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Quick Firestorm Games 073014

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markymark1970:
Brad and I met at Collectormania last night.  We managed to grab a table before a few dozen Magic people invaded the store for a tournament.  Was good to see a lot of people there as I infer that is a good sign for their business. 

Anywho, Brad has never played and I have two (badly played) games under my belt.  So since Stephan was not there to guide us, the plan was to just move and shoot and see how the rules worked. 

Brad liked the Dendrinzi look and the fluff so I tried to get some ships cobbled together, but between ill-fitting ship parts and dried up glue, the only Dendrinzi he got to use were some Thraex frigate (thankfully one-piece ships).

I opted to take Terrans, the traditional opponent.  I didnt even know what ships I could field because I had not really looked at what Terrans I had.

I was furiously putting stands together (after scouring three stores for blue-tak or something like it) when Brad showed up.  I showed Brad that his ships were still in the shipyard, not even ready for a shakedown cruise, so we needed to improvise...

ROUND ONE
Dindrenzi/Brad- represented by a squadron of three Directorate Executors subbing in for three Fury-class cruisers.
Terran/Mark- Flying three Relthoza Scarabs playing the part of Terran Sentinels.
Note that all the above ships are one piece and fully assembled...
As for the fight, I didn't take note of any details.  I know that I rolled pretty darn well, Brad a little less so.  We didn't notice that Dendrinzi gun racks are port or starboard till round two, so he used those on me, along with his torps and kinetics as we closed head to head.  I took a pounding.  There was not much maneuvering.  I think he ended up with two badly damaged cruisers while I lost all three.

Observations:
*Terran torp effectiveness decreases as you close while Dindrenzi remains constant.
*I like Terran shields, sector shielding is fun!
*The Dendrinzi cruisers can really take a beating!  DR 4, CR EIGHT!!!  I rolled really well and had several hits of 12 or over, which would have double critted most ships, but not them.  Saved his ships several times.
*Ablative armor on the cruisers is not much of a handicap, you have to have three (out of four) damage points and at that point your virtually toast.  No reason to pay to remove that MAR, may be worth it for large ships though.
*Unlike DW, many ships have fore-fixed weaponry, so a lot more maneuvering would be required in a bigger battle (and/or with more experienced opponents).

ROUND TWO
Dendrinzi/Brad- Three Fury (sans Executor) joined up with two squadrons of (real) Thraex frigates!
Terran/Mark- Three Scarabs (impersonating Sentinels) joined by three Relthoza Venom destroyers impersonating Terran Pilgrims and three (real) Armsman frigates.

In both rounds, Brad usually won initiative (which we only remembered to actually roll for between turns in the second round).  His first turn cruiser fire didn't do much while the return fire from my cruisers got a reactor critical on one of his, blowing it up and I think damaging both a nearby cruiser and frigate.  From there it went really one-sided (the wrong side).  About the third turn in, I noticed his gun racks can't shoot forward but didn't really matter at this point.  Near the end, I had two frigates and a cruiser and he still had a cruiser and five frigates.  By the end of the game, some luck die rolls on may part left him with only a severely damaged cruiser and damaged frigate while all of my ships received posthumous commendations for valor, good shield upkeep and good point defense! 

Observations:
*The lack of weapons arcs loaded for ALL weapons on ship stat cards (for no good reason that I can think of) sucked
*By virtue of more ships and three squadrons, there was a lot more maneuver in round two than one, mostly by the frigates trying to move around.  There were several aft shots (CR and DR minus 1) on the cruisers.
*Terran frigates are CR4/DR5 while Dindrenzi are 3/5.  Made it easier to score hits on them, especially with the firing ships being damaged or with single ship squadrons. 

Overall, we both had a good time.  We used up a lot of 6s, so we should play on opposing sides in the next game (or we'll be disadvantaged).  Brad eeked out two pyrrhic victories.  We both made a few mistakes/misjudgments about some rules.  And we'll be better prepared to take on the rest of all ya'll!

Brad, anything you want to add/deny/refute?

DarkKnight:
Yea it was fun and it got me to order the 2 player box to grab some models of my own!

Andrewchristlieb:
The Dindrenzi get a lot of beneift from the Burn Thrusters TAC, their Reroute Targeting Calculators TAC is also really helpful. They do get some support up close from their carrier, gunships, and corvettes also.

DarkKnight:
That's good to know, is there anything you would recommend to prevent from just flying straight at the enemy while keeping it's fixed on target?

DarkKnight:
As I was skimming thru the rule book I did notice we made some mistakes as we based the rules on dystopian wars. For example you get shields against torpedoes.

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