Ok, who wants odds on if the Armor fails first or he runs out of tea?
So here we are, part 0b11 of the PHR and now I will show you the true heroes of the PHR's line up.
The PHR overall have the best hull and have broadsides but so far we have seen semi scary Cruisers and some worrisome Frigates so lets see what the Heavy ships and above bring us shall we?
Heavy Cruisers:
Hector-class Heavy Cruiser:
Let us kick this off with the Hector. The Hector is pretty much an upgunned Orion that replaces the "Not-Turret" with a Twin Supernova Laser! The TSL is the exact same as a UCM Cobra Laser. It is 2 dice on 3+ that maxes out at 6 damage. So a pretty decent platform but nothing spectacular.
Think of the Hector as a good all around ship which it really is.
Achilles-class Heavy Cruiser:
The Achilles is the first Heavy Cruiser ship we have seen with a torpedo. At 25 points cheaper than the Scourge Manticore-class Battlecruiser, the Hector is a very specialized heavy ship killer.
The Torpedo does do 6 damage and is a strong force and the 4 shots with the Heavy Caliber Broadsides is nothing to sneeze at but it suffers for that Torpedo. Once it has shot that Torpedo, the Achilles is regulated to broadsides and is perfect for flanking and striking at targets.
Bellerophon-class Heavy Cruiser:
This ship. . . this ship caused many problems in the Beta. It was far cheaper than what it is now and currently I think it is the most expensive if not the most expensive Heavy Cruiser out there,
With Launch 4 and bombers that hit on a 2+ with their 2 dice, AND a Twin Supernova Laser. The Bellerophon loves to reach out and touch people. This ship still lives up to its namesake. Sadly we can no longer take 4 of these in a list and call it a day at 1500 points due to the Launch Limit but 2-3 is a strike force that will cause so many issues for player.
This slayer of monsters is ready to do battle.
Battlecruisers:
Leonidas-class Battlecruiser:
We now start the battlecruisers with a ship with a typo!
Now remember, it is not an official Hawk product without at least a single typo and this one is funny. The Medium Caliber Broadsides are wrong on this. There are 2 sets of Medium Caliber Broadside S(L) which means that the Left side has 3 weapons systems. It is supposed to be one on the left and one on the right.
Now the PHR battlecruisers are the weirdest battlecruisers I have seen to date. These are as fast as the PHR Frigates. Yes, that is indeed a Thrust 10" value you see there. The PHR Battlecruisers are designed to hunt and strike smaller swifter ships while being a MASSIVE tank.
Scipio-class Battlecruiser:
Here we have the Scipio! It is the forth carrier of the PHR making them the undisputed masters of Launch Assets. Well, versatility of Launch Assets anyway. The Scipio is another Thrust 10" battlecruiser and while I did not like it originally (i prefered the Bellerophon), after seeing the Thrust Value of this ship, I started to warm to it.
The Scipio is the truest Frigate Hunter in the PHR fleet. Able to chase down Frigates and send out swarms of bombers to hit even more targets, the Scipio will lay down some hurt!
Battleships:
Heracles-class Battleship:
The Heracles is the first ship we see with a Crippling Weapon. So far there are just three weapon systems with Crippling. We also see that the Battleships have 6 dice for its Heavy Caliber Cannonade.
So how Crippling works is that if you make an attack and deal a Crit (2+ the lock value) then you deal a single Crippling blow to the defending ship and they have to roll on the chart. If they reach half health or lower they have to roll as normal as well. This also gets rid of Cloak abilities since they have been Crippled (I have been told that this is wrong. Cloak only disappears when the ship hits 50% or less health)
Overall the Heracles is a great ship and is one of the most expensive Battleships out there and even has the MOST hull next to its sister ship.
Minos-class Battlecruiser:
The Minos is the Close Action monster of the PHR and has 2 Torpedoes. Now while I LOVE the Heracles, I feel that the Minos is mediocre at best. First off, it is the same cost as the Heracles for a weaker ranged main weapon, its main weapon is a Close Action Weapon that can roll as few as 2 dice or as much as 4 dice and if that crit gets negated by point defense you wont get the Crippling.
Some may say that its firepower is in the two Torpedoes it can launch in a single turn. Well that is true but once they are used up they are used up. Overall I am just not happy with what the Minos is bringing to the table for its cost. I think that it could be as much as 35-40 points cheaper and that would increase its versatility because you could take 2 of them.
Thoughts:
Overall, I like the PHR Heavy Cruisers and the Scipio. I think that they are the strength of the fleet and will be a major annoyance to face. As for the Leonidas, I am not happy that I have to go Weapons Free just to use one side of the Leonidas but with how tough a ship is it could make up for that.
We shall see over the next few months. Likely my opinion will be made moot by one of you ingenious players out there. Put your thoughts in the comments below and lets see what you come up with!
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