Infinity Ammo Tactica: E/M ammo

Hello again and welcome to another instalment of our ammo tactica series. Today, we will discuss E/M ammo.

E/M stands for electromagnetic and it is translated in game terms as a non-lethal ammunition which causes one BTS roll per hit. On a failure, all E/M vulnerable gear your target is carrying is immediately deactivated. As well, if your target happens to be a TAG, Heavy Infantry or a Remote, it will be immobilised until an Engineer comes to repair.

That is not all. Enemy camouflage will be disabled and reduced to mimetism which means that the target will not be able to hide as a camo token.

As you can see that is a lot of utility right there, because the range of E/M vulnerable equipment that you can harm is very large, going from basic weapons like combi-rifles up to fancy gear like ODD or Nano screens.

Since E/M ammo is non-lethal it rises an important question. Why bother deactivating weapons when you could kill the target instead? Sometimes, for example, your chances of neutralising a TAG with one shot are as good as non-existent and that is when E/M becomes handy.

The difference between shooting with lethal ammo and shutting down with E/M is that with the latter you just need one shot to go past your opponent’s defenses. It is true that usually TAGs and HI are well protected via BTS, but, how many shots would you need to kill a Sogarat or Asawira in cover? Those targets are hard, but their BTS is not.

So even though it is difficult to go through BTS defences with E/M it is still an invaluable tool to have when you left the big guns at home and the battlefield is swarming with ultra high tech troops.

E/M also works well in tandem with D-charges or good CC troops. Immobilised troops are sitting ducks and you can apply explosive measures to finish them off as you please (remember that Immobilised troops do still provide an Order to the Order Pool and count as scoring in quadrant control, frontline and are not considered dead for retreat or annihilation purposes).

Almost every faction, has access to some sort of E/M weaponry. It comes in multiple forms, from the very useful e/marat (direct templates are full of uses, E/M direct templates have even more as already talked about in my Fire Ammo article , the unimpressive e/mitter and the glorious, Blitzen and it’s E/M variant, E/M2.

E/M2 follows the same pattern as DA ammo. One hit causes two BTS saves and one fail results in all the high tech gear being turned off.

The good thing about the Blitzen is that it has the same range bands as the HMG (arguably the best range bands of the game) and it’s stopping power can bring down anything big from a good safe distance. This makes it especially good in ARO or to close fire lines that TAGs or HI could use to attack your positions.

Other good sources of E/M are E/M grenades/grenade launchers. Area weapons are always good, because they allow you to use speculative fire, and also allow to threaten multiple targets at once. You can try for a lucky shot against that Aquila, Intruder or Atalanta that is pinning your guys from an elevated position. Sometimes deactivating weapons and visors is as good as killing a model.

A couple of useful tips: even if your target does make its BTS roll, it is still required to make a guts roll which can save your bacon for a turn as a last resource.

Void, Vector and Jump operators can die as a result of an E/M shot they have no BTS so it is lethal against them and they have also no unconscious state.

So to recap:

Good against: Heavy Infantry, TAGs and Remotes, better if they have poor BTS protection (Asawiras, Sogarats, Geckos).

Also good against: Troops with no BTS but E/M vulnerable weapons, Intruders, Atalanta, Nisses, Yaogats, Void, Vector and Jump operators.

I hope you found this article useful and don’t forget to give your two cents on E/M ammo and how you use it.