Tag Archives: Terledrom

Second Battle of Fromeltar (Terledrom) – FY62.083

In an unexpected and horrifying turn of events, the sathar fleet attacked the civilian orbital shipyard around Terledrom in their attack today before retreating from the system. The shipyard was completely destroyed along with all the ships under construction. Many of the crew and engineers were lost as well.

Task Force Cassidine, together with with the new Frontier Fighter Corps squadron and the militia drove off the attackers destroying five major vessels of the sathar fleet. UPF forces lost fourteen of the twenty fighters in the system and the militia lost one of its assault scouts. Luckily nearly all the crew were recovered. The militia frigate was significantly damaged as well and will be heading to Outer Reach in the Dramune system for repairs with the loss of the local shipyard.

Kat’kst’kll, Terledrom News Service

Background

Deciding on a change of tactics, the sathar launch a massive fleet at Fromeltar, larger than any of the fleets seen so far in the Frontier.  Despite the increased size of the Fromeltar militia and the presence of Frontier Fighter Corps Squadron Gamma, these ships plus the depleted Task Force Cassidine are outgunned by the incoming sathar fleet.  The UPF has more ships, 32 vs 21, but twenty of the UPF ships are fighters with another 7 being assault scouts.  The UPF fleet only has 5 capital ships, a battleship, an assault carrier, and three frigates, compared to the 10 capital ships of the sathar fleet including four heavy cruisers.

However, unlike previous sorties into the Frontier, the primary target of this attack is not the ships of Spacefleet but rather the starship construction center in that system.  This is only going to be a hit and run on the sathar’s part and they aren’t planning on a major engagement with the fleet.  Three hours before the sathar ships reach the planet, the assault carrier deploys its fighters and turns to head home.  It looks like the fighters are to be sacrificed.

Order of Battle

UPF

Task Force Cassidine

  • 9 fighters
  • 3 assault scouts
  • 2 frigates
  • 1 assault carrier
  • 1 battleship

FFC Squadron Gamma

  • 8 fighters

Terledrom Militia

  • 3 fighters (manned for UPF)
  • 4 assault scouts
  • 1 frigate
  • armed station
  • Terledrom SCC

Sathar

  • 9 fighters
  • 2 cutters
  • 3 frigates
  • 1 destroyer
  • 2 light cruisers
  • 4 heavy cruisers
  • 1 assault carrier (not participating in battle)

The Battle

Setup

Unlike previous engagements, instead of continuing to slow as they approach the planet, two hours out, the sathar forces start accelerating instead of continuing to slow down.  Additionally instead of dispersing out to engage the UPF forces, the fleet amasses into a single tight formation bearing directly on the planet.  They enter the map at speed 44.

Caught by surprise by the sathar’s speedup, the UPF forces scramble to gain speed and because of this are somewhat out of position as the attack commences.  The fighters and assault scouts have matched the sathar’s speed but the frigates have only achieved a speed of 35 while the battleship and assault carrier are at speed 20.  The fighters form up into flights of 3 or 4 ships and the assault scout fly in pairs or trios.

Positions at the start of the battle. The sathar are all massed into a single hex with the composition shown in the upper right box. The gray background space station is the starship construction center and the blue background one is the armed station in the system. Click for full size image.

Turn 1

The sathar stay as a group and accelerate with an ADF of 2 to a speed of 46. The armed station, expecting to be obliterated, fires its laser battery and rocket battery at a pair of fighters, hoping to reduce the assault rockets coming at it but both miss. 

Surprisingly the sathar do not attack the armed station or continue on toward the UPF ships. Rather they swing around the planet, using the gravity of the planet to get an extra turn for the heavy cruisers and as they pass by, unload all of their firepower into the starship construction center orbiting behind the armed station.  Defenseless, the SCC is pummeled by the sathar attacks.

Eight of the nine assault rockets connect with various parts of the shipyard, five of which do double damage reducing the hull integrity of the station by 35%.  Six of the ten fired rocket batteries hit reducing the hull integrity by another 15%.  Only four of the ten torpedoes connect and amazingly are not very effective, reducing the hull integrity by only another 11%.  Four of the six disruptor cannons connect knocking out the station’s DCR, and reducing its hull integrity by another 7%.  All four laser cannons hit dropping the hull integrity another 10%.  Seven of the ten electron and proton batteries connect, inducing an electrical fire and reducing the hull integrity by another 4%.  Finally, fifteen of the eighteen laser batteries connect reducing the hull integrity by another 17% leaving the station with just 1% of its hull integrity remaining.  Finally, the heavy cruisers deploy some seeker missiles along their path to activate against pursing ships.

