Starfire

I had a brief discussion the other day on Reddit with someone who was chatting about the old Starfire spaceship game from Task Force Games. I remembered that I had a copy of this at one stage and wondered if it was still in my old games pile.

And it was. 

This was a pretty good game back in teh day. I don't recall that we played it a lot, but it was something we dragged out from tome to time. But I don't think I've had it out of the ziplock bag in 40 years. On Saturday I set it up and had another go.

The scenarios are quite well done (up to a point) in that they tell a continuing story of the first war between the Terrans (who are beginning to expand into space via the discovery of wormholes called Warp Points) and teh Khanate of Orion, the first hostile race they have come across. As the war continues the game introduces new weapons and new classes of ship and the battles get bigger. A third force joins in so the final scenario is a gigantic three-way fight using every counter.

However the first scenario is a simple first contact between a Terran exploration vessel (which the ever pragmatic Terrans have still ensured is armed) against a small Khanate escort vessel. The Terrans have popped through a wormhole and must scan both the enemy vessel and a planet before escaping. The Khanate is trying to stop them.

In this scenario the Terran vessel had a gun (literally a weapon firing an explosive shell) and some lasers, whilst the Khanate vessel has a gun and some missiles. Guns and missiles score low damage. Guns are effective at close range whilst missiles are better at long range. Laser (and other beam weapons) have variable ranges depending on how powerful they are, hit better at closer ranges and also score more damage at close ranges.

The key to Starfire is obviously engaging the enemy at the optimal range for your weapons. In this first scenario, for example, the Khanate can stand off and shoot missiles. However the Terran vessel is bigger and also faster, so can close the range to where its lasers can score some real damage. And, obviously, the victory conditions require a close approach in order to use the scan.

The damage system is pretty nice. Each ship is made up of a number of systems (shield, armour, weapons, engines and so forth). These are represented by a code letter, and listed in the order in which they will take damage. Shields are always first, then armour and then internal systems. A hit crosses off systems from the left (although some weapons systems modify this - lasers ignore Shields, for example)

So in the first scenario the Khanate ship is listed as: SSAIGIRII (4) 2

S is Shields, A is Armour, G is the Gun, R the Missile Launcher and I the Engines. Each undestroyed engine give 1 movement point, so this ship has a move of 4. The final number is based on hull size and is how many movement points must be expended between each turn.

It's a neat system.

Less good is movement which is pretty clunky. Player rolls for initiative. The side with initiative moves second and fires first. When it's your turn to move you have to expend 1 movement point for each of your ships. Then the other side does the same. And you alternate expending points for ships until all ships have expended all of their points. It's fiddly, but not unplayable. However since there's a minimum distance you have to move between turns, you have to remember how far each ship in play has moved when you want to turn. And you're allowed to carry over movement from the previous turn as well. This is really difficult to do with lots of ships in play. 

There is an optional rule for pre-plotted movement, and that really seems the only viable way to play, since you have a record of points expended from turn to turn.

Firing works OK. Players alternate firing ships until both run out. Any damage scored counts immediately, so you can take out weapons on an enemy before it can shoot back.

Anyway, I played that first scenario and the Khanate lost. Twice. It's really unbalanced. I can't see how the Terrans can't always win. They have a bigger ship that's as well armed as their opponent's and it's faster so it can close the range to bring its better weapons to bear.

Still, it got me back into the game.

I then tried the second scenario. In this the Terrans have beefed up some ships and returned to the system they had their first encounter. They have three ships, armed with a new weapons system, the Gun/Missile Launcher (you can choose whether to fire it as a Gun or Missile depending on the range).

The Khanate are waiting with a static armed base, three small ships and a light cruiser. 

This is a straight 'destroy the enemy' scenario, although you get VPs for damaging enemy ships. The Khanate outgun the Terrans, although not at long range. They got into close range and wiped the Terrans out.

Interestingly you get VPs for simply scoring damage, so a viable Terran strategy is to drop in via the Warp Point, fire off a load of missiles until you score some hits and then run away. You can outshoot the Khanate at long range, so should have more VPs, and can then end the scenario.

Anyway, I played a few games and it wasn't horrible, but somehow it didn't seem as good as I remember it. 

One other selling point it has is that it's possible to play a campaign in which you design and build your own ships. That would certainly be a way to play that offsets the imbalance of the scenarios provided. The ship-building system is really nice, although I haven't explored it a great deal.

A Billion Suns Again

Catherine and I played another game of 'A Billion Suns' yesterday evening. Once again we went for Scale 3 and got Supply, Industrial Espionage and Whaling contracts. This meant three tables, but our dining table is really only good for two if we want space for admin and helms, so we pressed a kitchen work-surface into action as well.

We committed more initial resources in this game. Catherine ignored the Supply contract and sent four wings of fighters to grab a container ship and go for the Industrial Espionage one. She also sent a gunship and utility ship after one of the space kraken. I sent fighters after her fighters, some utility ships on the Supply contract, and a frigate and utility ship combo to hunt kraken.

