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I've been a fan of the imperial ships range for BFG for a long time and am decided on making a purchase. I have a few questions and would appreciate advice from learned Admirals out there. I am a total newbie with regards this game, never even seen it played.

1. What's a 'reasonable' sized force?

2. What ships are hot/what's deadweight in an imperial fleet? I do like me some of the big battleships and heavy cruisers.

3. I know that escorts and frigates and things are out of favour, but if I do get some for fluffy/completeness, which ones? I do like the cobras and swords.

4. What about all the tiny stuff? Fighters and assault boats etc, if I am taking carriers, are these the fighters to be represented?

5. What are the best builds and non-starters for the plastic cruisers?

6. Any other advice you can offer me!

1. What's a 'reasonable' sized force?

1500pts is the standard game size. 2000pts is a good collection point with some swappabillity. 3000pts for an end point, end points are useful as at 3000pts you can have just about everything can play that size and it puts a natrual break on overspending.


2. What ships are hot/what's deadweight in an imperial fleet? I do like me some of the big battleships and heavy cruisers.

Imperial fleet is quite nasty and the ships are fairly well balanced. Some dislike the Overlord, I however don't. The Grand Cruisers arent really needed though. I would perosnally say no to the Vengeance in all its forms, the Oberon, the Gothic and Falchions. Firestorms are generally inferior to Dauntless.

Whats good. Emperor class battleships, Dominators, Dauntlesses and Swords are great. Lunars and Dictators are good, and needed. Mars, Cobras and Overlords are mediocre but useful. All the others you can make do with.


3. I know that escorts and frigates and things are out of favour, but if I do get some for fluffy/completeness, which ones? I do like the cobras and swords.

They aren't out of favour! Space Marines and Chaos dont need escorts, some here put an argument for ecort free Ork and Necron fleets. Imperial Navy however needs escorts.
Swords are very good support vessels, I use them in pairs and close formation with capital ships when facing attack craft heavy fleets. Cobras are one of the many ways you can mass torpedos at an opponent. One a torpedo per point basis Cobras are ther best, but I think you can do just fine with Lunars and Dauntlesses.


4. What about all the tiny stuff? Fighters and assault boats etc, if I am taking carriers, are these the fighters to be represented?

You need them. Imperials however pay more for attack craft than other races, you will likely have to surrender attack craft superiority. Emperor class battleships are the only means by which you can have assault boats, and this ocsts you 5pts exta. I find this worthwhile for the versatility, though bombers are usually good enough. However if you find yourself 5pts overbudget you can redeem the investment and get your extra ship/reroll or whatever you need to buy without much loss.
Dictators are expensive and are the only other option you have for a carrier force and its one you will have to rely on. Dictators are expensive but do have their plus points. Thery have etra turret defences and because they carry both torpeoes and bombers, one of very few ships of any fleet that can, means that Dictators can operate alone and take on ships one on one. More on this later.
Games Workshop sells attack craft miniatures, they are not mandatory though, the boxset came with counters for attack craft and these, even photocopies of same are very much acceptible. If your minitures sourcing doesnt bother you you could also buy fighters for Full Thrust by GZG. This is how I got my attack craft.


5. What are the best builds and non-starters for the plastic cruisers?

An impotant question and its good that you ask it early. Thre main issue you will find is that you get four plastic cruisers (per faction) in the boxset and they are also sold in pairs. Each ship also has a single sprue of add on bits including turrets masts and glue on weapons broadsides.
The issue is that every vessel except the Gothic requires a pair of weapons battery broadside panels. The other two panels, lances and carier bays respectively are of secondanry importance in fleet building.
So you will need to accept that the only ships you can build from the fleetbox straight off are Lunars, Mars and Dictators. For every other ship class you build, Overlord, Tyrants, and Dominators require you build a Gothic for each one. Some want Gothics however I do not recommend them, Lunars are more versatile. It is better to have two Lunars than a Gothic and a Tyrant or Dominator. This is because Lunars spread out your lances and weapons batteries evenly so that an opposing fleet more vulnerable to one cannot target your effective ships and ignore (for now) the less effective ships. lunars can also have Nova cannon just as Dominators can. Dominators are good ships though, as they have nova cannon for less, a nova cannon armed Lunar will cost you 200pts.

