Star Trek Attack Wing next week...

So, with the Thollian Web OP being moved from this Sunday (Mother’s Day) to next Sunday…  J  I get to play without risking my amazing wife’s wrath for going out to play with my wee toys on that particular day… 

So, playing Federation I think…  My Klingons are REALLY good at maneuver and fire, hitting hard and moving away.  This particular scenario however being one that has a shrinking playable area as the Web closes, finally getting to a 12”x12” area.  I could I suppose go for the “kill them by Turn 3 hope with the Klingons, but killing 120 points of ships if they are not also rushing right at me might be problematic.  And the Cloaked Mines are going to be absolutely brutal to any ship relying on Cloaks and the defense bonus they grant.  As it will be “Ship Faction Pure”, I cannot put the Cloaking Mines onto a non Romulan ship, so that limits what I will potentially face I think.  The ONLY real defense against the CMs is either a Scan action or the Navigational Deflectors the Federation has…  Klingons and Romulans for the most part cannot Scan, so that would be one of the likely matchups that I think would go VERY poorly for the Cloaking Fleets. 

The other big problematic matchup would be the Borg.  Honestly I do not really have a particular plan for this or a realistic clue what to do having never actually faced them.  Big, expensive ships.  No real Defense, just hard to kill/damage.  And of course they have things that can take your upgrades and use them against you.  Ablative Shields being one of their upgrades for an additional 4 hits being eaten without actually damaging the Sphere…  10 points, and eats up one of their 2 “Borg” upgrades.  Good, I would think but nothing that would survive long against an equivalent ship.  Plus side for them is they get to keep their impressive Shields up (7 for the named ship, 6 for the generic) and the 7 Hull before being removed.  Can regenerate as well, so damage must be quick and fairly massive to kill them before their impressive attacks kill you…  They do also have a Feedback card that completely negates one attack…  Oh, and half of the damage rounded down hits the Attacker.  Only the Named Borg ship can carry it, so really only have to worry about it there I guess.  Defense against a nasty Alpha Strike, and would suck for my kitted out torpedo boat (USS Excelsior) if I hit them with the fully boosted Torpedoes for 8-9 hits…  Wouldn’t kill it outright, but guessing the follow-up attack from the Sphere would.  So, will I think have to change my fleet build, or at least be aware of this possibility.

Looking at either:

List Name:  Torpedoes Away!

Resource: Federation Attack Fighters (20)

U.S.S Excelsior (26)

Jean-Luc Picard (6)

Montgomery Scott (5)

Tuvok (5)

Lojour (2)

Quantum Torpedoes (6)

The Doctor (3)

Ship SP: 53

USS Voyager (30)

James T. Kirk (6)

Cheat Death (3)

Pavel Chekov (3)

Antimatter Mines (5)

Ship SP: 47

Total Build SP: 120

Generated by STAW Builder

http://www.dracossoftware.com/STAWHome.html

Or:

List Name: Federation Swarm!

Resource: Federation Attack Fighters (20)

U.S.S. Reliant (20)

Rudolph Ransom (2)

Photon Torpedoes (3)

Ship SP: 25

USS Voyager (30)

Jean-Luc Picard (6)

Ship SP: 36

U.S.S Enterprise-D (28)

James T. Kirk (6)

Antimatter Mines (5)

Ship SP: 39

Total Build SP: 120

Generated by STAW Builder

http://www.dracossoftware.com/STAWHome.html

With the second build being one I am still mulling over the pieces…  NEED Chekov to run the Voyager at full effect, so that will definitely change and therefore be a target for the Borg Assimilation Tubes to steal him…  The Reliant I am also not sold on here for the cost…  Could I think bring a Klingon or Romulan ship as a dedicated Torpedo boat/minelayer…  So the second one is really just the first draft…

With either, I have the Voyager for its forward 6 move to get me close enough to the center to make the best placement of the Cloaked mines impossible for Turn 2…  Still will be possible to put one in the Web so I will have to be careful, but I will not be hitting them every damn turn.  The AM Mines might get swapped for the Navigational Deflectors, dunno…  The Defense bonus IS nice, but dropping the AM Mines onto a Cloaked ship has a decent chance to outright destroy the smaller ones…  Really only the bigger Romulan ships with their 6 Hull not in danger of outright death there.   So, overall the Offense is more powerful I think.

