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On the dials I found that filing them down a mm makes them ideal to spin without any trouble.

Sure, you get a (very) narrow band of the sticker below showing through but it's still massively clear what the order/orbit is and the ability to just push to spin without having to hold down the base and knock over your models is more than worth it. I honestly don't know why Hawk thought they had to make the spinning part of the dial such an exact fit to the base.

(Note, be sure to leave a 2-3 bits are not filed down at all otherwise there will be no contact with the base and the dial will spin like crazy when you move your ships)

I had my first clash game the other night (UCM Vs PHR) which I managed to lose due to a combination of not properly reading the deployment rules (my entire fleet was effectively 1 turn of movement behind where they should have been so the PHR got to the central clusters first and set up defense batteries) and some sloppy orders which severely limited some of my strike carriers which again limited my ground objective grabbing.

At least it was close in the end and my Avalon managed to get 23 damage in 3 turns of shooting (out of a maximum of 24) with its gigantic laser before being eaten by swarms of bombers.

Larger games are a lot more tactical; minor things really do matter, things tend to die fast and PHR bombers are evil.

I converted some UCM corvettes this morning. The burnthrough laser from the Cruiser sprue fits perfectly with the Frigate 'wings' so its an easy conversion to do. The sensor spikes are from the Cruiser troopship module and the engines are Tau fusion gun muzzles.

Sweet little things.

Nicely done

Does anyone know if the assembly instructions for the various factions have been posted online anywhere? I received my kickstarter pledge a couple of weeks ago and it was missing the instructions for the PHR and Shaltari. Or if they haven't, does anyone have them and can make scans of them and post them? I'd greatly appreciate it.

Did you check your kickstarter box for an A4 brown envelope that probably camouflaged itself and is attached to the bottom of the box? Most of the extra instructions and bonus transfer sheets are in there.

 Compel wrote:
Did you check your kickstarter box for an A4 brown envelope that probably camouflaged itself and is attached to the bottom of the box? Most of the extra instructions and bonus transfer sheets are in there.

Also, for reasons unexplainable my shipment had those two fleets instructions and reference sheets folded in half and actually somewhat difficult to notice if I wasn't paranoid about such things. If you did find the envelope, double-check that they didn't just decide to put creases into it for no reason and they slipped by.

I think they're folded in half because normally you can only find them in the starter fleet boxes - Which are less than half the size of A4.

 Compel wrote:
I think they're folded in half because normally you can only find them in the starter fleet boxes - Which are less than half the size of A4.

Fair enough if they were folded at the printers I suppose; just mildly bothersome when you grab everything else at once and they don't come with.

On more important matters, what ships make up the "solid core" in a competent list for any fleet? Am I correct that a couple of Strike Carriers and a troopship are good ideas for all four factions? Trying to plan out building of models and while they seem like they'd magnetize really well, I have a feeling I'm going to want them "finalized" in their classes like my BFG fleets.

On more important matters, what ships make up the "solid core" in a competent list for any fleet? Am I correct that a couple of Strike Carriers and a troopship are good ideas for all four factions? Trying to plan out building of models and while they seem like they'd magnetize really well, I have a feeling I'm going to want them "finalized" in their classes like my BFG fleets.

The number of troop delivering ships that you use in any list is extremely important. I cannot speak for anyone else, but my current plan is three strike carriers for quick insertion and three bulk landers for key contested areas at 1500 points. In DZC I always go with the following rubric: One unit of infantry plus one more for each five-hundred points you are playing. It is not a perfect analog to ground troops in DFC, but after playing a few test games with my KS stuff I feel that it is a safe direction to go.

As for the rest of the list? It really depends on your strategy. I've found the game is often about the art of engagement initiation. Once the initial salvos are complete and the ships close in the combat is incredibly brutal and ever changing, but the first couple of turns are extremely important for setting the tone of the fight. Who spikes first? Are the return salvos all in weapons free orders or does the enemy try to hide a turn longer and take a few pot shots on standard orders? Do your ships utilize weapon outfits that favor massed weapons fire (like the Moscow) or orders that only allow you to fire a single weapon (like the Berlin)?