Initial moves saw Catherine's fighter wings wiped out by mine (see the picture showing the five ones I rolled when shooting at her with passive fire), giving me a start on the Espionage contract, and her kraken-hunting force destroyed by the kraken after we seriously underestimated how nasty their attacks are. This wiped her ships out. I got the Supply contract well underway, and easily killed a kraken with the frigate to pick up and score a heart.

 
Catherine rallied and sent a swarm of recon wings to escort two of the container ships, allowing her to score all 12 Credits from the Espionage contract on the second round. However I scored the full amount on the Supply contract, plus a kraken heart to finish with a score tat was less negative than hers. I 'won' with -4 Credits whilst she had -10.

 
This game played really quickly and we felt we had a handle on what we were doing as well. However the Whaling contract wasn't one worth going after with any great degree of commitment, since it takes too long to reap its full benefits and the other two contracts have mechanisms which cause them to time out. We actually didn't play the third round - Catherine worked out that she couldn't stop me scoring the last cards on the Supply contract without pulling in new ships, which would have cost her more than I would have lost by not finishing the contract.

To be fair, my investment in a frigate for the whaling contract was a bit ambitious, although had we had more time from the other contracts I think it would have paid off; it killed two of the beasties during the course of the game, including jump-hopping to a new table and using railguns on one with Power to Weapons to score three 2 damage hits.

Anyway, I still haven't worked out how I'm going to put together ships and so forth for this game yet, so until then I'll be using these boring counters. But at least I'm playing.

Here's the pictures.

The game spread across three 'tables'.

Fighters compete to 'escort' a container ship whilst they search it for a rare specimen.

Hunting a space kraken.

Hunting a space kraken and not getting destroyed by it.

Blue wipes out the red fighters.

Collecting a kraken heart.

'A Billion Suns' - First Game

Catherine and I had our first go at 'A Billion Suns' this afternoon, playing a basic Scale 3 game. There's quite a lot of information to unload on a new player who hasn't read the rules before, but Catherine managed to get a reasonable grasp of what she had to do.

We drew our three contracts and got Shipping (picking luxury stuff up from a planet and selling it), Demolition (blowing up rogue space-stations) and Rhexis Harvesting (picking up weird energy from a 'pearl' surrounded by a dangerous energy field). The game was spread across two tables, which you can see marked here by a chalk line. On one table were the three facilities and on the second the planet and the Rhexis pearl.

I have outlined how 'A Billion Suns' works here, so won't repeat it. We both had a think about what resources we wanted to commit to the contracts. Catherine decided to harvest the pearl, whilst I decided that the shipping contract looked tasty. We both decided to demolish space-stations. I sent in a gunship, whilst Catherine was more frugal, and sent in a fighter wing.

Meanwhile on the other side of the galaxy, two large merchant ships approached a planet, ready to trade. Nearby, unphotographed, Catherine's utility ship was scanning the Rhexis pearl.

Back at the space-stations, I decided to soften one up and ended up destroying it. This scored revenue, but less than I would have got had I taken the time to erase the AI core first. Still, it was money in the bank, and a second station (with no AI) would pay for the gunship.

Catherine erased the AI from a station, and set her fighters back into an attack. The station's automated defences wiped them out. She jumped in a squadron or recon ships to try and finish the job, but they were wiped out too.

I was accumulating luxuries at the planet, and was ready to ship them out for a score. But I realised that Catherine was about to score big from her harvesting. And if she did it would end that contract as well. Since the demolition contract also had a time-limit. I realised that I wouldn't have time to score revenue from my shipping contract before the game ended (the game ends when two contracts can no longer score revenue). I jumped in a pair of fighter wings, sending them after Catherine's harvesting ship, hoping to destroy it before it reaped the full benefits of the pearl. I failed. She scored.

My gunship went after another station, hoping to take it out and justify its cost. The station's shields deflected my attacks and, to add insult to injury, the station then auto-destructed, ending the contract and taking out my gunship in its blast radius.

I did earn some revenue from the shipping contract, but not as much as I'd hoped.

Catherine won decisively, spending 5 Credits on ships and earning 12 Credits from contracts to pick up +7 Credits. I spent 11 Credits on ships and earned a measly 7 Credits in return for a total of -4 Credits. Instead of going after Catherine's harvesting ship I would have been better off jumping the fighters in on the third space station - destroying both of them would have left me in credit, if nothing else.

The game played smoothly and quickly, especially given that we hadn't played it before. We're both keen to try it again.

Counters For 'A Billion Suns'

I'm still not sure when I'm going to get a chance to play 'A Billion Suns' for the first time yet, but last night I printed out a whole set of counters and markers so I will have all the pieces I need and more. They're glued to card and the next stage is going to be the long process of cutting them out.

There's far more stuff there than I'll need for a basic Scale 3 game - there's enough objectives to cover me up to Scale 5, for example - so I should be good for a while.

