Battlefleet Gothic: The Question Thread

[ElectricPaladin]

This is a long shot, but I'm going to go for it.

Ladies and gentlemen of BoLS, Battlefleet Gothic is an awesome and awe-inspiring game. It is balanced in a way that the rest of the 40k universe can only dream of - not perfect, but close to it. Gameplay is challenging, but intuitive, and includes an element of command and control that really brings you into the action. Unlike most other specialist games, Battlefleet Gothic is entirely playable with products Games Workshop still carries, and has a thriving community that is in the process of creating a revised edition of the rules.

Most importantly, it's incredibly cheap. You can play 1k games with $50 to $60 worth of minis, especially if you troll eBay for deals.

There are many reasons that you - yes, you - should be playing Battlefleet Gothic. In the interests of evangelizing this incredible game, I have started this thread to be a central clearinghouse for all questions. If you are curious about Battlefleet Gothic, post your question here and I - and, perhaps, other BFG fans lurking on BoLS - will do our best to answer it.

[chrach7]

Can you recommend some active websites for BFG? I go to taccom for epic stuff but I'd like to find an equivalent site for BFG (alternate fleet lists, model proxies etc). Thanks.

[ElectricPaladin]

Why, yes. Yes I can.

The Specialist Arms forums (http://www.forum.specialist-arms.com/) are a very lively Battlefleet Gothic community. There are several fascinating projects in progress there, including a revised edition of Battlefleet Gothic, a simple rewrite and compilation of the most up-to-date rulesset for the less experimental folks, and lots of conversation about alternate fleet lists, missions, campaigns, and so on.

[Myu]

Thanks for making this thread!

I'm designing my own fleet at the moment and am curious to see what you think of my idea of weapon costs. Now just looking at the imperial fleet you can't say "add left and right side weapons batteries of S6 30cm and increase points by X" but I believe I've been able to find some equivalents looking at imperial cruisers and light cruisers.

All theses are equal in worth:
S6 30cm Weapons batteries
S2 30cm Lance (The gothic is the same as a luna in every way except for S2 Side lances instead of S6 WB)
S4 30cm Torpedoes (The Dauntless can replace S3 lance for S6 torpedoes for free)
S4 45 Weapons batteries (Admittedly the Tyrant class cruiser is 5 points more but that's about the same)

So I concluded:
Increase range: 50% Drop strength by 1/3
Decrease range by 1/3, Increase strength by 50%

And to determine the total firepower of a ship, assuming S6 30cm WB is of value 1:
A gothic and lunar (180 points each) have 5.5 worth of guns (2 Left side + 2 right side + 1.5 for torpedoes).

However it doesn't seem to match up with chaos ships.

Chaos carnage cruiser: 180 pts
Prow WS6 60cm = 3x(WS6 30cm) = 3
Star WS6 45cm = 1.5 x(WS6 30cm) = 1.5
Port WS6 45cm = 1.5 x(WS6 30cm) = 1.5

Star WS4 60cm = 2 x(WS6 30cm) = 2
SPort WS4 60cm = 2 x(WS6 30cm) = 2

Prow 3 Star 3.5 Port 3.5 = 10 worth of WS6 30cm batteries
= WS 60 30cm batteries.

What do you think?

[ElectricPaladin]

However it doesn't seem to match up with chaos ships...

What do you think?

The thing is that different weapons have different values in different fleets because weapon synergies is an important part of the game. The same is true of weapon ranges. For example, the Imperial Navy's sweet spot is 30cm. Very few ships, except for the occasional battlecruiser and only one or two cruisers, have weapons with any greater range. The Imperial Navy is a blunt instrument, meant to smash its way through the opposition and (hopefully) come out the other side. Thus, long range weapons - especially lances, who have the role of "finisher" and can easily take advantage of long range and the versatility that affords - are at a premium in that faction. The Chaos fleet, though, is all about speed and long-range weapons. Even some of their escorts have 45cm range weapons. Range isn't a problem for Chaos, but high power and massed torpedoes are, as is the problem of their ships' general fragility.

This is part of why I don't envy you the project of inventing a new fleet for BFG.

What race are you inventing a fleet for? Any chance you could just "codex-drift" the rules from a fleet that GW already wrote?

[Myu]

True that.

Still I'm going for something new, no intention of codex drifting. I plan to test my rules (got 2 battle ships, 3-4 cruisers at the moment) after I've played some games of BFG to get back into the swing of things.

Story wise the race is human but the armies are robots inspired from the old computer game total annihilation.

BFG rules wise it's sorta a cross between Chaos and Tau. Some guidelines I am using:

5+ Armour standard (No 6+)
Sizable range on some ships
No Torpedoes
Produce less fighter/bombers but no upper limit to the amount a ship can put on the field at once
Not as fast all full ahead speed (thinking also of no cruiser with >20cm movement or battleship with >15cm movement) but better at turning
Each ship is fairly adaptable but within a particular role.
Best firepower at the forward arc.
Some custom special orders with turning and self repairing.

[ElectricPaladin]

Produce less fighter/bombers but no upper limit to the amount a ship can put on the field at once


Don't do that. Trust me.

Everyone used to have that, and the 2010 FAQ changed that for a very good reason. It's way too easy - too broken - to use that sort of mechanic to put out an unstoppable cloud of very deadly small ships. It made escorts completely meaningless.

In general, though, your fleet sounds like the Necron fleet... which is also troubling, because they are the most broken fleet, and some people I know refuse to play against them.

[Phototoxin]

It was / is an awesome game. I do miss it. I have no ships, no books, no order dice and no rules. The scenery was cool and different too. (ping pong balls on flying stands!)

[Myu]

Like Necron fleet? Don't worry I'd actually price my guys fairly, plus they'd be no where NEAR as fast or as tough as Necrons. Not by a long shot :P