Greg Smith
Mongoose
He means the warlock.
Newbie: EA
- Thread starter On_DS9
- Start date
On_DS9 said:
Broadly speaking most fleets you build will have the same core backbone of ships you like to use (probably about 4 Fleet Allocation Points worth). You will probably find that having about 1 FAP of swappable stuff will help you counter some of the advantages of the other races. Hull 6 ships reduce the nastyness of Beams, Interceptors reduce the efectiveness of non-beam weapons, fighters will negate other fighters or give you a bit of an edge against fighter-light fleets (not the Narn as they will likely bring e-mines) for example.
On_DS9 said:
Which was a pretty good assesment of Hyperions Vs high end Minbari. Against Skirmish and Raid Minbari and many of the other races, they are very good and useful ships. You will find each race has a 'preferred power level' where their fleet list operates best due to the qulity of the hulls available. For Minbari - Battle and War, for Centauri - Raid and Narn - Skirmish. I think EA performs well in Patrol, Raid and Battle.
On_DS9 said:
The following makes a very good backbone to any 3rd age EA fleet against 'all comers'. Just be wary with the Hyperion against a Centauri Beam Team or the Minbari and Vorlons as their beams negate the Hyperions interceptors.
2 Omegas
2 Novas
1 Hyperion
1 Oracle
4 Hermes
I would put the following into a sideboard to allow you to vary things a bit depending on what race you are facing.
1 Oracle
1 Olympus
1 Hyperion
1 Omega
On_DS9 said:
Sounds a pretty good general tactic. The oblique entry of the Omega's actually increases the chance of boresighting an enemy ship if they enter in the right place, as pretty much all of the enemy fleet should be in arc of their 1/45º turn. Remember, planets gravity wells and obscuring terrain can really effect how a game plays out.
On_DS9 said:
Again, this has potential, remember though Hermes are Patrol Level ships and can be very fragile in Battle PL games (but then so can Skirmish or Raid). Aditionally you may also wish to consider keeping the Scout for its other funtion - redirecting fire. If you succed with a lock-on you can re-direct lots of wepons fire to the targeted ship (effectively giving you a free CAF for one weapons system on each ship attacking the locked one).
Thanks for that. Sounds about right. So for the moment, if I build I fleet I think I'll go with a normal fleet and a "vs Minbari" fleet. Here's what I'm thinking:
Normal
2 Omegas
2 Novas
2 Hyperions
Oracle
5 Hermes
vs. Minbari:
2 Omegas
3 Novas
2 Oracles
5 Hermes
Would that work?
Was also tinkering with a Crusade era idea:
2 Marathon
Apollo
2 Chronos
Delphi
3 Hermes
Against Minbari, the Apollo would probably go. What do I get for it? 2 more Chronos? Another Marathon? It seems to me that the Crusade fleet seems kinda weak for what you get. The Chronos looks way to flimsy to be a Raid level ship.
Again try Assault Hyperions (skirmish level), Chronos are distinctly not at their best vs Minbari where as 2 Hyperions barralling into him forces to waste firepower on them and as skirmish ships thay have a lot of hits for their PL. If he uses all stop you may ven get to board him!
Crusade vs Minabari is winable but playing with/against the Delphi makes me have a bad taste in my mouth.
OKay so I played another game against the Minbari. I don't think the Minbari fleet was optimized because it was a "lets try out the rules game." My fleet:
2 Omegas
3 Novas
3 Artemis
4 Hermes
Minbari fleet:
2 Tigaras
2 Tinashis
Sharlin
It was a short battle, not going beyond a few turns. General thoughts:
I see what people mean about the Novas being slow pigs. I turned with them early when I should've gone straight ahead.
The Artemis did well, being manuverable and having decent guns.
There's very little that vstands up to a Sharlin. Or a Tinashi for that matter.
The Hermes as initiative sinks really work well in the Hermes. Sadly they didn't do much else. I may rework the list to get down to 3 of them.
Manuever to shield them is an effective tool with the Hermes. I feel a bit...munchkin-ish doing it though.
Loads of fighters: better than an oracle at overcoming stealth. Question, can you stack the effects of Scanners to Full? I had enough fighters that on turn 1 I made two rolls on the same ship
2 Omegas
3 Novas
3 Artemis
4 Hermes
Minbari fleet:
2 Tigaras
2 Tinashis
Sharlin
It was a short battle, not going beyond a few turns. General thoughts:
I see what people mean about the Novas being slow pigs. I turned with them early when I should've gone straight ahead.
The Artemis did well, being manuverable and having decent guns.
There's very little that vstands up to a Sharlin. Or a Tinashi for that matter.
