Play testing for Q Continuum OP2

Upon reading the rules set for Q2 my first thought was that the ship with Q on board would be useless. Having read the clarifications on WORF (Wizkids online rules forum) I don’t necessarily think it is useless, but waiting a minimum of 4 turns for a ship to enter the fight could be a huge deal. So my first thoughts on Q2 were to make a list that had a high hull ship that could be the Q ship (NB: Old naval term for heavily armed merchant ships used as decoys) and whose offensive power I wouldn’t miss, so that I could do the rest of the fleet designed to kill my opponent. The q ship itself could still head for the moon and try to complete the mission whilst the rest of my fleet engages the enemy. Enter the Olympic Class…

Olympic Class [U.S.S. Pasteur] (20)
Mirror Universe Captain [I.S.S. Enterprise] (0)
Total (20)

I.S.S. Defiant [I.S.S. Defiant] (24)
Flagship: Independent (Romulan) [Flagship Resource] (10)
William T. Riker [U.S.S. Pasteur] (4)
Adm Worf [Regent's Flagship] (2)
Strafing Run [I.S.S. Defiant] (5)
Rebellion [I.S.S. Defiant] (5)
Elim Garak [Regent's Flagship] (3)
Jennifer Sisko [I.S.S. Defiant] (3)
Julian Bashir [I.S.S. Defiant] (2)
Improved Deflector Screens [Gornarus] (4)
Dorsal Weapons Array [Prakesh] (2)
Total (64)

I.S.S. Avenger [I.S.S. Avenger] (16)
Mr. Spock [I.S.S. Enterprise] (5)
Starfleet Intelligence [U.S.S. Pasteur] (3)
Alyssa Ogawa [U.S.S. Pasteur] (2)
Hikaru Sulu [I.S.S. Enterprise] (4)
Enhanced Hull Plating [I.S.S. Avenger] (4)
Plasma Cannons [I.S.S. Avenger] (2)
Total (36)

Fleet total: 120

The idea with this list was to have Q on the Olympic whilst the Defiant and the Avenger did their thing. The Defiant is flagged for +1 Attack, Defence and Shields, and gets access to Improved Deflector Screens (Since it is dual faction Mirror/Independent thanks to the flagship bonus). Riker’s battery ability makes the first few actions of a game worthwhile, and can mean that I’m attacking with 5 dice, BS and TL every turn, with an ability to cancel one hit or crit due to IDS and another due to the ship’s ability (at the cost of an auxiliary power token). With 3 evade basic, hopefully the now 3 hull 4 shield defiant will last long enough to hold onto those points, because 64 points is a huge investment in a potentially fragile ship.

Another fragile ship is the Avenger, which also has a multi-action captain in the form of Spock, whose ability each turn will grant the APT needed to trigger the ship’s ability (+2 attack dice), meaning that the ship will again fire with 4 dice, TL and BS.

The thing that worries me most about this list is that it is really quite fragile, and a few poor defence rolls, coupled with an opponent running high skill captains, could mean the end for the fleet in pretty short order. I do like the idea of running a Mirror Universe fleet for this event, but I don’t think this is quite the ticket.

Idea 2: Federation

Having read the clarifications on the Wizkids Online Rules Forum (WORF) I see that a ship’s secondary weapons are not negatively affected by Q. This got me thinking that a torpedo boat may be the right path to go down. Enter the Excelsior…

U.S.S. Excelsior [U.S.S. Excelsior] (26)

Mr. Spock [U.S.S. Enterprise (Refit)] (4)

Tuvok [U.S.S. Voyager] (4)

Dmitri Valtane [U.S.S. Excelsior] (2)

Lojur [U.S.S. Excelsior] (1)

William T. Riker [U.S.S. Enterprise-E] (4)

The Doctor [U.S.S. Voyager] (3)

Systems Upgrade [U.S.S. Hood] (2)

Quantum Torpedoes [U.S.S. Enterprise-E] (6)

Total (52)

Federation Attack Squadron [Fighter Squadron 6] (20)

Squad Leader [Fighter Squadron 6] (4)

Total (24)

U.S.S. Enterprise [U.S.S. Enterprise] (22)

Jonathan Archer [Enterprise NX-01] (3)

Fleet Captain: Independent (Klingon) [Fleet Captain Resource] (5)

