how good are the vorlons

Denny crane

Mongoose
I came up with by watching the TV series. So how good are they in the game?
What are there strengths and weaknesses and so on?
 
IMO... they rock after the Armageddon changes.

Strengths: big nasty guns, and hard to kill.
Weaknesses: Precise weapons hurt them. They cost double RR to buy in campaigns. They only have forward weaponry.
 
Burger said:
IMO... they rock after the Armageddon changes.

Strengths: big nasty guns, and hard to kill.
Weaknesses: Precise weapons hurt them. They cost double RR to buy in campaigns. They only have forward weaponry.
Don't bother with the Transport/Destroyer in big games though, if the opposition gangs up on them they go phut... AT or below their own PL, they are excellent though. But the Cruiser & Heavy Cruiser could take on a standard fleet each...

Unfortunately, against Hull 6, they do rely almost entirely on Crits, even SAP Beams generally only get a few hits, up to a half dozen being common. But they have Precise weapons, so that's not too bad...

Wulf
 
You forgot Adaptive Armour!

In some games where you have 10 turns to resolve the battle, the Vorlon player could slap an LC or HC on the table and the oppostion is going to have a Hard time to remove it.

They also might cost double RR to buy in campaigns, but they dont have to pay for repairs or recruit crew. So IMHO, they are probably cheaper to maintain.

Flight computer means they have a minimum of 4, on any CQ tests, and the they also cannot be boarded :)

Finally, Charged engergy pulse, to keep pesky enemy fighters away from the caps :)
 
So how good are they in the game?

Stay away from the front of the heavy cruisers. Just stay away.
18 dice of high powered precise beam fire will gut almost anything of raid priority or lower in one volley. The fact that they can deliver such a salvo as they jump in is really nasty.

However, they are slow and unwieldy - and have no flank weapons save the flak field. Manouverable heavy weapons ships can swarm them quite effectively. Expect to lose a hell of a lot of them trying to grind it down though.

The light cruiser is in many ways a more daunting prospect - at war priority it's more realistic to field, and whilst its armament is less overwhelming, 6 discharge gun shots still outclass the laser armament of almost anything else in its class.
It does lack secondary armament, as with its heavier cousin, but it has the same manouvrability as most races raid/skirmish laser ships - and doesn't need to boresight a target to fire.
The 'stay out of the firing arc' theory goes straight out of the window.
And with 200 hit points and almost the same repair rate, it's still hell to bring down.

The lighter ships are much more killable, but also damned fast - they have to hit-and-fade; dart in, using good - but not excessive (beware of missiles and battle lasers) range to knock some critical holes, then falling back out of enemy fire arcs to allow the self-repair trait time to heal some of the damage.

Vorlon fighters are more like small gunships - not reliable in a dogfight, but thanks to the new 'fighters fire first' rule, they can bring their immense firepower to bear on capital ships - one flight of vorlon fighter essentially has the same firepower as a Milani-class Carrier's battle lasers....except it can shoot down fighters as well.
They're also as cheap as starfuries, so you don't half get a lot of them for your points relative to other Ancients ships.
 
locarno24 said:
one flight of vorlon fighter essentially has the same firepower as a Milani-class Carrier's battle lasers
Well, 2/3 of the firepower, at 3" range.
 
locarno24 said:
Vorlon fighters are more like small gunships - not reliable in a dogfight, but thanks to the new 'fighters fire first' rule, they can bring their immense firepower to bear on capital ships - one flight of vorlon fighter essentially has the same firepower as a Milani-class Carrier's battle lasers....except it can shoot down fighters as well.
They're also as cheap as starfuries, so you don't half get a lot of them for your points relative to other Ancients ships.
Yup. A fighter with a 3" Anti-Fighter Beam weapon is scary...

Wulf
 
Is it a viable or even possible tactic for the Vorlons/Shadows to Ram?
Granted most times you will need a 6 on the QC roll but still.

