Halo Flashpoint: Sangheili Elites

 Because it's good to have a least a couple of new games on the go I've also started painting up Mantic's latest game, Halo: Flashpoint. This is Mantic's entry into the growing field of low model count skirmish games using large models (40mm+) based on popular IP's. I'm thinking of Marvel Crisis Protocol and Star Wars: Shatterpoint as prime examples. These games are more aimed at people who love the IP but don't necessarily have a background in wargaming. My personal interest was piqued by the fact the rules are based on my favourite set, Mantic's Deadzone rules. I've never played Halo and don't really know much about it's setting as I was busy shooting people in Planetside on the PC when Halo was released on consoles. 

The games comes in a couple of versions and I went for the bigger box as you got a greater variety of models including some non-humans to play with. The human forces are made up of genetically modified warriors called Spartans. The aliens in the box are called Sangheili and I believe they are the main enemy in the games for the Spartans. Each fireteam is (currently) made up of 3 or 4 models with the biggest difference from Deadzone being that when they die the models can respawn into the battle. This is a mechanism straight from any PC/console game and means that you can only really gain a temporary numbers advantage rather than the snow-ball effect losing models can have in Deadzone. 

The Sangheili Mercenaries are a complete fireteam of four elites so I've started off the painting with them. This will allow me to field a complete team with only having to paint a few models.

In the box you get a nice stat card for each model, these have been produced to a high standard and give you all the information you need about each unit and it's various keywords and weapons. One thing I have noticed is that compared to Deadzone the weapon ranges tend to be shorter and the movement speeds quicker so I think you can expect to be in melee more often.

That won't be a bad thing for the Sangheili as you can see they have a Fight of 4+ so they are perfectly able to handle themselves in a brawl. Each of them is also armed with a one-use grenade (which comes back when you respawn) so you certainly want to make sure you use that every life. Like Deadzone, Flashpoint uses command dice but you only start with two in your initial pool. At present the Sangheili have no models that add to this pool so they will always be starved of dice and get no re-rolls. Command dice are very much part of the 'special sauce' that makes Deadzone so it will be interesting to see how this lack impacts the amount of fun you have playing the Elites.

The team itself looks to be reasonably well balanced between melee and shooting with the energy sword looking to be a top melee weapon and the ranged weapons having a decent spread of abilities. One thing Flashpoint does have is random weapon spawns so you can add a second weapon onto a model, having 4+ for melee and shooting will help the Sangheili make good use of any weapon that they pick up.

If like me you have no knowledge of the history of Halo then flipping the unit cards over gives you a nice little bit of information on the unit and the weapon it comes equipped with. I'm hopeful that Mantic plan to add Halo to the Companion so we get the appropriate keywords printed out with the list in the future. 

The models themselves are good quality pre-built plastic miniatures of the sort you'd get in a high end board game. You can see they are aimed more at the non-wargaming community and offer a quick to table experience. You also get some rather nice cardboard terrain in the box which slots together very easily to make up your board. Of course I also have plenty of Deadzone terrain to add onto the table but with the shorter weapon ranges I think you could go a bit lighter on the terrain in Flashpoint.

Well that's the first team done, I'll probably try to do another team over Christmas in between starting the DAK forces for WW2.