Wormhole (2nd race of our 1st X-Wing Racing Championship)

For the general racing rules, see DagobahDave's Vidla Crucible scenario.
The race track was created by me (JL): Wormhole.


Teams

Andies (41 points) (played by Andreas)
- Green Squadron A-Wing with A-Wing Test Pilot, Push the Limit, Shield Upgrade and Veteran Instincts (27)
- Black Squadron TIE Fighter (14)

Darth Messengers (41 points) (played by JL)
- Green Squadron A-Wing with Push the Limit (22)
- Green Squadron A-Wing (19)

Steel Nipples (39 points) (played by Ciro)
- Tala Squadron Z-95 with Stealth Device (16)
- Green Squadron Y-Wing with A-Wing Test Pilot, Veteran Instincts and Stealth Device (23)

Tardis (37 points) (played by Beni; could not participate this time)
- Firespray Bounty Hunter with Engine Upgrade (37)

Unagi (34 points) (played by Antonio)
- 2x Green Squadron A-Wings with A-Wing Test Pilot and Chardaan Refit (2x 17)

This was our second race and it was clear that everyone was more experienced, because both the lists and the maneuvering were done expertly by everyone... On top of that, my friend Jagoba came to take some shots of the race with his Macro lens...

Warming up

Darth Messengers' main pilot

Steel Nipple's Wingman

Steel Nipple's main pilot

One of Unagi's Test Pilots

A closer view of Steel Nipple's wingman

Andies' main pilot

Setup and first maneuvers

 This was going to be our first epic sized race, and I was curious to see how it would turn out. I thought it was going to be a relatively simple and fast affair.

A panoramic view of the complete racing track

All the ships warming up their engines

First Turns

Two main groups formed in the race. Unagi (controlled by Antonio) went straight for the first Wormhole, while Steel Nipples (controlled by Ciro) changed tactics and decided to go hunting. Meanwhile, Andies (piloted by Andreas) and the Darth Messengers (piloted by JL) tried to survive as best they could without any defined tactic.

Two main groups form, but Unagi's main pilot takes the lead to the closest Wormhole

And Antonio gets his main pilot through the Wormhole

And Antonio's main pilot exits the Wormhole well ahead of the other ships...

...while his Wingman blocks Andreas' wingman and JL's main ship. Antonio's Wingman managed to dodge Andreas' and JL's fire and he lost only his shields.

Middle Game

Antonio's strategy of blocking the Wormholes worked well, as it forced the rest of the ships to stay behind. Ciro even decided to change tactics and his pilots surrendered to the bloodlust that sometimes captures racing pilots!

Three ships go through the Wormhole, blocking the rest. Antonio's great maneuvering is paying off!

In the first half of the circuit Ciro's ships spread fire but don't do much damage.

In a later turn, Andreas' ships score the only Kill of the race shooting down JL's Wingman, just before he could attack Antonio's Wingman

Unagi is clearly in the lead!

Antonio's lead pilot escapes through the chaos and throttles toward the finish line!

Meanwhile, JL's main pilot cannot shake off Ciro's main pilot. Nevertheless, it was not a good shooting day for Steel Nipples, as most of their shots failed to hit the enemy ships.

Last Turns

Antonio's ships went through the chaos without being shot at much (only the Wingman sustained a couple hits)... As the saying goes now: "he just went to the supermarket!"

Antonio's main pilot goes back behind the back of Ciro's ships

Andreas' ships are exiting the Touchzone, while JL's main pilot approaches

Ciro's Wingman can only look as Antonio's first pilot crosses the finish line

Antonio's Wingman also crosses the finish line and completes a perfect day for the Unagi team!

Summary

We had a great time playing this race, although it was a bit slower than expected, so I decided to make a couple changes to the circuit and to simplify some of the special rules that we anyway forgot to apply.

I also think my decision to allow blocking the Wormholes' exits detracted a bit from the fun, because it reduced too much the interactions with the leading ships.

I have thus made several changes to the original scenario. A quick summary of some of the changes:

• Wormhole causes 1 Stress and a possible hit (roll 1 red die).
• Wormholes cannot be blocked. A ship that cannot complete its movement through a Wormhole and would be unable to cross it would be placed in front of the blocking ship(s), their bases touching.
• The game ends immediately once the first 3 ships cross the finish line.

The winner of the scenario was Antonio and his Unagi team! His plan worked to perfection and most of the time he maneuvered his ships to place them far from danger.

