Sentient Rabbits - Battle Report - ISA vs. Narn

[Burger]

SENTIENT RABBITS GAMING SOCIETY: 1 Point Armageddon Battle Report no. 2

Not so much of a historical match-up this time, we had 1-point Armageddon ISA versus Narn last night. Apologies for the poor pictures, we all forgot our cameras so had to make do with camera-phones!

Admiral: Burger
Race: ISA
Priority/FAP: Armageddon/1
Selection: White Star Carrier (War), White Star WSC-2 (Battle), 2x White Star (Raid)

Those little WS Fighters really hurt, and their hull 5 makes them reasonably sturdy.

Admiral: Reaverman
Race: Narn
Priority/FAP: Armageddon/1
Selection: Bin'Tak (War), 2x G'Quan (Battle)

The Bin'Tak is a great heavy ship. The G'Quans don't have such a good reputation but the e-mines will clear fighters quite nicely and they ae at least hull 6, so should be hard to kill. Plus Narn don't really have any good Raid ships, so there's no point breaking the points down further. Each of the ships will have 1 tube of standard e-mines, and 1 tube of ionic burst.

DEPLOYMENT
ISA lost the initiative. I set up spread right across the deployment area, with the Carrier on the left and the WSC-2 on the right. Hopefully this should help in e-mine avoidance! Narn set up with the Bin'Tak central and the G'Quans off to one side.

TURN 1
ISA win initiative, so at least one Narn will not get boresight. I keep to the e-mine avoidance plan, by staying as spread out as possible. Narn advance slowly. WS fighters get out of F arc, and Nials stay out of e-mine range.

Ionic bursts are fired, so none of my ships can do any special actions next turn. Bin'Tak blows up a White Star in 1 shot. In retaliation, all my Neutron Lasers... miss completely.

TURN 2
Narn win initiative, and lacking special actions, the WSC-2 is going to be in the firing line. The Narn leave an opening in the middle for the Nials to get in, and the WS Fighters sneak further round the side.

WSC-2 takes heavy damage, and the Narn's paintwork gets a bit scratched.

TURN 3
The ISA's flanking manouvers finally pay off. They all avoid the forward arcs, and the remaining fighters can safely be launched.

Not much damage happens... the WS dodge most of the Narn's hits, and the Narn's hull 4 is a problem for the ISA. The Carrier loses its Starboard weapons though.

TURN 4
Lots of Come About rolls. Narn still don't get any boresights, but those secondary weapons are still nasty... and e-mines are back.

WS Fighters take out the Bin'Tak's engines and port weapons, but they all get destroyed by e-mines. WSC-2 is skeletoned by a G'Quan, and the other G'Quan is taken out by a 6-5 crit from the WS Carrier.

Game is ended due to time running out. It is a draw, 3 VPs each. It was quite a fun game, but a bit frustrating... the WS's had very good dodge rolls, and poor attack rolls... leading to not much damage being done to either side.

 

[H]

hmm, seemed some rather good crits on those poor G'Quans!
we have a Narn V Abbai battle planned, 3 arm points.
Narn will be KaBinTak and 4 G'Vrahns, Versus a Brivoki and 4 Juyacas

for sure would could split points down, but we want to try the newer ships out.

 

[Banichi]

we have a Narn V Abbai battle planned, 3 arm points.

Look out for those Abbai, I recieved one of my biggest spankings ever courtesy of the fish ladies. :lol: That will teach me to pick on pacifists.

 

[H]

oh don't I know it, the juyaca crushed my kabroktas and corumais without breaking a sweat

 

[Banichi]

Its those "buckets of dice" volleys from the quad partical arrays that did for me. If the Abbai get amongst your ships it hurts.

 

[Morgoth]

At least the G'Vrahn have some kinda defense in the form of interceptors!! But yeah those Abbai ships can be tough to get rid of!! double team them!!

 

[Ripple]

hmm...never seen anyone have issues killing the Abbai...they're beam bait. And hard as it is to maintain range in this game, range eight is one that can usually be avoided more than most. Maybe we don't know how to use them right.

As to the battle, nice short report. Little surprised that you guys didn't break the fleets down a bit deeper. Sure the Narn Raid choices are no great shakes but Skirmish is excellent and those puny torpedo boats are excellent sinks. ISA I suppose you could question the wisdom of a vaarl or two...or even blue stars if your allowing them.

Tactics I was wondering why the whitestars were inside eight on the g'quans. You seem to be in following positions so should have some free movement. Just wondering... This your guys usual 4 x 4 board? Harder to do the blow through moves against narn with ionics but... if you have room.

Ripple

 

[Hash]

This your guys usual 4 x 4 board? Harder to do the blow through moves against narn with ionics but... if you have room.

Actually we do play on anything from 4 x 4 to 8 x 4 - just depends on how bothered we are - Friendly games we tend to stick to 4 x 4 just cause it's easier to set-up and pack away...plus my flat is small

 

[thehod]

Its a wonder for me to even launch fighters against narn

 

[Hash]

As to the battle, nice short report. Little surprised that you guys didn't break the fleets down a bit deeper. Sure the Narn Raid choices are no great shakes but Skirmish is excellent and those puny torpedo boats are excellent sinks. ISA I suppose you could question the wisdom of a vaarl or two...or even blue stars if your allowing them.

All valid points and I'm sure Reaverman would have taken a few more Narn... - I placed an artificial constraint on Burger and Reaverman to limit the number of ships (no hard limit just a general keep it low guideline) to enable us to finish the game withing 2hrs - I had work early the next day

 

[Ripple]

Ah... well that makes more sense now...=)

We do that fairly frequently. Today we played a game of ISA/Minbari vs Vorlon/Brakiri. The Vorlons got their pawns killed pretty quick and bugged out. They just had too much damage potential vs our limited ships (Haltona's and scouts plus a vorlon light cruiser). So we limited the next game somewhat as to what could be played cause folks had to go by 7 pm and I had had enough of the high end beasties...we ended up abbai/ea 3rd vs drazi/ea 3rd.

The new drazi hull btw is nice...still fighter meat and all but it felt like a raid ship.

Ripple

 

[Burger]

I would probably have taken 3 blue stars in replacement of 1 white star... if they'd arrived a couple of days earlier

 

[katadder]

the problem with bluestars is they are very vunerable to multiple e-mines due to the low hull and low damage.

 

[Hash]

the problem with bluestars is they are very vunerable to multiple e-mines due to the low hull and low damage.

I don't know, e-mines aside, they seem to be a very powerful patrol level edition to the ISA fleet. I imagine a combination of Bluestars, Whitestars and the WS Carrier would have been devastating, even vs. the Narn fleet here, if the ISA player sufficiently outmanoeuvred his opponent.

Certainly agree he just couldn't mosey on up and have a scrap...finesse (and a little luck) would be required, that's all