Cheat Death [U.S.S. Enterprise] (0)

Nyota Uhura [U.S.S. Enterprise (Refit)] (2)

Phlox [Enterprise NX-01] (1)

Jack Crusher [U.S.S. Stargazer] (1)

Phil Wallace [U.S.S. Pegasus] (1)

Beverly Crusher [U.S.S. Enterprise-E] (2)

Pavel Chekov [U.S.S. Enterprise (Refit)] (2)

Eric Motz [U.S.S. Pegasus] (1)

Systems Upgrade [U.S.S. Hood] (2)

Type 8 Phaser Array [U.S.S. Hood] (2)

Total (44)

Fleet total: 120

This list relies upon a lot of crew and as such taking the Klingon Fleet captain seemed like a good idea. The Excelsior herself fires Quantum Torpedoes every turn with 1 extra dice thanks to Tuvok, BS as the ship’s action and a free scan thanks to the ability. Spock makes the Torpedoes lock on, and Lojur stops them from disabling. Valtane allows two re-rolls meaning that the final load out is 6 dice, bs conversions and 2 re-rolls for almost 90% accuracy. If any of those hits get through, I add another hit making it potentially 7 damage a turn.

The Enterprise uses Archer’s action to disable 2 crew (usually Motz and Wallace) to add +2 CS and +2 Attack. With Type 8 Phasers this makes it PWV 6 and CS 7, disable Uhura to add another 2 to the CS to all but guarantee that first strike at CS9. Chekov disables to give re-rolls and if the fleet is positioned correctly, then the fighter squadron can support the Enterprise with squad leader so that Archer’s action is free, allowing the ship to take BS too. At the beginning of the next turn, Phlox disables to take all of the disabled tokens from the crew, with Crusher disabling to stop that from happening, meaning that ever turn, all of those crew can be disabled over and over.

Fighters are fighters, but they give the extra action to Archer that helps the whole fleet to work, and two ships firing 6 dice a turn should do some damage, especially when the opposing fire coming back is potentially reduced due to Q.

Once Q is gone, both the Excelsior and Enterprise are free to engage at will, the only problem I forsee is an opponent using a cloaked fleet, where the Target Lock from Spock will be difficult to achieve in the first place.

So there are some ideas I’m working on at the moment, comments are welcome

I’m still not Picard.

D

After Action Report: Q Continuum OP1 - Dominion

When I first got into ST:AW I wanted to play Federation. The 'good guy syndrome' rests strong with me (in Warhammer Fantasy, God rest its soul, I played Empire, in X-Wing rebellion and even in Twilight Struggle I prefer USA to USSR) so off I went to buy a federation fleet.

Before too long though I was tempted by the other factions and began to play Klingons, Romulans and then Dominion. Deep Space Nine is my Favourite ST series and the option of having Gul Dukat (one of TV's most multi-faceted villains) fly my ships was too good to miss.

So with OP 1 I decided to play Dominion, and you can see my testing process elsewhere, eventually I settled on this list:

Trager [Assimilated Vessel 64758] (26)

Gul Dukat [Battle Cruiser] (5)

Breen Aide [Gor Portas] (2)

First Officer [Officer Resource] (3)

Aft Weapons Array [Reklar] (4)

Total (40)

Reklar [Reklar] (26)

Gul Lemec [Reklar] (3)

Adm Gul Madred [Reklar] (5)

Boheeka [Koranak] (2)

Aft Weapons Array [Reklar] (4)

Total (40)

Hideki Class Attack Squadron [1st Wave Attack Fighters] (20)

Total (20)

Hideki Class Attack Squadron [1st Wave Attack Fighters] (20)

Total (20)

Fleet total: 120

Many have counselled me that I have too many upgrades and may struggle to deal with the quixotic nature of Q, but practice games have taught me that as soon as you reach the central area (outside range 3 of a board edge) the effects of Q are easily dealt with. Having captains disabled might be annoying, but with an admiral and first officer in the fleet, I'd probably have a higher captain skill than my opponent.

So I rocked up to Wayland Games on Sunday ready to take whatever the worst Q had to throw at me was and was faced in round one with Borg.

