Has it really been 14 days and nobody has seen and commented on the last post from John Stiff?

I'm not looking at my rulebook, and I might be putting my proverbial foot in mouth, but... I am so confident of this reply that I am not even going to double-check.

John, I do not believe the ISC needs another roll to maintain wave-lock in the situation you describe. Once you have wave-lock, you keep it.

[...]

OK, confession. I broke down and checked. I am sort-of correct. The target moving to longer range does NOT break the wave-lock.

The only way to force a new wave-lock roll in the tournament is to launch a Wild Weasel and generate an ECM shift. Or, getting out of the FA arc of the ISC ship, so at least one pulse is lost. If and when the ISC gets you back into the FA arc, it will need a new lock-on roll. And maybe another edge case or so...

News on SFB at Council 2022 and 2023 coming real soon. Like probably tonight! Watch for that in the Tournaments > Council of Five Nations thread.

-DC

By David Cheng (Davec) on Tuesday, June 28, 2022 - 11:55 pm: Edit

Yes, the big Council announcement you have been waiting (liteally) years for really is finally posted:

> Company-Conventions-Stores-Ideas

> > Convention News (Multi Games)

> > > Council of Five Nations

Please email me with your answers to the three questions!

-DC

By John L Stiff (Tarkin22180) on Saturday, July 02, 2022 - 11:07 am: Edit

David - thanks. It is risky to trust one's memory at my age. A change in range does not break the wave-lock. An unfavorable ECM shift forces a re-roll.

Actually, having re-read the rules, moving out of arc of the PPD breaks the wave-lock and all subsequent pulses are lost. As does moving out of overload range of an overloaded PPD.

John

By Geoffrey Clark (Spartan) on Thursday, July 07, 2022 - 07:55 am: Edit

Hey Jack,

RE your question about Stan's TKR vs Gregg's ISC ...

As a Romulan, I always considered it to be a blessing to have a cloaking device, and in this case I would really consider the cloak under-run, as it has been called. The basic idea is to move about 13 hexes, and using every means possible to save power ... no AFC, holding G-torps, etc. The TFH is a bit better than the TKR in this way. The idea is to get as close a possible, and in some sort of a favorable position vs the ISC, like off his flank.

Turn 2, the Rom then comes out of cloak, moving 26 or so, and needs to try to minimize the plasma launched by the ISC by some means, but ultimately just take those torps, probably 40 G&F. This is the price to pay for avoiding the PPD entirely. The actual Rom attack can be at the Rom's option ... bolt / run into a corner / anchor, depending on the circumstances.

Anyway, I hope this gives an idea about one option that I consider to be rather potent.

Regards,
Geof

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Thursday, December 21, 2023 - 12:22 pm: Edit

Anyone got an opinion about the win-loss ratio of the orion HB package?

By Jack Taylor (Jtaylor) on Saturday, December 30, 2023 - 01:47 pm: Edit

Carl - have you been here yet:

http://rwschirmer.weebly.com/

Scroll down on homepage there and look for ace vs ace matches. The lion's share of all matches in Orion are with the HB package. I think you would get a pretty good idea of where the Orion fits in just assuming all the games were in the HB package. They aren't, but still, I best 90% of them are.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 01, 2024 - 12:42 pm: Edit

Jack, thanks to you I took a look at the schirmer's page a second time and found my own stats.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 01, 2024 - 02:32 pm: Edit

PPHff 2-2
PPH1f 2-1
PPPff 8-5
PgP11 2-0
PgHff 0-1
FFgff 1-0
1HHBB 1-0
HHgff 1-1
1HHff 0-1

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Monday, January 01, 2024 - 06:42 pm: Edit

I think the HB, HB, gat, b, b (or 1, b) is the best Orion, no contest.

Hellbores are incredibly good. With drones for padding, the Hellbores survive late into the game, where they become much more effective. Big crunch ships are always a problem for the Orion, regardless of the weapon load. But if you are just taking a package blind, HB, HB, gat, b, b is likely to work out well.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Tuesday, January 02, 2024 - 02:05 pm: Edit

It was a long time ago but I seem to have won a couple of games with the HB orion. Can't recall anything Maybe I liked it , maybe not. The present me notes that the HBs with padding probably would last longer than the engines:D
and that seem suboptimal.

I'll probably go with PPPff as one of the packages .

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Tuesday, January 02, 2024 - 02:37 pm: Edit

PPPff is pretty strong in the "I double everything, get to R4, roll the dice, and possibly just win on the first shot" kinda way, but the energy cost of the photons results in lower reinforcement, and possibly losing out to another heavy hitting ship (and also, lacks the gatling). But I have certainly seen the PPPff do very well (my buddy Dave went 7-0 and won in Saturday Patrol one year at Origins in that thing, but as it was Saturday Patrol, folks were very inclined to just concede immediately if the first exchange was disadvantageous).

The H, H, g, b, b version tends to be much more of a finesse ship that allows flexibility in the face of, like, Big Plasma and heavy drones; you don't need to commit to a serious, risky, early close exchange, and as the game goes on and both ships take damage, the Orion is *still* gonna have both HBs and the gatling till it pretty much blows up, so fighting at R8 against a damaged opponent with a down shield or two is very effective, and with the gat, you can make a devastating unexpected attack run on an off turn.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Wednesday, January 03, 2024 - 08:30 am: Edit

Let's assume PPPff and HHgbb.

