[GZG] Batrep for 28 July 2006

["Tim (Flak Magnet) G." <flakmagnet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Since this was our first game in a really long time we kept the fleets small.

Scenario:  500 point fleets chosen from the fleetbooks.  No custom ships were 
allowed.  With the agreement of the other players, Jeff used the playtest 
beta-rule for the UN Ships.

We split up into teams using dice to determine who was on which side.  Teams 
were Brian (Kra'vak) and Jeff (UN) vs. Patrick (ESU?) and I (NSL).  Then we 
rolled a scatter die to determine which point around the tables edge each 
fleet would come on from.  Patrick and I were on the East (short) edge, Brian 
on the South (long) edge and Jeff was on the West edge.  In the center of the 
table was a planet about 2" across.  Arrayed around the planet in a ring 
about 10-12" across were a bunch of Asteroids (lava-rocks).  Each turn, 
before orders were written the asteroids drifted at random around the table 
moving 1d6" in a random direction.  The scenario was that two opposed 
alliances (teams) were there to check out the anomolous drifting of the 
asteroids just in case it was some advanced alien (I joked Goa'uld) 
technology based on the planet that was causing it.

I don't remember a play-by-play, but we'd rolled randomly to be moving between 
1-3 times our slowest ships thrust rating for initial velocity.  Patrick was 
coming in "hot" and spend much of the game trying to avoid hitting the rocks 
and jockeying for a shot at them.  They seemed to get in his way constantly!  

Brian and I faced off first as Jeff was isolated from Patrick and I by the 
planet and rocks.  His K-guns knocked off some armor and damaged the hull, 
but since I was playing NSL I could take a lot of punishment per ship class.  
Brian wound up blasting a Destroyer to dust before he fell.  For my part, I 
closed on him and the beam batteries raked his ship harshly since the Kra'vak 
don't use shields.  He used his gravitic drives to move away from me and 
tried to put the rocks between he and I as Jeff advanced.  I continued 
sniping at him through gaps in the rocks and just as Jeff brought his UN 
Grasers to bear Brian's last ship was destroyed due to fire from my ships and 
Patrick's.

Jeff's ship (yeah, it had an escort...) blasted my remaining ship to dust 
before I could put enough hurt on it to make a difference for Patrick.

The end of the game was a duel between Patrick's almost entirely intact fleet 
and Jeff's slightly damaged ship (which was, admittedly, most of his fleet).   
Due to very effective maneuvering on Jeff's part, Patrick found himself out 
of position at least once to return Jeff's withering Graser fire and Jeff 
eventually found himself the sole, proud owner of an asteroid-chucking planet 
of doom!

The consensus was that using the pre-designed ships from the Fleet book, 
combined with the quirky drifting asteroids really made for a fun game.  Much 
better than the Paper-Rock-Scissors problems concerning fighters that our 
prior games had degenerated into.

Pictures Patrick took are here:
http://www.flakmagnet.com/gallery/index.php?spgmGal=FTGame%2029July06


-- 
--
Tim (Flak Magnet) G.
Flak Magnet's Miniatures
www.flakmagnet.com
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