Getting ready for holiday buying for ACTA: Star Fleet

[ericphillips]

Okay, I need to begin to decide how I am going to spend my xmas funds.

I am really interested in ACTA Star Fleet. Here are the things I need to know to make me begin to shift those funds to it:

1. Will there be ship statistics in the main book, or how will they be distributed. Will it be books of ships? Or will the stats come with the minis, a la WarMachine, forcing you to buy mins in order to play those ships?

2. I saw in a review the original ACTA box came with ship counters. Will this product be playable using say the 1" tokens I have from Federation Commander?

3. Will the bases for ACTA Star Fleet minis work on the 1" FC/SFB map?

4. OMG! Please license Dr. Who from the BBC. The thought of a Federation, Klingon, Dalek, and Cyberman four way battle would be sex!

Thanks.

 

[Iron Domokun]

A skirmish scale miniatures game would be better, but you'd need an infinitely large, 23-dimensional table to represent the inside of the TARDIS. Which would be a little impractical. Not to mention trying to find terrain for it.

 

[Ben2]

1. If it follows every other release stats will be with the main book.

2. Yes. However the minis are looking awesome so far.

3. No, the minis won't fit, the game will be designed to be played on a hexless table AFAIK.

4. Harlequin seem to still be doing that despite losing the licence as far as I'm aware. They've certainly got current rules out.

 

[ericphillips]

3. No, the minis won't fit, the game will be designed to be played on a hexless table AFAIK.

That might be a problem as most people play FC/SFB on hexes, not hexless (even though there is an option). Its been said the minis are for any Star Fleet game, but this is not good.

 

[miggel]

ACTA doesn't make sense on a hex map, because it has just 4 and not 6 arcs.

It should be no problem to use hex bases instead of the round ones ACTA normally uses. There are plenty companies producing them.

 

[locarno24]

That might be a problem as most people play FC/SFB on hexes, not hexless (even though there is an option). Its been said the minis are for any Star Fleet game, but this is not good.

Going from hexes to a free table with fore/port/starboard/aft isn't especially difficult - because visually estimating 90' arcs isn't that bad - it's going the other way that's a nightmare..

 

[BFalcon]

Eric: I'm hoping also, that they'll have the minis so that you can use standard hex-bases for the flying stands, if only to make the range more useful than just to those playing the game (just as Mongoose's Judge Dredd minis are useful for the RPGs as well). To limit the usefulness of any product without a valid reason would be unwise for sales...

The only thing I'm concerned with is if they're too big for the hex bases to be able to cope with keeping them upright without tipping... but being resin and when we have the ADB B10 metal base available if need be, we'll manage to get them onto those hexes...

Of course, getting them past each other when in adjacent hexes might be fun...

Another option would be to mount the ACTA bases on thin ply, card, plasticard or mdf bases and try to get a larger hex map either made up or sourced somewhere and, basically, go for a larger map than the older one - neither SFB or FC use real-world measurements, so it wouldn't be hard - I'm sure that ADB would consider making larger-hexed maps, if asked, for the slightly larger minis - provided there was sufficient demand. Maybe also an adaptor-base could be made up (plastic or resin) to allow you to use the same minis for both games, provided the hex-size was large enough.

Panic not... everything is possible, just not necessarily in the way you first think...

(Edit: aimed at wrong person... doh!)

 

[BFalcon]

Ben: will the stalks from the bases not fit the old hex-shaped "flying" bases?

 

[Iain McGhee]

Not the ADB bases, they use a slotted base with a T-shaped stem. You can get third-party hex flight bases which could be used as-is or adapted (in fact, I think Brigade do weighted versions for large models).

Regarding the model sizes; the FCA will be about 90mm long by my reckoning, so the 1" hex bases might be a bit too small, even weighted (balance issues rather than model weight).

BFalcon's suggestion regarding mounting the ships on larger hex bases and using a larger hex-map size might be the best option if you simply must play on a hex-map (I like the minis rules adaption better for FC myself). There's probably other companies out there doing similar, but Litko do up to 3" hex bases (MDF or metal) and Hotz Mats do up to 5" hex grids (3" would be my suggestion).

