I dunno--they are pretty strong, all things being equal. And there are a lot of wacky things you can do with HEAT targeting that I suspect a lot of people don't mess around with much.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 01:31 pm: Edit

There is an Omega Warships thread over in the new product development section; for my part, I would welcome such a module as a means of providing more ships which can compete on level terms with the "war" classes in the Alpha Octant and LMC. (Not least since those ships would be useful to consider in an FC context, too.)

I'm not sure which I'd sooner want to see worked on first, though; this, more Omega bases, or a second LMC module (or a first M33 module)...


...assuming we ever get any of the above, that is.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 01:42 pm: Edit

I like Omega, so I'd like to see more late war Omega ships. Omega Bases strike me as deeply uninteresting (I mean, like, having all the empires get an extra base in a book otherwise full of interesting late war ships would be fine; a book that revolved around bases? Not so much).

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 01:47 pm: Edit

Ah, well, there's a stitch--in the Omega Warship thread (which is closed), SVC says "only one of these products will be printed" (they being Omega Gunboats, Omega Warships, and Omega First Great War). And Omega Gunboats won that war. Of course, that was in 2007.

I can't see why there couldn't eventually be a Late War Omega Warship expansion. Granted, the printing of counters is always a hinge on these things. But they could also do fine with a product like C4A (i.e. lots of rules and SSDs, no counters)--make all the ships based on basic hull types (so they wouldn't "need" new counters), and then you can build an interesting expansion and not be stapled to the existence of counter sheets.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 01:52 pm: Edit

The problem is that, unlike what happened in Module C5 for the LMC, the logistical elements needed to make the Omega empires campaign compatible are not in print; and they can't simply use the kind of generic bases and civilian units seen over in Alpha.

(Well, I guess the FRA might be a partial exception, but even they are known to adopt several Mæsron civilian units over time.)


In hindsight, I would argue that the Omega empires should probably have been handled the way the LMC ones were; with less fleets offered at a time, but with a more complete range of ships and support units for each empire. (It's too late for the published Omega empires, of course; but, one day, if we ever get around to seeing the likes of the Echarri Dynasty or the Omega-Paravians, I would hope they would be given more concrete introductions than Omega has seen hitherto.)


EDIT: So far as a counter-less file goes, bear in mind that the Vari CC and WC have wholly new hull types.

Actually, as of this moment, the only Vari unit in a formally published module that is armed with particule splitter torpedoes is a gunboat variant. The four PST-armed ships (which also includes torpedo variants of the CA and FH) are still CL-only.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 03:35 pm: Edit

Gary wrote:
>>The problem is that, unlike what happened in Module C5 for the LMC, the logistical elements needed to make the Omega empires campaign compatible are not in print; and they can't simply use the kind of generic bases and civilian units seen over in Alpha.>>

They probably could, for the most part. I mean, yeah, the Alunda would need something weird, but a generic sort of "Base Station" kinda deal could cover most of the Omega empires well enough--a single mid sized BATS kinda deal with interchangeable weapons could stand in for most empires.

As noted, if everyone needed a empire specific base, they could easily make 1 per empire that would fill all the needed roles for a campaign kinda deal (i.e. something that defends borders, repairs ships, acts as a logistics node) that wouldn't take up a lot of space in a Warship expansion. For my money, however, an Omega Bases expansion (i.e. a book of nothing but Omega BS/BATS/SB/FRD/whatever) would be deeply uninteresting.

>>In hindsight, I would argue that the Omega empires should probably have been handled the way the LMC ones were; with less fleets offered at a time, but with a more complete range of ships and support units for each empire. (It's too late for the published Omega empires, of course; but, one day, if we ever get around to seeing the likes of the Echarri Dynasty or the Omega-Paravians, I would hope they would be given more concrete introductions than Omega has seen hitherto.) >>

Meh. I realize that some folks are really into logistics and bases and whatever, but I suspect that in the grand scheme, most folks are mostly interested in cool ships first and bases/logistics units 5th. I mean, yeah, it is good to have some of these around for campaigns and scenarios and whatever, but for the most part, I'm totally ok with giving bases and logistics the short shrift in the name of more cool ships. I've been playing SFB since, like, 1981 or so. And I can *still* count the number of times I've actually played a game involving a SB on one hand. And have used BS/BATS only slightly more often than that.