Round One: Dan - Borg

Assimilated Vessel 80279 [Assimilated Vessel 80279] (26)

Flagship: Independent (Klingon) [Flagship Resource] (10)

Third of Five [Scout Cube] (2)

Advanced Weapon System [Starter] (5)

Total (43)

Assimilated Vessel 64758 [Assimilated Vessel 64758] (30)

Drone [Borg Sphere 4270] (0)

Total (30)

Soong [Soong] (38)

Drone [Borg Sphere 4270] (0)

Feedback Pulse [Borg Sphere 4270] (8)

Total (46)

Fleet total: 119

Dan and I often bounce list ideas off one another so when I was drawn against Dan round one, it was reassuring to know I'd be in for a good game. Dan and I go way back too, having known each other first of all through playing Warhammer fantasy (rest in peace). 

This first game was characterised by only being able to move 1 ever, and whilst all of my upgrades were disabled in turn one, by the time we made contact with each other everything was re-enabled and my captains were in play so I was able to take out the B'rel first and then the Galor. The Soong did offer some resistance, but went down to fighter fire soon enough.

The main lesson from this game was that having a captain skill higher than 1 was key, as it allowed me to concentrate fire and remove a key threat before I came under fire.

Result: Me 120-0 Dan

Round Two: Rich - Species 8472

Rich is the venue's TO and only plays when an odd number of people turn up. He'd played at nationals and is no slouch as a commander, we've played twice before, the first my scimitar killed his J'H battleship and the second my Klingons killed his Tholian. For this event he'd also gone down the no upgrades route with this list:

Species 8472 Bioship [Bioship Alpha] (36)

Species 8472 Captain [Bioship Alpha] (0)

Total (36)

Bioship Alpha [Bioship Alpha] (38)

Flagship: Independent (Klingon) [Flagship Resource] (10)

Species 8472 Captain [Bioship Alpha] (0)

Total (48)

Species 8472 Bioship [Bioship Alpha] (36)

Species 8472 Captain [Bioship Alpha] (0)

Total (36)

Fleet total: 120

This game was a similar game to the last- by the time we were in range of one another all of my upgrades were operational and I was able to concentrate firepower on the flagship and take it down before it had chance to fire. Afterwards, the fighters did their thing and I came away again unscathed.

Result: Me 120-0 Rich

Round 3: Mark - Romulans

Mark had the only fleet that really scared me, since he had 3 sets of cloaked mines  and a lot of upgrades too. 

I.R.W. Haakona [I.R.W. Haakona] (30)

Miles O'Brien [I.S.S. Defiant] (2)

Adm Mendak [I.R.W. Haakona] (4)

Tasha Yar [Prakesh] (2)

Brunt [Regent's Flagship] (1)

Cloaked Mines [I.R.W. Praetus] (3)

Total (42)

I.R.W. Valdore [I.R.W. Valdore] (30)

Donatra [I.R.W. Valdore] (4)

Jennifer Sisko [I.S.S. Defiant] (3)

Romulan Pilot [P.W.B. Aj'Rmr] (2)

Interphase Generator [R.I.S. Apnex] (3)

Total (42)

Prototype 01 [Prototype 01] (24)

Gareb [Prototype 01] (0 overridden to 3)

Shinzon [Scimitar] (6 overridden to 0)

Counter Attack [Starter] (3)

Cloaked Mines [I.R.W. Praetus] (3)

Cloaked Mines [I.R.W. Praetus] (3)

Total (36)

Officer Exchange Program (0)

Fleet total: 120

The first turn saw Incredible Power and Very Advanced from Q, which nullified the effectiveness of Jennifer Sisko, since that card would have caused me to disable all of my upgrades anyway. In the second turn the movement limiter came up again, and whilst my captain was captive of an Honored (sic) Judge, I was able to re-enable Boheeka and Breen Aide. A third turn of limited movement allowed me to re-enable both Aft Weapons arrays, meaning that by the time I engaged, all of my initial upgrades were re-enabled, and I was firing at a higher captain skill that my opponent.

The middle of the board was peppered with cloaked mines, and whilst I was relatively sure that in the end the mines would get me, I was confident that I could remove the enemy before that happened. The first round of firing got rid of the Valdore before I received any return fire, and the second round of shooting got the Prototype too. All that was left was getting the Haakona, which has considerably less firepower once the rest of the fleet are gone. Flying through the minefields hurt me a lot, but I was able to kill the Haakona before my whole fleet died.

