Backstory:
Early in the Alien vs Terran war, a series of skirmishes were fought in an obscure, backwater system on the very edge of the two empires. There were no military bases or highly populated planets there, just some scattered asteroid mining operations established by both races before hostilities broke out. Neither race's military could afford to send regular fleets to a region so far from the war's main fronts.
They did know that the rare isotopes from the system's asteroids were important to military production efforts and to maintaining the civilian economies that paid for the war. The race that could claim the most asteroid belts would gain a real advantage if the war continued for years. They planned to build powerful defensive space stations in each belt to protect the miners. But space station construction isn't something that can happen overnight. Just like in that ancient Terran movie, a partially constructed station is vulnerable to fire from ships that can get in close. Each belt would have to be secured by space fighters before a station could be assembled in it.
The task of securing the belts was given to independent pilots who, before the war, had worked for the mining companies flying personnel and supplies where they were needed. The Terran and Alien governments each provided their pilots with small budgets to arm and upgrade civilian ships, turning them into irregular fighters. At the outset, the budgets of the two sides were more or less equal, but losses would take their toll. The mission of these irregular pilots was to secure as many asteroid belts as they could, without costing too much in replacement ships and gear.
The Campaign Plan:
The campaign will be played in rounds, each consisting of two battles taking place at the same time. The initial plan is to have five rounds for a total of ten battles. I expect most of the battles to be three or four to a side, but if there's enough interest we can make them larger. Similarly, we can add additional rounds if desired. Players can join battles on either side, so if you want, you can join both games in a round on opposite sides. I'll start a sign-up thread where players can post which side they are going to be on for each battle.
The Terran Irregulars will be team one. They're likely to have nimble, low powered fighters with lots of missiles, short range lasers and OFCs. The Alien Independents will be team two. Their ships will almost always have dual thrusters and light spinners, and they tend to mount lots of longer range QGP guns and inertial grenades.
All fighters must be custom designs and each should have a character piloting them. If you want to play but don't have a free Terran or Alien pilot, start a new one on the "My Characters" page.
Scoring:
The winning team will be the one that wins the most battles. A battle is won by having at least one ship left on the battlefield at the end. If neither side has any ships left, the battle has no winner.
A secondary consideration is the loss of ships. This does not play any part in determining the overall winner of the campaign, but it will effect the budgets of the two teams in later rounds. Budgets will start at 900 and automatically increase in the next round by 10 points for each fighter used by the team. However, each fighter that is destroyed reduces the team's budget by 20 points (for a net change of -10). This means at team taking exactly 50% casualties will maintain an even budget while taking heavier losses will see its budget go down from round to round. Winning battles has no effect on the budget (so beware of early Pyrrhic victories). There is no budgetary penalty for retreating.
Because the budgets are likely to remain less than 1000 points, the battles cannot be played for stats. Each battle will be set up to allow a budget corresponding to the higher of the two team's budgets. Players on the other team are on their honor not to overspend!
Planning for Battle:
The available communication system (radio) in Void Patrol is difficult to use effectively. Messages must be very short and are delayed a turn before they are seen by teammates. This doesn't allow much strategic play, which a campaign like this really requires.
To encourage the best play we can get, I will create a pair of forum threads for each battle of the campaign. Players who sign up can read and post in the appropriate thread until the battle's first turn has been processed. Discussions can involve fighter design, initial moves and reactions to the enemy designs after all players have built their fighters. Once the game is underway, discussion should use the radio for orders and guidance or the in game chat area for OOC taunting and complaining about the RNG. Once again, players are on their honor to not read posts in the other team's thread.
Use this thread to discuss this campaign idea. Nothing is set in stone yet, so if you think there can be improvements, please suggest them. Once I feel we have the best setup we can get, I'll kick off round one.
, warm hugs, and no money.