Fed Photon package
Kli photons
Kzi Hellbore for drone defense
Ori photons
And either works
Hyd photons
Lyr photons
Tho Photons
Grn Hellbore for plasma defence
Rom Hellbore for plasma defence
Wyn Hellbore for drone defence
Aux Hellbore for drone defence
ISC Hellbore for plasma defence

By Timothy Linden (Timlinden) on Thursday, January 04, 2024 - 03:42 pm: Edit

One nice thing about the drone/hellbore padding for the orion is that it works both ways. If the orion gets into a situation where both are taking oodles of internals, the hellbores can pad the drones instead. You'd rather have hellbores, but if you cannot power them you'd rather have the drones instead. Fortunately you get to choose!

The Fed has the most problems of the 'big crunch' opponents versus the HHgbb orion. As the orion will win a R1 exchange 99% of the time due to the photon feedback. The fed has to manage a R2 shot (not easy, though not quite as hard to do as I had thought it was) and have a way to delay dealing with drones long enough. And even then they have to hit with all 4 photons (marginally less than 50%) or they still lose.

I found the most problems with the klingon with that orion. Too much drones and direct firepower, as well as flexibility on their part. Then the Gorn (mostly Peter's fault). Versus Lyrans I still use the HHgbb package, and generally it works fine. Even if more annoying.

Tim

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Thursday, January 04, 2024 - 04:21 pm: Edit

I thought it would have good drone def vs the klink. Hm, i guess being reactive with your launches is problematic.

I have used the photon package vs the fed, but perhaps the HB is better.

By Timothy Linden (Timlinden) on Monday, January 08, 2024 - 03:59 pm: Edit

That Orion has excellent drone defense, but, the Klingon will take every chance to smack your shields while you are dealing with their drones. At a range where you cannot smack the Klingon around back that much. A well flown Klingon can normally take advantage of that enough to make the difference overall. Especially when they do not Have to launch the SP right off, and can even go for a hack and slash attempt if the Orion is not wary enough. The Shark can do this, but is not as good at it. And the Kzinti does not have the firepower to really pull that off.

Hellbores just do too much damage to really pass up IMO. Many otherwise close games became 'easy' wins once you get a point blank final exchange with hellbores crashing through 2+ down shields - 60 damage becomes 40 internals for 2 down shields, and that sort of multi shield internals lets you hit otherwise out of arc phasers. That has often just outright blown the opponent up. Does not matter that you only have a couple of power and a gatling left if they are expanding gases!

Tim.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, January 08, 2024 - 06:24 pm: Edit

I feel the need to carry drones lessen the appeal of HBs. Still the record says I have played HB package and won.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Friday, March 01, 2024 - 02:35 am: Edit

I recall a fan page with damage probability charts for every tourney ship.
Anyone know more about that?

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, March 18, 2024 - 04:22 am: Edit

Re-visiting the HB package conundrum

HHBBB. Six drones over a turn break, but you loose the gatling.


Or PPPBB, you build up the drone wave while arming overloads. Next turn you attack

By Graham Cridland (Grahamcridland) on Wednesday, October 16, 2024 - 11:33 am: Edit

On Orions...

On the list above I would take a HB package against Feds and probably Lyrans instead of PPPff. PPPff is for ships you want to murder in one impulse, like a Krait, another Orion, or a WAX, and yeah, maybe a Klingon. HBs are the standard, anything else is something you do because you don't think HBs work.

To my reason for posting... does anyone have a link to the "Victory" article Sir_Cruiser (I think? Maybe Sir_Starfurry.) after one of the RAT's he won in the Orion? I remember he was super-aggressive and doubled both most every turn and wanted to read it again. But I can't find a link and Google stinks at this nowadays.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Wednesday, October 16, 2024 - 11:37 pm: Edit

iwould like to see that one too. Maybe internetr archive got a copy

By Paul Franz (Andromedan) on Thursday, October 17, 2024 - 05:21 pm: Edit

I have one on the SFB Online site that might be what you are looking for. It is written by Norman Cruz. It is a "Almost Victory At" article. He came in second place. It is at:

Almost Victory At

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Thursday, October 17, 2024 - 06:24 pm: Edit

Fantastic! Tnx Paul!

By Graham Cridland (Grahamcridland) on Saturday, October 19, 2024 - 11:28 am: Edit

Thank you, Paul!

By Graham Cridland (Grahamcridland) on Saturday, October 19, 2024 - 11:31 am: Edit

Having reread it, I forgot that the packages were FgF1f and HgHbb and that the F torp package was taken in every non-plasma game. (It isn't entirely clear that the first package has only one fusion, but he refers to "the fusion" a couple of times so I think the above is correct.)

It also appears that he and Paul Scott dominated Origins in the same ship with the same strategies they developed together.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Sunday, October 20, 2024 - 09:50 am: Edit

yes, that's correct. I recently bought a digital copy of the CL with Pauls article in it.