SPACE VOTING RESULTS:
Voters, By Period - Boarding Actions

Daring raid on a heavily protected space station. I succeeded in sneaking in a destroyer with 2 long range hitting gunboats with a very meager escort. After a heavy fight 3/4 of the defending ships were out, my escorts were halved and my destroyer was badly mauled. But the most important part; the space station was still allive (damn) I had to run as reinforcements would arrive soon. I managed to limp away with the expensive destroyer (phew) and I could rescue all ejected crew. I was driven off but my enemies paid a high price: many fighters destroyen and crew killed as they bravely defended the station and worse the station was hit hard, very hard. Probably 60% of the facilities were destroyed. We are playing a campaign and that damage will be very expensive and difficult to repair. A second fleet of mine is already gathering to finish the job now he is weak..... [04 Nov 1999]

Played the Star Wars game at Historicon '98..lost of fun, the game used Full Thrust...the rules were simple and easy to use and rewarded good tactics...I like rules like that. [24 Apr 99]

We had a battle of two battlecruisers on 8 destroyers in a playtest for "Exordium Tactical". The chief designer managed to pilot one of his battlecruisers into a planet, and the destroyers were able to quickly put an end to the rampaging ruptors of the surviving BC. [19 Apr 99]

I was testing some new spaceship designs for the Jovian Universe. Basically, the Martian Free Republic was performing a space facility seisure against the Martian Federation. It was my first boarding actions tactical gameset. The Free Republic was beaten back. [4 Apr 99]

My last SF starship combat game was a B5 scenario I ran at our local club, set during the Narn-Centauri war and using the TBP variant of the Full Thrust rules. An EarthForce squadron was recovering a covert science team from a system in a backwater near the Narn-Centauri border (unspecified research was going on). A nasty three-way action ensued which saw the Earthers getting away largely undamagedbut with the CO of one of the cruisers facing a court martial for opening fire contrary to orders. [2 Apr 99]

Playtesting for a generic space combat ruleset a friend and I are working on. The Trinity Theocracy (me) vs silicon based beasties with a wierd idea of what ships should look like.

I ended up winning, destroying the last silicon ship by shooting it, ramming it, and finally boarding it and flushing the crew out into space. Great fun. [1 Apr 99]

My last game involved a playtest of B5W, flying EA dreadnoughts against a mixed force of Non-ALigned worlds ships, slaughtering equal sized forces of Hyach and Cascor ships in a close range slug fest...gruesome. [1 Apr 99]

Played Battlefield Gothic for the first time last night. Fleet of 4 Imperium Cruisers against fleet of 4 Chaos cruisers, I was the Imperium. I got lucky and zeroed in on his flagship with my Nova cannons at 135cm, plus got lucky with damage rolls. Chaos flagship was crippled. I then closed while bombers finished off the flagship, and eventually split the Chaos fleet such that my forward weapons were firing at one ship while my port weapons got a full broadside on another, crippling both. Chaos resigned, Imperium went home with no damage. [30 Mar 99]

It was a full Trust game based on our Nazi's in Space idea. Rocket ships look more like something out of the old buck rodgers/flash gordon films and a lot of daft stuff. I think in our last battle ReichsAdmiral Goering (great-grandson) beat Admiral Kennedy (the Hero of Dallas) in a close fight for the Pluto Waffen-ss colony !Told you it was mad ! [30 Mar 99]

The FSE (Federal Stats Europa) under the command of Admiral Fulton entered a so called friendly system to find an ESU (Eurasian Solar Union) fleet orbiting the gas giant. In a moment of sheer lunacy the FSE frigates and corvettes raced in an break neck speed only to disappear in clouds of expanding gas before doing much beyond minimal damage to the dasardly ESU. Then the main FSE group (carrier, heavy cruiser etc.) swung around to the port and proceeded to pepper the ESU escorts with SMs (missiles) while some torpoedo fighters went in for the kill... unfortunately the ESU have damn fine PDS and Interceptors (fighters made to dogfight) so not too many SMs made it in and only two (out of 42) fighters made it to their target. Then the ultimate insult... Admiral Fultons penchant for rolling ones surfaced and zip damage was inflicted. At this point the ESU were slowly plodding forward (and had to get home for dinner) and the FSE was fast running out of munitions and table...erm solar system so the FSE made the decision to gracefully withdraw (and buy some dice that know what a 6 looks like!) [30 Mar 99]

Heh. We (CEGA BG69) ran down a "renegade" venusian convoy. Turned out their Ryus aren't THAT advanced....