Kind of a running theme with the whole game if you look at it.  Many of the ships have the ability to throw 5+ Attack dice with even the weakest throwing 2 (3 at range 1)…  Most ships have only a single Agility to dodge for the 1 Defense die.  More agile ships have 2 and of course Cloak grants +4 and Range 3 for Primary Weapons grant another +1…  So, I HAVE had a Klingon ship throwing 7 Defense dice and dodged a lot of incoming fire.  That is very much the exception.  And now there are things that either outright remove Cloaks or ignore them to worry about…  But essentially, Offense FAR outweighs Defense in this game in general.  Why the Klingons were the more powerful faction for a bit there hitting harder and not really relying on many tricks.  Now I think the Borg are that obviously powerful faction.  Only one ship at the moment, so hard really to say, but given the fictional universe and their place in it…  Guessing they will be a difficult one to face.  So, I am mostly focusing on more offensive minded Federation builds myself, seems to be working well enough for me…

New 40K edition "eh", Star Trek and Motorcycles...

So…  New edition of 40K coming out after 2 years.  Not sure if it is “7^th” or “6.5” or “6^th revised”, and frankly it does not matter to me.  I think I can sum up my thoughts in a single word: “Disappointing”.  Now, I am reserving final judgment of course, but for the most part my 40K stuff is going back into storage I think.  A shame, overall the game is actually quite good and the new books were balanced and decent…  I say overall because there were the few “WTF” moment things that just make the game completely broken if and only if people play those broken things.  Problem being, it really only takes one or a small number of folks taking the “optimized” lists and units to break it for everyone.  And of course when there is money on the table in the form of prize support, etc. then you really have to be prepared for the most broken things to be fielded.  We’ve seen the Allies hit and really break the game through the USR interactions with Battle Brothers as well as breaking the FOC (“Force Org Chart”, I’ll keep using those silly military acronyms) allowing many armies to field the bare minimum “Troops” and “HQ” and focus on fielding the 4+ “Heavy”, “Fast Attack” or “Elite” depending on where the actual power units in your Army lie.   Looking at my Space Marine book, it is a fun army, and the book overall is pretty well balanced.  The “Troops” selections however are at best lackluster though.  Tactical Marines are “eh”, and in this 6^th ed environment expensive casualties.  With SO many things specializing in essentially killing Marines these days the lack of that particular ability means that they start at a disadvantage.  Seems a bit odd that Marines would go into battle with the majority of their people armed with weapons that are ineffective against themselves.  I can bring the lads in a Rhino or Drop Pod, but of course those are easy to kill for First Blood or Kill Points in those missions.  So…  I have yet to field a Tactical Marine as a Crimson Fist or Dark Angel.  Scouts are Scouts…  Cheap, but craptastic.  If I HAVE to field Troops I will likely spend the minimum to field things that can actually kill things, so Scouts I guess…  So, on one hand I CAN field things like massed Centurion Devastators and Sternguard like I do now, without paying the “tax” of 2 squads of Scouts…  So, overall the Army gets no worse than it was I guess…  Just not better really.  And the game itself gets far less interesting.  How many Wraith Lords can I fit into a list if I am not concerned about anything else?  10?  And really how many other armies can deal with that?  Or perhaps an all Flier list?

Yes, you can say “Only Bound lists” or some other House rules, but really that is not an acceptable solution I think…  Good for small, local groups, yes…  But when you game outside of your local group?  A Tournament perhaps?  Killing off that scene does seem a priority for GW, but is it a good thing?  I think it is perhaps best if I simply step back and wait at this point.  My wife would agree that I have too many miniatures already, perhaps she is right.  I never really got rid of any of the 40K armies I had over the years, and with the pace they have released things in the current era I have not been keeping up with the books as I had in the past.  SO many rule changes and additions with what seems to be little regard to balance or play testing.  2++ re-rollable saves, D Weapons ignoring everything, etc…  Kind of makes even bothering to show up to play a game seem somewhat pointless… 