>>Actually, as of this moment, the only Vari unit in a formally published module that is armed with particule splitter torpedoes is a gunboat variant. The four PST-armed ships (which also includes torpedo variants of the CA and FH) are still CL-only.>>

For my money, I'm totally ok with ships not having correct counters if it means that it gets an otherwise unlikely to see print expansion out of the gate.

-Peter

By Andrew Granger (Captaincf) on Tuesday, August 02, 2011 - 06:23 am: Edit

I have a question. On all of the Omega maps there is a hex labled JF. What is that?

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Tuesday, August 02, 2011 - 08:43 am: Edit

The Jindarian Freehold, it has not been described beyond; "a system that is so rich the Jindarians have a permanent lodgement, and do not allow others in."

By Andrew Granger (Captaincf) on Tuesday, August 02, 2011 - 10:38 am: Edit

I had a feeling it had something to do with them.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Tuesday, August 02, 2011 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Bruce Graw gave a couple of half-developed ideas he had for the Freehold in Omega's Lost Futures; an article in CL36 which also mentioned a few of the other yet-to-be-published empires (such as the Echarri Dynasty and the Vulpa Confederacy).

By Andrew Granger (Captaincf) on Friday, August 05, 2011 - 06:45 pm: Edit

So I had my group play two Omega scenarios. They did not seem too enthusiastic afterward, but it was probably a bad combination of terrain and fleets. The first scenario was a raid on a Maesron world by the Vari. The Maesron planted themselves near the planet and waitied for the Vari to close. Not so great a game. The second was Probr trying to stop the Sigvirion from crossing the map, but the random terrain was an asteroid field. No damage to any ships except for some Probr phaser hits to the Sigs and one weak hit from a HEAT.
The next game will be Chlorophons against the Kolighar, no terrain, but both fleets bring thier own.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, August 05, 2011 - 10:59 pm: Edit

I suspect that if you try a few games that are just a cruiser vs a cruiser (some historical match ups of, like, an Alunda HS vs some Vari cruiser or a couple Hiver ships; a Maesron vs a Koligahr) or small squadron action (a CA and a couple DDs; the Hivers would get, like, a whole fleet!) without terrain or special victory conditions, you'd get a much better feel for the ships and their tech.

Of the basic set empires, the Maesron, Koligahr, Vari, Probr, Alunda, and Hivers are probably the most straight forward and lack excessive rule weirdness (the Alunda have some wacky rules, but they are more color than anything that changes the game significantly).

The Trobrin are kinda straight forward, but the can be stupidly powerful if you aren't expecting what they can do.

The Chlorophons are weird 'cause of the Spore Casters, but more so that they have a lot of trouble doing internal damage (their heavy guns don't really do internals and their phasers are weak in close).

The Drex are generally considered overpowered due to their overly advantageous ECM rules (i.e. they get tons of free ECCM and get a -1 shift when they have more ECCM than their opponent's ECM; consequently they also kind of require you to use EW rules) and the overly powerful enveloping Hyper Cannon.

The Sigvirion are very one trick-pony; either they can keep the range open and kill their opponent with the weird plasmas or they can't and they are crushed.

The Loriyill aren't that complicated, but the flame shields are wacky, and their torps aren't that impressive.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Saturday, August 06, 2011 - 01:46 am: Edit

One idea for the Trobrin might be to wait until you get Module Omega 3 and try the Encounter at Aurora scenario instead; which has a Trobrin CA, FFL and two FFs take on two Auroran CLs and two FFs.

The first wave of FRA ships might be easier for Alpha players to get into the setting with, if they don't feel too comfortable with the "new" fleets just yet; plus that battle makes for a decent scale at which to get some practice in with Trobrin squadron tactics.


(In fact, I made a point of adding that scenario to the Omega playtest rulebook I am working on for Federation Commander; I generally consider the Aurorans to be a good entry point into the Omega Octant from an Alpha perspective, plus I'm hoping any would-be Trobrin squadron commodores there might use this encounter to help learn how to further the Silicate Plan in that game system...)