A Billion Suns

'A Billion Suns' is the new game from the fertile mind of 'Gaslands' creator Mike Hutchinson. Whilst I never got as far as actually playing a game, I have followed the playtest and development stages online for the past couple of years, and decided that I'd have to get a copy when it was released. It arrived the other day.

Sadly my copy somehow got caught in the flooding our area has recently, and was partially waterlogged when it arrived. Obviously I have raised an issue about this with the shipping company (and Osprey, just to be sure), but over a day or so I did manage to dry the book out and make it readable. It looks like it's lived a fair bit, but there's no serious damage.

Anyway, I sat down and read it properly over the weekend.

I haven't played it, so I'm not going to attempt a lengthy review. Basically 'A Billion Suns' is a spaceship combat game. Or, at least, it's a game involving spaceships. How much combat there is is partially up to the players. Because unlike other spaceship games I've seen, ABS is heavily mission-driven. Each player (the game is designed for 2-4 players) is the CEO of a far-future corporation, and you win the game by either having the highest profit at the end or, if things go badly for everyone, the least deficit. The game is set up with three contracts; twelve are provided in the game, with the promise of more to come. The contracts will dictate what terrain and other items will be on the table. Or tables. Yes, you read that right. Some contracts require you to add an extra table to the game. To be fair a 'table' is simply a playing area distinct from the other playing area, or areas. So you can divide up your classic 6' x 4' table in some way to do it. Each contract is worth a number of credits, with different contracts delivering that revenue in different ways and at different rates. Some are time-limited, so have to be achieved against the clock.

And that's it. You will have one or more tables with objectives spread across them, and a bank account with 0 Credits in it. The game then begins.

A CEO has access to a list of ship types, from fighter wings and light utility vessels, to mighty carriers and battleships. Each ship type costs credits and, during the course of their turn, a CEO will requisition ships and jump them into play in order to take on the various missions. Obviously you want to spend no more on ships than you think you can reap in terms of revenue, so there's a delicate balancing act between selecting what you need and selecting what you can afford. And if you need more ships later in the game? You simply requisition them. There's no concept of building a fleet at the start of the game and using that; you adapt what you have in play to the changing circumstances. 

Once two of the three contracts have reached the point where they can generate no more revenue then the game ends, and the CEOs check their balance sheets and prepare to deliver the good or bad news to their shareholders.

What about the mechanics? Well, the game has a fairly daunting turn sequence, but it's broken down into fairly logical steps. CEOs first assign command tokens to their a Command Helm. These can be assigned to seize initiative, jump in more ships or used later to modify various game effects - give a group of ships a bonus move, or strengthen their shields against an attack, for example. The CEOs then take turns to activate ships or groups of ships, which move and then attack. Finally there is an end phase in which various admin tasks are performed.

Ships move in battlegroups, consisting of 1-5 ships of the same type. When a group is activated it is given an order. This allows the group to concentrate on movement, firing, damage control or jumping out of play. Movement is simple; a ship pivots by any amount, and then moves in a straight line up to its thrust value. A ship with Vector orders can move twice. Firing is performed by rolling a handful of dice, the type and number of which vary according to the weapon, looking to score less than the target's silhouette value. Each hit scores a fixed amount of damage, again according to weapon type. A ship may block hits with its shields. The shooting system is quite elegant; big guns score loads of damage, but are less effective against smaller ships because they roll bigger dice; a D6 blaster scoring 1 hit stands more chance of hitting a silhouette 3 fighter group than a torpedo rolling a D10 but scoring 3 hits. A ship's silhouette is also its damage value; the battlegroup accumulates hits until the value reaches a multiple of the silhouette, at which point a ship, or ships, are removed.

A nice feature of the game is Scale. This is a value from 1-10 which the players decide on at the start, and it is used to determine how many objectives a contract might have, which in turn affects the available revenue. Scale will therefore dictate how long and complex the game will be, and the available revenue will dictate, or limit, which ship classes will be viable. Deploying a battleship in a scale 3 game, for example, will cost more than the probable revenue you'll gain from the whole game; scale 3 games are the domain of fighters and light combat vessels. Scale basically allows you to pitch the game to your available time, miniatures and experience level.

This preview has really just scratched the surface of the game. There are lots of neat little rules and ideas tucked away in it, although I suspect that it is similar to games like Maurice and Saga, where there is something of a learning curve not just for the mechanisms themselves, but also how you actually play the game in order to achieve particular results. Some of the game is clever, but not immediately obvious, and a first time player has a lot to take in.

I'm not sure just yet when I will get a chance to play this game. I have a handful of scratchbuilt spaceships, but have put together some simple counters first in order to try it out and get a feel for the numbers of vessels I'll eventually require. You can see an example sheet here:

A Night of Flames and Thrust

We had two games on the go last night. Bryan and Ralph played a Flames of War games set during the 1967 Six-Day War, featuring Israeli Shermans taking on Egyptian T55s (see, Ralph, I read the scenario you posted).

The Egyptians based their position on a piece of cheese.

