Weakest race?
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CZuschlag
Mongoose
Raiders are hosed even worse than the Abbai. And that takes work! Other than the Battlewagon, the fleet is an abject joke.
I have zero idea why the pak' are in this list. While the initiative stinks, the Plasma Torpedo barrage is fierce, and you can do some nasty tricks with the Plasma Web against ships with dodge, such as Drazi, Drakh, and ISA, or fighter swarms, like Gaim. the Urik'hal and Halik are both better-than-par Raid level ships, and the pak'ma'ra version of the Ikorta is better than the one the Brakiri came up with. The bombardment capabilities at Patrol level are supported better by the pak'ma'ra Sunhawk than any other Patrol ship, including the Hermes, Sho'Kov, or Jashakar Tae.
For best effect, integrate them with a few Vree scouts (League is League!) and watch the plasma torpedo barrage --- it's hideous.
The Brakiri also mystify me --- if nothing else, the Haltona is just too darn good for this fleet not to absolutely rock. The Brokados may be the best CVA buy in the game (the Garasoch is the other main competition). Both War-level ships are maouverable and provide unique support capabilities, even if they are expensive. On their own, the lack of a Patrol ship is, indeed, annoying.
I have zero idea why the pak' are in this list. While the initiative stinks, the Plasma Torpedo barrage is fierce, and you can do some nasty tricks with the Plasma Web against ships with dodge, such as Drazi, Drakh, and ISA, or fighter swarms, like Gaim. the Urik'hal and Halik are both better-than-par Raid level ships, and the pak'ma'ra version of the Ikorta is better than the one the Brakiri came up with. The bombardment capabilities at Patrol level are supported better by the pak'ma'ra Sunhawk than any other Patrol ship, including the Hermes, Sho'Kov, or Jashakar Tae.
For best effect, integrate them with a few Vree scouts (League is League!) and watch the plasma torpedo barrage --- it's hideous.
The Brakiri also mystify me --- if nothing else, the Haltona is just too darn good for this fleet not to absolutely rock. The Brokados may be the best CVA buy in the game (the Garasoch is the other main competition). Both War-level ships are maouverable and provide unique support capabilities, even if they are expensive. On their own, the lack of a Patrol ship is, indeed, annoying.
Locutus9956
Mongoose
The Raiders are, aside from the Battlewagon, which is a lovely ship, crap I'm afraid. Now they're supposed to be, well, raiders, though, rather than an organised navy so I actually like them that way. But they ARE the weakest UNLESS you use Battlewagons Battlewagons and MORE Battlewagons, then theyre actually quite decent.
The abbaion the other hand are a nice idea but are too slow and too short ranged resulting in a fleet that generally gets rogered without being able to return much, if any rogering. And shields, whilst excellent on paper, just dont cut it in the abbai case as their regen rate is a bit too low.
Basically Abbai need either more speed, more firepower or even MORE defences. ONE of those though not all 3. Personally I'd go for the last one and maybe a racial ability to use minefields or some such. Abbai SHOULDNT be good offensively but they should be insanely hard to hurt (Im talking hull 6, lots of hitpoints, 3 or 4 interceptors and shields 5/5 (maybe even more) at raid level kind of thing).
Basically leave them with crappy weapons, but make them double hard bastards to actually kill
The abbaion the other hand are a nice idea but are too slow and too short ranged resulting in a fleet that generally gets rogered without being able to return much, if any rogering. And shields, whilst excellent on paper, just dont cut it in the abbai case as their regen rate is a bit too low.
Basically Abbai need either more speed, more firepower or even MORE defences. ONE of those though not all 3. Personally I'd go for the last one and maybe a racial ability to use minefields or some such. Abbai SHOULDNT be good offensively but they should be insanely hard to hurt (Im talking hull 6, lots of hitpoints, 3 or 4 interceptors and shields 5/5 (maybe even more) at raid level kind of thing).
Basically leave them with crappy weapons, but make them double hard bastards to actually kill
Raiders:
They are the weakest and are apparently meant to be. I still don't quite get why - yes, they shouldn't have heavy warships but I still don't see why they should be forced down in power at a given priority level rather than simply only having low priority ships.
