Post by toaster on Oct 16, 2010 22:34:58 GMT -5
A friend and I play-tested some of my Fleet book one designs yesterday, we chose unprepared defense because both side get a random sized force generated the same way, this meant I could design the forces during the week and Chris then chose a force and we rolled for who got to be attacker this not losing half the game to force design.
The FSE attacked with 2 Roma BBB, 1 Ypres BCR a Milan CLS and a Suffern CLR.
NAC had 2 Victoria BBB, 1 Vandenburg CAR, 2 Furious CLS and 2 Huron CLS. The heavy screen force is due to the FSE being a primarily missile armed force.
The NAC started in a tight group and turned towards the warp point as soon as it appeared, The FSE came through, accelerated and split into 2 groups, 1 BB and the CL's turned to starboard and the other BB and the BC continued straight all ships launched missiles.
The NAC accelerated to pass between the missile spread before it could converge and damaged a light cruiser with long range fire taking out its forward shield and both fire cons.
The FSE continued their split hoping to either split the NAC or force them to expose their rear shields to one group, unfortunately the separated by to far to give mutual support and the NAC fell upon the group with the light cruisers and destroyed the undamaged one.
The FSE thought they were in trouble but a win of the initiative combined with their high velocity (some ships were at 9) allowed them to punch through the NAC group and place themselves in their rear arc, meanwhile the other group was moving back in to range and it appeared that the FSE was going to form up in good order on the NAC rear. Missiles destroyed one of the NAC light cruisers and inficted major damage on one BB.
Initiative swung back to the NAC and they managed to get some weapons to bear although the FSE still had the advantage of having all targets in their frontal arc. The NAC lost another cruiser and the damaged BB took a further pounding.
The end came suddenly the NAC were running broadside across the FSE,s bows with one BB down to 19 hull and 8 missiles locked onto the undamaged one and about to run in when the NAC BB took down the shields of one of the Roma 's and hit it's bridge, the crippled BB then added what fire power it could and scored a second bridge critical, after a quick check of the rule book the resulting explosion took out all eight missiles and the remaining FSE CL!
With magazines empty and the fight swinging so dramatically in the NAC's favor the FSE quit the field.
The game was great fun (and I won) the fleets felt more or less like their FT inspiration but what was really noticeable was how many more tactical decisions the game presented us with, FT missiles are a little to random to base a strategy on but in CBF they work well and present both sides with a lot of options. Also the tactic of splitting into two forces to flank the enemy, I have seen this end in disaster every time it's been tried in FT were the rule is the most guns in one place wins, in this game it almost worked and would have worked even better if the FSE had taken a bit more time to figure what their optimal separation should have been.
Thanks Harry for such a great game I'll be playing it a lot more.
I'll post my FT designs in the House Rules forum for those who are interested.
Robert
The FSE attacked with 2 Roma BBB, 1 Ypres BCR a Milan CLS and a Suffern CLR.
NAC had 2 Victoria BBB, 1 Vandenburg CAR, 2 Furious CLS and 2 Huron CLS. The heavy screen force is due to the FSE being a primarily missile armed force.
The NAC started in a tight group and turned towards the warp point as soon as it appeared, The FSE came through, accelerated and split into 2 groups, 1 BB and the CL's turned to starboard and the other BB and the BC continued straight all ships launched missiles.
The NAC accelerated to pass between the missile spread before it could converge and damaged a light cruiser with long range fire taking out its forward shield and both fire cons.
The FSE continued their split hoping to either split the NAC or force them to expose their rear shields to one group, unfortunately the separated by to far to give mutual support and the NAC fell upon the group with the light cruisers and destroyed the undamaged one.
The FSE thought they were in trouble but a win of the initiative combined with their high velocity (some ships were at 9) allowed them to punch through the NAC group and place themselves in their rear arc, meanwhile the other group was moving back in to range and it appeared that the FSE was going to form up in good order on the NAC rear. Missiles destroyed one of the NAC light cruisers and inficted major damage on one BB.
Initiative swung back to the NAC and they managed to get some weapons to bear although the FSE still had the advantage of having all targets in their frontal arc. The NAC lost another cruiser and the damaged BB took a further pounding.
The end came suddenly the NAC were running broadside across the FSE,s bows with one BB down to 19 hull and 8 missiles locked onto the undamaged one and about to run in when the NAC BB took down the shields of one of the Roma 's and hit it's bridge, the crippled BB then added what fire power it could and scored a second bridge critical, after a quick check of the rule book the resulting explosion took out all eight missiles and the remaining FSE CL!
With magazines empty and the fight swinging so dramatically in the NAC's favor the FSE quit the field.
The game was great fun (and I won) the fleets felt more or less like their FT inspiration but what was really noticeable was how many more tactical decisions the game presented us with, FT missiles are a little to random to base a strategy on but in CBF they work well and present both sides with a lot of options. Also the tactic of splitting into two forces to flank the enemy, I have seen this end in disaster every time it's been tried in FT were the rule is the most guns in one place wins, in this game it almost worked and would have worked even better if the FSE had taken a bit more time to figure what their optimal separation should have been.
Thanks Harry for such a great game I'll be playing it a lot more.
I'll post my FT designs in the House Rules forum for those who are interested.
Robert
