Australian Armada Nationals

Last weekend (24 & 25 September) I participated in the Australian Armada Nationals. There were 34 players gathered in Sunny Queensland, with about a dozen making the trip from interstate.

ROUND ONE - NICK'S ACKBAR LIST

This is the setup from the first game - I am flying my "Tora Tora Tora!" list, with 2 Mc30c Torpedo Frigates with OE, APT, and H9s. One is Admonition. I also have 2 CR90As with TRCs, one carrying Dodonna. There are two nekid Flotillas, commanding 3 X-Wings, and one Jan Ors. I've been flying a variant of this list for a while now, typically on VASSAL, but also against my regular sparring associate, Theo.

My list has a 16 point bid, which was enough to get me initiative in all my games (with some good luck in game two...).

My opponent in Round One was Nick W, about whom I have had blog reports in the past. Nick won a number of regional competitions (I think NSW, ACT, and VIC), On this occasion he was flying 3 AF2Bs with ECM and GTs, one with Xi7, another with Enhanced Armament, and the third with TRCs. Ackbar was on the lone Flotilla Bright Hope, with four A-Wings.

I chose Nick's Dangerous Territory.

End of turn 1, and Nick has turned one frigate to my left, and two to the right. My ships are racing towards the front of the mini-conga, with Admonition dashing forward for an early turn 2 strike - unfortunately my side arc was just out of black range - I should have taken a last section yaw click to turn a little.

End of turn 2, and Admonition, having fired its front arc only, is now in a great position with double arcs on the front Frigate. The other Mc30c is lining up waiting for targets to fly into torpedo range. My far right Corvette is avoiding side arcs and is heading back to the centre of the map.

A slightly zoomed in section.

End of turn 3 - one of Nick's firgates is gone, the other damaged from the torpedo frigate, and double arced by Dodonna's ride. I'm working hard to get viable arcs on Ackbar's Flotilla, but it is hard work.

 End of turn 4 - the middle frigate is still alive, but will soon succumb to the incoming TRC90. Dodonna has Bright Hope in front arc, but will fail to get the necessary accuracy. Amazingly, Nick's A-Wings are cutting down the Jan Ors supported X-Wings, due to some awful anti-squadron fire.

End of turn 5 - one of my flotillas is chasing Bright Hope planning to ram it to death - but it was too little too late.

I didn't take an end of turn 6 photo - I lost my X-Wings and one flotilla, but took out two Assault Frigates and two A-Wings. All-in-all, it was a good result for me, with an 8/3 victory.

ROUND TWO - ANDY'S RIEEKAN CORVETTES

My second game was against Andy, the Queensland Regional Champion. He was flying 4 TRC90s, with Rieekan on a Quantum Storm Flottila. He had 3 YT2400s, Dash Rendar, Han Solo, Jan Ors, and an X-Wing. We both had a 16 point bid, and I won initiative on a coin toss. I chose to go first. We played his Most Wanted. He chose my Admonition and one of his Corvettes as the target ships.

Andy's first deployment was Rieekan's flotilla, giving me my first target - Admonition was gunning for the flagship.

End of turn 2, and my non-Dodonna corvette has sped from the far left to the centre-right, heading for one of Andy's corvettes, that is making a similar move to the flank.

 End of turn 3, and Admonition is in striking distance of the Rieekan flotilla, as well as the target corvette. Andy's other corvettes are heading into the side arc of the other corvette, which is waiting with baited breath...

End of turn 4, Rieekan and two corvettes are gone. Admonition is on the run, pursued by Andy's Rogues. My Corvettes are hunting Andy's remaining two vessels.

End of turn 5, and Admonition is nearly away... only one of Andy's Corvettes remains, and is double arced by my own TRC90 at close range.
During turn 6 that last corvette went pop, and we played out the squadron phase to see what would happen. One of my X-Wings made it into range to tie up some rogues, but Dash Rendar made it to range, rerolled a blank to get a crit/hit, and as Admonition had burned all its defence tokens we turned to the damage deck - anything but a structural damage to live - and I drew a structural damage. Sigh.

I took out all of Andy's ships, lost a few X-Wings and Admonition. After scores were totaled we got to 9/2 in my favour.

