League of Non-Aligned Worlds. Viable and Competitive?

[Iron Panda]

It seems that the main factions, EA, Narn, Centauri, Minbari and even the Ancients are often-used fleets in the forums. Granted, they have awesome background histories and varied ships and tactics but as compared to the League, the latter seems to be a bit lackluster in most areas. How do they stack up against the major powers? It would be cool to field a pure Drazi, Vree, Abbai, Pak Ma Ra,Brakiri, but from reading the forums, such fleets are hard to use and has to be augmented by using a combination of factions in order to be a winning force.

Anyone tried fielding a purely one league faction or a combination of two or more factions? If so, what would be an effective combo?

Thanks!

 

[animus]

I think most people field one race League fleets. The days of the mixed league are endangered if not gone.

 

[prelude_to_war]

Really? Endangered? The campaign we just completed was won by a mixed League force. Their strength lies in their shared diversity. I'll be using Pak in the next one...we'll see how it turns out using only the one race (um, Vree scouts please?)

 

[demonllamma]

I am the only person that I know who will even consider a mixed league fleet. Chernobyl and I had a Vassal game where I took a mixed league fleet and he didn't like it. My fiancee fields Abbai, and I've only beat her once, but she never mixes stuff. I know I've had success with them but I've been fielding ISA for our campaign, so I haven't had much opportunity. I like to though if that counts.

 

[Tank]

Well burger won the Sentient Rabbits tourney with a mixed league fleet, Adam has used mixed league in tourney, Triggy won a Mongoose tourney with pure Abbai. League fleets, both pure and mixed are out there!!

 

[LaranosTZ]

I firmly believe that a mixed league fleet is the strongest fleet in the game. Every time I've done a fully mixed fleet I have practically walked all over my opponent, it doesn't matter what race they play. Let's face it, a mixed league fleet has a ship that's good for every occasion, and every opponent. You also have more fleet choices then even an earth alliance player, so you can play mix-and-match with your fleet in every game just for the variety, or you can build a killer fleet for whatever fleet you know you are going up against.

Centauri Beam fleet? No problem, you have hull six ships at every priority level except patrol and heavy weapons that will make those centauri ships fold like decks of cards in the form of Braikiri, Pak'ma'ra and Drazi fleets.

Going against ancients/vorlons/shadows? Oooo, let me bring out the vree and the abbai to throw massive amounts of dice at them, a good chunk of which are super AP and precise.

Basically, as league you can put something on the field at every priority level that can match your opponent in the best possible way. Now I'm not saying to build your fleet custom for each battle when you see your opponent's fleet, but I'm saying that if you know you are playing a certain race you can build a fleet that works best against that race's fleet tendencies.

The other nice effect? It's nearly impossible for your opponent to determine what type of fleet they should prepare for when facing you.

 

[Alexb83]

All the league fleets I've seen (aside from the Abbai swarm) have been 'mixed' in the sense that they take masses of either Brakiri or Drazi with multiple Vree scouts, almost without fail.

I mean... why wouldn't you, if you could?

 

[High Sierra]

it would actually be nice to see a mixed league fleet set. however atm I have a pure Vree fleet it works really well.

everyone I play against have problems against my Vree, however in a battle of attrition I will always go first because my hulls just cant take a pounding.

Having said that, one on one the only fleet I have major problems against is the Minbari.

 

[Iron Panda]

From High Sierra:

it would actually be nice to see a mixed league fleet set. however atm I have a pure Vree fleet it works really well.

everyone I play against have problems against my Vree, however in a battle of attrition I will always go first because my hulls just cant take a pounding.

Really digging the idea of an all Vree fleet myself. They're fast, manueverable, and have 360 degree fire arc as their main selling point.

Mix them with, say a Pak fleet, with their awesome plasma weapons and ship durability and you can really have a force to be reckoned with. the Pak goes into the fray blasting, while the Vree darts in and out picking off crippled ships.

That would rock!

 

[Valen is my name]

and when the moulds of the new armageddon level abbai/brakiri ship comes out they will be able to match pretty much anything that gets fielded against them. Plus the brakiris falkosi fighters are very fast and good against white stars (im talking from past experience - they are a real pain)

 

[Davesaint]

Really? Endangered? The campaign we just completed was won by a mixed League force. Their strength lies in their shared diversity. I'll be using Pak in the next one...we'll see how it turns out using only the one race (um, Vree scouts please?)

