[StarSlayer]

I dunno, I just find torpedoes to be wholly unreliable for the amount of micro required.  Even when I shock jump a CA on an unshielded target and derp them with a full volley the damage is just wildly inconsistent.  Really they should make the damage worth the effort or increase the ease of use, its probably contributing to the Nova cheese builds complained about on the forums.  Its too bad because I would like to try spamming Cobras but right now the Swords are entirely more versatile.  Since I use my CL to ride herd on the escort flotilla and the Dauntess with lance is more useful in the skirmish/pursuit role.

I do wish they allowed a fourth CA slot though, I would like to try out the Gothic or run two Lunars but I'm not going to cough up an upgraded Dominator or Tyrant. 

[NGTM-1R]

My experience is that the torpedoes, which have effectively infinite range, are slightly more valuable because you can fire them all the way across the map a couple times during the closing stage and either deal some damage or disrupt some formations with them.

I was a little surprised to notice that, but they do basically just keep running until you run out of map and effectively outrange even Nova Cannon, which you can also usually manage to get off a couple rounds of before contact to mess with people. You can usually afford the micro to throw some overlapping torpedo spreads during the initial closing stages too. Afterwards, they serve as a means to deal opportunity damage, or to throw shade that keeps people on their toes as the fight breaks into two fights or enemy ships are falling behind/trying to join up with others.

Also, space station assault. Standoff weapons that pierce shields and reload.

[The E]

Torpedoes feel very underwhelming for the kind of setup you have to do in order to use them effectively; right now, I feel like they're at their most useful when doing station assaults. In ship-to-ship combat, the Nova cannon rules supreme; A Mars and two Dominators are really good at trashing things.

[0rph3u5]

Patch Notes for the upcoming balance changes:

Torpedoes:
- Now have armor piercing. (Reducing the enemy armor to 25%)

I persisted to keep them as in the board game despite all the negative comments regarding their effectiveness. But after testing them with this change i must admit they are more interesting, devastating and give more incentive to dodge them.

Nova Cannon:
- Minimal range increase from 5000 to 6000.
- Slightly increase the dispersion radius.
- Slightly decrease the epicenter. (Area that deal max damage)

I think this should decrease a bit the Nova Cannon spam without rendering it useless.

Chaos rework:
- Add more Chaos macro turrets variation in order to fit with the rulebook range stats.
- Add new heavy missile pods to the Chaos weaponry in order to fit with the rulebook firepower stats. (DPS: 3)
- Add a missile pod (range 6000) to the Slaughter/Devastation.
- Add a heavy missile pod (range 9000) to the Acheron.
- Add a super heavy missile pod (range 12000) to the Carnage/Styx.
- Add 2 heavy missile (range 12000) pod to the Desolator.
- Slaughter speed have been increase by 50.
- Light macro turret are now called Light missile pod.
- Missile pod rate of fire is now 6.
- Twin linked battery rate of fire is now 3.
- Iconoclast now have 6 missile pod instead of 9.
- Chaos heavy macro battery no longer have 12 attacks but 8.
- Chaos heavy lances battery no longer exist. All Chaos heavy lances occurrences are replaced by Chaos lances battery.
- Chaos heavy launch bay no longer exist. All Chaos heavy launch bay occurrences are replaced by Chaos launch bay.
- Add a prow launch bay to the Chaos weaponry that count as 2 launch bay.
- Add a prow launch bay to the despoiler.
- Replace the twin linked battery of the Devastation by a lance battery.
- Chaos macro battery rate of fire is now 5.
- Chaos heavy macro battery rate of fire is now 6.
- All point costs have been modified to fit with new stats values.

With those changes, Chaos will fit more to the stats of the TT. For most ship it's a up!
Most important thing is the addition of a new missile pods and the range variation on macro turrets that allow us to perfectly match the firepower and arc of fire of Chaos ships that you find in the BFG rulebook. Maybe some of you didn't noticed it but DPS of the weapons match the firepower of the TT. Only exception was some Chaos ships for various technical and complex reasons. this will be no longer the case in the next patch.