I went into round three with quite a nice score -I think I was 8th overall...

ROUND THREE - TRISTAN'S SCREED SCRAMBLERS

 Game three was against Tristan, aka "Trizzo" of PAWCast fame.

He was playing Screed with a Flotilla, Interdictor with Targeting Scramblers, VSD1, and a kitted out Demo. Six Tie Fighters made up a token squadron component.

I chose first, and selected "Most Wanted", a fateful decision! Tristan chose my Admonition, and his flotilla as the targets.

End of turn 1.

Tristan had deployed well back in the zone, and with only modest speeds. I did something similar, and allowed my ships to take some engineering tokens early on, which I normally do not do.

The Interdictor had the ability to move terrain, so during setup I had spread it out as much as possible. This was my first real life game against interdictor.

End of turn 2.

I was gearing up for a non-Admonition early run against the flotilla and the victory, but Tristan suddenly turned on the speed and threatened Admonition a bit more than expected. Admonition ended up making the first attack run.

End of turn 3.

Admonition has jumped in to double arc the Demolisher - A Wonderful Thing! Dodonna is on the CR90 on the back left, and the other CR90 is ready to line up for support. My Squadrons have been launched at the Victory, while Tristan's Squads stand back, waiting for their chance to pounce...

 A slightly zoomed in version of the last photo. Admonition is in prime position, but will utterly fail to roll anything close to the needed hits to take out Demolisher at the start of turn 4. Targeting scramblers had a little to do with this, but not much. It was truly some woeful rolling.
Admonition activated, and I should have moved it well away at speed 4 - instead I turned hard and ended up in the side arc of Demolisher. I thought about activating the Corvette to dash in and at least obstruct the shot, but decided to leave it in wait to finish Demolisher - a poor choice. I didn't end up with a double arc on Demo anyway, and Tristan rolled exactly enough to finish Admonition on 5 dice - thanks to Most Wanted. Sigh.
But, then Demo sailed forwards into the other Mc30s side arc, as did the Victory, and I was able to put some serious hurt on both. Demolisher blew up, and the Victory was badly damaged.

End of turn 5. Turn 4 photo was not taken I think.
The  Corvettes have managed to take out the flotilla, and are angling to put hurt on the victory. My Flotillas are flying hard to avoid getting into blue range of the victory and the Interdictor. My Squads continue to shoot the Victory, while Tristan's Ties try to finish off the torpedo frigate.

 End of round 6 - only the Interdictor and the Ties remain. I have lost Admonition, and that's about it.
After calculations, it's a 7/4 to me. I should have been more careful with the Most Wanted Admonition, but it came out nicely in the end I think.

*Some weeks later the nasty thought occurs to me that perhaps I did not use the Admonition ability to rescue this particular vessel - it is a nasty and pernicious thought - but I have no evidence against it apart from that maybe I forgot using it.*

GAME FOUR - KEN'S CRACKEN CORVETTES

At the end of three rounds I was in third place overall, and setting up to play on Table 2: the Penultimate Table! My opponent was Ken, also from PAW. Of the four players I faced, three were folks I had played against in Tournaments before, and all from Parramatta.

 Ken was flying Cracken, with a list quite similar to my own. He had one less Torpedo Frigate, and one more TRC90. He also had six A-Wings. Otherwise, very similar. His flotillas had more upgrades then mine, and he had a 12 point bid. I chose to go first, and picked "Hyperspace Assault." Perhaps I should have gone with "Most Wanted", but the previous game had burned me out a little on that one.

Ken deployed facing away from me, and I placed my corvettes sadly out of the way, but with my Torpedo Frigates ready to dash in and blast away. It has been my experience playing Cracken that he is a pain in the neck, and an early death for the occasional gunner of the Millenium Falcon is the best way to handle this fleet.

Ken put his Admonition into Hyperspace, and we went into action.

*I ran out of steam writing up this report some weeks ago, so the following will be a bland recital of dull facts.

Torpedo Frigates rush forward hoping to catch some corvettes. Ken's A-Wings decline to engage my Squadrons, and gear up to fight Admonition.

Start of turn 3 I think, and I have a choice - Ken's Admonition has jumped into range of my Dodonna Corvette (double arcing but facing away), while my Frigate on the right has side arcs on the rear of TWO of Ken's corvettes. Who to activate first?

