The Patriarch looked out over his burning capital.

Reports were still sketchy, but billions had died.

Initial reports indicated close to 100% destruction of military and economic targets on the other primary planets in the Capital system - 'his' home seemed to have lucky survived a similar fate, although the 3rd, 7th, 8th and 13th Military districts reported the total destruction of 4 bases.

Military losses had also been high, with the CVS Lionheart being destroyed along with it's two escorts. Two other ships had yet to report in - and 'claims' of several Lyran DN's being destroyed had already been disproved - only two ships was know to have been killed in the raid, a D6M and CW (at least he had proof of that, the ship had been captured attempting escape the destruction it had been party too).

Hopefully the promised 'Federation Aid' will start arriving he thought - as it will take years to repair the damage...…..

………………………….


It's fair to say - the Coaltion very much have taken notice of the Kzinti.

The first attack on 1401 of the game has seen 3 Major Planets Devastated, 4 Minor Planets Devastated and 4 PDU's killed on the Capital.

William also directed a CVS (with EFF and FF escorts), a CM and a FF (Plus a Battle Tug was direct crippled).

Coalition lost a D6M and a CW (captured) - and have 21 crippled ships (fortunately, 3 DN's was self crippled).

Alas, the Kzinti force was probably 6 ships too light to offer a reasonable fight over the Majors (and the Minors wasn't worth it, with what William attacked them with).

Kzinti blew 2 CPs - and atleast the Lyrans blew 4 CPs.

Last turn's Alliance offensive has left a lot of heavy Kzinti escorts crippled - and it was telling this turn.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Tuesday, December 22, 2020 - 07:20 pm: Edit

Coalition turn 9 combat is over.

The earlier protestations of lack of interest in Kzintai were genuine. We had planned to push into Northern Fed space. However, two things Paul did on turn A8 changed that:

1) The Kzinti move pulled about 30 Klingon ships back from Fed space to defend Klingon space.
2) The Feds cut off Klingon forces in the Earth region, making full movement for them expensive.

In light of this, I decided to attack the Kzinti capital instead. Our line included 8 12-compot ships. Compot was typically 140ish without drones, and 3D6D were available in case the Kzinti put up a line. This made us a threat to kill a 3-ship carrier group, or even to kill a battle tug in the form box. That's why the Kzinti didn't defend their side planets much.

I went into Kzintai for a single round to kill 4PDU. I would have stayed on a terrific roll, or possibly if Paul had directed on a big ship. Neither happened. So we retreated from the hex.

Territorial gains vs. the Federation were approximately zero. We did take a minor planet we hadn't previously touched. But on turn 9, the Feds will be getting income from a major and a minor they retook on A7.

We did much better on fleet losses. The Klingons lost 5 ships and the Lyrans lost 1. The only large one was a D6M. But we killed 12 Kzinti and 7 Feds. The only large one was the CVS. Of the rest, 13 were FF of various descriptions. We also recaptured an E4A, while the Kzinti captured the Lyran they killed (a CW).

In sum, the fact that the Kzinti mostly gave up their side planets without fighting was a win. But the fact that we didn't gain ground against the Feds was a loss.

The Romulans are on deck.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Wednesday, December 23, 2020 - 10:38 pm: Edit

Coalition turn 9 is done. All four Klingon reserves are inside the Federation. The three Lyran reserves are in either Kzinti space or Northern Klingon space. Hopefully they will be sufficient to prevent the Kzinti from causing much trouble this time

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, December 24, 2020 - 03:07 pm: Edit

Losses on Coalition Turn 9 was about as expected - Alliance got lucky in 1 battle (SSC 2 v 12) and unlucky in another (William got a 1/12 chance to cripple one ship and kill the other - and then got a lucky roll to catch it in persuit).

One area that Coalition is massively ahead in still is pursuit....

William succeeded with a 3 and 4 ship persist forces - and I failed (again!) with 5 ship pursuit force.

Probably also worthwhile saying Alliance remains very good at rolling the highest roll possible to do no damage...

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, December 24, 2020 - 03:27 pm: Edit

Alliance turn 9.

Well, fair to say survey was very mixed (better than 3 horrible survey rolls I suppose).

Kzinti - 6 (total 85, average 3.14)

MEC and 8 FF's built, CVS converted and a reduced 13 Ep's spent on repairs.

9 Ships in Expeditionary Fleet.

Balance 0 Ep's and 5 Cp's.

