Infinity Mission Focus: Firefight

Welcome to the sixth installment of this series focusing on Infinity Missions. After analyzing the beloved classic which is Acquisition, we dive into a multi faced mission that can be approached in radically different ways: Firefight. 

In this mission you score points killing more specialists, lieutenants and army points than your opponent; acquiring more items from panoplies than your opponent and completing 3 Classified Objectives. 

Skills, weapons and equipment

Rasyat Diplomatic Division by Cristian Il Corinzio: we wrote about this unit when analyzing Mindwipe and you're definitely going to meet it again in Firefight!

⛽ Disposable strikes back: if you're a fan of coordinated mine deployment remember that you can also use a panoply to cancel unloaded states. It's important to do that before succeeding the panoply WIP roll or you won't be able to use it again with the same trooper. Moreover, your opponent may have lowered his/her guard after you've used all your blitzen, sepsitor or panzerfaust: prove them you have more rounds up your sleeve with this simple trick (which is way better than using one entire order on baggage). 

PanOceanian Echo-Bravo Rapid Reaction Unit. This parachuting troop has two interesting specialist profiles with disposables: an hacker with Panzerfaust and (in picture) a paramedic with WildParrot

🌚 Hidden deployment: this mission really push you for some heavy airborne deployment, providing a +3 bonus and the opportunity to reach the enemy deployment zone. Setting up hidden deployed troops to welcome combat jumpers is a good way to break your opponent's nerves.

💂Veteran: this skill is not cheap but is still better than informing your opponent about who to kill next via Chain of Command, it will ultimately save you some precious command tokens. Remember: only the Veteran troop type is useful for Classified Objectives, not the skill!

Behaviours and tactics

Hexa (top center) and other PanOceanian troops by Supermassive Barnowl

🐅🐉 Hidden hacker, crouching camo: since the classified deck has 25% of the objectives that can be completed by hackers, you may definitely want to bring some here. Hackers with parachutist or hidden deployment have a defensive edge that will improve their life span so watch for this kind of units. Once you reveal them they will be on top of your opponents' killing list so troops below 30 points like Ninjas, Hexas or Noctifer are the real deal. My final line here is: lower your revealed specialists to the bare essential (doctor/engineer), make sure they have two peripherals and go for camo specs if you think you need more.

With camouflage, hidden deployment, infiltration, mimetism (-6), surprise attack (-3) and two specialist profiles the Croc Man is an excellent Firefight unit for PanOceania!

🤖 Remote spec. party: this is the occasion for your remote presence specialists to shine. With two levels of unconscious and a few hackers around, these guys can be a real pain for your opponent in this mission even when they're not hackers themselves like Parvati, Dakinis, Betatroopers and Dropsuit Taryots. Just be sure to have enough GizmoKits to bring them out of null state before the end of the game. 

📔 Be ready to change your agenda: you may have an idea of how to take the match home on turn one, based on how you and your opponent have prepared for the mission. This is ok and proves that you've made your due diligence, but victory cares about opportunities and you must be ready to seize them. If you have a specialist oriented list you may still win through army point killing in case you have a lucky reactive turn and, vice versa, you may still have a chance to win by classified even with a super aggressive born-to-kill army. Don't sit on your premises and keep trying to understand what is going on. 

Final thoughts 

Firefight tends to be a very oscillating mission so don't be surprised if things look irrecoverable at the end of turn one. Despite all the midfield elements, there is a high chance the game will be played around deployment zones so watch out for your cheerleaders and consider spending an order on them any now and then.