Encounter One - Ship Design

 Encounter One - Ship Design.

I must spend a lot more of my time designing ships than I do playing the game with them. Some of that is in refining existing designs, swapping out weapons or equipment, or fine tuning mass and points costs. I like symmetry in my ship diagrams and round numbers for the points and/or mass. The main reason that my Broadheads have two Dart Launchers is that they neaten the points cost off to 250 points! I can argue that My Empire has a tradition of putting a physical shot across the enemies bow before opening up with their Beam arrays, but it's a fairly weak justification. 

Most of the model ships I use are about as old as the rules. I bought them a long time ago and have played a few games with them. We have history, and I am fond of them. Also, I am trying to complete a collection, which is another hobby in itself. 

You can use whatever ships you have. There are loads of wonderful miniatures available now. Use what ever you like. 

My two main fleets are Empire and Novans. I really like the QT models designs for the Empire's ships and over the years I have acquired a fair fleet from QT and Citadel. My Novan's have a xenophobic predator focus that fits nicely with the old Citadel bio ships. They are getting harder to find now, and the price for Tyranid War Drones is ridiculous. I do have a small Federation fleet, but they are not favourites and I usually think of them as The Enemy.

I believe there are two main approaches to ship design. There may be others but these are what I have in mind. They are not exclusive and most players will use a combination to get the fleet they want to play.

1 - Miniatures driven. Pick out a model spaceship, decide its role and what equipment it ought to have, then design the layout to fit. You may have to trim some of the equipment to get it within mass or points value, but you should be able to design someway towards your concept. 

2 - Competition driven, Work out your strategy, design your ships to maximise their effectiveness, then pick out some miniatures to suit. 

My designs are mostly Miniatures Driven. I start with the model ship then work out what its role is and how it should be equipped. I tend to design my ships for general roles rather than to meet a specific enemy. My fleets are built around the model ships I have, not the ones I want. I still want them to be effective in a game, so there are elements of maximising their weapons. 

It is a huge advantage if you have some idea what your opponent is bringing to the table, or what their likely strategy is. If you don't know what you are likely to be up against, then you may need to generalise on your design and make allowance for Plan B.

These are some of my Design Guidelines. 

• Loading up on Shields is little help if the enemy is mainly armed with missiles. 
• If the enemy has a lot of fighters, then you need point defence and or your own fighters. 
• Loading up on Point Defence is a waste of points and mass if the enemy doesn't use missiles or fighters. 
• If you have Marines on board, be prepared to use them. Either to defend your ship or take the enemies ships.
• Kennedy Fields are game changers. Not only do they provide very effective defence against Beam and Missiles, they also nullify many of the other special weapons such as Photon Torpedoes or Tractor Beams. They can be beaten by concentrated fire and they have a very specific vulnerability. 
• Clever Metal provides a very effective defence against Hull damage from most Missiles, Scatter Pack and Mines. But it is expensive, even if you are playing Novans.
• Concentrate your Beams in Arrays. So consider six ST5 Beam launchers as a single ST30 Beam array. You can do this with missile batteries too. 
• I have a tendency to put my best weapons in the forward arc. This works reasonably well with more agile smaller ships, but is less handy for bigger ships. They may struggle to keep the pointy end towards the enemy. In this case, broadside batteries and turrets can be your friend.
• Smaller ships are more cost effective.
• Bigger ships look more impressive.
• Don't mix Missile systems on the same ship. Recalculating Hit probability for each weapon system can soon gets tedious. And yes, I know my own published designs break this rule. But, these may not be the ships I put on the table! 
• Don't poke the Auregan.

Have fun, design some ships and put them on the table. If you send me your designs, I will add them to the blog (with permission) as part of a Jaynes Spaceships.