Rindis.com

Crossposted from the SFU blog on BGG.

It took a couple days to entirely regain my equilibrium after the Alliance counterstrike on turn 11. But overall, the damage was limited, if still a problem. The Klingon economy suffered, thanks to the loss of a major planet, but the Romulan economy is still expanding, largely thanks to exploring their back area, though income has started coming in from captured Federation territory; overall the Coalition economy was 431.2, slightly higher than the turn 10 total, and 8.1 EP better than turn 11. We’ll see if I get to hang on to much (such as Hydran planets) to do even better next time.

Lyran survey rolls were horrible (3 on 3d6), while Klingon rolls were slightly below average. This was made up for by good B10 rolls, and it is probable (2/3rds chance) that B10-1 will finish next turn.

Builds:
Klingon: C8V, D6M, TGA, 3xD5, 4xAD5, MD5, D5S, F5L, 5xF5, 2xF5E, F5J, E4R, PDU, D6->D6S, D6->D6D, BS(f)->BTS(F), 2xVP2->2xVP3
Romulan: SUB, FHF, 2xSP, SPC, SPF, SK, 2xSKE, SEH, WE, SNB, PDU (4112), 3xWE->KE, BH->BHF
Lyran: DN, TGC, CVP, CWE, CWS, STJ, DW, 2xDWE, 2xFF, FCR, MB, 2xFF->DW, DDE->CWE

I had planned on not converting up the last pair of VP2 pods, but my forces on 2106 had been left out of supply, and with no fighters on several carriers. Part of the solution was to reestablish supply there and then swap out carrier pods on a couple of available tugs (thanks to the flexible tugs rules; under older versions of the game I couldn’t do this slight of hand). Since TAVs were going to be my main carriers, I wanted it to be a full squadron. The new TGA got the ’empty’ set as they went into a reserve (at which point fighters had been supplied to it). The Romulans built a PDU to stiffen the defense of the planet near the corner of Gorn and Federation space, while the Klingons built one to start rebuilding their major planet in 1611.

Raids went poorly. The Lyrans raided the Kzinti home province… only for the DNL to be driven off by the called up POL. The other Lyran raid, on a Federation FF blocking supply to 2106, drew a Kzinti DN reaction, which slaughtered the CF. The Klingons did successfully take out the FFE holding 1611 with a raiding D5, liberating it before movement. The C6 successfully disrupted a province, but another raiding D5 was driven off. The Romulans made one cloaked evasion roll to disrupt the province, while the other two raiders were driven off, though at least one of them crippled an NCL in the process.

I was planning on a more or less ‘general’ offensive, as a last hurrah before the Gorns join in, but decided to keep things calm in Hydran space from a distinct lack of maulers to take out decent-sized ships. A spare LTT picked up the new PDU in the Klingon capital. If he goes after that… well, he’s not going somewhere else.

The main goals were to try for the 6th Fleet (Romulan border) SB, and to cut off the 4th Fleet SB. Lyran forces mostly blocked Kzinti reserves from going to help the last Federation BATS on the Kzinti border (which is barely in supply/Strat Move range of the Barony), and helped show the flag against the Kzinti force left near the Federation border. Several moves and counter moves got me decent fights at much of NW Fed space, but I was worried about the Romulan side. Three out of four Federation reserves were in range of the SB, and the Romulans could only get at one. Of course, anything that went there would give the Klingons an easier time, and I was definitely giving Byron some decisions to make.

At the last minute, I saw a possibility. I was planning on taking on a pile of cripples + LAV at planet 2509, but he had ships that could react to that, so it was unlikely to draw a reserve (or to be taken without one). I realized the Klingon South Fleet could reach the BATS in 3209… which was undefended, and was directly between two reserves and the SB. He could still get a good number of ships to the SB and make sure it was save to continue being a big problem to me… but it would leave the Klingons nearly free to loot northern Fed space.

Traffic in Kzinti space.

Offensives deeper into the Federation.

Going for the 6th Fleet SB.

And, he ended up not reinforcing the SB at all. The reserve near the Romulans wasn’t quite pinned, and a CVA group headed out to planet 3210, while the other three all headed to face the Klingons. In a surprise, one of the Kzinti reserves went to ‘open up supply’ to the fight against the wandering Kzinti fleet (supply to the hex he went to would be lost once the Lyrans took planet 1802 from a single defending POL), giving me more ships in the area to worry about.