I seems a bit crude for them but they seem like they have the best vessels to do it.

"suffer immediate damage & crew loss equal to half the opponents starting damage score....also suffer 1d6 critical hits."

Just having a tournament-stat vorlon transport ram say an Omega would devastate it. 20 DMG & 20 Crew + 1d6 Crits! Yeah the transport would also take 20 DMG + 1d6 Crits, but with very lucky rolls that transport would still be there when the shooting starts.

And, in general, would a ramming ship be able to fire at the ship that was rammed? Or does it break through and continue on it's way?
 
Dunno are tghey even allowed to do that?

Plus i dont think theyre armor is quite the same way as the usual one, it doesnt have to rely on hardness to survive, its biological after all.......
should making rams alot less useful.


Just realized the Light Cruiser gets 2 turns now........OUCH. OUCH. OUCH.
A very good upgrade, so stuff will have a real hard time getting behing it....
 
There is a list of special actions that Vorlons can perform. Ramming Speed is not amongst them.

As for firing, well the ram is done and resolved in the movement phase. If both survive, I don't see why you can't shoot as well, although your ship must be crippled to perform the ram so the chances of it surviving are minimal!
 
Well a war lvl ship ramming a skirmish lvl ship out of the way (just to get the speed boost) and then shooting at something else.....

Ahhh thatd be cool. Why cant we do that to small ships. Like ram all those Havens out of the way to get at the nice stuff behind :D
 
You can obviously only ram a target to your front.....

If you are in front of a Vorlon and within weapon range you are already in a world of trouble, ramming not neccessary.

I happen to think the transport is the prettiest Vorlon ship, got to assemble mine soon.
 
You can only ram something, when your ship reaches crippled, and since Vorlons never suffer from being crippled.........
 
Ok ofc i meant an Octurion, a Bin'Tak or a uhh well i was going to say Warlock, but its up to ARmageddon ^^.

But imagine that. A Warlock just ramming a Vorchan out of the way, to get at the Primus behind that.

Well except that its always easier to just fire the thrusters gain and gain a fire vector that is unobstructed......

BUT its kinda cool
 
okay so they are very strong and tough, but only have forward fire. this is a pain i can imagin because ships that are fast and can flank you are going to destroy you. but they would need powerful weaponry
 
Commander sampson said:
okay so they are very strong and tough, but only have forward fire. this is a pain i can imagin because ships that are fast and can flank you are going to destroy you. but they would need powerful weaponry

All the Vorlon weapons are Beam, and Precise at least. The smaller ships have DD, and AP. The Cruisers have TD,and SAP. Rember, these ships have F arc, not Bore Sight. So while you can outflank them. Getting out of arc, especially with a fleet , can be quite hard
 
And dont forget, the LC got an extra turn.....

If it pulls of a Come about, youre in trouble.....

WS will be able to play them more like in ages past, but other fleets will have bigger problems actually getting somewhere where there isnt a Vorlon ship grinning with an F arc.....
 
Another aspect is that they don't blow up, they just curl up and die.

This may not seam significant, but it does mean that they can fly in incredibly tight formations, effectively 'boresnouting' into the enemy line and vapourising everything in front of them.

OK, works like this. Other races either spread their ships out to avoid explosion damage, which can leave even a relatively small fleet spread over two to three feet of table, or pack in closer and take damage from their friends explosions. I've even seen a chain reaction from one ship blow up a second which then killed a third, each one damaging other ships along the way.

The vorlon fleet can pack in incredibly tight, easily getting their entire fleet into a wedge 4" across and twice that deep. This gives them localised superiority if the enemy fleet is spread out, or effectively greater firepower if they pack in close and take their own explosion damage.

Not to mention the intimidation factor that a Vorlon wedge has, it's great fun just watching every enemy ship opposite them frantically trying to come about to get out of the way. (Vorlons are likely to win initiative for deployment, so deploy second and can pick what to aim the wedge at).
 
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