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Hey guys just getting into BFG! read through the basic rules it looks awesome!! I had a question about like ordinance particularly fighters/bombers after a ship loses one and it reloads and fires that one and reloads and just keeps doing that or is their a limit to how many times it can fire off squadrons?

also i had a question on a 500 point list i read on here that alot of you guys for imperials like to do 1 battle cruiser and 2 cruiser combo but i was looking at points and im trying to figure out how!? this is what i was thinking...

Overlord battle cruiser
Tyrant cruiser

but that gets me to 420 i dont see where you fit a third cruiser in, or am i wrong any help would be great! thanks!

A fleet can only have launched at any one time as many attack craft squadrons as it has launch bays. so if you took a dictator you could have four squadrons on the wing at once, and would need to complete or recall those wings missions before you could launch more.

Overlords are underrated but still undergunned, you need firepower elsewhere. Tyrants however are not good. It looks to me like you want ranged broadsides, frankly give it up. You can have 45 or 60 cm ranges, but not at an affordable price. accept that yourt main fighting range is 30. Overlords are still useful but to provide cover for larger formations, frankly you cannot afford it here.

For a 500pt list I would be looking at a Mars or Dictator and a pair of Dauntless, its pretty much the only way to get three cruisers in 500pts anyway. If you take Dauntless you must have a carrier, or they will get eaten, Dauntless are fine ships but horribly vulnerable to bombers.

I highly recommend the Dominator class for any points level. Massive batteries and a nova cannon are a wonderful combination! You would definitely need a Dauntless to reach a battlecruiser under 500 pts.

You might try a Dominator, a Dictator, and 3 Cobras. A nova cannon, 12 torps and 4 bombers is impressive long ranged firepower.

Hmm okay so when it says has starboard launching bay... str 2
that means it can fire 2 squadrons from there? and well what would you guys suggest as a 500 point list. I just thought 3 cruisers was the way to go after reading thoughts on here, but im open to any suggestion i just heard escorts were terrible and not worth taking.

And you mention overlords are good at providing cover how exactly do they provide cover? And being as im new i dont exactly see how tyrants aren't good, could you explain please. Thanks to both of you guys quite helpful i like Gitszbitah last idea but also think dauntless look fun too.

One more thing, what dauntless load out do you think is better prow torpedoes or lances? Personally i think torps sound more fun, but i dont really know which is better in game due to the fact i have never played so your guy's help is great! thank you!

The berief called for this:

IHEARTLARGEBLASTTEMPLATES wrote:
also i had a question on a 500 point list i read on here that alot of you guys for imperials like to do 1 battle cruiser and 2 cruiser combo but i was looking at points and im trying to figure out how!?

So this:

Gitzbitah wrote:
You might try a Dominator, a Dictator, and 3 Cobras. A nova cannon, 12 torps and 4 bombers is impressive long ranged firepower.

doesn't help.

Not too bad a list though.

IHEARTLARGEBLASTTEMPLATES wrote:Hmm okay so when it says has starboard launching bay... str 2
that means it can fire 2 squadrons from there? and well what would you guys suggest as a 500 point list. I just thought 3 cruisers was the way to go after reading thoughts on here, but im open to any suggestion i just heard escorts were terrible and not worth taking.

First you get two launch bays port and starboard, so the Dictator, Oberon and Mars get 4 launch bays, the Emperor 8. All those vessels are good except the Oberon, which is a really confused and generally substandard design, and looks crap too.

500pts is an odd points total, normally the game starts at 750pts. We can and have given 500pt lists but frankly build for 750pts, its also more realistic to say three cruisers as a general loadout for 750pts and gives some leeway as to which to take, and what erscorts to support them with.

I dont know who said ecorts were terrible and not worth taking, but they wereent an imperial player. With some fleets it is true, Space marines are better off without escort, the mperial Navy most certainly is not. Cobras are fairly good mainly because they can launch as big torpedo wave, though you can do without them. Firestorms are good also with good offensiove acapbility. Swords are where it is at, they are needed to proviide flanking cover, especially against Eldar have good turret defences and are cheap. Any fleet above 750pts is recommended to have some Swords in it.

IHEARTLARGEBLASTTEMPLATES wrote:
And you mention overlords are good at providing cover how exactly do they provide cover? And being as im new i dont exactly see how tyrants aren't good, could you explain please. Thanks to both of you guys quite helpful i like Gitszbitah last idea but also think dauntless look fun too.

Overlords have a pair of nice lances, which have a good all round cover. They also have the opportunity to take three turrets - which you should always take unless points are very desperately needed to buy a better ship elsewhere. Finally range 60cm batteries haelp enormously against Eldar. This is where Overlord provide cover, Edlar arr v ery nasty and easilyb evade Imperial guns, most of which are range 30. Overlords and battleships are the exception, with 60cm range guns Eldar cannot evade their firepower.
Tyrants are a poor comparison because they have only very minimal firepower beyond 30cm range, it can be improved, but at extra cost. That cost is not too much les than an Overlord for which you get a lot of benefits. Also 45cm range is not good enough, sure irt can more of less protect itself, but has no force projection arc large enough to also punish eldar heading for surrounding ships which is where the 60cm range batteries come in. Being a cruiser instead of a battlecruiser has its advantages, but it is easy to have a battlecruiser in an Imperial list and the Mars is too expensive for regular use. Do please note that an Overlord is 2/3 the cost and capability of a retribution battleship more or less, so all that I said about the overlord casn be obtained and more by buying the battleshiop instead. this isnt a bad idea really as the Retribution is a good ship, though frankly I would buy both or just the Overlord depending on how badly you need the range extension ships in the middle of your fleet..