Personally I would wait to get an Emperor class battleship with the plastic cruisers. An Emperor is sold with three sprues of bits, and needs only two for the broadside panels, this will leave you two weapons batteries left over, enough to equip a Dominator or Overlord ion your fleet without requiring a Gothic.

My standing loadout for a boxset cruiser fleet is: Mars, Dictator and two Lunars. Otherwise get an Emperor, Dominator, Dictator and two Lunars. Take at least one nova cannon in your main fleet, preferably two.

You could get more, but at that point I would recommend youj spend on Dauntless and swords instead. I would deploy a minimum of two Swords per plastic cruiser. Also a high priority are Dauntlesses. Arm them in accordance with how many you want to buy. Torpedo Dauntless are good for solo flanking moves, lance Dauntlesses are better used in squadrons.


6. Any other advice you can offer me!

I should explain a couple of things here. First unelss you are facing Eldar and to a lesser extent orcs you will ave your firepower fall into a standard pattern. The firepower of one imperial ship is only enough to drop the shields of a single target, thus to actually do damage you need to have a 2:1 local superiority on direct firepower. Now you can get around that with ordnance which ignores shields. This is why solo Dauntless should be torpedo armed, wheras squadroned or intersupporting Dauntless armed with lances.
This also explains the Dictator. The Dictators having both bombers and torpedoes can not only laugh at shields but also overload turret defences too. Yes it also means if you fair to reload your launchers you are reduced to an overweight frigate until you do. A Dictator can therefore attack a cruiser on its own with a good chance of doing real damage, whereas on average dice a Lunar or Gothic with down the targets shields.



Basic tactical rules.

1. You can do all things... for price. BFG is the best tactical game GW has made, you get to choose how effective your ships are, subject to a leadership test. You can have bonus firepower, bonus manoeuverability or bonus survivability, all at the expense of the other two. Choose wisely.

2. Concentrate to win. Naval combat is different to land combat. Its a matter of statistics, the bigger fleet wins, so concentrate your fleet to get all your fleet in combat at once to gain that superiority.

3. Overconcentrate to lose. Ships blow up, if your ships are too close together you can lose that battle when one exploding cruiser damages several others.

4. Quit when you are ahead. In most land wargaming its bad form to withdraw forces, in 40K withdrawn forces count as destroyed. In BFG its often pruident and quite acceptible to withdraw forces. Withdraw a cruiser if it has dangerous critical damage or if it is in danger of being destoyed or crippled. Disengage your entire fleet and call a battle over if you score an early victory, this is NOT being unfair.

5. Manoeuver by design, fire by opportunity. You should plan your mover before the battle begins. This cannot be emphasised enough, some ships like the Emperor cannot manoeuver once batle is joined, so make sure when you set up there are no celestial phenomena in direct line ahead. Also as manoeuver involves special orders a lot of the time it should be minimised. Some manoeuver is necessary but your lighter fleet elements should observe most of that. Heavier elements will move according to plan, the plan being to be in the right position to maximise fire arcs over critical positions of the battle area.
While you manoeuver according to plan, changing the plan only as necessary, you can still react to the enemy. You do this by your choice of what to fire at. Careful planning in manoeuver will mean your firepower should be in position to cover the field, however where in the field the enemy will be is up to them. If you didnt follow this point you might be halving firepower in some of your ships to change your fire arcs, but while the fleets might be unpredicatole the fire arcs are not, so you should be able to plan.
When choosiong your targets concentrate fire to damage ships, split fire to disrupt tghem (or kill Eldar). Think long terms with your shooting priority, try and damage those ships that will be in a position to best damage you next turn. Its beter to criplle a dangerous ship than dstoery a ship that is not in a position to damage you. You can judge which is which by seeing which ship combinations have the power to overcome your shields.

6. Fear is your ally. BFG is a psychological game, remember point 1. Now choosing what to do is not only about maximising your ships efficiency its also about the psychological conditions. an example: nova cannon are especially import here. While it is horribly random in both accuracy and damage potential it can cripple fresh cruisers in a single shot. While nova cannon often do no damage, if you play the psychological game you will get the opponent to brace anyway.
Got plenty of torpedoes, your opponent might feel pressured to launch more fightrs than otherwise needed. A smart player will try the same back to you, look at the odds carefully before you decide whether to brace and what to launch.

