link Leader, and while you will be getting hit by normal rolls back, you may potentially be able to strip one of their link team bonuses.  If the active player wants their Fireteam member to dodge, then the link leader also has to dodge, which then means that you aren’t getting shot back.

Something you don’t want to do however, is to try to drop smoke and shoot a Fireteam member if they are covering an objective in ARO.  If they are 4 or more, and have access to Sixth Sense LV2, they will be able to ARO you back through the smoke without penalty (likewise for Direct Template Weapons).  However, if you drop smoke on top of the objective and they don’t have MSV, you’ll be able to just drop smoke, complete your objectives and then back out again.

I hope you guys have enoyed this little primer to Fireteams!  As always, feel free to comment or let us know if we missed something important.

’til next time!