Enraged by the nearly complete destruction of the shipyard, its crews, and the ships inside, the UPF forces swarm after the fleeing sathar vessels.  The only exception is the assault carrier which flies to get as far away from the sathar as possible. The battleship is moving too slow to get into range, and the two UPF frigates can’t get to optimal range but are at least able to bring some of their weapons to bear.  The fire on the SCC knocks out half of its remaining hull integrity (3 of 600 HP left).

Recognizing the danger of all the fighters, the sathar concentrate their defensive fire on that threat.  The defensive fire destroys four fighters and nearly destroys two more.  It damages the engines on two fighters, and completely knocks out the engines on another.  It knocks out the maneuvering system on one fighter and the assault rocket launcher on yet another.  Finally, one of the fighters is hit damaging its combat control system.

The UPF ships return fire with a vengeance.  The fighters concentrate on two of the heavy cruisers while the assault scouts focus one of the light cruisers.  The frigates focus on one of their counterparts.  The more distant frigates miss but the one close in with the fighters connects with its laser cannon and a torpedo.  The don’t do as much damages as they could but still manage to take out 67% of the sathar frigate’s hull integrity (the LC only did 3 HP and the T, while rolling double damage, only did 24 HP).

The assault scouts miss with their laser batteries but connect with six of the seven assault rockets on the light cruiser knocking out its ICM launcher and damaging its maneuvering jets before the others slam into it and destroy it completely.  The first heavy cruiser is hit by six of the eight assault rockets launched at it.  The rockets take out just over half of its hull integrity, knock out its maneuvering, damage its engines, knock out its disruptor cannon, and cause a power short circuit knocking out all of its screens and ICMs. The second doesn’t fare as well.  It is also hit by six assault rockets.  The first three knock out about 56% of its hull integrity, the next two damage its engines and knock out its maneuvering.  But the final assault rocket slams into the cruiser’s torpedo magazine causing a massive explosion that destroys the ship.

Courses and positions after the first round. The UPF ships show in the yellow boxes are positioned at the corresponding letter on the map. Their facing is as given in the boxes. Click for larger image.

Turn 2

The sathar continue to effect their retreat from the system.  The wounded heavy cruiser with no MR, accompanied by the wounded frigate accelerate by 1 (the HC’s max) and continue straight and the frigate doesn’t break up from the slight acceleration.  The other capital ships make a turn to port, accelerate by two and begin to leave the inner system.  The fighters loop back to make a pass at the battleship.

At the same time the sathar activate three of the seeker missiles that they had deployed last turn. The first one starts to accelerate toward the armed station.  The second activates among all the fighters and assault scouts and targets the militia frigate in that group. The third goes after the UPF frigate just behind the larger group of ships chasing the sathar fleet.  Both frigates fire off all of their ICMs in an attempt to intercept the incoming missile.  The missile going after the UPF frigate manages to evade the seeker missile but the militia frigate isn’t so lucky.  The missile slams home but mercifully doesn’t destroy the ship.  It’s hull integrity is only reduced by 40% (only 16 points on 5d10).

Defensively, the armed station, UPF frigate A, and the battleship fire at the fighters while the other ships focus on the damaged heavy cruiser.  The frigate connects with the lead fighter knocking out its AR launcher.  The station misses but the battleship hit with 2 laser batteries destroying one fighter and knocking out the AR launcher on a second, and its disruptor cannon vaporizes a second fighter.  The other frigates and assault scouts, firing on the damaged heavy cruiser, only manage to land two laser battery hits (from the militia frigate and assault scout) knocking out the cruisers PB and only scratching its hull (1 HP).

Offensively, the sathar fighters fire their assault rockets at the battleship, but the destruction of and damage to their wingworms distract them and only one of the five rockets connect damaging the battleship’s engines.

The fleeing sathar ships focus the energy battery weapons on the fighters behind them, while they focus their cannons and rocket batteries on the fighters in the lower group (C) along their flight path.  They fire torpedoes at the frigate and assault scouts behind them as well.  The assault scouts immediately start dodging in an attempt to evade the incoming torpedoes but the frigate, having expended its ICMs unsuccessfully on the seeker missile can only watch as the torpedo homes in.

