Recon Run

[mollari_uk]

I've played Recon Run for the first time and I have some questions about this scenario. First some details:

The game was Raid level and I was playing Earth as the defender and the attacker was ISA. The ISA took 1 Whitestar and 6 Bluestars. Earth took 3 raid ships, 2 skirmish and 4 patrol.

I realise this was our first try at this scenario but it seems almost impossible for the defender to win. We played to the end and it was 30VPs to the ISA and 18VPs to Earth and earth was doing very well destroying the ISA until of course the ISA scanned everything ending the game.

We talked about different ways you can play this scenario but couldn't figure out how to make it easier for the defender. It did seem possible for the defender to win but the attacker would have to be unlucky to not scan enough ships and then be almost entirely destroyed. If the attacker also manages to destroy some of the attackers I think it then is almost impossible for the defender to win even if they killed everything due to the available VPs in the attacking force.

E.g.

Destroy - 1 Raid + 6 Patrol = 28 points + 5 for last on board = 33 VP's
Scan - 3 Raid + 2 Skirmish + 4 Patrol = 29VPs

See how close it is and the attacker simply has to roll a CQ 7 to gain his VPs the defender has to destroy everything!

Am I missing something or is this scenario totally imbalanced?

 

[AdrianH]

The first thing you can do to make things easier for the defender is not allow ISA or Shadows to be the attacker. White Stars and Shadow Scouts are hard to kill. White Stars get a +1 CQ to the scan roll. Shadows can hyperspace in next to their targets rather than move in from an edge.

Are you allowed to use ships in a squadron to scan? Because if so, another dirty trick is to bring in a few squadrons of fast Patrol level ships, get the whole lot to scan their targets, and with a bit of luck it's game over before the defender even gets to finish moving.

 

[mollari_uk]

We thought of that too so we are going to try this again with different fleets, but we still struggled to think of how this is a fair fight for the defender.

Anyone successfully won as the defender?

 

[Democratus]

Just played a game last night where the defender won. The game was played at Patrol level (rolled up in the campaign), Centauri attacking Narn.

With 3 patrol points, the Centauri bought a Maximus and a Kutai. The Narn (with 5 points) bought a Ka'Tan, Ka'Toc and a Sho'Kov.

The Kutai was killed (10 pts) in turn one by a 6/5 critical, but it managed to scan the Ka'Toc (10 pts). The Maximus failed 2 scans in a row on the Ka'Tan before finally making the scan (10 pts) on the third try. Because it had to loiter so long chasing after a ship to scan the Narn was aple to bring numbers to bear. The Maximus was then destroyed (20 pts) by a runaway 2-dice beam that scored 13 hits.

Throughout the whole battle, the Narn smartly kept the tiny Sho'Kov on the other side of the board so that it couldn't be scanned and end the game.

Final score: attacker 20, defender 30.

 

[mollari_uk]

Ok I didn't specify but that's not really a shining example. Not only is it a small patrol game but I can see mistakes made by the attacker there.

One being only taking 2 ships, when the objective is to scan ships as quickly as possible. The other is that hiding a ship is almost impossible when the attacker can use hyperspace so I presume he didn't?

I suppose it proves it is possible to win but only if your opponant doesn't know the scenario well or makes mistakes.

Thanks anyway.

I'm sure I'm missing something with this scenario which is why I'm asking here but I just don't see it.

 

[AdrianH]

Also, the defender got lucky - a 6,5 critical on the small ship, a runaway beam hit on the large ship, and the large ship failed a simple CQ check twice in a row.

As for hyperspace, the Narn don't have advanced jump engines and definitely don't have Shadow hyperspace mastery. So first they have to open a jump point, announcing to the Centauri where they intend to enter realspace; then that jump point won't be quite where they wanted it; and then the Sho'Kov has a turn to run away from the jump point. Whatever came through the jump point has to move half speed in a straight line, giving the Sho'Kov another turn in which to run away.

What I don't understand is why we're talking about one Sho'Kov. They come in pairs.

One thing the defender can do is spend all his FAP's on fighters. They can't be scanned. Otherwise I wonder if a good general strategy might be to always buy down at least one PL below the scenario - not possible in a Patrol scenario of course, but in a Raid scenario you have nothing bigger than Skirmish level. That means the attacker has more ships to scan before he can end the game, and each one yields fewer VP's.

 

[Democratus]

The defender did get a bit lucky here, but it was also rough because the mission was at Patrol level. I could either have taken 3 Kutai or 1 Kutai and 1 Skirmish-level ship. Since Kutai are crippled by a mere 8 points of damage - I needed something a bit more survivable. The first turn kill of my Kutai punctuated this point. Thus I choose a Maximus as my second ship.

My opponent purchased a single Sho'Kov for one of his patrol points because we were playing a campaign and he only had one Sho'Kov remaining. So he simply had a "short" force.

I'm not sure what the hyperspace stuff is about. A ship can enter realspace on the same turn it creates the jump point. The one-turn delay is only for going from realspace to hyperspace. However, you can't scan a ship if you gave the Initiate Jump Point! Special Action. So you're still stuck a turn away from anything useful. And, as AdrianH says, your entry point will be random.

I guess you could try and force an interesting game by using fighters only. The game will last only a single turn (since every ship excluding fighters has been scanned) and most fighters could guarantee to be out of scanning range after watching enemy ships move. The Narn could have fielded 25 Frazi flights - more than enough to destroy several patrol-level ships in a single turn. This is another reason I took the Maximus, as it had Anti-Fighter to ward off this possibility.

 

[Misiolak]

The one turn delay is also for hyperspace to normal space travel. It isn't stated like that in the rules, but check the faq.