Armed freighters

[Mike]

The armed freighters were introduced in Communique #37.

While regular freighters and even Q-ships cannot select a Base Speed of 24, the small and large armed freighters have Base Speed 24 on their Ship Cards and have the engine power to select it.

Furthermore, they have so much engine power that they can not only go Base Speed 24, but they can also accelerate every impulse and move 32 hexes per turn.

My questions are:

1. Are armed freighters allowed to select Base Speed 24 and accelerate so that they can go 32 hexes per turn?

2. If Q-ships are relatively rare within each empire's fleets, how common are armed freighters?

[mjwest]

1. Are armed freighters allowed to select Base Speed 24 and accelerate so that they can go 32 hexes per turn?

Yes. They may do both. They have full power (for their movement rate) engines, and may make full use of them.

2. If Q-ships are relatively rare within each empire's fleets, how common are armed freighters?

Armed freighters are more common. At the beginning of the war, they are fairly rare. As the war progresses, they become more and more common. They never seem to account for more than a third or so of the total force, but there are almost always some present in any convoy.

So, while not as common as the convoys would like, they are way more common than Q-ships.