I decided to rescue Dodonna and let one of Ken's Corvettes escape - which it did. I then activated the Torpedo Frigate, which completely failed to kill a Corvette in the rear arc even with H9s. I did not get a critical, even with rerolls. SIGH.

The dice deserted me, and I did not get them back in a hurry.

This is not the last turn, but it is getting close - my Admonition has survived the A-Wing barrage, and is positioning to kill Cracken, the wily dog. My Dodonna Corvette is swinging back into battle range, while Ken's Admonition is hunting my Transports.

I managed to kill Cracken, and Ken took out my normal Corvette. I got angry at this point and threw Dodonna into the battle unnecessarily in order to kill another of Ken's Corvettes - this brought me into Admonition range, and the rest is history.

When we totalled points, Ken had won with a margin of exactly 60 points - precisely enough for a 7/4. Which was exactly enough to get him into the Final Battle with Luke. I ended up fifth in tournament points.


It was a good game with Ken, who is always a fun player and great sport.


I quite enjoyed the Tournament - disappointed I did not make the top table, but very happy to be in the top tiers of a great competition. And beating Nick is always worth the price of admission... tee hee hee.

Andy, you still owe me that drink - I will not forget.


This blog-post was held in Comms Blackout pending the outcome of Worlds, lest we provide spoilers for Luke's A and Y wing spam list - Our National Champ did very well at Worlds, missing out on the CUT by only a small margin, and coming in the top 5 or 6 overall.

Well done Luke!


Regionals season is starting again in a few weeks in Australia - I am hoping to make it to Canberra for ACT regionals - and then we'll see where Nationals is in 2017.

The Cornwallian Campaign - LTD vs Matt Antilles

I posted some rules for a Campaign Game on the FFG forums - Matt Antilles has volunteered to help me test them to see if this is a viable concept for games - I think it may have some problems straight off the bat.

Here's the initial map after rolling for "political support".

(Click for larger view)


After chatting with Matt, I decided that giving the Imperials such a force superiority was probably not a great idea - so reduced the Imperial starting forces to 1000, plus 200 in Truro.

Here's the starting setup...

And here's the map after the first turn - the non-moving Rebel commanders recruited new forces, while Mon Mothma is attacking Konstantine in Truro.

Imperial leaders advanced, while Konstantine recruited.

We have a battle to resolve at Truro, then we'll be ready for turn 2...

Admiral Konstantine was defeated thoroughly by Mon Monthma, outnumber 274 points to 400 - outactivated, etc.

In turn 2, Screed Recruited, and brought Admiral Ozzel to the Campaign. Motti and Tagge attempted to assert Imperial political control - Motti succeeded, Tagge did not.

Mon Mothma attempted to turn the loyal citizens of Truro into rebel (or at least neutral) scum. She failed.

The other Rebel Commanders moved.

Map at the start of turn 3:

Map at the start of turn 4:

Map at the end of 4, beginning of 5...

Hero vs Lyraeus

Interview with Matt the Shadowlord...

Choice of Mission and introduction of fleets...

Set up - complete

End of One - Start of Two

Turn two until the end - in rapid fire motion - sorry I didn't turn down / off the "pew pew" noises, so you might want to brace yourself...

LTD vs thecactusman17 - Video Vassal killed the Radio Vassal Star

A short account of a recent tournament battle...

ACT Regionals - Like a Bossk! - Part Three

The success of the second game saw me rise through the ranks to the third table - I think I was fifth highest in the standings at this point.

My opponent was a Novocastrian, flying a true Rieekan Corvette Swarm.

Seven Corvette Bs with SW7, and one (with Rieekan) Corvette A with TRCs.

It was a sight to behold.

He said to me, "Well, you are one of the fleets I did not want to face."

I must say that the feeling was entirely mutual.

With thirteen activations between us, it was quite a long game, and we were still playing a good half an hour after the rest of the round had finished.

I had initiative again, and chose to go first - if I was going to be swamped by Zombie Corvettes, then at least I wanted the chance to decide where to shoot first.