The Hermes as initiative sinks really work well in the Hermes. Sadly they didn't do much else. I may rework the list to get down to 3 of them.
Manuever to shield them is an effective tool with the Hermes. I feel a bit...munchkin-ish doing it though.
Loads of fighters: better than an oracle at overcoming stealth. Question, can you stack the effects of Scanners to Full? I had enough fighters that on turn 1 I made two rolls on the same ship
That is quite a potent Minbari fleet. The better choice at 5 Battle would be to replace the Tigaras with Teshlans, for even more Neutron Laser goodness.
These vessels are designed to kill ships one at a time. When compared to a Warlock or Bin'Tak that are designed to kill whole fleets of smaller ships.
Think of it like a pawn sacrifice in chess. If you can sacrifice a Hermes for a Nova or Omega that is well worth it, and in my mind seems very fitting for the desperate EA vs Minbari.
No. Two fighters cannot stack Scanners to Full for a +2 (or more) bonus (two Scouts cannot stack either). However, a Scout can stack with a fighter for a +2 bonus.
On_DS9 said:
These vessels are designed to kill ships one at a time. When compared to a Warlock or Bin'Tak that are designed to kill whole fleets of smaller ships.
On_DS9 said:
Think of it like a pawn sacrifice in chess. If you can sacrifice a Hermes for a Nova or Omega that is well worth it, and in my mind seems very fitting for the desperate EA vs Minbari.
On_DS9 said:
No. Two fighters cannot stack Scanners to Full for a +2 (or more) bonus (two Scouts cannot stack either). However, a Scout can stack with a fighter for a +2 bonus.
I only have the box set and Armageddon. Is that ship in SFOS?
It did sort of feel right, the desperate EA, but also felt kinda munckinish: "right so this hundred meter ship is going to shield this mile long ship..."
D'oh. Oh well.
One other thing has me curious: is it just me or do the special orders seem like they need work? Some are just not worth it and some come across as way too easy.
For example, the Minbari player had never played this game before. However, after flipping through the rules while I set up fleets, he asked me why he wouldn't just spend 2 out of every 3 turns using an All Stop. As automatica, he figured he'd just sit back and pummel me, only manuevering when he had to. Now, he didn't and actually advanced on me (at the minimum speed) just to make a game out of it.
Also, some others, while not bad, I simply wouldn't use because there's better things out there. For example, All Hands to deck, close the blast doors, and Run Silent simply doesn't seem to have enough rewards for giving up the other special actions.
Finally, I ended up not using the All Power to Engines so I could launch fighters who would give me spotting. I really feel the fighters don't deploy quick enough (only 1 per round) and at great cost (no other special actions). Am I wrong in this assessment?
Some Special orders are good
Close Blast Doors works very well on ships that only have one real gun - Maximus!
All Power to Engines is very useful for lots of ships on many occasions.
But yes some are not at all useful - All Hands to Deck, by the time you need it its usually not possible -
re shielding - no thats what Escort ships have done in reality and fiction, screen the big boys.
Close Blast Doors works very well on ships that only have one real gun - Maximus!
All Power to Engines is very useful for lots of ships on many occasions.
But yes some are not at all useful - All Hands to Deck, by the time you need it its usually not possible -
re shielding - no thats what Escort ships have done in reality and fiction, screen the big boys.
The no fighter launch while using an SA is a big deal in many of our fights too. It's not so bad in games heavy with terrain or with deep deployment zones like Space Superiority, ie places you will be safe from long range fire for a turn or two while you deploy, but generally ships that cannot get their fighters out in the first turn are a handicap if you want to get them all out before the action.
Ripple
Ripple
Thanks. I printed out the Teshlan. Didn't use it in the last game because we don't have the counter for it. Looking at it, why would you take the Tigara over the Teshlan? It's quicker, still has a flight of Nials. Yeah the Tigara has more dice to roll closer, but the stand off fire of the beam is nice.
Played another game with the same fleets:
Third Age EA
2 Omegas
3 Novas
3 Artemis
4 Hermes
Minbari fleet:
2 Tigaras
2 Tinashis
Sharlin
This time, I squadroned everything but the Hermes, which were little more than Init sinks. EA won, mainly because of winning Initiative two out of three turns and by a fortuitous series of Stealth rolls. My thoughts:
--I have learned the joy of squadrons. Activate three Artemis or three Novas in a single activation.
--The Hermes is an oversized fighter. Other than serving as Init sinks, the missiles really didn't do anything.
--Ships really need to be able to launch fighters even if doing special actions. The Novas, Omegas, and Sharlin all ended the game with fighters in the bays.
