My orders were in and they were what I had expected “send in a strike force to sector Alpha 200065 Delta and take the mining station from the enemy as this would set their ship building plans back a few years if it could be held or even destroyed”
Even though I knew these orders were coming I didn’t like it, I was going to have to send in a force without any intelligence of the enemy fleet size or strength and that was not good.
What made matters worse was that most of the fleet were either out patrolling enemy borders and would take too long to return or were in the docks receiving repairs from recent battle damage, so all that was left to send was a lone heavy cruiser and four small escorts.
There was nothing I could do I had been given my orders so now I had to send in a force to at least attempt the task…
Well that was my scenario for my game this weekend, and I thought it would be another great chance to use my solo rules, I decided to go for a small force for this battle which consisted of one heavy cruiser with a pulse laser on a turret and three lots of engineer teams to help with any repairs and to get the shields back up each turn ( although this has not worked well for me in the past! )
As the cruisers escorts I picked two frigates and two corvettes and then added two fighter bases and two bomber bases, so that was my force for this game.
I rolled and got an extra 50 points for my upgrades… yep I rolled a one again! Not a great start.
Now it was time to pick the enemy force, and well the first ship that they got was a battlecruiser, and with that were two frigates and three corvettes, they also had in support three bases of fighters and two bases of bombers.
The enemy force got 80 points for their upgrades so they added a rail gun on a turret to their battlecruiser and then three engineer teams and two extra ablative armour sections.
Things were not looking good…
The enemy force was going to be the defending force for the battle so that should make it a little easier for me as they wouldn’t be coming at me with all weapons blazing, even so they would be moving to the mining station and would shoot me if I get in their way.
I set up the table with the mining station in the centre with a few asteroids scattered around the table, it was a basic deployment so both forces set up opposite each other and were ready to start.
I took a card for the first random event and only managed a simple aimed shot bonus for a random ship ( one of the enemies ) but nothing came from it as they missed their long range shooting.
Both forces moved forward into the asteroids and taking a few long shots but not even a shield fell, so a very slow start for both sides.
Turn two and no random event for this turn.
The turn did see a lot more movement towards the station and some really close range shooting, I managed to get a critical hit on an enemy corvette taking out their comm’s which led to it flying into an asteroid, I didn’t laugh honest…
The rest of the enemy force had to take response check and it seemed that they thought it was funny as well and carried on as a defensive force.
Turn three saw a fire on board one of my frigates which did some damage before it was brought under control.
Enemy fighters destroyed one of my corvettes but it did take out one fighter before it died, then the battlecruiser slowly turned and brought its banks of lasers to bear on one of my frigates, the only ship of mine that hadn’t managed to get its shields back online, once the big ship had stopped firing all I could see was my dead ship spinning slowly off into space…
Not to be outdone by the enemies big ship my heavy cruiser managed to ram a frigate and then vaporized it from point blank range! Now that obviously upset the enemy force as they changed from a defensive force to an aggressive force.
I took critical hits on a frigate and a corvette and both had damage to their engines reducing their speed, my ships took five critical hits this turn!!!
Turn four and no random event this turn, I was praying for something good to help me as my force was in a bad way, my heavy cruiser was in bad shape and was not looking good as she had taken a lot of hits and guess what my engineers failed to get her shields back up!
This turn saw the fighters start to dish out some pain, my last base of bombers destroyed and enemy corvette before being blown to pieces by enemy fighters.
Then I lost a frigate to the last base of enemy bombers, my fighters got there too late to help but they at least destroyed all the enemy bombers.
Well with no shields on my heavy cruiser and having taken so much damage already I decided to hit the FTL engines and get the big ship out of there, the single remaining corvette followed leaving the mining station still in enemy control…
Well although that was a short game it was great fun.
Not knowing what I was going to face was interesting especially when the enemy got a battlecruiser for their first ship, well at least it wasn’t a battleship!
I rolled well for their upgrades and their fighter support which didn’t help my chances, but again it came down to my rolling of the dice that lost me the game, “the enemy” rolled really well and “my ships” rolled average at best.
The random events were fun and not to heavy, I did add some “no event” cards to the pile which of course reduced the chance of an event happening and as this was a scenario and not just a straight fight I took out the “big events” because even though they are fun they can make things a bit hectic especially when trying to complete objectives in a scenario.
One good thing is when I play solo games, I win…
The solo rules are now available for free to download on this site or on wargames vault – https://www.wargamevault.com/product/317499/Stars-amp-Lasers-Solo-Games
Just saw your rules on the WGV follow your favorites. look interesting. Those ships you have look excellent. Can i ask who makes them (esp the one in bottom left of the third last picture)? The idea of rock asteroids (with mining stations) is inspired. Do the rule allow for different ‘altitudes’ for the ships? I know some air combat game do away with that because of the complexity it causes on eh table – have you don;t the same? Looks really interesting. Great blog by the way. Cheers Alan
Hi Alan, thanks I am glad you like the blog.
The ship is ( I am sure someone will correct me if I am wrong ) an old Ground Zero Games N.S.L ship which was painted by a friend, and I think he added the wing on the side… some people think it looks a bit odd but I kind of like it
;O)
The asteroids came from the fact that I needed some really quickly for a game and I had failed at making them out of polystyrene so I got a couple of bricks out of the garden and went at them with a hammer, and well after a little bit of paint and a wash or two they turned out not too bad, but I have to remember not to fly my ships into them or they will damage my ships
:O)
And the mining station on the asteroid was not my original idea I had seen something similar ( actually better ) done by someone else so I tried to make something similar.
Alan I don’t have different altitudes for spaceships in Stars & Lasers as it is meant to be really simple and fun game, I felt that things like that were not needed.
Cheers,
Mac
Thanks for getting back to me. I really like that style of starship – looks like a GZG NSL as you say – been browsing their lone. Interesting. It’s inspired me to try some scratch building. I’ll be picking up your rules next payday for sure. I am looking for something that leas more to fun gaming rather than of the rivet counting on airlocks type!
The pieces of brick gave a great result. Sometimes a rush job can create something great. Cheers Alan
Hi Alan,
There is lots of free stuff on Wargames Vault for Stars & Lasers, supplements and scenarios etc. they will give you some idea of what the game is like, also there are a few battle reports on this site.
If you do decide to get the rules I hope you like them and of course please let me know what you think of them and how your battles go.
Mac
Thanks Mac – I’ll be sure to check that out and will let you know how I go once I get my hands on a few starships!
Great blog – the play throughs are great inspiration.
Cheers, Alan