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duties of the Imperial Navy, and upsets the balance of power within the Imperium, giving too much to the Adeptus Astartes. Due to this, the Nova remains a rare sight in the fleets of the Space Marines.Can you imagine how they feel the Navy would feel about a Rogue Trader having access to battleship?Actually I can illustrate it for you from Matt Farrers novel -LegacyThe Navy’s goodwill toward the Phrax flotilla tarnished quickly. Despite an invitation, then a request, then a demand that it haltone hundred and fifty kilometres out from Coronet Triatic MRA-47 to await escort, the flotilla grudgingly dropped its velocity toa little under cruising speed and set a course that would take them between Hydraphur’s two ecliptics, around the star and towardthe planet itself. Offended by the flotilla’s rudeness and unimpressed by the repeated and unsubtle references in its communiquesto the privileges ... charter granted it, Traze took the opportunity to give his squadron a little live close-manoeuvring drill. So the observers on the flotilla decks were startled to see the high, crenellated prows of half a dozen Battlefleet Pacificus warshipsbearing down on them, fast enough for some of the more nervous flotilla commanders to issue orders to brace for collision.So the observers on the flotilla decks were startled to see the high, crenellated prows of half a dozen Battlefleet Pacificus warshipsbearing down on them, fast enough for some of the more nervous flotilla commanders to issue orders to brace for collision. TheNavy formation speared into the side of the Phrax flotilla and then, in a beautiful display of piloting and discipline, the powerfulwarships wheeled around onto the flotilla’s course, effortlessly matching speeds. The flotilla crews, used to looking out of theirviewports to the comforting sight of other flotilla ships blazing -
unlikely as it is, a really cool way of using repaints to add depth to the game would be to release medium-base flotillas, with e.g. 2 CR90s or Raiders or even Nebulon-Bs (to lend them a new lease of life). It has been noted before, but it's worth remembering that the Flotilla rules do not state anywhere that they must always be Small: FLOTILLAS“The ship included in this expansion is a flotilla. Ships of this type feature two plastic ship models (instead of one). Flotillas follow the same rules as other ships* with the following exceptions: • When a flotilla would overlap another ship (or be overlapped by another ship), deal one facedown damage card to the flotilla. Do not deal a facedown damage card to the closest ship the flotilla overlapped (or that overlapped it) unless that ship is also a flotilla. • A flotilla cannot equip ... commander) upgrade card.” *: i.e. including the following: SIZE CLASSEach ship has a size class: small, medium or large. Small ships use the 41 mm x 71 mm base, medium ships use the 61mm x 102mm base, and large ships use the 76mm x 129mm base. There is no other basis than this one for (current) flotillas being Small ships. I think this is brilliant future-proofing -
what you are doing here and I don't think flotillas are really that big of a problem in the game. They make the activation economy aspect of the game playable even with big ships. Yes, I think the presence of flotillas makes bigger ships more viable. But a couple of flotillas aren't free. I wouldn't pay 50 points for a initiative bid, but that is the price of 2 flotillas. Also When they first came out the flotilla spam was a problem. But I don't think they are any more. Sure Demolisher struggles to kill them, but isn't a weakness for Demolisher over all good for the game. killing flotillas is funny, because, sometimes it is incredibly hard but other times it is really easy. This variety seems good for the game IMO. Some people may complain about the flotillas that just fly away from ... battle. Well a CR90 is just as hard if not harder to catch and kill. And if you can't put your Admiral on them then all they can do from a distance is use relay to command fighters. So kill the shuttle. Nothing shuts a list that spent a lot of points on fighters and flotillas down (that will rely on relay) like killing the shuttle. The flotillas are out of position, the fighters can't be activated. As for the unique fighter nerfs, I would have agreed with you just a few months ago. Then I began started to figure out how to fly a good sloane fleet. I had visions of something like 14 activations of TIE Fighters. I would let quantity be my quality. But as I played I noticed a few things. For the points Unique squadrons were just too good of an investment -
