Store Championship Season is upon us once more, and Task Force Orange traveled to Bathurst for one of the FOUR store champs that will be held in NSW.
I flew a modified version of my previous Regionals' List - the Cracken Seven.
In this version one of the flotillas is replaced by a Corvette B, which serves as lifeboat and token mine, safely on a flank. It also has a five point bid, and 3 X-wings instead of the normal 5.
We had twelve players present, with 3 from Orange and I think 2 from Bathurst, the rest part of the Parramatta Flying Circus (attack wing).
Game One - Steve
Steve was flying Mon Mothma with 3 Torpedo Frigates and two transports, Tycho, Shara, a Generic A-Wing and a VCX. I outbid him and chose to go second (or did he outbid me? I don't recall - eitherway, second).
Steve perused the objectives and chose Fire Lanes.
I placed two tokens on the right, and one on the left. I outdeployed Steve, and left Cracken to guard the left most token (hoping to draw Admonition out of the fight).
Turn 2, and I'm able to wait with my seven activations to see what is what before committing myself too much. Admonition turned into the fight, so Cracken was safe. I probably sent my Squadrons too far forward, but against A-Wings there is no such thing as safe.
Cracken spent the game claiming his token - a safe 90 points right there.
Many of the middle turn pictures are missing, so use your imagination. Mothma was on foresight on my far right, so there was no way I could kill her with TRC90s (they can do many things, but not that). Admonition was coming in from my left - Admo is also very hard to kill with TRC90s. So I focused on killing the non-title MC30. It flew into my many overlapping arcs and rammed Jaina's Light to threaten the tokens. One of my corvettes was forced to sail forward into Admo and the middle MC30's side arc, and survived the open abrrage with one hull or so left - I think I had forgotten Cracken as well but by the time I realized it was far too late - we had gone on to a number of other activations. I put it down to "too bad, so sad" and resolved not to forget it again. One of my flotillas died as a result of Wide Area Barrage (it had already taken a hit from a ram).
Jaina's light survived the MC30 front arc, and the MC30 jumped past and started to run away, stripped of tokens and low on shields and hull (it had been shot at by 3 Corvettes and some fighters).
In my turn I was able to give Jan Ors an order to jump back and knock off the last shield - then Jaina's Light was able to put in the final hit thanks to TRCs. If Jan Ors had missed the shield, the frigate would have gotten away.
One the far right one of Corvettes gave Foresight the slip by ending move just outside of black range and just on the table. It didn't do much except escape.
I think this photo comes shortly after Jaina's Light finished off the MC30 and ran away. One of my corvettes has flown through the enemy line and swung back (I think it was planning to finish off the MC30 if it had lived). It was now in a difficult place with Foresight and Admonition.
My sacrifical corvette rammed one of Steve's Flotillas to keep at speed 3 (for Cracken) and only take a single MC30 side arc - but it was enough and the Corvette evaporated.
The game ended with me having lost a Corvette and a Transport, and Steve losing an MC30 and a transport. His squads had done the business on mine - I think I only had one VCX alive at the end.
But the tokens made the difference - I came out almost 140 points ahead - but not quite - This was a 7/4.
Game 2 - Christian
Christian was a new-ish Armada player who has made the switch from X-Wing in recent weeks. He had defeated another Bathurst player to come into the second round on six points (I think?).
He was flying a ISD 2, Demo, Raider, Gozanti, some fighters. The exact specifics are lost on me.
I had the bid and chose second. Christian decided the yellow and blue were traps, and chose the red Most Wanted. I decided to pick the Demolisher and one of the Transports. I generally prefer to knock out a Demo or Quasar quickly with MW, knowing that I might be able to kill the ISD later on - and never sure if I actually can get it either way.
I had a deployment advantage, and ganged my Corvettes up on the flank - Christian turned in towards me and I was able to put lots of front arcs on the Demolisher.
Start of turn 3, and Demolisher is dead. One of my Corvettes has taken a bash from Demo and is about to die from the Raider. The other three TRC90s are gearing up to focus down the ISD - my MW transport is running away, while the other staying near by to help the fighter battle, which is not going well for me.