From here its best if we stick to specific questions.

Excellent answers, thank you Orlanth.

1. So, 2k is a good collection point allowing swaps. Given what's available on the GW website, what would you recommend purchasing to effect that size force?

2. I'm glad to hear the grand cruisers aren't needed, they are ugly as all hell. You refer to the Dauntless being very useful, which of the variants would you field (both available at GW atm)?

3. Emperor is Command ship of choice? Ok, but are the other 2 (retribution and apocalypse) shoddy or to be used differently? Emps are carriers and the other 2 are gunboats as I read it, so can I take an emp and a gun command ship in the same force or are they limited along the lines of monsters and HQs sort of thing? Could you just give me some more info on why carriers are the better option/what you can get out of the other big ships?(I was considering splitting the force into 2 halves, a hammer of gunships getting stuck in and an anvil of carrier/ranged, both led by a big ship).

4. I've been thinking about magnetising the plastic cruisers, thanks for the tips on which ones are worth the points. Will the extra Emp sprues fit the cruisers or need some work?

5. How many fighters/bombers/assault boats do I need to own, what's a good mix of them, how do they get used in regular games?

Aha! Another question:
6. How do I compose my fleet? Do I use the gothic fleet rule or can I use the 'imperial fleets' or what? If I meet another player at a FLGS and he invites me for a scrap, which is the composition method to use?

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Excellent answers, thank you Orlanth.

Your welcome. You asked for my input on the other thread.


1. So, 2k is a good collection point allowing swaps. Given what's available on the GW website, what would you recommend purchasing to effect that size force?

Emperor 365pts
Dominator 190pts - BFG boxset or two plastic cruiser boxsets, wait to get the Emperor to have enough weapons battery panels.
Dictator 220pts
Lunar 180pts
Lunar 200pts - with a Nova cannon
3 lance Dauntlesses 330pts
torpedo Dauntless 110pts
9 Swords 315pts - three blisters
6 Cobras 180pts - two blisters

This is over 2000pts on its own without an admiral or rerolls but I have to go by what is sold not what is optimal. You can expand on this with two more plastic cruisers, one of which should be a carrier and another battleship - choose, they are both good. Firestorms wont hurt, but dont help that much either.



2. I'm glad to hear the grand cruisers aren't needed, they are ugly as all hell. You refer to the Dauntless being very useful, which of the variants would you field (both available at GW atm)?

Grand cruisers have no prow weapons, so those criticals are upgraded to something worse. The new 2010 FAQ will appartently deal with this vulnerability. What it doesnt do is deal with the lacklustre performance of the class. Vengeances provide nothing you cannot get elsewhere and the lack of the 6+ prow hurts.
Buy three or four lance Dauntlesses and just one torpedo Dauntless, thats enough for all your games, this counts or 300pts fleets also.


3. Emperor is Command ship of choice? Ok, but are the other 2 (retribution and apocalypse) shoddy or to be used differently?

The Emperor advances behind your fleet I recommend advancing at 45 degree off to the flank. It has to advance alone and cannot manoeuver. Be warned about that, any blast markers reduce your speed below that required to actually make a turn in a battleship with Burn Retro orders. However these downsides are surmountable by carefully advancing on the diagonal. It also accentuates your strengths you also amass your considerable long range battery firepower forwards combining the broadside and prow batteries. Advancing behind your lines will give good coverage for your line fleet. The Emperor is a very useful design, the long range batteries clear off Eldar and escorts which can outmanoeuver your short ranged gun arcs. Your need for reasonably prices launch bays doesn't need explanation.

What the Emperor isn't is a flagship. The +1 leadership it gets is very useful to reload ordnance, but it isn't compatible with your admiral and might be wasted. The admiral should be on a ship that you cannot squadron easily and has poor leadership. This may well end up being the Emperor but your Dictator (or Mars), which lacks the +1 and shouldn't really be squadroned except with another of its kind which you will not easily afford.


4. I've been thinking about magnetising the plastic cruisers, thanks for the tips on which ones are worth the points. Will the extra Emp sprues fit the cruisers or need some work?

