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so now that it has been out for a bit any updated opinions on game play?

i cant decide if i want to get uncharted seas or armada...

usernamesareannoying wrote:
i cant decide if i want to get uncharted seas or armada...

Check out Episode 46 of the D6G podcast:

http://www.thed6generation.com/

Good overview of FS:A. I think they reviewed Uncharted Seas in a past episode too.

I'm also thinking of FS:A, but am waiting to get some other opinions from other Dakkites....

Mez

I'm curious about this as well.

I had bought Uncharted Seas along with two starter fleets, read the rules, and sold it all off.

Maybe I missed something, but in Uncharted Seas (US), there didn't seem to be any 'tactics' in movement. Your gunnery value was your gunnery value, and the only modifiers to it were range. The only other decision was whether to fire all your dice at one target, or split it, or whether or not to link fire with other ships.

There didn't appear to be any difference if you shot at a ship in the front, rear, side, whatever.

I couldn't figure out how the game was 'strategic' at all, and why you'd ever want to split up your fleet for any reason.

I'm wondering if Armada is the same (and from the quickplay sheets on their website, is seems to be). The only difference being there are rules for attack craft.

I still might pick up the rules, just to see how they handled torpedoes and attack craft.

Cruentus wrote:Maybe I missed something, but in Uncharted Seas (US), there didn't seem to be any 'tactics' in movement.

Actually, ship combat games are all about "movement". I tend to think ship combat as a dance where you keep your enemy's ships within in line of sight of your "most powerful guns" (usually located on the port/starboard (sides) of the ship), while you stay out of your opponent's "gun heavy" arcs. Your fleet's formation, placement, and movement are a huge chunk of ship warfare & tactics for many ship warfare games.

Cruentus wrote:Your gunnery value was your gunnery value, and the only modifiers to it were range. The only other decision was whether to fire all your dice at one target, or split it, or whether or not to link fire with other ships.

A little over simplified but like shooting a gun, the skill comes from lining up for the shot, while pulling the trigger is (somewhat) trivial... As your opponent, it is definitely not my best interest to stay within your gun-sights for very long (if at all). If jousting and maneuvering your fleet of gigantic weapons platform into position doesn't sound like fun, then ship combat games may not be for you.

Assuming you can keep the enemy ships within line of sight of your main port/starboard gun batteries, and keep them in your ideal range (range band 2 (between 8"-16") in FS:A), then you are absolutely correct, the only thing you need to do is pull the trigger... It's kind of like saying, once I get my troops within 6" of your 40K army, the only decision I make is whether to shoot or assault... Whether you can maintain distance and get your opponent into your gun-sights for longer than a turn or two, or get out of your opponent's firing arc and put them back into your line of fire of your guns will be the tricky (and fun) part...

Cruentus wrote:There didn't appear to be any difference if you shot at a ship in the front, rear, side, whatever.

Ever watch StarTrek? People on the bridge are always blasted through the air regardless of where the ship is hit... I think the idea is that these weapons are so powerful that it doesn't really matter where it hits. Uncharted Seas is like shooting an elephant gun at a watermelon, while FS:A is like firing a bazooka at a car; you will know if you get hit, and it doesn't really matter where... Either way, the your ship will have a very bad day.

I have both, and like both. I roll with Bone Griffons in Uncharted Seas and Dindrenzi in Firestorm Armada, and enjoy both as much if not more than Gothic.

I'll give my impressions after getting my first games in this weekend.

Playing my first game tonight. I like US which appeals to me - the complexity of the game is all in the experience on the tabletop rather than in extremely detailed rules. FA is a bit more complex, particularly with all the extra rules around Wings, but doesn't seem overly complex. I'll know more once I've played it a couple of times and the rules have bedded more in my head. As for now US is a firm favourite game of mine and I expect FA to join it.

My initial "concerns" (not really concerns, more personal priorities) lie around the modelling aspects. There seem to be lots of issues around miscasts and so forth. Spartan have (apparently) given stirling service on replacements however, so its no biggy, other than I can do without spending £30+ on more models to sit in my backlog. I'm going with proxying an existing Full Thrust fleet to begin with. As the models are really irrelevant for game mechanics perposes - the position of the stem and the size of the base being the only functional part of the model - proxying is just fine. Also, Spartan don't have any fighters for sale yet, so if you want to have wee models for your Wings instead of counters, then you have to get alternatives anyway (I recommend Ground Zero Games http://www.gtns.co.uk/store1/commerce.cgi?page=ft-fp.html&cart_id=7101269.28470 as they charge £1 for six fighters, so £10 should see you with all the Wings and pods you need).