The inevitable: Ralph + Tanks = Burning Tanks

Although Bryan managed some as well.

However eventually all of Ralph's were on fire, having not troubled the objective markers they were after at all.

The rest of us played Full Thrust, with a New Anglian Confederation force taking on the Neu Swabian League. There were a few rocks floating around as well.

NSL ships.

My part of our force - it included the Essex, captained by Sean Connery.

We exchanged fire. A few of the NAC destroyers were taken out, but the NSL ships suffered too, as heavy fire from the beams and torpedoes of the NAC ships concentrated their fire. Captain Connery made a small navigational error, though, which found the Essex too close to a rock. At that point it took a bridge hit, and could no longer change course ...

Did I say I'd not played Full Thrust in a while. I forgot how to turn and completely failed to judge distances. A destroyer flew into another asteroid ...

... then I finished up by piling my other cruiser into the same asteroid on which the Essex had met its end.

With Geoff's ships destroyed by more conventional means, that was pretty much it for the NAC fleet. And it's back to starship driving-school for me.

Void and Stars - An Alternative Activation System

'Void and Stars' was a playtest game of starship combat which used a version of the 'Ganesha Games' 'Songs of Blades and Heroes' system. Development activity on it fizzled out a couple of years ago, but from time to time I give it some thought, wondering if there's still a viable game to be teased out of it. After all, this is the size of starship game I want - five to eight ships a side - but with a low level of bookkeeping and technical detail, and no pre-plotted moves.

One of the problems with it was the activation system. Whilst the idea of some of your figures not doing anything during a turn kind of works for individual beings in a skirmish setting, it didn't sit quite right to an environment where your playing pieces - spaceships - are in constant motion. The problem Void and Stars had was that an entire fleet could spend a lot of the game flying around in straight lines not shooting because of a few unlucky activation rolls. Add in terrain and you had ships flying headlong into planets because one of their fellows had a bad roll when activating.

The principle was sound, but a number of games showed that it didn't quite work so well in practice.

For a while I've been mulling over a variation in the activation system, which allows all ships to act in some form of controlled manner, whilst still rewarding those ships with quality - or luck. I'm certain there's holes in it a mile wide, and I haven't crafted the wording into something consistent and logical, but for what it's worth, here it is - untried and untested.

---

Alternative Void and Stars Activation System

Both sides roll for initiative. The highest roll decides who activates first. In the event of a tie, reroll.

The player with initiative chooses a ship that has not attempted to activate this turn, and may attempt to activate it with 1, 2 or 3 dice. Each successful roll against Quality gives an action. A ship automatically has one action, plus however many it rolls. However at least one action must be spent to move the ship (including a turn)

If a ship fails to activate with two or more dice, the initiative passes to the other player.

Otherwise the player with initiative chooses another ship to activate.

If a player has attempted to activate all of their ship, initiative automatically passes to the other player. They may attempt to activate each of their remaining ships one after the other, with 1,2, or 3 dice as normal. However if a ship fails to activate with 2 or more dice, then subsequent ships cannot activate with more than 2 dice. If a subsequent ship fails to activate with 2 dice, then all further ships may only attempt to activate with 1 dice.

Once every ship has attempted to activate, a new turn begins.

Indirect fire markers move twice during the turn, immediately after a player activates their final ship.

Example. The Red Player and the Blue Player each have three ships, Red One to Red Three against Blue One to Blue Three.

The players roll initiative and Red wins. He chooses to go first.

He activates Red One with 3 dice, but fails two activations. Red One gets two actions, one of which must be a move.

Because Red failed two or more activations, initiative passes to Blue.

Blue actives Blue One with two dice, and both rolls succeed. Blue One gets three actions – one compulsory move and two other actions. Blue can now attempt to activate another ship, and attempts to activate Blue Two with one dice. The roll fails, so Blue Two merely gets one action, which must be a move. However because it was only a single activation roll which failed, Blue keeps the initiative. Blue has one ship left; Blue Three. He activates it with three dice, because there is no reason not to.

Blue has now attempted to activate all of his ships, so all indirect fire markers move and resolve attacks. The initiative passes to Red. Red has already attempted to activate Red One, so just has Red Two and Red Three this turn. He attempts to activate Red Two with two dice, and fails with both of them, just getting the compulsory movement action. Red Three is the only ship that has yet to activate in this turn. But because on his previous activation Red failed with two or more rolls, Red Three cannot attempt to activate with more than two dice. Once Red Three has been activated the indirect fire markers move again, and then the turn ends.

---

I hope that makes some sense. Comments and criticism welcome.

The other major effort I think is needed is on the damage system which, whilst workable, needs a little streamlining in my view. But I'm not sure where to start on that.

The Gothic Empire

A couple of years ago I scratchbuilt some spaceships in order to playtest a possible starship combat game based on the 'Songs of Blades and Heroes' engine. The game was fun, but there were still flaws in it when the developer seemed to stop work on it, so nothing more came of it. This was a shame, as it had about the right level of detail (not much) complexity (not much) and scale of game (small) that I wanted in a starship game, and had yet to find in any commercial rules up to that point.

