Penultimate Victory in Orange

In preparation for the Orange Store Championship, I ran my list at a practice session at the local games' club. In my practice games I am running two AF2Bs, with gunnery teams and enhanced armament, a MC30c with some upgrades, and a Corvette A with Leia Organa and Admiral Ackbar.
The Fighter complement is minimal, with two X-Wings and Jan Ors.

My first practice game was against Josh, a great bloke who introduced me and Noah to this game early last year.

Josh brought his ISD and two VSDs with a smattering of fighters. I think Screed was his Admiral. I have a bid of 15 points, and elected to go first. I chose Josh's minefields mission, and he deployed 3 on each side to produce a narrow middle of the board. I deployed in classic Ackbar Conga line, with the Corvette behind to hand out new orders and protect Admiral Fishlips. Josh deployed in the appropriate formation to break up the Conga line.

Start of turn 2, and my Ships have all made a hard turn to port, breaking the Conga line and heading for the "Ackbar Slash". My ships will sail between those Star Destroyers, firing left and right. The Gunnery teams won't come in so much use, but such is life.

Start of turn 3, and I have used my first / last activation to put my Tropedo frigate in prime position on the Victory Star Destroyer on left of photo. I'm still undecided about the MC30 - I think I'd rather another Assault Frigate. I chose the MC30 to go first, which left one of my Assault Frigates taking a very close range beating from the other Victory and ISD, but such is life...

 This is a close up of the central action. There are some fighters floating around, but by and large the "little war" had little impact on the capital ship action.

Start of turn 4, and the Victory on the left is gone, destroyed by a combination of double arcing with the Torpedo Frigate, and long range gunnery from my Assault Frigate(s). One of my Assault Frigates is in very bad condition, having only two hull left, while the other is in pretty good shape - but heading for ignominy! Ackbar and Leia are broadsiding the ISD from the Corvette, but without great effect.

Start of turn 5, and my fleet is through the enemy lines, having blasted the other victory to pieces. The ISD remains in fine fettle, and is chasing my crippled AF2 towards the left. Josh also has "Boba Fett" who can do some damage if he activates within range one of a ship or squadron. I hadn't read the fine print, and chose to ignore the bounty hunter with daddy issues, and so nearly lost the damaged Frigate. I flew some fighters in eventually, but this led directly to the destruction of Jan Ors.

My other Assault Frigate (the original lead ship) turned right instead of left, and as a consequence was travelling too fast and too close to the edge, and proceeded to engage the Mclaughlin Manoeuvre, and fly right off the board. Sad.

That wayward Frigate was the only Capital ship I lost, with an X-Wing and Jan Ors. Josh lost two Victory class Destroyers, and some Tie Fighters. In tournament points, it was a 7/3 in my favour.

Killing Imperial Class Star Destroyers is still something I struggle with, but Victories go "pop" with regular alacrity when confronted by Ackbar Assaults.

*****

I played one more test game at the Club, this time against Noah. Noah plays occasionally, and might one day actually buy some stuff. He played with my Imperials, which is quite a limited collection at this point. I again went first, and chose Noah's mission of "Fleet Ambush." I also cheated.

Due to the lateness of the hour and general gross incompetence, I deployed three ships in the ambush zone rather than the requisite two. I really have no idea how this happened, and Noah didn't pick it up, and it wasn't until the middle of the night that I suddenly woke up with the realisation that I was a no-good-lousy-cheating-jackass. 

I do hereby apologise to Noah for this oversight, and humbly beg his forgiveness.

Noah did a good job of getting stuck into the Ackbar Conga line, causing all sorts of troubles with collisions and ramming.  

I knocked out the twin gladiators in short order (one is already gone in this photo), but the Victories caused all kinds of trouble, blocking the advance and following up behind. My Frigates were too close together to be able to break out of line, and things were pretty bad for a while there. Eventually I knocked out the front Victory to release the blockage, but I'd lost frigate and most of the fighters.

This game was a victory to me, but only because I cheated so thoroughly in the set up. Noah taught me some good lessons about the vulnerability of the Ackbar Conga line, and I will make changes to my tactics heading forward.

