Starting the Drakh...

[Saku]

I'm a new player that's trying to decide what race to start with. I have the 2nd edition box set and a friend and I have been playing a few low PL games with the included counters. He's dead set on playing EA and has already started buying and painting models, but I'm still on the fence.

I like the Centauri, but they seem very common and quite one-dimensional. I'm also a fan of the Vorlons (and will probably be even moreso after looking at Armaggedon) but I don't like their lack of low-PL options. The Drakh also look really cool and I really liked them in the series but I haven't played any games with them (don't have the book).

I'm very curious how the Drakh play. What are their strengths and weaknesses? Are they well-represented at all PLs? Are all of their ships useful? How are the models to assemble? Do they paint up well?

Thanks.

 

[Slightly Norse John]

One of the Drakh models is politely referred to as the plumb bob. It's impolitely referred to as, well, it would be impolite to say. :wink:
The Centauri are, well, under revision (by the player base) at the moment, but the SFoS/Armageddon version has more lasers than a DVD player factory. They are easy to do well with as a beginner, and even easier as an experienced player- they throw the most firepower of any race, on average. A good plan with insufficient resources will be trumped by a bad plan backed by stupendous overkill, far more often than not.
The Drakh were very controversial when they first came out, but the dust has settled by now. They're a race that takes a bit of practise to gget results with.
the big ships, carrier and mothership, as ships, are very poor for their level. As payload carriers, they have a certain usefulness. Don't take them in a fight at their PL, or one below if you can avoid it.
Mediocre to poor survivability- no head on attacks if you can avoid them, either- horde upon horde of small ships with good manoeuvre and good to excellent firepower. Very fighter resistant, not so hot at repelling the big guns. Higher levels, take a few more medium ships and a lot of little ones.
There was general astonishment when someone posted a set of images of tigerstripe Drakh that actually looked not too bad. Previous comments had included 'I could sneeze a better mini'.

 

[Burger]

One of the Drakh models is politely referred to as the plumb bob. It's impolitely referred to as, well, it would be impolite to say. :wink:

The Buttplug, you mean :lol: (Hey I never claimed to be polite!)

The Centauri are, well, under revision (by the player base) at the moment

Or, in other words: some players think they should be changed, but Mongoose has no plans to do so. They are a very strong fleet at the moment with few real drawbacks (I said few not none, before anyone starts complaining about Prefect's lack of rear weapons).

 

[Locutus9956]

Well of the three races youve expressed interest in (and Im basing this off armageddon fully up to date etc stats):

Centauri: Very powerful long range forward firepower and an excellent selection of ships. They are certainly one of the more powerful fleets in the game but personally I think theyre balanced enough (Ive fought against them many times, won some, lost some, but never had any issues with them tbh). Not to everyones liking but I have no problems with them really.

Vorlons: Well if you thought they were top heavy PRE armageddon then you might not be that keen on them in said book, theyre VERY top heavy now (the TRANSPORT, their weakest ship, is now raid...) However they DO have a disgusting amount of firepower and with their high damage raitngs, adaptive armour and imunity to critical hits, and buckets of self repair they can take one hell of a beating before they die....

Drakh: Drakh are an interesting fleet tbh, some people absolutely HATE the miniatures but personally I actually quite like them aside from the aformentioned rather dodgey looking one.... As to the fleet itself, well they have a very interesting play style, very effective weapons but not an awful LOT of them, very fast maneuverable ships that are quite good at evading damage but that cant actually TAKE an awful lot of it form the bulk of their fleet (raiders) (some people argue that they are better played relying on their light cruisers but I prefer the raider swarm version, its more fun and is how they seem to fight on the show!). Their gravitic energy grids allow them to shrug off alot of the small glancing hits that can whittle down other opponents but the Drakh are VERY vulnerable to big nasty crits that ignore their GEGs and due to their limited weapon arcs can esily leave them unarmed even if they survive.