There is a lot of nuance involved. Especially once you start adding in fleet carriers (for fighters and bombers) and close action specialists. I am honestly hard pressed to pick a specific ship that is must have. Other than maybe suggesting a fleet carrier in every list (for the tool box value).

It's really hard to tell how the meta is going to evolve right now.

For example, right now, the only real "authority" on the game is from one of the beta players blogs at http://thehotlz.blogspot.co.uk/

Who recommends

The HOTLZ wrote: I recommend 1 for every 750 points if you are the Scourge and UCM. For the PHR and Shaltari it is 1 for every 500 points.

He then recommends 4 strike carriers at 1500.

However, coming from games like X-Wings, I think it's kind of up in the air, really. - If everyone starts following that 'rule' and that becomes the meta, someone will then do something to break the meta - Like say, 1 troop ship and 10 strike carriers(!)

To be honest, I'm kinda just grumpy that, after following the recommended build from the starter set, I'm probably going to have to assemble my Scourge kickstarter as 2 troopships and 2 Hydra Carriers, without going into any of the other fun toys...

I still have yet to play my first game- that's coming up this week.

Using my two UCM Starters, my gut told me to make two Strike Carriers and one Troop Ship. After that, I went for just about one of each, sticking to battle cruisers, heavy cruisers, and cruisers and avoiding light cruisers. The rest of my frigates are two of each except for the Aegis and "ECM" firgates. I mainly concentrated on the ships with the big lasers (Cobra's), because I just can't see myself using "Weapons Free" all that much due to the lack of turning and a major spike. I'm thinking one attack each turn will be the main way to play.

I had a hard time deciding on a Madrid (bombardment cruiser) or Seattle (fleet carrier), and ended up with the Seattle figuring that fighters and bombers from the Seattle would be more important than a cruiser whose primary job is to bombard a planet... I dunno. We'll see after I get some experience, but destroying sectors/clusters just doesn't seem like the way to win the game, and when it comes to destroying a cluster, there is always the Nuke It From Orbit option...

Played my first proper game this week.

Enjoyed it - it was like and unlike other space combat games.

The Initiative system was interesting, looks a bit convoluted from game to game but intersting as I am used to activating ships or squadrons at wll. It does mean that the battlegroup composition is important and you need to think about it when creating your fleet list.

The Spotting distance for range is also very interesting - although most games have been quite brawl like so distance for many ships means can see. I like the ability to use a firgate to light up the enemy with an active ping.

Love the fact that terrain matters.

Small game so the the small flights of UCM bombers were usless against my Scourge.

Turning is an absolute pain, not used to it being that hard to bring ships, expecially frigates around. Would have prefered that they had 2 x 45 degrees.....

Hittign ships in the atmosphere is very very hard, will be proxying my Shadow Scouts as Corvettes in the next game I think.

All in all - good game

I think the general thing to remember with frigates is that, most only have one weapon system, so station keeping or Course Change orders aren't unreasonable

 Compel wrote:
I think the general thing to remember with frigates is that, most only have one weapon system, so station keeping or Course Change orders aren't unreasonable

Yeah I picked up on that but its early days so still feels odd to me downside of playing other space ship games - same thing happened with the All Ahead Special Order - both of us had just assumed we could not turn but then read the rules..............

 Compel wrote:
Did you check your kickstarter box for an A4 brown envelope that probably camouflaged itself and is attached to the bottom of the box? Most of the extra instructions and bonus transfer sheets are in there.

I did have that brown envelope, it had the bonus stickers and such and another set of Scourge/UCM instructions but nothing for the PHR or Shaltari. So I have 2 sets of Scourge/UCM instructions, but nothing for the other factions. I've seen a couple people on the kickstarter comments with the same issue so probably just a packing error. I've emailed Hawk, but no response as of yet.

Been building and painting my 4 PHR starters. Almost enough to do 2 of every large ship and way more then needed of every frigate.