Alasseo said:Sounds about right, in the novel Legacy a Rogue Trader fleet gets shirty with the Imperial Navy on the approach to Hydraphur, and in return they get boarded and given a good seeing to, by the navy."The Navy's goodwill toward the Phrax flotilla tarnished quickly. Despite an invitation, then a request, then a demand that it halt one hundred and fifty kilometres out from Coronet Triatic MRA-47 to await escort, the flotilla grudgingly dropped its velocity to a little under cruising speed and set a course that would take them between Hydraphur's two ecliptics, around the star and toward the planet itself. Offended by the flotilla's rudeness and unimpressed by the repeated and unsubtle references in its communiques to the privileges the charter granted it, Traze took the opportunity to give his squadron a little live close-manoeuvring drill.So the observers ... flotilla decks were startled to see the high, crenellated prows of half a dozen Battlefleet Pacificus warships bearing down on them, fast enough for some of the more nervous flotilla commanders to issue orders to brace for collision. The Navy formation speared into the side of the Phrax flotilla and then, in a beautiful display of piloting and discipline, the powerful warships wheeled around onto the flotilla's course, effort¬lessly matching speeds. The flotilla crews, used to looking out of their viewports to the comforting sight of otherflotilla ships blazing with light, now looked out at the pitted grey hulls of the battlefleet vessels, their arched gunports and the venomous, hulking shapes of lance tur¬rets.This time there was no invitation, request or demand, but an order. Navy pilots would come aboard with data-plaques and vox-links to guide the flotilla through the maze of minefields, sentry gates
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attempt to place the ship as normal. If you are overlapping, and cannot place you go back down the maneuver tool until you can place the ship (even if that ends up being back in its original position). Then, simply, the overlapping and overlapped ship both take a face down damage card. (The Caveat to that, is that if a flotilla is involved as eitehr the overlapper or overlapee, only the Flotilla will take damage... Flotilla hits Ship? Only Flotilla takes damage... Ship hits Flotilla? Only Flotilla takes Damage... Flotilla hits Flotilla? Both Flotillas take damage...) Done. Maneuver finished. If next turn, it still can't get away (due to no navigate, ability to overpass, etc), then it will ram again. Fighters never deal or take damage from overlapping. They're simply placed in base contact with the ship that overlapped them, by the player NOT controlling the ship that -
into my campaign, and in today's game the pcs are finally reaching their ship at high anchor above Spectoris, they are going to do a 3 part adventure (probably taking 3 sessions) revolving around setting up a trade route inside Calixis space, but I have already laid a lot of ground work in preparation for playing Forsaken Bounty thereafter. The pc's have learnt that the Bounty was one of his dynasty's flotilla (a Sword Class Frigate), that mutineed after the death of the previous Rogue Trader, and they have learnt it ended up in the Battlefield ... so they have a personal interest in the ship ... in that in theory it already actually legally belongs to them.I'm not planning on using that clumsy 'first man to set foot' nonsense.Here's a bit of fluff I wrote setting up Forsaken Bounty and it's sequel, that they found ... beside the ruined corpse of a former Ship Master of their Dynasty Flotilla who they had to kill on Scintilla in Adventure 6;++ Danfries's Tale - The Fate of the Fortuna ++I lay out my confession here before I am unable to discern the truth of what passed after we broke our compact with the House of Rakespur, from the black nightmares that plague me now both night and day. My mind becomes ever more enmeshed in the maze, or rather the Labyrinth, which consumes me. A maze you see only confuses and misdirects, it is constructed with that intention, to puzzle those who walk it's ways, to baffle them with myriad choices of direction ... a labyrinth may seem so too, but unlike a maze, a labyrinth by it's nature in fact has an inevitable ending, it is designed to trick that is true, to give a false -
closely guarded at all. I had 2 very similar lists, but by merely changing the commander between them, they played very differently, but both used the same mass generic squadrons and loads of plink damage. The list I used had Cracken. The idea was outactivate my opponent by a large margin, trade shots from long range whilst obstructed (greatly increasing the chances of survival for a flotilla), and use that as a buffer to move my ships into survivable positions at medium range. Really hard to do (biggest cause for my headache), but the plink damage was real, and my opponents could definitely feel it. The other list had Sato. The idea was to set everything onto one target and "box" it in. Sato would increase the overall effectiveness of the plink damage, but greatly reduced my survivability. Some other thoughts I had on these lists involved points spent versus ... attack dice gained, taking into account a CF command dial. A combat flotilla could produce 2 black dice at long range under Sato for 27 points (plus squads, but I always use squads so I don't take that cost into account), versus an MC80 doing 2 red and 2+1 black at long range for ~100 points under the same conditions. Multiply the flotilla by 4 and you get 8 black dice, plus activation advantage, plus deployment advantage, plus the availability of fleet support, plus the ability to push many squadrons through relay, all for about the same price as that MC80. Once it moves to close range, the Mc80 (both variants) gains much more power, but they also become more vulnerable, as do the flotillas. Flotillas can more easily stay out of close range, especially with the activation advantage they inherently come with. It's just hard -
