Post by Fadril Adren on Mar 22, 2016 19:49:49 GMT -5
Rebel and Imperial fleets fight for the fate of the galaxy in Star Wars™: Armada, the two-player miniatures game of epic Star Wars space battles!
Massive Star Destroyers fly to battle against Rebel corvettes and frigates. Banks of turbolasers unleash torrential volleys of fire against squadrons of X-wings and TIEs. Engineering teams race to route additional power to failing shields. Laser blasts and explosions flare across the battlefield. Even a single ship can change the tide of battle.
In Star Wars: Armada, you assume the role of fleet admiral, serving with either the Imperial Navy or Rebel Alliance. It’s your job to issue the tactical commands that will decide the course of battle and, perhaps, the fate of the galaxy.
Assault Frigate Mark II
The largest and most heavily armed of the Rebellion’s first wave of starships for Star Wars: Armada, the Assault Frigate Mark II is a light warship seven-hundred meters long that sports a crew just under five-thousand and features a considerable armament of fifteen turbolaser batteries, fifteen laser cannons, and twenty quad laser cannons. Designed in secret by Rebel engineers, the Assault Frigate Mark II frequently surprises Imperial admirals with its speed.
The Assault Frigate Mark II Expansion Pack introduces one fully pre-painted Assault Frigate Mark II starship miniature, along with all the command dials and tokens that you need to bring it to battle. Two ship cards allow you to configure your Assault Frigate Mark II to better fit your fleet, and fourteen upgrade cards allow you to further refine its role within your fleet as you select your crew, upgrade your armament, and assign your commander.
The third of the Rebel starship expansion packs in the first wave of Armada releases is the Assault Frigate Mark II Expansion Pack.
Featuring one pre-painted Assault Frigate Mark II miniature and fourteen upgrades, this is the big Rebel expansion for admirals who want to battle the Empire’s Star Destroyers on more even terms. While neither the CR90 corvette or Nebulon-B frigate wield firepower that measures up to a Star Destroyer’s, and both demand that you fly them carefully about the battlefield in order to limit their exposure to your opponent’s main weapons, the Assault Frigate Mark II can fire attacks of four dice from either its left or right hull zone.
Those are attack values that match the Gladiator-class Star Destroyer’s best attacks for total dice, but at a greater distance, and while they don’t quite measure up to the Victory-class Star Destroyer’s forward attack, they give the advantage to any Rebel commander who can maneuver an Assault Frigate Mark II alongside a Victory-class Star Destroyer, whose left and right hull zones attack for only three dice each.
As to be expected, as with each of the other ships, there are multiple ways to outfit your Assault Frigate Mark II, and you will find notable differences between the eighty-one fleet point Assault Frigate Mark II A and the seventy-two fleet point Assault Frigate Mark II B.
The ship cards for the Assault Frigate Mark II A (left) and the Assault Frigate Mark II B (right).
For the extra fleet points it costs you, the Assault Frigate Mark II A gains an extra blue attack die from its forward and rear hull zones. It also features a more impressive anti-squadron armament of two blue dice, instead of just one. On the other hand, the Assault Frigate Mark II B features a squadron value of “3” instead of “2.” It may not be as well-equipped at dealing with enemy fighters directly, but it can better coordinate any fighter wing sent to escort it.
However, both versions of the Assault Frigate Mark II feature a command value of “3,” meaning that it’s noticeably less responsive than the Rebellion’s other ships. As is true of all the starships in Armada, the more powerful ships demand that you plan further ahead.
Still, the ships larger command value also means that it can hold more command tokens for later use, and that pairs well with the ability of the expansion’s commander, Garm Bel Iblis, who in both the game’s first and penultimate rounds allows you to add a number of command tokens to each of your ships equal to their command ratings.
Garm Bel Iblis is accompanied within the expansion’s upgrades by another unique Rebel, Adar Tallon, who serves equally well aboard the Assault Frigate Mark II B and the Yavaris. For ten fleet points, Adar Tallon basically allows you to get double the value out of your best squadron pilot every round, and if you choose to go all-in on the investment in your squadrons, you may also wish to consider equipping your Assault Frigate Mark II B with the Gallant Haven title, which reduces by one the total damage dealt to any of your squadrons at distance “1.”
Like the Nebulon-B frigate, the Assault Frigate Mark II also seems to be meant for one of two roles, and if you opt not to outfit it as a fighter escort, then you can add the Paragon title to add one black die to any attack your ship makes as a second attack against the same target. With the Paragon title, your Assault Frigate Mark II A can concentrate its fire upon a single foe for as many as eight attack dice, or nine if you also outfit it with the Enhanced Armament upgrade.
Even Star Destroyers have a hard time concentrating nine dice at the same foe, and if you start launching those sorts of explosive attacks against your enemies, it’s worth taking a look at adding the Sensor Team upgrade to your ship. At the cost of two dice, the Sensor Team allows you to gain an accuracy result when you need it to prevent your opponent from halving the damage his ship would otherwise take.