Another option, perhaps the simplest, would be to just mark the round base with a map-size-of-your-choice hex (for those who haven't seen FC, the map boards are double-sided in two hex sizes) and ignore the overlap.

Minis overlapping the hexes shouldn't be that much more of a problem than they already are, you'll still have to swap out minis for counters or whatever your preferred solution is for resolving FC adjacent/same-hex combat with minis (one really smart idea I've seen is to have a few giant MDF hexes to hand to "zoom-in" as it were, shifting the models onto these as required and marking the position on the standard board).

 

[BFalcon]

So they're like the B10 heavy-duty bases from ADB then... that's fine - you can get 1" hex bases still - they used to be used for the D&D/citadel minis years back - I've still seen a few on ebay kicking around... worst case, we can nab a bunch of those.

As I said, we'll find a way - I've got a guy I know in the US who makes resin scenery - I'm sure I could talk him into making resin adaptors if the worst came to the worst... we are talking general pieces here, not copyrighted items...

 

[Rick]

I've got loads of the black plastic 1" flying stands around - most websites that sell spare plastic bases also sell these, they are a pretty common item. I have no doubt that you'll find suppliers of them on both sides of the pond, as well as most other countries as well.

 

[Ben2]

Another option is getting a bigger hex map. A 2" hex map should be quite adequate and give ABD another product to sell you.

Also we played B5W with minis that were even bigger and 1" hexes in the past, so it isn't an insurmountable problem.

 

[ericphillips]

ACTA doesn't make sense on a hex map, because it has just 4 and not 6 arcs.

It should be no problem to use hex bases instead of the round ones ACTA normally uses. There are plenty companies producing them.

Just to point out to ACTA players: These models are aimed to be used for all Star Fleet games, not just ACTA, at least that is what has been said. I spent a bunch of money to get a better 1" hex map for FC. I don't want to buy a larger map.

Anyway, I intend to play ACTA but will still play FC as well. I have several FC minis. If the case is they don't with FC/SFB standards, then I might not get into ACTA at all. Seems the scale change might have been a mistake.

The base doesn't have to be hex shaped, BTW, just fits the 1" hex, as the hexes themselves show the arcs.

 

[Rick]

I think that if you can balance a Starline 2400 metal model on top of a 1" flight stand, you'll easily be able to do the same with the Starline 2500 resin model. In fact, it might be even easier.

 

[Ben2]

That's a pretty good point, the new models will be larger but will weigh less (significantly less in some cases, I'm looking at you dreadnoughts).

In a couple of months time Matt will have resin mock ups, we can ask him to put a couple of cruisers on 1" hex bases and it will demonstrate to everyone that it isn't the worry people think it might be.

 

[BFalcon]

Ben: I'm not expecting it to be a problem balance-wise, I was mainly concerned with swapping bases...

I might yet pursue the "adaptor" idea and use, for example, 2" hexes - that'll allow me to use my minis for both systems without worrying about such things as whether my bases will fall off if I pick the mini up or if the mini will fall over due to the base not being glued on... (I'm thinking magnet in the bases to solve that problem...)

 

[Iain McGhee]

Anyway, I intend to play ACTA but will still play FC as well. I have several FC minis. If the case is they don't with FC/SFB standards, then I might not get into ACTA at all. Seems the scale change might have been a mistake.

No reason anyone can't just use their FC/SFB minis to play ACTA: Star Fleet if the new models don't suit them. ACTA measures everything from the stem. It's not uncommon to see Babylon 5 full scale and (much smaller) fleet scale minis on the same table, sometimes even in the same fleet.

 

[Ben2]

Magnets solve every problem.

However you could just as easily use 1" hex bases for both systems, just mark 90 degree arcs on the hex bases, job done.

 

[BFalcon]

That's actually very useful to know - thanks Iain...

I've got some SFB minis, but not that many (unless you count the NCLs I picked up cheap off ADB because they had miscast dishes, in which case I have several squadrons, I think)

Marking 90 degrees might be awkward, but I'll see how it goes. Another option would be to use the (ugh) GW style stalks and swap the bases on those as needed between the hexes and the rounds...

Either way - there's always a way...