Take a good look at the Kzinti fleet and you see that it can be divided roughly into two styles of combat. Drones aside that is.
You have the older ships with the wider Disruptor arcs, often with pairs of disruptors firing F/P or F/S and you have the fixed forward ships with a block of disruptors just in the F arc. Also the Phasers are very lacking on the older ships but they have more Phaser 3s.
You can build two fleets out of the Kzinti, well three if you mix and match. One fleet goes head on, all those F arc disruptors force you to fight like Klingon’s in a way only without the better shields. The other fleet is the skirmish fleet that can fire Disruptors sideways to combine with the Drones.
Kzinti are on the whole a bit fragile against a plasma race, lack of Phasers and those oh so useful ADDs against incoming fiery plasma death. They do better against the Klingon’s, Feds etc.
A skirmish fleet should be racing around all over the place trying to keep the range open, trying to fly between separate groups of enemy ships so you get off both broadsides if you can but otherwise aiming for 15-16", 18" and under anyway. Here you can fly past, use Drones and those sideways disruptors to full effect and be far enough away to minimise return fire. This is very much a manoeuvre fleet and will get murdered up close due to the lack of Phasers and lower shields. Still with turn mode 4 and/or Agile ships you can flank the big slow Fed ships, try to stay out of Photon arc while hitting back with side arc disruptors. Disruptors at 16” and less hit on a 3+ which is good, they only do 2 Damage each but if you are firing them every turn sideways and your enemy is firing no heavy weapons back you are doing well.
Also you can make it obvious you are lining up on a target, watch it boost shields then shoot sideways against another target that doesn’t look like an obvious target.
The other fleet is the head on one, these are generally better shielded and have more Phasers (plus some ADDs), this are the ones that chuck Drones on the way in then fight like the Klinks in that they can move all over the place but need to end up nose onto the targets. The Drones act like super disruptors in this fleet, drawing off Phaser fire and doing significant damage to unwary targets.
You can mix the two together with some heavier ships going head on while some smaller ships skirmish and act as Init sinks. An entire fleet of skirmishers is hard to play, people will hide behind the terrain and try to rush you to get close and murder you. It’s what I do when faces with a bunch of cowardly Drone chucking furballs anyway
Thoughts on Drones. The three ship limit and range restriction where they don’t need a roll to not miss means that the Kzinti are going to be using them at 18” or less.
They can be shot down, indeed they mostly should be shot down as ignoring them is very painful. So the 4 Drones on a Kzinti ship can remove 4 enemy Phasers a turn (or less if they use Tractors dammit) but they still act to tie up enemy firepower. In this way they can be spread around, look at the enemy ships, how many tractors and Phaser 3s, how many Phaser 1s, do they have ADDs. Pick on ships with low ADDs, empty them first, or watch the Feds and if any of them fire Drones hammer them. Count how many Drones a ship can shoot down (1 per two tractors, 2 per 3 Phaser 3s etc) then fire enough Drones to make them use all those big Phaser 1s, you may not be able to hurt them but in return they are not hurting you. This can be very important against someone like the Feds with lots of Phaser 1s who seem to have trouble reloaded the Photons. Tractors and Phaser 3s can generally handle the first 4 Drones. After that its Phaser 1s or take 4D6 on the shields, make your enemy decide that every turn.
They are 360 arc and 18” range allowing you to focus them anywhere inside a large area and regardless of facing. This is very handing when mixing it against the Klingon’s since you can fire into the rear or flank of a Klingon ship that is not your target weakening the shields to allow someone else to fire against the now shield less ship. Kzinti fleets facing Klingon’s should be all over the place giving the Klingon player nightmares trying to keep those forward shields facing every Kzinti ship. Also with the range you can fire over the fighting line and hit enemy small ships that think they are well behind the fighting stripping away Init sinks and useful functions like scouts.
Even with the rules changes limiting Drones to 18” and three ship groups they are still the biggest weapon the Kzinti have, choose your fleet based on your overall tactical plan then go with that plan but use your Drones to add flexibility to whatever you do. 12 Drones still hurt and the fact that your ships can hit a single target from half way across the map makes it very hard to avoid attacks or to predict who the Kzinti targets are going to be. Line up your ships to use Disruptors against a D5W but then slam 12 Drones into the D7 which is engaging another part of your fleet and has its back towards several ships. The D5Ws ADDs are of no use against the Disruptors and a lone D7 is going to get hurt with only its normal shields. Plus other parts of your fleet can hammer the sides of the D5W in return.
The Kzinti can be an odd race to play, low Phaser firepower and not so tough but they have in effect a pair of 18” 12AD weapons that can be fired against targets in any direction. Aside from the Heavy cruiser types try not to get up close and personal, instead be everywhere so you cannot get pinned down. You can savage two enemy ships every turn at long range forcing them to use a lot of defensive fire power or suffer some heavy hits while your Disruptors nit pick other targets.
The hard part with Kzinti, (well to me anyway) is that you have such distinct and separate firepower. You almost need to treat the Drones and Phasers/Disruptors as two totally separate things then manoeuvre to get the best effect out of both.