The missions to choose from included Most Wanted, Fire Lanes, and Dangerous Territory. I did not want Most Wanted, since I would likely lose the targeted vessel handing over more points, whereas the second players ship would simply hide and run, denying me any recourse. I did not want fire lanes, since 8 ships with 3 front dice each would easily control them, so Dangerous Territory seemed the best choice, especially as I had Jaina's Light, which does not mind smashing into asteroids so much.

Strangely (I thought) he did not deploy the station first, giving me the opportunity to gain an additional victory token at no real cost. I deployed my three terrain to one side, he deployed his to the other side.

If I had my time over, I would set up on more of an angle, and at speed 3. As it was, speed 2 and straight ahead. All of Jason's ships deployed at speed 4, except the two tasked to claim his tokens, including Rieekan.

I should probably have deployed one of the torpedo boats further back and at speed 1 in order to have a second punch. I decided to throw a corvette at a debris field, figuring I could afford to take 2 shields in exchange for 15 points.

Start of turn 2 - I have three tokens, Jason has only one. Victory!

I have also rushed my left-most torpedo boat forward into range of THREE enemy corvettes. The frigate fired both broadsides, badly damaging both ships, but not killing either. Then the frigate ran through the line, arcing to the right.

Yavaris activated next, shooting double B-Wings and an X-Wing at neighbouring vessels, finishing one of the heavily damaged vessels, and damaging another, before shooting away. Yavaris did not have the speed to break the line.

The other vessels shot in turn, and Dodonna was destroyed from a whole host of back and side blue arcs. Perhaps Dodonna should have run further and not turned, but such is life.

Start of turn 3 - my ships are on the other side of the table, Jason's on this side. At the end of turn 2 I moved my unactivated X-Wing into range of the heavily damaged Corvette, and still in Medium range of Yavaris. First activation, and I needed two hits from those fickle red dice to kill the corvette - and got them! One more Zombie flying.

The rest of the turn went without much incident, except Jason made a mistake flying a Corvette into range of an unactivated Torpedo boat (he forgot which one had been activated), and received a sizeable blast to the front.

 Start of turn 4, Yavaris' B-Wings finish off the damaged corvette before running away. Everything else is about avoiding contact, and taking pot-shots with TRCs.

Start of turn 6 - the photo from turn 5 is missing. I managed to take out another Corvette with my TRCs at close range (it had been damaged by B-Wings).
In turn 6 I flew my CR90 away from Rieekan's TRCs, and managed to hide behind my torpedo frigate.

End of the game - we decided nothing else was going to die, and everyone else was waiting for us to finish, so we didn't bother with all the final moves.

Jason had scored 118 points, 73 from from losing Dodonna, and 45 from tokens.

I had 265 points, from killing 5 44 point Corvettes, and 45 points from tokens.

I won by 147 points, which was an 8/2.

This was not a great victory, but I did much better than I thought I would against a Rieekan swarm. It was always going to be impossible for me to table Jason, and on reflection, quite difficult for him to table me. Neither of us were going to walk away with a 10/0, but it wouldn't have won us the tournament anyway - Nick was well ahead on 28 points, compared to my 22 finishing position. Second had 26.

After three victories (even if the first had been quite marginal) I ended up third in the tournament. My goal was complete - my red shirt had interrupted the Parramatta Attack Wing Podium Photo!

It was a great tournament, and tremendous fun. The three and a half hour drive home was filled with listening to election results, so all in all, a great day!

ACT Regionals - Like a Bossk! - Part Two

My draw with Ken left us both in the middle of the pack, facing the other middle results obtainers.

I was paired up with Scott, who claimed to be a Canberra local, though under intense interrogation this was revealed to be a false assertion, since 1: he was not born there, and 2: no-one being local to Canberra, as it is an artificial city, and generally a figment of the deranged Australian imagination.
QED.

Scott was playing a Dodonna decked out Home One Mc80 with Yavaris and Corvette CR90. He had Hans Olo, Tycho Celchu!, some A-Wings, X-Wings, and a Y-Wing.

I had initiative and chose to go first - the mission was HyperSpace assault. Scott is only relatively new to the game, and made some interesting decisions with deployment, etc. I did my best to guide his efforts in my finest and most patronising style. Sarcasm aside, after I learned he was quite knew, I toned done my jovial-competitiveness and did the friendly thing of asking questions, reminding about Hans Olo, making suggestions on defence token usage, etc. I hope Scott received these suggestions in the manner intended - I want the game to grow, and for Armada to have the reputation of the best behaved players around.

