The Battle of Xiphos Alpha

I beg leave to report to Starfleet Command that this battle was a very bloody affair. A Constitution-class Heavy Cruiser and a Burke-class Frigate on the border with Klingon space changed course to investigate mysterious energy fluctuations, and ran into two Klingon warships, a D7 Battlecruiser and an F5 Frigate. The junior Klingon commander, being over-confident, advanced too rapidly into the teeth of the Federation ships' firepower, and his ship was soon reduced to dusty wreckage in space. The Federation ships, having concentrated on first eliminating the Klingon frigate, found the Battlecruiser overmatched them, and the Federation Heavy Cruiser went down with all hands to a point-blank volley of Disruptor and Phaser fire. Before her demise, she had reduced the enemy vessel to such a parlous state that the Federation frigate was able to finish her off.

So this is the third (I think) game I've played of these Mongoose rules. I want to drag in some other folk, but I feel I should first get my head around how everything works, which necessitates getting a few more games under my belt! I cleared off the table in the attic and had a bit of a shufti at things. I rather ignored terrain. Despite deploying a couple of small moons and an asteroid field to the table, none of my ships flew through, into or around them. I have developed a slightly better grasp of the rules, but since I mainly avoided things such as Crew Quality checks, Suicide Shuttles and the like, I am still a long way from being "Admiral Kirk"!

I have been throwing together a few plans for refighting historical battles, but they are still some way from being brought to completion. I am quite drawn to The Battle of the Plate Nebula, which will see a longer-ranged Klingon vessel attempt to defeat superior Federation vessels with shorter-ranged weapons. I am also rather keen on The Battle of the Dennish Strait, in which a couple of Federation Dreadnoughts will have a go at slapping a Klingon Dread and accompanying cruiser (of some sort). I had a funny idea yesterday about doing a chase of sorts with the Klingon warships Goeben and Breslau, but the first step in all of this is to get my head around the rules. I do not yet have a nice, pretty little table, so I shan't pain you with photographs of models being manoeuvred around a scratched table-tennis table.

In other news, Ian over at The Blog With No Name is running a gift giveaway to celebrate reaching a hundred followers. He's a top bloke and there are some grand prizes, so pop over there and have a gander!