--Nials = annoying. Had 1 flight kill 3 flights of starfuries in dogfighting. Granted that's lucky dice rolling, but still...stupid Nials... :evil: 8)
--The Omega is an frakking tank. Had one lose its engines on a lucky Neutron beam shot on turn 1. It spent the rest of the game getting pumelled by Tigaras and Tinashis (generally one or the other every turn), only went down on turn 3. Against not-beams, the EA interceptors rock.
--The Nova is a slow pig, yes, and has little in the way of damage boxes, but a squadron of 3 of them is a good, good thing. They won me the game:
Last turn of the game was a dogfight. The Minbari had a battered sharlin, a battered Tigara, an okay Tigara, a battered Tinashi, and an okay Tinashi. The tinashis and Tigaras had flanked right and left, respectively. The Omega had moved directly up so it was almost touching the front of the sharlin, daring the guy to All Stop. The Sharlin ran right past the Omega, getting its front arc on a Nova, and aft neutron laser on the Omega. Effectively took the omega's front arc out fo comission. The 3 artemis flanked aorund behind the Sharlin. And the novas were right in the middle of the maelstrom.
All three Novas had a target in the starboard, port, and aft arcs. They made all of their stealth rolls. 72 broadside, and 8 aft dice later, the Minbari had an even more battered Tigara and an okay Tigara. The Novas ran out of shots on the aft for two of the Novas, when one of the Tinashi's got blown by a 6 on the Vital Systems table.
Played another game with the same fleets:
Third Age EA
2 Omegas
3 Novas
3 Artemis
4 Hermes
Minbari fleet:
2 Tigaras
2 Tinashis
Sharlin
This time, I squadroned everything but the Hermes, which were little more than Init sinks. EA won, mainly because of winning Initiative two out of three turns and by a fortuitous series of Stealth rolls. My thoughts:
--I have learned the joy of squadrons. Activate three Artemis or three Novas in a single activation.
--The Hermes is an oversized fighter. Other than serving as Init sinks, the missiles really didn't do anything.
--Ships really need to be able to launch fighters even if doing special actions. The Novas, Omegas, and Sharlin all ended the game with fighters in the bays.
--Nials = annoying. Had 1 flight kill 3 flights of starfuries in dogfighting. Granted that's lucky dice rolling, but still...stupid Nials... :evil: 8)
--The Omega is an frakking tank. Had one lose its engines on a lucky Neutron beam shot on turn 1. It spent the rest of the game getting pumelled by Tigaras and Tinashis (generally one or the other every turn), only went down on turn 3. Against not-beams, the EA interceptors rock.
--The Nova is a slow pig, yes, and has little in the way of damage boxes, but a squadron of 3 of them is a good, good thing. They won me the game:
Last turn of the game was a dogfight. The Minbari had a battered sharlin, a battered Tigara, an okay Tigara, a battered Tinashi, and an okay Tinashi. The tinashis and Tigaras had flanked right and left, respectively. The Omega had moved directly up so it was almost touching the front of the sharlin, daring the guy to All Stop. The Sharlin ran right past the Omega, getting its front arc on a Nova, and aft neutron laser on the Omega. Effectively took the omega's front arc out fo comission. The 3 artemis flanked aorund behind the Sharlin. And the novas were right in the middle of the maelstrom.
All three Novas had a target in the starboard, port, and aft arcs. They made all of their stealth rolls. 72 broadside, and 8 aft dice later, the Minbari had an even more battered Tigara and an okay Tigara. The Novas ran out of shots on the aft for two of the Novas, when one of the Tinashi's got blown by a 6 on the Vital Systems table.
The shuttles only matter in a Planetary Assault. It lets you drop two troops to the planet per turn instead of one. Personaly, I just send T-bolts in and let them strafe the ground troops into submission. Then land a single point of troops to "secure" the area.
Of your two choices, I'd go with the Olympus. It has the nice pulse cannons, missiles, and the rail gun. Not a bad set of weapons for a skirmish ship. It may not be as heavily armored as the Hyperion but it has the same damage track.
SERGE
Of your two choices, I'd go with the Olympus. It has the nice pulse cannons, missiles, and the rail gun. Not a bad set of weapons for a skirmish ship. It may not be as heavily armored as the Hyperion but it has the same damage track.
SERGE
On_DS9 said:
Because the Tigara used to be superb as a knife fighter. The Armageddon changes to Stealth and Fighters really crippled this ship in it's roll. The can still be used, the best way is on a terrain heavy board or as Hyperspace re-enforcements either as a Pair or one with a couple of Torothas. Dropping in from Hyperspace means you can use the AJP trait to fire your weapons on the turn you exit. Having a pair of Tigaras appear in the middle of your fleet guns blazing can be a real pain in the ass.
On_DS9 said:
Converted!