Hydrans - 13 - hurrah an above average roll (just - and it's there second above average roll, the first one was a 11...) - 63 - average 3)

13 Ep's on the Shipyard (49 total), DG, 2 x LN, KN and DE repaired - and a CU built.

0 Eps and 4 Cp's.

Federation - 25 (total 62, average 2.95).

Feds build DN+, CVS, 3 x NCL, 3 x FF - 8 ships mothball and convert 21 Eps (Escorts, a 2 nd CVS and a FV) - plus 23 Ep's on repairs and a Command Point.

Balance 30.95 and 5 CP's.

I remain concerned the Alliance remains too far behind on the Survey points, which I am not re-claiming, although this turn they did get the expected Of Map Province income - they are just half a turn to a turn behind on the total survey points they should be at (and so future provinces will be found 1 turn behind).

i.e. Kzinti should be around 94-95, Hydrans 73-74 and Federation 73-74 - in total I am down 30 survey points across the 3 empires.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Monday, December 28, 2020 - 02:03 pm: Edit

A9 - Op movement has been done.

Unlike previous turns far more modest offenses have been ordered.

In Kzinti space - Kzinti Forces have gone around 1502 to hit weaker targets.

In Federation Space - a modest Counter attack in the North was ordered along with a slightly deeper thrust towards 2214.

Two Klingon reserves did indeed go south and the other two went north.

In Kzinti space, Lyran reserve went into the Western Sector - saving 1001 from liberation.

So far, both sides have rolled high (alas the Coalition have rolled a lot better though 4.09 v 4.64, again) and losses are : -

Kzinti 2 x CC and crippled CVS, CLE and FF.
Federation DD (was already crippled) and crippled 2 x CA, CL, DE and 3 x FF.

Lyrans - Battle Tug, CW, FF, Crippled 3 x CW
Klingons D5, E4, 2 x F5E, Crippled D6M, D7C, D6, 2 x F5 and 2 x E4

Kzinti got pounded over 1001 - and the Coalition traded F5E's for multiple Federation crippled ships in 2816.

Both sides failed a pursuit (on 6's) and no captures (although a lot of doubles).

Due to the small number of battles and non being 'crucial', the significant Coalition out rolling - just meant the Alliance again took more damage then expected and the Coaliton less than expected,

The Lyran BT died on a 1/12 chance - and one of the Kzinti CC's died on slightly better odds (the other CC died due to a Mauler - although it would have lived if William had rolled a 1 (which I got).

So dice are hurting the Alliance still.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, December 29, 2020 - 12:19 pm: Edit

Retrograde and SM has been done.

Federation have a new 6th Fleet - and 4 reserves dotted in Central and Eastern Fed Space.

Kzinti pulled the bulk of their forces back to 1401 and have a modest reserve in 1401 and a small reserve in the Barony.

Hydrans remain op map.

Federation spent 12 Ep's on Field Repair (CVB, 2 x DE and a FF) plus 2 Ep's on Strategic Movement - with 10 Ep's going the long way to the Kzinti.

Federation have 6.95 Ep's left.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Wednesday, December 30, 2020 - 10:29 pm: Edit

Lyran economy, Turn 10
Survey roll 12
Survey total 101
Survey EP 10
Offmap 24
Capital 35
Planets 24
Provinces 32
Conquered 6.8

Income 131.8
From last turn 1.1
Total Money 132.9

Repairs
1707 18
K NR 6
Subtotal 24

Builds
DN 16
STT 10
2CW, CWE 16
DW, DWE, DWS 15
3FF 7.5
CA (overbuild) 16
Battle Pod 6
Subtotal 86.5

Conversions
Lyrantan CA>DN 6
608 CVL 2
Subtotal 8

Total spent 118.5
Remaining after econ 14.4

Command points: 3+1=4 (4 spent at Kzintai on C9)

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Wednesday, December 30, 2020 - 10:31 pm: Edit

Klingon economy, Turn 10
Survey roll 10
Survey total 67
Survey EP 6
Capital 49
Planets 41
Provinces 52
Conquered 47.6

Income 195.6
From last turn -3
Total Money 192.6

Repairs
1807 7
1707 12.5
1507 8
1307 2
1107 1
906 1.5
NR 1.5
SR
Klinshai 8
1809 2
1811 2
2416 2
2517 2
2519 1.5
2218 2
1013 2
Tholian SB 7.5
2106 6
Subtotal 68.5

