Friday 27 April 2012

Battlefleet Gothic fun times

My friend Kenny and I have stared to play Battlefleet Gothic and I have to say that this game rocks. It baffles the mind to think that GW do not support it anymore. Its fun and easy to play. The learning curve is fairly gentle and the rules are simple and easy compared to games like Heavy Gear and Flames of War.

All in all we are having a blast and are now doing our utmost to get other people to play.

We have played 4 games thus far. All have been between my Imperial Navy and his Word Bearers Fleet. The first 2 of them are recorded for prosperity over on Kennys blog "The Lead Cotillion". Sadly, the third game went unrecorded as it was a brutal thrashing and victory for Chaos.

For the fourth game I actually remembered to pull my thumb out and bring my camera. Got so caught up in the game I didnt take that many pictures but did get some.

Scenario was "Suprise Attack" played at 650 points. I was the defender. All but one of my ships was caught napping with only the "Neptune", my Lunar Class on alert.

The Warmasters fleet bears down on an unsuspecting world.

My orbital defences were the minefield (represented by the red tokens), an orbital laser battery (the orange token) and 2 orbital mines (the blue tokens). The Neptune is the green ship. Kenny chose to bring his whole fleet in from the side of the board.

The first turn did not go well for me. He brought his ships into range and crippled the "Superb", my Gothic cruiser as well as destroyed its thrusters so it could not turn. On my turn the Superb and the escort squadron woke up and started to manouver. The Superb headed off in a straight line and was not in range of any of the enemy. The Neptune fired its Nova cannon but missed.

Kenny's second turn started where his first left off. He destroyed the Gothic, turning it into a burning hulk. and landed hits on the still stationary "Scylla", my Dominator Cruiser. He also moved his fleet up.

My next turn was a good one. The "Scylla" activated and started to manouver. The Neptune reloaded his Nova Cannon and once again the escorts manouvered for position. The burning Gothic also drifted quite nicely almost into the center of his fleet where it exploded, taking out one of his escorts. The Nova Cannons on the Lunar and the Scylla opened up, crippling his carrier.

On Kenny's next turn he opted to disengage the carrier and move his forces closer. However at this range he was not able to turn enough to bring his full broadsides to bear and inflicted no damage to me.


The Chaos Dogs get a taste of Imperial steel.

My turn saw me manouver for affect getting in behind his forces with the Lunar and the escorts. My orbital mines also managed to close the distance. Punishing fire saw his one cruiser destroyed and his other crippled.

On Kennys last turn he chose to disengage his last crusier and sacrifice his last escort, moving it in close to my fleet to distract my gun captains. My turn saw his escort gutted by the Orbital Laser battery. A convincing win for me.


The aftermath of Victory

What I like about this game is that nothing is certain. After the first 2 rounds I was fairly sure I was going to utterly spanked but some lucky dice rolls turned it all around. This is in direct contrast to some games where if you dont get the first turn you may as well pack up and go home. A really excellent game system and I cant wait to get me some more models and play some bigger games.

3 comments:

  1. Your table mat looks incredible, did you make or purchase it? Adds so much to the game IMO.

    Unfortunately how little support it gets. One of these days I will build a fleet - probably not out of GW minis. I still would love to put my crazy idea to practice and build a tyranid fleet out of fishing lures - lol!

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  2. The mat belongs to Kenny. Not sure who makes it but its a generic Space Battles mat.

    The fishing lure idea sounds inspired!!!

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  3. Tristan, unfortunately I cannot recall the manufacturer of the mat; when I go back to the store next Thursday I'll check to see who the maker was.

    Rory, that was a really great write-up! I will be writing up our Tuesday game on my blog later this weekend; but you did such a good job on this one I'm not sure I'll try to revisit it (and certainly that has nothing to do with the drubbing you handed me).

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