Archive through July 02, 2010
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: General Tactics Discussion: Romulan Tactics: Archive through July 02, 2010
By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Thursday, November 26, 2009 - 02:38 pm: Edit

Quote:

There's nothing quite as craptacular as having a speed-20 drone slam into your #4 during a tailchase when you're going speed-23, due to the speed chart.



Well, the trick is to pay attention to make sure the drone isn't chasing you at a range of '1'. Even speed 21 has no speeds where 20 moves twice before 21 can move again.

Now, that's not saying that through maneuver choices (too many slips), a 'faster' ship couldn't have the drone get too close so as to have exactly this happen. So the closer you are to the drone's speed, the more caution you must exercise when choosing where you move (IE., the more the drone owner can control your maneuver choices).

Quote:

For anything besides F drones, there's always speed, and even against F-drone speed can buy you time for phasers to recycle or maneuver drones into a stack for more efficient T-bombing.



It's always amusing when training people on SFB to keep doing the Fed vs Klink battles with speed 8 or 12 drones until they get used to the game...then introducing late-war variants of the ships (with speed 32 drones), or a plasma race. For someone USED to dealing with speed 12 drones, seeing the look on their face when you are running down the chart "Impulse 1, drone moves. Impulse 2, drone moves. Impulse 3, drone move." It's something LOGICALLY easy to grasp - but to actually see a map full of drones moving every impulse can cause a certain stunned deal-in-headlights shock. It's LOLcake!

T-bombs (shuttle bay rollout, if you have the time) and phasers are really the trick, here, although judicious use is KEY. Remember that, by the time speed 32 drones are running all over the map, most ships fielding them are going to have refits giving them larger racks (6 space vs 4 space), and another whole reload for all spaces, too. LOTS MORE DRONES to deal with!

Consider a Kzinti BC. Early war, it's got 16 drones on the rack and 16 reloads - 32 drones total. By the time speed-32 drones are about, it's got 20 drones on the rack, and 40 reloads - 60 drones to deal with over the course of a scenario!

That's something you MUST keep in mind when planning for drone defense - he's going to be chucking drones at you for a very long time.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Monday, November 30, 2009 - 01:57 pm: Edit

He's got to reload sometime. Once hea does, it's two turns of drone outlay and a turn with nothing...or some variant on 2/3 of his possible drone launch ability.

IF he uses Type I drones. The cadence for IVs if every other turn, which is not nearly as scary.

By Sidney G. Kanouse (Konus67c7) on Thursday, January 21, 2010 - 03:55 pm: Edit

In the near future I will be fighting with a Romulan KE against an "unknown enemy" ship with a BPV within 10 pts. of my ship. Maybe somewhere between 130-150 pts. What advice would my fellow Romulans have for me. I know I have the R torp. and cheap cloak cost, but I'm as fragile as glass after a good volley. Thanks for any advice.

By Fred J. Kreller (Kreller1) on Thursday, January 21, 2010 - 04:21 pm: Edit

Tactics will depend largely on who your enemy is going to be. I would just say in general have a plan to use your cloak and plasma, and stick to it. You could try to anchor (risky in a KE), or ballet if you face another plasma user. And remember that if you get caught while under cloak, things get really tough for you. I dunno, if we had more info on who you are fighting it would help narrow down more tactics..

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, January 21, 2010 - 05:53 pm: Edit

Pack plenty of T-bombs and remember you get a NSM free of charge.

Your opponent race is likely one that will be advantaged against the cloak.

You'll want to brush up on Disruptors, Carronades, ESGs and Web at the very least. Also mid-turn speed changes and mines. You need to know the cloak rules forward and backward.

You are fighting at a disadvantage because your opponent knows what you're flying and can choose how to fight you. He isn't giving up many points to get this advantage and may not be giving up any. You equalizer is to know the rules better than your opponent and exploit that knowledge.

Who's generally the better player, you or your opponent?

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Thursday, January 21, 2010 - 07:25 pm: Edit

What type of map? You want to be on a single fixed map.

What year? You also want sabots if you can get them. Make use of your ECPs too.

