First Battle of Khilsiek:

The civil war in the Khilsiek system had intensified and the Earth Alliance was supporting one faction by hunting down and eliminating the other. the death toll had been quite shocking so far, and Resha-Kar had received a request for direct aid, rather than just material aid. Kalora had been tasked with engaging and then eliminating one of the Earth Alliances 'anti piracy' patrols, and then delivering a large quantity of humanitarian aid to civilians whose supplies had been cut off by the earth alliance blockade of the outer system. They would also be delivering a number of warships to the Free Khilsiek forces and providing training and technical support to them. 

The Resha-Vanguard was already in the main Khilsiek system, and had been monitoring Earth Force patrols. Kaloras force was in position, so now all they needed was a little bait.

'Send transmission' she ordered her communications officer. he stabbed a button on his console, 'Sending ma'am' he responded

The Humans were only about 10 light seconds away so a response should be quite quick.....

Introduction

In the last encounter, Earth Force had a very rough day when they encountered the Brakiri in a practice game for our upcoming second campaign and they are looking to even the score. The battle, and future campaign will be fought in the Khilsiek system. This is home to a sapient species that has not yet independently discovered Jump drive, and the various factions are looking to bring the system into their sphere of influence. Forces are mustering and it looks like we will have 5 players in our upcoming A Call To Arms campaign. We had planned to be started by now, but forces need to be built and painted, practice needs to be had, and terrain needs to be made. 

This weeks battle is again Earth Alliance versus Brakiri. I will be adding a bit more variety in the future, don't worry. The Selected mission is Call To Arms, and we elected to use terrain which left a very nice open area in the middle with very little to maneuver around. We will be playing at Raid level and have 5 points each.

Earth Alliance

The Earth Alliance fleet is different from last time, being based around the Nova dreadnought and Hyperion heavy cruiser. The Nova is one of the better raid level ships having a honestly shocking number of attacks with good all round coverage, a respectable hit point pool plus interceptors and 4 flights of fighters. The weakness of the ship is its poor speed and maneuverability which means it can be quite hard to leverage their firepower which is limited to 12" range only. this isn't terrible, but it does mean the ship has to potentially weather a few turns of shooting with no ability to respond. This probably won't be an issue against the Brakiri since as a faction they are generally lacking in ranged options themselves and operate almost entirely with weapons in the 12-18" range, with a few weapons hitting beyond this. The Hyperion is quite nimble and can hit hard if given the chance. These two ships are backed up by an Avenger to contribute to fighter support, and escorts in the form of the Olympus, a great all rounder, An Artemis which is one of the best skirmish ships in raw firepower, a pair of Hermes and an Oracle as support and initiative sinks. This is quite a decent fleet as it has a good mix of abilities, and a very respectable amount of firepower.

The Earth Fleet forms up for action

Nova-class Dreadnought: EAS Iron Duke
Avenger-class fleet carrier: EAS Invincible
Hyperion-class heavy cruiser: EAS Spartan
Olympus-class corvette: EAS Valhalla
Artemis-class heavy frigate: EAS Dido
Oracle-class scout cruiser: EAS Cassandra
2x Hermes-class transport: EAS Vagabond, EAS Ben-My-Chree

Brakiri

The Brakiri fleet has a fairly complete roster even without ships i've been designing myself and to date I've only used a few of them. I was intending to use a pair of Batrados as the core of my force, but they aren't yet ready. Instead I took the ever useful Brokados with its healthy fighter complement and command +1 and bolstered my antifighter ability with the Halik. This ship has a very impressive 8 anti-fighter shots to dish out with its escort ability, and you can double this to 16 while on the Intensify Defensive fire order. hopefully that will allow me to even the odds against the Human fighter swarms they bring along with their fleets. I bolstered my fighters with a Brikorta, giving me a total of 12 fighter flights. I have no Pikatos' available, so It will have to be all Falkosi's again. to finish off, I spent the remainder of my points on an Ikorta to threaten boarding actions and give me some mid ranged punch, and then took 4 Haltanas. These gravitic frigates are skirmish level and based on the Halik hull making them very tough, and have the very useful Gravitic Shifters. these can disrupt enemy formations by turning ships in place, and even cause some damage if you concentrate them against a single ship. they also ignore dodge, so in a pinch can be used to take out enemy fighters.
With my force selected, we went on to Deployment

The Brakiri Task Group, Ready for action

Brokados-class battle carrier Resha-Emissary
Halik-class frigate Resha-Custodian
4x Haltana-class gravitic frigate, Resha-Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate
Ikorta-class light assault cruiser: Resha-Batterer
Brikorta-class light carrier Resha-Bearer

Deployment

Initiative: Earth Alliance

The Terrain was concentrated around the edges of the battlefield, with a large area in the center which was open. I opted therefore to deploy my force with some dust clouds to block line of sight for at least the first turn, and with asteroids to the right, I could use them to maneuver round and catch the earth alliance fleet in the flank if they counter deployed opposite me.

