This battle took place when I was in high school. We were playing Star Fleet Battles with the Tournament Rules. There were four of us on one map, I don't remember the other two ships as I think we just paired up and went at it. Now SFB is a rather rules heavy combat simulation. There are only like 50 pages of actual rules, and another 100 pages to clarify those rules; since it is a war- game, the rules need to be more definitive than in a role-playing game. Contrast this with FASA's Starship Tactical Combat Simulator for their old Star Trek RPG which is about 50 pages total.

Anyway, I had a WYN Auxiliary Battlecruiser. The WYN Star Cluster is a small nation-state, sorrounded by three powerful neighbors and protected by a natural radiation zone which temporarily disa- bles starships trying to pass through it. Reminds me of the Swiss. They have only a small shipyard incapable of producing true war- ships; they depend on a fleet of heavily upgraded freighters to defend their borders.

The WYN Battlecruiser's advantages are its option mounts and drone racks (missiles). Four drone racks give the ship more drone fire- power than most other cruisers. They don't take power to use, are guided and fast, but have limited reloads. Option mounts cover the fact that WYN ships are highly customized for their captains. I had four option mounts so I could conceivably mount four different weapon systems (or even more power, transporters, or a couple of other choices). For this fight I think I chose 2 photon torpedoes on the wings and a hellbore on the centerline. Photon torpedoes are archetypical heavy weapons. Hellbores envelop a ship, delive- ring half their damage to the weakest shield. The disadvantage of my ship was an abysmal acceleration rate and turning radius, it is after all a freighter.

My opponent was Mike's brother, who's name I've forgotten. He had a Neo-Tholian Cruiser. As in TOS, Tholian ships can lay an energy field (Tholian web) to trap enemy ships and hide behind. They can fire phasers through it and pass through it at will while other ships can't. Neo-Tholian ships have the additional advantage of being able to fire web out to a distance of 20 hexes, quite good. The Neo-Tholian Cruiser has one web caster, a web snare (which has a range of 1 and is used for point defense), and four disruptors for its heavy weapons. Disruptors are standard Klingon weapons, they can fire every turn (most heavy weapons can only fire every other turn) but they do less damage per shot than a photon torpedo and do less damage at distant targets. Their disadvantage is that the ship is a little brittle, moderate damage can easily take out the web caster and a couple of disruptors.

The fight was actually short in game time. Only took a one intense turn, although in SFB each turn is subdivided into 32 impulses, which means it can take the better part of an hour a turn. I had to make sure to keep my speed up, not run into the Tholian web, which can stop a ship, and use my superior alpha strike and better ability to take damage.

The Tholian made a mistake by firing his web too early. It takes four impulses for it to form, meanwhile I fired my heavy weapons which took down his front shield. Then in the next two impulses I fired my phasers and destroyed a couple of his weapons. His return fire took down my front shield also, but did very little internal damage. Then the web came up and I just went around it.

At the end of the turn he was down a couple of heavy weapons and phasers but still had his web caster. I was still at close to maximum effectiveness, so he gave up. Another victory for the brave defenders of the Cluster!