Im thinking of making a Drakh fleet myself sometime

 

[locarno24]

Vorlons: Well if you thought they were top heavy PRE armageddon then you might not be that keen on them in said book, theyre VERY top heavy now (the TRANSPORT, their weakest ship, is now raid...) However they DO have a disgusting amount of firepower and with their high damage raitngs, adaptive armour and imunity to critical hits, and buckets of self repair they can take one hell of a beating before they die....

I have to say there's nothing wrong with the New leveled up Vorlons...the mental image of a flock of a half-dozen fighter wings and diplomatic transports turning up and.....being diplomatic*....to an Earthforce cruiser/destroyer squadron seems perfect to me; and it's still doable in most games to bring a light cruiser to the table.





* Speak softly, and carry a big discharge cannon. 8)

 

[Wulf Corbett]

Or, in other words: some players think they should be changed, but Mongoose has no plans to do so.

Not within FIRST edition.

Wulf

 

[Locutus9956]

Sorry I never meant to imply that I thought the new vorlon PLs was a bad thing, I do in fact think, that the new Vorlon list is fantastic, and the best thing IN armageddon

 

[locarno24]

Definitely. One of the things everyone always seemed to think previously was that the ancients weren't quite up to par for power (Tournament Shadow Hybrid aside).

That is definitely not the case now. Even the shadows, who arguably aren't as good for their points, are, on a simple qualitative level of 'what do you think of this for a statline?', truly brutal.

 

[thePirv]

I'm very curious how the Drakh play. What are their strengths and weaknesses? Are they well-represented at all PLs?Thanks.

I'm gonna get dragged over the coals for this, but to hell with it.
The Drakh aren't supported at Armageddon level. They're "too new" to qualify for ths kind of support.

The Drakh are a very awkward fleet to play. When you first start to play as them, you will lose an awful lot until you figure out the better ways to use them. There are a few strategies that work; as mentioned, the Raider swarm can be effective, but expect to lose bucketloads of ships to the big guns before you even get to fire a shot, OR the Cruisers and particularly the Light Cruisers pack a mean punch, but your enemy will know this and pour Beam weapon fire into them. This hurts Drakh moreso than most fleets because the Drakh have poor hull values (all 4's and 5's) and not a lot of damage on most ships (the Mothership has about 100, but a Hull 4 War level ship doesn't last long AT ALL)

 

[Reborn]

One of the Drakh models is politely referred to as the plumb bob. It's impolitely referred to as, well, it would be impolite to say. :wink:

The Buttplug, you mean :lol: (Hey I never claimed to be polite!)

The Centauri are, well, under revision (by the player base) at the moment

Or, in other words: some players think they should be changed, but Mongoose has no plans to do so. They are a very strong fleet at the moment with few real drawbacks (I said few not none, before anyone starts complaining about Prefect's lack of rear weapons).

*whiney voice* But cmon, dude, the Prefect has, like, no rear weapons, guy. Hey let's go play some Counterstrike!! :roll:

 

[Locutus9956]

Definitely. One of the things everyone always seemed to think previously was that the ancients weren't quite up to par for power (Tournament Shadow Hybrid aside).

That is definitely not the case now. Even the shadows, who arguably aren't as good for their points, are, on a simple qualitative level of 'what do you think of this for a statline?', truly brutal.

Id strongly disagree with anyone who thinks the shadows are weak for their PL still, sure you cant just waltz in and take it like the Vorlons and you dont have the sheer FIREPOWER but on the other hand, Vorlons dont have supermaneuverable ships.... And if youre playing a scenario where you can come in from hyperspace.......

Shadows may not LOOK as scary on paper but I suspect people will find once they start playing with them more, that they can be rather horrifically nasty (I suspect it would actually be a pretty good match now between the Vorlons and Shadows wheras before the Vorlons didnt have the firepower or toughnees to take the shadows on before they got in behind them and sat their laughing maniacally )

 

[Locutus9956]

*whiney voice* But cmon, dude, the Prefect has, like, no rear weapons, guy. Hey let's go play some Counterstrike!! :roll:

:twisted:

 

[Alexb83]

All stop and pivot ftw. Both need relatively close range to get all their AD to bear (18 inches, seemingly), Being as neither races' main ships is particularly fast (5 and 6), the best the Vorlons can do is get in really close, sit there, and dedicate their SAs to turning in place in order to keep their arc.

