10 hours ago, Green Knight said:

My veterans: ISD, Demo, Jonus and Valen.

Rebels: none.

Late here. Maybe I can do a story tomorrow.

No story, but a report:

https://armadaihaveyounow.blogspot.no/2018/02/vassal-corellian-conflict-campaign-blog_13.html

@BrobaFett , I have come up with a neat idea how to deal with the problem of never dying uniques. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST TO CHANGE RULES OF OUR ALREADY RUNNING CAMPAIGN. I post it simply here, because we have discussed the problem here earlier. It is a new power for the Skilled Spacers token that is meant to replace the old one:

Skilled Spacers: Before deploying fleets, chose one enemy squadron or unique upgrade that is not a Fleet Commander. If the squadron or the ship with the upgrade is destroyed in this battle, roll a blue die after the battle. If it is a hit, the upgrade/squadron is permanently removed from the campaign.

Have you guys scheduled games?

There is no rush, since we agreed to about 2 weeks per round, just wondering.

43 minutes ago, Green Knight said:

Have you guys scheduled games?

There is no rush, since we agreed to about 2 weeks per round, just wondering.

We aim for Thursday. I have a busy week and it took 2 tries for the WC round. And will have another one with Aresius soon.

1 hour ago, Tokra said:

We aim for Thursday. I have a busy week and it took 2 tries for the WC round. And will have another one with Aresius soon.

Speaking of WC, it appears JJ and I might be scheduled for this Thursday as that is perhaps the only day our schedules will be free. It may need to be Wednesday or next week for the CC, and I am sorry to be causing coordination troubles like this, but the WC timeline is much more condensed.

4 hours ago, Darth Veggie said:

@BrobaFett , I have come up with a neat idea how to deal with the problem of never dying uniques. THIS IS NOT A REQUEST TO CHANGE RULES OF OUR ALREADY RUNNING CAMPAIGN. I post it simply here, because we have discussed the problem here earlier. It is a new power for the Skilled Spacers token that is meant to replace the old one:

Skilled Spacers: Before deploying fleets, chose one enemy squadron or unique upgrade that is not a Fleet Commander. If the squadron or the ship with the upgrade is destroyed in this battle, roll a blue die after the battle. If it is a hit, the upgrade/squadron is permanently removed from the campaign.

I actually think you are on to something here. I really like this.

19 minutes ago, BrobaFett said:

I actually think you are on to something here. I really like this.

This change (which I'm not sure I like) would favour the team that can afford the most locations. Meaning rebels.

1 hour ago, Green Knight said:

This change (which I'm not sure I like) would favour the team that can afford the most locations. Meaning rebels.

That's partly why I like it. If you remove all the other house rules and just go with this maybe this balances out the empires resource lead by allowing Rebel players to target things that can't be refit. Or maybe limit it to squads only, I think that would make it better, so they can't target an ISD and have a 50/50 shot of removing it from the game. But even just limited to squads it would have large ripples in forcing imperial players to occasionally eat into their upgrade points to replace squads that get blown up, and perhaps reduce investment in aces.

Of course, it's AVAILABLE to the Empire as well, so the Rebels have the exact same fears, and this would make aces more risky them too, but it's a little more limited impact on the Rebels as they are behind in resources at the start.

In the future, I think it would be interesting to try this as a lone house rule, or maybe in conjunction with a no base assaults/special assaults r1.

22 hours ago, BrobaFett said:

We need a Tokra-esque story.... @Green Knight or yourself should do that!

Also, I'll let Tokra do ours

Done, see the post.

@Green Knight I think your analysis is correct, ramming you to death was a good move in a tournament game with a CR90 (which is generally where my rebel experience is), but a bad move in a campaign with an MC30. My concern was getting retribution from the raider before I killed it, but looking at the screen shots that was not going to happen.

As I mentioned I’ve also never run an MC30 before so Co-ordinating three was quite fun, they do not move like corvettes.

Looking at the set set up I definitely screwed up the orintation of the left CR90, I really should have had that coming toward my fleet, not towards demo.

5 minutes ago, Dr alex said:

Done, see the post.

@Green Knight I think your analysis is correct, ramming you to death was a good move in a tournament game with a CR90 (which is generally where my rebel experience is), but a bad move in a campaign with an MC30. My concern was getting retribution from the raider before I killed it, but looking at the screen shots that was not going to happen.

As I mentioned I’ve also never run an MC30 before so Co-ordinating three was quite fun, they do not move like corvettes.

