The Zamyan Campaign

 The Lyran offensive resumes, and this time their main target is the major Kzinti planet of Zamyan:

The big cats are not expecting to hold the planet, especially since much of their weight has gone to help the Duke inflict as much damage as possible on the Klingons as they attack his Starbase. Learning from previous experience, the Kzinti already know that the Lyrans will have a decent amount of fighter power at their disposal, albeit without too much in the way of reinforcement, so they elect to engage the Lyrans at a distance from the planet itself.

The open space battle really does not go the way of the Kzinti. The Lyran fleet deploys in a relatively condensed formation, which means their ship defences plus fighters deal handily with Kzinti drone attacks. They really only lose an Escort Frigate crippled plus nine fighters. The Kzinti, however, feel the wrath of Lyran frustration and take it hard, with their Battle Tug, Orion Battle Raider and Drone Frigate all crippled, and two FFk improved Frigates heavily damaged. Their fighters, though, remain intact. Kzinti morale seems to be weakening (i.e. I rolled low!) and the result vindicates the commanding Count's decision to fight away from the planet, because it would probably have fallen almost immediately.

Second Battle

The next engagement sees some interesting features:

The Lyrans have replaced their Escort Frigate with a War Destroyer Leader, and have enough fighters in reserve from a Fleet Resupply vessel to replenish their initial losses there. The Kzinti, however, have now been pressed hard back upon their rear areas, and for the first time in the war I'll see some auxiliaries joining in the action.

The Kzinti have their revenge for the approach action. There are three main points of engagement from the big cats' viewpoint: one on either side of the planet and one to the front. The port (left) side of the Kzinti fleet sees a squadron of three of their Battlecruisers tangling with the War Destroyer ships of the Lyran fleet - their DW Leader and two carriers. The Kzinti cripple the DWL and then have problems of their own as the Lyran Dreadnought roars into action. It swiftly knocks two Battlecruisers out of the fight, heavily damaged, with a combination of ESG rams and overloaded disruptors.

In the centre, the Kzinti deployed near the planet are composed of the auxiliary vessels plus all of their fighters and the two squadrons from the planet. There is a great dogfight, and all 28 of the attacking fighters are wiped out for the loss of 21 Kzinti fighters. Strangely enough the auxiliaries just get to sit and watch - I have been expecting them to go bang, but it doesn't happen.

The main event, however, is off on the starboard side of the Kzinti defence. Here they lose two Frigates crippled by the Lyran War Cruiser Squadron, but then the Kzinti Battle Tug gets to do an impression of what the Lyran Dreadnought is doing at almost exactly the same time elsewhere. It gets even better for the Kzinti capital ship, though, because its target is a squadron of three ships that have had to use all of their ESG power to fight their way forwards through waves of Kzinti fighter and ship drone missiles: a Lyran Heavy Cruiser fronting the two Jagdpanther carriers. Smelling blood, the Battle Tug and two more Battlecruisers smash into the depleted Lyrans. First of all they drive off the CA with heavy damage, and then a perfectly timed drone and disruptor strike blows away one of the Lyran carriers and cripples the other. This is a sweet moment for the Kzinti because it removes a carrier from the Lyran order of battle - in fact two, one permanently and one temporarily.

Third Battle

As you can see from the Battle Mat, though, the weight still clearly flavours the Lyran attack:

The Lyrans have a whole three fighters left, so the fleet they will field next is a classically elegant one: a Dreadnought accompanied by a Fleet Tug with scout pods; six (!) Heavy Cruisers in two squadrons; a War Cruiser Squadron; and a War Destroyer Squadron. The Kzinti still have plenty of fighters left, but are running out of non-carrier ships. In between battles, I remove the casualties, crippled vessels and those too heavily damaged or precious to risk more involvement and place them back in their respective fleet boxes; this is also when I clean up the local logistics, for example by feeding fighters from FCR vessels and rear-echelon smaller carriers into the fray. They are even having to use a Police corvette to fill out the ranks.

I could take a chance and include some more of the carrier vessels from the rear echelons, but that is not the Kzinti way: they steadily attrit the attackers by means of a combination of fighter factors and fixed installations, and they are in it for the long haul. They want to keep their carriers alive as long as possible, and the Lyrans have very powerful ships - the bigger cats don't want to chance their counterparts getting too many good shots at expensive carriers, so the Kzinti are content to use the carriers in reserve to keep fielding fresh waves of fighters. Eventually, though, there comes a point where they have to use some of them in the cruiser role because they just don't have enough of the non-carriers, and the fighters will run out.

