Quickdraw and I met at Gamer's Haven this evening for a 1500-point Halo slugfest. He was running his beautifully painted Covenant under the new commander Xytan 'Jar Wattinree, while I was running the UNSC under the new commander Fleet Admiral Lord Hood. This was the first time either of us had used these new commander cards (they came in the recently released Fleet Box sets), and also the first time we had used Heroic Characters--the Minister of Etiology for the Covenant, and the AI Cortana for the UNSC.
It has been awhile since Quickdraw and I last played, and I've had this nagging fear in my mind over the past few weeks that the UNSC are too powerful, and that the Covenant player was going to face an uphill slog in every engagement. So, I was anxious to get ships back on the table to see how things would go.
Tonight's game went a long way towards debunking that idea in my mind. The Covenant forces established a masterful control over the game board early, with the UNSC fighting to keep up almost from the start of turn 1. We rolled for the "Blockade Run" scenario, which is played on a 4x6 surface and significantly changes up the normal deployment for both sides. He was the attacker and I was the defender. I had to deploy first, deploying my entire fleet at once within 24" of my edge of the table. The attacker automatically has initiative in turn one of this scenario, and the attacker deploys his forces--starting with his Wings--by placing them on his deployment edge and then activating them. This meant he was able to attack at least one of my battlegroups every time deployed a battlegroup--and it meant that I activated at least three of my battlegroups with no targets to engage, as not all of his forces were deployed yet. Also, since I didn't know where he would deploy, two of my battlegroups were in terrible positions from the beginning of the game and were not really able to contribute anything to the fight. Had the game gone longer than the three turns we were able to play, they would have come into effective range, but such was not the case tonight.
So, some observations (and a few pictures):
1. As stated before, the UNSC will not always overpower the Covenant. Yes, Quickdraw was using a couple specialist battlegroups (which break the normal rules for building a battlegroup--one contained TWO ORS heavy cruisers!!!), but his fleet build was perfectly legal, and showcased the firepower the Covenant can bring to bear. We agreed this scenario, along with how the terrain was placed, probably gave him an edge over me, so we want to run it again with the UNSC as the attacker. And again, I was genuinely happy to see the Covenant win. Given how some of our other games have gone, it seemed as if the UNSC was just too powerful.
2. It's too early to tell how synergistic the relationship will be between the Heroic Character and the Fleet Commander. For my part, Cortana did bring some interesting abilities to the table, most notably (for this game) an ability called "Missile Command" (which I totally dig, because I started my video game career on the old Atari 2600). This ability allows Cortana to take control of the Missile Barrage firing option and aim the missiles at whichever target you want to nominate; ordinarily, Missile Barrage allows you to fire your missiles into the forward firing arc but they MUST target the closest enemy element.
3. There certainly is a difference in Fleet Commanders for the UNSC. I was accustomed to being able to use certain commands in certain situations, but Lord Hood and Vice Admiral Stanforth (the commander from the starter box) have different abilities. On paper, it seems that Cortana won't have any specific advantages for working with either Hood or Stanforth, but I'll have to run through a few games with both to see how this shakes out.
4. The UNSC player should try at all cost to avoid passing by a Covenant formation at close range.
In the picture above, my frigate element is in the process of passing his heavy corvettes and CCS battlecruiser. Covenant main weapons have a 270-degree forward firing arc, and some of their secondaries have the same arc; UNSC ships have MACs in the forward arc, and missile batteries in the port and starboard arcs. While you can fire the missiles forward (Missile Barrage), there are limitations, and you have no options to change the MACs' firing arc. So if you pass by a Covenant ship, you are severely limiting your firepower, while still taking the brunt of the Covenant ship's weapons. Turning in this game is not like turning in Firestorm Armada; a frigate element could bring the MACs to bear in the next turn (provided the element wasn't destroyed), but it would take a cruiser element at least two turns, and a large capital ship (like a heavy carrier) at least three turns to get the MACs back into play. So, UNSC commanders, try your best to keep the enemy in front of you!
5. Covenant battlegroups that include two ORS heavy cruisers suck. Plain and simple, no bones about it. Don't go anywhere near this battlegroup, unless you can somehow approach from behind.
6. Boarding actions in Halo are very cool and very cinematic. Unless there is a definitive end to the boarding action--Critical Core Breach, bloody repulse, etc--the boarding actions continue as long as there are enemy boarding craft aboard the target ship. I've covered boarding before in a previous post, so I won't go into it here, but tonight was our first experience with Countdown Timers, the red markers on the CCS in the below picture.
Basically, a Countdown Timer is a bomb that has been placed aboard the ship. The timers are placed based on the number of hits from the attackers and defenders, and the resultant 2D6 roll against the boarding table. If an element reaches 6 Countdown Timers, it suffers a Critical Core Breach. Here's the fun part: the defender has to try to fix them in the end phase by rolling a Halo die for each marker. On a 1 or a 2, a marker is diffused. On any other result, another marker is added. If there are still enemy boarding craft aboard the element, and defender rolls a "Skull" on the Halo die, TWO ADDITIONAL markers are added. So, the element becomes quite literally a flying time bomb, and nobody can predict what will happen. Unfortunately, we didn't play long enough tonight to see how the markers on the CCS would have resolved.
In summary: still enjoying the game, and still have lots to explore. The addition of new Fleet Commanders and Heroic Characters adds a new dimension to the game (although Quickdraw wasn't as impressed with the Minister of Etiology, but I'll let him discuss that). I've tossed in a few more pictures below. Thanks for reading!