Builds
C8 16
D6M 10
D7 8
8D5, AD5 46
2F5, 3F5E, F5S 19
3xE4 7.5
B10 roll 5
Activations 2
Subtotal 113.5

Conversion
D7V 2

Total spent 184
Remaining after econ 8.6

Command points 2+1=3

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Wednesday, December 30, 2020 - 10:34 pm: Edit

Romulan economy, Turn 10
Capital 34
Planets 11
Provinces 52
Conquered 0
Income 97

Builds
2FH 16
SPB, SPF, SPH 22
2SK, 2SKE 16
SN 2.5
WE 6
Activate WE+BH 2
Subtotal 64.5

Conversions
Romulus WE>KE 3
Remus WE>KE 3
North WE>KE 3
NorthEast WE>KE 3
West WE>KE 3
Tholian WE>KE 3
Subtotal 18

Total spent 82.5
Remaining after econ 14.5

Command points 4+1=5

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Wednesday, December 30, 2020 - 10:38 pm: Edit

With the repairs from C7 largely done already, the Klingons can again do full builds. The Klingons and the Lyrans even both have surpluses.

The Romulans are the new kids on the block. The part of their build that was unclear to me was the WE. War eagles are pretty bad, and possibly I should have just skipped it. But the Romulans have 14.5EP left, and the WE can turn into a KE next turn. King Eagles are nice.

I don't much like Falcons due to their extreme repair cost. So my mauler build was an SPH. I expect that will usually be the case.

By Stefano Predieri (Preda) on Thursday, December 31, 2020 - 04:11 am: Edit

KE are extremely nice but there WE->KE conversion is sadly limited to 1 per turn...
And you have more than enough WE to convert into KE and FAL to build more.
The WE build is usually either used to build Falcons or downgraded to SN for pin.
Romulans can spam a lot of maulers, so I usually build the FAL, cripple them and Deposit repair them, but in a base F&E i might skip them too.
SPM all the way in base game, since there is not much alternative with the fancy mauler FH variant out too...

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, December 31, 2020 - 05:14 am: Edit

I agree the WE> KE conversion is very nice...

3 Compot and 1 CR for 3 Ep's.

Hence why it's probably limited to 1 per turn.

(About the 'best' equivalent is the Gorn CL to BC/CC which gains 2 compot for 3 Ep's....

So 3 for 3 is excellent value - and so is limited!)

WE to FAL - it's a good Sub I think, but repair was generally never an issue for me (dead or captured - whats 'crippled'? )

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Thursday, December 31, 2020 - 12:46 pm: Edit

Note that ships subject to shock (ie a FAL) cannot use the depot system (424.37).

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Thursday, December 31, 2020 - 04:43 pm: Edit

Romulan Economy, turn 10, without cheating

Income 97

Builds
FH 8
SUB 24
SPF, SPH, 2SP 22
3SKE 13.5
SN 2.5
Activate WE+BH 2

Conversions
West K5 > K5S 1
Tholian WE>KE 3

Total spent 76
Remaining after econ 21

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Saturday, January 02, 2021 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Well, no attack on 2908 this turn....

But pretty much everywhere else is under a horde of Lyran, Klingon and Romulan ships.

Going to be a tough turn for the Federation.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, January 03, 2021 - 07:06 am: Edit

Well, the Coalition tsunami will swamp most of Federation space - and 1 SB will probably die.

Couple of silly reactions haven't helped.

4 of the 6 Kz/Fed reserves got pinned - and so no not much chance of surprises - but hopefully the Fed reserve will save a Minor planet and BATS (had to go through the Minor Planet hex to get to the BATS).

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, January 03, 2021 - 04:08 pm: Edit

Well, Williams luck holds so far.

After 12 battle - average is 4.5 v 3.58 (including 5 5's in a row for William....)

The bigger the battle - the worse my roll too.

Two largest battles so far - 6 v 1 and 5 v 3

The 6 v 1 was nasty as it allowed William to then property retreat into a hex I had already had to retreat into (1 v 6 would have meant he could have still done - - but would have probably had 2 more cripples and no fighters in his force...)

So - with the remaining 2/3rds of the battles - I really do need some luck back.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Sunday, January 03, 2021 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Alas, looks like it's a repeat of turn 7.

Dice are going from bad to worse.

17 rounds - average so far 4.29 v 3.35

But that's only half the story

In the key battles it's 4.29 v 2.57...

Last 4 rounds have seen the Alliance with 50% more compot than the Coalition - I have rolled

1,4,2,2 and William has rolled 3,2,4,5 - an average of plus 1.25 to William.

