I'm really liking the CC rules so far, but I'm questioning a few things so far when it comes to fleets and overall strategy.

1st. What is the point in attacking some of the planets that don't offer many resources? I suppose some places offer special bonuses, but It's looking to me like the game will mostly just be a back and forth fight over a few key systems such as Corellia to get victory points and resources to build you fleet before the final engagement.

2nd. What is the point in going after victory points? As I mentioned earlier, why not focus on getting resources for building the biggest fleets possible with hopefully minimal losses. As soon as your opponent gets close to winning, just declare a final battle.

3rd. Lets say I'm the rebels and my fleets are desperately needing more resources after some losses. The rulebook recommends declaring a special Hyperlane Raid assault to get more resources. So that sounds like a good idea, but I feel like the objective makes it hard to gain resources against a larger fleet without losing more ships in the process. I guess I just feel like it would be easier to attack somewhere else and build a base for the next turn instead, unless you had a very lucky Hyperlane Raid match.

I might be missing some key strategical components, but these are my questions so far.

My internet went haywire, I'm trying to delete this extra post...

It is too late. Ye be judged.

1^st. If you win an assault on a system, you will at the least get +1 campaign point. If you win an assault in a system you have the option of placing an outpost (rebel only) or a base in that system which will give you more resource points in later turns. Another strategic aspect is that your opponents are less likely to use their most powerful fleets to defend such a system so you may increase your odds of success. Being able to place an outpost at zero cost makes these unremarkable systems a more attractive choice for rebels. For the Rebels systems like Truuzdann and New Plympto are ripe for Hyperlane Raids. For the Imperials sytems like Froz and Talfaglio are good choices for a Show of Force.

2^nd. The final battle is not a required thing. It could be that the side losing feels that they have no chance in a final battle and a better chance to change the course of the conflict by strategically planning attacks to try and boost their own campaign points. Of course the strategy of building up your resources in anticipation of winning the All-Out Offensive is also a valid tactic.

3^rd. The faction with the fewest campaign points will get to choose two assaults so my strategy would be to plot my other assault at a system that your opponent really doesn’t want to lose in.

A lot of this is going to come down to the skills and unit availability of the two factions. As the rules warn, “…pitting a team of experienced players against a team of new players will likely result in a short and brutal campaign.”

Not sure if this discussion belongs in this thread. It is not a fleet build.

1^st. If you win an assault on a system, you will at the least get +1 campaign point. If you win an assault in a system you have the option of placing an outpost (rebel only) or a base in that system which will give you more resource points in later turns. Another strategic aspect is that your opponents are less likely to use their most powerful fleets to defend such a system so you may increase your odds of success. Being able to place an outpost at zero cost makes these unremarkable systems a more attractive choice for rebels. For the Rebels systems like Truuzdann and New Plympto are ripe for Hyperlane Raids. For the Imperials sytems like Froz and Talfaglio are good choices for a Show of Force.

2^nd. The final battle is not a required thing. It could be that the side losing feels that they have no chance in a final battle and a better chance to change the course of the conflict by strategically planning attacks to try and boost their own campaign points. Of course the strategy of building up your resources in anticipation of winning the All-Out Offensive is also a valid tactic.

3^rd. The faction with the fewest campaign points will get to choose two assaults so my strategy would be to plot my other assault at a system that your opponent really doesn’t want to lose in.

A lot of this is going to come down to the skills and unit availability of the two factions. As the rules warn, “…pitting a team of experienced players against a team of new players will likely result in a short and brutal campaign.”

Not sure if this discussion belongs in this thread. It is not a fleet build.

Great thanks that helps a lot. I realized later that this might not be the best place for this post, but I'm not sure where else to put it... and then I double posted *derp*. I was hoping I could delete posts.

I think there is a lot going on in the cc... I think spy net will be really useful and may even be a build around.. Low deployment fleets may be able to redeploy up to 3 ships at the beginning of the game... This can grant a massive advantage... Spy nets on the map are in nebulae as well, with raiders something or other location making the nebula objective mandatory... Read that objective and think about that second player bonus... Oh boy!!!