Cracken is off on the far left minding his own business and avoiding the fight.
Turn 4 and the Corvettes have made the swing around the ISD after stripping shields. Jaina's Light is pursuing the Raider (thanks to Cracken it can't hit anything in its rear arc). The Raider is chasing Cracken, but can't catch it - but Cracken is riding on a B, so can't do enough damage to threaten the Raider - 12 points! 12 points! My Kingdom for 12 points!
Turn 5 and Jaina's Light has had to choose between Raider and finishing the ISD - and turned to make that clear.
Turn 6 and the ISD with Thrawn is gone - Cracken is safe from the remorseless Raider, and my Squadron ball is down to Jan Ors and a solitary VCX. I didn't get the tabling, but did get a solid 9/2.
Christian is a great chap, and I look forward to facing him again - he will get the hang of this game pretty quickly I think.
Game 3 - Nick
My 16 points had me second on the table, behind Nick, also on 16 (he'd gone 10/1, then 6/5). Nick was flying Thrawn with ISD Kuat, Interdictor, 2 Gozantis, four aces. He had a bid of 7 points and chose to go second. I decided to go with Salvage Run, since my VCXs could manipulate the tokens. I had played a similar thing on Vassal recently, and been able to get most of the tokens - but I've never played it on a real table (I also lost that Vassal match).
I had a couple of brain snaps in this game, firstly not really getting that the Interdictor had the grav well thing that moves the terrain, so I did not spread out my placements enough - I think only one obstacle was outside the range.
My second snap was putting the VCXs not as far forwards as possible - as a result they fell short of some tokens by a matter of millimetres - very annoying.
My third (potential) snap was deploying my Corvettes to gun down the Interdictor. I thought three TRC90s and one B with Cracken would be enough to take it down - and was very nearly right. The ISD had Brunson (and was in all the obstacles) so I thought it would be too much.
At the start of round 2, my left Transport will activate, take a token, move the VCXs, get a token to Jaina's Light and another to range 1 of my blue transports. If I had deployed the squads properly I might have been able to get all four tokens - but I only got three.
This must be Round four. My squads are getting butchered by the enemy and flak, while the Corvettes are working hard on the Interdictor.
Round 5 and the Interdictor is hurting bad - but some of my corvettes are pretty bad as well. Maarek Steele has done his thing and will finish off one of them this round.
Start of round 6, and I've made a tactical error. Cracken has flown in front of the Interdictor to double arc it and cause a ram, but I have to activate the other TRC90 (in front of the ISD) first or it is DEAD. With Cracken in place the Interdictor can ram and then avoid long range of another TRC90 on the far right (not pictured). I outsmarted myself here - Cracken could have slowed last turn to avoid blue range on the ISD and just kept out of the way - as it was the Interdictor survived on (I think) one or two hull.
End of turn 6 - I have lost a Corvette, most Squadrons, and only gained 3 tokens. If I'd taken the Interdictor I would have been up (maybe) 7/4 - but as it was I had lost 5/6 (48 points the difference).
Nick had won (the first game against me he has won) the Tournament!
Except wait, no he hadn't. On table three? Table four? Damien had briefly perused Dan's objectives and assumed (making an Ass out of himself and everyone else) the nature of the blue objective - thinking it was Dangerous Territory when it was actually Navigational Hazards. He did realize his mistake until the end of turn 1 when the Terrain started moving in front of him... he lost badly.
Dan got 10 points and ended up taking the tournament on 23 points. I came third on 21.
So even if I had killed the Interdictor and gotten a 7/4, I would still have lost the tournament.
It's a funny old game!
Bathurst is the best shop for Armada - tons of space, food on site, great parking nearby. It is my reccommendation for Australian Nationals (not that anyone asks me). It is also on a trainline, so easy to get to from Melbourne, and not too far from Sydney for interstate flights - and accommodation is cheap! Go Bathurst!