Retribution:
- Retribution speed have been increase by 50.

[StarSlayer]

Well it will be interesting to see if the new patch ups the usefulness of torpedoes.  I'm getting tired of dumping full cruiser salvos into targets and getting little to no damage.  I also traded in my Lunar for a Gothic need to get some more reps in to get a feel for her. 

Managed to ranch up to Level 7 with the Speedy Spikey lot.  This faction seems to be all about the Cruisers, once you can start running a pack of them this Chaos comes into its own.   Individually I don't think the ships are as powerful as their IN counterparts but as a group when circling at 9-12km focusing down targets one at a time all that DPM stacks up quick.  Their ships are also pretty fast, allowing you to abuse your range by kiting and obviating the need for lighter ships to scout and pursue like the IN.  Since they seem most comfortable in a certain playstyle I find they are not as flexible as the Imperials for certain game modes.  I'm using the Mark of Tzeentch not because its useful against AI but because I like the blue and gold 

I'm currently running:

Battleship:
Despoiler Class Harbinger
-Spawns lots of strikecraft and has long range batteries and lances to contribute to the cruiser brawl.

Battlecruisers:
Styx Class Wages of Sin 
-Pretty solid CV, more launch bays than the Mars at the cost of ship to ship.  After they nerfed the Assault Boats I'm not sure CVs are quite as powerful, I am hoping they will buff bombers at some point.
Acheron Class The Herald of Torment 
-Lances akimbo, I think this ship really klicks with the Carnage, once they knock down the shields the Acheron just goes punish mode.

Cruisers:
Carnage Class Carnage Kabuto  (It goes on a killing rampage until next Saturday!)
-Fairly powerful long range batteries.  Very straightforward upgrade path and a strong ranged broadside
Carnage Class Tyrant's Test
Slaughter Class The Chains of Anguish 
-Short ranged mixed load out of Lances and Macro Batteries, I've been upgrading it to tank damage in a brawl.

Light Cruisers:
Hellbringer Mk2 The Night Caller
-Probably the best choice of Chaos CL.  Speedy mix of Lances and batteries, can scout and then plink from range, though I think the Dauntless siblings are better.
Hellbringer Mk2 The Night Hunter
Hellbringer The Night Stalker
-Nice little carrier CL, don't think its that useful in low points/low tier games but if you have some spare points what the hey.

Escorts:
Idolator Class
-Unlike the IN I think Choas escorts are pretty crap, this fleet is all about maxing out on the CAs.  If I have the spare points I take one of these lance boats as fodder.


Overall I prefer the IN but Chaos can be fun when you max out the cruiser synergy.

[NGTM-1R]

I'm a little disappointed by the bland repeat of the IN progression with Chaos. It required inventing some classes (at least the Hellbringer technically does exist), but battlecruisers are an IN thing, whereas Chaos is to either side of the clean cruiser-battlecruiser progression with heavy cruisers that are nominally more powerful than cruisers but not by much, and grand cruisers which are definitely more powerful than battlecruisers but still weaker than battleships.

There were also some IN ships that fell into these categories, and I am a bit mad the game is simply not set up for me to deploy the only BFG ship I still own: the Avenger-class Grand Cruiser Imperium Lux.

It'll be really bad with the Eldar, though. They actually have a good variety of light cruisers, but not a single battlecruiser-type vessel to their name, even in supplementary materials and Fantasy Flight Games stuff.

[0rph3u5]

It'll be really bad with the Eldar, though. They actually have a good variety of light cruisers, but not a single battlecruiser-type vessel to their name, even in supplementary materials and Fantasy Flight Games stuff.

The Void Stalker is already in the trailers (List of Eldar Ships)

Disregard the Void Stalker is battleship not a battlecruiser

[StarSlayer]

I'm a little disappointed by the bland repeat of the IN progression with Chaos. It required inventing some classes (at least the Hellbringer technically does exist), but battlecruisers are an IN thing, whereas Chaos is to either side of the clean cruiser-battlecruiser progression with heavy cruisers that are nominally more powerful than cruisers but not by much, and grand cruisers which are definitely more powerful than battlecruisers but still weaker than battleships.