Eh, I have my Star Trek Attack Wing game now…  Looks like it will be a good one overall.  Think I have it more or less figured out now…  My 2 ship Federation build overpowered a fairly nasty Dominion/Romulan list in a Thollian Web test run last night…  The Torpedoes when run correctly are REALLY powerful.  USS Excelsior with CPT Picard, Spock, Scott, Lojour, the Doctor and just regular Photon torpedoes as I do not have the Defiant (yet) for the Quantum Torpedoes…  Still, hit a Cardassian ship for 8 damage in the opening salvo, destroying it completely…  Not everything went as expected in the test, but it was a REALLY good start.  And proof that as I progressed from losing my first game badly, to almost even the second game and a very narrow loss my third game to consistently winning since…  My learning curve seems about right for normal, and the locals were probably right that I’ll do fine with this game.  Inherited a few X-wing things as well, and might play a few games there as the local store has several events related to that…

Otherwise, ancient motorcycle running really well.  Still need to fix and straighten out the title for the Magna to sell it…  The Silverwing I will be selling as well, but as it is my working bike now…  Well, it works well enough for in town, etc…  REALLY wanting to get an older Goldwing to replace the 2 bikes I have now, so early to mid 80’s before they became more “luxury” vehicles than motorcycles…  I’ve heard them called “flying couches” and it seems an apt name for some of the really decked out ones…  I want something simple and reliable…  The Goldwing would allow me to stretch my legs enough to ride comfortably for longer distances and the real luggage would be less limiting than the current ones I have…  Those nagging old injuries are more a problem as I get old, so the bigger but slower bike I think would be better for me than the racing bike the Magna really is…

Star Trek Attack Wing... Thollian Web mental exercise...

So, looking at the “deck building” exercise for the Star Trek Attack Wing event Sunday.  Unfortunate that it is also Mother’s Day, so like the Easter event…  Well J…  Fun building a fleet at least. 

Looking at the scenario, I see 2 realistic possibilities:  Either a quick win or die joust or a long drawn out spiral as the web closes on the play area and the more maneuverable fleet with things like Cloaked Mines and the like seem like they’ll do well.  So, if I chose the first I would run a Klingon fleet of 2-3 ships and just do the berserker rush and hope for the best.  Too many things these days can avoid or survive that for a turn or two, so I think that something else will be the way to go.  My Federation fleet has some good survivability and if I build it right I can fire Torpedoes every turn for a fair amount of damage as things close in around us…  Maneuver and survive long enough to kill them or just kill more of them as time expires on the round.  Feds ARE pretty good at surviving, and while they are not quite up to Klingon levels of damage dealing…  Well, built right I think they can throw out enough damage to wear out others. 

Since we’re playing semi faction pure with the ships having to be faction pure rather than a whole fleet I think that is another advantage for the Feds.  Having 2 Skill 9 Captains I can almost guarantee moving last and shooting first every turn.  The Borg get less scary when I look at them not being able to run Jean Luc Picard for his free actions and Skill 9.  Still pretty darn powerful and because they maneuver on a very different “dial”, not really all that sure how to counter that other than hit them hard and often.  Ships I am looking at are:

USS Voyager:  360 fire arc for the primary weapon if I need it, powerful shields, fast…  Quantum Torpedoes have the potential for 7 dice.  Good solid ship.  Concerns me that it would be a really good second ship or something other than a Torpedo boat…

USS Excelsior:  Torpedo boat.  The big dice attack every turn.  Lojour, Torpedo, Tuvok, Spock, Picard and the Doctor hologram all combine nicely allowing for a Scan, Target Lock and the Doctor clearing all of the other disabled crew cards to keep up the rate of fire.  180 degree front arc, 90 degree rear arc gives me almost 360 degree coverage…  Still over 50 points for a ship that is good, but…  OTOH, with Montgomery Scott I can have 8 dice for a potential 9 hit attack…  No re-rolls or Battlestations  without that action somehow, but still that many dice should generate a hefty hit…  Could assign Spock over there with Flagship…

USS Defiant:  Secondary ship, maneuverable, can have a cloaking device, the Antimatter mines are brutal up close as they are an attack…  Still, it is a fairly small ship for the 45 or so points I’d need to kit it out to fight fairly defensively…