Ive read that they are the most popular from design but right now not a ton of fun to play as broadsides are fiddly. Hoping to get a game in Friday so will see how they play for the first time.

Anyone happen to kitbash PHR corvettes? Theres so many extra bits id like to make some

I'm thinking at 1500, your 'standard' should be 2 troopships, 4 Strike Carriers. Maybe a bombardment cruiser.

Total objective package: That's about 400-ish points.

You could go heavier, or just run 1 troopship. Or not take the bombardment ship(s). But that's a matter of taste and fleet.

 Krinsath wrote:

On more important matters, what ships make up the "solid core" in a competent list for any fleet? Am I correct that a couple of Strike Carriers and a troopship are good ideas for all four factions? Trying to plan out building of models and while they seem like they'd magnetize really well, I have a feeling I'm going to want them "finalized" in their classes like my BFG fleets.

Personally I am using 1 troopship and 4 strike carriers in 1k point games. I have played against people who have taken more but they lacked actual firepower in space which allowed me to win despite having less ground assets.

Corvettes are a must though, strike carriers are near enough invincible once they are in atmosphere and you need to clear them if you want to capture clusters.

My current UCM list:
--------------------------------------
999 UCM - 996pts
UCM - 3 launch assets

SR16 Vanguard battlegroup (311pts)
1 x Avalon - 195pts - H
1 x Lima - 37pts - L
1 x Madrid - 79pts - M

SR9 Line battlegroup (240pts)
2 x Santiago - 44pts - L
2 x New Orleans - 64pts - L
1 x Seattle - 132pts - M

SR6 Pathfinder battlegroup (226pts)
4 x Taipei - 156pts - L
2 x Toulon - 70pts - L

SR9 Pathfinder battlegroup (219pts)
2 x Santiago - 44pts - L
1 x San Francisco - 111pts - M
2 x New Orleans - 64pts - L
--------------------------------------
http://dflist.com/s/#/share/09f6479810837
--------------------------------------

This has enough ground assets to contest every cluster on the board, some bombardment capability to help clear out sectors and sufficient corvettes to be give you air superiority in 2 key clusters.
The Avalon is frankly awesome, its laser is utterly deadly, for me it almost always does 8 damage a shot, and the Lima gives it more firing opportunities.
The Toulon are handy frigates, nothing special but can pump out some reliable damage and are a significant threat to enemy frigates.
The Taipei are a really good unit, in a recent game they one shot a Ganymede troopship and then crippled a Battlecruiser in the following turn although that was pretty lucky
UCM are pretty poor when it comes to strike craft but at least the Seattle has some nasty guns.

Trying my first 1000pt game on Thursday - likely against Shaltari

Vanguard BG - Akuma (H), Ruiju (H), Charybis (L) - likey use the Firgate to light up enemy and bombardment latter if need be

Pathfinder BG - Chimera (M), 2 Gargoyle Frigates (L)

Pathfinder BG - Chimera (M), 1 Gargoyle frigate (L)

Line BG - 2 Hydra (m)

no idea if it will work

THis is my 1500pt list I built, still need to test.

UCM - 1495pts
UCM - 0 launch assets

SR17 Vanguard battlegroup (374pts)
1 x Perth - 195pts - H
1 x Berlin - 105pts - M
2 x Lima - 74pts - L

SR17 Vanguard battlegroup (374pts)
1 x Perth - 195pts - H
1 x Berlin - 105pts - M
2 x Lima - 74pts - L

SR7 Line battlegroup (175pts)
1 x San Francisco - 111pts - M
1 x New Orleans - 32pts - L
1 x New Orleans - 32pts - L

SR9 Line battlegroup (260pts)
1 x San Francisco - 111pts - M
1 x New Orleans - 32pts - L
3 x Taipei - 117pts - L

SR5 Pathfinder battlegroup (140pts)
1 x New Orleans - 32pts - L
2 x Jakarta - 64pts - L
2 x Santiago - 44pts - L

SR6 Pathfinder battlegroup (172pts)
2 x New Orleans - 64pts - L
2 x Jakarta - 64pts - L
2 x Santiago - 44pts - L
------------- dflist.com -------------

Anybody else had problems with the Frigates staying on the stands? It's the one thing I wasn't happy with in the 2 Player Starter set I've just bought so magnetised them whilst I was sorting out the Scourge Frigates.