Both forces deploy for action

The Earth Alliance didn't deploy opposite, instead deploying on the other side of the board with a nice wide open space between the 2 forces. There would be no sneaking around flanks using terrain as cover. this would be a meeting engagement.

Turn 1

Initiative: Earth Alliance

The distance between the forces was quite large, with no chance of either force reaching effective weapons range both the earth alliance and Brakiri forces scrambled all their fighters and started to organise their formations. The Brakiri elected to move the Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate to the right to engage first, and the Batterer was ordered to flank left to act as a lure in future turns

Both fleets scramble fighters

Turn 2

Initiative: Brakiri

The Brakiri fleet broke through the dust clouds having launched all their fighters, but kept their formation reasonably compact. The Batterer veered to the left to act as a lure next turn, while the Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate were on the right. the Emissary and Bearer reduced speed to allow both flanking forces to get ahead of them. 

First blood to the Brakiri as a flight of thunderbolts gets too close

The Custodian maintained a central position to maintain escort cover. It wasn't yet clear where the humans were aiming for, so the whole force was still kept compact enough to react to enemy. With all fighters from both fleets now launched or launching, the Earth Alliance fighter force sped ahead of the capital ships to be in position to clear out the Brakiri fighters next turn. one flight of thunderbolts was perhaps a little too enthusiastic, the maneuvers taking it into range of the forward batteries of Inflexible who shot the fighters down. 

Turn 3

Initiative: Brakiri

The Earth Alliance fleet had so far not performed any aggressive maneuvers, and with the Iron Duke lacking agility, the Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate sped forwards ready to catch the human formation in the flank. The Starfury's received instructions to attack the Batterer. The Brakiri responded, and their fighters engaged them, supporting fire from the Custodian was able to scatter or destroy 4 Starfury flights with only a handful surving to make it back to their carrier, while the Humans showed their fighter superiority by outmaneuvering and destroying a similar number of Brakiri fighters. They then unleashed a torrent of missiles into the Batterer. 

Earth Alliance fighters attack the Resha-Batterer

The Vagabond, Ben-My-Chree and Valhalla all added to the deluge of fire, their missiles scoring several hits to the machinery spaces and causing the Batterer to lose power to some of its weapons and reducing its speed. Spartan fired its main laser at Inflexible and dealt minor damage, while Emissary and Bearer both fired into the Iron Duke but did very little to it. 

The Custodian lends its anti-fighter batteries to even the odds, and the Earth Force fighters come off worse

Batterer fired forwards into a flight of fighters, destroying them, and the Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate swept the space in front of the Brakiri fleet with their Gravitic shifters and destroyed several more enemy fighter flights. in a few short minutes, the Earth Alliance fleet had lost three fifths of their fighters, while the Brakiri had lost only a third of theirs.

Turn 4

Initiative: Brakiri

Contact was unavoidable by this point, and the Brakiri ships moved into close quarters. they had no long range weapons to speak of, and the human fleet had kept itself relatively compact. any notion of an orderly tactical battle with sweeping maneuvers was abandoned as weapons were fired in all directions by all combatants. 

The Fighting gets close as both sides unleash a torrent of fire into each other

Inflexible was ravaged by fire from the Spartan and Iron Duke. Batterer too was pounded by the Iron Duke and its forward guns blasted into the Bearer as well while laser beams from the Bearer and Emissary slashed through the hull of the Iron Duke in return. fighters had to maneuver hard to avoid colliding with enemy ships, and thus found themselves falling prey to the Custodian which was at the center of the whole inferno but seemingly immune to it. The Inflexible, Inexorable, Unyielding and Obstinate unleashed a torrent of fire into the Valhalla, their pulsars overloading the interceptor grid wrecking the ship. the Inflexible was seriously damaged, and the Batterer was engaged from all sides, miraculously surviving but with most of the crew dead or injured. Several Earth Alliance ships found themselves being shifted by the Brakiri Gravitic Shifters, and they focused them onto the Spartan which suffered extensive damage as the hull was twisted to breaking point. Capacitors overloaded, hull beams snapped, conduits were severed, the ship held together, but barely. Dido fired in all directions targetting several Brakiri ships, railgun rounds punching holes through already battered hull plating and smashing internal components

Turn 5

Initiative: Brakiri

Both sides were battered by this point, but there had only been 1 ship lost. There were only a few ships in the engagement that had not suffered any damage at all. The 2 forces moved closer together. There was no prospect whatsoever of any ships on either side being able to make it out of range of the enemy at this point.

