I decided to make my first attempt at the game. Selected the Colonial Fleet and 4000 points. Selected 3 Adamants with missiles and Vipers, and then 3 Manticores, 2 with torpedoes and 1 with missiles (not enough points for all 3 with torpedoes).
My plan was to cross the Cylon “T” with my Adamants as they have good broadsides, and sweep wide with my Manticores and then sweep back in and make torpedo runs, and launch all of my Vipers to take out any Cylon fighters. Of course, the plan went out the window once the fight started. The enemy had 3 Talons (their version of Adamants),a and 4 ships (can’t remember the name) that specialize in hacking. They hacked two of my Manticores leaving them dead in space, and started hacking an Adamant. Meanwhile, my Vipers killed his fighters, while i got a good missile strike in on a Talon, leaving it pretty crippled (but one of my Adamants was heavily damaged in the exchange). I directed my fighters on the crippled Talon, and my remaining Manticore make a torpedo run on it and destroyed it. The other two Talons had charged too far, too fast and had taken themselves out of the battle and had to circle round.
I charged my Adamants at the hacking ships and took out one of them. Meanwhile my Vipers and Manticore, after taking out the Talon, I directed to one of the hackers, and another torpedo run took it out. One of my hacked Maniticores was hit by Talon missiles and went down. My heavily damaged Adamant went down to another missile barrage.
So, now was the crucial point. I had one active Adamant, one active Manticore, a hacked Admanant, and a hacked Manticore, both repairing themselves as fast as they could, along with 3 Viper squadrons. The enemy had two Talons and two hackers. So the questions was two fold - could I destroy his 2 remaining hackers before they could cripple any ships,and could my hacked ships repair themselves before the enemy Talons swung back around.
Luckily, my Adamant took out another hacker, though it sustained another missile attack from a Talon. With only one hacker remaining, my other ships managed to repair themselves and take it out. My Vipers meanwhile attacked a Talon and missile strikes from my Adamant and Manticore took it out. Then my undamaged Adamant, my Vipers attacked, with my Adamant, giving a broadside, then turning and raking the Talon rear, while my Manticore made a final torpedo run which destroyed it. The victory was mine.
Learnings:
- Vipers are very powerful and can take out Cylon raiders pretty easily. They also do pretty good on capital ships. They were my ace in the hole in this battle, and I think really swung the tide at a couple of the crucial points.
- Hackers are a pain and potentially very dangerous. Your ships have subsystems (navigation, fire control, etc) and they can make it impossible to move or fire.
- When facing hacker, just plunge past the main enemy ships and focus on them. The main enemy warships will hopefully swing past take themselves out of the battle, giving you time to focus on the hackers.
- Though unguided (unlike missiles), torpedoes can be very powerful. But unlike missiles, you can’t fire them from across the battlefield. You need to get close, but if you get in a good position you can do devastating damage.
This is a really great game, I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. Loved it.