Its a natural answer that oddly enough don't see often done. The main problem is that the launch bay panels arent easy to magnetise, they have no back you see. Also the centre of the ship is rather thin so digging in magnets might be troublesome. Another issue is going to be turrets and nova cannon, some vessels have them others do not.
Apart from Dauntlesses and Vengeance cruisers all Imperial vessels use the same broadside panels.


5. How many fighters/bombers/assault boats do I need to own, what's a good mix of them, how do they get used in regular games?

You can only have as many attack craft out as you have launch bays. As you will likely be outnumbered you might havr to play defensive. So assume 12 fighters. Bombers should be escorted by fighters so the best you can hold for is safe of six and a wave of three, each with a fighter, so thats 9 bombers limit. Assault boats need not be escorted they destroy individual ecorts individually, you cannot deploy more than eight at any time.
12 fighters, 9 bombers, 8 assault boats. This covers pretty much everything an Emperor and one Dictator/Mars can do. It will be enough even if you add more IMHO. One pack of each type of attack craft should provide more than enough, just because your supposed to put five fighters on a stand doesnt mean you need to, three will do.

I strayed across this re magnetising:

http://foxphoenix40k.blogspot.com/2010/03/magnetizing-battlefleet-gothic-imperial.html

basically, drill through your ship's core, putting the magnet inside, then metal on the inside of the weapons will hold it well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I would also just like to ask again:

Are the other two battleships useless or just a no-brainer compared to the Emp?

Also, how do I compose the force? Using the 'Gothic Sector' restrictions or the other 'imperial sector' lists?

It doesn't seem clear reading the PDFs online.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:I strayed across this re magnetising:

Interesting, to have value you would need to backfil the launch bay panels. Personally I wouldnt bother with this, you can pick up cruisers cheaply on eBay and there are not that many options. I would choose ten plastic cruisers over four magnetised ones, but that is up to you. I have seven unmagentised cruisers, it has everything I need.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:
Are the other two battleships useless or just a no-brainer compared to the Emp?

Orlanth wrote:one of which should be a carrier and another battleship - choose, they are both good.

Actually threre are four canon designs. Eperor, which we covered Retribution, Armageddon and Oberon. Don't bother with the Oberon, its a jack all trades, it doesnt look right and isnt very powerful. A battleship needs to be good at something, cruisers do the multi role stuff.
Retribution class is not bad, it looks mediocre but it does a good job because the lang ranged batteries are very useful agasinst Eldar. Armageddon have very nasty firepower and the range extension is worth it. You should move the Retribution like you move an Emperor on a preplanned vector and allow the ship to soak up thruster drain while diverting power to those nasty nasty lances.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:
Also, how do I compose the force? Using the 'Gothic Sector' restrictions or the other 'imperial sector' lists?

Read the lists carefully, they all allow different ships. The Armageddon list is the most versatile, I would try that or Gothic sector. They are just list styles, you dont hqave to be fighting an Armageddon or Gothic sector campaign to play those lists. You may come across other lists from time to time, ignore them. Most are from the magazine and are no longer canon. Ther Terran fleet is a gimic list and has lots of restrictions.

While you can mix in Space Marines in Armageddon lists most players find it unfair that you get two lists to pick from while nearly everyone else gets one. You don't need Strike Cruisers anyway.

The only golden rules you need to remember is: maximum of one battleship per three cruisers, a maximum of one heavy cruiser per two other cruisers. This rules are accumulative. So a Lunar and a Dauntless can support Mars and all three count to allow you to take an Emperor. Beyond that so long as you pay the proper point take only one admiral and pay the correct price for rerolls you can mix between the ships avaialable. I dont have the lists with me, but from memory the Gothic list is fine unless you want the Armageddon battleship, every other ship worth taking is in the Gothic list. I cannot remember what is missing from the Armageddon list which is in the Gothic off hand. Take a look and we will see if its important.

Orlanth has some pretty good points there, although the Armageddon list allows you to take battlecruisers and regular cruisers in a 1:1 ratio, if for some reason you decide you want to go battle cruiser heavy (wouldn't recommend it myself!). Also, through the use of the Reserves rule you can bring in a ship from another fleet list that isn't on the one you are building a fleet for. A good example would be the Dominator. The Armageddon fleet list does not have that ship, but the Gothic sector list does. If you take 3 ships off of the Armageddon list (say, 3 Lunars), then you take one ship from any other list, wihich in this case would be a Dominator from the Gothic sector. Note, however, this does NOT allow you to bring SM ships into any other list than the Armageddon list.