Anyway, at he time I built three forces, whose adventures you can find documented elsewhere on this blog. However I built a fourth force that never saw action. I found it today whilst rummaging through boxes for something else, and thought they deserved a quick iPhone photoshoot. Say hello to the ships of - The Gothic Empire!

Here's the fleet deployed - one Battleship, two Cruisers, three Frigates and four Destroyers.

The Battleship Sombre Poetry of Dreams

The Cruisers Master of the Tortured Existence and Mistress of the Exquisite Solitude

The Frigates Stygian Purpose, Dark Enshrouded Desires and Fearful Symmetry

The Destroyers Shroud, Suffering, Seduction and Silence

A top down view of the vessels - the largest is a couple of inches long, the smallest about an inch. As with my other starships they are built from stacked layers of card, toothpicks, lentils and grains of rice.

I have to say that, having found these models I'm keen to give them a game of some sort, even if it means fixing the last published playtest version of the rules myself.

Full Thrust

We played 'Full Thrust' tonight. It's been a while for most of us, so we spent a while trying to remember how to play (as well as putting a couple of forces together).

We hurled two forces of ships against each other. We think that scenarios are probably a better way to play it; otherwise with two fleets it really just becomes an exercise in lining up and blazing away.

Anyway, here's a few pictures. Geoff and I took the NAC force. Peter, Caesar and John ran FSE ships masquerading as NSL vessels. There were a couple of Klingon models in there as well; John's quite attached to his Klingon ships. Oddly enough they've yet to actually appear in a game as Klingons.

Two NAC ships. A big one and a small one.

I think these are FSE or NAC models - newer designs. A couple of Klingons lurk behind. But in reality they were all statted as NSL ships.

A swirling melee of missiles, pulse torpedoes and laser death. The NAC came off worse, and ran away.

We're going to play Saga for the first time next week. I'm quite excited.

The Red Dog Rebellion

The Red Dog Rebels
Left To Right: Fair Go, Eureka Stockade, Such Is Life,
Night Shifter and Ship With No Beer

Once again I have been playtesting 'Void and Stars'. I have tried a couple of odd, short games over the weekend, mostly to try out mechanisms and concepts, but this afternoon I played a full 750pt game. I used the recently released v1.4 playtest version of the rules.

The games was played on a 2' x 2' area, using half-sized measuring sticks. the ships were all scratchbuilt from card, lentils and cork tile. You will also notice that I have acquired, on loan it has to be said, a suitable gaming cloth. Space is no longer a sandy brown in this house.

Introduction

With the cost of the conflict with the LLAR escalating, the Oceanic Union looked to its citizens for further funding. A tax on revenues from the lucrative asteroid mining operations on the western rim of the Oceanic Union proved too much however. The miners of the Red Dog System rebelled, and declared independence from the Union. A flotilla from the OUDF was sent to bring them back into line.

But the miners were resourceful. Living on the fringes of the Union had taught them to look to their own defence, and when the OUDF ships arrived they found that the miners had an unusual flotilla of their own ...

The Fleets

The OUDF were equipped with two Town Class cruisers (Mittagong and Emu Plains) and three Island Class Destroyers (Pukapuka, Savai'i and Norfolk). The stats for the cruisers can be seen here. The destroyers are as follows:

Island Class Destroyer - Escort, CV: 3, Range: S, Speed: M, Hardened Armour,Point Defence Support: S, Point Defence, Escort Support
Systems Cost: 24 Actual Cost 96

All ships were Quality 3

The Red Dog Miners' fleet was cobbled together from whatever ships they had available, plus their other main resource - asteroids. Their force consisted of two hollowed-out rocks, with engines and weapons systems installed, plus three converted mining support vessels operating as a carrier, a gunship and a missile launcher.

Asteroid 'Eureka Stockade' - Capital, CV: 6, Range: M, Speed: S, Indirect: 5, Shield Generator, Hardened Armour, Fighter Bays: 4, Capacity Battery, Repair Drones, Leviathan
System Cost: 85, Actual Cost: 255

Asteroid 'Such Is Life' - Capital, CV: 5, Range: M, Speed: S, Indirect: 5, Shield Generator, Hardened Armour, Heavy Ion Cannon, Leviathan
System Cost 65, Actual Cost: 195

Support Vessel 'Fair Go' - Escort, CV: 4, Range: S, Speed: M, Light Fighter Hangar: 3, Hardened Armour, Rapid Fire Escort Support, Escort Support
System Cost 33, Actual Cost 99

Support Vessel 'Night Shifter' - Escort, CV: 4, Range: M, Speed: M, Repeater Weapon, Hardened Armour, Escort Support
System Cost 33, Actual Cost 99

Support Vessel 'Ship With No Beer' - Escort, CV: 4, Range: S, Speed: M, Indirect: 2, External Ordinance: 1, Hardened Armour
System Cost 33, Actual Cost 99

All ships were Quality 4

Left to Right: Eureka Stockade, Such Is Life and Night Shifter

The Eureka Stockade - a hollowed-out asteroid converted to a warship.
The white counter shows that it has active shields.