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Saturday, August 06, 2011 - 01:29 pm: Edit

In my battle group i pulled trobrin and the first thing i did was launch a full salvo at one of the other players, he squeezed into range 1 to get the "perfect" defensive fire and got upset when they all exploded on him. i had atleast 6 plasma in the stack 1 of them a superheavy.

The Phons are NOT weak, the EH will strip your shields like theres no tomorrow and the phasers give +4ECCM ontop of any ECCM you already have, so your almost immune to opposing ECM. that makes thier phasers much more deadly.

My battle group got tired of the Drex always having the super computer so we actually attatched a 15% BPV cost for it. it seems to fix the problem.

The Loriyills main offence is thier Flame shields, the whole "best offence is a good defence" these guys personify that greatly.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 12:43 pm: Edit

Alex wrote:
>>The Phons are NOT weak,>>

What I said was "they have trouble doing internals", which they do.

The EHs strip shields well, and the PQs are good at long range sniping. So if they can keep the range open for an extended period of time, yeah, they'll strip a lot of shields and do consistent, small batches of internals at long range. In close, their PQs are less effective than most other phasers and if their opponents can corner them, they tend to get crushed.

Really, their biggest problem is that their ability to fight seriously depends on map selection--if it is an open map, they can be very effective. If it is a closed map, they tend to get demolished.

By Andy Vancil (Andy) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 02:30 pm: Edit

The Phons are very good at their historical role, which is to convince attackers to go away.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 03:15 pm: Edit

Oh, yeah, they certainly can do that well--you blast off shields at long range, snipe some, and their opponents say "Well, no shields left. Let's go..."

By Andrew Granger (Captaincf) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 06:34 pm: Edit

Thanks for the advice. We have been playing a lot of SFB lately so we are taking a break. I will try to mix the Omegas with the Alphas to see how it goes.

By james lee boyce II (Postalpanzer) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 06:57 pm: Edit

It is hard to corner the phon because he has a good power ratio combined with the spore caster and since most of their weapons are rs/ls they can pretty run away from you and still bring most of their weapons to bear. And though they cant blow up ships they can mizia you to death stripping you of weapons.

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 07:49 pm: Edit

Andrew; Alpha and Omega mix as well as Hydran and Big Plasma, generally fairly well, but there are unexpected bumps. Our group has house rule that you can buy up enough warp for the Omegans to be able to go speed 30(no more) at 2 BPV per warp box, it works reasonably well for a kludge.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Sunday, August 07, 2011 - 08:04 pm: Edit

Part of the issue is that most of the printed Omega ships are equivalent to unrefitted Middle Years hulls in the Alpha Octant; unlike in the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, little in the way of refits or "war" classes have been shown as of yet.

I'm not sure too many people think of the Middle Years Alpha ships when they try cross-Octant mash-ups, though...

There are a couple of glimpses here and there; the Vari get two speed-30 cruisers (the Command Cruiser and Wing Cruiser) in Captain's Log #23, for example.

By and large, we'll probably have to wait for the "Omega Warships" module (if/when that ever rolls around) before we get wider range of ships that would truly match refitted Alpha and LMC units.

By Andrew Granger (Captaincf) on Monday, August 08, 2011 - 04:17 am: Edit

Actually, the first thing that went through my mind was that the Omegas are pretty equal to pre-refit Alphas. So that is how I am going to play them. It should make things easier.

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Tuesday, August 09, 2011 - 02:44 am: Edit

I am a part of A. David Merritt's battle group, David has played since college (a good 20-25 years ago), one player has played longer then David, and another player has been going about 15 years i think. When there is a basic hull design that is missing, its usually between David, Daniel (15 years), and myself. but we can BUILD the ship thats missing reasonably well. such as we made conjectural Trobrin Pol and DD.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, August 09, 2011 - 02:33 pm: Edit

Joel has updated and added to the Omega Page, which many Omega fans never knew we had created years ago.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, August 09, 2011 - 02:34 pm: Edit

http://www.starfleetgames.com/omegasector.shtml