This was my second battle at Bathurst on Saturday 12 December.
This time I was against my primary opponent, Theo, the reigning champion of Task Force Orange.
Theo was playing Rebels as well (I played three rebel fleets - though very different in composition).
Theo had four ships - an Assault Frigate, a Corvette B, and two of the new "Shrimp" frigates, with powerful broadsides. He had some A-Wings and some kind of bounty hunter chap.
My fleet was the same as the last battle (though I should mention I have two As, Bs, Xs, and Ys as the fighters, including Tycho Celchu - hence: Alphabet Soup).
Again I chose to go second, and Theo chose the bad thing to happen to him: Most Wanted. This allows double points for killing a unit chosen by the second player, and bonuses for shooting at the target. I chose to make Theo's target unit the Assault Frigate (a mistake? perhaps?), and for my target unit to be a Corvette A, which you might notice floating out over the death star on the far right.
We both moved forward quite aggressively, and I focused fire on the closest Shrimp Frigate, which had all kinds of special dodging abilities, and took a fair bit to kill.
The fighter battle was much more balanced in this game than the last, with Theo's typical flight command skill limiting my capacities to inflict damage. We both had fighters left at the end of the game.
I think this is the start of turn 4. My right hand frigate has made its flanking maneuver and is heading back into the fray. My left hand frigate is also turning back in from the top left. Theo's frigate has gone through the asteroid belt and is heading in from the bottom left.
In the centre, my Neb-B's have succeeded in wiping out the Shrimp Frigate with a little bit of damage in reply, and are gently brushing off Theo's A-Wings and bounty hunter.
In the centre right, my Assault Frigate is trading broadsides with Theo's frigate, which is taking the worst of it, being the target ships. My bombers are also shooting as often as possible. Things are looking so good at this point that I start to get excited, and ram the second Shrimp Frigate with my Assault Frigate, not once, but twice!
And that's when it all goes wrong.
But fortunately there are no more photos of my disaster.
Theo's Assault frigate escapes with a few more scratches, and manages to finish off one of the Neb B's with some long ranged shooting.
The remaining Shrimp Frigate lets off a devastating broadside (Thanks, Akbar!) which gets through my otherwise intact shields and does exactly enough damage to destroy My Assault frigate. Had I not rammed the blasted thing so often, it would have survived (and I probably won the battle, using it to send bombers against Theo's assault Frigate).
Hubris, thy name is David!
Theo won this game convincingly, but up until turn 4 I was pretty sure I was going to come out on top. Such is the nature of the game.
Lessons learnt:
Same as the last one, really. Concentrate fire on one target. Don't go for the slaughter - work on winning.
On this occasion, I probably went towards the enemy too quickly, as he came towards me very fast. I should have started slower, tried to win the fighter war, and then gone for the kill.
Also, I think I should have chosen a different target ship - that Shrimp Frigate could have died a lot quicker, and then I could have turned on to the other ships.
[William Shatner] THEEEEEOOOOOO!!!!! [/William Shatner]
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