Choice of battleships is really going to boil down to one question: Do you want to have an offensive carrier force? That is, do you want your fleet to have a significant bomber/assault boat strike capability? If the answer is yes, the Emperor is pretty much the only way to go IMO. As far as IN carriers go, it is easily the best in terms of launch capacity, cost, and defensive ability (5 turrets = essentially bomber proof).

If the answer is no, then I would vote for the Retribution. This is my personal favorite battleship; while its broadsides aren't that strong, they do have the long range that Orlanth mentioned, paired with a decent lance attack and a devastating 9 torp salvo. Also not to be underestimated is the ship's 20 cm speed, which allows it to keep pace with your cruisers and means that it can't be prevented from turning by a mere blast marker.

With this ship anchoring your fleet, you are going to be left primarily with the Dictator and Mars for your carriers (I also like the Exorcist, but as you mentioned you don't like the model!). These ships will primarily be using their launch bays to provide fighter cover for your fleet, at least until enough of the enemy's carrier capability is neutralized.

Gents, thank you, continued food for thought here and I'm mulling a good many ideas.

I'm looking at the lists, Gothic and Armageddon, here's the breakdown:

Gothic:
Battleships:
Retribution
Emperor

Battlecruisers:
Mars
Overlord

Cruisers:
Dictator
Dominator
Tyrant
Lunar
Gothic
Dauntless (light)


Escort Ships
Firestorm
Sword
Cobra


Armageddon:
Battleships:
Emperor
Apocalypse
Oberon

Battlecruisers:
Mars
Armageddon

Cruisers:
Dictator
Tyrant
Lunar
Gothic
[i]SM Strike Cruiser
Endeavour (light)
Endurance (light)
Defiant (light)[/i]

Escort Ships
Firestorm
Falchion
SM Firestorm
SM Sword
SM Cobra
SM Hunter - destroyer
SM Gladius - frigate
SM Nova - frigate




So, the Gothic is looking favourite as a fleet for me, I like the dauntless model and also the escorts are simple, rather than the sm variants and the falchion which is an odd looking little ship.

Also it seems like half the ships of the Armageddon range weren't released and I'm not into the idea of converting more. (although I just found this: http://www.paulsongames.com/catalog/item/7434381/8207935.htm)

I'd like to add, in the future, an Apocalypse and/or a Retribution, with escorts as necessary and a few more cruisers/perhaps a battlecruiser or 2, to bring everything up to the grand comfort of 3k.
Would people blanch if I show up with an Apocalypse class battleship in a Gothic force?

Also, what's the score on adding some weird and wonderful stuff at 2k plus? I read snippets about things like:

Mechanicus
Rogue Traders
Inquisition Black Ships
Demiurg
Grey Knight Strike Cruisers

And all that stuff sounds like fun for distant future expansion.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
**Update**

I was pondering the Dictator Class and reading around on it, I happened across this article http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4984053 and was ponder what a poster meant by this quote:

in my opinion, the Dictator has the big merit to do his work (that is making ordnances) and fire continuously torpedoes with one unique order, reload ordnances.

Does he mean that the only order you should be dealing out to the Dictator should be 'reload ordinance' so as to constantly have a supply of fighters and bombers? (I think the poster was not a native English speaker in his defence).

Well I have a link that may help save you money: Magnetizing your IN Cruisers (video tutorial)-

http://foxphoenix40k.blogspot.com/2010/03/200th-post-celebration-video-tutorials.html

Nice, thank you!

No problem, mate!

MeanGreenStompa wrote:
I'm looking at the lists, Gothic and Armageddon, here's the breakdown:

I dont have my books with me. But i remember thatsomething was wrong with the Armageddon list. No Dominators and Dauntless is a potential problem, no Apocalypse is no biggie.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:
So, the Gothic is looking favourite as a fleet for me, I like the dauntless model and also the escorts are simple, rather than the sm variants and the falchion which is an odd looking little ship.

