Otterhound

Stellar Conquest

The players were Andy York at entry point 1, Kevin Wilson at entry point 2, Bob Robles at entry point 3, and Bill Scharf at entry point 4. In the early game, all players concentrated on building up their colonies, but Andy did split his forces a bit, which ended up costing him. On turn 6, his colony at Dubhe was conquered by Bill. That colony ended up changing hands 2 more times during the game, making it the most contested colony. Kevin went in big for military technology right away, and was the first player to get both death stars and improved ship weaponry. Bill, on the other hand, was the first player to get planetary shields, which ended up making the difference. Bob was the only player to colonize any mineral rich planets, but the extra production was not decisive. In the end, here are the results:

Andy York (Player 1) controls colonies on Scorpii T80 (3), Aurigae T60 (3), and Mirach S40 (1) for 7 points.

Kevin Wilson (Player 2) controls colonies on Ceti T60 (3), Alcor T80 (3), Hydrae S60 (1), Mira S60 (1), Rastaban S40 (1), Sadir S40 (1), Eridani S60 (1), Pherda S20 (1), Sirius S20 (1), and Alphard T60 (3) and controls uncolonized planets Capella S40 (1) and Kaptyen S40 (1) for 18 points.

Bob Robles (Player 3) controls colonies on Canis T80 (3), Indi T40 (3), Kochab MT10MR (0), Ophiuchi MT30MR (0), and Diphda T80 (3) for 9 points.

Bill Scharf (Player 4) controls colonies on Bootis T60 (3), Tauri T80 (3), Wezen T60 (3), Spica T60 (3), Arcturus S40 (1), Wolf S40 (1), Dubhe T60 (3), Polaris S40 (1), Crucis MT20 (0), Draconis T80 (3), Cygni MT40 (0), Lyrae S40 (1), and Scheat S40 (1) for 23 points.

Congratulations to Bill Scharf on his victory!

Bill Scharf (Player 4): Thanks for running the game Chris, you’ve done your usual excellent job of gming. It was a very close game, one I didn’t expect to win. It was an unusually quiet game...which is always a bit nerve-wracking.

Andrew York and I sparred over Dubhe and Polaris. But not an all out effort, which made me think he was under a lot of pressure from player two...or he was building up for a massive retaliatory strike...neither of which would be good for me.

Bob Robles made a strike against Tauri later in the game with two Death Stars....but I destroyed them without loss...so he didn’t find out I had shield Technology by then. Again we didn’t do a lot of other fighting...so player two pressure was looking a bit more likely. I moved big time into the center and ran into a lot, a whole lot of Kevin Wilson Death Stars. I had no idea of how successful he’d been against the other two players so I set about grabbing anything I could in the middle of the board...and trying to destroy as many Death Stars that I could to limit his offensives. I ended the game with only six ships, three of them Death Stars, but I had fifteen points worth of planets defended with shields by then..which turned out to be enough. Thanks for sparring with me guys...I had a lot of fun trying to figure out what was going on, and what to do about it.

Kevin Wilson (Player 2): I think the game was even closer than Bill thought in his comments. We get VP for controlling systems in addition to colonies not conquered by someone else. Bill still wins but it was tighter still. I look forward to the update from Chris on just how close.

I tried a fairly simple strategy for this game. I decided on a number of VP that I guessed might be sufficient to win. I decided 22 or more would do it. My sole focus was finding/identifying that many VP and preparing to grab them. I wanted to build resources and ships for most of the game then “burst” out of my cocoon at the end.

First, I negotiated borders with my two neighbors then, other than the occasional Scout, stayed within those borders. No warships went beyond them until the end.

I explored every star within reach and within those borders to find the VP identified. I found 5 Terran planets (15 VP) and 10 Sub-Terran (10 points) so that was enough. Only two of the T-planets (Ceti and Alcor) were in my corner so they were my first focus. Fill them up, produce weapons and research and ship out excess population. My main goal was to get them behind Planetary Shields and with Unlimited Ship Range, they could allow the final push for VP.

Unfortunately I didn’t find a single mineral rich planet that wasn’t barren. I didn’t want to spend the IP to be able to colonize them so I didn’t have a secret, super-productive base. That may have been my eventual downfall as though I had a decent fleet of DS come game end, it turned out it wasn’t enough.

Then, I put small colonies everywhere so that if needed, I could pop up CPs anywhere. But, few visits from other players in my corner let me keep that to a minimum. I also kind of hoped all those CP flags might attract some attention away from other areas but again, no one came calling.

Once I had the range and protection it was Death Stars only. In other games I’ve ended up with more than this time, only 13, but I did add Improved Weaponry so 13 acted like 26 if in combat. Then it was just put them in place to try for the remaining systems and VP. Having on 13 DS I think was a result of not having any productive mineral rich planets. Had I found simply one, I think I could have had 2 maybe 3 more.

After turn 40 I had 3 T-planets behind shields for 9 VP and 8 ST-planets in my control. That was 17 of my targeted 22+ so I need to go grab 5 more. Moves on Diphda, Draconis, Capella, Almach and Scheat were the play. My hope was I didn’t lose too many in my backyard and picked up enough of the new to get me where I wanted. The DSs focused on Diphda and Draconis as those were critical to the target. But, splitting my DS as I did meant I didn’t take any. And a couple I found colonies already in place behind shields, obviously someone who did find a productive mineral rich planet. Perhaps if I had kept the DS together or in only 2 TFs, I might have successfully grabbed a system or two that I had targeted. Taking 1 from Bill might have made the difference, especially with the game tighter than the initial end report suggests. We’ll see.

In games in the past I’ve been lucky enough to find the MT40MR or MT30MR planet. One of those can make all the difference. Even a MT20MR can be the difference as it can pump out a DS every turn from early in the game. Failing to find even 1 of those slowed my production.

I look forward to hearing Bob’s comments. Early in the game one of his corvettes was cavorting in my back field. I didn’t see any CP so he must have developed USR early. It caused me to turtle down a bit more than I might have. But I didn’t see much of his ships after that. Had I stayed a bit more assertive on my perimeter perhaps I would have beaten Bill to some of the T-planets in the center.

Thanks to the others for playing and essentially leaving me alone in my corner. Congrats to Bill on a well played game. Being across the board from one another, we didn’t cross swords until the end and by then, it was too late. I’m guessing you found 1 or more of those valuable MTXXMR planets.

Thanks to Chris for running the game which is, I’m sure, a bookkeeping nightmare. It’s an oldie but a goodie and a favorite. I’ll play anytime anyone wants to.

Andy York (Player 1): Well, my usual dismal result in this game, just can't figure out a viable strategy to do well.

Congrats to Bill on his win and thanks to Chris for keeping the game on track.

Bob Robles (Player 3): Thanks for the great game, Chris for running it and for the other players. I have not played this game in a very long time so I was torn between go-for-broke expansion and a more conservative strategy. Unfortunately, I think I chose the worst of both. I agree with Bill, an unusually quiet game with little combat in my sector until the very end. Congratulations to Bill for a well deserved win.