Chances of Winning

[Triggy]

i would have liked to have voted yes for this but cant.

I play with a group of friends that continually try to balance the game for the reason that it is not a well thought out game in the first place.
sure it is a great idea but thier has just been to many mistakes along the line to make it play able in a fair sense.

lets look at the Drakh Battle level carrier for example, a ship that carries more than a battle point worth of if it carries nothing but skirmish ships (lets face it the scouts wont be used much with these carriers as the are a bit below par with its counterparts from other races).

Ask your selves this what would you take
3 skirmish class ships
or
a carrier that carriers 4 skirmisk class ships for the same price of a single battle point.

the vree are another race that have been poorly thought about, sure they have low powered but turreted armour and yes they are super manuevrable at slow speeds but as a race they are no match for an equall matched opponent playing any other race except the raiders possibly raiders

my point is simple for this game to excell as a great war game there must be balance, and B5 a call to arms has anything but.

If you actually take the Drakh Mothership/Carrier in a game you'll see that they're not the automatic great choice the raw numbers make it appear! I've played a game against a Drakh Mothership (5 point Raid) and even given that we played the carrier rules wrongly (only taking one turn after deployment to release all the Raiders), the Carrier was vapourised on turn 2 and the game was basically lost already! So much for "a mistake". If I asked myself which I'd take, I'd honestly say just the Raiders! I think this is a perfect example of playtesting showing up peculiarities that raw stats almost cannot possibly reveal.

 

[lastbesthope]

Ask your selves this what would you take
3 skirmish class ships
or
a carrier that carriers 4 skirmisk class ships for the same price of a single battle point.

What you actually mean is
"...a potentially volatile and fragile carrier with one Skirmish class ship emerging a Turn for 3 Turns, providing it isn't destroyed as a priority, and providing my opponent with twice as many VP if it is than any other Battle PL ship..."

Do you get the VP for the Huge Hangar craft as well when you destroy the Carrier, etc.?

Page ref please, I haven't really looked at the Drakh rules yet

LBH

 

[Geekybiker]

Do you get the VP for the Huge Hangar craft as well when you destroy the Carrier, etc.?

Page ref please, I haven't really looked at the Drakh rules yet

LBH[/quote]

For that matter do you get VP, xp, etc from raiders launched as "aux" craft? With normal fighters you only get that for destroying their mothership.

 

[lastbesthope]

P.12 of the Drakh book says if destroyed the HH craft types (can't remember them from 2 secs ago ) yield VP as normmal. not sure about if that counts if they aren't deployed yet, but I'd say it clears it up once they are.

LBH

 

[Wulf Corbett]

I keep hearing about how it takes 3+ turns to get the 4 skirmish level ships off of the Drakh carrier.

Hey, if the poster I was replying to can exaggerate wildly, so can I! :wink:

Nonetheless, I've experienced or read of three such happenings now...

Wulf

 

[Wulf Corbett]

P.12 of the Drakh book says if destroyed the HH craft types (can't remember them from 2 secs ago ) yield VP as normmal. not sure about if that counts if they aren't deployed yet, but I'd say it clears it up once they are.

Got to admit, it's never been discussed that I've rad, but we assumed it was the case. They are there after all. So are regular Fighters in a regular Carrier, of course, but you don't get VP for carrier-born fighters, whereas you DO for Raiders.

Wulf

 

[tiny]

Ask your selves this what would you take
3 skirmish class ships
or
a carrier that carriers 4 skirmisk class ships for the same price of a single battle point.

What you actually mean is
"...a potentially volatile and fragile carrier with one Skirmish class ship emerging a Turn for 3 Turns, providing it isn't destroyed as a priority, and providing my opponent with twice as many VP if it is than any other Battle PL ship..."

Every race, and every ship, has good and bad points. Keep trying, and you'll figure out the tactics. Plenty of people quite happily and successfuly play the races you have written off.

Wulf

i would just like to say that i havent written these races off and never wanted anyone to be lead to that conclusion. all i was pointing out is that their are some poorly thought out races.

As for the drakh battle level carrier i didn't mean a potentially volatile and fragile carrier what i said is what i meant plain and simple. the ship is less volatile than people might think, this is because its sheilds pretty much soak up or lessen any damage dealt by smaller ships and fighters, in fact and any one can correct me if i am wrong that fighters are pretty much useless unless they critical.

and as for gaining more VP points when its destroyed if you kill it before it launches all it ships is a poor excuse for a ship that potencially carries more points worth of ships than you can field normally.

 

[CZuschlag]

Remember that flying saucer in the old space invaders coin-op game. Its an example of a basic phenomenon: some ships can conceivably penalize their own side by even showing up. Just like that saucer in the top of the screen, the relatively easily smushable Carrier and Mothership fit these bills to a tee. It tries to make up for its presence by bringing gift raiders, but the access isn't ... easy.

I'm slowly coming to the opinion that the Drakh heavy carriers are Rock Paper Scissors. Heavy beams light these things up like Christmas trees for huge amounts of victory points. I showed a slightly flabergasted player how one CAFed volley from a Primus could take out about 1/2 of the mothership in shot number one. Granted, this is a "best case" scenario, but it's still obscene.

And with this amount of points dead, you may simply be able to leave the table and still claim the victory, depending on the scenario. You don't actually have to stay to let the Drakh raiders fight. Kill what you need to, and leave. Or correspondingly, kill enough so even if you die out, you still win. Those carriers need places to Hide. These ships may be best served by just going into asteroid fields and then all stopping forever. Seriously. At least the beams won't slice you into oblivion. Dust clouds are your friend, and the scout is valuable ... you want terrain in your deployment zone to hide behind! In particular, fielding a Carrier or Mothership in a Convoy Raid or Recon Run scenario is just asking for it (look Mom, more ships to Recon and get points for!).

On the other hand, against ships with "Swiss-army knife" armaments -- one tool for just about everything -- the GEG puts you in a world of hurt, and doesn't your Bin'Tak with more lines than Sunday know it. But don't take all Hyperions, OK? The instant you know you're hitting the table against Drakh, you should be running for your big one-trick ponies -- Apollo flash missiles, Warlocks and SOmegas, Novae(pulse vs. the Raiders, the Drakh carriers seem Made for the Laser mode!), Chronos, etc. In the Centauri armament, the Maximus looks like a total solution ship.

And everyone knows not to actually field carriers intentionally, right? Right?

I've only simmed it out so far, and done a couple of turns as countertest vs. myself ... I haven't run against an opponent, so I'm relatively uninformed over the table. But, with dice and a spreadsheet on hand, it doesn't seem overwhelming.