The Battle

The Miners defended and, by a stroke of fortune, rolled three asteroid fields as the terrain. The scenario was a straight stand-up fight.

The OUDF advanced quickly, pushing the destroyers Norfolk and Pukapuka around an asteroid field to try and flank the miners' ships. meanwhile the miners advanced slowly, limited by the Leviathan special on their capitals. They concentrated on the third OUDF destroyer, the Savai'i, launching missiles and fighters at it, and hitting it with a slow, steady barrage of direct fire. It didn't last long, and before the fleets had really got to grips was blown up by a shot from the Such Is Life. The Miner's fighters switched to the other destroyers.

The early part of the game belonged to the Miners. Some bad activations by the OUDF meant that they inflicted very little damage as they moved across the board.

The advance
The Savai'i has already been destroyed, and missiles and fighters are closing on the Pukapuka to the left of the picture

The Miners switched their attention to the Pukapuka, and that was so badly damaged that it warped to safety. The OUDF were already two ships down, and fighters were now closing on the Norfolk. The Miners had still suffered no significant damage. However as it moved into the rear of the Miner's flotilla the Norfolk fended of a several waves of fighter attacks, and emerged relatively unscathed.

At this point the fleets had closed right up, and were exchanging fire at close range. Activation failures on the part of the Miners meant that their fire was weak, whilst the two OUDF cruisers started to damage the Ship With No Beer. The initiative remained with the OUDF as the flotillas passed each other, and the Mittagong and Emu Plains swung round into the rear of the Eureka Stockade and started to pound it with a deadly fire. Within a couple of turns it was so badly damaged that it had to test morale, and it quickly fled. 

The Eureka Stockade comes under a deadly fire
from the OUDF cruisers Mittagong and Emu Plains

Ignoring the Such Is Life, the cruisers switched their attentions to the Fair Go, destroying it in a volley of fire. The Norfolk duelled with the Ship With No Beer, badly damaging it, leaving it easy meat for the Emu Plains to finish off. However the Night Shifter put in some accurate shots on the Norfolk, forcing it to flee the battle.

Both fleets now had to test morale. The OUDF passed with little problem, as did the Such Is Life, but the Night Shifter decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and fled.

It was now the two cruisers against the Such Is Life. after a round of fire it was obvious the asteroid stood no chance against he well-drilled OUDF crews, and the Miners conceded the game.

The Such Is Life discovers that ... such is life

The Miners had lost the Fair Go and the Ship With No Beer destroyed, whilst the Night Shifter and the mighty Eureka Stockade had fled. The OUDF lost the Savai'i, with the Norfolk and Pukapuka fleeing.

Conclusion

This was a fairly close fight. I thought that the Miners would be let down by their low Quality, but a conservative use of activation dice, limiting most ships to one roll in the early part of the turn, allowed them to keep up a steady fire on the approaching OUDF ships. The OUDF trusted to their superior quality early on, needing to out-manoeuvre the Miners, but failed a couple of activations. A Quality 4 force can survive without a Fleet Command Centre so long as its ships aren't designed such that they require multiple actions; low quality fleets require simple, no-nonsense designs, possibly with decent passive defences in order to survive those turns when activations mostly fail. Once the action hotted up the Quality 3 of the OUDF allowed them to move faster and more often, running rings around the Leviathans.

The new firing modifiers made direct fire more deadly and decisive, which was good. This was despite all ships having Hardened Armour. This was the first game I've played with reasonable numbers of fighters, and they seemed to work well; not as instantly deadly as missiles, but a sustained annoyance.

There did seem to be a small flaw with the morale rules - a force has to test morale when it has lost 50% of its ships. Escorts are easier to take out than capital ships, so the game developed into a fight to eliminate enemy escorts, forcing the capitals to test morale. I wonder if a force's morale value should be calculated based on 2pts for a capital and 1pt for an escort, with 50% of that total forcing a test. That way, for example, neither force in this game would have tested morale if all of its escorts had been lost; you would have to eliminate a capital ship.

Top Terrain Tip: I use areas of felt to mark asteroid fields. A field has a strength of 4-6, so I put the appropriate number of rock on each felt shape to show he strength in-game. So a Strength 5 field will have five rocks on it. I just need a way to show pulsar strength now.

Void And Stars - The Rematch

With fewer jobs to do on Sunday than I anticipated, and an early start in order that Mrs Kobold could visit the local market, I found myself with time to devote to Void and Stars. I decided to rejig the starship designs I used in the previous game, adjusting them to make them faster with better ranges and CV on the hope it would produce a more decisive game.

The new stats follow. I have listed two costs, System Cost and Actual Cost. The first is the cost of the CV plus specials, whilst the second takes into account the multiplier for Quality. I have decided to base the break-point for capital ship/escort on the System Cost, with anything over 40 being a capital ship. Thus a high-quality escort might cost more than 150pts (there's a phrase I never thought I'd write), whilst a low-quality capital ship may be less then 150pts.