The Batterer escapes while the fire fight intensifies

The Emissary, Bearer and Inflexible were pounded by the Iron Duke which was now at the center of the battle, its weapons firing in all directions, with the combined fire from several ships, the Bearer was first crippled, and then knocked out of action. the Inflexible also suffered serious damage and lost all power as shots from all sides mangled the ships hull and knocked the reactors off line. The Emissary spewed atmosphere as hull plates tumbled away.

Gravitic Shifters move the Iron Duke so Emissary can deal the killing shot

Throughout all of this, the last human fighters were eliminated, and the Brakiri were not idle as the Earth Alliance ships pounded theirs. The Spartan was disabled, and fire into the Vagabond and Ben-My-Chree saw both ships knocked out of action. The Dido and Cassandra were also disabled, and then the Emissary, having suffered extensive damage so far, ordered Inexorable to turn the Nova, the ship now presented its flank as the gravitational waves in space shifted and the Iron Dukes prow fell into a temporary gravity well, and the Emissary's laser sliced deep into the hull as pulsar fire blasted weapons off their sponsons and the ship went dead, disgorging escape pods as it started to tumble. Finally, the Invincible took heavy fire and was crippled.

In a few short minutes, the Earth Alliance force had been totally destroyed, only one badly damaged human ship remained, there were no human fighters remaining, space was swarming with escape pods as crews abandoned their stricken ships, and the only message being sent was 'We surrender, I repeat, we surrender'

46-10 Brakiri Victory

Conclusion

Ouch.

A meeting Engagement and then brawl is usually where the Earth Alliance excels. their ships generally lack a single weapon arc where they can deliver overwhelming firepower, but in return, they have good firepower all round, and when they can leverage this, fire from multiple ships in all directions can, and often will decide the firefight. When you add in the general space superiority that they can often enjoy thanks to their fighters, they can degrade enemy fleets before a decisive clash happens.
So what went wrong for the Earth Alliance?
The first factor was the Halik, with its amazing anti-fighter score it can clear out enemy fighters very efficiently by using escort. This can be mitigated somewhat if you have the initiative, and unfortunately the Brakiri won that in 4 out of 5 turns allowing them to dictate where fighters would be, and use the Halik to get into the best position to bully the Human fighters when they were engaged by the Falkosi's
Then we have the Haltanas. to say they overperformed is a bit of an understatement, those 4 Skirmish ships in 2 turns eliminated a swathe of fighters, did most of the damage to the Nova and Artemis, Crippled the Avenger and destroyed the Olympus and Hyperion. I was expecting them to be a nuisance, but they absolutely wrecked the Human fleet with their Gravitic Shifters. In future I think I will moderate the number of Haltanas I use, unless I fight the Minbari, they deserve everything they get.

The Nova Dreadnought performed extremely well. Being able to fire all round for 2 consecutive turns really hammered the Brakiri fleet, and the earth fighters, issues with the Halik slaughtering them notwithstanding, won every dogfight, and did some damage to the Brakiri ships. Had the EA been able to win the initiative and dictate the tempo of the fighter engagements they may well have been able to sweep the Falkosi's off the field.
The Hermes also once again wandered too close to the fighting and were swiftly dealt with, although if they had survived turn 5, there would have been little they could have done to change the outcome. The Ikorta which barely survived could have been chased down, but otherwise, it was all over by that time.

The Salvage crews had finished their work. The Inflexible and Bearer would have to be scrapped. they could make it back to Brakiri space but the damage to the ships had been, extreme. Kalora had looked through the reports the ships engineers had provided shortly after the Invincible surrendered. they 'could' be rebuilt but they were both old ships, and it would be cheaper to buy break them up and buy replacements. What to do with the Human ships though?

The crews had been taken off the wrecked ships, and all the escape pods recovered. and a prize crew had immediately taken the captured carrier to a secure system where it would be assessed, repaired, and then handed to the Free Khilsiek navy. The Hermes' had both been loaded into super heavy freighters. As for the rest, they were all old ships, The Nova they would hand over to their Shokan allies, the Hyperion would be taken for a full examination given that it had been disabled by the gravitic shifters alone, and the other ships....

She had been really annoyed at losing 2 ships and having a third needing to be put in to dock for major repairs, but Resha-Kar had now gotten another 8 Earth Alliance warships. It was almost like it had been during the Dilgar War when, if her father was to be believed, they had so many ships awaiting examination, it took them 6 years to look over them all.

The Earth Alliance is not going to like this, she thought to herself, I hope the board know what they are doing....