My initial impression is that it is a much more "modern" game than BFG, Full Thrust, B5 or other popular space fleet games. The mechanics are more streamlined and the tactics are not always apparent until you have likely played a few games. That was certainly the case with US, and if you sold off your fleets without actually playing the game, I would contend you made a mistake!

I love it.

I like how brutal and quick it plays. The cards give it that little extra.

I played Dindrenzi against Sorylians.

First turn I play the card that lets me place a disturbance area on the board. one of my frigate squadrons and my cruisers open up long range with forward batteries and wipe out a frigate squadron. My other frigates see off some Assaulter waves with some crew lost(from the card that lets you pull out Wings from a board edge), everything else moves forward.

Second turn, I play Bingo Fuel/Ammo on his Fighter wings, we both close in to range band 2, my Frigates and cruisers reduce his cruiser squadron to one ship, but not before his cruisers and remaining frigates destroy a cruiser, cripple another, and destroy a couple frigates(1 from each of my squadrons). His last Assaulter captures a frigate, while his carrier destroys a frigate from the other squadron and finishes my crippled cruiser. My battleship opens up with its forward guns(16 shots at range 2!) and cripples his Carrier.

Unfortunately, we had to end it there, as I had to leave to meet up with my wife.

I can't wait to play again.

Played my first game of Firestorm Armada today, and I have to say that I didn't like quite as much as I thought I would... The smaller ships Frigates and Cruisers are all way too brittle compared to the Battleship, and at the end, the game just turned into a big dice-fest where the two capital ships dropped dice until one of us blew up with a critical roll of 2 or 12... Tactically, there's not much to do when all the little ships get blown away and all you are left with is a lone battleship. The big ships seems too powerful, and the remainder of the fleet is really there to shield the mothership.

Anyone else have other experiences?

I haven't got to play yet, but I've watched several games at the store. Seems like they all came down to the battleships on either side, with eveything else dying fairly fast. I'd still like to try the game anyway since no one at the store plays Gothic.

It is true with Firestorm that if you just throw everything at each other the Battleships live longer... that's kind of the point. This does vary by race too, with the Aquan Battleship being quite the beast up close.

I'm starting to shift my tactics to leading with the Battleship and keeping the smaller ships back and saving them for the end game when possible.

The Green Git wrote:It is true with Firestorm that if you just throw everything at each other the Battleships live longer... that's kind of the point. This does vary by race too, with the Aquan Battleship being quite the beast up close.

I'm starting to shift my tactics to leading with the Battleship and keeping the smaller ships back and saving them for the end game when possible.

Moving your battleship up front is a sound tactic, but two players moving their one model six inches before throwing a bucket of dice for an hour wasn't particularly fun... Basically the first person to roll or on their crit roll wins... Very anticlimactic, the game was fun initially but the second half of the game was a drag... The win felt kind of "cheap", winning by luck isn't particularly satisfying or rewarding...

Perhaps we should have played a scenario instead of a simple kill each other game?

Salisar wrote:Moving your battleship up front is a sound tactic, but two players moving their one model six inches before throwing a bucket of dice for an hour wasn't particularly fun... Basically the first person to roll or on their crit roll wins... Very anticlimactic, the game was fun initially but the second half of the game was a drag... The win felt kind of "cheap", winning by luck isn't particularly satisfying or rewarding...

I've honestly not lost a BB yet in a game and have had lots of Crits done. If you are throwing dice by the bucket your ships should be getting pounded into crippled, limping hulks. The main problem I have with the usual game is I get my smaller ships killed early and the game becomes a "circle of death" affair with both bloodied and battered ships in a swirling knife fight trying to come to bear on each other.

Are you deducting damage from your AD like you are supposed to? Halving linked fire? Using Point Defense? It almost sounds like you guys are missing some game mechanic causing too many dice to be thrown.

As for the "winning by luck" thing... any game with dice involves an element of luck! It's only a 1 in 18 chance of that single shot death critical coming up and that's after landing the critical in the first place!

The Green Git wrote:Are you deducting damage from your AD like you are supposed to? Halving linked fire? Using Point Defense? It almost sounds like you guys are missing some game mechanic causing too many dice to be thrown.