Federation Fighters vs. Flagship:  As I can have only the one Resource…  Flagship is 10 points to give 3 +1’s to stats and probably a free action along with some bonus from the text on the card in terms of an action.  The Fighters are tough as they cannot ever really take more than a single Damage from any attack.  Fed fighters have Shields and potential Evade tokens, so they’ll need to be hit for at least 3 to have a good chance of taking that Damage point…  Likely more…  Not too fast, but maneuverable and can throw out a lot of damage, so liking the Fighters at 20 points…

USS Reliant/Miranda Class:  Cheap Torpedo boat, can throw out a decent amount of damage in close if it comes to that.  Maneuverable and not bad for the price…  That however is the issue…  Even the named ship has only 3 Shields and 3 Hull, so one strong attack could potentially take out the 20-30 point ship putting the opponent ahead in a timed event…  Thinking that the swarm mentality will NOT work here as the smaller builds can kill enough to get ahead on points and run out the clock as it were...

Might see if I can either fit in the Excelsior as the Torpedo Boat, Voyager as the backup and either Fighters or Flagship and REALLY equip the ships well…  Hope for the best without an “oops I lose” dice roll…  Neat mental exercise at least…

Star Trek Attack Wing initial thoughts

So, now that I have a fair number of games in, I think I have a really good handle on the Klingons at least.  Have seen some really good builds in Dominion, Romulan and Klingon flavors...  The Federation I have been unimpressed with so far, but I'm building some fleets in that area, so I hope that they work out the way I think they will...

Have yet to face a Borg build.  I think the Klingons are in a pretty good place playing "pure" fleets against the Borg.  They have the Stasis field card, generally good but not one shot/one kill offensive power and a few other tricks.  I think the Klingon Boarding Party is one that was not used much before that will be brutal against some of the Borg/hero ship builds.  Martok and Gowron make for good support Captains and Chang seems like another one to mess with "hero" builds...  Disabled Captains going to Skill one and potentially messing with the Ship's actions.  At the very least it forces the disabled CPT to spend an action to re-enable if he is a higher Skill than Chang...  If a lower skill, then it potentially gives me more opportunity to destroy the ship before the now Skill one CPT can fire...  Seeing CPT Picard a LOT in many builds, having him disabled means that he at the very least loses the free action he provides, and it makes the target a Lot more predictable.  Concussive charges as well getting rid of tokens like say Ablative Armor or Borg Armor?  Have to check if those are tokens...

Hoping to get into one or more of the Tholian Web OPs...  Assuming the Gopher is running it next Month, but I know of a place in Indy running it...  Might be a day trip on the bike...  Have to admit I am FAR more interested in the Borg arc OP.  Wondering if the things like the Flagship and Fighters are going to be allowed going forward...  REALLY powerful Resources there, and with the rumor of Wizkids going to 120-150 points?  Well, they look even better...

But in any case, looking at running the Excelsior and ?...  Picard, perhaps Kahn?  Looking at what I have, the Enterprise-D, Voyager, Reliant?  Have the Fighters and Flagship cards too...  I can build some decent things I think, not sure it will be better than my Klingon ones though...  Different, will try to get in some games with them to learn how to use Battlestations, Scanning, etc...  Pretty sure I have Cloaking and Sensor Echo down...  Lookig for the OP2 prize pack for the Symon (?) card...  The 3 Sensor Echo is just huge, and I think it will be something to watch for...

This week's STAW game...

So, got in another STAW game last night, ran:

IKW Kronos One (K’Tinga class) with Martok

IKW Koraga (K’vort class) with Worf, Advanced Weapons and Photon Torpedoes

IRW Praetus (Bird of Prey class) with CPT, Nuclear Warhead and Cloaked Mines

Joe ran a 3 ship Fed fleet with:

NCC-1701 Enterprise with Kirk, cheat death and I stab at thee, Spock, Scotty and ?

Defiant with CPT Sisko and ?

Reliant with defensive bonus CPT, Positron Beam and ?

No torpedoes though…  That was one thing he noted as a “Feds NEED Torpedoes”.