And with 126-142 compot, that's a lot of damage not being done.

I think the game will end after Coalition turn 10 - as there is nothing the Alliance can do with such poor dice.

I shouldn't get annoyed, but when it's both constant poor rolling and constant major battle under rolling, what can 1 side do?

(i.e. with even just average dice, Coalition will have taken about 20 more damage - and that's just in 2708 - if the dice was reversed - Coalition does 13 less damage and Federation would have done 17 more.)

BIR has been low and so the pain has been even worse, the 1 round I rolled better, VBIR went up 2 to lessen the pain.

With a 6-9 damage per round of combat* dice switch in damage- that just breaks the game IMHO.

* - Yes, it will happen, and it will happen for several rounds in a turn - but when it's constant, that's where it goes wrong for game balance.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Monday, January 04, 2021 - 05:57 am: Edit

Just had a quick look at the dice and combat dice since A7 have been massively in the Coalition favour (basically once they started outrolling - it has just continued).

I didn't take notes of the earlier combat dice (as they generally seemed to be pretty average), but turn reports have

A3 - Persuit dice imbalance
C4 - Some poor Alliance dice
A5 - Some Combat imbalance
C6 - Pursuit Dice imbalance
A6 - Poor Alliance Survey rolls

Buts it's from A7 when things go down hill
A7 - Horrible Alliance combat dice (and poor survey for the Alliance)
C8 - Horrible Alliance combat dice
A8 - Poor survey (and close on dice, but Coalition still came out ahead)
C9 - Persuit
A9 - Horrible Alliance combat dice

So not only haven't the improved since A7 - they probably have got worse for the Alliance.

And so I think when A10 is done - it will be pretty obvious the Alliance will be massively behind the economic curve - and will in effect never recover from it.

Basically - too many Alliance hulls crippled and too few Coalition hulls crippled - which will allow the Coalition to remain deep in Federation space - and even when 75% Exhaustion hits - the Alliance will have a lower income still.

I think the Coalition can get unlucky on dice - and still do well (due to the natural flow of the game), but the Alliance can't.

Thoughts?

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Monday, January 04, 2021 - 12:10 pm: Edit

Hi William

Slack keeps coming with a Server Error in the UK - don't know if it's affecting you?

I saw your message about trying to do the capture roll an it crashed again.....

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, January 05, 2021 - 05:21 pm: Edit

Well, not unexpectantly I had a series of battles I actually rolled better in...

Shame in it was against undefended BATs and planets (16-60 v 18)….. William only rolled 3.2 v 3.4 - and I think it did precisely zero extra damage on cripples.

Closest was perhaps 3612 where a KE and WE was crippled (the K5S was able to capture the planet, but the 1.33 outrolling per round in 3 rounds wasn't enough to save it).

As soo as we get back to battles which are relevant - outrolling returns, 3.42 v 3.14.

Might have won over 2705 - bur the third round 6 v 2 roll ended that. (Round 1 was 4 v 3, round 2 was 2 v 3).

Dice for the turn (45 rolls) so far is 3.87 v 3.58.

William also got a 1/12 chance to kill a Fed DN over 2708.

So, luck remains very much with William, both on outrolling and timing.

Not sure what the Alliance can do with such poor luck and timing?

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Tuesday, January 05, 2021 - 06:08 pm: Edit

The one round over Kzintai might reasonably be construed as crucial. We were outrolled by 2 pips on that one. With a good roll there, we could have stayed to kill more PDU at a reasonable price. Unsure whether or not it would have put us in a position to capture Kzintai at that point. Not complaining, just saying it does go both ways.

Mainly, this game convinces me that the basic game, with no expansions, is unbalanced in favor of the Coalition. But Richard seems to specialize in running the Expedition on people who share my opinion.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Tuesday, January 05, 2021 - 07:58 pm: Edit

I think Paul is stating that the alliance is doing poorly in this game due to die rolls; if actually true then this game would not be a good case for determining that overall balance favors the Coalition.

I tend to think that basic F&E _does_ favor the Coalition, but I am not yet firm in this belief. In any case, I recommend that players that agree on what the balance actually is can rectify that, at least partially, through the use of balance options.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Tuesday, January 05, 2021 - 08:13 pm: Edit

Yes Richard, he is. But the Alliance did start out with 9 balance points.

It's also not just this game. Without going into a lot of details, I used to be in your "think it's probably true" camp, but I'm past that now. It's definitely true.