You'll get nothing and like it Spaulding. :wink:

I will be playing a pure Brakiri fleet in our next campaign.


Dave

 

[CZuschlag]

There was a time and phase during which the initial assessment of the League was: "Abbai can't get a shot, Drazi lose because of boresight restrictions, Vree can't take a hit ... well, the Brakiri look like they might work. But that's marginal. So, the League sucks."

Then, as tactics and fleet makeups were refined and improved, League began to win a Lot more games. I think the same thing can be thought to be happening overseas as well with the result of the Sentient Rabbits tournament. This is probably in response to the scout clarification that a successful roll affects one weapon system per ship firing on the target, which elevated the Vaarl and Vaarka to priority puchases, the rejiggering of the Brikorta in Armageddon, and simply to people finding the "right" way to leverage combined league assets. I'm certain that Abbai theory has improved substantially in some way, but I'm not certain what it is, yet (would love clarification).

And, of course, the Pak adds some more ... well, vile ... fleet assets. Consider this -- as a percentage of total fleet options, which race has had the most new ships introduced in the last year? Surprise, surprise, it isn't EA (even as a whole) --- it's LONAW: new Brikorta, Pak Fleet (6 new assets -- Sunhawk, Warbird, Brikorta, Urik'hal, P'Shul'Shi, Por'fa'tais), Z'Takk, Boombox, Eyehawk ... and I think I'm forgetting one. That's 10 to 11 new options, on a fleet that had 39 options already; that's a 28.2% fleet increase. Only the Drakh can claim more expansion, mostly because a year ago, they didn't exist. Even they only got 8 ships total (no, breaching pods do NOT count.)

It isn't surprising at all, really; and as the game expands, it'll just get further exacerbated -- LONAW may likely include Hyach, Gaim, and Ipsha in the future, if I understand correctly.

LONAW, especially as an integrated whole, has more than surpassed its original difficulties, and, as its fleet list is expected to expand far more quickly than any other race going forward, it can be expected to dramatically outstrip in group the elder powers.

The LONAW future looks extremely bright.

 

[Valen is my name]

The LONAW future looks extremely bright.

but the drakh are orange :!:
(sorry for really bad pun)

 

[phoenixhawk]

I'm slowly building up a League fleet, right now have 6 pts Raid level of ships plus one Avioki model that is still unassembled. Right now have some Brakiri, some Drazi, and a few Vree. Looking into the Pak for some additions. I am glad to see so many people have had success with the League as I was wondering if I might be doing something wrong or taboo since many people seem to play separate races and not the combined League and it seemed like maybe there was a split of the League in SFoS.

My question is: I can think of ways for the League to beat Centauri, Narn, Minbari, other League races, Raiders, and maybe even ISA. How does the League fare against EA and Drakh. EA because of Interceptors against the League's seeming lack of strong Beam weapons and the Drakh because of the GEG and the League's lack of AD on most of the main weapons on some of their staple ships. What might be some good fleet choices for these opponents?

Another League question, how does initiative work in a multi-race League fleet? If I have a Vree, Drazi, and Brakiri ship each represented, what is my initiative? What if I lose one of the races, does it get recalculated? I doubt it, but just thought I would ask.

Thanks,

Chris

 

[CZuschlag]

I might not be able to speak as for EA matchups, but I might be able to talk about the Drakh...

As to the Drakh, I can talk about that. If you think you have a grip on dealing with Centauri, I won't ask you to figure out how to handle the Drakh Beam Team -- you (likely) know how to beat that.

Ok. Versus the Drakh Raider Stack, we'll concede one thing --- we sure as hell aren't going to win initiative very often. Even with Drazi, we'll be down 2 or 3, and that with the Drakh not taking a Mothership, which will make it 4 or 5. So, we don't care about that initiative modifier.

What we do care about is lots and lots and lots of dice in very few weapon systems at range 8, where his Raiders will live. This sounds like a job for Abbai to me. (Warning! I am not a LONAW player. This is just early analysis.)

Yes, I know. Abbai give up the initiative, horribly. There are no double/triple/lots damage weapons to use. They ain't fast. But against the Heavy and Light Raider, he has to come to you anyways. Why not exploit that?

