Small ships and SMLS & Killing Torp armed fleets.....

I'll throw in my .02 in the matter.  I'm a big fan of the SML system.  I

think that you can really kick butt with them.	However the majority of 
my games we don't see speeds above 20 really, unless you're running
away. 
 This is precisely why SML's kick butt so well.  Part of the reason was 
that we played fix map ( we really didn't have much area to play on... )

as such you had to keep your fleet in the boundries.  With an SML fleet 
you really need to max out the number of missles you can launch.  I feel

that 2 salvo's is enough... they usually never get out more then that.	
In the archives I posted my JFK class free cal tex missle cruiser.... 
"Kicks ass man...".  Anyway, I found that making missle boats worked 
pretty well.... that is assuming that your opponents fly slow and don't 
do the adfc tricks.

If you keep the speeds low... my opponents solution was to still stick 
with the big SDN's ( actually I don't think he every used anything 
smaller then a light cruiser... ).  Tack on armor, 6+pds/ship, some 
class-1's, and 1+ adfc per ship. Keep the formation tight so that you
can 
overlap adfc coverage on your leading ships.  Lead with one or two ships

and make sure that your formation is tight enough that all of the other 
pds fire can cover those two ships.  Put on class-3 beams for your
ranged 
fire... And like me... you'll discover that if your opponent sucks it 
up... he'll really nuter your salvos crunch potential... usually what I 
started to find was that my weak hulled missle boats would empty their 
racks and at best I'd have 1 possibly 2 destroyed enemy ships... I would

have little to no fire power against a lot o'beam armed ships chugging
in 
on me... usually it'd be messey or I'd flee.  The weak hulled ships tend

to take thresholds easily and go boom or are forced to stick around to
go 
boom.  I didn't play around much with adding fighters to the mix.  
However I'd suspect that if he sucked up the fighter attacks for your
1st 
2 rounds (or possibly 3 rounds ) of sml fire... he could then clean them

up really fast.  Then what... you've got maybe a handful of wimpy beams 
against a lot of fire power...

If your opponent goes the speed route. and sticks to 24+ speeds  (I play

cinematic... I assume vector would be similar... maybe a lower speed the

effects start to enter into play?), you'll find that you start missing a

lot.. his ships just arn't there...... and you're not in range or
weapons 
arc a lot to do the shooting at him.... kinda sucks sitting there at 
range 60" trying to figure out when his ships are going to buzz by close

enough to the 24-30" point to make smling effective.... usually they
buzz 
around and you might tag one or 2 of them....  Usually you do diddly and

he mopps you up.  ( last 2 games of SML fleet against buzzers in my new 
Condo... aka no space limits anymore... showed this to me... )

Torps guys::
Okay I visited this a lot and still go back and forth with this issue a 
lot.  Torps are really cool... but the range sucks... you need to be a 
good die roller if you're engaging your enemy at range > 18".	I found 
that I couldn't hit very well beyond that range ( okay so I'm a mediocer

die roller ).  Inside 18" you're nasty.  If your opponent is a number 
cruncher, he'll be loaded with class-2 beams... and he'll mostly be 
history if you're doing screens.  However, if your opponent builds ships

similar to yours, but gives them a thrust advantage and class-3/4 
beams... well it starts to get a little interesting.  I had one game 
where my thrust-2 BB's with pulse torps were getting scratched to death 
by the class-3/4 beam dd/cruiser fleet of my opponent... he only had 
thrust - 4, but most of the passes I was around 20" or so... I never got

a shot off in my sweet spot (< 18" ).  Any opponent that got within 18" 
or so usually got anhilated by the massive torp fire.  Mixed fleets with

better thrust then I and class-3 beams/ftr's tended to do fairly well 
against the torp fleets.  I ended up designing torps ships with 
thrust-4,avg hull, screen-1, high levels of armor, 4+pds/each, 2 
class-2's, (eventially 1 adfc... when my opponents started smling...)
and 
as many 3 arc torps as I could.  I stuck with mass 100+.  They were 
pretty bad ass... however you just don't have the range... I can't count

the number of times I'd get whittled down by long range beam fire that I

really couldn't awnser too very effectively.  I tried go to screen-2....

but being that defensive you don't have enough massed torp firepower....

you open yourself up to him doing the close and use his more massive 
firepower against you.	Either way, I ended up mixing and matching.  
Class-3 beams with Torps are even switches.  I went to 2-3 torps / large

ship, 2-3 class-3 beams, and then put in a couple o'class-2 beams if 
possible and voila... serious balanced fleets... not quite as 
overwhelming as before but pretty nasty.  ( I like big ships ... they 
don't take those annoying thresholds as offen as the small crunchies...
)

Anyway, try opposing him with a thrust advantage and class-3/4 beams... 
ditch the class-2 beams... they get you to close to within his crunch 
zone.  Depending upon his pdaf coverage... try fighters... if he's smart

and does the adfc and tight formations... the fighters won't really do 
much for the mass... just snip and buzz at speed.

Chuck