OUDF - All ships Quality 3

Town Class Cruiser - Capital Ship, CV: 5, Range: M, Speed: M, Hardened Armour, Full Spectrum Sensors, Damage Control, Point Defence, Shield Generator
System Cost: 55 Actual Cost: 220

Opal Class Frigate - Escort, CV: 4, Range: M, Speed: M, Hardened Armour, Full Spectrum Sensors, Point Defence, Escort Support
Systems Cost: 36 Actual Cost 144

Explorer Class Carrier - Escort, CV: 3 Range: S Speed: M Hardened Armour, Light Fighter Hangar: 2 Point defence, Point Defence Support: M, Escort Support
System Cost: 30 Actual Cost 120

LLAR - All ships Quality 4

Port Class Cruiser - Capital Ship, CV: 5 Range: L, Speed: M, Indirect: 4, Assault Doctrine, Shields, Fleet Control Centre, External Ordinance: 4
System Cost: 70 Actual Cost: 210

Tiburon Class Missile Frigate - Escort, CV: 4, Range: M, Speed: L, Indirect: 3, Escort Support
System Cost: 38 Actual Cost: 114

Conquistador Class Gun Frigate - Escort, CV: 4, Range: L, Speed: L, Spinal Mount, Escort Support
System Cost: 34 Actual Cost: 102

Essentially I raised all CV values, and increased weapon ranges on some ships to allow for decisive fire at longer distances. The OUDF ships are still tough, but the LLAR have better factors for dealing with it. Higher speeds mean more chance for rear shots.

And then I played a game ...

You'll be pleased to know that I didn't record it in the same detail as the last one. It lasted longer because both sides had rotten luck in terms of activation, failing the easiest of rolls. It ended in a decisive result though.

Because of the changed points values the two sides were uneven in terms of numbers, with the LLAR having six ships and the OUDF only five.

The LLAR force was, once again, the cruiser Montevideo, the gun-frigates Pizarro and Orellana and the missile frigates Estrella, Tiburon and Raya. A total of 756pts.

The OUDF had the cruise Mittagong, the escort carrier Flinders and the frigates Opal, Sapphire and Diamond. A total of 772pts.

The OUDF defended and rolled a strength 4 asteroid field, a nebula and a dust cloud. The asteroids went in the centre, the dust cloud to the N and the nebula to the NE. The LLAR deployed to the S whilst the OUDF deployed to the N.

Once again the LLAR plan was to pump missiles at the Mittagong, whilst sending the gun-frigates after the OUDF frigates. The OUDF covered the Mittagong with the Flinders, and sent the frigates on a flanking move.

The LLAR move first in each turn.

Turn 1

The LLAR launched missiles at the Mittagong and fired at the Flinders until the Montevideo failed to activate.

On the OUDF turn the Flinders launched fighters on a CAP mission to cover the Mittagong, before the Mittagong failed its activation and ended the turn.

Turn 2

The Montevideo launched missiles, then the Estrella ended the turn.

The OUDF  frigates moved past the nebula, firing ineffectively at the Orellana as they did so. One of them caused a turnover.

Turn 3

The LLAR launched more missiles until the Montevideo ended the activation. the gun-frigates had not yet acted.

The Mittagong fired at the Estrella causing a weapon damage, whilst the Flinders used escort support to eliminate a missile marker. The Diamond caused a turnover.

In the turnover phase missiles hit the Mittagong, but its armour handled the damage.

This was pretty much the position at this stage:

Turn 4

In a change of plan the Montevideo and its supports closed up rapidly on the Flinders and hit it with direct fire and missiles, causing both systems and weapon damage. Once again the other ships failed to activate.

The Mittagong shrugged off more missiles.

In the OUDF turn the Flinders came good, repairing all damage, then launching a new CAP patrol to protect the Mittagong. The Mittagong returned the favour by failing to activate and ending the turn, but not before it had damaged the Estrella.

Turn 5

The LLAR switched attention to the gun-frigates, and the Pizarro inflicted a system damage on the Opal. Then the Orellena failed its roll.

The OUDF had it worse. Their first ship failed to activate on two dice and caused a turnover.

Turn 6

The LLAR failed to activate their first ship, and the two forces passed  each other with barely a shot exchanged.

The OUDF exploited this, with the frigates swinging around into the rear of the LLAR gun frigates, destroying the Pizarro's weapons. On the other side of the table the Flinders and the Mittagong took down the Montevideo's screens.

Turn 7

Things were hotting up now. The LLAR gun frigates also came about and the Pizarro blasted the rear of the Flinders, damaging its weapons. The Montevideo added to this, adding a weapons destroyed to the tally. Were it not for the armour the Flinders would have been destroyed.

The Mittagong now engaged the Pizarro with full spectrum sensor enhanced  overload shot, causing a weapons critical. The Diamond caused a systems destroyed on the Pizarro, but caused a turnover.

