INFINITY- A Look at Factions, Part 3: Tohaa
They have crossed the void between the stars…to shoot everyone with their Ebola rifles.
“They want something from us, and whatever they offer in return will not be worth our while. Even worse, their conscience will be clean.”
Saladin, on his impressions of theTohaa.
Three’s Company
Like humanity, the Tohaa are a species at a crossroads. They are a larger, older space empire, one that has already dealt with issues of unification, first contact with other species, and the management of the politics and resources or expansion and growth. And yet, they are a race on the brink: from the outside, being bled white in a devastating conflict with the overwhelming might of the Combined Army, and from within, with their fate being made hostage by a shadowy cabal that steers Tohaa Trinomial affairs for its own convenience and quest for dominance.
More, they are a race with a burden, being the last heralds of the bio-artefacts known as the T’zechi digesters, a network of ancient monolith-like constructs that take in impossible amounts of information about all lifeforms in their planets, storing them for mysterious purposes. The digesters document the rise and fall of entire civilizations, from the tiniest scrap of genetic data to the highest scientific achievements of galactic empires long gone. They absorb everything and give back nothing, and are one of the greatest mysteries in the universe.
Tohaa are a gregarious, inquisitive, advanced civilization. Much like we are geared toward understanding the world on a 10-scale, the number 3 is a defining aspect of their culture and identity. One Tohaa is alone. Two tohaa are also alone and miserable. Three Tohaa are in good company. Matrimony is established between triads, until a child is born to form a new base-3 family unit, with one spouse leaving to form a new triad, or they get busy cranking two more kids to get two full triads: a parental one and an offspring one.
They are also not above sculpting themselves for practical purposes, adopting symbiotes and other bio-alterations into their bodies for improved function. In fact, it’s hinted that they were not even too capable of verbal communication, relying on subtler pheromone-based communications, until meeting mankind and happily fashioning proper mouths and vocal chords for themselves to better chat with the funny ape-people with the wrong math.
Jerkilles will -never- not be funny.
The Trinomial’s softer, organic approach to matters is also seen in its penchant for ‘Exalting’ races: using their mastery of biotech to raise species into sentience, and giving them a useful place in their society. As with many things Infinity, this has a somewhat darker side. History is rife with cases of peoples who came under the thumb of stronger empires and gotten irrigation/roads/antibiotics/etc from them, but if the benefit was worth the cost is often an open and contentious subject. It’s not different for those Exalted by our trinary friends. They offer boons of clear value, but who can say what they truly ask in return, and how much of their protectorate is not gracefully disguised slavery?
And yet the Trinomial is not really an expansionist culture. Until not long ago, they did not even have a proper military machine worthy of the name, getting by with a light, ostensibly pacifist colonial escort force. It took a bloody, recent engagement with the pitiless forces of the Fenrig Imperative to reorganize their society for something like total war.
However, the secret society known as the Triumvirate, a conspiracy that seems to twist every aspect of Tohaa nature and culture to its darker side, shows that even if the Trinomial’s Intentions are honorable (in their own alien way), they might simply not prevail. The Triumvirate has actually had knowledge of humanity (and even contact! Though we are getting into spoilers here) far before the rest of their race, and their nefarious plans would make the EI clear its throat and applaud respectfully. With this driving force between the meeting of both races, who knows what lies in store?
Stengths: Thinking in Triplicate
More than any other force in the game, the Tohaa thrive on synergy. They have some very strong units, but those tend to be pricey, so you’ll rarely be able to afford many of them; to make them shine, you’ll need to link them with the right triad to both boost them with fireteam bonuses, and have a proper backup in case things get tense. A Sakiel with a Viral Combi Rifle is scary. A Linked Sakiel with that same Viral rifle having a ROF similar to a Spitfire is another. That goes double for an Ectros packing a Vulkan Shotgun if you manage to get up close.
So we come to the main ability the Tohaa bring to the game: their unique ability to pack fireteams without a sectorial, and using different units as the building blocks. Even more, they get to have more than one active fireteam at once, which can make for terrifying order efficiency, burst capability, and reactive power in ARO. It’s a very fun, strong boon, but it’s not without some caveats and finesse required to make it really work.