Except of course, unless you add "to a minimum of 1", and assume that means you don't set a command dial if you're at Command 1..... Its actually a penalty.

Playing without a Command Dial is a penalty...

Two dimensions will ultimately emerge as to the success of a campaign:

1. Relative skill levels of the players at playing the game of Armada

2. Strategic skill in assigning fleets against each other in favorable match-ups.

I get this from doing a sample starting placement with my own map and working out some of the possibilities. In this respect, both sides have some leeway in where they can place, but certain systems really ought to go much more quickly than others. And in the end, you should see about 100 points or so per player at the end of a campaign turn, when you add Refit points together with the points with which you can buy new ships/squadrons/upgrades, that may not necessarily replace all the losses you incurred in a battle. So that takes us back to relative skill levels: Can you create a higher level of margin in your games? Ideally, you'd want 6 players all equally skilled. In practice, you're going to have skill levels all over the board. So that takes us to the second point. Making good use of the match-ups, both in terms of how each player's fleet stands on a given turn, but also in what you know about the skill levels of the players.

The interesting question is how long it takes to build up key combinations of upgrades on ships the way we see in the standard game. My sense is that you'll want to get started on this process as soon as possible, and part of the skill of the game will be in deciding how to field scarred units in your fleet, and minimizing their loss for as long as possible. After all, if I take 100 points of losses in my first game and then have roughly 100 points, I probably want to spend some of them on upgrades, which means not everything gets unscarred. There's going to be a rhythm and rhyme to the art of building a fleet that can remain effective despite the presence of some scarred units and can retain that effectiveness as long as possible.

The part which I'm least sure about how it will affect the outcome has to do with base limits. In a two-player game, the Empire is limited to 5 bases which means that they will be collecting resources from only 5 system. The Rebels, OTOH, will have three bases and four outposts for a total of 7 locations. Outposts are free so they can be squashed but it will be difficult to keep their numbers down. (1.4 ratio)

In a three players game, the ratio is similar, 7 for the Empire and 4+6=10 for the Rebels (1.42 ratio)

On thing I noticed was that if you destroy a base, you get the Campaign points equal to the Victory Bonus printed on the map but that some spots have +0. It says you get the the bonus, not 1+the bonus. This means that if you have a base on a +0 spot, your opponent gains nothing from destroying it. IOW, they will be the best spots to build a base.

As I read it (and I certainly might have misread or misunderstood something):

1. If you assault a system that contains an enemy base or outpost and win, then you get campaign points equal to that location’s Victory Bonus value.
2. If you win a battle as the defender at a system that contains one of your bases or outposts you get one campaign point.
3. If you win a battle as defender or assaulter at an unoccupied system you get one campaign point. Note that a system with an outpost counts as an unoccupied for this purpose.
4. If there is no base in a system, and the assault was not a Special Assault the winner is gets a campaign point.
5. If the defender wins a battle in an unoccupied system, they get one campaign point even if it was the subject of a Special Assault.

In Summary:

If you win a battle as the defender you are going to get one campaign point no matter the status of the system. A winning Assaulter will get one campaign point for an unoccupied system or the Victory Point bonus of the system if the defender has a base there. If the Assaulter wins a Special Assault, or an Assault against a base in a system with no Victory Point bonus then they will get no campaign points.

The team with the fewest campaign points will be making two assaults in a turn so the defender should technically have the better chance to win campaign points. The best way to earn campaign points is to successfully defend, or to attack systems with a Victory Point bonus that contains an enemy base.

The longer the campaign drags on it seems like the Rebels will start to get more and more resources. Thematically it makes sense, the longer the rebellion is able to endure the more it will spread. The Imperial faction needs to win campaign points fast, before the Rebels can grow powerful. If that fails, then the Empire will want to declare an All-Out Offensive before the Rebels are able to get many more refits and upgrades. Of course, the best way to win is to simply crush the opposing fleets in every battle so their resources dwindle and they are forced to use scarred ships with few upgrades.

My question: Is there any advantage to going first in a 4-player game? The rules say the team with fewer points chooses the first assault. However, that gives the team with more points full control over both of that round's matchups. They choose a fleet to defend, and the 2 remaining fleets pair off.