Also, 4 destoyers for every 1 shadow ship seems to give the vorlons the edge on initiative sinks and the ability to surround said shadow ship. Super manouverable is well and good, but if you can get 2/4 ships out of his forward arc, he's in a bit of trouble.

 

[Wulf Corbett]

[Shadows may not LOOK as scary on paper but I suspect people will find once they start playing with them more, that they can be rather horrifically nasty

After playtesting Shadow Dancing (although with Anti-Fighter on the Shadow Beam), I found them quite balanced. Two Sharlins on CaF! could take out one Shadow, but one Shadow WOULD take out a Sharlin, so long as it beat Stealth (which was pretty easy). The Aviokis fared a lot better in survival, but even the Tournament Aviokis didn't deal enough damage, it needed 4 of them on CaF! to make a sure kill. I managed 4 Shadows dead (out of 10) and two in a bad state when my one Xill and 4 Warbirds decided to leave... quickly...

That SHOULD have been a 20-odd point Battle PL scenario, but with the Shadows doubled in PL, it seems quite fair that they eliminated the opposition for less than half their number...

Wulf

 

[Locutus9956]

Actually Vorlons CANT all stop and pivot unless theyve changed it, its not one of the special orders their allowed to use.

Also of note, All stop and pivot stops you firing on the turn you use it which actually to largely defeats the POINT of using it in most situations (when fighing shadows anyway, as any turn you DO use it they can ignore that ship as it cant fire, and any turn you DONT use it they can simply duck behind your fire arc....)

 

[Alexb83]

Actually Vorlons CANT all stop and pivot unless theyve changed it, its not one of the special orders their allowed to use.

Also of note, All stop and pivot stops you firing on the turn you use it which actually to largely defeats the POINT of using it in most situations (when fighing shadows anyway, as any turn you DO use it they can ignore that ship as it cant fire, and any turn you DONT use it they can simply duck behind your fire arc....)

Hmm, good point... are there any SAs that vorlons actually /can/ use? ASaP is a bit of an odd one, being a later edition. Will have to check what they can/can't do in Armageddon when I get home. Surprising that the can't, considering they have spiffy gravitic drives, and we do often see them stop/turn/move in the series.

 

[locarno24]

(I suspect it would actually be a pretty good match now between the Vorlons and Shadows wheras before the Vorlons didnt have the firepower or toughnees to take the shadows on before they got in behind them and sat their laughing maniacally )

Fair point.

4 destoyers for every 1 shadow ship seems to give the vorlons the edge on initiative sinks

Shadow scouts. Redirecting a slicer beam? shudders. Destroyers and transports, though, will make a mess.

Vorlons aren't so bad at special actions. The last version I saw of the rule was....

Vorlon ships may use any Special Actions except All Hands to Deck!, Close Blast Doors and Activate Defense Grid!, Run Silent! and Stand Down and Prepare to be Boarded!

 

[Locutus9956]

I did ask this in the past on rulesmasters or somewhere and am pretty sure they cant (though personally I think they should be able to)

As far as I know Vorlons CAN:

All stop,
Come About,
All power to engines
Initate Jump point/Activate Jump gate

thats pretty much it as far as I know.

Shadows are limited to just Jump point but then they dont need the other ones anyway

But regardless, Vorlons still cant FIRE while doing all stop and pivot even if theyre allowed to perform the SA

 

[locarno24]

Can you find a link, if you have the time? It might be one of the ones they dumped, but I'd love to have a glance, if I can...

One other thing in the ancient's favour - they're cheap!

The vorlons/shadows miniatures still cost the same as they did before they got moved up a priority level....I dread to think how many War points the Vorlon box now represents....

 

[Locutus9956]

The VORLON box? Have you thought how many points the SHADOW one is worth now