Well, Williams luck continued for the rest of the turn.

By the end of A9, average was VBIR 3.45, Coalition 3.0 and Alliance 3.95.

Couple of key rolls really hurt the Coalition and just when I thought I would get a crippled LC in pursuit..... I rolled another 1 for damage (so a HN died and I crippled a BC).

I think the Alliance will be very happy with the north (bar 1 issue) and happy with the south.

In the south, the Hydrans kept everything in supply...

But in the north, the Kzinti's will be Out of Supply for fighter replacements (they are in supply for retro though, as they can get to the Kzinti BATS).

Hydrans lost a valuable Paladin (and the HN and 2 SC's) and Coalition lost a C8, D6M and F5S over 617.

About my only success was holding 617.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Sunday, September 22, 2019 - 04:10 pm: Edit

Alliance turn 9 is done. Due to a combination of unfortunate circumstances, the Hydrans had to retro all of their ships offmap. Their onmap fleets simply had too many problems in their current locations. They will be back.

The Kzinti sent most of their ships to their two remaining BATS. They have a few crips in Fed space and two offmap reserves -- a 3-ship CVL group, and a one-ship reserve.

The Feds sent a lot of forces to the Romulan front. The 3rd fleet SB is defended by a bit less than a full battle line as the threat to it is limited. Paul could certainly pull a reserve down there, but I doubt he can take the hex.

There are also a lot of forces in and near the 4th fleet region. The Feds now have three SB up there. Not sure if he could kill one or not. But he certainly can't kill all of them.

Two of their reserves are still tied to the 5th and 6th fleets. Of the other two, there is one each facing the Klingons and the Romulans.

Being Feds, they spent 14EP on field repairs.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 05:10 am: Edit

End of Turn 9 and start of turn 10...

Romulans split Western Fleet over 4010 and 3516 with 3 Ships at permitted SB's for conversion.

Lyrans Survey roll of 7 (104 total)

Builds : DN, STT, 2 x CW, 2 x DW, 3 x FF, CWE and DWE.

Conversions CL>BC(408), CC>CV(411) and MB>BATS(1401)

Repairs - 57/5 Ep's spent and 0.3 Ep's left.

Klingons

Survey Rolls 6 (57 Total)

Builds : C8*, TGB, D6M, 8 x D5, 6 x F5, 3 x E4 and a D5V.

* - There may be a design flaw in the C8 - as they just keep exploding in Combat.

Conversion: F5>FV (2318)

Other Costs
B10 Roll of 3 (27)
Mothball 2 x D6;s
Command Point

Repairs 52 Ep's

Balance of 0.1 Eps.

It should be noted that the bulk of the crippled Klingon ships on the Federation Border have been repaired, due to an escalation of aggressive Federation patrols along the border.

Romulans

Builds : SUP, FH, 3 x SP, SPF, SKE, SK, SKF, FAL, SN

Conversions : SP>SPB(4015, SK>SKE(4015), SK>SKB(3518), WE>KE(4514), SN>BHE(3518)*

* I have estimated cost is 2 Ep's - closest comparison I could find is the Kzinti FF to FKE

Balance 2 Eps

Noting the aggressive actions of the Federation, the Romulans would prefer peace but must prepare for war.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 08:11 am: Edit

Paul, the Lyran CV requires 3 total escorts. See (515.211). I don't know if you have a third escort sitting somewhere awaiting the Lyran CV.

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 08:21 am: Edit

An ad-hoc FF, I'd imagine...

By Stefano Predieri (Preda) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 09:41 am: Edit

BH are the pre-Smarba Romulan DD not heavy frigate. So it shouldn't be possible to turn an SN in any BH variant, and even assuming it possible to convert it, I'll give it a conversion cost compared to FF->DWE.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 10:25 am: Edit

Thomas - there are a few escorts dotted around...somehow they seemed to move one way though...and their carriers another way!

Peter - if I have to... (and there actually is a FFE which got converted last turn as I wanted an escort for a group and the only hull available was the SB built FF...)

