Hi Dystopian Fans,
Welcome to part 2 of my blog where I layout my attempts to go from loss to win in 2014. Before I start I’d like to say thank you to all those who provided comments and suggestions on my last post – your ideas have been very much appreciated. So without further ado lets dive into part 2 of my journey.
Armed with a new Russian Coalition list I headed to my FLGS. This list was not such a big change from the last list – here it is for reference.
1000 points – Borodino Battleship + 2x Escorts (230), 8x Novgorod Frigates (200), 2x Pesets Submarines (160), 3x Rostov Destroyers (120), 3x Suvorov Cruisers (195) and a Landing Field (95).
As you can see, the Myshkin are gone (and good riddance as well) the Novgorod’s are back to 2 full sized squadrons and I added a Landing Field. The Landing Field might seem like a strange inclusion but I have learned the value of Russian Tiny Flyers, especially Fighters. With their ability to ignore Abort results and then “dive-bomb” into a target with Hard Shell(2) on each token I really wanted to get as many tokens onto the board as possible.
Game number 1 for the day was against Micky and his Republique of France aerial force. Micky’s victory condition was to destroy 50% of my core fleet points plus all Medium models – meaning my Pesets and Suvorov’s were his primary targets. Mine was to destroy all Large and Massive models – his fleet carrier and large flyer. I felt confident that I could achieve this within the game’s turn limit.
I now realise that focusing on your opponent’s objectives is just as important as yours – for some stupid reason, and I still don’t know why, I moved my medium models FORWARD! Besides from this gaff the battle was tough but I did manage to bring down his large flyer. His battle carrier, which I dropped in AP, moved forward to use its heat lance. I saw an opportunity to push forward with my battleship and board it (I was confident of boarding with my 12AP vs 5AP plus I had the STAR card in my hand dropping my boarding rolls from 5 to 4).
Unfortunately it was not to be – a mix up of my activations allowed his fleet carrier to fire first. The Borodino, which had already lost its ablative armour, suffered a Magazine Explosion! Goodbye battleship, 2 escorts, 1 frigate and my last Medium sized ship. With only a squadron of Novgorod’s left it was congratulations Micky on achieving his victory condition.
Game number 2 and I was up against my old sparring partner – Luke and his Ottomans. Luke’s list was an Ottoman static list which included a Hussar and a Dreadnought. My victory condition was to destroy all Medium models and 50% of his fleet points; Luke’s was 70% of my fleet – all within 4 turns + variable turn limit.
Taking Luke’s earlier advice I set up a refused flank on the left hand side of the table. The game went well for me as at turn 3 I had managed to destroy his only two medium models on the board. However destroying the dreadnought or Hussar proved more difficult. In the end Luke managed to achieve his victory condition before mine.
While both games were a loss I did feel that I was making progress and I was more confident with the fleet. I don’t feel that the current fleet needs anymore changes; I just need to better organise my deployment and REMEMBER all victory conditions.
In a fortnight I’ll have this fleet back on the table and ready for another go at victory. Then I’m taking a break for a month while I attend a Dreadball tournament – after that I’ll be back with my first go, in over a year, with my Prussians.
Till next blog – watch out for those exploding 6’s. I know I will be.
What a massive month December is going to be! Hopefully you’ve all been good and Santa will drop some of these under the tree.
Element270 