It's not all doom and gloom - the Battlewagon is quite nice, and in small games so is the strike carrier. Utter turd that it may be in a direct fight, it is (a) quite tough, especially against beam weapons and (b) the cheapest fleet carrier in the game. Unfortunately whilst this is a nice trick, the fact that it's stuck with Delta-V fighters to support makes it still a bit iffy. Even more so because upgrading to Delta-V2's costs quite a bit (especially compared to upgrading Starfury Novas to Auroras, which gives Early Years EA the same benefit for free!)
pak'ma'ra:
It's not initiative so much as CQ, which makes critical repairs annoying. But, redundant systems makes them tough, plasma webs make them efficient swarm-killers, and as noted plasma torpedos are just harsh. The porfatis is a very tasty bomber as well, quite capable of pummelling a mid-weight ship in packs without coming anywhere near AF range. The pak'ma'ra have a bit of a blind spot for well-armoured, interceptor equipped opponents, but then so do the vree and you're never going to see them on this list!
Drazi:
Boresight = bad
on the other hand
Swarm = good
The two more or less cancel one another out. In theory. In practice it's awkward as whilst you can out-swarm someone in the movement phase, firing a single sunhawk's weapons for every destroyer-class ship the enemy fires means that you cede initiative in the shooting phase (meaning losing a lot of ships before they get to fire). Drazi whateverbirds are ok for durability but not fantastic.
Firepower is very good if you can boresight (solarhawks stand out as borderline insane!), but nonexistant if you can't. This may change, of course, so P&P may see a big boost for the Freehold.
More to the point, there are still alternatives - the Darkhawk is much more flexible and packs a nice missile volley and the Guardhawk has gone from being a joke in first edition to one of the best fighter-killers out there. Escort and AF 6 per patrol point is just wrong.
The weak point it the bigger ships, which do tend to be underpowered and a bit critical-vulnerable (lose a random arc - you have a choice of boresight or forwards, both are a big, big problem)
Abbai:
I can kind of see this one. 8" range secondaries aren't easy to get shots with, the fighter is awful and the combat laser only does so much to compensate. At 15" it's pretty short-legged itself.
Shields are a big plus - in a game where criticals matter so much, having 8-12 damage that can't cause criticals gives you some nice protection.
The fighters need escort protection to achieve much but that's ok because they're not exactly going to be doing strafing runs. If you just think of them as a way to extend the range of escort's anti-fighter firepower you've got it about right......note that you've got a nice cheap escort frigate as well as the big, slow bimith.
All in all they're just unable to do enough damage - they tend to have a similar number of attack dice to other race's ships but without the damage multipliers.
The Jucaya is the obvious exception - and is a very, very nice ship.
Also, if the regular ships are tough, the Marata diplomatic transport is ridiculously so. Granted it's armament is pretty feeble - 6-8 twin-linked AD depending on facing - but it's fast and hard to stop. Try using them as blockade runners and watch the swearwords.
Brakiri:
I agree - I don't know why the brakiri are in here, really - they have all weights and specialisations of ships you could want; a good escort that can hold its own against lighter ships if needs be (halik), a cheap atmospheric assault transport (ikorta), a scout (shakara) - and with AP weapons rather than twin-linked you actually benefit from a scout, two fleet carriers (brokados/cidikar), a swarm-clearance ship (takata) and a number of very good quality gunships.
Their ships are tough, and the falkosi can act as interceptors (and some ships have them already). Slow-loading but powerful beam weapons is a nice trade, and regardless of what the fleet book says, the Haltona and Tashkat more than make up for any lack of manouvrability. In fact, slow-loading beams work fine - a salvo from a number of graviton beams is able to do two turns worth of heavy laser fire in one turn....meaning the enemy isn't there to shoot back next turn!
They are the weakest and are apparently meant to be. I still don't quite get why - yes, they shouldn't have heavy warships but I still don't see why they should be forced down in power at a given priority level rather than simply only having low priority ships.
