On the other side (DBS vs. Starmada)

While the European Team-Tournament ended a week after N4 was released, I decided to offer an individual aftermath to meet your favourite opponents again or to play against someone you have not faced yet. In three rounds with 300 points ITS 11 but now with N4-rules, we now clash against each other without the support of our teams. My first game here was Acquisition vs. Starmada, played by Al'Espagnol, a spanish guy now living in France.

Since I knew that the opponent would be Starmada with a ton of mimetism and quite fast and potent gunfighters on short ranges, I also shifted my list a bit towards these ranges and challenges. The alltime-favourite core is build around the LGL this time, since I needed one Druze and wanted to utilize my hacking game a bit more. The Bulleteer in group one is the main-beatstick. Everyone will take two orders from group one with him there, so Wolfgang showed up in group two, hoping to have a plan b alphastrike. There is an opportunity to build a haris, but this is only supposed as an option. Wolfgang should act on his own and the KHD with cybermask is also supposed to be a solo-piece. I made no big plans to play the mission, since the Hunzakuts are able to click the consoles easily and controlling them at the end of the game isn't that important. But the tech-coffin needed some more planning. For this, Arslan showed up in this list. He is more durable than most of the other stuff and he is able to gun down mimetism-datatrackers in turn three. From my experience, I should be able to pull enough orders together in my last turn and push him up in the center. Until that time, Wolfgang and the Bulleteer should have gunned down everything else.

We discussed Starmada before the game a little bit and the list in the end. As it appeared, I have done a few more games with Starmada for the moment than Al'Espagnol. He was still struggling with the limited long-range potential in that sectorial, so two Varangians and the Epsilon HMG showed up to compensate this and maybe that is the reason for the Kappa HMG. The added PsiCop is quite flexible and can shift the potential of the core a bit. The Cyberghost seems to be the needed specialist here and there, while the Raptor KHD with Devabot may be a great datatracker. And then there is Andromeda, simply to slow everything on the opponent side down.

Someone may recognize this table from the ENTE, since I simply threw together an interesting mix of maps. It is a quite open map in the center and on the left, while the right is obstructed by saturation and low visibility zones and some big rocks. The new terrain-rules made it a bit easier to play as it was in N3 and Arslan got even more value here, next to the Hunzakuts.

I win the Lt-roll and decide to go first, in fear of a hard alphastrike with a Zeta or whatever. So I am forced to deploy in the south.

My core is deployed around the left building with my Lt, the LGL and the MSR on the roof. One Fugazi reinforces that side, while the rest of group two is deployed on the left. Wolfgang hides in the grass there, to get more vectors to attack. Arslan is allone in the center, drawing some attention from the Brawler Lt and overwatching my back, if there is a Santiago Knight dropping. Hunzakut 1 starts in the center, while the second one hides around the left antenna.

The Kappa-core is deployed on the right but completely prone. The Raptor and his Deva take the center, together with one Varangian, while the rest is scattered on the right. For now, I only see the Kappas and the Epsilon as heavy guns.

The Bulleteer, knowing that I won't use him in turn one, is also deployed in the center and Andromeda appears on my right flank, pinning down the whole group two with her zapper. Arslan is my datatracker, while the Raptor gets to be the Starmada one.

DBS 1: As expected, I loose two orders in group one. This leaves the Hunzakut with enough orders to probably get Andromeda outside of 8" in her back. With my first shot I realize that I am standing in the woods, so not only my odds are terrible, but also I am loosing burst and allow her to dodge nearer to my group two. So I cancel this plan, parking the Hunzakut in front of the enemy DZ in the woods. Wolfgang climbs up the antenna in his forest-zone, from where he manages to gun down Andromeda. Some orders are spent to improve my position and to cybermask my KHD.

Starmada 1: The right Varangian advances a bit, followed by the Epsilon, gunning down my Hunzakut. Together with the Varangian, he advances on my right, killing the Fugazi and Arslan. Instead of placing the chain rifle of Wolfgang over the Epsilon and the Varangian, I dodge into CC with the Epsilon, only to be engaged by the Varangian then. Both die in combat.

DBS 2: My Brawler manages to gun down the Epsilon, while the left Hunzakut activates the left antenna and save it with a repeater and a mine, retreating back into safety. The Bulleteer advances a bit and enters suppressive fire.

Starmada 2: The core-team stands up. The PsiCop manages to down my MSR Brawler, freeing the Raptor. He manages to reach ZoC of my Bulleteer, frying my Brawler HD, while getting crushed by my KHD in return. Meanwhile the Warcor fails several times to score in extremis recovery on my Hunzakut. Obviously a pen can't solve every problem!

DBS 3: I drag everyone into group two and buff my Bulleteer. If I can shoot down the ML-Kappa, I can score my classified (extreme prejudice) on the Devabot and go into suppressife fire on the tech-coffin. So I first shoot the Devabot unconscious and then get two hits from the Kappa in the next order, blowing the remote completely. The left Fugazi tries a rush into the center but is also crushed by the Kappa. So the Hunzakut places an other mine and secures the left antenna.

Starmada 3: The left Varangian takes out the Hunzakut in CC, while the Lambda revives the Raptor. He then secures the tech-coffin with ease, other than the Warcor, failing one more time on the classified, but securing the right antenna. To finish the mission, the PsiCop re-activates the left antenna and secures it.

With that, the game ends as a 9-0 for Al'Espagnol. Loosing the Bulleteer against the Kappa was crucial for my loss, while the success of the PsiCop on my MSR was the only option to get the remaining Starmada-tools into the game. That the Raptor gets two wounds from my KHD was a bit of bad luck. I am still not sure if it was the right decision, to use him to reduce my hacking game. Of course, the Lambda was available to get him back with nice odds, what turned out very good, but it still was a heavy invest, just to kill my Brawler HD. On my side, Arslan was in the wrong position, not only on the table, but also being in the list in general. Besides this, I probably made the wrong decision in my first turn. If I have started with Wolfgang and the antenna, there were 6 orders in group one for the Hunzakut, which had a path to at least suicide-run to kill the Epsilon.But since that would have come down to the last order, maybe even one order short, I didn't want to take the risk and paid the price for this.

In general I felt quite comfortable with my list. Wolfgang does his job(s) and the Bulleteer gets scarier with each turn he is still alive. The Hunzakuts were useful as always, as well as the core-link. I had no opportunity to utilize my hacking game and the LGL here. Maybe I should have used an order to shoot a pitcher on the right flank. The importance of my KHD in this plan still needs to get deeper in my mind. What was a waste of space and points was Arslan. Of course, NWI, hyperdynamics and MSV1 is nice and more useful in N4, but in the end you can take better and more reliable options for whatever Arslan can be useful for in a better position or for less points. If he still would count as Druze for fireteam-composion, he could take the position of the LGL, freeing at least these points...But well, it was a try.