Looking at the set set up I definitely screwed up the orintation of the left CR90, I really should have had that coming toward my fleet, not towards demo.

It even weakened MC30 hull - and let the other raider ram it for another hull dmg. Only no HIE crit saved it from an even earlier death.

But you know, you don't have to refit everything. You can leave some of it scarred. So it won't hurt much. Unless you aim to get into a bloody fight next time.

Btw you did well with the 30s if this was your first run!

2 minutes ago, Green Knight said:

But you know, you don't have to refit everything. You can leave some of it scarred. So it won't hurt much. Unless you aim to get into a bloody fight next time.

I think you’ll find I only do bloody fights.

I also should have gone with nebula, I figured Mothma would protect me against the station, but needing my evades for TRC meant I had to do some compromising I hadn’t considered.

finally, if I’ve learnt anything from the long line of other people’s dead MC30s I’ve left across the galaxy, I should have remembered they have high shields and low hull, do not ram with them...

24 minutes ago, Dr alex said:

I think you’ll find I only do bloody fights.

A couple of bloody fights in a row can cripple a CC fleet... many admirals have discovered that. It pays to have a different mentality.

41 minutes ago, Green Knight said:

A couple of bloody fights in a row can cripple a CC fleet... many admirals have discovered that. It pays to have a different mentality.

Not my blood, not my problem

16 hours ago, Green Knight said:

This change (which I'm not sure I like) would favour the team that can afford the most locations. Meaning rebels.

That is true. But I think this is more of a general problem of every single approach that succeeds in bringing Diplomats/Skilled Spacers/Spynets on par with Repair Yards - which does not invalidate your argument. My conclusion from your line of reasoning is that one needs another house rule as soon as one addresses the big strategy effects issue.

15 hours ago, BrobaFett said:

That's partly why I like it. If you remove all the other house rules and just go with this maybe this balances out the empires resource lead by allowing Rebel players to target things that can't be refit. Or maybe limit it to squads only, I think that would make it better, so they can't target an ISD and have a 50/50 shot of removing it from the game. But even just limited to squads it would have large ripples in forcing imperial players to occasionally eat into their upgrade points to replace squads that get blown up, and perhaps reduce investment in aces.

[...]

I think you haven't read closely the proposal. There is no 50% chance of losing an ISD. You lose merely the unique upgrade on it (thematicly: the heavy damage of the battle resulted in the death of poor Toryn, but not in the utter destruction of the entire ship).

Drawbacks of the rule are to me that if one refuses to adopt and still designs a fleet around a specific unique and then loses it, the game won't be much fun for him from now on. Which sucks. But maybe that is his failure. A second and in my eyes bigger problem is that it slightly increases the snowballing effect of the game in two ways. First, the side that is going to a strong lead will have destroyed more enemy units than the opposing one and thereby will have by this rule a higher chance to kill the uniques of the weaker side. Second, the side with the strong lead will much more likely have more planets and hence skilled spacers - which makes them even more deadly. However, the second point is again a problem of every single strategic effect that does not help the losing side more than the winning one.

What I personally especially like about this rule is that it enforces fleet diversity and development. Now you cannot simply build a fleet around those same way to often seen uniques (Admo, Demo, Yavaris, GH etc.). You have to keep in mind that you lose them and you need to have a strategy in mind how your fleet will adopt. Another benefit is that fleets still change after the 500 point cap is hit.

The Empire has successfully defended Polanis from the terrorist cell that attempted an unprovoked assault upon it under the command of the nefarious being Sato.

The Imperial fleet under Grand Admiral Thrawn had stopped at Polanis for a bit of R&R, much deserved after a strenuous and successful foray into the Outer Rim to crush the terrorist cells of those unruly regions. What was their dismay and anger, therefore, to find that even here at home such cells existed! Nevertheless, they were not caught off guard, and the Grand Admiral quickly put a plan in place. As the rebel rabble turned to flee from the overbearing might of the Empire, he swung upon their exposed right flank, catching the Nebulon-B ship Salvation in the side and destroying it easily. A Gladiator sacrificed itself and its vacation-and-medal-of-honor-deserving crew to prevent the vessel's escape and to wound the MC75 that reports indicated Sato was aboard. Unfortunately, before the final salvos of turbolaser fire could utterly annihilate the fleeing flagship, it and the rest of the fleet jumped into hyperspace, as all cowardly terrorists must of necessity when faced with the concentrated firepower of an Imperial fleet.