I was under the impression IN BCs and Chaos Heavies are essentially upgunned versions of the standard cruiser hull?  It looks like that is how they are made from the TT models.  I can see the need for the CLs though, having to rank up early game with only escorts would be a major drag.

[NGTM-1R]

I was under the impression IN BCs and Chaos Heavies are essentially upgunned versions of the standard cruiser hull?  It looks like that is how they are made from the TT models.  I can see the need for the CLs though, having to rank up early game with only escorts would be a major drag.

The TT Chaos list did treat them as battlecruiser effectively (1 CA for every 2 C) and gave them similar points values, but they tended to be more fragile than IN BCs on the table if not at first glance.

But the way it treated Grand Cruisers as identical to battleships (1 GC or BB for every 3 C) contrasts kind of sharply with their points values; a Repulsive is 230 points making it cost less than a Styx CA by the price of an Idolator, and cheaper than either a Desolator or an IN Emperor-class by at least 70 points.

Even the most expensive Grand Cruiser, the Retaliator-class, is only 275 points, making it still less than a Styx by 15 points and 25 points cheaper than a Desolator. A GC has 10 hits to the 12 of a BB and resolves them as a cruiser rather than a BB, 2 shields to to the 4 of a BB, etc. They're really not battleships.

[StarSlayer]

Well if we are lucky they will add them in later, I'm still hoping for the Apocalypse Class BB because it's got the most dank prow in BFG. 

Anyway I got the itch to try BFG so I scrounged up some stuff of eBay.  I will be stripping and repairing minis in the near future.  Seven assorted IN cruisers, two Dauntless CLs and six Sword Frigates should be a decent starting place.

[NGTM-1R]

Has the game been delayed? It was counting down to noon today on the preorder pack, now it's not.

[The E]

The preorder thing has been extended to March 31st, so who knows?

[NGTM-1R]

It appears it has been delayed to the 31st, though steam is snafuing about it; according to the front page it's released, according to the store page it's not.

[StarSlayer]

I haven't tried the Desolator but considering how well my IN CAs counter it I wasn't impressed, but this thing on the other hand is pretty snazzy:



Lots of attack craft bays backed by long range batteries and lances.  The Despoiler augments the Chaos Cruiser swarm handily.

[Mikes]

I haven't tried the Desolator but considering how well my IN CAs counter it I wasn't impressed, but this thing on the other hand is pretty snazzy:

...

Lots of attack craft bays backed by long range batteries and lances.  The Despoiler augments the Chaos Cruiser swarm handily.

It won't be no match for Orc Techniology!!!! :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=19JRYTkg5fQ

[The E]

So, the official release has been pushed back to April 21st. But we will get Orks in the beta soon, and there's going to be a 5th fleet added in as a bonus.

[0rph3u5]

The 5th Fleet is probably being the Adeptus Mechanicus aka the Cult of the Machine God. Mechanicum had only 3 unique ships but access to the Imperiums entire arsenal with a few alternations and perks.

[The E]

Could also be Dark Eldar. I figure any fleet that can be made by kitbashing existing models is probable at this time.

[0rph3u5]

Could also be Dark Eldar. I figure any fleet that can be made by kitbashing existing models is probable at this time.

Dark Eldar would be really nice (I started in Wh40k with 3rd Ed Dark Eldar, so nostalgia aplenty there) but DE had a very radical face-lift while BFG was no longer supported:

This is the Raven Fighter, featuring the old aesthetic:


This the Razorwing Fighter, featuring the new aesthetic:


There is also now a single piece of artwork (5th Ed. book, p. 9; 7th Ed. book, p. 11) which features Dark Eldar ships which look very different from the BFG ships (though they are very small in that piece)

[NGTM-1R]

The 5th Fleet is probably being the Adeptus Mechanicus aka the Cult of the Machine God. Mechanicum had only 3 unique ships but access to the Imperiums entire arsenal with a few alternations and perks.

My money's on Tau, Tyranids, or simply the Space Marines that they've been advertising already be promoted to not-DLC status. They all have "full" fleets, so.