Yeah, we did... I guess I am exhagerating with the "buckets" of dice... The routine is more like, roll 10-16 at range band 2 with battleships. I roll, he roll and what happens? ...

Shoot offs

ROUND ONE (1) FIGHT! (1) Nothing, 1HP. (2) nothing, 1HP, (3) nothing, nothing, (4) 1HP, nothing, (5) nothing, play repair card (repair D3), (6) Crit 2HP (loose engine), repaired engine on a 1, nothing (7) nothing, crit (loose 2 HP & crew), (8) nothing, nothing, (9) crit (loose 2 HP & crew), nothing, (10) play repair card (repair D3), nothing, nothing ... Until finally... Crit , and BOOM! Shake hands, good game...

Maybe it was just an odd game, because during our final battleship duels we somehow managed to draw all of our "repair cards", "reinforced hull", etc. on the final turns where we can only draw one card a turn... I guess that really didn't help make the game move any faster.

How many other games have incredibly interesting experiences with just the starter box though? Off the top of my head, none strike me as being incredibly deep (or else they wouldn't be starters).

I'll have my FA rule book in this week, so I'll be able to really check it out.

I suspect Endgame has hit on something here... as we explore the depths of the rules with things like Cruiser heavy forces or Frigate swarms things will get more interesting.

Terrans seem like they can be nasty at range.

Aquans are knife fighters. That swirling circle of death is going to the Aquan most times.

Sorylians will surprise you. Don't let them get close or you are getting boarded and you will lose that ship.

Dindrenzi of course are the flying shotguns. You get out in front of them and you are in for a hurting. I'm still exploring formations and how to get the most out of the Dindrenzi. So far it seems like they either win big or lose big... there's not much middle ground. Maybe it's just the way I'm playing them...

The Green Git wrote:I suspect Endgame has hit on something here... as we explore the depths of the rules with things like Cruiser heavy forces or Frigate swarms things will get more interesting.

Terrans seem like they can be nasty at range.

Aquans are knife fighters. That swirling circle of death is going to the Aquan most times.

Sorylians will surprise you. Don't let them get close or you are getting boarded and you will lose that ship.

Dindrenzi of course are the flying shotguns. You get out in front of them and you are in for a hurting. I'm still exploring formations and how to get the most out of the Dindrenzi. So far it seems like they either win big or lose big... there's not much middle ground. Maybe it's just the way I'm playing them...

From reading everything I can without a rulebook, I'm already thinking:

Terrans with 2x Battleships and lots of Frigates. The Terran Frigates have a good amount of firepower at Range Band 4, and the Battleships seem to be very durable.

Sorylians with a Carrier for Interceptors and lots of Cruisers. The Cruisers seem to be their best ship, so why not go heavy on them and then bring some extra point defense from a carrier?

Dindrenzi have the cheapest carrier. You could probably bring 2x Carriers and a battleship and still have some room for something else.

The spider guys (can't think of their names) could probably go cruiser and frigate heavy. Cloaking makes them hard to hit, and battleships already have a hard time killing frigates without the cloak bonus. Use your own cloaked frigates to take out their cruisers and frigates and wear down their battleship with your hard to kill small ships.

So just from the models currently available there is a lot to explore. Then add in the fact that in a couple of weeks escorts will be available and after that heavy cruisers. For a brand new game things are already looking really interesting!

I know it took Warmachine a couple of years to build up real steam -- if you've played it, think about what WM was like when you only had 3 jacks and a caster to play with. I think F:A has a better out of the gate play experience than that.

I'm looking forward to the newer ship types(they've already shown us Escorts and Civilian vessels, with promises after that of Heavy Cruisers followed by the Directorate fleet). I have a feeling once we get more than the 4 starting ship types, the game will start to get more interesting and play a bit differently(and games will be more than BB's backed up by a few smaller ships, we may actually see swarm fleets of relatively smaller ships led by HCs that are able to hurt BBs).

Plus, don't forget we'll eventually get Leviathans to put BBs in their place. ;p

Has anyone started to play with fleet compositions beyond just that of the starter box + Carrier?

I picked up the Terran Box and the Sorylian box. I'm going to give both factions a solid shot (already have played the Terrans) before I really commit to a faction, and then I'll likely pickup another starter of that faction and an extra pack of Cruisers and Frigates.