It's not all doom and gloom - the Battlewagon is quite nice, and in small games so is the strike carrier. Utter turd that it may be in a direct fight, it is (a) quite tough, especially against beam weapons and (b) the cheapest fleet carrier in the game. Unfortunately whilst this is a nice trick, the fact that it's stuck with Delta-V fighters to support makes it still a bit iffy. Even more so because upgrading to Delta-V2's costs quite a bit (especially compared to upgrading Starfury Novas to Auroras, which gives Early Years EA the same benefit for free!)
pak'ma'ra:
It's not initiative so much as CQ, which makes critical repairs annoying. But, redundant systems makes them tough, plasma webs make them efficient swarm-killers, and as noted plasma torpedos are just harsh. The porfatis is a very tasty bomber as well, quite capable of pummelling a mid-weight ship in packs without coming anywhere near AF range. The pak'ma'ra have a bit of a blind spot for well-armoured, interceptor equipped opponents, but then so do the vree and you're never going to see them on this list!
Drazi:
Boresight = bad
on the other hand
Swarm = good
The two more or less cancel one another out. In theory. In practice it's awkward as whilst you can out-swarm someone in the movement phase, firing a single sunhawk's weapons for every destroyer-class ship the enemy fires means that you cede initiative in the shooting phase (meaning losing a lot of ships before they get to fire). Drazi whateverbirds are ok for durability but not fantastic.
Firepower is very good if you can boresight (solarhawks stand out as borderline insane!), but nonexistant if you can't. This may change, of course, so P&P may see a big boost for the Freehold.
More to the point, there are still alternatives - the Darkhawk is much more flexible and packs a nice missile volley and the Guardhawk has gone from being a joke in first edition to one of the best fighter-killers out there. Escort and AF 6 per patrol point is just wrong.
The weak point it the bigger ships, which do tend to be underpowered and a bit critical-vulnerable (lose a random arc - you have a choice of boresight or forwards, both are a big, big problem)
Abbai:
I can kind of see this one. 8" range secondaries aren't easy to get shots with, the fighter is awful and the combat laser only does so much to compensate. At 15" it's pretty short-legged itself.
Shields are a big plus - in a game where criticals matter so much, having 8-12 damage that can't cause criticals gives you some nice protection.
The fighters need escort protection to achieve much but that's ok because they're not exactly going to be doing strafing runs. If you just think of them as a way to extend the range of escort's anti-fighter firepower you've got it about right......note that you've got a nice cheap escort frigate as well as the big, slow bimith.
All in all they're just unable to do enough damage - they tend to have a similar number of attack dice to other race's ships but without the damage multipliers.
The Jucaya is the obvious exception - and is a very, very nice ship.
Also, if the regular ships are tough, the Marata diplomatic transport is ridiculously so. Granted it's armament is pretty feeble - 6-8 twin-linked AD depending on facing - but it's fast and hard to stop. Try using them as blockade runners and watch the swearwords.
Brakiri:
I agree - I don't know why the brakiri are in here, really - they have all weights and specialisations of ships you could want; a good escort that can hold its own against lighter ships if needs be (halik), a cheap atmospheric assault transport (ikorta), a scout (shakara) - and with AP weapons rather than twin-linked you actually benefit from a scout, two fleet carriers (brokados/cidikar), a swarm-clearance ship (takata) and a number of very good quality gunships.
Their ships are tough, and the falkosi can act as interceptors (and some ships have them already). Slow-loading but powerful beam weapons is a nice trade, and regardless of what the fleet book says, the Haltona and Tashkat more than make up for any lack of manouvrability. In fact, slow-loading beams work fine - a salvo from a number of graviton beams is able to do two turns worth of heavy laser fire in one turn....meaning the enemy isn't there to shoot back next turn!
The combination of slow speed, Hull 5 or below, short-ranged weapons, and a slow shield re-charge rate, and absolutely useless fighters combine to make the Abbai the weakest in my eyes.
Now, don't mistake, I play Abbai all the time and really like them, but they are VERY difficult to win with, especially if your opponent is expecting them. The one change I'd really like to see at this time is to boost their shield re-charge rate to 100% recharged every End Phase. That one change would most easily move them from unambiguously weak to tricky but viable.
Now, don't mistake, I play Abbai all the time and really like them, but they are VERY difficult to win with, especially if your opponent is expecting them. The one change I'd really like to see at this time is to boost their shield re-charge rate to 100% recharged every End Phase. That one change would most easily move them from unambiguously weak to tricky but viable.