The Flinders In Big Trouble

Turn 8

The LLAR got a good set of activations this turn. The Orellana and Raya engaged the Sapphire, but inflicted no damage, whilst the Tiburon and Estrella damaged the Diamond's weapons with a volley of direct fire and missiles. Finally, aided by the fleet command centre on the Montevideo, the damaged Pizarro managed a series of rear-shots on the Flinders which destroyed it. First blood to the LLAR.

This was now the situation:

The OUDF lost no time in taking revenge. Fire from the Mittagong and the Diamond stacked up hits on the Pizarro, caused a crew panic and the Pizarro engaged its warp drive and fled. the Sapphire then failed to activate an the turn ended.

Turn 9

The LLAR frigates engaged the Diamond and Opal with direct fire and missiles to no effect, before the Montevideo ended the activation.

The OUDF had a better turn. The Sapphire moved in behind the Orellana and destroyed it, and the Opal damage the Raya before the turn ended.

Turn 10

In danger of going off the table the Montevideo slowly turned back into the fight. The Estrella and Tiburon used missiles and direct fire to plaster the Diamond, leaving it with a systems destroyed and weapons damaged.

In the OUDF turn they managed a systems destroyed on the Tiburon, before the Opal once again failed to activate.

Turn 11

The Estrella and Raya continued to persecute the Diamond, putting it in weapons destroyed with a crew panic as well. It passed its morale, but was in a bad way.

In the OUDF turn the Opal failed the fleet again, but not before inflicting weapon damage on the Raya.

Turn 12

The Estrella finished off the Diamond. But that was it for the turn.

Once again the Opal threw away the OUDF turn.

Turn 13

The Raya showed that it could emulate the Opal, and threw away the LLAR turn.

The OUDF engaged the Montevideo with the Mittagong and the Sapphire, using overload fire and full spectrum sensors, and left it with its weapons damaged and systems destroyed. It hadn't had chance to raise its shields since they were taken down on Turn 6. Meanwhile the Opal destroyed the Raya's weapons. Things were starting to look bad for the LLAR.

Turn 14

The Raya and Estrella launched missiles at the Sapphire, causing weapons damage. And that was it.

In the OUDF turn the Mittagong caused a turnover, but still managed to add a systems destroyed to the Montevideo's woes.

Turn 15

This happened:

The LLAR launched everything it had at the Sapphire, overloading it with direct fire and missiles. It didn't stand a chance and vanished in a massive explosion. The OUDF had now lost over half of their ships, but the morale test only caused a systems damage on the Mittagong.

The Opal and Mittagong concentrated their fire on the Montevideo; the Opal's shot caused a weapon critical, giving the Mittagong the opening it needed to destroy the enemy capital ship. 

Bye Bye, Montevideo

The LLAR morale tests went less well than those for the OUDF - the Estrella and Tiburon fled, leaving the Raya alone on the field. At that point I ended the game.

The losses were as follows:

The LLAR lost the Montevideo and Orellana destroyed and the Estrella, Tiburon and Pizarro fled.

The OUDF lost three ships destroyed; the Diamond, Sapphire and Flinders. Despite this the victory was really theirs as the Raya was in no state to take on both the Opal and Mittagong alone.

Conclusion

This was a much more decisive game than the last, with the changed ship designs making a lot of difference, as well as being easier to run. Faster speeds meant that rear shots were easier to get, and they seem to be the key to destroying an enemy; getting behind a ship and unloading every weapon you have is very effective. The problem is not leaving yourself vulnerable to return fire.

The rapid turnovers were frustrating, and it looks like a force needs either a good innate Quality, or such things as the fleet command centre to avoid being inactive. Since ships that don't act still move in a straight line, there is a danger that with a run of bad luck your fast ships will fly off the table and count as lost. I reckon a force needs to have, or simulate, a Quality of 3 or better to stand a reasonable chance, although a fight between two low-quality forces might be interesting. Or amusing.

The hardened armour still proved useful, but was not as frustratingly useful as it was in the last game. The OUDF's direct fire linked with full spectrum sensors is a great weapon, but I also have a soft spot for the LLAR's spinal mount gun-frigates. When it activated the Montevideo's assault doctrine was effective too; this could be nasty if combined with a spinal mount, although I don't know if a capital ship can have two doctrines. The current version of the rules doesn't forbid it ...

The game generated no major questions. I tried the the alternative escort support rule (your CV + die roll against full strength of missiles/fighter) but not enough to form an opinion as to whether it's better than the 'published' version.

Overall, a much more satisfying game in terms of result and ease of play.

Edit: I realise after reading the rules again that in both games I made a mistake with direct fire in that I gave the firing ship a +1 for overload, rather than it putting the target on a -1. Obviously this makes a difference in how decisive damage is. OUDF ships are better off skipping overload if they can use their full spectrum sensors, though, as the sensors give both a +1 to the firer and a -1 to the target; a nasty combination.