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Post by Timf on Aug 4, 2017 10:56:28 GMT
Ok SFB is a long standing kind-of but actually licenced Star Trek universe.
Its a single ship to small fleet action scale high detail spaceship combat game and I'd like to run a few games of it. Its board and hex based. You get two sheets of paper - your SSD which is lots of boxes that make up your ship, systems shields and weapons, plus an energy allocation form which you use to spend up energy produced each turn to fire, use shields etc.
I plan to do an intro scenario with smaller ships to get people used to the game before trying something with the more classic Trek size ships
Anyone interested - looking for 2-6players.
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Post by mrspaceman on Aug 4, 2017 12:44:15 GMT
I'm interested! I'm free for the next three Mondays (unless my WHFRP is on next week...but I think the GM is in Italy).
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Post by Timf on Aug 4, 2017 12:47:46 GMT
Well we did our WFRP last week, so there are three weeks I and others have. We will be doing one of those as a Formula D race (probably next week) - so that gives me time to get everything printed out and players interested.
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Post by Timf on Aug 9, 2017 9:30:47 GMT
OK a quick run up for the game: We will be using small ships - frigates, gunboats, cutters types.
A turn consists of energy allocation where you produce and assign energy to run the ship, then 32 impulses of action. Except for highly experienced players really the action points are when people move and the tactical situation changes. Smaller ships mean people tend to fly fast doing little or slowly doing things as they move....generally it makes decision points obvious. it will go faster if people treat it as a learning game and if they cannot decide in 5seconds to flip a coin.
Most ships will have 3 energy systems that you use to allocate points to movement, general systems, shield reinforcement, ECM and weapons. Warp is useable for anything, impulse is useable for 1 point of movement and for most other things though some heavy weapons require warp energy, battery power is a one shot energy type for a quick boost or reaction actions.
Most ships have a few points of basic power they need to use - life support, shields, activation of phasers that just tick into boxes and go. General systems get used as needed - tractors, transporters, powering shuttles and similar - usually obvious but these small ships have very few of them. ECM might get used but spare energy is hard to come by in small ships, shield reinforcement is likely to be some people want to know about but you can pump energy into that to temporarily reinforce shields. Weapons - there are two major types and a third that is not uncommon Phasers - these are direct fire insta hit weapons, in three grades of power. Most ships carry a reasonable battery of these - 3-4 on small warships up to 16 on cruisers and above. Heavy weapons - these are one area that makes the different races. Many carry disruptors that fire every turn and do moderate damage. However, the Federation have photon torpedoes that fire every other turn, direct fire and hurt if they hit (a lot), Romulans have plasma torpedoes that hunt you down across the board and a LOT if they hit but they only fire every three turns. Other races have their own or variants/mixes. The third type is the drone - these are missile that track on the board. One race, the Kzinti, its their primary weapon and they get a lot of them, others have them as secondary weapons. The take no energy to fire is their main advantage and they also tend to strip away a defending ship's phaser firepower.