You haven't been sneaking a look at the playtester e-mails have you?Locutus9956 said:Basically Abbai need either more speed, more firepower or even MORE defences. ONE of those though not all 3. Personally I'd go for the last one and maybe a racial ability to use minefields or some such. Abbai SHOULDNT be good offensively but they should be insanely hard to hurt (Im talking hull 6, lots of hitpoints, 3 or 4 interceptors and shields 5/5 (maybe even more) at raid level kind of thing).
Basically leave them with crappy weapons, but make them double hard bastards to actually kill
phoenixhawk
Mongoose
I didn't vote for the raiders for the simple fact that they are not supposed to be a stand-up fight sort of fleet. They should not even really be ocnsidered a "race" in terms of fleet lists. They should be more like a scenario-based list for scenarios or campaigns and not a stand-alone faction.
While I don't like all the Drazi boresights, I don't know why they would be on the list. No one does swarms like the Drazi
I went with the Abbai as weakest. They might have good defense and all, but without the firepower to back it up, and horrible initiative, they aren't much good in a fight. And the horrible initiative prevents "splashing" them in a mixed League or ISA fleet since no one wants to give up initiative with a -2 penalty. I know I've been tempted to try an Abbai ship or two, but the initiative thing bugs me. Just my two-cents on the matter.
Chris
While I don't like all the Drazi boresights, I don't know why they would be on the list. No one does swarms like the Drazi
I went with the Abbai as weakest. They might have good defense and all, but without the firepower to back it up, and horrible initiative, they aren't much good in a fight. And the horrible initiative prevents "splashing" them in a mixed League or ISA fleet since no one wants to give up initiative with a -2 penalty. I know I've been tempted to try an Abbai ship or two, but the initiative thing bugs me. Just my two-cents on the matter.
Chris
I know I am in the minority on this, but after watching the Abbai in about a dozen plus games against the following races:
Narn
Centauri
Pak'Ma'Ra
EA Crusade
PSI Corp
Shadows
In the right hands the Abbai are deadly. With the Patrol and Skirmish level ships that they have with 5 and 10 shieds, tons of Twin Linked dice out all sides they can seriously hurt you. With the way the Critical Hit table is that is their greatest asset. With the multiple dice that they can throw the chances of getting Critical hits increases.
The player in our campaign has not lost a game and to be honest I hope to never see an Abbai ship on the table again! What he does is with the swarm of Patrol Ships is uses All Power to Engines and closes the distance to you so that on Turn 1 or the latest Turn 2 you are caught in his TL range and with the swarm he uses Squadrons to fire multiple ships at you. 6 Dice out the front on a Patrol Level ship is greater than some Skirmish level ships. Then through in the Comms Disrupter on a Patrol level Scout, try and repair a Critical hit the next turn.
Inn the recent game against the EA Crusade, 6 point War, he fielded a Brivoki and it totally wrecked the game plan of the EA. It gutted a Warlock and then turned 2 Marathons with the Gravitic Shifters so that the Marathons had no shots, then the swarm attacked and had them at greatly reduced level.
With the Shields you have to oiver kill them with a much higher rated ship just to get past the shields. then with the swarm those ships move last and out of range to recharge their shields while you are facing a fresh line of ships.
Granted when he stated he was taking the Abbai as his fleet I thought he would be done by turn 3. He has taken a planet each turn, and won multiple games each tuen and now has a fleet that is unstopable. The whole group is in shock. He is switching to Minbari just ot extend the campaign until P&P is printed or I get my campaign rules written.
I will now duck for cover for the shots that are bound to come my way!
tschuma
Narn
Centauri
Pak'Ma'Ra
EA Crusade
PSI Corp
Shadows
In the right hands the Abbai are deadly. With the Patrol and Skirmish level ships that they have with 5 and 10 shieds, tons of Twin Linked dice out all sides they can seriously hurt you. With the way the Critical Hit table is that is their greatest asset. With the multiple dice that they can throw the chances of getting Critical hits increases.
The player in our campaign has not lost a game and to be honest I hope to never see an Abbai ship on the table again! What he does is with the swarm of Patrol Ships is uses All Power to Engines and closes the distance to you so that on Turn 1 or the latest Turn 2 you are caught in his TL range and with the swarm he uses Squadrons to fire multiple ships at you. 6 Dice out the front on a Patrol Level ship is greater than some Skirmish level ships. Then through in the Comms Disrupter on a Patrol level Scout, try and repair a Critical hit the next turn.