Models are excellent and pretty easy to swap parts out or magnatise which is very much appreciated. Rules seem pretty straightforward so I'm looking forward to getting some small games in soon before expanding the fleets.

Did you remember to glue the "Hawk Widget" plastic thingie to the bottom of the ships?

I din't, I was hoping I could get away without that, the cruisers certainly stay on fine..

They stay perfect, if you use them as intended with the widgets

Ive seen the articles on magnetizing, and its way more trouble then its worth (unless said model owner has tons of free time)

Myself being busy, its far easier to buy starter sets and assemble as I want then swap around parts.

I've finished assembling my ships, and getting ready to paint them, but for storage and transport, I don't want them on the flight stands, and gluing that widget into the ship.... ugly. So I'm just going to use magnets on the flight stand peg and in the hole on the ship. Looks about 7/16"?

This game strikes me as requiring multiple small ships like frigates (and maybe destroyers and corvettes eventually), a couple medium (cruisers) ships, and few large (battleship) ships. I see no reason to try to magnetize frigates- that would be an exercise in futility. I could see maybe magnetizing a cruiser or two, but it just seems like a large amount of time for little pay back. You might be able to field cruiser X/Y/Z with magnets, but what do you do when you need multiples of cruiser X/YZ?

Battleships- yeah, these I could see magnetizing. You can only field a couple at normal point costs, so it would make sense to be able to swap 'em on the fly instead of spending the money on multiple Battleships.

I dunno. Some people just have to magnetize everything. And there is nothing wrong with that. I play far too many table top games as it is, and my time is limited. Spending more time and money to magnetize a single model gives me less time to assembles and paint another model. That, and DFC models are pretty different from each other. Very few share more than a couple common pieces. For example, UCM cruisers all have the same lower hull, but different "wings", engines, upper hull, weapons... that's a lot of magnets for one ship. You could definitely run into a "Is that a Berlin or New Cairo?"

 Tamwulf wrote:
I've finished assembling my ships, and getting ready to paint them, but for storage and transport, I don't want them on the flight stands, and gluing that widget into the ship.... ugly. So I'm just going to use magnets on the flight stand peg and in the hole on the ship. Looks about 7/16"?

This game strikes me as requiring multiple small ships like frigates (and maybe destroyers and corvettes eventually), a couple medium (cruisers) ships, and few large (battleship) ships. I see no reason to try to magnetize frigates- that would be an exercise in futility. I could see maybe magnetizing a cruiser or two, but it just seems like a large amount of time for little pay back. You might be able to field cruiser X/Y/Z with magnets, but what do you do when you need multiples of cruiser X/YZ?

Battleships- yeah, these I could see magnetizing. You can only field a couple at normal point costs, so it would make sense to be able to swap 'em on the fly instead of spending the money on multiple Battleships.

I dunno. Some people just have to magnetize everything. And there is nothing wrong with that. I play far too many table top games as it is, and my time is limited. Spending more time and money to magnetize a single model gives me less time to assembles and paint another model. That, and DFC models are pretty different from each other. Very few share more than a couple common pieces. For example, UCM cruisers all have the same lower hull, but different "wings", engines, upper hull, weapons... that's a lot of magnets for one ship. You could definitely run into a "Is that a Berlin or New Cairo?"

First time I've tried magnatising with these and I've done it with the starter set because it lets me try things out with a small 500pts ish fleet, when I expand I'll have a much better idea of what I want and wont have to bother with it. As far as the UCM ships go, the Frigates don't need any magnatising or even gluing, they're brilliantly designed. With the cruisers the wings/engines don't need to be glued in place, they stey put securely as is so no need to magnatise, and whilst not quite as secure the two top parts go on OK without needing to be glued, the only thing I have magnetised is the weapon attachments.