What did I learn?  The mine layer was mostly useless as a “let’s add it into a Fleet” sort of upgrade.  It’s mines were there and DID deny a huge chunk of the field as he avoided it, but I can put them on a Klingon or Federation ship for 4 points instead of the 3 for the Romulans and not wind up with a 20+ point useless ship that will be an easy kill.  That being the problem in a timed event, grabbing the early point lead then just keeping alive to run out the clock with 45 minute rounds.  So, at 100 points it is looking more like 2 good ships, loaded out with decent crew and weapons are the way to go.  Alternately, going for a swarm of cheap crappy ships might work or the one Uber ship, but I think that 2-3 is the balanced approach.  One ship leads too much to the “oops I lose” on a bad roll or falling prey to some trick or combo that works on a single ship…  Having a few of those combos, I think that getting them to hit will be pretty bad for a single ship build.  The swarms do not concern me so much as I tend toward the more “aggressive” builds with the theory of the best Defense being a solid Attack.  Well, works well enough for my Klingons at least.  The Federation ships I am looking at running tend more toward the “Warship” end than the “Science Vessel, now with weapons”, but even so I agree with Joe’s assessment that additional weapons are needed.  Being able to Sensor Echo and keep the Kronos One at range 3 for the -1 Attack Die bonus with the +1 Defense Die for a Primary Weapon meant that more often than not when the Feds even bothered to shoot at the cloaked K’tinga class ship, he would roll only 2 dice and I would have 7 for Defense.  The odds are heavily in my favor for this, so I had no problem doing the ancient Klingon Saber Dance and cutting away his shields a little at a time before closing in for the kill.  Not to say that the Feds had bad ships overall, just that once they killed off the Praetus, he was in trouble trying to take down either of my main ships.  The Koraga did take some damage even while cloaked but even so, by that point the Defiant was destroyed and the other two ships had only 3 Hull between them, no shields.

So, going forward…  Not a lot coming out for the Romulans or Klingons frankly as wizkids releases are looking more like everything for the “Voyager” series…  Well, and a LOT of Borg stuff.  So, best learn how to fight the Borg/Bioships with the Klingons and Federation.  Feds looking like the focus of the “story arc”, so guess I’d better learn how to fly those ships…  Several Vlucan ships, wondering if they’ll be Federation, being one fo the founding races and all…  Also, still have not used an elite talent, so might need to learn about those :-)  And I think learning to play non cloaking ships like most of the Federations one will be good for me to do.  I think I have a pretty good handle on the movement of the Cloaked Klingon ones at least.  They are really quite powerful with the Sensor Echo action...

Star Trek Attack Wing...

So, looking very much like the game I'll be focusing on more in the near term.  Saw that the IG had come out, but to be honest I haven't played them in years now.  My Praetorians look OK, just gets repetitive painting essentially the same 6 figures over and over and over :-)...  Lot of bodies in a Light Rifles Company...  I don't know, they are just boring to me.  It is NOT that I could not do well with them, quite the opposite.  Having had professional experience commanding actual troops at this level, I have a pretty good grasp of the tactics and usage of the tools they bring to the table.  Mortars, massed fire, real Artillery and metric crap-tons of Heavy Weapons with effective leaders directing their fire.  Got it.  Oh, and close air support.  Yup, got it.  Just really nothing but math I can do in my head, the game is decided more or less when I have built my list and see what is across the table.  A few "power" lists that might be a challenge to fight, but most will just be going through the motions of removing the enemy from the field with the greatest precision I can manage.  I do suspect that if nothing changes, IG will be part of many of the "power" lists going forward.  Loads of scoring bodies, the ability to manage Kill Points if needed, not a lot of weaknesses that cannot be covered in some way by the book.  I know the big rumor is a revamping of the Ally system, essentially removing the "Battle Brothers" where most of the truly abusive combinations lie...  We'll see.  I'm not holding out any hope personally, I just feel the game is reaching a point where it no longer interests me.

Star Trek Attack Wing (STAW) on the other hand...  I've picked up the game and enough ships to get a really good start.  Klingons are my primary focus, they are pretty straightforward with a heavy focus on attack.  Cloaking on most of their ships and some really strong Captains and crew.  Probably not the best way to do it, but I am playing mostly Faction Pure...  At least at the ship level.  I see the Klingons, Romulans and Federation as the factions I will play and as they all fought alongside each other at various times...  Specifically against the Dominion, one of the other factions.  Event locally at the Gopher Sunday, but as it is Easter Sunday unlikely I will be going.