Battles:
1802: Kzinti: dest POL; Lyran capture planet
1801: Kzinti: dest POL
1701: Kzinti: crip CLE, FFK, FKE; Lyran: crip CW, DW, HDD, SC
2201: Federation: dest BATS; Klingon: crip F5
1906: Kzinti: crip 3xDD; Klingon: dest D6D
1705: Klingon: dest F5
2606: Federation: crip NCL; Klingon: crip D6, D5G, F5L
2505: Federation: dest FF, 2xPDU, crip 3xNCL; Klingon: dest F5L, crip D7, D6, 2xD5, F5L, F5, capture planet
2705: Federation: dest 2xPDU; Klingon: capture planet and retreat off of it
2603: Federation: dest BATS, cripCFF; Klingon: crip F5
3013: SSC: Federation retreats
2609: Federation: dest FF; Klingon: dest F5S
3508: Federation: dest BATS
3209: Federation: dest BATS
3611: Federation: dest DN, CA, SC, crip CA, CMC, 4xDE, 12xFF, FFE; Romulan: dest SP, K7R, 2xK5L, 2xK5, 2xK4, KE, 3xWE, SN, crip NH, 7xSP, SPF, SK, SKB, 2xSKE, SKF, KRC, 2xKR, KRM, 2xK5, K5S, 3xKE, 3xWE, CE, SE, 2xBHE
3509: Retreat after declined approach
3210: Federation: dest 2xPDU, 2xSWAC, crip ECL; Romulan: crip 2xWE, 2xWH, 2xBHE, SN, capture planet and retreat off of it
2107: SSC: Federation: dest POL

2201 was the last of the Federation border BATS near Kzinti space. I had hoped to kill it previous to this point, but got diverted by the attempt on the 4th Fleet SB last turn. Now there are no bases within six hexes of the Barony, and financial aid has to go off map (or 1802 will have to be held for a turn).

I had a fairly minimal base-busting force to take 2606 (all I could afford), so I was at a severe disadvantage when a full reserve showed up there, but we both retreated off after the first round as part of trying to maneuver to keep/deny supply.

The SB fight in 3611 went rounds, and started well enough with a 6-1 die roll split on the first round, which I used to kill the only Federation scout present. Most of the rest of the battle, Byron had to dial the SB’s EW up to 2 just to avoid an EW shift. We both had admirals, but he used a command point, which I forgot about, so I fought one ship down, which certainly did not help. I eventually killed the DN (the only CR10 ship present), which evened that out, but ended up waiting a while to do it (should have put a mauler on the line early, instead of trying to wait out his good chances of killing it). Mauling the CA before I’d gotten rid of the DN was certainly a mistake (made worse when the SPF shocked), but I didn’t expect the fight to drag on so long at that point. The second and fourth rounds had good Federation rolls against poor Romulan ones, round four being at BIR 10, and the Federation missed getting 50% only because of the EW shift. Both fleets are thoroughly wrecked, with the Federation 6th Fleet, naturally, in better shape, but not an offensive force by itself anymore. Most likely, the Romulans will have no real ability to mess around in Federation space on Turn 13….

And the fight for planet 3210 wrecked another fleet. It was a small Romulan force vs a partial CVA group that reserved over, plus a BATS squadron that reacted into the hex, for nearly equal compot. I killed the first SWAC on the first round to get rid of his EW advantage (missed killing a PDU by one), and the second at the end when the PDUs were gone. Since the BATS was dead, he lost that squadron after the first round as well. In fact, most of his ComPot was fighters, which allowed me to slowly sandpaper the Federation down while taking cripples over four rounds. He’d probably have done better to push the BIR high while he still had good ComPot, but I suppose he was worried about what might happen to the CVA.

Both the Klingon and Romulan navies have been roughly handled at the moment, the Romulans worse than the Klingons (though they have a local problem of a lot of cripples in and near north Federation space). This could be the high-water mark for the Coalition, or close to it, if the Federation and Kzinti can get a real counter-offensive going, and the Gorns can keep the Romulans busy. More likely, I will be able to push further into Federation space next turn, but I’m not going to take out four BATS and three planets again (they’re getting rarer for one thing).