What are you doing with Commander's Options? A seeking weapon drogue or two will come in real handy, but don't forget to buy some reloads.

By Sidney G. Kanouse (Konus67c7) on Thursday, January 21, 2010 - 09:41 pm: Edit

I'll make it short and sweet, and hope my opponent doesn't catch this thread. I'm fighting an ISC CM, 150 v/s KE, 140. Fixed map. Thanks for the advice. Long live the Star Empire!

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 02:17 am: Edit

Quote:

Make use of your ECPs too



This! With a KE, it's especially nice, as PPT F-torps...I mean, okay, if you are really close they might spook the enemy, but those two tubes are usually MUCH better spent as ECPs against any DF race.

Quote:

What type of map? You want to be on a single fixed map.



And this is generally important, too. Floating is fine if you have some objective on the map (planet to bombard, whatever - just something). Fighting on an empty, floating map, in deep space, is almost always a bad idea. Doubly so for the Romulans - there is just no reason to ever fight under those situations

By Jonathan Jordan (Arcturusv) on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 02:33 am: Edit

Either that or agree to a scenario rule for reinforcements if he just runs and guns. My few times playing with slow/medium speed drone Kzintis against the Lyran player in our group (Who would never close within 30 hexes if I had a single drone left aboard any ship), were so pointlessly time consuming that I eventually had to come up with a house rule that if a player ran for so many turns (I think we had it with something like 4 turns of dancing away and not fighting) that reinforcements would appear in his line of retreat.

Which if I was a Romulan, that's what I'd do. Chase with my Plasma, watching him just run and run if you don't empty your tubes for him... then Pow! Have some KRs suddenly pop out from thier flanking manuevers in front of him, forcing some fun and destruction.

... Course good luck finding players willing to agree to that in a pick up game. Or just play the waiting game, cloak, sit around and wait for him to decide he wants to actually play. Nothing is more annoying and boring than watching some guy running from you at speed 31 thinking he can plink you to death with some phaser-1 snipes for a couple damage a turn, which just gets absorbed by some shield reinforcement.

By Dale McKee (Brigman) on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 03:31 am: Edit

Against the PPD, I recommend you cloak early, and cloak often.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 12:15 pm: Edit

Removing a shield to exploit with EPTs is desireable. Some people like to bolt R torps. It is a gamble, but at range 10 it will hit 50% of the time. Add some phasers and maybe F bolt and you could have that downed shield.
Still, a regular torp launched from a good map position (you are closer to the center of the board than your opponent) will possibly get the same result. Especially if you can sabot the torp as this add more hexes to the range the bigger the torp is. Your R will 35 points out to range 15 ordinarily, but saboted you can add 3-4 hexes.to that depending on when you launch.
On a fixed map this is a pain.

Another plan to create that downed shield is to chase him away with an EPT and then follow him for a dual F launch. When he is close to the map edge he can't so easily handle two F's. Fire some phasers too at the likely shield of impact, if you are within range 8.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Friday, January 22, 2010 - 02:45 pm: Edit

I keep forgetting which ISC the CM is.

2x G-torp + PPD and 1 lateral f-torp each side?

If true, that's about the ISC TC.

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Saturday, January 23, 2010 - 01:26 am: Edit

Quote:

I keep forgetting which ISC the CM is



I can't even find what product it's in! I've been working through my SSD books, scanning them in (it's a HIDEOUSLY laborious task), and have C2 and R4 scanned...but it's not in either of these.

Where's the guy at?

By Dale McKee (Brigman) on Saturday, January 23, 2010 - 01:33 am: Edit

R6.

And yes, it's 1x PPD, 2x G, 4x rear F (2 per side).

By Sidney G. Kanouse (Konus67c7) on Saturday, January 23, 2010 - 01:53 pm: Edit

Thanks for the advice folks. My opponent will not sit around and wait. The map is fixed and I have read the cloak rules front and back. I like the R-bolt option, it's risky but a hit will weaken or take out a shield. The salt in the wound is the NSM; just gotta time it right. The ISC CM is no slouch. It has good shields, firepower, and more bulk than I do. I'm flying a glass bird with a big hammer, wish me luck. For the Empire!