Result: Me 120-80 Mark

So 3 games, maximum points from all three games and what did I discover? Aft Weapons Array with some quality (Boheeka and BS) is brutal, as are fighters. Whilst mines do damage fighter builds a great deal, I was still able to eek out the win thanks to some 8 HP carriers.

I'm still not Picard though....

D

Play Testing for Q Continuum 1 – Encounter at Farpoint

After my victory at the last OP event I decided that rather than stick with that fleet (however successful it was!) I would work on a whole new fleet for the first Q event. The scenario itself is somewhat crazy, so I thought I’d start by running down what the Q cards do and adding some of my own comments on the implications (apologies for picture quality).

1.       Honored Judge

I get the feeling that this might just be the card that people worry about the most. My first idea for this event’s fleet building was to run dominion fighters with Galor Class Phaser banks and Aft-Disruptor Wave Cannons – I could cover a large area of board space with a ship that wouldn’t be concerned about having its captain disabled, would fire with between 4 and 7 dice depending on tokens left and range, and would be consistently firing at a higher captain skill than that of its opponents. The problem of course was that the second line of text on honored judge says that if you have no captain disable a crew upgrade, and if you have no crew disable another upgrade. This would mean that if Honored Judge came up, it would rob me of one of the upgrades that I’d bought, and so what might ultimately be worthwhile doing was to run the fighters without any upgrades at all, particularly when one considers the potential effects of number 2…

2.       Very Advanced

If one were to deploy within range one of the board edge and this card is drawn on the first turn, then one has to perform a 6 straight manoeuvre to escape the area of effect. This means that no ship will be able to avoid the 2 disabled upgrades unless a) it has a 6 forward on its dial, or b) it has no upgrades. The fighters I spoke about above have only a 4 forward and if this card was drawn (let alone Honored Judge) then they would lose both of the upgrades. I think that if this card does come up and you have no 6 straight manoeuvre, then the best bet may be to accept that you are going to have cards disabled, and put yourself into a position to escape the area of effect next turn, rather that barrel forwards as fast as you can just to be alpha struck (striked?) by a Voyager/Enterprise-E/Scimitar that can escape the area of effect on turn one. As far as my fleet building went, this card was the death of Aft-Disruptor Wave/Galor Class Phaser Fighters.

3.       Incredible Power

This card actually encouraged me to still take fighters, even though I’d have to run them without any upgrades. Manoeuvring is severely limited by this card, with most ships only able to do a 1 forward or bank without avoiding (the chance) of taking damage. I think most players are conservative and fearful of damage enough that they won’t risk taking damage. Fighters therefore become all the more valuable, since in addition to straight and bank manoeuvres, they also possess 1 turns and the federation fighters have a 1 come about (that is white). Whilst I had been thinking that Dominion was the way to go for this event, the fantastic manoeuvrability that the Federation fighter offers, may just swing me towards favouring them. (NB: It always bothered me that the Federation fighters were never named “Peregrine Fighters” as they are in-universe).

4.       A Powerful Mind

This one is less of a spoiler than it might first appear. Yes, taking an APT can be the death of some ships, and certainly I would rather not take one, but taking one to perform an action bar action is not necessarily the end of the world- particularly when you can take upgrade actions, ship actions or captain actions (if the captain is enabled) without penalty. The key here might be that most ships can survive taking one APT a turn but few can survive taking two. Cards like Positron Beam, Brunt (not-FCA) and (the almost forgotten) Borg Missile become all the more powerful when they add an APT to a ship that already has an APT. It also means, conversely, that cards that give out APTs for some benefit (Such as Reinforced Hull Plating, the Tal’Kir’s named ability and Gul Macet) are less useful when you already have an APT. I’m looking quite hard at both the TOS Enterprise and the Tactical Prototype tech from the Prometheus expansion as means of being able to take actions despite the presence of an APT.

All of this discussion leads me towards two possible builds, with a third hovering in the back of my mind.

