B5 Narn Campaign help

[bayruun]

I'm currently having some difficulty with my Narn in a five-player campaign.

What I've got left:

G'Quanth, Crew 6

G'Quan, Crew 4, 5 damage, 21 crew missing
+2 Fore Ion Cannons, HLC upgraded to Fore

G'Quan, Crew 4, 16 crew missing
Long Range HLC

G'Quan, Crew 4, messed up (sent back to homeworld)

G'Quan, Crew 3, 4 damage, 10 crew missing

Var'Nic, Crew 4, 4 damage, 14 crew missing

G'Karith, Crew 4, 8 damage, 19 crew missing

3x Ka'Toc, Crew 4

Sho'Kov, Crew 3

Sho'Kov, Crew 6

In short, most of my fleet is scratched up, but functional. I have yet to win a battle due to poor choices and tactics.

There are five players: Narn (me), Earth/ISA, Earth/Psicorps, Minbari, and Centauri. The Minbari are vastly more powerful than the other players in terms of material. Earth/Psicorps holds the most territory.

I'll post the strategic points later (I haven't got the map with me).

 

[Democratus]

My first suggestion would be to pour on the "Other Duties" rolls. Every two battles lost is 2 XP for the surviving ships. Each of these ships can then make a roll on the Other Duties tables. There are many good things to be had here, from re-rolls to extra RR to free ships.

You should also form alliances with other players - agreeing to primarily attack the Centauri player. You can even arrange battles with each other that are little more than set pieces designed to gather XP with little to no loss in materiel.

Five players is a great size for a campaign. I'm jealous! There should be enough politiking there for you to thrive if you take things by the horns!

 

[bayruun]

We're still early in the campaign, so we haven't fully formed alliances. The Minbari player, with his massive resources, might consider an alliance with me, since I'm the largest threat to him (Emines). I'm pretty sure that the Psicorps player won't be leaving me alone anytime soon, as he's quite aggressive, and might see me as a wounded foe (which I am). I have a cease-fire with the Centauri, for now. The ISA hasn't bothered me yet, and I have nothing they want -- I figure we'll ignore each other.

The training-for-XP thing might go very well, especially for the Minbari, since he can afford to lose battles on purpose.

 

[Democratus]

Cheap-but-effective is the catchphrase of the Narn Regime. I noticed you have some very nice large ships there. But you seem light on attrition units. Patrol choices are only 3 RR to purchase in a campaign, making it easy to stock up on them even when money is tight.

One often overlooked "secret weapon" of the Narn fleet is the Frazi fighter. Never underestimate the power of these guys. Just five of these cheap fighters represents 20 AD on the attack - twin linked with the help of a scout!

The Sho'Kov can cheaply bring Precise weapons onto the field. For one patrol point they bring 2 AD of P/SAP (again even better with scouts). And they are suprisingly hard to kill as they have Dodge and should always be under CBD (leaving the Weak weapons unfired). When ramming, each cutter is 6 AD of SAP/TD and their Agile trait gives them a +1 to hit. Ram these little guys into a lumbering cruiser and you will likely do more economic damage to the enemy than the paltry 3 RR it cost to get one.

You seem to have the e-mine thing down. I'm assuming you had Dag'Kars but they were all blown up. That's par for the course.

 

[Greg Smith]

Narn have some great skirmish and raid level ships - Thentus, Ka'toc and Var'nic. The T'loth is is a big-ass ship that is hard to kill and great to threaten your enemy with boarding.

And Sho'kov's as initiative sinks. Always on CBD.

And use your Frazi's as interceptors.

And the G'vrahn is worth more than a dozen G'Quans.

 

[bayruun]

Unfortunately, we're limited to 2261 in this campaign. Otherwise, I'd take many G'Vrahns. I had a few more G'Kariths and Var'Nics, but unfortunately, they've been picked off over the course of many battles.

I might grab a T'loth, but it doesn't seem to have any real fighting power, aside from boarding.

 

[AdrianH]

My only comment, given that I have rarely played Narn, would be to question the choice of the G'Quonth. For the same price you could have a G'Quan and a G'Tal, giving you an extra init sink, another beam, and a command bonus.

 

[H]

ask your opponents to give you a fighting chance and ditch the G'Quans in favour of raiders and Skirmishers! but yeah, with your RR buy raiders and skirmishers. if you can buildup a bigger fleet of dag kars, you can keep them aside for when you do have to fight minbari, or one shot gamble versus whitestars, enough massed emine fire will drop a whitestar quicker than pretty much anything else.

I'd also consider picking on the EA player, he's probably the most like you in terms of ability, and should get you a few wins or close defeats/tactical withdrawals. ISA will rip you a new one as you'll rarely bring weapons to bear on the whitestars, the Minbari despite being vulnerable to e-mines will generally last long enough to crit you out of the game, and the Centauri have good ships at every level and might be too risky if you are a bit beat up.