IHEARTLARGEBLASTTEMPLATES wrote:
One more thing, what dauntless load out do you think is better prow torpedoes or lances? Personally i think torps sound more fun, but i dont really know which is better in game due to the fact i have never played so your guy's help is great! thank you!

My rule of thumb, and I have never had to change my mind on this issue is: for a singel Dauntless always take torpedoes, for more than one take lances and preferably take three. My recommendartion is to collect four Dauntlesses, one torped and three lances. My reasoning goes thus: Torpedoes because they do not interact with shield are an all or nothing weapon, you could score highly or you could flunk your attacks, this means for a single vessel the potential is there to do a lot of damage or next to none. This is an acceptable risk for 110pts. Lance Duntless are more steady each l;ance having a 50% chance of a hit, however you omnly get three and most opponents have two shields so a single Dauntless is very likely to fizzle against a sheilded target and will have problems with killing even escorts ion their own, however three Dauntless can reliably cause four and a half hits per group salvo, enough to burn through shields and damage a line cruiser reliably. You need to pay 330pt for this reliability but like the single torpedo Dauntless it is worthwhile. Necrons can affect this as Necrons respect lances but not torpedoes, though by the time you face Necrons you will hopefully know more about your fleet, Necrons ard tough to face even for veteran players and are NOT recommended for intro play.
Dauntless are always good so take up to the four, which you take torpedo or lance is really up to how many you can afford in your fleet. Design your whole fleet find out how many Dauntless you can afford afterwards and allocate accordingly: 1= torpedo, 2-3 = lance, 4 = all. This also makes Dauntless a points filler as if you needcto take points or have point spare you can always play around with the number of Dauntless you field and allocate their weaponry in respect to the final choice.

Wow thanks for the great reply!

So basically today i played my first BFG games ever..... and... I LOVED them they were great. The first one i took the tyrant so we could do 185 v the 185 ork ship just for ease of exact points value, and we did the one v one cruiser scenario and it was a little un eventful but it was quite helpful to get a hang of the rules so after that i realized what you were saying about the tyrants mediocre short range fire power, i wasn't impressed so 2nd game we played 750 pts. and i ran a dictator, dominator, overlord, and 3 cobras, i really like the dictator launch bays and torpedo volleys over all i really liked it performing quite well, The dominator also huge fan the nova cannon is just to fun and when we finally closed distance the HIGH strength broadsides were such a fun surprise really like the dominator, The overlord's lances were quite nice as was it's torpedoes didn't really get much out of the weapons batteries but that probably user error i kept him facing forward to fire torps, but overall hes did pretty well, i will try him out again, but cobras i was a little disappointed in 2 died without doing anything the one that did live manage to get behind them and fire point black torps but didnt really do much... not that impressed i would like to try the firestorms cause i feel like fast moving lances would be really nice. but to be honest i dont know if i played them right, i charged them forward let off a torp salvo then next turn 2 destroyed with kind of ease and then net turn i manage to get behind him and it wasnt worth him turning a cruiser to kill it so he just kinda hung around firing torps. any other way i could of used them? either way i really enjoyed them it was quite alot of fun and will for sure be ordering my own ships, we used tau drones for the ships , also one question on gw they sell waves of fighters and bombers, what do you do with those glue them on stands? or just use the markers you can print and not get those? thanks!

The metal ordnance minis come packaged with the 5-across Epic infantry bases. However, these are a different size than the markers that were included in the box set/are available as a PDF from the GW site. The easy solution is to use cardboard or sheet styrene to make your own bases (I believe the small WHFB square bases are also close to the right size). I would recommend only gluing 2 or 3 minis to each base; the are not cheap, and if you glue 5 to a stand you won't get as many markers out of them.

hmm wow okay thank you!

Congrats on your first two games! I think you may be right, Cobras may not be your style. Escorts, contrary to what you'd expect, are generally not meant to lead the charge. They're at their best on the flanks, or in your cruiser formations waiting for their moment of glory. I tend to use cobras as outriders, well away from my main force and sending long range torpedo salvos coasting towards the enemy to influence their movement. This does take a very long view of the battle to make it effective. On further thought, it also took me a long time before I could get them to survive. You might want to save them for later.

The Firestorms would definitely add to the punch of your fleet when they got into range- just remember to fire your weapons batteries first! Lances are not affected by blast markers at all.

The Dictator is also really awesome at 20cm or less- at that range, it can hit you with torpedoes and bombers in the same turn- and they can only use their turrets on one of them.

Hmm i agree about the cobras...

Firestorms seem great, i didnt even think about about batteries then lance! thanks