By Xander Fulton (Dderidex) on Saturday, January 23, 2010 - 02:52 pm: Edit

Do make sure to buy your t-bombs. With 4xt-bombs and an NSM, playing defensively can work.

By Jonathan Jordan (Arcturusv) on Saturday, January 23, 2010 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Good luck. Tell us how it goes.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Monday, January 25, 2010 - 03:59 pm: Edit

review ISC TCA vs Rom TKE tactics if possible for ideas, but be aware of differences in ships and rules environment. Your fight approximates that tourney matchup if not exactly.

By antoine sauliere (Brazouck) on Thursday, July 01, 2010 - 05:38 pm: Edit

Hi,
Ok, i'm totaly noob and I would like to play romulans with tournament conditions. I would like to play with plasma (of course) and cloak.

I love the original series romulans, that's explain

What advice can you give me to start ?

Thanks !

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, July 01, 2010 - 07:03 pm: Edit

How experienced with SFB are you? Have you fought plasma ships?

Read the rules for plasma and cloak. If you have time, wait a week and read them again.

Plasma is powerful but it takes a long time to rearm. Don't launch it all at once. It looks cool but your enemy will have a weasel 9 times out of 10. Chain it out in bits and pieces so your oppponent is always asking himself if it's worth flying into the plasma you have on the board.

Add the wild Weasel rules to your mandatory reading.

Players often run away from plasma because plasma weakens naturally over time. Expect it.

Use enveloping torps sparingly. They're not as scary as their warhead strength suggests.

Knowing when to cloak is an art. Give it your best shot. You will find out the hard way when you cloaked when you shouldn't have and when you didn't cloak when you should have.

Remember the tournament rules put a clock on how long you can stay under cloak. You lose when you exceed that time and it makes for a boring game in any event.

The cloak consumes a lot of power on cruiser-size ships. Never cloak lightly. A good time to consider cloaking is when you're low on plasma or out.

Don't expect to outrun many opponents while cloaked. They may follow you at point-blank range and hold their fire until you surface because you *will* have to surface.

Romulans tend to be a little phaser-poor compared to other races. That means drones will tie up a greater percentage of phasers of your phaser firepower than someone else.

Play the long game. A cloaked ship makes a game last more turns. don't throw cuation to the wind and charge unless you have a bona fide opening to exploit. Drones and weasels run out. Your plasma doesn't.

By Jim Davies (Mudfoot) on Thursday, July 01, 2010 - 08:09 pm: Edit

Also know the tractor rules.

There are two basic plasma tactics: ballet and anchor. Ballet means keeping your speed up, raining plasma on the enemy and running away again. Anchor means charging in with plenty of plasma on board, grabbing the enemy with a big tractor and feeding him 100 points of plasma that he can't weasel.

Use the threat of doing one to allow you to do the other.

There are three Rom tournament ships:
The TKR ballets; it can anchor but isn't so good at it because of the firing arcs; it can't sensibly cloak.
The TFH can ballet, anchor or cloak, and is probably the best ship.
The TKE cloaks well, and needs to. It's a bit weird.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, July 01, 2010 - 08:16 pm: Edit

Also remember that you if you are holding a plasma in a launcher that gets destroyed, you can launch it up to 8 impulses *after* the launcher is destroyed.

You can't plasma bolt from a destoyed launcher however.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Thursday, July 01, 2010 - 08:41 pm: Edit

Plasma is much about the term 'control'.
It is neccessary to use torpedoes to force your opponent away from the center of the map.

By antoine sauliere (Brazouck) on Friday, July 02, 2010 - 04:59 am: Edit

I have 4 play, with D7 or Fed CA, never played plasma or cloak.

All these things seems to give an interesting race to fly.

so the TFH looks good for a beginner.

I'm going on holiday with my rulebook, I will learn all these rules. See you in one week !

Thanks a lot

By antoine sauliere (Brazouck) on Friday, July 02, 2010 - 05:12 am: Edit

Another question, is the romulan TFH in the basic set or have I to buy another thing (im at work right now)

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