What you're looking for here is criticals. Just like the ISA, it's not like the Raiders aren't pieced together with glue and Traits. When bad things happen to Trait ships, they die, and the Raiders are no exception. A mere Milani, assuming front guns unCAFed, can expect to do 4:4 and a critical. The side guns are probably 3:3 and a critical. The Bimith is more impressive, giving you 8:8 and 1.5 criticals per Broadside. And, of course, it'll take forever for anything but Heavy Raiders to kill that Bimith. The Abbai's problem is getting there --- against the Drakh Raider stack, the Raiders have to come to the Abbai. Problem solved!

There will be a temptation to run Vree because of the range 10, turreted weapons, and antifighter guns. Don't do it. Even against a Heavy Raider, the Xill can probably expect to get, CAFed, perhaps 9:9 and a critical against a Heavy Raider. That's not going to cut it. And the Xorrs are meat to the Neutron Cannons.

You can try the Solarhawk Gambit. Against Hull 4 Raiders, the amount of damage you will generate will be truly spectacular. However, you may get initiative-outsinked badly and only get to shoot Light Raiders, which won't make your Solar Cannon's day. A Light Raider might be able to live through that, and a Solarhawk is in great danger from 2 Heavy Raider is one turn's fire. Never buy the Stormfalcon.

One last possibility is the Graviton Beam-ships. The Graviton Beam ... doesn't it sorta yank the bad apple? Well, yeah -- normally, it's a lousy weapon, as it can't hit. But here, against all the Hull 4 Raiders, it isn't horrible. Heck, against a Heavy Raider, you're looking at 10:9 and 1 critical in one shot from the lowly Avoiki. Warning however --- with the Slow-Load property, you may only get to fire that thing once.

 

[Chernobyl]

DL's mixed Brakiri and Abbai force was quite a bit scary. it was my first experience against a mixed league force. Previously I've fought Vree, with mixed results. I think leage are quite good in general, nothing to be sneezed at. Wasn't it a Drazi force that won one of the early USA tourneys?

Chern

 

[Ripple]

- Wave -

I play a mixed league fleet for most serious games. CZuschlag's assertions about the previous feeling of the league are somewhat true, but the reason we often felt the league sucked was not so much what the league couldn't do as what could often be done to them. The issue here was most pure league fleets had (and in some cases still have) real holes in the fleet list. When the tourney list came out, it largely became the defacto local list and that made the situation worse. Now that we play with all the variants many combined and pure forces are fairly strong.

The other issue is whether you know who your up against. If the Drahk player goes w/ cruisers and you were expecting raiders you might find the bimith/milani stack lacking all of a sudden. League has lots of options, and an answer for just about anything...but making sure you brought the right kit can be an issue.

We used to say that league had a real tough time in tourney due to not knowing which kit to bring to the party.

Ripple

 

[Iain McGhee]

Another League question, how does initiative work in a multi-race League fleet? If I have a Vree, Drazi, and Brakiri ship each represented, what is my initiative? What if I lose one of the races, does it get recalculated? I doubt it, but just thought I would ask.
Chris

You use the lowest Initiative score of all the races in your fleet. It remains at that throught the battle or campaign regardless of any ship losses or other factors (unless you added other ships from a race with a lower Initiative than any of your current ones in a campaign I suppose).

I've only ever used a mixed Brakiri/Drazi fleet against the EA. Never fought the Drakh (most of my fleets are pre-ISA). I've found they do pretty well against them. The Drazi have plenty of beams and twin-linked particle weapons which are effective against interceptor equipped ships, especially when you gang up on them. The Brakiri have a few Beam weapons but throw out lots of AP weapons dice which can cause serious damage to most EA hulls (Third Age and earlier are mainlu Hull 5 or lower). The biggest problem you'd likely have against an EA force is the large number of excellent fighters they normally have. Thunderbolts can stay out of the Brakiri's AF range and pound them with missiles and Drazi are usually toast against the EA unless they have masses of fighter support.

 

[Valen is my name]

do you still get an extra fleet point to spend if you only use on race of ships, because i cant find it in any other book than the revised edition fleet list, SFoS doesnt say anything about it - or not that i can find.

For the record i think that if your playing a lonaw fleet it needs to have at least some brakari ships, but then im biased because im going to field a brakari/vree fleet soon

 

[CZuschlag]

No such thing currently exists.

I haven't been around since the early days, so I don't know, but I've never heard of such a ruling.