I'm scratching my head to build balanced lists for all 4 factions at the 999 level (b/c I only got a Commodore pledge and the starters for each). It's a lot to take in. My gut instincts say:

5-8 fighter/bomber launches - though I'm not sure if I should split them between groups of keep them together
2 bulk landers/turn
2 dropships/turn - presumably in the same battlegroup as the bulk landers, though spreading 2 of them in 2 different groups enables a lot of land grabbing.
At least 1 bombardment weapon if possible - in the lander battlegroup, or a different group to soften up the approach of the landers?

I also wonder if I should bother withe KS battlecruisers or wait until I can do higher values, given that it forces me to use a Vanguard.

At the 999 point level, I think you can take the battlecruisers, if you're not taking the heavy cruiser. - Broadly speaking.

It depends though. PHR Battlecruisers can be seen as 'better' Light Cruisers rather than 'better' Heavy Cruisers. So I could foresee a list that had a Leonidas but no Theseus.

I think 5-8 Fighters/Bombers is quite a lot, for the UCM at least. - That would mean taking 2 Seattles minimum, which seems like a lot.

Throwing together a quick list.

Vanguard (aka Spikes R Us)
Avalon Battlecruiser - Commodore
2x Lima Frigates
Berlin Class

Line Battlegroup
Seattle Class
2x New Orleans
1x New Orleans

Line Battlegroup (Go for the eyes.. Err, Middle Cluster, Boo!)
Madrid Class
San Francisco Class
2x Jakarta Class

Pathfinder Battlegroup (Sneaky sneaking)
2x Touloun Frigates
1x New Orleans

I might have overdid the Spike generation there, possibly worth dropping to 1 Lima, then replacing the Berlin with your 2nd Seattle Class if you wanted to. - I'd be tempted to instead bulk out the Touloun's to 3 though and keep the Berlin class. Heck, I could even drop the second Jakarta class and bump up the Touloun squadron to 4. - I'd then want to move the New Orleans in the Pathfinders to a different battlegroup though, as I'd still want to stay below the magic Strategy rating of 5.



For the PHR fleet, I had a go at playing to the PHR strengths. - Launch Assets and Ground Control.

Vanguard Battlegroup
Scipio Battlecarrier - Vice Director
Hector Heavy Cruiser
Calypso Frigate (I'm pretty sure this is rubbish but hey, it goes on points on the nose)

Line Battlegroup
Ikarus Carrier

Line Battlegroup
Orpheus Assault Troopship
2x Andromeda Escort Frigates

Pathfinder Battlegroup
Ganymede Troopship
2x Medea Strike Carriers


I kinda wanted to fit in more Strike Carriers, but didn't have the points. I also don't have any combat frigates. On the other hand, that's a heckuva lot of launch assets for a skirmish game. The other thing to remember is that the Orpheus is pretty much an Ajax Cruiser that can drop troops. I foresee the Scipio and Ikarus bombing things, whereas the Andromedas are more likely launching protective fighters.




So, the Scourge, I've thrown together even more quickly than the other two... I'm not too happy about how the battlegroups work out, but hey...

Vanguard Battlegroup
Manticore Battlecruiser (I'm sorry, it's a torpedo in the skirmish game, gotta do it...)

Line Battlegroup
Sphinx Cruiser
3x Gargoyles (I'm wanting to keep the Vanguard group low on the Strategy scale)

Line Battlegroup (Fun Fact: None of these need the Weapons Free order)
Ifrit Cruiser (I kinda wish I could put this in a group on its own as well... Oh well)
Hydra Carrier
2x Harpy

Pathfinder Battlegroup (The 'Central Cluster' express)
Chimera Troopship
2x Scylla Frigates
1x Gargoyle Carrier


I'm not too sure of the Scylla's but I really want to try them out

I don't have a Shaltari fleet, so I've not really looked at their rules at all. You're probably wanting at least 2 Motherships though. I'm not too sure if 3 is that crazy an idea.