*****
The day of the Store Championship arrived! I changed my list! (slightly) There were only two players! Total!

There had been some scheduling issues with the Store Champs, mostly because I objected to playing on a Sunday (again), and the suggested day change clashed with other things that Theo was doing.

I turned up expecting there to be no-one else in attendance, but Theo (pronounced Tay-Oh) from Bathurst was there with his Imperials and we had a game. This Theo had only played a few games in total, and I think all against the same guy from Bathurst, so there were a couple of things that I needed to gently remind / inform him about regards the rules.

My list had dropped the Corvette, and added a bunch of upgrades on my MC30c, and Raymus Antilles on the AF2. Bathurst Theo had an ISD, VSD, and raider, with some fighters. I had initiative, and chose Minefields. He deployed terrain, and set out the mines.

This photo is the start of turn 3, and I'm already missing my activation advantage. Four ships is where I am comfortable as first player - I love going first and last! My Frigates are angling to concentrate on the ISD, and the MC30c is creeping forward, looking for a last/first activation to get some serious hits into an enemy vessel. Bathurst Theo's ISD has landed in range of a mine, but he rolled double Accs, with no damage resulting. My fighters have massed on the station, and Bathurst Theo's have drifted off to the flanks - I think this was an example of his inexperience, since there was little the fighters did for most of the game.

Start of turn 3, and my Frigates have formed a mini-conga line and are preparing to blast the ISD and raider. My MC30c has geared up for a double arc on the VSD, and then the ISD moved towards it. My fighters launched attacks on the ISD, with limited damage.
For my first activation I have a choice of double arcing the VSD (red), or launching an Ackbar backed port-arc on the ISD. I decided that destroying the ISD was probably the main game, and the MC30c let rip with four black dice (cf) and four red. With Ordnance Experts and Xi7s, the little guy did a ton of damage, and then accelerated to get away and behind the VSD. I accidentally landed on a mine, and took a face up card of damage.

My Raymus Frigate Flagship took out the raider at long range, and then both frigates sent broadsides into the ISD. The ISD took a beating, moved forward, and the VSD couldn't move and rammed.

Start of turn 4, and thanks to the ram, my MC30c has close range on the back of the VSD. Another powerful broadside and the victory is down to half strength. There is a little bit of a fighter skirmish in the middle of the board, and I used Jan Ors to get my heavily damaged X-Wing out of the fray and onto the station for a necessary repair.
Unfortunately the ISD has moved out of range of my Frigates, who cannot turn fast enough to get back into range... I have sadly shot myself in the foot here - the ISD is very badly damaged, only being two or three hits off dead, with the VSD in much the same position. Neither of them is in range, and my frigates simply cannot turn fast enough to re-engage.

Start of turn 5, and my ships are turning and chasing, and the fighters are trying to reach the enemy vessels, but it is not going to work.

End of game positions, and I have not managed to take out any of the big imperial ships. On the other hand, my own ships have taken limited damage, with the MC30 still carrying its face-up card from the mine, and not much else.

I won the game, having taking out the raider and a few fighters. I lost an A-wing in response.

This game reminded me that I have not yet worked out how to kill an ISD. Perhaps I should have sent one of my Assault Frigates to ram the beggar for a turn, forcing it to sit in the centre of the board, and trust in my ECMs to keep me alive. As it was, after we flew past each other, Bathurst Theo had no intention of coming back to the fight, and I just could not turn fast enough. Perhaps I should have put some more Nav commands earlier in my stack. Or perhaps I should just decide that ISDs are too tough and focus on killing Victories and smaller. Raiders do not worry me much with Ackbar Frigates - one accuracy and they die pretty quick.

The game was a win to me, and I declared myself store champion of all Orange! Kneel at my feet, lowly peons!

However, with only two players we (that is, me and the shop folks) agreed that it probably shouldn't count as a store championship. They refunded my $15, and I left with my honorary title only. I won't get an 8 point bye at Regionals, but it seems most likely that I won't make it to Regionals at all....

Thus ended my Orange games.