So, next month there is a Thollian Web event.  Looks interesting and looking at the scenario I see a few obvious things.  The basic choice is to either rush forward and kill the enemy before the web closes, so in the first 4-5 turns.  A Klingon Fleet would probably do very well here.  The other option is Cloaked Mines and a maneuverable fleet.  I have one Cloaked Mine, several other Mine cards and some decently maneuverable ships.  Does however seem to be one or the other though.  I think I will be getting in some games next week, testing a few builds.  Glad I got in on the last part of the Dominion War OP so I have pretty much all of the Resource things like Flagship, Dice, etc...  Both fighters, but as one is a Dominion one I'll not play it.  Feds though...  Flagship makes some of the things REALLY powerful for 10 points.  Think we are staying at 100 points though it looks like Wizkids is suggesting moving to 120 points...  We'll see :-)...  Getting into the game at an interesting time.

40K vs Star Trek Attack Wing, at least locally...

So, looking at the state of things now in 40k...  Looking like a real mess with the company producing more rules with seemingly no interest in fixing the previous ones.  The upper level Tournaments are dominated by a handful of armies, for the most part FMC, Seer/beast stars, Tau(dar) and White Scar bike armies?  Anything I missed there?  There is a much higher level Math discussion here , but pretty much anyone actually playing the game knows this at some level.  One reason I think that competitive play is stagnant at best, unlikely to grow in the long term.  

Casual play is fine ("fine" as long as the whole group acknowledges the giant elephant in the room and no one plays one of the problematic overpowered armies), and I have to admit that if the rumored fix to D class weapons hits, locally at least we will do well.  Knights, super heavies, etc. Are all decent and with that minor correction, we would have a fun game I think.  Right now, the D shooting attacks are simply too good, something that Forgeworld seems to have gotten at least...  GW seems to be ignoring the issue in their rush to sell more books/models...  

The speed with which the releases are hitting is dizzying, and I think that their "brand" is suffering badly because of it.  A lot feels rushed, the lack of testing and editing is obvious and the big price tag for 2 pages of supplemental rules is pretty insane.  Worse being the ebooks only releases and cutting out the local game store from the mix.  Maybe the UK has the GW monopoly, but here it is certainly not the case.  I do not now, nor will I think ever own an iPad/iOS device, nor will I make a purchase through tie Apple Store.  Likewise, limiting the releases in that fashion mean that I am FAR less likely to buy them and therefore play them...  It does seem rather like a "scorched earth" policy is in effect for GW, banning all competition for online sales, killing off any sales channel they do not wholly control, massive and rapid change to their games requiring new purchases to continue playing...  Really all seems rather desperate, like they're trying to milk out as much money before the inevitable collapse.  I don't know, I bought the Knight and the WD for the rules as I do not intend to field more than the one :-)...  Might well be my last 40K purchases for a long time.  IG codex hitting "soon", but it  looks like it is a lot of cut/paste with not a lot changing, except for the Storm Troopers getting better and taking over for the Vets in the current book.  Yea, AP 3 shots for everyone...  

Guess that is one reason I am really looking so hard at Star Trek Attack Wing...  Looks like a reasonable group of folks playing it locally, even if some of us are banned from the other store in town :-)...  At least the Gopher is having the events, and most of us are on more or less even footing at the moment WRT the ships out and Fleets we could build.  My Klingons are actually worked out well, and I'm now 1 and 3 for a record...  I know the rules and have seen the obvious traps that I think I can now play the game well enough.  Thollian Web being next then the big OP thing comes later with Borg, etc...  

Which brings me to the next thing irritating me :-)  I can look at the Wizkids page and see the next 5 full waves of miniatures out to October...  Not all of the stats or cards, but the ships at least and so a pretty darn good idea what is coming.  Contrast of GW where they send out the Inquisition to take down rumor pages, their own web page is "not great", their social media presence is now completely gone, etc...  

Right, that's about it...  Had a great walk with the puppy and my amazing wife :-)  Should be getting parts to get both motorcycles back to full operation and I may even get to actually ride again at some point...