While the torpedoes are only moderately successful, damaging the LC on the militia frigate and destroying one of the militia assault scouts, the energy weapons and rocket batteries are much more effective, completely destroying the fighters along the sathar flight path and destroying four fighters in the trailing groups.  In addition, two more fighters are damaged (12% and 88% hull integrity left).

With the battleship too slow to catch the fleeing ships, and some of the assault scouts thrown off track trying to avoid the incoming torpedoes, the UPF cannot safely pursue the larger group of sathar vessels and go after the damaged ships to finish them off.  Three of the assault scouts are able to pursue even with their evasive maneuvers and are joined by the four functional fighters.  One fighter has its maneuvering damaged and just starts to decelerate.  The sixth fighter cannot accelerate and tries to stay with the main group but falls behind and doesn’t come into weapon range.  The frigates also pursue the damaged sathar ships but they are still at a speed disadvantage and fall a bit further behind.  The battleship starts slowing down and staying near the station while the three militia assault scouts slow down as they are headed off in the wrong direction for pursuit but should be able to start to catch up soon.  The assault carrier, now safe, begins slowing down and returning to the planet.

The starship construction center succumbs the fire and is completely destroyed.  Defensively, the sathar heavy cruiser and frigate fire on the incoming fighters but all the shots go wide.

The UPF ships fire five assault rockets at the heavy cruiser and two at the frigate.  They focus all their energy weapons at the frigate (3 LB from the Assault scouts and 2 LC & LB from the frigates).   Four of the five assault rockets hit the heavy cruiser.  All of them rip into the hull completely destroying the ship.  Of the energy weapons fired at the frigate, only one of the assault scouts score a hit reducing the frigate’s hull integrity by 10%.  One of the assault rockets knocks out the frigate’s LC while the other detonates in the core of the ship with a titanic explosion that consumes the entire ship (42 HP).

Upper half of the map. The yellow numbers indicate how many hexes off the map the ship is along the direction they were traveling. Click for larger image.
Lower map. The top row of this map is the same as the bottom row of the upper map. Click for the full-size image.

Turn 3

The remaining sathar ships continue to flee the system but activate their remaining seeker missile that they left by the planet.  Both the newly activated one and the one activated the previous turn fly at the armed station.  Firing ICMs to try to avoid an impact, one of the missiles is intercepted but the other one hits the station reducing its hull integrity by 30% but not destroying it.  With the sathar ships now quite far away and retreating, the UPF calls off the pursuit and begins looking for survivors from the starship construction center.

Repairs

The only damage on the surviving sathar ships are damaged assault rocket launchers on two of the fighters which are quickly repaired once they rejoin the assault carrier.

Damage to the UPF ships is only a little more extensive.  The battleship quickly repairs its damaged engines and the militia frigate is able to get its laser cannon back online immediately as well.  Over the next hour an a half it is able to get its hull back up to 75% integrity but then hits a snag that can only be repaired in a shipyard. 

The fighter with the lightly damaged engines also gets that under control immediately can begin decelerating with the rest of the fighter group.  It takes nearly an hour for the fighter with the completely knocked out engines to get some engine power back and many hours for it to slow down enough to dock with the carrier where it is completely repaired.  After an hour and half of work, the fighter with the damaged maneuvering jets restores some control and begins to head back to the carrier where it arrives a few hours later and is completely repaired.  The fighters with damages hull carefully make their way back to the carrier where they are fully repaired. 

Unfortunately, the damage to the station from the seeker missile are such that it would take tools and equipment from the shipyard to repair.  Those repairs will take some time to effect now that the shipyard has been destroyed.

Aftermath

The sathar lost more ships than they had planned on, losing 34.5% of their hull points that they came into the battle with, 2 fighters, a frigate, a light cruiser and 2 heavy cruisers (286 HP of ships).  That said, they accomplished their primary goal of destroying the starship construction center.

The UPF “only” lost 14 fighters (72% of the ships) and a militia assault scout (for a total of 135 HP) but the loss of the shipyard is going to be significant.  Additionally, it lost the ships that were in the shipyard including an assault scout that would have been completed the next day, two fighters, and a frigate and destroyer under construction.  There were also three civilian ships in the shipyard, a HS 11 ship undergoing maintenance, and HS 10 and HS 11 ships that were under construction and scheduled to be completed in 38 and 76 days respectively. 