Four Analysis:Biggs thought that 32 was good enough for the Cut. In 1A, Juggernaught and WWPDSteven got 34!In 1B, Nathan and Justin got 34 and 32 (not sure who was who). I think there was a gap in their scores (maybe there was a 31 in 1B) from the next tier so they were definitely deserving! Note: While a valid strategy, I was praying for exciting matches instead Nathan - Rieekan Aces, Guppy, Flotillas, Yavaris I didn't really see Nathan play so I'll make general comments later.WWPD Steven - You heard my thoughts on his list. WWPD Steven vs. Justin (see it on Twitch) At the end of Round 2, I thought Steven was in a strong position. I thought elimination rounds were supposed to be 3 hours? Since Steven has an arc-dodge list, I wonder if Round 6 had played out... sorry, I haven't watched ... Twitch yet.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FINALS -----------------------------Justin.. 3x Flotilla, Guppy, Rieekan Aces, Yavaris In the short history, we've had names of fleets... I feel Justin has deserved the naming of a maneuver!If you net deck Justin's list, you will think it's just OK... or you/I could have come up with it. Justin's move shall be called the "Flotilla Cage." (Blood Bowl fans will get that reference). It's worth watching the Twitch for this. Analysis:Flotillas are the ultimate tarpit in Armada. I cannot think of a combo that costs less than double a flotilla cost or maybe even triple cost that can kill a flotilla in one turn. JJ's Guppy, Admo, 8xY, 2xHWK, 2xYT-1300 Tech: 2x YT-1300(!)... If you read my Road to Nationals, I had played Y Spam to a draw. The YTs give enough time to protect the HWKs and BCCs -
distance 1-5 requirement would require the flotilla's to be near the action, instead of scooting of into the distance. I have in another thread suggested that Flotillas can't activate before a non-flotilla ship, unless its within distance 1-5 of a non-flotilla ship or that there are no non-flotilla ships left to activate. this forces the owner to keep his flotillas near the action or spend +36 points on a corvette to fly away with them. But it seems, now that I think of it, a bit complicated -
Nice synopsis of your games and experience! I hope to make it out for the next one. One thing I find interesting is your description of calling flotillas tar-pits. I assume you mean a shot on a flotilla is wasted if you also have a shot on a non-flotilla? If so, I actually find it beneficial to pick off flotillas, if I know I can do it in 1 shot. They lose an activation, likely Comms Net or BCC, and I bag some points. I am certainly biased since I run a lot of GT tanks that are designed to 1 shot small ships. How would you suggest dealing with fleets that run 2-3 flotillas like JJ? Kill the AF or kill the flotillas if you have a clear shot to both -
agree, if only it were possible to place in a major tournament without any flotillas, that would truely mean that there is a viable counter to them out there and everyone who says there are counters would be right. Sadly this is clearly not the case and it is impossible to achieve this. I mean, I only managed third in the swiss at euros with my 'no flotillas' list. I'm sure if I'd put a flotilla in there I would have reached a proper high position, like maybe second? Gosh, I look so stupid now looking back at the errors I made in not taking any flotillas. Seriously everyone needs to calm down. Activation advantage is massive, that is correct and is of massive tactical value in armada. Flotillas are not the be all and end all, neither is Reikan, nor Rhymer, nor cluster bombs, nor director Isard ... other overpowered stuff people are getting hysterical about. Flotillas are an easy but flawed way of getting an activation advantage, there are other ways too. I'm now just going to go and shout at my medal for not being good enough, it's the only way it will learn -
apologies for misinterpreting you then, last time I tried to discuss this reasonably I was met with a few very obviously angry individuals, and I jumped the gun with you, so I am sorry for that. I agree activation advantage is huge in Armada, and my issue with it is it leads to less list diversity. And sure, your list can kill flotillas, there are many lists that can, and obviously yours did quite well, but I don't think this would discourage flotillas from being taken, and your list also capitalizes on the same mechanic that many flotilla lists do--activations. Anyway, we are all just spouting opinions here, my experiences will vary from yours, of course, but the data does show that flotilla ubiquity is rampant, and ubiquity means less diversity, which makes me somewhat sad. I personally feel first player is good enough without having first/last ... other end, out activating someone as second player by two or more activations feels a little strong the other way. As someone who also placed rather high at a big event, I think I played one person who only had one flotilla, the rest had at least 2-3 flotillas, and the only ones I saw that lacked any were CR90 spam -