Even though the Kzinti are more than satisfied with the results of the first engagement at the planet itself, they have still lost a couple of Battlecruisers from the line due to heavy damage, and it shows. They have taken the fighters from one of the CVLs and used them to bring the auxiliary fighter squadron back up to full strength in combination with the FCR Frigate, but they have been forced to include the CVL in this next fight as the equivalent of a Battlecruiser. They are also having to place one of their Command Cruisers in the same role. This is becoming a common pattern in these desperate defensive mini-campaigns as ships are pressed into service in ways that are not ideal. The Lyrans, of course, have plenty of reserves.

And so it goes...

This time the Kzinti lose three fighter squadrons, along with two Frigates and the little Police Corvette destroyed. Again, somehow, the auxiliaries are unscathed. The Lyrans take most of the return damage on three groups of ships: the Dreadnought plus the Scout Tug in support; the War Cruiser Squadron; and the War Destroyer Squadron. The results are not pretty (well, unless you're a Kzin!). The Dreadnought is heavily damaged and the Tug crippled (again - I'm beginning to think that the Scout Pod mission is cursed or something). Both War Destroyers are crippled and their leader destroyed. And one War Cruiser is heavily damaged and its leader crippled. 

Fourth Battle

And now the Battle Map reveals all:

The excellent admiral leading the Lyran offensive has been wounded in action, and is replaced by a standard admiral with no plus or minus points. This does, though, reduce the heavy ship capacity of their battle force a little, so this time around there are only (!) five Heavy Cruisers. War Cruiser hulls are replaced like for like, but the Lyrans are starting to use the less powerful of their lighter vessels, with a couple of Heavy Frigates making an appearance, as well as a Destroyer Scout. Soon they will be forced to use standard Frigates, but they do have plenty of them - that's the large stack off to the right of the photo as you look at it. Attrition ships...

The Kzinti are able to replace their fighters, but this is the last time they will be able to do this if the wastage keeps going the way it has been so far. They have had to bring a CVE Escort Carrier plus a couple of Escort Frigates into the fray, although at least the CVE still has its fighters. Using my fleet rules for carrier escorts, only those with the large Strike Carrier come free (two Escort Light Cruisers); the little ones count against the ship limit for the force. As usual, the Kzinti are dishing out loads of grief, but are slowly running out of options in the longer term.

And the carnage continues. The Lyrans make another pass, and this time there are two main points of action. In the centre and centre-right of the filed, most of the two fleets clashes. The Lyran Heavy Cruiser Squadron continues to smash Kzinti fighters; all of those overloaded disruptors and Ph-1s can make a right mess, so they handily destroy 26 fighters in total. The War Cruisers also cripple the Kzinti Destroyer. In return, the bigger cats remove the flotilla of small Lyran ships, forcing the two Heavy Frigates to disengage with heavy damage and crippling the War Destroyer. The main Kzinti command vessels then get in on the act, heavily damaging one of the CAs and crippling a second. 

The three Kzinti Battlecruisers are up against it in the meantime as they encounter the enemy Dreadnought, supported by the other two Heavy Cruisers and the Destroyer Scout to help against missile attacks. The Kzinti drive off the Dreadnought with heavy damage, but the two remaining (and entirely fresh) Lyran Heavy Cruisers close to ESG ramming range before their fleet warps out. One of the Kzinti Battlecruisers is completely destroyed and another heavily damaged.

Fifth Battle

The Kzinti are now having to commit quite a few of their precious carriers, although at the moment they still have a reasonable number of fighters left. Weight of numbers is starting to tell, though, as the Lyrans simply replace their losses quite handily. The only sign that they are feeling it at all is that are starting to dig into their reserve pool of small ships:

This time, the dice are not kind to the defenders. They are spread across the map, while the Lyrans are neatly concentrated. You could rationalise this as the Kzinti Admiral trying not to bunch his expensive carriers too much, while the Lyrans are intent on going for the jugular.

Which is what they do. A relatively dispersed disruptor fleet is not likely to inflict major damage, while the Lyrans' overlapping defence allows them to shrug off the usual missiles with relative ease. The upshot is that the Kzinti fighters and lighter vessels take an absolute hammering, while the Lyrans are pretty much unharmed. The attackers have a Frigate crippled and two Destroyers heavily damaged. The Kzinti lose two full fighter squadrons and an Escort Frigate destroyed, along with another Escort Frigate, two Escort Light Cruisers and a standard Frigate all crippled, together with another Frigate heavily damaged. Kzinti morale breaks and their fleet leaves; Zamyan has finally fallen. Oh well, at least the carriers survived.