aurax said:

Now we're talking :)

Example number 1: it is very important to know if this is a 12 marines game or a 6 marines game, for instance. In a 6 marine game, losing one marine is a very heavy loss (and even more in the Void Lock!), even for a vanilla one, because you can't get a lot of support tokens for Calistarius or the Zael (you have to distribute a little more between all the marines), and every shot counts. Due to the "Death Spiral effect", you are seriously hampering your victory chances is you lose one marine on the Void Lock. Let's imagine that this example is a 12 marines game.

Points in favor of and  against speding the token to reroll the attack: the red terrain card will spawn almost for sure new genestealers in front of Omnio. If he is not next to a marine with heavy firepower that can attack the next round, you don't want to add one more genestealer to the next spawn (although it could be even worse). If, on the other side, he is next to, say Calistarius or Lorenzo, I wouldn't spend the token attacking again. Are there more genestealers nearby? If you have firepower next to you, but it will be required at some other spot, don't count on them. Being at the Void Lock is a fact that suggest playing conservatively (specially if it's the first or second round), but on the other hand, having 12 marines, it's not the worst tragedy in the world if you lose one of the vanillas like Omnio. Personally, I wouldn't reroll the attack, due to being in the Void Lock and in front of the red terrain. But if we were at the Chapel of the Fury of Baal, Omnio didn't have in front of him any terrain, and there were other genestealers around, I would reroll the attack for sure.

Example number 2: it's impossible to answer, because you can't plan which tokens are going to be used and which not in advance, you can just plan which orders and more or less the average cost of the orders in tokens. In other words, if Leon landed his three shots and saved some of the vanillas, of course they are going to use the token to reroll their attacks. Others won't have this choice because probably you can't attack with every team you got, so supporting and place additional tokens on them would be a wise decision. In other words, you'll have to take the decision one after another, beginning with Deino and finishing with Goriel. If the first ones begin to miss, I would reroll and use the latters to save them in case they could hit on their first shot. In other words, you are never confronted with the choice of firing again or keeping the token for every vanilla at the same time. Seeing what the first ones do conditions your next choices (and let's not forget that there are also the Star marines, some of them may save several vanillas). You can't end your turn with the formation full of genestealers, especially in front or next to terrain cards, so if the first attacks miss you'll have to take some risks. If, on the other hand, the first attacks hit, you may save your next support tokens and play defensively, leaving a couple of genestealers alive.

But, to give an answer, if I had the choice of shooting again or keeping the token at location number 3, with every marine alive, depending on where are the rest of the marines, I would reroll the attack for Deino (if Lorenzo hadn't hit or he is to shoot later, I could get the support back), Valencio, Omnio (unless Zael is in danger), Scipio (unless Calistarius is in danger and Noctis (worth rerolling because of his good %, above average), and keep the counter for Goriel (you need him alive above all, he can bring here another marine later or he can use it later on Defensive Stance). Except I wouldn't shoot the genestealers I'm facing with the vanilla marines if I had other choices (but that's another story)

[Edit: message posted twice. Any moderator… How do I delete this post? Thanks]

I need to read the strategy guide again. I played a game last night using the dream team of flamer, Librarian, and Cyclonic missle launcher.  I thought this would be great because the missle launcher is like the yellow team's furious charge, only with range and no chance of dying.  However, I still find the game tough to beat if you play a straight game (as in no cheating or phantom support tickets, or acts of the Emperor).  I am sure that there is a rhythm that you can follow which is really efficient, but it still eludes me.

If you want to take a detailed look of how I use to play, check this out: www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/811312/death-angel-an-example

Or if you prefer, open a new thread or mail me and explain in detail how did you play, I will give you some more tips. Maybe you just had bad luck, it happens sometimes (I remeber one game a long time ago in which I didn't score one single hit with my vanilla marines nor Calistarius. I managed to the 4th location only to lose there in a very close game).

peterstepon said:

Also, no defensive team at all… Why don't you try again adding Lorenzo?

I agree with Freeman, for Solo Play the dream team combination would be probably flamer (Zael) + psychic (Calistarius) + sword (Lorenzo)

The Cyclone Launcher is great but more unreliable than other attacks because it cannot be rerolled. Sooner or later you will roll a 0 and then you will be facing a complicated defense roll. Anyway, the brown team is still one of the strongest of them all, and the “double token” support action in a 6 marine game is awesome.

Calistarius and Zael can cover each other´s back, and because of their great offense power, you can guarantee that almost any major spawn will be wipped off. Because you will have a small formation, the flamer will be able to reach almost all spawns if combined with the move action from other team.

If there are GS surviving, use the Strategize to move the swarms at your convenience and put them in front of Lorenzo with his counterattack. This allows you to kill GS both in offense and defense.

For desperate situations you have the power field from Calistarius + blue team Intimidation (the “blocked” GS can still be intimidated) Also, if you attack with the blue team and one of the teammembers has a Token, you can almost be sure you will get the token back, so use it to kill xenos.

Maybe there is some small details in the rules that you overlooked? I remember in my first games I used to move the GS individually based on their movement symbols, till I realize I should move the whole swarms, and that every GS card can only be moved once per turn. This allowed me to select my kills accordingly to the expected (o desired) swarms potential movements.

Good luck! And don't forget to pray to the Emperor every time you roll the die, maybe that will do the trick!
 

 mmmh about Target Lock rerolls :( 

http://www.buzzbox.com/news/2012-03-06/ffg:space/?clusterId=9199490

Brady Sadler, the guy who designed the most imbalanced expansions for a fine tuned game by Corey Coniezcska. In fact, I suspect Mission Pack 1 and Marine Pack 1 come from him too, although it figures Corey's name on the credits. So I'll take his word concerning the Target Lock. It makes the Orange team a bit less powerful but they are still great.