already. It'll hurt, but you'll burn the combo, and get a return shot--just make sure you're able to get out of that arc or kill him in return, or the second front arc will still finish you off. There are plenty of other tactical options for dealing with it, but they're obviously very list-dependent. Some options: Just as they did against Demo when they first came out, flotilla blockers go a long way against these kinds of one-hit wonders. Particularly against the ISD1 version, flotillas are fairly likely to weather that front arc with scatter, so use them to force the choice: pop BT on a flotilla, or gamble on being stuck in place. Then threaten the position they're in with your own ships. Or better yet, block with two, and guarantee the stiffarm. With that large base, it can be very ... hard to position around a well-placed flotilla blocker without having to weather return first. You can also use blockers to funnel Avenger to where you want it be. Want to make sure it gets a front arc shot into your Liberty's front arc, and only into your front arc? Set up something like this: Pin it at long range with a flotilla or two while you pepper it with your fast CR90s or your bombers. All of the super-high activation/super-high bid BTVenger fleets are either squadronless or very squadron-light: punish it for that. Bombers are still amazing, and Yavaris B-wings can still put some serious hurt on an ISD really fast. Rieekan works fine against it. Yeah, you're going to lose a ship, but that was going to happen against most competent opponents anyway (with exceptions, of course). Make him trade for it. ISDs -
Vath ships had been countered and then dispersed. Idris’ work in rebuilding and expanding the navigation beacons allowed the remaining ships to have a shared point of reference once again. Binar had spent copious amounts of time convincing Magos Tevla to devote resources in drowning the vox transmissions that we now believe are coming from the refineries. And so I was given the ability to command. One cruiser-carrier, two system monitors in a flotilla with a grand cruiser, a handful of other cruisers, and more escorts than necessary, and I took command by simply giving orders. I knew not to press my luck and broke apart the Winterscale and Chorda forces, sandwiching them between Charlabelle’s task force. How quickly she had wormed her influence into those dynasty ships! Even the malcontents at Geijer listened to me and survived because of it. We were awash with praise in victory ... warned him of the folly of a frontal attack. Though they were not full cruisers, the Endeavours had torpedoes and a lance battery on their prows, supplementing their broadsides full of macrobatteries. It was a deadly mix, one that I witnessed in the previous battle. I opted to give each light cruiser back their own escorts. The Blessed Enterprise, the Lady Zhar, and the Bocephus would form the command squadron of the entire flotilla. We each had two escorts, though our flagship made do with system ships. Bain was second in command of the squadron--he needed the authority over Captain Vers, though I don’t believe there was any friction there that wasn’t welcome by either. The entire flotilla I had no choice but to second to Madam Charlabelle. Either of the Winterscale or Chorda commanders were better suited, and also entire inappropriate. The Rising became Madam Charlabelle -
ship-focused archetype has never been a strong fleet build, even in wave 2 (they got chewed up by Ackbar, sadly). If anything, they're more competitive now than they ever have been. With flotillas around, you can pad your activations far better with big ships than you could earlier AND big ships themselves are the best flotilla hunters available provided they're outfitted correctly. My flotillas want to be nowhere near a large ship with Gunnery Teams and some means of getting Accuracy results and/or Intel Officer. Nowhere even close. The same kind of configuration is still effective against other meatier ships too. We're just waiting for the meta to catch up to it, methinks. This is particularly true with Imperials, where VSDs simply aren't maneuverable enough to be a reliable threat to flotillas* and ISDs are the only other good option that rolls enough dice ... long enough range to pop flotillas and has the turbolaser slot for H9s or Quad Turbolaser Cannons (+Sensor Team or other shenanigans to fish for that red accuracy). One of the biggest pitfalls for large ships is non-ideal upgrade suites. It's fairly common to see players not outfit them properly. They do get just the 1-2 big attacks per turn, so any upgrades that make that damage more likely to stick (Intel Officer, H9s, XI7s), less likely to suffer from bad rolls (Leading Shots), and/or more likely to get maximum value from your two allowed attacks (Gunnery Team) should be prioritized. *Once Jerrjerrod is released, this will be incorrect -
