FSA Campaign - Battle Report 2

Turn two of our campaign saw my backup fleet chasing Oscars primary fleet back into Aquan space, hoping to catch it while still depleted and either recover or destroy my captured Brood. Elsewhere it was a game of cat and mouse, with fleets warily moving around the borders. My secondary (750 point) fleet was on patrol when an Aquan fleet moved into an adjacent hex, so I moved to intercept. Fortunately (for me), it turned out to be a minor (500 point) fleet.

Our fleets were as follows;

Relthoza
Brood Battleship (with Star Admiral and 1 interceptor)
Hive Carrier (6 Bombers)
Hive Carrier (6 Bombers)
3 Banes (3 Assaulters)
1 Squadron of 4 Drones

Aquans
Poseidon Battleship (Star Admiral)
Cruiser Squadron (1 Tsunami, 3 Storms)
1 Squadrons of 2 Piranhas

Setup
Green Zone with 6 obstacles - a 12" asteroid field, a planet in one corner, a distortion field, two minefields (3 & 7 mines) and a couple of deadfall salvos. Oscar chose the free short end of the table with a line of battle deployment, whereas I got a waypoint deployemnt right in the middle of the board, near the asteroids, mines and distortion field - just where I didn't want to be!

Deployment
Oscar deployed in a short line, I used the asteroid field to hide my Drones to preserve them from early fire )not easy as the mines made it single file only!) - the carriers and Brood deployed as far right and rear of their deployment area and the banes on the other side by the Drones to form a narrow pincer. Again, all ships that could cloak were deployed cloaked.

Play
Turn one was a gentle nudging forward of fleets, with Oscar's early fire defeated by stealth and cloaks. Hives, Brood and Banes moved forward, torpedoes finding no targets, except the Banes, who smashed a Piranha. The Drones carefully negotiated their way on out of the asteroid field, and flights were all disgorged - the bombers moving a modest 12" forward to avoid possible PD attacks next turn but be in strike distance.

Next turn showed the dice gods had indeed switched their allegiances. I won initiative and shot one of the bomber squadrons forward to attack the Poseidon. Playing a "Jinking" card to skip the PD, the 18AD attack critted the Poseidon despite a healthy shield reduction, and the Aquan battleship blazed inside with a raging fire. The Aquans tried to strike back with the cruisers and the battleship, and critted the Brood with an Engine failure, I played a running repairs and got it down to 1HP damage, then started applying the big hitting stick. A double crit on the Tsunami, another crit on the Battleship (decompression), more bombers attacking the Poseidon (engine failure) one Storm critted (systems offline...or no effect!). It was pretty brutal - but then I really needed to pull back something since the loss of my main fleet.

I swatted the remaining Piranha and the Aquans tried in vain to toast a Hive, putting just a single point on it.The assaulters from the Banes attempted to board the Poseidon, which I knew was suicide but I wanted them to take down the crew a bt more before I planned to board with the Banes and capture her - she was now down to 2CP and 2AP...Unfortunately that plan went bang when a crit from the Drones redused her to an expanding debris field and some escape pods...the remaining fire from my big ships vapourised the remaining ships, but not before I tried to board the same Storm twice - once from a single Bane and once from my Brood - the Storms crew earning great respect after annihilating all opposition for no loss! After a fold-space containment rupture I then vapourised this ship too, meaning I won in record time, but with little to show in terms of spoils - just 7 escape pods of fish to interrogate...

Verdict
Unlike the disaster of Aquarisum, the clash here was even more one-sided to the spiders - which was a huge relief, especially as I had a larger force - a failure would have bode very badly indeed! The Carriers really carried the day - their Bombers struck a (probably vital) early crit on the Poseidon, and I just kept pounding it, whereas the 10AD broadsides are more than capable of crushing cruisers. Banes were a slight letdown compared to the epic and valiant performance they gave last game, but they did most of what I asked of them. Brood hardly even got warmed up, which was kind of a good thing really. Anyway, the final stats were;

Aquans:
Entire fleet lost

Relthoza:
Brood: -1HP, 0AP
Hive 1: -1HP, -1 Bomber
Hive 2: -1 Bomber
Bane Squadron: One Bane 0AP, all Banes -1 Assaulter wing

Map at the end of Turn 2

Onto Turn 3!