Stefano - it's an 2010 permitted conversion if your not playing with AO (as their is no SN escort in '2010' - you gain it in AO)

By Stewart Frazier (Frazikar2) on Friday, September 27, 2019 - 06:47 pm: Edit

The SN/BHE is in F&E2K(R4) for 1.5 EP. Annex 751.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, September 28, 2019 - 02:39 pm: Edit

Thanks Stewart

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, September 28, 2019 - 02:43 pm: Edit

Due to the continued actions from the evil Federation Empire, loyal Kzinti forces have crossed into Federation space.

(In other news, the planned invasion of the Federation was nearly called off due a lack of reactions into Loyal Kzinti space by the Federations, which would have caused major delays to the planned 'liberation' of large areas of Federation space and so a smaller 'limited' liberation has started).

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, September 28, 2019 - 02:47 pm: Edit

The turn 10 invasion will not be massively effective - due to so many crippled ships still, but hopefully I can do some damage to the Federation economy.

The Romulans and southern Klingon forces are about equal to the Federation forces on the border, 3 x SB and 4 reserves.

By chris upson (Misanthropope) on Saturday, September 28, 2019 - 07:05 pm: Edit

what kind of fleet does it take to be equal to a starbase in the sense you mean, here?

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, September 29, 2019 - 04:21 am: Edit

Chris

Sorry, should have been clear, the Fed fleet is based on a BATS, 3 x SB and the 4 reserves are all in the South

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Sunday, September 29, 2019 - 11:36 am: Edit

The Invasion has commenced. It appears that the Fed economy will be reduced by about 30EP, give or take, including the 10EP for Orion.

About 10 BATS will be lost, as will whichever minor planet the Feds choose not to reserve.

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 29, 2019 - 12:53 pm: Edit

Ok, so on T10, the Klingons and Romulans both attacked the Feds, after the Feds having turns 7, 8, and 9 to build up and reposition.

Realistically, what does the situation look like for the Feds? Are they in reasonably ok shape? Is the invasion an avalanche of destruction? Are the Feds already capable of striking back in places?

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Sunday, September 29, 2019 - 07:12 pm: Edit

I would have said no SB were going down, but we now have an unexpected SB assault, as Paul sent a reserve-drawing force to the Fed 3rd, and I took a look at his force and decided to use the reserve to mug a BATS assault instead. The Feds have 9 ships plus the SB against 20 Klingons, and both fleets have lowish quality (no CR 10 ship for the Klingons, and lots of DD for the Feds).

The Klingons took Hydrax on turn 9 and still have a lot of crips, so this turn the overall pressure on the Feds is not that great. Next turn it will ramp up on both fronts. But the Klingons are still going to be in the throes of their repair cycle.

I assume there will be localized Federation counterattacks on the Alliance turn, yes.

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 29, 2019 - 08:09 pm: Edit

Interesting. Thanks!

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Monday, September 30, 2019 - 01:54 am: Edit

Coalition turn 10 battles have started..

A couple of good rolls for the Coalition was then destroyed by the Coalition (and to be fair the Alliance), failing to roll 3+ to direct cripple the annoying BATS in 1803.

Net result was the Klingon D6M was direct crippled by the Kzinti and the Coaliton then fled from the undamaged Kzinti BATS (and William rolled a 6 for pursuit).

1902 has been crippled and time will tell if the Coalition kill it this turn.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Tuesday, October 01, 2019 - 01:28 am: Edit

The SB assault did not succeed. Paul could have made an attempt by spending command points and self killing, but even that would have succeeded in crippling the SB only if he rolled a little better than I did. In the event, he rolled a lot better, but he could not have known that at the time he chose not to spend the command points, and spending his only 2CP and doing a bunch of self killing, only to fail because of equal or worse rolls, would have been a total disaster for him.

At the SB, Paul did manage to give better than he got in terms of EP damage. The Feds had to take SIDS and crips while preserving fighters in order to keep their compot up. They ended up with 4 SIDS, 8EP of crips and a dead DD, or 22EP lost total, while the Klingon loss was something like 17EP of crips.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, October 01, 2019 - 02:25 am: Edit

The Back up plan over 2211 was to get some cheap SIDS, so that was a success.