Veggie chose Opening Salvo, and deployed in the left side of the board. I deployed in the center and swung toward him. One GSD went wide left to prevent flanking maneuvers. One I deployed too far right and it did nothing. He killed my squads in turn 3, and Han was left on 1 hull. The left-flanking GSD I had left in the front arc of the 75 in the hopes of causing a ram and double arc, but he navigated around it after stripping it of shields. My other GSDs were flanking on the right his TF HH and Salvation. Navigating allowed him to rescue the HH, which was at 3 hull, but not Salvation, which he rammed into the GSD, leaving it on 1 hull at the end of the round due to some poor rolls. Han killed it at the start of the next turn. Turn 4 I killed Salvation and his 75 and the HH hyped out, the former on 1 hull. I only needed 1 more hit to kill it, but rolled a blank. Turn 5 the rest of his fleet hyped out, leaving me victorious.

End result:

Han and Tycho vets
Salvation and a GSD scarred.

Polanis secured for the Empire.

Here's the log .

@GhostofNobodyInParticular was a great opponent. I made several mistakes, had initially quite cold dice (seriously, Han?), and had to recognize that after merely in-depth playing close-combat fleets for 1,5 years I am really unexperienced when playing a fleet that functions in a totally different way. GNiP won and he rightfully did so. And a lot of luck (and maybe generosity from his side considering a misdialed HH) merely prevented my Flagship from death.

One thing: GNiP has Superior Positions among his objectives and he seems to regret it. It seems to me to be obviously a bad choice. I offered to advocate that he can change it. After all, we are still gentlemen, right? I would prefer him to change it. Of course, in that case he has to post here his new one

That concludes round 1!

Well played everyone. It looks like a fairly balanced start, with no player badly hurt, or 1 team with a lead.

In points it's Imps 2, Rebs 1, so rebs get 2 assault next round as well.

According to my calculations:

Refit: both teams 45 each

Resources: Imps 164 (55+55+54), Rebs 153 (51+51+51), both teams 1 spacer (+4 resources, divided any way)

As soon as the Rebel team is ready we can post our r2 fleets and declare assaults.

And I STILL am not sure about special resource rules:

• YARDS: unchanged - this is certain
• DIPLOMATS: can block any (ie one with a base/outpost/presence) non-diplomat planet
• SPIES: unchanged - there was a proposal they double in value, but was this ever actually settled???
• SPACERS: can give +4 resources to any player (or combination of players), but is this as an alternative to the basic effect, or instead of ???

Special assaults:

• not in r1
• otherwise unchanged??? or was there some changes after all???

5 hours ago, Green Knight said:

And I STILL am not sure about special resource rules:

• YARDS: unchanged - this is certain
• DIPLOMATS: can block any (ie one with a base/outpost/presence) non-diplomat planet
• SPIES: unchanged - there was a proposal they double in value, but was this ever actually settled???
• SPACERS: can give +4 resources to any player (or combination of players), but is this as an alternative to the basic effect, or instead of ???

Special assaults:

• not in r1
• otherwise unchanged??? or was there some changes after all???

I am not sure how much I can help you, but here is my (non-GA) understanding from what happened:

• YARDS: as you said
• DIPLOMATS: as you said
• SPIES: You can redeploy 2 ships within one battle (that was the way @Tokra and @BrobaFett played it yesterday)
• SPACERS: merely the resources; it seems to me that they can be split or given as lump payment

Special assualts:

• No base/presence after successfull assault

At least, that is my understanding of our current state.

Spynet is already the strongest token, doubling it made it too strong. Imo we need to return to RAW on spynet.

Yes, i used it on two ships yesterday. But it made no difference. i didn't had to redeploy the MC80 this much as it was already standing at the right place.

And yes, i will write a report. But was a bit busy today and will have my WC match later today.

42 minutes ago, Tokra said:

Yes, i used it on two ships yesterday. But it made no difference. i didn't had to redeploy the MC80 this much as it was already standing at the right place.

Yeah, but that's under normal conditions. It invalidates an entire aspect of cards like solar corona and superior positions.

8 hours ago, Darth Veggie said:

One thing: GNiP has Superior Positions among his objectives and he seems to regret it. It seems to me to be obviously a bad choice. I offered to advocate that he can change it. After all, we are still gentlemen, right? I would prefer him to change it. Of course, in that case he has to post here his new one

That's what Skilled Spacers are for.

24 minutes ago, GhostofNobodyInParticular said:

Yeah, but that's under normal conditions. It invalidates an entire aspect of cards like solar corona and superior positions.

That's what Skilled Spacers are for.

(Wait, am I repeating myself?)

Peanut Gallery, out!