Snow Storm

of game "Snow Storm", ended 06/21/2003

Greeted again, young Jedi.

In today's lesson we will learn that the Rebellion can be a devastating force all on it's own...

As example take the "Snow Storm"-universe.
This universe was uncommon in many aspects. It had a map similar to that of a wheel, with a clustered rim, a hub cluster, and several spokes. The diameter of said wheel was a bit more than 1500 lightyears.

We took command of the Rebel Alliance shortly after our predecessor dropped out for unknown reasons, it was barely turn 30. The ship limit was reached, and the Rebellion was near the top of the scores, in a tight race with the Robots. When we surveyed what we inherited, we were mildly shocked: lots of planets only had one clan, even very promising ones. Not a single Merlin was in our fleet, nor was there a Neutronic Refinery. We had about 8 Rushes, most of which didn't have proper engines. The economy, if one can use this term, was on the shoulders of Geminis, used as freighters. Not a single Patriot was in the fleet, but one Xray-Mk4-Iron Lady was. On the plus side, there were 2 Coldpains, and the Birds seem to have been taken over shortly before the drop of the Rebel leader. They were played by Spacelord then and didn't have any warship left but only freighters and one base.
When imagining the "wheel" as a clock, the Rebellion was located between 8 and 10, with 9 o'clock being the former HW. At 8 downward started the Fascist realm, and at 10 were some remaining Bird outposts.

Taking action, many LDSF's were put in the build queue as priority builds, and some Rushes and Tranqs were sent to take out the Bird remnants, whereas the mighty, but Spacelord-controlled Fascist empire was left in peace. There seem to have been an alliance between the Fascists and the Rebels, as our races were still ff-allied although Spacelord did have command. So we left them alone and concentrated on economy and the Birds...

Two curious Privateer MBRs were killed in renewed minefields, and the Privateers were told to go play elsewhere, which they agreed reluctantly.
Already 2 turns later, when killing Bird planets, a Rebel task force suddenly passed a Lizard fleet in deep space. A surprise for both parts... Diplomatic negotiations started immediately and resulted in a non-agression pact with a fixed border and later a ff-alliance.
So our warships turned around and prepared for a preemptive strike against the Fascist Spacelord - when we were contacted by a very friendly and very human Fascist player asking to renew the existing alliance. We agreed.
So we were somewhat short on directions to expand, so we proceeded alongside the two spokes we controlled towards the center cluster. This cluster, we learned, was heavily Borg infested - and the Borg were allied to the Privateers. And that's when the heavy fighting started!
After a couple of rounds of preparation, 15 Falcons started to RGA Borg bases in the hub cluster, which was very rich and dense. 2 or 3 of those were killed by ships on guard, but the rest did their job marvelously. After the Falcons came Patriots and Rushes. None of the ships had a PE set, all only had mission RGA. Accompanying them were Tranquilities full of torpedoes and providing minefield coverage. It was a bit too easy: RGA-ing takes away 60 happiness points every turn. It would have made the natives more happy, but with Borg planets we need not worry about that. Most planets only surived 2-3 turns of continous RGA before the Borg clans were gone, these were the planets with low population/bad climates. The clans abord the Falcons happily colonized the now unowned planets. Most planets however needed longer. But time was on our side... The Borg desperately needed to get rid of this burden, and needed to kill off our ships. By the time the Borg got heavy ships there, there were lots of Rushes doing the RGA-ing. The Rushes not having a PE nor a numerical fc got the better side in all fights. And a Biocide having the left side agains a Rush only has a 20 or so percent chance against a Rush... Because we were shifting around our Rushes often and taking out undefended planets in the meantime more often than not the Bios did not meet what they intede to meet. Intercepting was deadly also, because we had minefield superiority most of the time... In fact we did not lose a single Rush to a Biocide at all and took out planet after planet and base after base, and even the Privateers were only able to steal 2 Rushes altogether (of which one was a SD1-Rush parked with RGA over an Borg base and left there for good...). Borg must have lost 7 bases to RGA alone, and countless planets. Time by time, we brought in replacements and the first base allowed us to repair our damaged ships in the hub cluster.
Then suddenly it was over and the hub was ours. But from the Privateer spoke (Priv home area was somewhere in the 4-5 o'clock region) suddely there came Crystal MBRs and started webbing the area! HPhaser Rushes were able to deal a bit with that situation, and one of the Crystal MBRs hit a mine (we took the freedom to liberally spread our mines wherever we went). After that the webbing slowed down considerably...
In the meantime the Fascists had further proceeded on their quarrel with the Crystals, which may have contributed to their lack of vigor in webbing the hub. Also in the meantime the Lizards have slowly progressed towards the Borg home area around "12 o'clock". 3 Rushes gave them the necessary firepower, and here again RGA proved to be devastating for a Borg empire...
And then, it was five minutes to twelve for the Borg, all in once the Borg, the Privateer and the Crystal dropped. The remaining races had fought too long side by side and also did not want to fight against Spacelord so this game was voted to end. And the Rebellion was leader in score and undefeated...

Synopsis:
RGA is deadly against a Borg empire. Especially if you can (thanks to a superior number of small ships) overload the Borg defences which usually consist of a rather small number of very heavy ships that normally can be chunneled to the action, but in the case of numerous small intruders... After this game I can only state that the Rebels (besides the better-known candidates Privs and Birds) are ideally suited to deal with an established Borg empire. Jump in with Falcons loaded with clans, set to RGA and have fun. Sure, you'll lose them, but who cares, Borg is gonna lose bases and might win a Falcon with clans. After the ship limit not much to worry about. And the clans in Borg hands are worth nil: if there's one thing a Borg has in abundance then it's clans.

Angelica DeRose

PS: the game stats can be viewed here.