The remaining six fighters are all assigned to Frontier Fighter Corps Squadron Delta.  The assault carrier is detached from TF Cassidine and with the militia frigate heads toward Dramune.  The frigate will enter the shipyard there while the carrier will head to Prenglar to pick up more fighters to round out FCC Squadron Delta and replenish its compliment with TF Cassidine.  Also, one of the minelayers at Prenglar will be heading to Fromeltar.

The shipyard situation is more serious.  Work will begin to build a new shipyard but it will be years before it is back at capacity.  Additionally, with the loss of the shipyard here at Terledrom and the one at Hentz (Araks), the UPF is going to start arming the shipyards, adding defenses, and increasing security.

Given that the UPF know the route to one of the active sathar shipyards in OFS019, the remnant of this battle group is headed there for defense while the sathar continue to rebuild their forces.

Lessons Learned

When I first conceived this scenario, I thought the sathar would come in hot, swing by the planet, take out the shipyard and then fly out of the system.  And that went just about perfectly as far as destruction of the shipyard went.  They did 594 HP of out the 600 HP the shipyard had and left it with a fire that took out the last 6 HP. And that was despite rolling poorly for the damage from the torpedoes.

However, as I was setting things up, I realized that with the limited ADF of the sathar since they were staying together as a group, the small fast UPF ships would be able to boost to the same speed and intercept the sathar.  So I set it up that way and the sathar took more damage than they expected.  The downside was that the UPF was just barely able to intercept the sathar on the first round which meant that they had to stay close and be subject to offensive fire from the sathar instead of making a run and turning out to be farther away.  They could have done that a little bit (2-4 hexes) but I didn’t have them do so as they are new pilots and I chalked it up to inexperience.

I was surprised at how close to exact the damage done to the shipyard was.  Since the shipyard as designed didn’t have weapons or defenses, the only non-hull hits possible were the fire and DCR.  Equipping the shipyards with weapons and defenses will help to increase their survivability since the damage will be spread around.  But not by much.

The sathar could have possibly wiped out the remaining UPF forces completely if they had stayed in the system but that would have been a long drawn out battle as it would have taken them a long time to slow back down. The shipyard was their target so they took it out and left.

Battle of Terledrom (Fromeltar) – FY61.285

There are four battles occurring on this day in the timeline and I debated which one to post first. I settled on this one as it was interesting for how quickly it was over. The other three, plus the battle that occurs on day FY61.287, will be showing up one a day for the next four days.

The Fromeltar militia, supported by the the Inner Reach and Outer Reach militias from Dramune that arrived yesterday after a high-speed risk jump, engaged sathar forces today around Terledrom.

In an intense battle lasting only twenty minutes, the militia forces overwhelmed the sathar forces, which consisted of five capital ships. Militia forces sustained damage and causalities resulting in the lost of the Inner Reach militia destroyer and severe damage to both frigates of the Outer Reach militia.

A memorial service will be held tomorrow for the crew of the lost ship. Our hearts go out to their families and we thank them for their dedication to defending the Frontier.

The damaged frigates have been given top priority to move into the local shipyard for repairs as soon as space opens which is expected to occur tomorrow.

The surviving militia crews remain vigilant as we await the arrival of Task Force Cassidine some time tomorrow evening.

Kat’kst’kll, Terledrom News Service

Background

The Fromeltar system has one of the larger militias with a frigate and 3 assault scouts on the roster. When news of the sathar ships went out across the Frontier, both the Inner Reach and Outer Reach militias in the adjacent Dramune system decided that it was in their interest to help Fromeltar and both militias risk jumped to the system arriving a day in advance of the sathar forces. They hope to stop the worms here and prevent them from ever entering the Dramune system.

Similarly, Task Force Cassidine was dispatched by Spacefleet and ordered to make a high speed risk jump to the Fromeltar system. Unfortunately, coming from two systems away, they are still a day away from Terledrom when the militia forces engage the sathar. They will be able to clean up the remnants of the sathar fleet if the militias can’t hold the line, but won’t be any help in this battle. This fight will be completely between the UPF militias and the sathar.

