Brand new player here, I played Armada once or twice when it came out, never got around to making it a regular thing but for my bachelor party I decided to run a 2x2 Corellian Conflict and I was going to run pretty much all the rule modifications found here but I wanted to get some feedback from experienced players, I'm a bit worried about starting down at 250 points (trying to combat snowballing) - do flotillas of smaller ships stand a chance against a fleet of 1 or 2 large ships with a few squadrons? I have visions of some poor player with a flotilla going up against an ISD and getting wiped, so I'm not sure how to balance the list building, seeing as we are all going to be in the noob-novice player category. I wondered if I should add some additionally= qualifiers to fleet building like no large ships on turn 1 or maybe even not until turn 3?

So far I'm thinking of adding the following to the guidelines linked above:

1) 250 starting fleet; no uniques, no large ships until turn 2.

2) No Admirals required until you fleet is 301+ (299+?) points.

3) Number of Squadrons must be less or equal to the fleets combined Squadron rating, and no more than 33% total points cost.

4) Maximum fleet point size rises by 50pts/turn, maxing out at 500 on turn 6.

Do any of you foresee any big problems? Another concern is whether I have enough ships for four people who could potentially reach 500 - but maybe starting at 250 will make it less likely for us to hit the 500pt ceiling by the time we are in range of 9 campaign points.

Should I be more proactive in balancing what starting fleets people are allowed to take to avoid everyone not having a fair chance at victory?

The most important thing to balance is player skill.

If your two best players are on the same team it *will* break the campaign.

Just now, Democratus said:

The most important thing to balance is player skill.

If your two best players are on the same team it *will* break the campaign.

Well two of us have played a handful of games when it first came out and none since, and the other two are complete novices, so I was just going to split the two novices between the two noobs. I thin realistically you are looking at 4 new players.

I might suggest sticking to the CC as it comes in the box with such new players - you're already going to be learning Armada, I'm not sure it's worth it to also be trying to learn a large fan modification to what is otherwise a relatively simple campaign ruleset, at the same time.

20 minutes ago, svelok said:

I might suggest sticking to the CC as it comes in the box with such new players - you're already going to be learning Armada, I'm not sure it's worth it to also be trying to learn a large fan modification to what is otherwise a relatively simple campaign ruleset, at the same time.

Agreed. No base or special assaults rd 1 is the only house rule I would suggest as a first time through the campaign. Starting at the lower point cap works just fine with the campaign rules as written.

And I know it's harder to do with ships, but don't hesitate to make some color copies of common to see but uncommon to own upgrade cards before hand. Stuff like Turbolaser Reroutes, Skilled First Officer, Assault Proton Torpedos etc.

I want to echo @svelok and add a little further rationale.

I think a good dab of the appeal of Armada(or any Star Wars game really) to new players is being able to play out the characters that we all know and love. Let the new guys have Tarkin or Han Solo from the get go. Sure they might get blasted but I believe they'll be a lot more invested if they get to pick what they want starting out and not be constrained. The ISD is a HUGE pull to this game, if you tell your buddies, "Sorry, can't get it until you play raiders or Glads"(which can be tough to learn with) they might be over Armada before they've even had a proper chance to get into it.

I applaud your decision to play Armada at your 'stag do' as our buddies across the pond call it, however I think teaching the game AND the campaign WITH restrictions might be a bit much for an evening or even two. If possible I'd try to get a learning game with the new players in prior to your bachelor party AND THEN see if they're down to go at it CC stay for your party. My intent here isn't to crush your dream, but rather save you a possible lot of heartache and frustration when your two newbie pals want to bail after the first match.

39 minutes ago, svelok said:

I might suggest sticking to the CC as it comes in the box with such new players - you're already going to be learning Armada, I'm not sure it's worth it to also be trying to learn a large fan modification to what is otherwise a relatively simple campaign ruleset, at the same time.

I agree. If you were going to change anything, I’d start at 200 points (with commanders) and play the first 3 turns on a 3 x 3 surface. Expand out to 3 x 6 at turn 4. The only reason I suggest this is because it will make the first 3 games quicker as you learn the ropes.

Thanks for the feedback. I do have a new Imperial Assault campaign they are very excited about as a plan B if they hate Armada, I know at least one of them really wants to give it a go though. I completely hear what some of you are saying about not limiting the "cool toys" and putting fun over balance for their first toe dip into the game, I'll take that on board. I do worry about the ISD's being too powerful, but that might just be my own lack of knowledge - my introduction to the game was being given a rebel wave 1-only fleet with nothing larger than a Nebulon-B and going against Victory Star Destroyers, so I saw quite a few of my ships get one shotted. I do have some of the big mon-cal ships now though, so perhaps it would be better to have everyone start with a large ship and enough change left over to add some support squadrons/ships to taste.