Played Sorylians vs Directorate last night. A devastating linked barrage from the Sorylian Cruisers dealt a double crit to the Directorate BS on turn 3, which was followed up by a single crit from the Sorylian BS later in the turn. The game went solidly to the Sorylians with all Directorate forces destroyed or captured. Remaining Sorylian ships were 1 Cruiser, 2 Frigates, and the Battleship.

In my other game, it was Terrans vs Dindrenzi which was quite even until the Dindrenzi battleship maneuvered around the planet in the center of the board. That allowed the terran battleship to finish off the DIndrenzi cruisers and position itself such that the Dindrenzi battleship had to clear the planet but only be in range band 3. The Dindrenzi Conquerer managed no damage, while the Terran BS closed into RB 2 and let lose with a 14 dice linked barrage.that placed a double crit on the Dindrenzi BB that both left raging fires on the ship. Now with a massive advantage in AD, the terran ship finished off the Dindrenzi ship without taking further damage. Surviving Terran ships were 2 frigates and the Battleship.

Overall, I'm quite enjoying the game, though I'm not yet fully decided on a faction. The Terrans fit my play style more, I think, but I prefer the Sorylian ships looks wise (even though I botched my BS putting it together)

I'm also not quite sure how the Directorate is supposed to play as they take damage fairly easily and don't have a massive advantage in any one category.

*twitch* Battleship abbreviation is BB, not BS...

Sound like a fun couple of games. I haven't tried either of the unreleased fleets, yet. I'm loving m Dindrenzi, glad I went with them first before doing Sorylians.

I have yet to get a game in, but I'll be doing so soon. I should receive the Dindrenzi Starter fleet box today and my Carrier and Escorts some time next week. I'll be playing against a buddy who decided to go with Sorylians for his first fleet.

We played BFG together before, but this looks to be a very promising game and will probably fill BFG's role in our club nicely.

I actually am liking FA much more than BFG right at the moment. It just plays faster and it really seems like it will expand a bit better in number of ships than BFG.

It's pretty cool, but horribly luck-dependent. Having your battleship one-shotted on turn 1 is not particularly fun.

lord_blackfang wrote:It's pretty cool, but horribly luck-dependent. Having your battleship one-shotted on turn 1 is not particularly fun.

And its extremely unlikely. Your opponent has to hit the crit rating, most likely at RB 4, you have to fail your shield saves, AND your opponent has to roll a 2 or 12 on the crit chart. Its kind of like losing a Land Raider with your command squad in it on turn 1 to 1 lascannon shot, or getting caster killed on turn 1 in Warmachine. There is probably more to the story than just luck.

And it's very historical, just look at the HMS Hood vs the Bismark!

All right so I received my Dindrenzi fleet last week. I like the models, but I must have gotten a bad casting of the Battleship. It took me over 3.5 hours to get all the extra flash and large amount of excess resin that had leaked in the areas where the guns were mounted. I realize the set was only $60, I got it for $40, but damn, it shouldn't take that long to put one model together.

Other than that I only had one other problem with one of the Cruisers. Everything else was in good shape. I should be receiving my Carrier and Escorts within the next couple days.

Overall I am pleased with the look of the fleet, and the size is just brutal. The smallest ships of these fleets are the same size as some of the larger ships for BFG.

Good stuff and I'm looking forward to getting a game or three in this weekend against Sorylians.

Endgame wrote:you have to fail your shield saves,

What are shields(says the Dindrenzi player)?

Got my first game in this past weekend. It was really fun! I'm looking forward to getting some more games in soon.

Rules were quite easy to adapt to. I'm now looking into getting a Uncharted Seas fleet as well.

Endgame wrote:

lord_blackfang wrote:It's pretty cool, but horribly luck-dependent. Having your battleship one-shotted on turn 1 is not particularly fun.

And its extremely unlikely. Your opponent has to hit the crit rating, most likely at RB 4, you have to fail your shield saves, AND your opponent has to roll a 2 or 12 on the crit chart. Its kind of like losing a Land Raider with your command squad in it on turn 1 to 1 lascannon shot, or getting caster killed on turn 1 in Warmachine. There is probably more to the story than just luck.

You would think that, except that I've done it in all 3 games that I've played so far, and had it done to me once as well. That's 4 one-shotted BBs over 3 games, using only starter sets + carrier.