This is a new game between myself (as the bad guys - Alliance) and Jim Howard (as the good guys - the Coalition).

We are deciding what rule packs to include : -

2010 Rules + FO+AO+CO

Advanced Raids are probably out, but PO and SO are under discussion.

Jim would like to play some of PO and SO - I would prefer to ignore both though

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, November 24, 2018 - 01:53 pm: Edit

OK - dragged my rules from Storage.

PO - I like some of the aspect (Rapid Combat Repair, Espionage & Sabotage and Resistance Movements) - although this adds to perhaps slowing the game down, as it adds further steps to each turn.

SO - don't think there is anything I real like is in this rules set.

Will be on Skype later.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Saturday, November 24, 2018 - 04:16 pm: Edit

Comments from the peanut gallery. Rapid Combat Repair doesn't slow the game down that much. E&S Missions and Resistance Movements won't slow it down too much to be very noticeable.

If you use the Minor Ship Yard Rules (450.0) from PO then you might want to consider Engineers from SO.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Saturday, November 24, 2018 - 05:26 pm: Edit

Engineers in SO are very nice, just sayin'.

Diplomacy is kinda fun too (from SO), and there are new ships there as well.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, November 25, 2018 - 03:54 am: Edit

I have played with both PO and SO....

….and other than probably Advanced Raids, I don't think there are any rules which can be taken out individually and keep the game balanced.

Advanced Raids hurt both sides...probably equally.

Coalition lose a lot more crippled ships but Alliance lose more key hulls.

So probably fair if it's ignored.

Absolutely also hate the Diplomacy Rules (makes the Hydran expedition even easier to stop primarily) - and Engineers are very pro-Coalition...

But thinking about it - perhaps Advanced Raids would help balance Engineers as it at least stops Engineers being used near the front line.

All just my 2p

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Sunday, November 25, 2018 - 05:04 am: Edit

I like the minor shipyards and the colonies.

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Sunday, November 25, 2018 - 05:08 am: Edit

espionage diplomacy police stuff all fluff to me. its about ships and economics not dandy stuff :P and even though im playing the bad guys again, anything that stops the hydrans reclaiming the whole kingdom back is a bad thing :P


founder member of the 'sod off vudar thats my land' (uk west country accent.) campaign :P

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Sunday, November 25, 2018 - 05:10 am: Edit

that and I actually need to find the rules again.... recently packed it all away just about two weeks before this and can I remember which box the rules are in, found the counters and original rules, but...…….

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, November 25, 2018 - 03:29 pm: Edit

Jim

Know what you mean....I have the Warhammer 40K 8th Edition Rules...somewhere.

Let me know when you track them down

By Karl Mangold (Karlsolomon) on Friday, November 30, 2018 - 10:59 am: Edit

Paul, just a reminder to check your game settings before you start. I followed your game "across the pond" and it looked like you had inadvertently set the game to "difficult," giving your opponent a +2 die roll modifier for the duration. /jk

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Friday, November 30, 2018 - 04:21 pm: Edit

Karl

Yep that would sound about right!!!

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Friday, November 30, 2018 - 06:42 pm: Edit

jinxed already, sigh.....

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Sunday, December 23, 2018 - 12:39 am: Edit

looks like I wont be 'able' to search for the rules until early February which is a pain in the rear. ill check over Christmas to make sure the additional stuff isn't near the counters and other stuff, here's to hoping.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, December 23, 2018 - 04:29 am: Edit

Hi Jim

No problem - hope you have a good Christmas!

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Wednesday, January 23, 2019 - 12:17 pm: Edit

Hi Jim

Any luck finding your rules?

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Friday, January 25, 2019 - 04:07 am: Edit

been delayed variously should start looking in boxes sometime next week.

chomping at the bit to start really though.

the guys on 'And now for something completely different' don't post often enough ( three times a day :P) to give me my F&E campaign fix.

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Monday, February 25, 2019 - 06:56 am: Edit

ok, now that SoRCon is out of the way (and stopped just before the end of coalition combat on turn four (we left the capital assault on Kzintai for next year ) I will search for A/O & S/O rules in the next couple of weeks, or we could go ahead with a new vanilla game as soon as I sort out downloading vassal again. I do have P/O and F/O to hand.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Monday, February 25, 2019 - 03:59 pm: Edit

Hi Jim

So who was winning?

AO is pretty crucial and is probably the one add on pack we do want to play.

Happy with F/O - P/O and S/O (Strategic Op - not the old Special Operations) add some issues (Advanced Raids and Diplomacy) which I think weaken the game

I would suggest
2010
Combined Ops
Advanced Ops
Fighter Ops

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Monday, February 25, 2019 - 08:26 pm: Edit

I have only found PO and FO atm I will be looking again for AO and SO.


the Kzinti hadn't really fought on the retreat, Robbie is entirely a newbie to F&E like the fact he built a SB on 701 on the 1st day... at the start of the 2nd day I said basically he didn't do that and the two trapped fleets at 701 and 902 could be unspent ep's and relocated to the capital to avoid a restart. Matthew could only make Friday and Sunday and is also a rusticated F&E player from the original 86 version 30 years ago.

I did give them as much advice as possible but one instance was Robbie taking an entire hour to say no reaction to a movement of a large Klingon fleet. to be fair its a lot to take in even if you did play SFB regularly 30 years ago and know the universe fairly fluently. I kept missing the free fighters for the Klingons for instance took until turn four for me to remember to convert some FV's to soak up the free fighters, so although im a rookie and they are novices it was fun all round, plus the fact when you haven't seen a mate in 22 years you do have some catching up to do

perhaps you can book the time off for next years SoRCon paul…. and anyone else interested in joining us. think of it as a three day multi year game of stratcon in the UK.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, February 26, 2019 - 02:27 am: Edit

Mmmmm

Sounds like each side perhaps needed a "Voice of Reason" - not necessarily playing by committee but 'do this'?

Did you try and play a mini-scenario (i.e. over one evening) to get people aware of the rules and basic's?

Next year - who knows!

OK on finding the rules.

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Tuesday, February 26, 2019 - 04:54 am: Edit

I was fair I gave them all the options (as many as I could remember including what I might do ( if I was thinking of doing three things I would tell them all of them )) they chose, then I did what I was going to do anyway. I told Robbie to more aggressively defend 1202 and 1704 he chose not to react into them fearing the capital assault on turn three. I said im clearly not attacking the capital but he still chose not to react.

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Thursday, March 07, 2019 - 07:58 am: Edit

so when do you want to start and what rules etc etc?.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Friday, March 08, 2019 - 01:17 pm: Edit

Hi Jim

Happy to start this week!

I would suggest
2010
Combined Ops
Advanced Ops
Fighter Ops

Overall, I think these 3 rule packages are more or less balanced (and with the changes to Carriers, perhaps some of the extremes have been reduced in effect).

Which rules sets do you now have?

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Saturday, March 09, 2019 - 06:04 am: Edit

as before just FO/PO atm AO/SO/CO in the shed still boxed amongst a lot of other stuff.

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Saturday, March 09, 2019 - 06:07 am: Edit

i'll do a recheck tonight when I get back. i'm off to Suffolk in a few minutes. it might be where I found the set up stuff when I was at day 2 of SoRCon. (Son Of Ramsden Con.) ie a day too late ...D'oh