RE: Retrograde gimmickry

>> In the circle i play in, if you are in a position where there is no
clear
>> objective (in most scenarios with an objective, the retrograde tactic
falls
>> flat on its face),

>Yeah... that's basically it.  What wartime operation is a skirmisher
going
to
>be able to fulfill?  If you need to provide cover while you're
conducting
>troop landings or evacuations, skirmishers are useless.  If you need to
defend
>a planet under concentrated attack, the only reason they'd be any use
at
all
>is if they had the luxury of a week between FTL and planetfall, and
they
lose
>even that if the enemy has fast drives, cloaking devices, or reflex
fields.
>If it needs to press in on a layered defense net of patrols at an enemy
planet,
>it's going to be pretty useless.  Neither can it present a particularly
>daunting defense grid of its own; surgical FTL placement or cloaking
devices
>will both defeat their purposes as such just by being there.

>> and it looks like a (very boring) loss is almost certain,
>> you fire up your ftl drives and piss off.

>Yup... let them have the open space.  Nothing there but dust. :)
--
A force must have a mix of both fast skirmishers that can scout the
enemy
without getting locked into battle.  They are great for commerce raiding
and
can be a great aid  in blockade.  I do believe that beam 6s are
excessive a
3 arc beam 4 is all that is usually needed. The main thing such raiders
needs is speed to keep the range open. If a speed 6, beam 4 raider,
encounters a speed 7 beam 2 armed ship of equal point value the the
speed 7
ship can gain its range. The raider must FTL.

Andy A