One of our players has been slowly building a Romulan fleet using mostly old FASA models. The result, IMO, is fantastic. Now that the building and painting is done it was time for the designs to be tried out. I chose to use my Brigade Models American Republic Fleet which is loosely based on NAC designs out of fleet book 1. The battle would be one of the most nail biting Ive had in a long time.
The Romulans: His fleet consisted of three very powerful heavy cruisers and two squadrons of gunboats (Birds of Prey)
The American Republic: I chose to use a SDN and several smaller supporting cruisers and escorts. I intentionally chose not to use fighters since most Star Trek ships are not ideal for shooting down fighters. I wanted him to see how viable his designs were in a traditional ship to ship slug fest.
The set up was pretty simple with no terrain. My fleet set up in a fairly tight group and his three cruisers set up cloaked. The Birds of Prey (gunboats) cannot cloak- something were going to make a house rule for later.
The first two turns were strange to say the least. The Romulans tried an unwise run at the AMR fleet with their gunbaots with terrible results. They were all destroyed just short of the fleet. The AMR Wasp frigates accelerated at best speed in a wide flanking maneuver which is what they are designed to do.
The third turn was nerve wracking to say the least, perhaps more so for the Romulans. The cloaking rules dictate that a ship de-cloaks in the movement phase which comes after the missile launch phase. meaning his Anti-matter missiles would stay on their racks until next turn. The Romulan fleet de-cloaked in good flanking positions. The bulk of my best weapons face forward.
The AMR had the initiative. The SDN fired everything it could bring to bear on the closest Warbird. The ships were at slightly less than 12" so the Gatling batteries on the SDN were able to lock on as well. The result was devastating.
Three of her four anti-matter missiles were hit and the ships simply vaporized as their containment was breached.
The flanking Warbird targeted both the AMR cruiser and one wasp. The was wasp easily critted and while the damage was slight, both of its pulse torpedo launchers were knocked off line. The rest of AMR fleet had inflicted little damage. The last warbird caused minor damage to the SDN.
The fourth turn things got dicey…so to speak. With the two surviving Romulan ships on both flanks I had to decide how best to maneuver the fleet. none of the options looked promising but i elected to keep them in a tight formation for mutual protection and let the wasps race in, hoping to draw fire and maybe get a lucky hit.
The Romulans continued to pursue and salvo-ed all of their antimatter missiles most of which ended up locking onto the SDN. The fleet managed to shoot down, or reduce, a large number of them but it was not enough. Unfortunately it required almost every Gatling btty and Twin beam the fleet had to do it leaving return fire very limited.
The damage the missiles inflicted was horrendous but not crippling. The SDN would repair its bridge at the end of the turn.
The Romulans had the initiative and fired attacking with their rearmost cruiser scoring hits on the undamaged wasp destroying it.
The exchange of fire between the second cruiser and the rest of the AMR fleet was fairly insignificant.
The next turn was payback time for the AMR…or so they hoped. The biggest problem is the Romulans are far more maneuverable and in abt the worst position possible, from the Americans point of view. Unfortunately the Romulans decided to cloak which was very frustrating as one might imagine.
They stayed cloaked for the next turn as well and finally reappeared on the following turn. The AMR turned as hard as possible to bring the ships back around but it was never enough. The AMR strike cruiser with the damaged engines had been struggling to make repairs but so far had no luck.
As a result the fleet's formation began to scatter.
The AMR Patrol cruiser found itself flanked, again, by the enemy but was able to fire first inflicting moderate damage, enough to force a threshold check.
Notice the Anit-matter suicide charge? Not good for the Warbird and a nice lucky hit for the Americans! At the end of the turn the ship exploded.
The Warbird returned fire and inflicted heavy damage on the smaller American ship destroying its shield generators. They were beyond any hope of repair.
The other Warbird exchanged fire with the SDN and the Destroyer. They only inflicted a few hits on one another.
Next turn- The AMR fleet was scattering even further. the surviving wasp frigate still hadnt repaired any of its torpedoes, the Strike cruiser still was having trouble with its engines and, to make things worse, the SDN wasnt able to turn hard enough to avoid going off the map. So, with no help from the Romulans the SDN was out of the battle.
On the following turn the strike cruiser managed to finally get its engines repaired and began accelerating and turn as hard as it could to get back into the fight. The wasp also managed to get one torpedo tube working and moved to attack. The Warbird, in typical arrogant Romulan fashion, turned to attack without regard to being outnumbered.
The Warbird, having the initiative fired on the destroyer, wrecking it, and obliterated the wasp frigate.
The next to last turn the warbird gave chase to the damaged AMR patrol cruiser and inflicted crippling damage. The AMR Strike cruiser closed in but only hit the Warbird with a single torpedo doing moderate damage.
This is the end. The Warbird continued chasing the AMR strike cruiser and finally finished it off.
The strike cruiser was in an excellent firing position and hit with most of his torpedoes crippling the Warbird.
The next turn the strike cruiser easily dispatched the Warbird.
All in all a great game that i was certain i had lost right up until the end. The truth is, if the strike cruiser hadnt repaired its engines it never would have been able to bring its torpedoes to bear and that is what swung the battle back in my favor.
The losses to both sides:
American Republic:
SDN- disengaged, heavy damage
Patrol cruiser- destroyed
Wasp frigates- two destroyed
Destroyer- Crippled but recovered.
Strike cruiser- minor damage.
Romulan Star Empire: All ships destroyed
The Romulan player will probably be redesigning his ships with Plasma Torps in place of the Anti-matter missiles (good thing) but will be retaining the anti-matter suicide charges. They are 'characterful' :)
Any and all comments welcome!!!!