So races: The Federation - ships are multipurpose and tend to have lot of system boxes making them survivable. Their phasers are typically the heaviest, Type Is (4-8 points damage at close range) and their primary heavy weapon is the Photon Torpedo (see above). They are a managers ship as you have to plan and aim. its easy to get wrong but they are the 'good guys' and when a full on alpha strike of torps and phasers from a Fed ship lands there are few enemies of similar size that can handle it. Mid range specialists in some ways except for closing for that massive alpha strike. Defend until ready to hit. The Klingons - purer warships so have system quantity issues. They are pretty light on boxes and their ships have famous weaknesses to the rear. Their phasers tend to be second grade (3-6 at close range) and they use the Disruptor as a primary weapon with bigger ships carrying small numbers of drones frequently. Their damage output is less at peak, and needs to be closer to the enemy but it is much more constant allowing you to nibble away a few hits every turn. If you can hang around that tends to mean the opposition fall to pieces. Romulans - cloaking devices, need I say more. Yes actually - their phaser armament tends to be type Is but in small numbers and they rely on the Plasma Torpedo firing every few turns....even more than Feds they rely on planning - many ships are built round one BIG torpedo. The type R, their signature does 50 points max if it hits - that'll wipe any frigate in one go. Gorn - big lizards, big lumbering ships. Good phaser Type 1s, their heavy weapons are also plasma torpes but they tend to go for multiple smaller ones allowing for more constant fire. Tholians - ragtag ships with sentient crystals - heavy on phasers, light on heavy weapons. They rely on webs from heavier ships so their smaller vessels can struggle. Tend to operate in deep space more like the Klingons than anything else. Small ships so tend to only have one hull area. Hydrans - the guys are the ultimate knife fighters....let a charged Hydran open up at range 0-2 and you are the new nebula in town. Their primary fusion weapons are incredibly short ranged but lethal, their phasers include the Gatling phaser which operates as a light phaser 3 - ineffective beyond range 4, 2-4point damage at that range, but it can fire 4 times a turn unlike other weapons 1. They also were the first to carry fighters in numbers and even smaller ships carry 1 or 2 as extra firepower. Their small ships tend to also be only one hull area. Kzinti - moderate phaser banks, a few disruptor beams but mostly these guys pump drones out. Drones do a fair amount of damage on hitting but also suck phasers away destroying drones - since one drone equals one phaser, this means some races with small numbers of powerful phasers can end up stripping their offense to avoid damage.
That's most races, there are others (Lyrans, WYN, Orions, Andromedans, LDR, ISC as a few) but those all have complexities that aren't good for a first game.
If anyone has a preference then shout and it will help me set sides up.
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Post by mrspaceman on Aug 10, 2017 12:59:46 GMT
Lots of information there. If I'm down for a game, I'm happy to play with whatever's available. It might be nice to play one of the familiar factions, tho': Feds, Klingons or Romulans. My leaning would be to Klingons. Qapla'!
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Post by Timf on Aug 15, 2017 9:48:14 GMT
OK well the intro game worked well enough. I think people were working out how the game works by the end of it all. We can add complicated things like drones, tractors, labs, crew and boarding into the next game as people want to. We might use more shuttles as well.
So a quick recap - one side had a Hydran Cuirassier Frigate and Gendarme Police ship plus a Fed Police ship. The others were a Klingon F5 and E4 with a shield refit. In game points terms, this was a pair of 130point flotillas. About the points of a refitted cruiser per side.
Both sides closed rapidly - possibly quicker than the inexperienced captains realised...but medium range shots were exchanged mostly just bouncing off shield reinforcements but a few points here and there fell off shields but the Klingons started to deploy transporter bombs. The next couple of turns devolved into a turn fight with Klingon disruptors failing them. New gun crews stepped into the dead men's shoes. However, the first volleys from the Hydrans hit about this point and fusion beams plus gatling phasers at range 1-2 are a messy combination.
The next turn the Klingons replied to some effect, and the heavily overloaded Fed photon missed. Both Klingons were by now sporting internal damage and Alliance losses were some downed shields but little else. The Gendarme police ship had the worst of it losing two shields at this point and sporting the two internals their side had suffered. The F5 launched a suicide shuttle that forced the Cuirassier to turn about to deal with it for a turn.
During the last few turns the Klingons performed a switch across the battlefield, with one Klingon ship revealing a dummy transport bomb by rolling over it. The Fed police ship carried out a HET and got another photon off striking into Klingon shields and phaser back up scoring more internals. The Klingon E4 ran past the Hydran frigate without marking it much but delivered damage to the both police ships as it went. The Fed dropped a transporter bomb which detonated shortly thereafter removing a further shield from the Hydran police ship but missing its intended target and the Fed, by this time badly battered and running with no functional weapons proceeded to gain enough distance to warp away. The E4 attempted the same but the Cuirassier frigate sat on its tail and pumped Gatling and Type II phaser firepower into to leaving it badly crippled before delivering a fusion beam coup-de-grace and excess damage caused the frame of the vessel to disintegrate. Having performed a HET the Klingon F5 had fought itself to a standstill - stripped of weapons and with badly damaged engines only its strong front shield kept it alive as the Hydrans closed. At this point recall orders were received from Scout HQ.