All of the battles are going to be run using the Advanced Combat Rules from the Tactical Operations manual and the combat table that represents the “average” skills. It would be interesting to run this using the specific skills provided by the Second Sathar War rules for the different groups (or even individual skills per ship), but I decided that would be just one more complication that I didn’t want to have to track.

Order of Battle

This setup is nearly identical to the Banding Together Knight Hawks encounter that I published back in Jan 2013 in issue 3 of the Frontier Explorer (p30). The only difference is that in that scenario, there was an additional UPF destroyer. This opening gambit by the sathar and the UPF response is something I’ve been thinking about playing out for a while now and that article and some of the others I’ll reference were specifically based on this opening of the Second Sathar War. As you’ll see, the UPF ship isn’t needed.

Militia Forces

With the arrival of the Dramune militias, the UPF have a definite hull point and ship number advantage although most of their ships are small.

Terledrom (Fromeltar)

  • 3 Assault Scouts
  • 1 Frigate
  • 1 Armed station

Inner Reach (Dramune)

  • 3 Assault Scouts
  • 1 Frigate
  • 1 Destroyer

Outer Reach (Dramune)

  • 2 Assault Scouts
  • 2 Frigates

Sathar

  • 1 Frigate
  • 2 Destroyers
  • 1 Light Cruiser
  • 1 Heavy Cruiser

This is a standard mix that the sathar are employing to start off the battle. You’ll see it in several of the upcoming battles. While it should have been enough to deal with any of militias they encountered, they didn’t figure on high risk jumps to support neighboring systems.

The Battle

Setup

With the recent animosity between the two Dramune worlds, the ships from those respective militias line up on opposite sides of the planet with the Terledrom militia arrayed between them.  The Outer Reach militia and Terledrom assault scouts are “above” the planet with the other ships “below”.  The assault scouts have an initial speed of 30 while the capital ships start at speed 20.  The station is at position 4 and orbiting counter clockwise.

The sathar start at speed 10 and are arranged in a diamond formation with the center consisting of a frigate in the lead, followed by the light and heavy cruisers with the destroyers above and below the main line. They are headed straight toward the planet.

Starting positions for the battle. Click for full sized version.

Turn 1

The sathar vessels accelerate and veer down to engage with the ships that are “below” the planet. However, due to the extreme range, no shots are fired.

The UPF sweep in closing in from both sides. The Outer Reach militia focuses on the two destroyers with the assault scouts making an assault rocket pass and then flying out of range of the sathar’s energy weapons while the frigates fly into torpedo range and keep their laser canons trained on the sathar vessels.

The Inner Reach militia converges on the sathar light cruiser, with the destroyer and frigate coming in from the aft port quarter and the assault scouts making a pass on the forward port quarter and then flying out of range to prepare for another pass.

The Terledrom assault scouts loop around and come in from behind to make a pass at the sathar heavy cruiser and then fly off. Trying to avoid a direct shot by the sathar frigate and light cruiser, the Terledrom frigate accelerates, rolls to port, and lines up for a shot on the sathar destroyers, electing to shoot at the same ones as the Inner Reach assault scouts.

Defensive fire by the sathar is practically ineffective with the only damage being the light cruiser’s electron battery which disables the ICM launcher on the Inner Reach destroyer.

The militia are much more effective.

The heavy cruiser is hit by 3 assault rockets damaging its combat control system and reducing its hull integrity by over half. One of the destroyers is hit by an assault rocket severely damaging it and reducing its hull integrity by nearly half. The other destroyer gets away nearly unscathed as both of the torpedoes fired at it are neutralized by its interceptor missiles (ICMs), only being scratched by a laser battery for minimal hull damage. The sathar light cruiser is hit by a torpedo, 2 assault rockets, and a laser battery taking out nearly half of its hull integrity and its ICM and torpedo launchers.

Ship positions and paths at the end of turn 1. Click for full sized image.

Turn 2

The sathar heavy cruiser turns to go after the Inner Reach frigate. The light cruiser and frigate turn to go after the Outer Reach frigates focusing all their fire on the leading one. The sathar destroyers swing around to go after the Inner Reach destroyer.

The defensive fire by the Inner Reach frigate and destroyer focuses on the sathar heavy cruiser and is devastating – hitting it with both laser batteries, both laser cannons, and a rocket battery knocking out the cruiser’s distruptor cannon before completely destroying the massive ship. The Outer Reach frigates are not quite as effective. Firing their laser canons at the lead sathar destroyer they only knock out its laser battery, The other weapons are fired at the frigate as it approaches and only do some minor hull damage even though they hit with two rocket batteries.

