Completed Starfighters

I painted up some of the fighters I started working on awhile back.  First up are two dozen Avarian fighters, sold under the Galactic Knights label as Raven light fighters (although in Starfleet Wars these are referred to as Bluejays).

Next, I have twenty Carnivoran fighters, which are called Leopard heavy fighters for GK (but were known in SfW as Bobcats).

Still to go: 35 Entomalian Mosquito attack craft, and two types of Aquarians (Pikes and Eels).  After that, I need to get around to repainting my multitudes of Terran fighters.

Dice, dice, baby

Since all the cool kids are doing it, I thought I'd post a pic of my dice like everyone else:

My collection of polyhedrals includes a bunch of specialty dice for the Heroscape game, ten-sided dice for Galactic Knights, more 10-siders for Starfleet Wars in the BOX O' DEATH™, d6s for Hordes of the Things and Song of Blades and Heroes, and the white multisided dice for D&D.  Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to play very much recently.  Hopefully, I'll get some gaming in soon.

EDIT: I see I'm not the first person to come up with this headline.

Sunday Starships: Avarians

We're a little bit late today, but for your viewing pleasure, here's this week's installment of Sunday Starships.  This week, rounding out the Five Powers, it's the Avarian United Worlds from the Galactic Knights line of minis by Monday Knight Productions (originally the Starfleet Wars collection from Superior Models).

This is my second-largest GK/SfW faction, behind my Terran Red and White fleets.  My painted ships include:

• Condor-class galactic dreadnought
• Nest-class galactic attack carrier
• Eagle-class galactic battlecruisers (2)
• Falcon-class stellar cruisers (3)
• Screech Owl-class stellar destroyer leader
• Hawk-class stellar destroyers (3)

I also have plenty of unpainted birdies: a Gryphon-class super galactic dreadnought, another dreadnought, a second Nest-class carrier, two more battlecruisers, and an extra pair of DDs.  Oh yeah--and seven Buzzard-class starbombers that need a coat of paint.

I don't have any Avarian star armored pursuit ships, and I also need to get ahold of at least one of the other class of carriers, the Vulture.

I also need to pick up a few more fighters, even though I have plenty of starfighters to paint already. 

Drift Markers

In the comments to my Aquarian fleet post, Matgc asks about the use of drift markers in Galactic Knights--in particular, whether they clutter up the map too much and how to match the right token with the correct ship.  Instead of replying in the comments, I thought I'd post about it in case others were interested.

As I mentioned in the first part of my GK review, the drift marker indicates a starship's momentum, and follows it around on the table.  The faster the ship is moving, the further away the marker is, and vice versa.  The Galactic Knights rulebook has a sheet with numbered drift markers you can copy (different colors, numbered, with the Terran and Avarian logos), and the publisher uploaded a full-color version of this page to the game's mailing list.  Thing is, these markers are pretty big, taking up a whole hex.  So to cut down on the clutter--and color-coordinate with my own paint schemes--I made my own.

I took some small wooden discs left over from an assortment I'd bought to make stands for my ships.  These circles were about ¾ an inch across, about the same size as those printable circular adhesive labels you can find in office supply stores.  As you can see in the photo above, I printed out the ship type and numbers (DD-01, BC-01, etc.) to match my fleets (and numbered the bases of the models themselves), then applied the labels to the discs. 

The round labels come in different colors, so you can pick the hues that match your fleet.  That way, it's easy to tell at a glance which marker goes with which ship.  If you don't see the color you want, use a white sticker and color it with a highlighter.  That's what I did for some of those markers pictured, although the flash kind of washed them out.  If you're worried that they might shift during a game, glue a small washer to the bottom for extra weight.

As to how it looks on the table, I think it cuts down on the clutter significantly.  It's not perfect, but it's somewhat aesthetically pleasing and does its job of indicating vector movement on the game board.  I don't think it's too confusing, but see for yourself in this image from my Chimaeracon game:

A closer look at Galactic Knights (part 3)

So Galactic Knights has vector-based movement, and ship-to-ship combat.  It also has two sets of fighter and missile rules.