At game end, Fed Police ship crippled and disengaged, Gendarme Police ship crippled due to damage boxes count but the Hydran Cuirassier was essentially intact and certainly functional. The Klingons had one ship destroyed, and the other crippled and hors de combat. A win to the Fed/Hydran combination but with two ships taken out not perhaps as clear as they might have liked. The number of manoeuvre units told here despite the wide arcs and steady fire rates of the Klingons. Their disruptors managed 3 hits in the 5 turn game despite their being two on each ship - and for a total of 16 damage (not a lot).
No drones got used by the Klingons but once the players felt confident in the basics their drones were trashed, so next game I will try to introduce them. Hydrans at range 1 are not friendly. That is all.
We will do this again.
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Post by mrspaceman on Aug 15, 2017 13:51:20 GMT
You played this week!? I missed it...
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Katie
Cato Would Be Proud
We need bigger datas.
Posts: 625
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Post by Katie on Aug 15, 2017 17:23:28 GMT
We totally, TOTALLY need little model ships...
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Post by Timf on Aug 16, 2017 9:29:49 GMT
They don't work on the board unless you use Megahex boards and that doubles the size of the playing space at a minimum. I also have Star Fleet: Call to Arms which is a miniatures game in the same universe but using Mongoose's Call to Arms rules and that works very much better for fleet actions. I may roll out a game or two of that.
Roger, I hope to run a few more games in the near future....I'll probably bring it again on Monday, maybe move up to cruiser weight - or possibly a Hunt the Bismark game.....
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Post by kaustic on Aug 16, 2017 18:06:02 GMT
It was a good game. Up for that again.
Could do with a crib sheet on the energy allocation , requirements for fancy stuff and the abreviations.etc
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Post by Timf on Aug 17, 2017 14:19:43 GMT
OK - the next scenario is going to be a Hunt the Bismark type game. I will run the big bad, and you guys will run those sent to hunt it and kill it. People will die, possibly howwibly howwibly, so everyone has reinforcements ready to warp in once a ship is out of action.
So scenario description is:
The Klingons have deployed a gamechanging new warship that their high command is all agog about. Technical data varies hugely with some spies insisting its a carrier, others that it carries an immense energy emitter codenamed 'Mauler', others that its carrying advanced new technologies that tinker with time itself, yet more that its arsenal of weapons is heavier than any yet deployed.....all agree on one thing. its BIG.
The Kzinti, Hydrans, Federation, Gorn, Lyran Democratic Republic, WYN enclave and Tholians have all agreed to a strike on the unit as it undergoes it shakedown trials. The vessel should not yet be fully operational and this surprise attack should be sufficient to take it down. A reserve strike force will be assembled and be ready to warp in if their support is needed.
So I'll bring a bunch of ships to start the game with - if anyone has a hankering to play particular factions then say here. I could add perfidious Romulans if someone wants to play with really big torpedoes but possibly best to keep to Gorns for plasma. The WYN are an unusual race with a mix of Auxiliary vessels and second rate but mixed technologies. The LDR add the Expanding Sphere Generator to the game - if you wish to play this you will need to have played before and give me a bit of time to explain the specific technology in details - its a 0-3 hex forcefield that primarily aims to take out drones but can be used as a ram-bow if that excites.
If no-one has strong preferences I will bring a mix with me.
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Post by Timf on Aug 17, 2017 16:07:32 GMT
Also we will make this mysterious by using the Tactical Intelligence rules - so your labs will be useful too. Broadly the closer you get the more information you get about the enemy ship and you can augment it with assorted other systems like getting shuttles nearby, or labs etc.
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Post by Timf on Aug 18, 2017 13:04:36 GMT
Placeholder for some rules summary.
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Katie
Cato Would Be Proud
We need bigger datas.
Posts: 625
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Post by Katie on Aug 18, 2017 17:08:37 GMT
Oh, oh... Kzinti. Their ships go: Meeeeeeooooooooowwwwmmm.....
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Post by Timf on Aug 18, 2017 22:25:37 GMT
Ok that means you have to use your drones......
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