Race Results

Antonio: 3 points

Andreas: 2,5 points

JL: 1 point

Ciro: 0,5 points

Beni: 0,5 points (could not play, so receives same as last player)

Championship Classification

Andreas: 3,5 points

Antonio: 3 points

Ciro: 2,5 points

JL: 2 points

Beni: 0,5 points

Next race will be the Minefield, the last one of our 1st X-Wing Racing Championship. As it is the last race, there are rumors that certain important members of the Imperial command will attend as spectators!

Antonio will be able to use a 43-point team; Andreas a 42 point team and JL will be able to use a 41-point team... That will probably be next Friday, but maybe it'll be postponed 1 week.

Pac-Wing (1st race of our 1st X-Wing Racing Championship)

For the general racing rules, see DagobahDave's Vidla Crucible scenario.
The race track was created by me (JL): Pac-Wing.


Teams

Andies (40 points) (played by Andreas)
- 2x Black Squadron TIEs with Expert Handling and Engine Upgrade (20x2)

Darth Messengers (37 points) (played by JL)
- Black Squadron TIE Fighter with Veteran Instincts (15)
- Saber Squadron TIE Interceptor with Veteran Instincts (22)

Steel Nipples (40 points) (played by Ciro)
- Tala Squadron Z-95 with Shield Upgrade (17)
- Green Squadron Y-Wing with Adrenaline Rush and Hull Upgrade (23)

Tardis (40 points) (played by Beni)
- 2x Avenger Squadron TIE Interceptors (20x2)

Unagi (36 points) (played by Antonio)
- Ony Squadron TIE Defender with Engine Upgrade 


This was going to be our first race, so everybody was nervous and revving up their ships' engines!

Setup and first maneuvers

All ships rev up their engines!

First Round

In the left side of the circuit, Antonio's TIE Defender gets near two containers but he is ionized by JL's TIE Fighter which was in turn shot at and ionized by Beni's TIE Interceptor and one of Andreas' TIE Fighters

In the right side of the board, Ciro's Rebel scum fly unmolested under the radar while Beni, JL and Andreas shoot at each other.

Second Round

In the left, JL's TIE Fighter and Ciro's Z-95 snatch the containers from the desperate grasp of Antonio's TIE Defender, while on the right, one of Andreas' TIE Fighters captures the Satellite from under Beni's ship!

Close up view of the left side of the racing track

Third Round

4 ships, controlled by Antonio, Beni and Ciro fly to fight for the last two Satellites.

Meanwhile, Andreas' TIE Fighter tries to turn around with its priced container, but Bespin's gravity well causes him a lot of trouble as he approaches dangerously the border of the racing track

Fourth Round

At the bottom left, JL tries to escape with one container after having been ionized and also trapped in Bespin's gravity well.
At the top left, Ciro's A-Wing captures one of the satellites amidst the chaos.
In the center, Ciro's Z-95 turns around amidst a barrage of Tractor Beam fire and, against all odds, is not ionized.
At the right, JL's TIE Interceptor ionizes Andreas' TIE Fighter, dooming it to flee the track without scoring the Satellite.

View of the complete racing track

Andreas' TIE Fighter approaches the border of the map... Will Bespin's gravity pull him in... Andreas rolls 1 Green die to simulate the pull of Bespin's gravity but it's not a blank result and the inertia of the ionized ship takes it out of the circuit

Last Rounds

Ciro's Z-95 is the first one to score a container!
In the interview after the race he said it was "like walking into a supermarket to buy a couple kgs of potatoes"

 

 

 

 

 

The other three ships that scored were JL's TIE Fighter, one of Andreas' TIE Fighters and Ciro's A-Wing

Summary

Even though it was our first "official" race and the scenario had a couple problems, we had lots of fun and finished in around 75 minutes (excluding setup and cleaning). Although I had originally planned that the Tractor Beams would cause damage, I did not write it correctly in the scenario and we had to play without damaging other ships. Thus, destroying a ship was almost impossible and the game turned into grabbing the satellite first and avoiding being ionized and fleeing the map.



I have thus made several changes to the original scenario. A quick summary of the changes:

• Asteroids will be much more dangerous and there will be 12 on the map.
• It will be possible to snatch a container from another ship's grasp.
• Championship points awarded now per circuit (instead of general rules).

The winner of the scenario was Ciro and his Steel Nipples! He showed great maneuver and planning abilities and the Dice Gods smiled upon him at the right times!