I did look at CP's - but I felt with only 2 or 3 rounds of combat likely, the extra hull or hull wasn't worth it.

Could have squeezed another ship or two there - but the reserve would then have turned up, so would have got a BATS - but with only 23 compot at the BATS, would have been a tough fight.

On dice - Offensive Cloaks have worked twice, failed twice and not worked about 16 times - so massively above the average falure rate on those already!

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, October 01, 2019 - 08:31 am: Edit

Well,the dice gods clearly love the Alliance still.

Overall dice was pretty similar (might even have rolled slightly up) but timing of dice was pretty much one side.

Small battles I generally rolled well (and the Alliance similar or worse) but at the key rolls the dice gods favoured the Alliance.

Main points

Both Kzinti BATS remain alive (1 is crippled though) and they do remain cut off from the main grid.

Federation lost 10 BATS, a minor planet (3612)a NCL and a DD.

Coalition lost a CW, 2 x F5L (one was already crippled) F5, KRM, BHE, SKE and a K5S.

Both sides have a modest pile of cripples.

The key difference between Alliance Turn 9 and Coalition turn 10 was reserves - the Federation reserves basically rolled well (and therefore allowed them to beat up smaller Romulan force) whereas the Coalition reserves rolled horribly.

On Offensive Cloak usage - numbers don't look too good, 4 Success, 2 Failures and 12 no effects (should have been 5/1/12).

Alliance even captured another hull (a F5) and so are 3 v 2 up on captures.

Wierdly also - we seemed to roll a lot (and I do mean a lot) of 1's and 6's.

In 50's rolls - we rolled 4 triple 1 results and 2 triple 6's!

I also rolled 3 1's and 4 1's in a row for Coalition damage

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, October 03, 2019 - 08:22 am: Edit

Kzinti economy, turn 10

Survey roll 9
Survey total 105
Survey EP 10
Offmap 17
Income 27
From last turn 8.5
Total Money 35.5

Builds
Shipyard 15 (turn 3 of 6)
FF 2.5

Total spending 17.5

Money after Econ 18

Marquis grid 2EP, spent on fighters and supply

Also: 3CP available

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, October 03, 2019 - 08:36 am: Edit

Hydran economy, turn 10

Survey roll 5
Survey total 73
Survey EP 6
Offmap 17
Income 23
From last turn 2.5
Scrap captured D5 2
Total Money 27.5

Repairs
Offmap 19.5

Build
CU 2.5

Conversions
3x(HN>SC) 3

Total spending 25

Money after Econ 2.5

Also: 2CP avaialable

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, October 03, 2019 - 08:47 am: Edit

Federation economy, turn 10

The new SB on the Kzinti border have been named the 8th Fleet SB (2004) and the 9th Fleet SB (2103)

Survey roll (7 dice -- 3CVL are on the map) 21
Survey total 21
Survey EP 2
Offmap 6
Capital 59
Planets 53
Provinces 72

Total 192
From last turn 30.35

Total Money 222.35

Repairs
3 Northern SB (Kzinti ships) 13
3rd fleet SB 8
2213 2
6th 1

Subtotal 24

Builds
CVA (FFF) 36
CC 9
CVS (for CA) 22
10NCL 50
3FFE 12
8FF 24
FFS 4
active CA+DD+3CL+3FF 8
Skipped: 2DD, ECL 0 (I don't see any provision for the Feds to substitute for their expensive escorts in the basic game)

Subtotal 165

Conversions

3x(CL>ECL) (Earth) 3
CA>CC(Earth) 2
DN>DN+(4th) 2
CA>CC(8th) 2
FF>FV(7th) 7
CL>ECL, FF>FFE (6th) 2

Subtotal 18

Homeless Kzinti (8 ships including 1 carrier) 5
Command point 5

Total spent 217
Remaining after econ 5.35

Command points 2 (1 received+1 purchased)

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Friday, October 04, 2019 - 08:41 am: Edit

William, you can build the base hulls or variants of the base hulls. Example: DD and SC for the DEs and CMC for the ECL.

You could also downsub them to FFs.