“Talon Tuesdays” is an article series appearing on InsideGMT periodically on Tuesdays.  It features articles from the Talon development team regarding the game’s design, development and upcoming release.

Issue #22: Talon Puzzle 1 Solution

I’m so pumped for the community’s response to the first Talon Puzzle. People really took to answering them. Within hours of the Talon Tuesday issue going live we had nearly 100% correct responses on BoardGameGeek and some really close responses in the comments section here on the InsideGMT page.  Let’s go through the solution as it highlights a key tactical maneuver.

Fearless gets AP in D and she MUST use it to side slip to the right. That Terran Torpedo is ready to go and Fearless has no front shields. Terran DD’s can fire torpedoes forward AND left/right arcs – watch out!

Now that Fearless has spent AP (to mark for Sideslip) and moved, executing the sideslip to the right, she could fire on Achilles and hit the rear shield arc with all forward weapons. But, I said in the puzzle to try and deal as much damage by Impulse F. It’s only Impulse D now and there is a final trick we can pull to increase the damage.

In Impulse E Terran could have fired and hit the Fearless had she not just side slipped, now Achilles has no options for this impulse: she gets no AP and cannot move.  In Talon’s Impulse E, Fearless hits its final afterburner (Fearless gets no AP and is not scheduled to move) to move forward one more hex, closing to Range 2- optimal Disruptor Range.

Three disruptor attacks at range 2 hit on any die roll but a 1; so let’s say this causes 5 damage on average (odds were 5/6 x 2 damage per shot x 3 shots). This would knock out the rear shields of Achilles and likely cause a crit. There’s even a chance this waxes the ship in one big blast.

Impulse E is a tricky Impulse. It tends to also be a good time to steal the initiative if you’re Terran.

Patrick brought up a good follow up question on the forums:

“In the above situation, assuming the Talon ship afterburners, fires, gets 4 damage on the Terran ship, and the Critical comes up a 7 (no effect), what would be the only defensive move(s) for the Terran ship to survive until Impulse B?

In Impulse F, Fearless will be able to charge 1 Yellow bar on the port, multi-arc, disruptor. During the Power Phase that disruptor’s Red Box will be marked off then during Impulse A of the subsequent Round Fearless should be able to finish charging it and fire it!

Achilles MUST turn to port and give Fearless her “good” side to survive another Disruptor shot. She MUST also put her AP to recharge her battery (you’ll see why shortly).

Now is also probably a good time to fire that Torpedo. It will only hit Fearless’ side shield, taking it down and causing just 1 hull damage, but the Torpedo is going away if Achilles is destroyed.  (I’m not showing that in the illustrations here.)

Fearless, after charging 1 Yellow Box on the port disruptor, will want to move straight in Impulse F. Turning towards Achilles takes her out of optimal range since the Terran ship will likely not move in Impulse A before Fearless can fire. Moving forward puts the Terran ship’s down rear shield back into Fearless’ firing arc.

During the Power Phase, Achilles MUST speed up to 2-4-1 power curve so she can move in Impulse A. The Talon ship could match that speed, changing to 3-4-1, but she would then be unable to finish charging the port disruptor by Impulse A since she won’t be getting any AP in A. By speeding up, Achilles can use the Battery in Impulse A to get rid of the turn radius marker (it moves 1 hex closer and is eliminated) then turn to port again.

Now, even though Fearless can finish charging the disruptor, it will hit Achilles’ good shield and not cause any ship-destroying hull damage.

This, of course, was just one possible outcome. Had the dice come up differently there would be completely different optimal moves. Not to mention we’re assuming there aren’t a bunch of other ships in this battle, which would be unusual in a Talon game.

Hope you enjoyed solving the puzzle as much as we enjoyed putting it together.  We’ll be back in the next week or so with another one so stay tuned.  I’ll go back to checking my doorstep for the arrival of my copy…

Previous Article in the Series: Talon Tuesday Issue #21: How to Build a Warhead

Next Article in the Series: Talon Tuesday Issue #23: Talon Puzzle 2

Author: Bob Seifert