Championship Classification

Ciro: 2 points

Andreas & JL: 1 point

Antonio & Beni: 0 points

Next race will be the Wormhole. Ciro will be able to use a 42-point team; Andreas and JL will be able to use 41-point teams... That will be next Friday, folks!

Wings on Fire: 1st X-Wing Racing Championship

So, it has been a couple months since I last posted an X-Wing battle report. I did play some X-Wing but mostly trial games for the Racing Championship I wanted to organize with some friends of my gaming club.

Many years ago, I used to play a classic game called Car Wars. The game was great fun and one of my favorites (although its rules were complex and cumbersome). It's a game that I would find it difficult to play now, though apparently Steve Jackson Games is preparing a new version, I hope modernized and shorter to play.

Anyway, while checking FFGs forums I read a post from one DagobahDave (Dave Graffam) about running racing scenarios with the X-Wing rules. It dawned on me that X-Wing would probably bring a similar experience that I had back in the day with Car Wars! It would also have the advantage of trying the game with more players, something my friend Beni and I had wanted to do for a long time, so we immediately put ourselves to the task. We ran a series of trial scenarios with several interested friends and I designed 4 circuits to try for our 1st X-Wing Racing Championship:

1. Minefield
2. Pac-Wing
3. Shooting Range
4. Wormhole

For the 1st Championship, which we thought of also as a trial, we have randomly selected 3 of these circuits to race following this order:
1. Pac-Wing
2. Wormhole
3. Minefield

So, without further ado, let's race!

T2a. Refueling Ambush

One week after our first scenario with the Corvette, we again had time to play a Corvette scenario. As T1 had been won by the Rebels (not surprisingly, I must say, as that scenario seems quite difficult for the Imperials), we played T2a: Refueling Ambush.

Rebels (203 points) (played by JL)
- CR90 Corvette Fore with 2 Single Turbolasers, Gunnery Team and Sensor Team (74 points)
- CR90 Corvette Aft with Quad Laser Cannons, Engineering Team and Tibanna Gas Supplies (54 points)
- 2x Gold Squadron with Ion Cannon Turret (23x2=46 points)
- Prototype A-Wing (17 points)
- Bandit Z-95 (12 points)

Imperials (145 points) (played by Beni)
- Soontir Fel with Push the Limit (30 points)
- Omicron Lambda-Class Shuttle with Engine Upgrade (25 points)
- 2x Scimitar TIE Bomber with 2x Cluster Missiles (2x24= 48 points)
- 3x Black Squadron TIE Fighters (3x14 = 54 points)

The goal for the Imperials is to cripple one section of the Corvette before it escapes the refueling station. The Corvette starts refueling and impaired, as it will get less energy than normal.

This time I did switch the flash from my smartphone to automatic, so the photos were much better!

Setup and first maneuvers

I started by placing the Corvette within range 2 of the border and centered. Then Beni placed three Black Squadron TIEs coming perpendicular to the Corvette and Soontir Fel with the rest of his ships from the front part of the Corvette. I decided to run a screen with my ships against the two TIE Bombers, as they seemed to be the most dangerous to me.

In retrospect, I think I should have set up one of my ships (the Z-95 or the A-Wing) to screen a bit against the TIE Fighters to make it more difficult for Beni to destroy the Cargo Container used by the Corvette to refuel.

Another thing I realized while writing the blog is that I could have placed the Corvette closer to my side of the board, as the scenario instructs to place the Corvette within (and not "at") range 2... This would have given me 1 more turn to refuel.

Setup: the Imperials find the Corvette in a very favorable situation for them!

Soontir Fel, the best Imperial pilot, is ready to show some of his ace skills!

Keep the Bombers in your sights!

Full Throttle to attack the Cargo Container

Turn 1

On the first turn I decided to keep the Corvette docked and launch my other ships into a screen formation.

The result of the screen was mixed... I blocked the Bombers from easily reaching the Corvette, but I could not seriously damage any of them in the first two turns, because Beni maneuvered really well and did not give me easy ion cannon shots against his Bombers.

On the other side of the battle, two of the TIE Fighters were able to shoot at the Cargo Container from turn 1 and scored already two hits... the dice were falling in the Imperial side this time!

I placed my A-Wing to try to annoy the Bombers as much as possible and left the Y-Wings behind

The TIE Fighters approach the container at full speed...