Defiants and Falchions look crap IMHO, they dont work very well either.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:
Also, what's the score on adding some weird and wonderful stuff at 2k plus? I read snippets about things like:

Gimics, the Imperial fleet has everything you need,

Dictator:
one reload is enough to reload torpedoes and bombers/fighters.
An unique ship in that it can do its own synergy strike of torps & bombers in a single turn (overwhelm turrets).

Snippets:
Escorts are nifty. Use em well. Need more practise.

Space Marines:
powergamers do a Barge or 2 Barges + escorts only (Hunters, Firestorm RSV) at 1500pts.

Grand Cruisers are FANTASTIC COOL models. The pics at Gw are crap:


Have fun!

Have to say that I don't play BFG, but this thread is making it seem interesting - lots of advice here

Wow, you're right, those grand old ladies do look far far better than the 'orrible pics on the GW site.

Perhaps I might grab 1 or 2 at a later date for upping the battlegroup to 3k.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

horizon wrote:Dictator:
one reload is enough to reload torpedoes and bombers/fighters.
An unique ship in that it can do its own synergy strike of torps & bombers in a single turn (overwhelm turrets).

Oh, I get it!

Due to being both a torpedo boat and a carrier, giving the order 'reload ordnance' covers both, then the torps and bombers together bypass the shields on enemy ships and are too much for enemy defence turrets to cope with. This facilitates the Dictator taking on another cruiser 1:1, am I understanding this correctly?

Dictators reload every turn to make the most of themselves.

As ship leadership is random you nedd to either squadron up two Dictators to give a decent chance of decent leadership or be prepared to put the Admiral there.


its a matter of opinion, but I think the grand Cruisers, with the exceptioon of the Repulsive are really poor models. The hybrid design doesnt look right. The picture above is a really flattering angle, its a hollow T cros section beneath what you see there grots.
The thin T shape carries a lot of weaponry, while the bulbousd prow carries nothing at all. Its a nonsensical design.
Thses ships only exist because of a simplistic idea that the chaos ships are older imerpail ones so there must be a bridging design.


Its sloppy background too, the idea that chaos fleets are older models than Imperial fleets nd thus there was a transition.
The Emperor class battleship Divine Right is several thousand years older than the chaos equivalent. Thus they were building some of the current Imperial designs before the chaos ones.

I prefer this alternate thinking: Flying cathedrals are holier. Current Imperial designs better withstand warp influence, wheras the older roughly wedge shaped designs, while sleeker, allow the tendril of the warp to brush closer to the souls of the crew. Thus 'chaos' pattern vessels tend to rebel wheras the flying cathedrals tend not to.

This is backed up by the write up in the Gothic campaign. How remaining chaos pattern ships in the Gothic fleet rebelled at the start of the Gothic war. They were ok until they puit to sea. I blame inadequate warp shielding not the age of the design.

The guys who made the grand cruisers didnt think too clearly on what was going onv and created a monster on top of a brainfart.

Orlanth wrote:Dictators reload every turn to make the most of themselves.

As ship leadership is random you nedd to either squadron up two Dictators to give a decent chance of decent leadership or be prepared to put the Admiral there.

Ah! Yes, I had concluded that for the original list you wrote for me, once you'd explained the Emperor not needing the Admiral, that the other carrier at the party would get him instead, thanks for that verification!

The random leadership is worrying, i guess rerolls is a good idea then for purchase.

As to the weird timeline vs ships design thingamaboo, I'd decided for my own version of events that just as the Amageddon ships design is different, so other sectors would have been wildly different during the Great Crusade and the subsequent Horus Heresy... So when entire systems and their shipyards betrayed, they took their entire navies with them, When the heresy was over, those systems retaken were given over to the victorius loyalists, who built their loyalist designed ships there instead.
That would allow for perhaps a loyalist list of chaos ships one day, a system producing those designs that didn't betray, perhaps painting their ships in bright white and gold to make sure other imperial navies don't shoot them on sight!

Orlanth wrote:

As ship leadership is random you nedd to either squadron up two Dictators to give a decent chance of decent leadership or be prepared to put the Admiral there.

Alternatively, you could partner the Dictator with a standard cruiser if necessary, which isn't as bad as it seems since if the other cruiser has torpedoes you would have some Reload Ordnance synergy going. Either way, squadroning is the only way to really take advantage of the St. 6 guns on the Dictator.