activations it would be a one-trick pony and very easy to plan for and dismantle. Demolisher is good, but it's not good enough to take on an entire fleet by itself.TL;DR version: casual players who haven't actually played against a clontroper-style fleet seem to be taking away only that Demolisher + lots of activations is good but that's a comedic and incorrect summary of how the fleet works.Regarding using flotillas AGAINST a clontroper-style fleet, we'll need to see what they can do. Simply getting in the way may not be sufficient as there needs to be some kind of "punishment" for letting the flotillas live or else they can be ignored (to the best of your ability, of course). The argument for flotillas is that even with Intel Officer, if I need to waste two Gladiator attacks to pop a single 20ish point ... ship, that's a waste of my time. Raiders would be increasingly useful as the blue dice stand a good chance of generating an Accuracy to lock down the Scatter and one-shotting troublesome flotillas. Plus Raiders will happily crash-land into flotillas to set themselves up for an attack next turn
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people think flotillas will help against the Demolisher. Sure, it ups your own activation count and can maybe be used as a speed bump, but odds are experienced Demo players will be able to avoid the flotilla. Also, let's not forget that the Clonish type lists can simply put in a bunch of their own flotillas, to take them to a higher total activation count as well, meaning they'll be able to deploy that Demo last (and thus probably avoid their opponent's flotilla screen).Maybe it will help, but it seems to me like from what we know a lot of the ways in which the flotillas offer benefits could also be used by Clonish lists, too.Clearly, the Demolisher title needs a nerf, as it is an absolute auto-include in every single Imperial list with a Gladiator, and practically an auto-include in every single Imperial -
Even at 20 points per flotilla, I think they'll be more than balanced. Activation advantage is a little overrated at the moment. Yes, it's great to have, but it's not so great that you can sink 20 points into something that will do nothing but give you another activation. In a ship oriented list, are you really going to take 2 flottillas over a TRC90? In Imperial lists, is it really work dropping a Raider I with APT and OE for another activation? These are not insignificant sources of firewpower. Even in my squadron lists, which will very clearly benefit from the flotilla's bomber command center, I'm thinking very hard about the advantages versus the very real drop off in raw firepower. The flotillas have to bring more than an activation to offset their lack of firepower. For example, in my match against Ninja ... would have wiped the floor with him had he brought 8 flotillas and Demolisher. Sure, Demolisher would have killed something (and it did), but you can position yourself to make it go away after that initial pain. Ninja managed to pull it to a 5-5 because of his APT/OE Raiders. If those had been nothing but flottilas, the game would have been a 10-0 in my favor easily. If it had been 4 flotillas, a ~100 point Rhymerball, and Demolisher, it would have been closer game, but I still don't think a Rhymerball of that size would have given me much of a headache. There is a huge drop off in firepower when you invest 80 points in ships that only have a single blue -
seems to be popping up more and more lately because I too feel like this is one of the few areas the game is lacking... Red objectives are imo particularly afflicted here. As has been stated MW is a no brainer, with niche lists taking AG/SA... the rest are either ultra risky or HOT GARBAGE! And i feel like although MW is auto pick in a lot of cases, it's fairly mediocre overall... Flotillae helped 2nd player in this objective but also hurt 2nd player as well. If you have one flotilla to make your most wanted, then fine. But if you have one flotilla to make your most wanted, and 2 or 3 other flotillae after that, how many extra dice can you get out of the objective. Yet another facet of flotillae/MW interplay is that if your opponent is delaying with flotilla -