STANDARD RULES: The standard rules treat fighters and missiles as miniature starships--they launch and move in the maneuver phase and fire during the combat phase, just like the larger vessels.  They have stats same as starships, too--a profile, movement, and weapons.  A hit from any other weapon will destroy a fighter or a missile.  There are some differences, however: for simplicity's sake, missiles and fighters don't drift or need to change facing; they can move in any direction up to their full move (12 hexes).

Missiles attack in salvoes of five.  They, of course, remain on the map for but a single turn, striking with the power and range of a light particle battery.

Fighters launch and attack in squadrons of three and come in two flavors: light and heavy.  Light fighters carry one LPB and a needle gun that is only effective against other fighters.  Heavy fighters carry a short-range version of a medium plasma battery.  Fighters stay in the game until they or their carrier are destroyed; there's no need for them to land and re-arm in the standard rules.

COMMAND RULES: In the command rules, missiles and fighters get their own action phase, in between the maneuver phase and the combat phase.  They're not treated like starships, and they have a set of stats somewhat different than those in the standard rules.

Instead of attacking with a LPB (2 points damage), missiles now inflict 3 points of damage per hit.  It's a tradeoff, however, because now a missile must move into an adjacent hex before it can hit a starship.  However, now a starship's larger weapons are ineffective against missiles, only fighters or a starship's point defense (its LPBs) can take out a missile.

Fighters also get a makeover for the command rules.  On one hand, they now have to head back to their mothership after one turn of attacking.  On the other hand, they're more powerful--light fighters inflict 1 point of damage on starships and get two attacks against enemy fighters; heavy fighters do 4 points damage against ships.  On the gripping hand, they also evade larger vessels' medium and heavy particle batteries, but light batteries can do a number on incoming fighters if a player gets some good rolls.  This brings us to the command rules combat sequence. 

As mentioned earlier, the fighter & missile phase lies in between the maneuver and combat phases.  This part of the turn breaks down into several subphases: First, one player launches all fighters and missiles for that turn, then the other player does the same thing (fighters deploy up to three hexes ahead of their carriers; missiles travel their full move).  Next, the first player moves half his fighters (in groups of three), the second player moves all his fighter squads, and the first player moves his remaining fighters. 

After that, players remove their stands of fighters and missiles from the main map and place them on the assault battle board to play out the combat.  And since I'm out of time right now, I'll describe how fighter combat works with the command rules in a later post.

Sunday Starships: Aquarians

Sorry I haven't been posting lately; real life, lassitude, and lack of inspiration have all taken their toll.  But we're back with this week's installment of Sunday Starships.  Our featured starfleet today is the Aquarian Alliance from the Galactic Knights line of minis by Monday Knight Productions (originally the Starfleet Wars collection from Superior Models).

This is the smallest fleet in my collection of Five Powers ships:

• Stingray-class galactic attack carriers (2)
• Shark-class galactic battlecruiser
• Barracuda-class stellar cruisers (2)
• Piranha-class stellar destroyers (5)

I just realized, even though I have two carriers for this fleet, I don't have enough Aquarian starfighter models to fill out the small craft contingent for both flattops.  If I want to field both carriers at the same time, I'm gonna have to proxy.  Luckily, I own plenty of Terran fighters; I can spare a few to paint in Aquarian colors.

I'd like to get some more models for this fleet--a destroyer leader, a galactic dreadnought, and a Behemoth-class carrier; maybe some starbombers and SAPS.

This is also the only one of my Five Powers starfleets which doesn't have a super galactic dreadnought (painted or unpainted) in its table of organization.  I have an extra Entomalian SGDN I'm looking to get rid of, so if anyone wants to trade ...

Work in Progress: Shuttles

More tiny spaceships for my fleet.  This time, it's small transports/shuttles for transferring small numbers of personnel between ships, planets, and so on.  They're part of my recent acquisition of more starship miniatures.

Unlike the fighter stands in the background, these models are from Valiant's Stardate: 3000 line of miniatures.  In particular, these spacecraft a're Federation Phantom VB Assault Ships.

Since they're larger than all the fighter models, these vessels will make nice civilian transports.  As you can see, there's room enough for one Phantom on each stand.

I'll probably end up painting these like I did my other civilian ships.  Once I find some spare time, that is.