Unless you are really steamrolling an opponent, at some point one of your triad members will be knocked unconscious or die, and break your link. So a smart Tohaa player will be careful to do two things: One, save up some Command tokens to reform links as necessary, and two, always have a spare unit with the Fireteam:Tohaa rule nearby to run up and replace the casualty in an important link, with a minimal expenditure of orders. Or a doctor (better yet, a doctor’s Servant!) to get up there and heal the downed unit if possible, keeping your order pool up.
Finally, still on the subject of Tohaa fireteams, knowing how to build them is an art. You can assemble them for pure firepower, turn them into swiss army knives with one member for each job alternating as required, or go for your own mix of specialists, heavy hitters, smoke-grenade carriers and long-range destroyers.
The extensive use of symbiote armor by the Tohaa are also a big differential. Not every Tohaa has one, but most do. This basically gives you a ‘true’ statline for a unit, and then a weaker backup profile that kicks in once your armor is gone due to taking too many wounds. In practice, it means that a lot of units have an added ‘wound’ more than they should, at the cost of lower performance once they are at death’s door. This means a lot. In a game of few models and limited orders, having your targeted guy still being around in some form, tossing out AROs, keeping links whole and your order pool stable, not to mention clearing objectives, cannot be overstated! Any active statline is better than being an Unconscious marker on the floor.
Their auxiliaries, the Chaksas, are also quite good. Unlike the remotes other factions use, they are actual infantry, which means that they can go prone, use Cautious movement, and dodge without penalty! Sure, they tend to not be as fast as actual remotes, but I’ll take that trade anyday, personally. They also lack the Fireteam:Tohaa rule (obviously), so beware of packing your list with too many of their cheap orders, or you’ll have fewer bodies for your link teams.
And while the Tohaa are still leagues away from the supremacy of the Combined Army, their tech is nothing to sneeze at. They have ample access to things that target the enemy BTS instead of armor: Viral weaponry, nanopulsers, Swarm grenades, you name it. They can turn entire areas of the battlefield into infowar deadzones with nullifiers. And for a race that is vulnerable to fire, they pack enough incendiary ordnance to make a Naffatun proud: Vulkan shotguns, flamethrowers, Flamenspeers, rocket launchers left and right. if the Pyro from Team Fortress 2 had to pick an army, I know which one he’d choose.
We have crossed the void between the stars, and filled it with beautiful, purifying fire!
Weaknesses: Sometime’s Three’s not Enough
First, the elephant in the room: Fire. Any model with Symbiote Armor that fails a save against a Fire weapon dies. Instantly. No matter how many wounds it has left. That’s not such an issue for the cheaper, basic guys (most 1-wound models that fail a save end up unconscious and out of the game unless you brought a doctor, after all), but losing an Ectros or a Gorgos to a lucky flamethrower hit can be galling. Thankfully, templates are much easier to dodge in N3, but it’s still something to be aware of.
The second issue is limited hacking. Tohaa get access to the Defensive Hacking Device, and that’s it. It has some very neat tricks, enough to guide your drop troops and buff your HI with firewalls, but it’s not going to freeze enemies or ruin their comm anytime soon. They do get exclusive access to Nullifiers, though, which throw a giant wrench into the hacking coverage of your opponents.
The third hiccup is relatively minor: the aliens have a low armor cap. Even their heavy infantry tops out at ARM 3, though several ‘lighter’ units sport very decent mid-range armor (Sakiel and particularly the Gao-Tarsos). That is compensated by the ‘extra’ wound provided by their symbiotes, but makes finding good cover and protecting your groups all the more important. Infinity is not a game in which you let the opponent take free licks at your dudes, and this goes double for the Trident forces.
“Why yes, I’m basically a Heavy Infantry with two wounds dropping from low orbit right on your backfield”
The final issue the Trident has to deal with is somewhat lighter ordnance than most factions. Their sniper rifles have no MULTI ammo, their TAG is packing ‘only’ a Spitfire to go with its Flamenspeers, and they get no missile launchers/autocannons. They make up for that with tons of rockets, Fire weapons, and Viral ammo, all of which can be boosted into further lethality by being linked.
What Infinity Army do you want to see profiled next? Tell us in the comments!