Its sloppy background too, the idea that chaos fleets are older models than Imperial fleets and thus there was a transition.
The Emperor class battleship Divine Right is several thousand years older than the chaos equivalent. Thus they were building some of the current Imperial designs before the chaos ones.

Ugh, I hear you on this point. While I like the grand cruiser model, there is no denying that the design lineage of the BFG Chaos/Imperial ships is completely FUBAR thanks to the ridiculous fluff about when the ships were constructed. The only possible explanation is that ships like the Divine Right looked like the Chaos ships at some point in the past, but were completely rebuilt to a new appearance at some point in their history (which is a pretty poor explanation imo). Honestly, for a tech-nut like me who gets off on things like the Starfleet Museum, this is one of the most annoying things about BFG!

horizon wrote:Dictator:
one reload is enough to reload torpedoes and bombers/fighters.
An unique ship in that it can do its own synergy strike of torps & bombers in a single turn (overwhelm turrets).

Snippets:
Escorts are nifty. Use em well. Need more practise.

Space Marines:
powergamers do a Barge or 2 Barges + escorts only (Hunters, Firestorm RSV) at 1500pts.

Grand Cruisers are FANTASTIC COOL models. The pics at Gw are crap:


Have fun!

If you made those name counters, please tell me how!!

Hi,
nameplates, search around for Vaaish, he made them (it is his fleet).

The Grand Cruisers look cool in all angles.

And if you call ships Murder, Carnage, Despoiler, Styx, etc they are bound to be Chaos infested.

haha

Even without the grand cruiser background they already messed history up in the rulebook with the normal designs.

Ruckdog wrote:
Ugh, I hear you on this point. While I like the grand cruiser model, there is no denying that the design lineage of the BFG Chaos/Imperial ships is completely FUBAR thanks to the ridiculous fluff about when the ships were constructed. The only possible explanation is that ships like the Divine Right looked like the Chaos ships at some point in the past, but were completely rebuilt to a new appearance at some point in their history (which is a pretty poor explanation imo). Honestly, for a tech-nut like me who gets off on things like the Starfleet Museum, this is one of the most annoying things about BFG!

It doesnt annoy me. Stick to the explnation in the Big Blue Book, take the ship construction dates as canon. The Divine Right need not be remodelled, though it was refitted, its just older than the Despoiler class.
The grand cruisers still work as an attempt by a fleet manufactorum to get the best out of both classes of vessel back before the Heresy. The Chaos ships can still be older, the Imperial is not making the wedge shaped pattern nymore wheras as many Lunars etc are fresh builds. Wheras most of the Chaos fleet are relics of the Heresy and beyond. in any case all of the designs are ancient, I doubt the Imperium can design new ships at this scale. Nor does it need to.

As there were 'wedge' pattern ships in the Gothic fleet right up to the Gothic war, and they rebelled but the Lunars did not I think the only rational explanation is that there is substandared warp shieldimng in the wedge shaped designs. The Grand cruisers have slightly better warp shielding, being halfway to the 'Cathedral' pattern fleets and thus only half turn to chaos.

The brainfarted fluff add on, which wasnt in the orginal game by the way can still be explained alongside this revised approach. The Imperium likes to keep secrets and the fact that whole ship classes are inadequately warp sghielded is a secret they might not want to disclose, thus the myth about how the wedge shaped ships are all older, in violation of known facts about ship construction dates. I think ther Imperial Commision for Moral Truth, which we see from time to time might have been behind it.

Applying the new thiniing might therefore not even be a retcon. Most people in the Imperium and beyond will beleive the official line.

horizon wrote:
And if you call ships Murder, Carnage, Despoiler, Styx, etc they are bound to be Chaos infested.

I have a non canon explanation to the ship class names too. They are renames from when the ships were lost as a class to Chaos.

There are points to back this up. The only 'chaos' class ship left in the Imperial arsenal is the Cardinal class which is found in the now apocryphal Bakka list. When the last Cardinal defects the clas might be renamed Apostate or something.

Looking at the pattern operhaps the Repulsive class was once the Repulse class and so on.

Despoiler was designed by IN. M36 iirc.

Yes, I do think IN had other names for Murders etc but I still think there is a gap.