The TIE Bombers advance slowly, placing themselves just outside the reach of the Ion Cannon Turrets... Meanwhile, the Shuttle advances at full speed toward the Corvette, and Soontir Fel pulls a crazy stunt to place himself at range 1 from one of the Y-Wings and obtaining a 4-hit attack

Turn 2

In the second turn of the battle I wanted to activate the Corvette, but realized that the rules of the scenario say that the CR90 would activate normally in the following Activation phase... This means I would have to wait until turn 3 to escape the exploding Container!

On the other hand, my screen worked a bit better and I blocked the Bombers at range 4 from the Corvette.

The big melee with my four ships, Soontir Fel and the two TIE Bombers

The TIE Fighters get closer to the Cargo Container while the Shuttle avoids the Corvette

The Corvette shoots its primary weapon against one of the Bombers...

And scores a good hit... unfortunately not enough to take the Bomber down

The Bomber's pilot became stunned

The TIE Fighters blow the container on the second round... Beni rolled three more hits with the exploding container and that, together with a previous shot from the Shuttle wiped all the Corvette's shields... Again, dice were falling on the Imperial side.

This turn I managed to ionize one of the Bombers and Soontir Fel!

Turn 3

Things were looking bleak for the Rebellion... The Corvette was being hit both in its front and aft sections, and one of my Y-Wings would move out of range of the other ships for the rest of the game.

On the other hand, I had a good chance to shoot either Soontir or one of the Bombers down, but was not able to do it, yet.

The TIE Fighters move closer to the Corvette

Meanwhile, my ships concentrate on Soontir Fel and damaged him again

The Bombers cross the scree and get ready to shoot their deadly ordnance

And the Corvette finally starts its movement and finishes one of the TIE Fighters with its Quad Laser Cannons

Turn 4

Although I had been able to ionize one of Beni's Bombers the previous turn, the other one was free and Beni placed her in a very good situation to attack the Corvette.

The Corvette blows a second TIE Fighter

The Y-Wing that had been almost destroyed by Soontir Fel (he had score 7 hits on the ship) shoots him down and scores the only Rebel achievement of the day!

The Bomber in position shoots its Cluster Missiles... 4 hits in two attacks of 3 and cripples the Corvette!... The Dark Side shines with a special dark bright today!

Summary

Another brilliant X-Wing mission with the Corvette. This one is much more balanced than T1, specially considering that I could have set up the Corvette much better if I had read the rules a bit more attentively.

Beni obtained a well deserved victory. The dice also helped him today (he rolled better than average on almost every attack roll he made, specially against the Corvette), but the bigger part of the victory was due to his very adept maneuvering that prevented me from easily focusing fire on his Bombers... At the end, it was one of the Bombers that scored the final hit on the fore part of the Corvette.

To show the damage evolution on the Corvette:
Turn 1 (fore reinforced): fore section suffers 2 damage from Shuttle.
Turn 2 (back reinforced): fore and aft sections suffer 3 damage each from container's explosion; fore suffers extra 2 from TIE Fighter.
Turn 3 (fore reinforced): aft section suffers 4 hits from TIE Fighters.
Turn 4 (back reinforced): aft section suffers 1 hit from TIE Fighters. Fore section suffers 2 hits from Soontir Fel (1crit) and 4 final hits from Bomber's Cluster Missiles.

One thing that makes the scenario very interesting is that you'll have almost no energy for the Corvette. This reduces its survivability as it won't be able to easily recover shields... Also, being attached to a ticking bomb (the Container) is a big handicap for the Rebels.

One possibility for the Rebels (pointed by Beni) would have been to detach the Corvette already on turn 1, so that you can move from turn 2 and avoid the Container blast, but I'm not so sure. Waiting two turns gave me the 3 points of Energy that I used to add 1 die to my attack on a Bomber and to shoot the Quad Laser Cannons twice (destroying two TIE Fighters), and I could have obtained even more if I had gone straight in turn two and maybe regain some Shields...

I also did not play my best. I did not read the mission special rules properly and I could have made a much better screen. I had two options in my mind and finally decided for this one, but now I'm convinced that I should have annoyed the TIE Fighters much more to prevent them from easily destroying the Container.

Anyway, a memorable mission. It's complex, fun and with lot of tactical possibilities... I really cannot wait to play the next scenario. Unfortunately, a weird combination of work and vacation could mean that it will take us several weeks to play again.