(SP2101.0) THE RECOVERY
(Y173) by Steven P Petrick, Texas
    Contact with the ISC created a new border for the Gorn Confederation to monitor. War with the Romulan Star Empire left few resources available for that purpose, and large areas of space were watched by little more than a few fighter squadrons stationed at widely scattered bases.
    The ISC, for its part, was desperately trying to build a military to keep the insane races on its borders from bringing the insanity inside. Creating an entire Navy from scratch left large stretches of the ISC frontier virtually uncovered save for squadrons of fighters deployed on frontier worlds.
    For both races, an apparently abandoned freighter sighted drifting in the space between them was an object requiring investigation. Recovery was indicated in order to find evidence of what had happened if there was no crew to question.
    The commanders of the fighter squadrons on both sides were young and inexperienced. Both assumed on sighting the alien fighter squadron that the other side must be responsible for the derelict condition of the freighter. Both determined to recover the freighter. Both found themselves trying to defend the shuttles carrying the engineers and marines to board the freighter from attack while trying to drive off the enemy squadron.
(SP2101.1) NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2; the Gorn player and the ISC player.
(SP2101.2) INITIAL SET UP
GORN: 11xG-8, 1xG-8E, 1xGAS, and 1xHAS enter anywhere along the 10xx map edge, heading B or C, speed six, WS-III.
ISC: 11xAF, 1xAFE, 1xGAS, and 1xHAS enter anywhere along the 32xx map edge, heading E or F, speed six, WS-III.
DERELICT: Small freighter in 2215, facing direction A, speed 0, WS-0. See (SP2101.45).
(SP2101.3) LENGTH OF SCENARIO: The scenario continues until all forces belonging to one side have been destroyed, captured, or have disengaged.
(SP2101.4) SPECIAL RULES
(SP2101.41) MAP: Use a floating map. The Gorn units can only disengage in directions E or F. The ISC units can only disengage in directions B or C. Units which disengage in unauthorized directions are considered destroyed.
(SP2101.42) SHUTTLES AND PFs: No shuttles or PFs have warp booster packs. 
(SP2101.421) If using the optional MRS shuttles, one MRS shuttle may be added to each side. If MRS shuttles are added, players may opt to have additional boarding parties, crew units, or mines/NSMs aboard (J8.21). These selections must be made before the scenario begins and must be recorded so that the opposing player can confirm the selections at the end of the scenario.
(SP2101.422) If using EW fighters, one of the fighters in each squadron is an EW version. If not using EW fighters, it is a standard fighter of its squadron.
(SP2101.423) There are no PFs in this scenario.
(SP2101.43) COMMANDER’S OPTION ITEMS
(SP2101.431) Each fighter (or MRS shuttle) can be equipped with any allowable pods (J11.0) within the restrictions of the pod rules. For purposes of rule (J11.13) to determine the total numbers and types of pods available, the squadrons are from a small carrier. No additional pods may be purchased with Commander’s Option Points. 
(SP2101.432) The races involved in this scenario do not use drones. In a variation where a drone-armed race is used, all drones are "medium," i.e., speed-20. In a variation using drone-armed fighters, use the procedures in (FD2.45) to determine how many special drones would be purchased normally under historical racial percentages, and select those drone modules desired subject to the year of the scenario. Note that extra drones nominally in reload storage cannot be substituted for normal drones. 
(SP2101.433) If players wish to use the optional rules for Prime Teams (G32.0), the GAS or HAS may be defined as carrying such a team. 
(SP2101.44) REFITS were not available to any of the units involved in this action.
(SP2101.45) DERELICT: The small freighter was subject to an attack by pirates, and the crew abandoned it in their shuttle rather than resist. The ship is otherwise fully operational, but the computer shut it down due to the lack of a crew to monitor the systems and perform maintenance on the warp drive. It will take a crew unit 96 consecutive impulses to restart the warp and impulse drives, at which the point the ship will be operable. However, the phaser capacitor will not have been charged and the phaser cannot be fired until it has been (E2.3). Note that a second crew unit will not reduce the time needed to restart the ship’s engines. 
