Bane developed himself to extreme lengths. He bulked up amazing muscle mass through regular gym workouts, and his intelligence is nearly unmatched due to his keen interest in reading as he spends much of his down-time reading as much material as possible.
For this reason, the Soldier of Fortune is the most specialized crew in the game. This crew has the best mercenaries in the world, who will be under the command of their charismatic leaders, such as Bane. The Soldiers of Fortune will control the table with an iron fist!
The Deck
Its Objectives are based on controlling areas of the board and performing actions with models that have the Veteran trait (which is very common in this crew). You will have to exploit its full potential, since it is generally a faction that will place few models on the table.
The strong point of the Soldiers of Fortune crew and its Objectives is that it forces the opponent to approach specific points. If you use this ability well, you will be able to position your models to respond to the actions of the enemy models in order to eliminate them with your offensive supremacy.
It also helps that almost all the objectives are related to each other to allow you to be able to score objectives with the help of another previously played objective.
Its resources are crucial to obtain advantages, and to recover one of the mechanics of the crew, such as the valuable Venom, which is a substance that upgrades your combat capacity.
“You will know my name one day. And on that day you will beg for mercy. You will scream my name! SCREAM IT!” Bane
One of the main objective cards is Search & Destroy. It is one of the easiest cards in the crew to score. It just asks you to have made an Effort at least 2 times in a combat, and to have produced 2 hits at the end of the combat. This is especially easy to accomplish if you take advantage of the 2 free Efforts that Venom Doses grant you. And, for example, these doses will be even more useful thanks to the resource of this card. All this allows you to give a model that is using a +4” of movement, to reach the most distant places and attack the rival in places where it was believed to be safe.
Domination is a card that forces you to be active from the first activation, since the Event marker that you place in contact with an opponent, you must control during the Recount phase. To do this you will need to manipulate the marker to move it away from the rival and that, in turn, the rival cannot move it away from you. This is one of the cards we talked about earlier. If you place the event marker in a place where you force the rival to be placed where their models could be in danger, since yours will be well placed, then eliminate them. You can produce two effects, that the rival approaches and therefore loses models, or that they let you score the card. In both cases you will win.
The resource allows you to move a Suspect (yours or your opponent's!) or a Drone marker (a special type of marker that you deploy with another resource). Both are very useful in any game situation. You can protect your markers, or prevent scoring opponent's cards that require Suspect to be within a certain distance of a point.
“There is more work to be done” Bane
In relation to the resource of the previous card, we will talk about Invasion, a card that asks you to, for a number of random activations, protect one of the Suspects that you place near a Scenery element that is also near an enemy model. The best trick is to place it near a large Scenery element because this Suspect will normally have the rival models far away, and you'll be able to better protect the Suspect to give yourself enough time for the card to be scored. The resource of this card is devastating for crews that focus on taking advantage of the Suspects that they had already placed previously, such as the Court of Owls, simply the enemy Suspects that are within 2 "of a model that you choose with the Veteran trait, they will not be considered allies of the rival.
The next two objective cards we are going to talk about are directly related to each other. Hardpoint and Global Offensive will be scored based on how many Veterans you have at the table.
Hardpoint will be scored for blocking at least 2 hits with a Veteran that is within 8” of another ally with the Veteran trait.
On the other hand, Global Offensive will be scored for having more Veterans on the table than enemy Suspects. This is very important because it makes you defend your models well and when setting up your crew you will try to get most of your chosen models to have the Veteran trait.
As for Resources, the Hardpoint will help you keep your Venom Dose reserves high, as for the cost of removing a Suspect (and 0 Resource points!) you will gain a Venom Dose on a friendly model. These Doses are crucial to being able to attack without having to take a lot of Stun damage, thanks to its free Efforts. While the Global Offensive resource focuses on bringing your models with the Veteran trait closer to your other allies, such as models with the Medic trait, and being able to heal them so they can continue fighting.
“I Broke you once, and I can break you again. I am here to be king” Bane
The Cyber Attack and Ground War cards are also very closely related to each other. With Cyber Attack you will mark 2 enemy Suspects and in less than a random number of rounds. The opponent will have to reveal both Suspects to prevent you from scoring this card. This action can be especially effective if you choose a Suspect that the opponent needs to keep in play. Normally at the beginning the enemy Suspects are usually close to the enemy deployment zone, which makes us think of Ground War, which asks us to have two models within 4 "of a Scenery element that is inside, or 8 ", from the zone of enemy deployment, near the Suspects that you are going to target for the rival to reveal, since those that are close to your models can be eliminated.
Both resources help you to meet this condition. The Ground War one will allow you to make a Suspect give you Cover, and not be afraid of the enemy's shots, while the Cyber Attack resource will allow us to put the famous Drone Marker, which, while it is within 4" of enemy models, we will gain a +1 to hit rolls against them. A great advantage for the crew!
The Models
One of the best options to lead a Soldiers of Fortune crew could be Bane (Unleashed). An impressive figure of Bane, which stands out for his aggressive pose and the act of having the Batman himself defeated in his hands. This model focuses on aggression. He has all the necessary traits and stats to fight any enemy in melee combat. Scoring with Search & Destroy is incredibly easy. Ground War is also a great card to score with, as it can take hits thanks to its enormous Endurance value. Also, he has abilities to mitigate damage or even ignore it. Any cards that rely on the opponent interacting with your Suspects are good to place close to him, giving them targets to deal with in case the opponent is bold enough to try to stop you from scoring them, like Domination or Invasion.
“Still they cry out for him… for their hero and savior… but he is broken… and Gotham is mine!” Bane
To accompany him, we could choose between the powerful Henchmen available for the crew, since they have nothing to envy to the Sidekicks of other crews, and even too many Free Agents. Starting with Infiltrate Op, a model that has all the necessary traits to be where it is needed from the beginning of the game, she can always be inspired by her Radio trait, and with Hacking, she will protect Suspects to score Invasion or Domination, for example, by being able to move her markers. Do not forget that she also comes with an interesting Light Assault Carbine. Her incredible Defense value of 5 is a good item for scoring Hardpoint.
For the same action we could use Stealth Op, although he changes his role a bit by not having Hacking, but he can help us score both Search & Destroy with his powerful Katana or Hardpoint with his good Defense of 4.
Dreadnought Op will help us score Search & Destroy, since he has an amazing ease to do it thanks to rolling 2 force dice with his Tomahawk. Plus, he's tough enough to go along with Bane in scoring Ground War, for example.
Support Op and Sharp Shooter will help from a distance with their weapons. In the case of Support Op, he has always useful fragmentation grenades to reduce the resistance of the enemies, or the always effective smoke grenades, to be able to advance without fear of retaliation and help us score Global Offensive by protecting our troops.
On the contrary, Sharp Shooter is here to take down distant threats with his aim and devastating weapon. Placing it in the right spot early in the game will be crucial to taking advantage of this, although with the Undercover trait it will always make it easier to do so.
That’s all. Now it's your turn to play with the tough guys and gain control of Gotham City. In future articles we will show other Soldier of Fortune options and how to play them. Don’t miss them!