Four New Ships for A Call to Arms: Star Fleet

[MongooseMatt]

Four new ships have just been released for the Star Fleet range, and Klingon players are going to have a good day with the coming of the E5 Battle Corvette, F5W War Destroyer, and F6 Frignaut, a clutch of smaller ships that will terrorise much larger enemies!

To combat this, the Federation have launched the Star Tiger Light Raiding Dreadnought, a Fast ship that packs a great deal of firepower!

You can find all of these ships at;

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/miniatures/ctastarfleet.html?dir=desc&order=position&p=1

Rules for the E5 and F5W can already be found in the (free-to-download!) Fleet Update #1, which can be found at http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/miniatures/ctastarfleet/rulebooks/a-call-to-arms-star-fleet.html

The F6 and Light Raiding Dreadnought will be covered in the soon to be released (and still free!) Fleet Update #2.

 

[archon96]

cool I ordered most of this months ago when can I expect my order to ship out.

 

[mdauben]

Some nice new additions for the Klingons! 8)

 

[riftsinger]

timing :roll:

 

[nekomata fuyu]

I can't wait to get my hands on the Star Tiger and to see its rules

 

[McKinstry]

I received my order from ADB and the quality of the casts are the best yet. Things seem to be getting better on the quality front.

 

[bluebirds40]

cool minis, i like the fed light raiding dn.

 

[MongooseMatt]

cool I ordered most of this months ago when can I expect my order to ship out.

If they have not gone out already, they will be imminent!

 

[Zarathustra Suicune]

Hmm, as much as I love the star tiger, I may wait till after exams and the stuff I'm still waiting for to arrive and for it's rules to be released, any idea when the fleet update 2 will be out?

 

[Ben2]

The Star Tiger is a good ship, and in 750 point games you then have the option of taking an entirely fast fleet.

 

[AdmiralGrafSpee]

Matt,

When are you going to put all the newer style fed ships (NCL, DW, NCA, NCF, DNL) into a squad box for us? I'm would very much buy that but have zero interest in those 3 latest squad boxes with a weird mish-mash of ships, and certainly not interested in Squad box #7 with yet another BC and DN (have enough of those from the Fleet box and Squad box #1).

I realize there is a connection with what ADB wants, but you must be able to at least do some of your own packaging for people that only play ACTA and thus want makes sense for ACTA and not SFB/FC!

-Tim

 

[Zarathustra Suicune]

^^^^^ This, personally, a box with a Wolverine, a manta way, a Gettysburg, a Star tiger and possibly a Ramius would be brilliant, as it would allow you to either do a fast force, or just give you a selection of fast/advanced ships that don't come in the others, the Gettysburg is mainly in there to be instead of the Kirov as they are in every box, and as nice as they are, when you have 3 or 4 you have enough.
Would also love to see boxes of 3 (or 4/5 of firgates) of ships of the same class, paticually ones that are ships of line/workhorses.

 

[Rambler]

The problem is not the Squadron Boxes ADB use they provide exactly what they are intended to do which is a basic 5 Ship Fleet to play with.

The issue is with two logical but competing sales strategies. Mongoose sells Single Blister or 2 pack small ship Blisters. ADB sells the War Cruisers (NCL or D5) packaged with a Frigate, or 3 Pack sets of the smaller ships. Which when added to the Squadron Boxes of your choice makes a easy to expand Fleet.

Now what would be nice to see in the 2500 is a "Battle Group" box set that would be 6 ships, 3 War Cruisers and 3 War Destroyers. Or, bend the Battle Group definition just a hair and do the set as a NCA, 2 CWs, 2 DWs, and a FFB* or Frigate. Obvoiusly those would be the optimal "War Builds." The same could be done with Early War ships but I have a feeling those would not be worth while sellers.

As far as Boxing the Fast Dreadnoughts with the Heavy Command Cruisers. That is not a good option in my opinion. DNL are rarer than hens teeth in fleets. But using the Heavy Command Cruisers and Battleships as the center pieces of another Squadron Box might be cool.

* The F6 was the Klink Battle Frigate before the E6s came along.

 

[Ben2]

It's been suggested before (the notion of a booster fleet box) and with the additional ships in the next supplement, we might have a good opportunity to hassle Matt about it.

That or squadron bags for cruisers/DWs.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

And my Star Tiger (along with Mars and Gettysburg) have arrived!

Looking at the Star Tiger, I'm happy to say that the saucer/hull connection has been improved to the point that the saucer will quite happily sit there even without glue! The details are crisp (as is usually the case before the moulds have a chance to wear down - get those orders in quick people!), and for the most part it looks like minimal cleaning will be needed. Another change I'm noticing are that the sensor dish is now part of the hull rather than a separate piece - this should mean less small bits for me to lose when I open up pack to check I have all the peices, then put them to one side for a while until I get around to building them

My only real complaint is the design of the nacelles on all 3 ships, or rather the placement of the channels to allow metal to flow into the mould. On at least one of the nacelles for each ship, this main flow channel connects to the rear of the nacelle, onto what should be a domed surface. This gives you the dual problem of trying to cut off the channel without damaging the rear point of the nacelle, and then having to file the cut into the intended dome (also without damaging the rear point). I noticed the same problem with the "new" series of Federation ships, and it really is the only part of building them that fills me with dread.

Overall? I might even grab a second Star Tiger

 

[billclo]

I have some new F5Ws, and they have issues, as I expected they would. Major mold lines on the tops of the engines are the least of the issues. All 4 models have poorly molded rear deckhouses; forget about seeing a shuttle bay, drone ports, nay even the rear of the deckhouses are pretty rounded, especially the intercoolers. And this from a "new mold"? Yech.