One of the most anticipated upcoming releases is the U.S. Sectorial for Ariadna (USAr). I wouldn't doubt that once released, we could potentially run entire tournaments where a restriction is in place that you have to use the USAr Sectorial and be perfectly fine. It really is that looked forward to across the hobby base for Infinity.
True to form leading up to GenCon, Corvus Belli is teasing images once again. One of the latest actually having "Independence Day" on it, so perhaps it will be revealed on July 4th, with a GenCon release? Who knows. What we do know is that the community is hungry for this and our cries are being answered.
What I'd like to do now is dive into the latest teaser image and see what may be included in the initial roll-out for this faction.
Let's take a look at the first official imagery related to the USAr Sectorial, the Spec for the USAriadna Grunt:
The unit patch is pretty blatant on the sectorial, and from the N3 Profiles, we can reasonably speculate that these will be the line troopers for the faction. I'm perfectly happy with this as a standard line trooper for them is 10 points, a Forward Observer is 11 and a Paramedic is 12. Heck, their Sniper with Marksmanship LX is only 18 points and .5 SWC. Can you imagine them in a Link Team?
Now lets move on to the first two teaser images that were released:
The first one was a fairly generic, grungy landscape with a quote by a fictitious General Laura Burstyn. The fun part is when we examine her title: National Security Advisor. NSA. Now who specifically has a government agency with those initials? Right, moving on.
The second one gave even more weight to the excitement building, though this time is was in the quote itself, "A place where to build a new American state, if we survive the planet". So much love there in the teaser for the USAr Sectorial in just one word. It's seems that it's a sure thing at this point, we just are left to speculate on when and what's included in the initial release.
Now onto the latest teaser image, released a few days ago:
"The time has come. The time to demonstrate what we can do for our country. The time of the free and the brave." A quote attributed to a fictitious Captain of the 5th regiment of Minutemen. This image fills us with much giddiness as not only does it show 9 silhouettes, it also calls out "Independence Day".
…Wait, did you miss part of that, or catch it and are still counting the silhouettes in the image? Yes, I said NINE silhouettes. Why do I say 9 and not 8? Well, let's revisit the Independence Day teaser with some labels I've put on it with probable profiles/units corresponding to the silhouettes. I also bumped up the contrast and brightness to also show a couple details.
The Grunts I called out due to headgear similarities to the spec profile already shown. That, and it's easy to push that thought as if they are the line troops, then most boxes will have 3 of them. From the stance of the one on the far right, you also can speculate there is at least one female.
The "Unknown Motorcycle" is just that, an unknown new profile. However I'm excited to see what comes of it!
The Dog Warrior is fairly apparent in the back-middle, and after analyzing the image and where silhouettes should and shouldn't end, you can now make out what could be the back of an Antipode peeking between the Dog Warrior and the Grunts. As well as if you look between the motorcycle and the grunts, you can see a clawed foot that most likely does not belong to the Dog Warrior due to it's location. That's why I say 9 silhouettes.
The Hardcase I'm fairly confident in as you can see the dark outline of a bow at about waist height. Am I imagining this? Maybe, but it's there, so I'm putting my money on it.
The "Possible Minutemen" I'm speculating on purely because they need new sculpts so badly, and this would be a perfect time to roll them out. They also don't look like other Hardcases to me.
So there you are folks! I'm excited to see more from Corvus Belli, and really hope that they roll this out for a GenCon release!
What are your thoughts?
- Tim