 

[Democratus]

I've also got to add that the Year limit in your campaign seems almost tailor made to cripple the Narn.

2261 is the year the EA gets the Warlock, the year the Minbari get the Sharkaan, the year the Psi Corps get the Shadow Omega, and one year after the Centauri get the Demos. On the other hand, that same year denies you the G'Vrahn (your own Warlock-equavalent) and is even 2 years short of your command cruiser, the G'Tal.

Not exactly a level playing field. :? Hopefully the date will advance during the course of the campaign?

What kind of income to you earn at this point in the campaign? What's your per-turn spending power? That might help give an idea of what the most cost-efficient purchases are for you.

Also, keep in mind that you can choose not to show up at a battle at all (or simply show up and leave if you want the 1 XP) to avoid losses for a turn or two. This is assuming you can't arrange "training excercises" with an ally.

 

[H]

the G'Vrahn is not the be all and end all. A Bin'Tak can take a Warlock in a straight fight. heck a Bin'Tak can still take most ships, and is often now disregarded because of the G'Vrahn. The BT is without doubt still one of the best warships in the game, as well as looking damned cool!

 

[Democratus]

The Bin'Tak is a decent ship, but it is very much outclassed by the G'Vrahn.

The G'Vrahn has only 10 less damage points and two less troops. In exchange, it gets an E-mine that isn't one shot (at longer range), twice the dice of Mag Gun (at longer range), the same heavy laser (at longer range), much better manuverability (equal to a G'Karith), an advanced jump engine (allowing for ambush attacks from hyperspace), and a flight computer.

It is one of the best ships at War level in the game. Perhaps the very best.

Frustrating to be denied an advanced ship when other players (Psi Corps, EA) have full access to theirs.

 

[H]

The Bin'Tak is a decent ship, but it is very much outclassed by the G'Vrahn.

The G'Vrahn has only 10 less damage points and two less troops. In exchange, it gets an E-mine that isn't one shot (at longer range), twice the dice of Mag Gun (at longer range), the same heavy laser (at longer range), much better manuverability (equal to a G'Karith), an advanced jump engine (allowing for ambush attacks from hyperspace), and a flight computer.

It is one of the best ships at War level in the game. Perhaps the very best.

Frustrating to be denied an advanced ship when other players (Psi Corps, EA) have full access to theirs.

you will note, that wasn't the argument, the point was that the Bin Tak is still as good as most war level ships, the g'vrahn is just a touch over the top. I would still happily pit a bin tak against the warlock, or shadow omega and be confident. I'd pit a g'vrahn against them and be super confident.

 

[Democratus]

Indeed. I was just working off your statement of

the G'Vrahn is not the be all and end all.

Which I believe it is.

The Bin'tak is a decent War-level choice. I'd put it at middle-of-the-road for the class. If you are playing with the Redundancy rules it is even better.

What I thought was odd was that the campaign was set in a year that juuuust allows several opponents to get their shiny new ships (Demos, Warlock, Shadow Omega, etc.) but falls short of doing the same for the Narn.

 

[H]

thats just your Narn Paranoia speaking.

 

[Democratus]

You will pay for that! If it take a thousand years, we will tear down your tissue of lies!

Also, by that time we will have access to the G'Vrahn.

 

[Da Boss]

Speaking as a certified Narn Killer................

Both the two Narn war level ships have scary fronal firepower but have weak flanks and rear - the 8" range on the Bin'tak secondary's even worse.

With reduction in advanced technology from P+P the Bin'Tak is more of a match for the G'Vrahn - certainly in not dying.....

The T'loth is actually relatively quick (speed 8) for a big ship designed to board others - its guns are a bit meh but it has the ability to absorb damage whilst chraging the enemy gun line, hopefully drawing fire from your actual guns ships like the Var'nic.

The other ships I rate / find annoying

Dag'Kar - for obvious reasons - although no match for our Elutarians
G'karith - flexibility
K'toc and K'tan - as above
Sho'Kar - for those Ion torp lock ons
ShoKov - blood hard to kill
Thentus - felxibility

the 2261 ISD does not help the Narn I would admit as the G'tal is almost usable .

 

[bayruun]

We're doing creeping campaigns, with the year advancing in the campaign if it lasts long enough. Our last campaign was 2260, so this one's 2261.

I'll have to think about your ship suggestions, although I didn't have enough resources to buy much early in the campaign. There should be no issue now since I've allied myself to the Minbari.

My only holding, at the moment, is an Ancient Jump Gate. I'll have more soon, since I no longer have to worry about the Minbari attacking me.