anticipate where opponents are going to be and Cataclysm isn't as vital. And I rarely was able to use Cataclysm after Round 3 because by then the enemy's ships were past the Onager's special arc and into its flanks. I've often used Comms Net and Cataclysm to fire off an Ignition attack in Round 1, and I think I only one-shotted a small ship once -- and never a flotilla. Firstly, it would only be viable with SHCBT because it has blue dice. However, the token has to be placed at medium range so it's unlikely that enemy ships would be within medium range of the ignition token and the Ignition attack would roll those blue dice. Red Accuracy's are rare enough that being able to block a flotilla's Scatter is a long shot -- unless the Onager SD has equipped H9 Turbolasers. Second ... opponent would have to choose their deployment poorly and recklessly charge their small ship or flotilla forward in order for Cataclysm to place the Ignition token close and roll enough dice to one-shot small ships or a flotilla. So it's really on the defender if the Onager inflicts serious damage in Round 1. Regardless, losing a small ship or flotilla to an Onager early in a match should not be fatal. I think you just need more experience against the Onager and learn how to counter it properly -
couple of notes, Gozanti should be Flotilla sized as that is an important in game distinction and allows for some discussion of where are each faction getting their Small or Flotilla sized ships. I would say the Trident would make a fascinating Flotilla sized, because its supposed to ram and latch on, so is it like a Flotilla that acts sort of as a missile type unit? Getting away from the point of this. I would add for the CIS the Umbaran Support Vessel which I don't think we have official sizes on but probably small? Need to rewatch those episodes. Then there is the Diamond-class which would be Small as well at only 200m in length, admittedly quite a bit wider but looking at crew and compliment its not a very big craft and its very thin. For GRN there is the ISD I which appears ... movie and the GR-75 but if you could have a variant Paladin Class as your support flotilla I think it'd be better than just rehashing the GR-75 again -
what I think was interesting with the abundance of flotillas at worlds was how differently they were used. They weren't solely squadron support, etc... There was a fair mix of flotillas pushing squadrons, flotillas there to delay activations, flotillas using comms nets to pass tokens on to bigger ships, etc... I think if there was one thing I saw the most of was Admirals on flotillas skirting the edge of the battle to keep them alive -
want to get into a this beats that discussion (especially because I agree that lots of flotillas and one big hitter demo isn't going to rule), but your answer to defeat demo plus flotillas doesn't account for demos love of big targets. Your ISD might get two flotilla...at the cost of itself. Gunnery teams on osd is great against lots of flotilla. ISD heavy isn't great against high act demo. Hence my statement that corvettes would be better suited against flotilla -
think it kind of depends. I really wouldn't call H9's themselves an auto-include; I do think you want to have a plan for addressing flotillas, but there are lots of ways to do that. Four damage is not a lot, especially when you can zero-consequence ram for the fourth one. I think the best ways to deal with flots will be when people are able to augment their fleets with small things that are incidentally useful in killing flotillas. That's why I have the H9's on my shrimp: those H9's are invaluable in killing flotillas and corvettes quickly and efficiently, but they're still very useful in attacking the bigger ships too. Very much so. I think it's pretty important to get the shrimp in fast and hit very hard up front (back to the H9 thing, this ... Intel Officers in this fleet: shutting down defenses a little less reliably right now rather than discarding them for next turn is a big deal for me). That said, for me, activations tend to be most important in the first two turns, sometimes three, for delaying getting into red/squadron range before I'm ready. It's pretty hard to get something all the way across the board that fast and then kill a flotilla with it (this, more than any of the big-ship-killing doomsaying, is the strength of the ET/Demo in my experience). After that, hopefully either I've killed something of theirs to keep activation parity, or they have bigger problems to worry about than killing flotillas. This is where all the incremental mitigation will be really nice: just slowing down their death forces your adversary to focus on gnat-swatting with so much firepower and attention
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think that the separatists will immediately get the Lucrehulk. I think that the republic might get the arquitens soon, since the molds exist already, and the republic is lacking a frigate, unless there is a battle refit pelta. (which I very much doubt) I hope that the seperatists get a corvette or flotilla soon, because the hardcells seem very expensive. I know the pass tokens will probably minimize activation advantage in the future, but activation count is super important, and I see seperatists being even more limited than the imperials when it comes to activation count. But a flotilla each would keep things asymmetrical, so I hope wave 3-11 is the arquitens and a separatist corvette(and if it is a big wave maybe also flotillas) to level things out a tiny bit. Although maybe they're going for a huge asymmetry thing, and seperatists will never have corvettes ... flotillas