That autokill rule (302.617) still has yet to actually apply. This is the first time it could have applied, but the Hydrans chose instead to fry a C8.

Ships have been killed the old-fashioned way however. In the 1013 battle, it's been AH and 2LB for D6M and C8, with another AH probably about to die shortly.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 08:40 am: Edit

In true luck.... in the least relevant battle I rolled higher than William!

5 rolls - averages were 4.8 VBIR, 3.4 Alliance and 2 for the Coalition!

The key battle (1013) the Hydrans averaged 3.5 v the Coalition 1.5 though - with average luck Coalition probably would have had 3 less cripples (I would have still lost though, although William might have had to direct on the targets rather than my ships!)

I'll let William post the damage - but a good turn for the Alliance.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 08:49 am: Edit

Alliance turn 3 is done. Hydrans lost 2LB, SC and 2AH while killing C8, D6M, BATS 1013, and an MB setup at 1013. The Coalition also had 9 ships crippled on that front, mostly D5.

On the Kzinti front, the Kzinti killed 3 small ships that had strayed out of range of the Coalition reserves. Otherwise they simply set up for Coalition turn 4, which is likely to involve the capture of Kzintai.

Hydrans and Kzinti each have a small reserve and a medium-large reserve. The small one tends to be about 40 DefPot -- enough to swing a battle that the Coalition was planning to win by a small margin.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 04:42 pm: Edit

Will post builds shortly.... but can the Klingons roll higher than a 2 this turn?

Lyran - Survey roll was a 10 (so fair enough) - total is 43 after 12 rolls.

Klingon - Survey roll was a 3 (and after last turns 4....) - total is 14 after 6 rolls!! Klingons should be closer to 21.... (and if I roll less than 6 next turn, they will still not have found a province!!)

B10 - 1 rolled so total is 5 after 2 rolls.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 05:02 pm: Edit

'should be' leads to madness.

Random numbers can be outliers. It's part of the randomness.

If this is an issue, one (with opponent's agreement) alter the random number generator in some way, even just assuming each die is 3.5, or do a coin flip and do 3 or 4.

Or if you really like outliers, you could do a coin flip and assume the next 10 rolls are each a 1 if you get heads, or a 6 if you get tails.

Fun fun!

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 05:11 pm: Edit

Richard - can't disagree.

But why can't I average 4.5 then?

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 05:30 pm: Edit

I recall many years ago playing some miniatures game (probably either Napoleonic or Ancient, though I don't recall for sure) that used dice with sides 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5; to give a more Gaussian distribution and reduce spread between best and worst results.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 08:19 pm: Edit

If you can get your opponent to agree, you can reroll any die that takes your average below 4.5. Problem solved, Paul.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Wednesday, May 01, 2019 - 08:21 pm: Edit

Or if one doesn't like extremes, with opponent agreement, any roll of 1 or 6 on a die must be re-rolled (whatever the result is, it is kept). This would reduce the extreme swings.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, May 02, 2019 - 02:23 am: Edit

Alan - In the UK they are called Average Dice - certainly have played Napoleonic Rules with them and they do help reduce some extremes.

Richard - Well, it hasn't reached that extreme yet...but the Klingons seem to be a little unlucky at the moment

By jim howard (Noseybonk) on Thursday, May 02, 2019 - 07:22 am: Edit

now Paul, don't tar the Klingons with that brush. in our 1st game my Klingons did very well thank you, and your alliance rolled bad... see a pattern forming here :P

By Ted Fay (Catwhoeatsphoto) on Thursday, May 02, 2019 - 09:58 am: Edit

Or switch to a game that doesn't require dice. Like chess.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Friday, May 03, 2019 - 06:56 pm: Edit

The cute tabby who visited the Foremost budget ministry was actually working for the Patriarch. Resourceful little Oliver has safely returned to Kzintai with the documents, which show that the Klingons have built a TGB instead of a TGA and have almost no savings. The Patriarch has ordered that the information be shared with the Humans at once, and with the Hydrans as soon as practical.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Friday, May 03, 2019 - 07:33 pm: Edit

lol William. I needed a good cat story today. Thank you.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, May 04, 2019 - 06:02 am: Edit

Lyrans

DN -
CA STT (S)
3 x CW -
2 x DW -
DW DWS (S)
3 x FF -



Command Point
Battle Pod


Conversions
CL BC

Repairs
104 FF
504 4 x CW
705 CW
408 DW
1407 BC, 3 x CC, CA, 2 x CW, D7C, 3 x D5,

27.3 Ep's left - 20 Ep will be sent to Klingons

Klingons

C8 -
D7 TGB (S)
D6 D6M (S)
D5 D5V (S)
D5 4 x AD5 (3 C and 1 S)
D5 5 x D5
F5 2 x F5E(1 C and 1 S)
F5 4 x F5
3 x E4 -



B10 Roll


Conversions
NR & SR 3 x F5E


Repairs
906 F5
1307 D7C
1407 D7C, D7, 4 x D5, 2 x F5S
1507 2 x F5
1707 2 x F5


Several hulls have not been repaired - seriously thought about downgrading the C8 to a B10 roll (as it would save 11 Ep's), but with no Klingon C8s currently alive....I really needed it!