The sathar destroyers are quite effective hitting the Inner Reach destroyer with a laser cannon and two torpedoes which don’t have to worry about a screen of ICMs as the militia’s ICM launcher was damaged. The torpedos completely destroying the militia destroyer. Similarly, the sathar frigate and light cruiser focus their fire on the the lead Outer Reach frigate hitting it with a laser and distruptor cannon and a rocket battery knocking out all of its defensive systems and 75% of it’s hull integrity.

The Terledrom assault scouts loop around to fire at the lightly damaged destroyer. The Inner Reach assault scouts make a run on the sathar light cruiser. The Outer Reach frigates fire at the damaged sathar destroyer and the frigate with the heavily damaged one just drifting away from the battle as it fires. The Inner Reach frigate splits its fire using its laser cannon on the light cruiser and the other weapons at the damaged destroyer. The Terledrom frigate also loops around to fire at the light cruiser. The Outer Reach assault scouts loop around to fire at the frigate.

The sathar’s defensive fire is again mostly ineffective. The undamaged Outer Reach frigate is hit by several energy weapons from the frigate and light cruiser damaging its engines (both accelerating and maneuvering) and doing some significant hull damage (about 40% of the hull). The sathar destroyers fire at the Inner Reach frigate knocking out its ICM and torpedo launchers.

The return fire from the militia obliterates the last four sathar vessels. The frigate is hit by a rocket battery, two assault rockets, and two laser batteries knocking out its laser battery and doing enough hull damage to destroy a heavy cruiser. The damaged sathar destroyer is hit by a laser canon igniting an electrical fire and then a torpedo makes it through the ICM screen and hits a weapon magazine causing a massive explosion that destroys the ship. The undamaged destroyer is slammed by three different assault rockets that rip it to shreds (and a laser battery that knocks out some of its acceleration). Finally the light cruiser is hit by a laser battery starting a fire and then slammed by 3 assault rockets that rip its hull to pieces.

The savagery of the assault rocket damage surprised even the militia crews and the battle was over in less than 20 minutes.

Ship positions and paths at the end of the battle. The map has shifted to keep the drifting Outer Reach destroyer on the map for visualization. Click for full sized image.

Repairs

The damaged ships immediately begin working on battle repairs but the hull damage to the second Outer Reach frigate is beyond space repairs and needs to be completed in a shipyard. Similarly for the damage to that ship’s thrust. The other Outer Reach frigate is able to repair enough hull damage to prevent it from breaking up as it begins to maneuver and decelerate to return to the planet but it too will need time in the repair yards. The other ships are able to repair their minor damage over the next 2.5 hours.

Lessons Learned

I’ll admit, I expected this fight to go a bit longer and cause more damage to the militia. Between really good rolls for the militia and lousy rolls for the sathar, this fight was amazingly short.

Both sides leaned just how effective the assault rockets could be, especially if you roll well. The sathar seem to focus their ICMs on deflecting torpedoes but not the assault rockets which can do significant damage. Unfortunately for the other sathar fleets, this lesson was learned a little too late as all the sathar ships were obliterated in a single round and there was no time to transmit that information out. It wouldn’t have affected the other battles occurring today, but may have been useful for future encounters.

The sathar also learned (again) that they should probably focus on the smaller vessels to reduce that assault rocket threat. That information was transmitted from the Battle of Stenmar but the commanders of this battle fleet seems to have ignored it, focusing on the larger vessels first.

The militia were extremely lucky in this fight. It could have gone much worse. I rolled really bad for most of the sathar defensive fire which could have eliminated some militia ships before they could fire and the dice were extremely hot for the militia with double damage being generated for 6 assault rockets, 1 laser canon, 1 laser battery, and 1 torpedo. Even some of the regular damage rolls were really high (a torpedo hitting for 26 HP, laser batteries hitting for 9 & 10 HP, a RB hitting for 16 HP, and assault rockets hitting for 19 and 21 HP). Plus they took out the heavy cruiser before it even had a chance to deploy its more effective weapons. It only got one round of defensive fire and missed with everything.

On to the next battle being reported tomorrow.