During deployment I had to decide whether to focus down the Mc80 before the Yavaris came to help, or to take out Yavaris first. I went with the latter, even though it meant dividing my forces.

 Start of turn 2 - Scott launched his fighter wing early into my X-Wings, and they got quickly decimated by my Yavaris activated X-Wings and B-Wing. I realised my Mc30s weren't going to hit Yavaris at the start of turn 2, so maneuvered to force him into my short range during turn 2. My right most torpedo boat got an arc on Yavaris, then ducked past into the path of the Mc80, happily blocking it for the rest of the game.

 Start of turn 3, and the HyperSpacing Corvette and fighters arrived on my Yavaris' side. I activated my now rightmost torpedo boat, and took out Scott's Yavaris, before slowing and wheeling on the Mc80, trying to avoid his left arc (and failing), but hoping to stay at long range (and succeeding).

Hans Olo and Tycho both bought the farm this turn, and my remaining fighters moved on to engage the newly arrived chaps, carefully staying in Yavaris range.

The only mistake I think I made in this game happened in this turn, giving a Concentrate fire order to my Jaina's light instead of a Navigate. As a result, the Corvette could not slow down or maneuver sufficiently to avoid the side arc of the Mc80.

The ramifications of that are shown here - I had to activate Dodonna's ship first to avoid being blasted to Kingdom-come, which allowed the Mc80 to shoot the heavily damaged Corvette in the rear arc.

Yavaris took out Scott's Corvette, and with some tricky use of accuracy results, the torpedo frigate in the Mc80's front did exactly enough damage to destroy it without resorting to ramming, which would have killed my own ship as well.

Oh, that was another mistake I guess - I had slowed the torpedo boat to speed one when ramming the Mc80 - I should have stayed at 2 to help me navigate away without ramming if necessary.

This was the end of the game - Scott's ships gone, only one of my Corvettes lost, and some fighters on both sides.

I think we made an error in point calculations (so that's three mistakes).

I got 400, and Scott earned 91 from the corvette, X-wings, and B-wing.

I thin we reported it as 400 to 51, forgetting my fighter casualties. Hopefully this did not alter the outcome of the tournament dramatically...

It was a good game, and I hope to play Scott again in the future.

ACT Regionals - Like a Bossk! - Part One

The Regionals in Canberra were held at Three D6, an excellent venue and host, on the 2nd of July. The 2nd was also the day of the Federal Election in Australia, so Canberra was definitely the place to be.

I do not expect to make the Sydney Regionals on the 30th of July, so this was my one "at bat."

I planned and practiced and thought and designed, and then threw all of that aside and brought a list I had never used before, including a ship title I have never before included. It was fun!


I took Dodonna, two Mc30 Torpedo Frigates with OE and APT, two CR90s with TRC (one Jaina's Light and Flagship), and a Yavaris Nebulon-B Escort with Veteran Captain. The Squadron component was two X-Wings and two B-Wings.

Yavaris was the ship I had never used before, and came about because of competing ideas. I was firmly of the opinion that I needed five ships and initiative (I like that playstyle), and enough fighter output to seriously hamper or slow a Rhymer ball. Like the Austrian Empire of the late 1740s, I was planning on beating the Prussians and French (DeMSU and Rhymer Ball, respectively). Like the Austrian Empire of the late 1740s, I'm not sure I succeeded in my plan, and never actually encountered the enemies I thought I might.

My first game was against Iro Ken of the Parramatta attack wing. He was flying a decked out Ackbar Mc80 Defiance with two CR90 TRCs, 5 A-Wings and 4 YT2400s. He had no bid, I had a bid of 13. I chose to go first (my bid of 13 was enough to choose first player in all three games).

I chose his Contested Outpost, though did consider taking Advanced Gunnery with thoughts of getting some extra points from killing the Mc80. I played it safe on this occasion.

Start of turn 2, and my force is moving up, with Ken's moving towards the ol' station. My plan is to kill his Corvettes quickly, before using my own Corvettes to bring down the Mc80. My fighters and Yavaris are tasked to fighter mitigation.