Also note..... no mothballs this turn!!

I was expecting to get a Klingon Off Map province - so things are very tight at the moment!

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Saturday, May 04, 2019 - 06:59 am: Edit

No C8s alive? How did that happen?

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Saturday, May 04, 2019 - 08:33 am: Edit

With money this tight, why convert F5E's (8 of them, I think?) instead of activating more ships? Like, F5E's are cool and all, but generally speaking, the minor upgrade in compot per line is probably less useful at this point than more ships on the map.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Saturday, May 04, 2019 - 02:46 pm: Edit

The HydZinti kinda don't like C8s. The Kzinti fried two of them over side planets at Kzintai, and the Hydran CA/CC line traded an LB for the last one.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, May 04, 2019 - 04:31 pm: Edit

Thomas - as per Williams reply

A couple of good rolls over 1401 last turn in some of the side battles and William got an easy kill (VBIR up 2 and he rolled a 6 - and didn't direct on the BATS or Tug (in form) setting up the MB on the Hydran front over 1013 on the Alliance turn!

Peter - Well, I wanted to start to get some good Carrier lines to the front - and as I am deferring the Mothball ships, I felt it was a reasonable exchange - but thinking about it, your probably right - 3 more and immediate ships or +6 compot….

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 08:04 am: Edit

Coalition turn 4 op moves are underway. Assaults on Kzintai and the Count's SB appear to be developing. On the Hydran front, several BATS on the Klingon border are undefended and are under attack by superior forces. Other BATS and SB are under attack but are also defended.

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 08:37 am: Edit

>>Peter - Well, I wanted to start to get some good Carrier lines to the front - and as I am deferring the Mothball ships, I felt it was a reasonable exchange - but thinking about it, your probably right - 3 more and immediate ships or +6 compot….>>

Yeah, like, you want the F5E's *eventually*, but as of T4, the Klingons still don't have that many good CVs in play anyway, so even with the F5Es on there, you still probably don't want to put them on the line (as opposed to just feeding forward 6IFF squadrons); if you do, you can use ad-hoc F5Ls for 3 attack (instead of 4 with an F5E) and not really suffer significantly.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 10:13 am: Edit

On turn four your D6Vs can do 21 compot in three ship groups, your CVTs can do 22 and TGA(2VP)s do 23, if you are in range to link up with new AD5s and F5Es. You can convert three ships into escorts at 1509, and a few BATS are in range of 1411 if not yet destroyed (so any escorts built there can be used for this). Similarly, a few Hydran BATs are in range of the SR SB, so an AD5 and F5E built there can link up with a carrier for attacks on the border of the Hydrans.

Other AD5s and F5Es built on turn four can be moved up to the front during strategic movement and incorporated into reserves with any unused carriers (perhaps from new construction if otherwise unused). In any case you'd want enough AD5s and F5Es built on C4 to escort your D6Vs and up, letting you get lines that get CW+ compot without needing 9+ CW/CA class hulls.

F5Es are as hard to kill as F5Ls in non adhoc three ship carrier groups and cost the same, while giving more compot in such cases, while providing a cheaply repaired ship to take damage on without diluting compot (as opposed to F5s on the line).

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 11:24 am: Edit

I'm not like, suggesting that F5E's are *bad*; just that in this particular instance where the Klingons are giving up mothball activations in the name of more money for F5E conversions (I mean, essentially), early in the war, when the Klingons need as many hulls as they can get on the map, it is probably best to forgo F5E conversions this turn in the name of activating the extra mothball ships.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 11:29 am: Edit

You could sub a couple F5s for D5s to scape up some more EPs. I wonder what the Klingon starting treasury was, I think I counted 142.5 EP spent total.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, May 05, 2019 - 11:31 am: Edit

Also, I think I would have left a D7 unrepaired and activated 2D6 at least, it takes forever to run out of D6 activations, might as well not skip them (and two D6s are probably better than one D7).