I didn't set my opponent's faction. This was just a pickup game at the LGS :)

as a counter data point, i've always gotten great mileage out of guilangs. the minelayer+shotgun profile is a fantastic assault piece , and enabling turn 0 deployable repeater in the midfield backed up by a zhanying native sixth sense hacker can be game changing. You can deploy your Su Jian in your main phase of deployment and then potentially deploy the Guilang minelayer as your reserve model to exploit the way your opponent's deployment has been immediately been shaped by the presence of that Su Jian

Mostly it's the cost. A guilang almost always pays for something it won't use while still in some way being bad at what it is doing. Want to use it as a skirmish hacker? It's a full 30pts because you're paying for that MSV1, and it's BTS zero if it ever gets into a hacking fight. Want to use it as a gunfighter to use the MSV1? Bad luck, it's BS11. It's a piece that's very prone to underperforming compared to the points you pay for it. Not bad, exactly - I'd absolutely believe that people have gotten good results from it - but never exactly worth the cost.

​@@R0bertShepherd Thanks for your reply! It makes sense what you're saying and I have to agree, the Guilang is expensive for what he does. Still he's the cheapest hacker infiltrator and with a WIP of 14 that's not too shabby and still better than many other factions. IIRC, the only factions doing that combination better, from an economical standpoint, are Haqq and Aleph.

@@SilverstreamMusic yep, agree. And every now and again you will use the MSV gunfighting.

I don't think a faction that only has access to guilang minelayers as their network projection should run guided missile lists. WhiteCo manage with pitchers on the Danavas though (and having WIP15 hackers incentivises the play), but WhiteCo have peacemakers which even after the points increase are an attractive alternative. I could see running say one Guilang and one Peacemaker, though.

While I think you're probably right about how games of 300pts vs reinforcements may often play out, there are a few things that are worth considering. Among other things; - reinforcements don't need to be optimal all or even much of the time to add variety in the wider game. Reinforcements could be something that some players take in some lists for some scenarios, and it would give us some novel new experiences to enjoy and experiment with. In the current ITS pack I would say there are a few scenarios that are potentially either somewhat or reinforcements-favoured, which would change the utility or reinforcements in a 'reinforcements optional' event format based on list selection. I'd be happy with that. - although a reinforcements list might be susceptible to being hamstrung, crippled and then defeated by a honed 300pt list that goes first and attacks, . Reinforcement lists aren't unique in that regard; Infinity in 2023 can be very alpha-focused. Yes, reinforcements doesn't solve that, but that's not why I'm interested in reinforcements as an optional format. I'm interested in it because it adds variety. - I don't think we've yet seen particularly optimised reinforcements lists. People are still learning the format (and, Reinforcements Optional would be an entirely new and different format that would also need to be learned). I've seen only a tiny handful of reinforcements lists that feel close to properly optimised so far. - there are a lot of ways CB (or TOs) could adjust reinforcements from a balance perspective. Reinforcements armies have released with a lot of handbrakes on their performance (commlinks suck, reinforcements are public information, points allocation is inflexible etc). Some or all of these could change in future, if there's community uptake of the format.

No - or more accurately, I'm not worried about my reinforcements only arriving on turn three because my reinforcements have never arrived before turn three anyway. So glue can't really make them turn up any slower.