Jovian Chronicles is the greatest b/c the limitless possibilites in vehicle construction and the fast-playing, yet "realistic" tactical system. 3D vectored space combat, plus it interlocks perfectly w/surface and skirmish scale... [29 Mar 99]

Last Space Game I played was a Star Fleet Battles tournament deul, played FtF with someone in our local gaming group. I was flying ISC vs his Hydran, who conceded after 4 turns, mostly due to his ship being more damaged than mine. [29 Mar 99]

I was playing Battlefleet Gothic

2 Lunar class cruisers against the retreating Chaos Battlecruiser Abomination. The battlecruiser had some minor damage (basically a hit missing) and the Lunars had to destroy the ship or risk a battle against the wounded dreadnought and a Starbase. The Imperials launched torpedoes and fired their Nova cannons but were successful in achieving only the loss of some lances on the enemy before the battlecruiser turned and launched a retributive strike. One Imperial ship was crippled on an (extremely) lucky die roll whilst the other ship emerged unscratched. The Battle ended with the Chaos ship reaching safety. We played a game immediately after with 1500 pts worth of Imperial ships attacking a mined and defended 'harbor' near a planet that Abomination had retreated to.

The Imperials dished it out and got an expecially lucky stroke when the Chaos Battlecruiser's warp drive imploded and took the station with it. Afterwords there was just mop up in terms of the Imperials survivng the next Chaos turn. Victory was achieved Praise the Emperor! [29 Mar 99]

Four-on-two battle, two heavy ships trying to get to the jumpgate, being blocked by four faster lighter ships, two of which were heavy with boarders. [28 Mar 99]

The last game was in Jovian Chronicles.

It was a combat in Dione, one of the moons of Saturn. The players made reentry (I ruled that Dione had some residul atmosphere) and proceeded to the enemy base.

The met the enemies and, due to a very good roll, found other exo-armors that were hiding in the snow. They got near, were attacked but were ready, so they had no problem dispatching the foes. Once securing the area, they signaled the fleet in orbit and dropships with infantry and

fuel were sent. The classified cargo on the ship that fell in the planet was recovered and mission over.

From the, it was a long, boring and nerve-wrecking (mostly off-play) two months trip back to Jupiter. [28 Mar 99]

Well.. my last game was a game of B5 Wars -- I was introducing my friends to the game, so it was a plain vanilla point against point game of Minbari vs. Humans.. It got a bit bogged down when they started using theif fighters (I let them work together.. less for each to handle and a better chance of good ideas :)

In any case.. It was a stretched out game, but it came to a not-so decisive victory for the Minbari - Our main cruiser was taken out, but then the smaller ships harassed the Human's bigger vessels into running away with heavy damage.. [28 Mar 99]

Jovian Chronicles: 4 Jovian Exo-Armor Pathfinders vs. 4 CEGA Wyverns 1 Jovian Thunderbolt 1 CEGA Hachiman 2 Jovian Lancers 2 CEGA Wraiths Meeting engagement, CEGA force closed while the Jovian force split into 3 units, 2 sets of 2 Pathfinders and 1 Lancer with the Thunderbolt in the middle. The Wraiths and the Hachiman closed with the Thunderbolt and 2 pairs of Wyvern split to engage the Jovian flights. In short, the Thunderbolt was sunk, but the Wyverns were destroyed. The Wraiths escaped, but the Hachiman was sunk by the remaining two Pathfinders and two Lancers. [28 Mar 99]

Babylon 5 Wars by AoG is the most recent I have played. I played a loyalist EA fleet against a Minbari player. I look forward to the second edition rules, as this has promise to be a very good system. It would be much better as a campaign however (which I have written adhoc rules for that we use). I did just purchase Battlefleet Gothic today, and it looks very good, much better than the first rather lame version.

I really wish Fasa would bring back the Tactical combat simulator for another setting, as they lost the Trek license. Perhaps their Battlespace game setting which is NOT a very good game in itself. The Tactical Simulator is one of the best ever done. Pity it is so hard to find now. I do plan to convert a great deal of universes over to it in the future. [27 Mar 99]