Klingons and Hydrans: third helping

 The Klingons have their most powerful forces aiming for the third of the Hydran Battle Stations:

There are really only two related questions here: how long will it take for the Station to fall, and how many Klingons will the Hydrans destroy in the meantime?

The first engagement is a nasty introduction to the new generation of Hydran fighters. They simply power their way through the Klingon fighters, wiping them out completely. The D5 Squadron is faced with a load of angry Stingers, and one D5 is swiftly crippled and the other heavily damaged. To add insult to injury, the Hydran Frigate flotilla runs up to point-blank range on the D5C and cripples it too, almost destroying it in fact. The Klingons leave, having killed a grand total of fourteen fighters. Yet another Coalition Fleet feels the surprise of those new fighters.

Second Battle:

The Hydrans have enough reserves to replenish their fighter losses, so for this one their fleet is exactly the same as the previous engagement. A Fusion fleet has a lot of fighters!

The Klingons remove their carriers from the line and replace them with ships of the same class. This is going to be another attrition battle...

In fact, it turns out to be the most enjoyably vicious battle of the war so far. The Klingons have good Disruptor and Phaser power, which they use to great effect, stripping away entire squadrons of fighters. However, the strength of the Hydrans actually lies in their great flexibility, afforded them by the combination of fighters, fusions, hellbores and gatlings. This gives them the ability to take ruthless advantage of any perceived weakness, and they exploit it to great effect in this engagement.

The Klingon command group is powerful: a C8 Dreadnought flanked by a couple of D6 Battlecruisers, with a D6D Drone cruiser in support. However, they have used up a lot of their power against the fighters, and the Hydran light ships see an opportunity. First of all the Frigate squadron attacks from the command group's front left. A Hunter Frigate is destroyed, but any Hydran can dish out great amounts of damage at close range, and the two remaining ships force the D6 protecting the Dreadnought's left to warp out with heavy damage.

Then the Lancer flotilla closes on the other flank. One of them entirely loses its front shield, but the three of them opt for suicide overloads and completely vaporise the D6 here - they even inflict some internal on the C8. All those gatlings...

The coup de grace is delivered by the Hydran command contingent as the Battle Tug and Thoroughbred close to point blank on the C8 and open up with everything they have. This is truly epic stuff; it is the first time Dreadnought-class vessels have closed on each other like this in the war so far. The C8 dies and the Klingons leave.

Third Battle:

Despite their losses, the Klingons should still win this campaign. They destroyed 33 Stingers in the previous engagement, so the Hydrans are seriously running out of fighters:

A C5 Early Dreadnought replaces the C8 in the line, and the Klingons again bring forward their D6CV, supplied with fighters from the Carrier Tug in the reserves. The Klingon admiral was wounded when the C8 blew, but managed to escape in the boom section - handy. The second-in-command now takes over his duties. The Hydrans are almost unchanged; the destroyed Hunter is replaced by a Crusader Frigate Leader. As you can see, they don't have many reserves.

The result is an engaging engagement. There are two main points of action. On the right flank of their attack, the Klingon D5 Squadron wipes out the remaining Stinger-II fighters and cripples a Ranger Cruiser. However, in return, the Hydrans again 'sandwich' their enemies. The two remaining Rangers destroy one of the D5s, while the three Frigate-class ships do the same to the other.

On the other flank, the Lancer flotilla closes to point-blank range to the right of the Klingon command element. One Lancer is lost to heavy damage on the way in, but the other two cripple a D6 Battlecruiser. This is when the Klingon fighters finally make it to the fray, catching out the remaining Lancers with little left in the way of weaponry. One is crippled and the other heavily damaged; this is the first time in the campaign that some Klingon drones actually hit a Hydran. Plus, those heavier Klingon fighters with the Phaser-2s are quite nasty.

The Hydran command group now heads for the open right flank of the C5 and cripples it. The Klingons leave. However, the Hydrans no longer have enough force left to defend against the large number of reserve Klingon ships that are still available, so they evacuate the personnel and scuttle the base.