(SP2101.46) SHUTTLES: The GAS and HAS shuttles of each force are carrying two crew units and four boarding parties total. Each player may assign these personnel between the shuttles as he sees fit, but a record of the assignments must be kept. Only crew units (or a Prime Team) can restart the derelict. The boarding parties were brought along in case there was any trouble on ship, but may find a role in fending off the other side’s boarding parties (or seizing the derelict from them). 
(SP2101.47) PILOT QUALITY: Historically, the ISC pilots were hastily trained by nominally senior officers who themselves had no real practical experience in fighter combat. The Gorn pilots were those who had scored at the bottom of their flight schools and were assigned to the area of space where combat was thought to be unlikely. To reflect this, players might treat both fighter squadrons as being composed entirely of green pilots except for the EW fighters (J6.212) and one fighter with the squadron leader, both of which are of normal, i.e., good, quality.
(SP2101.5) VICTORY CONDITIONS: The player who captures the freighter and disengages it wins. 
If the freighter is not captured after one side has been destroyed or forced to disengage, the scenario is a draw (this can happen if one side disengages, but the other side has no crew units to man the freighter). Note that if one player withdraws and the other player still has crew unit(s) on his shuttles, then he has captured the freighter if it has not been destroyed.
If the freighter is destroyed, the side which destroyed it has lost the scenario, but the other player will have a difficult time explaining his failure to protect the freighter to his superiors.
(SP2101.6) VARIATIONS: The scenario can be played again under different conditions by making one or more of the following changes:
(SP2101.61) Replacing the two fighter squadrons with squadrons of any two neighboring races can be done. Care must be taken to keep the BPVs balanced as obviously a Federation F-15 squadron with a full load of drones will have little difficulty in defeating a squadron of Klingon Z-2s. 
(SP2101.62) The squadrons are investigating the freighter and do not know if it is a trap of some kind. Each squadron is required to gather 20 points of lab information on the freighter before he can land a shuttle aboard. 
(SP2101.63) For a smaller and faster battle, delete four fighter and the HAS from each squadron. The GAS has a militia squad which can either fight to take the freighter, or become a crew unit.
(SP2101.64) Allow both players to roll a single die at the start of each turn and keep a running total. When the total reaches 36 that player received a police ship (ISC Pol, Gorn FF) entering the same map edge as his fighters on the next turn. The ship’s initial placement can be no closer than 30 hexes from any enemy fighter or shuttle.
(SP2101.7) BALANCE: The scenario can be balanced between players of different skill levels by one or more of the following:
(SP2101.71) Change the GAS and HAS of the stronger player to an Admin and an HTS.
(SP2101.72) Limit the number of pods the stronger player can equip his fighters with.
(SP2101.73) Delete one or two fighters from the stronger player or add one or two fighters to the weaker player.
(SP2101.8) TACTICS: For both sides victory hinges on possession of the freighter. There are two ways to accomplish this. Place your crew units on the freighter and hold off your opponent until they can get the engines started and run away. Defeat or destroy the enemy force and then board the freighter to restart the engines at leisure.
Whichever way you choose to accomplish it, remember that you must protect your crew units in order to win, so make sure you keep your shuttles well back from the fighting, and well covered from any enemy breakthrough.
(SP2101.9) PLAYTESTERS COMMENTS: Well, actually, you are supposed to write these and include them in your report.
(SP2101.X) DESIGNER’S NOTES: I wanted to create a new twist on the old fighter versus fighter battle.
HISTORICAL OUTCOME: A brief and, considering the scale of the forces involved, bloody encounter left the freighter in the hands of the Gorns. While the Gorn pilots were not the best the Confederation had, their better developed fighter doctrine enabled them to scatter the ISC squadron and destroy their shuttles. The ISC pilots withdrew to lick their wounds, but the ISC high command took the lessons the Gorn officers taught to heart and redesigned their own training program. Future skirmishes would be different.