Build 1 – Dominion

Resource – Officer Cards

Trager [Assimilated Vessel 64758] (26)

Gul Dukat [Battle Cruiser] (5)

Breen Aide [Gor Portas] (2)

First Officer [Officer Resource] (3)

Aft Weapons Array [Reklar] (4)

Total (40)

Reklar [Reklar] (26)

Gul Lemec [Reklar] (3)

Adm Gul Madred [Reklar] (5)

Boheeka [Koranak] (2)

Aft Weapons Array [Reklar] (4)

Total (40)

Hideki Class Attack Squadron [1st Wave Attack Fighters] (20) Total (20)

Hideki Class Attack Squadron [1st Wave Attack Fighters] (20) Total (20)

Fleet total: 120

In play testing this fleet has been severely hamstrung by drawing Very Advanced on turn 1. If that doesn’t happen though, this fleet works well. If Honored Judge comes up, then neither the Trager nor the Reklar drop to 0 skill, as the First Officer Breen Aide and Admiral Madred take over. Reklar’s ability allows for a BS token to be dropped despite that action not being on the action bar, hence avoiding the APT and the Aft-Weapons array (fast becoming my favourite weapon upgrade) gives pretty good coverage at 4 Attack Dice.  The Trager is pretty survivable itself (I love the named ability) and the fighters just add to that ability. Whilst the number of moving parts here could go wrong pretty quickly, the upgrades are there to start with in order to deal with the scenario rather than ignore the worst that the scenario has to offer. It seems more skilful from my point of view to be able to take what the scenario throws at you and build around those potential drawbacks, than it does to build a fleet that doesn’t have to deal with the drawbacks. That is probably why I prefer this fleet to the next one…

Build 2 – Federation (sort of)

Resource – Federation Attack Fighters

U.S.S. Enterprise [U.S.S. Enterprise] (22) Federation Captain [U.S.S. Enterprise (Refit)] (0) Total (22)

Constitution Class [I.S.S. Enterprise] (20) Mirror Universe Captain [I.S.S. Enterprise] (0) Total (20)

Suurok Class [Ni'Var] (18) Vulcan Captain [Ni’Var] (0) Total (18)

Hideki Class Attack Squadron [1st Wave Attack Fighters] (20) Total (20)

Federation Attack Fighter [Federation Attack Fighter Resource] (20) Total (20)

Federation Attack Squadron [Fighter Squadron 6] (20) Total (20)

Fleet total: 120

Whilst the previous build was made to deal with the worst the scenario had to offer, this build is designed entirely to ignore the scenario. Three fighters, three cheap 4 hull ships, one of which, the prime universe Enterprise, can take actions regardless of the presence of APTs. The only interesting thing about this build is that I’ve tried to mix up the factions to avoid falling foul of Salatrel and Picard 8’s ability. Otherwise it is more or less just a case of flying into range two with the fighters and letting them do their thing. I’m worried it’ll be a little boring.

Build 3 - Evade-ager

U.S.S. Voyager [U.S.S. Voyager] (30)

Flagship: Independent (Romulan) [Flagship Resource] (10)

Jean-Luc Picard [U.S.S. Enterprise-E] (5)

Admiral Maxwell Forrest [Enterprise NX-01] (3)

Computer Analysis [Sakharov] (4)

Tom Paris [U.S.S. Voyager] (4)

Hikaru Sulu [U.S.S. Enterprise] (3)

Pavel Chekov [U.S.S. Reliant] (3)

Ilia [U.S.S. Enterprise (Refit)] (4)

William T. Riker [U.S.S. Pegasus] (4)

Multi-adaptive Shields [U.S.S. Raven] (5)

Transphasic Torpedoes [U.S.S. Voyager] (10)

Transphasic Torpedoes [U.S.S. Voyager] (10)

Tactical Station [U.S.S. Stargazer] (4) Total (100)

Federation Attack Squadron [Fighter Squadron 6] (20) Total (20)

Fleet total: 119

This fleet is just mean, and takes full advantage of my venue’s lifting of the 50 point cap and resource retirement rules. Voyager is tough to take down, with Captain Skill 12 when Honored Judge is not in play and 7 when it is. Between the Transphasics and Tactical Station it puts out a heap of damage and does not really suffer from things being disabled thanks to Computer Analysis. The only weakness that immediately jumps out at me is that the ship’s ability 360 Primary Weapon gives an APT, and that might prove difficult to shake off if I also have one from A Powerful Mind. I think out of the three builds this one is by far and away the best, most competitive and most annoying. I’m not sure what I’ll run yet, but this is a distinct possibility.

As always, comments are welcome, so let me know what you think.

D