Inn the recent game against the EA Crusade, 6 point War, he fielded a Brivoki and it totally wrecked the game plan of the EA. It gutted a Warlock and then turned 2 Marathons with the Gravitic Shifters so that the Marathons had no shots, then the swarm attacked and had them at greatly reduced level.
With the Shields you have to oiver kill them with a much higher rated ship just to get past the shields. then with the swarm those ships move last and out of range to recharge their shields while you are facing a fresh line of ships.
Granted when he stated he was taking the Abbai as his fleet I thought he would be done by turn 3. He has taken a planet each turn, and won multiple games each tuen and now has a fleet that is unstopable. The whole group is in shock. He is switching to Minbari just ot extend the campaign until P&P is printed or I get my campaign rules written.
I will now duck for cover for the shots that are bound to come my way!
tschuma
<Snip Post>
<<pak'ma'ra:
It's not initiative so much as CQ, which makes critical repairs annoying. But, redundant systems makes them tough, plasma webs make them efficient swarm-killers, and as noted plasma torpedos are just harsh. The porfatis is a very tasty bomber as well, quite capable of pummelling a mid-weight ship in packs without coming anywhere near AF range. The pak'ma'ra have a bit of a blind spot for well-armoured, interceptor equipped opponents, but then so do the vree and you're never going to see them on this list!>>
I had a question about the Pak'ma'ra: How many ships in a squadron are necessary to use the Plasma Web ability? Thanks.
Sincerely,
Andrew Norris
<<pak'ma'ra:
It's not initiative so much as CQ, which makes critical repairs annoying. But, redundant systems makes them tough, plasma webs make them efficient swarm-killers, and as noted plasma torpedos are just harsh. The porfatis is a very tasty bomber as well, quite capable of pummelling a mid-weight ship in packs without coming anywhere near AF range. The pak'ma'ra have a bit of a blind spot for well-armoured, interceptor equipped opponents, but then so do the vree and you're never going to see them on this list!>>
I had a question about the Pak'ma'ra: How many ships in a squadron are necessary to use the Plasma Web ability? Thanks.
Sincerely,
Andrew Norris
Foxmeister
Mongoose
tschuma said:
Some would argue, myself included, that this is probably more a function of the swarm than the race itself.
Regards,
Dave
Locutus9956
Mongoose
Triggy said:You haven't been sneaking a look at the playtester e-mails have you?Locutus9956 said:Basically Abbai need either more speed, more firepower or even MORE defences. ONE of those though not all 3. Personally I'd go for the last one and maybe a racial ability to use minefields or some such. Abbai SHOULDNT be good offensively but they should be insanely hard to hurt (Im talking hull 6, lots of hitpoints, 3 or 4 interceptors and shields 5/5 (maybe even more) at raid level kind of thing).
Basically leave them with crappy weapons, but make them double hard bastards to actually kill
Nope but I like where this is heading
Sounds like someone else thought of this and it might be appearing in P&P?Agreed.
Although in fairness, the Abbai patrol level ships aren't half bad*. Nor is the Milani (if it carried anything but Kothas it'd be really quite nice!).
It's the Bimith that accusations of general rubbishness is normally levelled at, and to a lesser degree the Lakara.
* Which reminds me. Why do the Abbai of all people have an attack frigate?
I agree that the swarm is an issue, but those damn ships are still tough to kill at this time. IF you compare them to a Shadow Scout at Raid level, at the start of firing, they are just as good, and if you us the tactic that he uses of pulling them out and regenerating, they are just as good. and at PAtrol level to boot! Even the Skirmish level ships are better than the Shadow Scout.
Our Abbai player only fileds the Bimuth only in larger games. He didn;t even take a Lakara in his fleet, that's how bad that one is.
Fix the FAP and Critical hit table and I would be happy.
tschuma
Our Abbai player only fileds the Bimuth only in larger games. He didn;t even take a Lakara in his fleet, that's how bad that one is.
Fix the FAP and Critical hit table and I would be happy.
tschuma
tschuma said:
er well the Scout - a superb Raid level ship - has also got Stealth 5+ and Dodge 6+ to add, and total regeneration of shields which is lovely and of course ignores crew damage and regens normal damage (and criticals) its a tad more maneuvable :wink: .............. yes its subject to pinning/telepaths but it is an excellent ship.