Ken (pictured above) is a great chap, fun to play with, generous to a fault, and the backbone of the Parramatta Attack Wing (the Premier Australian Armada group).

End of turn 3, and last activation has allowed my first torpedo boat to move into close range of a Corvette and the Mc80. My X-Wings are already dead, and the B-Wings are engaging the A-Wings within support range of Yavaris, which is nice.

I managed to get an accuracy with the Torpedo boat's ion cannons, and the right amount of damage from the rest to rip it asunder with one blow - it never even got to shoot. I took the opportunity to fire the other broadside at the Defiance. The Torpedo boat then shot into the newly created gap.

Looking back, my own Corvettes did not move quickly or efficiently enough to the battle line - they took too long to move around the Defiance.

Ken activated his Jaina's Light, broadsided the front Torpedo boat, and moved closer. For some REASON that I cannot remember, I moved Yavaris next. Strange things we do when excited / nervous. I could have used the Veteran Captain to slow down, possibly avoiding Ion Cannon range, but instead I decided to move shields to the front and rush at the Mc80.

That didn't work so well. Yavaris was toast in turn 4 - but on that topic, it's why I decided to go with Veteran Captain rather than Raymus Antilles - Raymus costs 7 points and hands out a free token each turn, but I figured in the design stage that if Yavaris makes it past turn 3 then I'm extremely lucky. My plan is thus: round 1, bank a Squadron token. Round 2, use order and token to activate 3 squadrons. Round 3, use order and veteran captain to activate 3 squadrons. Round 4: If not dead, bonus, activate squadrons, fly towards enemy.

This is the end of turn 4, before squadron phase. My plan is to take out the single A-Wing holding the B-Wings in place, and send the other B-Wing to tie up the unactivated rogues to stop them knocking out my front Torpedo boat. Nope. Anti-Squadron fire from the Corvette and BOTH B-Wings fail to take out the A-Wing. It was a slightly above-average shot, and it did not come off. Ken's YT2400s were enough to bust through the torpedo boats remaining hull.

I also forgot to use a banked engineering token to move a shield at the start of turn 3, but it probably wouldn't have made much difference.

The contested outpost was contested this turn, with my Frigate and Corvette both being in range 1, matching the Mc80.

I don't have a start of turn 4 photo, but my second torpedo boat had some nice arcs on Corvette and Mc80 - sadly it took my side and front arc just to take out the Corvette - no accuracy and a general lack of APTs on that occasion.

I decided to ram the Mc80 and stay in place, expecting to survive a single broadside from the Mc80.

Whoops.

Forgot the Mc80 had xi7 turbolasers (which are fairly mandatory, no?).

The Defiance activated and rolled exactly enough to kill the boat - it was a pretty dumb idea anyway, since Ken's YTs would have finished off a mostly dead Mc30 anyway - which they had just proved by doing it the turn earlier. I should have maneuvered to get into the Mc80's front arc, and made him ram me while taking APTs, etc.

Start of turn 6 - my Corvettes are in position to butcher the Defiance, which is hurting bad. My non-Jaina (on the station) did exactly enough damage with a ram to take out the Defiance. On reflection the ram was a mistake - I should have flown away to escape the fighter wrath, who took out the damaged corvette, despite my B-Wings jumping in to distract them.

I could have used my Jaina's TRCs to kill the Mc80, and lived to tell the tale.

End of round 6, and only Dodonna and Jaina's Light are left - in range 1 of the station to claim a token - I ended up with 1 Victory Marker, Ken with 4.

End of the game, I was ahead 420 points to 394. 26 points, and a 5/5 draw.

This was a good game, and gave me some reminders about how to play, particularly with this list.

There were a couple of errors on my part (the Corvettes not moving up faster, the Yavaris activating too early and moving too far forward, not using repair tokens on my Torpedo Frigates to move shields, ramming the Mc80, ramming the Mc80 again... you get the idea).

Ken said something about setting a trap and not quite realising my torpedo boat could move to a place that it did, so he probably wasn't perfectly happy with his game play either, but in his defence he has recently returned from a round-the-world honeymoon, and is probably a little out of practice (at Armada, at least).