Dindrenzi Conquerors

So last night, Brian, Dan, Jay and I all headed over to Brian's place to get a couple games of Firestorm Armada in. Dan had put out a blanket challenge (I had just played him last so I couldn't accept) and Jay jumped at the chance. That left me facing off against the evil Aquans again. Er, I guess, the good Aquans, since I'm playing a militaristic, totalitarianism society. We've quelled demonstrations with marines and we're about to press-gang populations into serving as crew on our ships. It's good to be bad sometimes. Especially since Brian's decided his Aquans are the quintessential good guys, trying to spread peace and love throughout the universe.

Anywho, we both rolled and I ended up being the attacker. Awesome deal - I put my ships into the same place we were before. We got a battle and Planetary Assault - couldn't be thematically any better. I'm pouring in with 1000 points (plus three Transports filled with additional marines) and he's got 900 points along with 70 extra points of planetary defenses.

I brought back the DFS Lord of the Flies for a second stab at the Aquans, and brought in the DFS Fallen Angel for its maiden voyage. The rest was filled out with some Cruisers and Frigates.

Brian pulled in two Battleships and support craft and set himself across from me, ready to stop me from dropping off marines to take over the planet. Not going to be the easiest task with the massive fleet across from him.

And then I saw the planetary defenses he selected. Between me and my target was a massive mine field three mines thick. Closer to the planet were two torpedo drones with tons of torpedoes sitting on them. This was going to be rough. Anything smaller than a battleship would probably take damage from the mines, and the battleship was severely threatened by the friggin' torpedo drones.

I made a quick decision - play for the mission and damn my losses. Battleships led the way, detonating the mine fields all around them and putting a couple points into each of Brian's battleships. Not enough to do a lot of damage, but enough to scratch the paint. My entire fleet followed into the hole they were creating.

Between the torpedo drones and the combined fire from his battleships, the Aquan commander was able to take revenge against the dreaded DFS Lord of the Flies, blasting it apart. The DFS Fallen Angel was fairing little better, already having taken 9 damage of its 10 possible. It was teetering on its last leg.

Fortunately, the sacrifice of the two battleships gave my smaller craft enough cover to break through his lines and head straight for the planet to deploy the marines.

Soon, there was a massive battle taking place in the middle of the field with Aquans picking off Dindrenzi ships left and right while any survivors blew past the Aquans and dropped their marines off.

The Aquans inflicted massive casualties on the Dindrenzi fleet, making them pay for every piece they got, but eventually the Dindrenzi marines overwhelmed the planet as more and more ships broke through the lines.




In the end, the Dindrenzi pulled out a victory, but at great cost. They lost more than half of their fleet and inflicted minor damage on the Aquan fleet. While the Dindrenzi name became more feared, it was the Aquan commander that everyone spoke of more, and his daring and, given the situation, impressive defense of the planet.