My only concern is if one of them wants a bunch of smaller ships and then goes up against an ISD and gets smacked, but maybe I'm overestimating how deadly an ISD is. I suppose it might go the other way if the ISD player doesn't maneouver well and gets flanked or flies off the board...

I would really run one game at least with your 4 guys first before the bachelors party. Get everyone situated with the rules, ensure that YES they do want to do this for 6 or so hours with you.

My son and I started a campaign with a starting point of 200, mostly because we don't have enough other players or ships to make up 2 fleets at 400 points. We could do 300 each but would have little room to add ships. Working very well so far. Just cut everything in half and round up. Total blast. Some odd decisions get made 200 points that you wouldn't normally make but it has made us both better players for having to learn new strategeries. Interdictor/raider combo for moving objectives for ****** and grab. Satisfying when it works. Anyway, I digress, 200 per fleet to start is fine. Especially for noobs.

3 hours ago, Grand Admiral Buford said:

My son and I started a campaign with a starting point of 200, mostly because we don't have enough other players or ships to make up 2 fleets at 400 points. We could do 300 each but would have little room to add ships. Working very well so far. Just cut everything in half and round up. Total blast. Some odd decisions get made 200 points that you wouldn't normally make but it has made us both better players for having to learn new strategeries. Interdictor/raider combo for moving objectives for ****** and grab. Satisfying when it works. Anyway, I digress, 200 per fleet to start is fine. Especially for noobs.

Was that 200pts including the cost of an Admiral?

3 hours ago, Grand Admiral Buford said:

My son and I started a campaign with a starting point of 200, mostly because we don't have enough other players or ships to make up 2 fleets at 400 points. We could do 300 each but would have little room to add ships. Working very well so far. Just cut everything in half and round up. Total blast. Some odd decisions get made 200 points that you wouldn't normally make but it has made us both better players for having to learn new strategeries. Interdictor/raider combo for moving objectives for ****** and grab. Satisfying when it works. Anyway, I digress, 200 per fleet to start is fine. Especially for noobs.

Taskforce!

5 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:

Taskforce!

Yes indeed. Works perfectly.

5 hours ago, Bakura83 said:

Was that 200pts including the cost of an Admiral?

Yes, tough choices but it really comes together in later rounds when your fleets start to grow larger.

6 hours ago, Grand Admiral Buford said:

Yes, tough choices but it really comes together in later rounds when your fleets start to grow larger.

Thats insane!

Do you remember roughly how fast your fleets grew in size from turn to turn?

Did either of you start with and ISD?

No isd in our collections yet but we did see an mc80 and an interdictor to start so, not too far off. We just started turn three and both sides are seeing decent growth. Like I said, hard choices to make but still fun.

44 minutes ago, Grand Admiral Buford said:

No isd in our collections yet but we did see an mc80 and an interdictor to start so, not too far off. We just started turn three and both sides are seeing decent growth. Like I said, hard choices to make but still fun.

wow okay, so it really was Taskforce format?? Can you talk about how well it worked??

What’s task force format??

EDIT Nevermind I found your life’s work...

...I think I’m going to try this.

1 hour ago, Blail Blerg said:

wow okay, so it really was Taskforce format?? Can you talk about how well it worked??

My main concern is that playing with so few points forces everyone to go with at least 1 big ship...don't fleets of smaller ships get overwhelmed?

If you take a large base, you are really limited in fighters and additional ships. Smaller ships allow more maneuver flexibility but limit long range fire power somewhat. In the end, we have seen that sometimes the big ship is preferable, other times it is an albatross. We are enjoying the campaign so far with these mods. With a few more models in our collection, we may bump the starting points up to 250, maybe 300. Even that will change the dynamics of the campaign. Only other change might be to rename this variation The Outer Rim Conflict to reflect the smaller fleet sizes.

I don’t think 200pts is unreasonable for the campaign setting: My head canon for this campaign is that Corellia being the powerhouse it is means the Empire is using the carrot instead of the stick to avoid a major thorn in its side, and so the elites who rule Corellia have nominally sided with the Empire for financial/stability reasons but have kept a large amount of atonomy and a large military and both the rebel’s and Empire have limited resources and freedom to act at first, and need to impress on the battlefield before more of the sector will side with them and tolerate larger military presences. Just my two cent idea.

Generally Taskforce is also meant to just be a good way for newer players with smaller collections to start playing as if they were playing the entire whole game.

Atm, large ships are very good, they got 4 more chassis and a wealth of new options. Its an issue that arises in the main game too.

200 points really limits your spends for objective cards...I’m trying to build a fleet that includes VIP capture. Or am I wrong about how campaigns work? Do you not buy objective cards as part of your fleet building in the campaign?

1 hour ago, Bakura83 said:

200 points really limits your spends for objective cards...I’m trying to build a fleet that includes VIP capture. Or am I wrong about how campaigns work? Do you not buy objective cards as part of your fleet building in the campaign?

Nope. You pick one of each color. The points value relates to how they score victory points.