Scourge Invasion (Shaltari vs Scourge)

So. This is a thing that happened.

I, playing as Shaltari, honestly thought that I could winnow down the Scourge numbers enough that they wouldn't be able to wreck me when they finally closed to CAW range. I've tried to type up this as a full battle report three times now and I've lost it for one reason or another each time, so here's the picture book version:

Scourge list:
https://goo.gl/photos/xCcPQS5KnocMibZb6

Shaltari list:
https://goo.gl/photos/HN2FeAnW78j7o35i9

Game start:
https://goo.gl/photos/Yec3C8Lc5au94oqU7

Turn 1:
https://goo.gl/photos/N5xWUsZRYig2HHyv9
(actually took the picture after the Scourge player had made his first move on turn 2)

Turn 2:
https://goo.gl/photos/hebPvYwZ3n8D8HJJ9

Turn 3:
https://goo.gl/photos/bxmST9qia6joWQiE6

Turn 4:
https://goo.gl/photos/GWcwoNkicL79wEew7

Doesn't look awful, right? I mean, it's a brutal slugfest, but the Shaltari player seems to be doing okay, right?

No. Scourge player utterly annihilates the rest of the Shaltari fleet, destroys most of the Shaltari ground force, and then holds basically all of the critical locations in space.

Shaltari player is very sad.

How many points was this? Both fleets seem light on drop elements.

Biggest thing I see from the pics is the Shaltari ships seem way too close to the Scourge. Those light cruisers should be off to the side not in the middle of the table.

The Scourge list also looks more balanced even if it could stand to add a couple more Gargoyles.

Shaltari fleet dosn't have enough VG or Emeralds, you want 3 emeralds at that sort of point level.
Shaltari clumped together way to much,
Azurites should have been flanking, also personally would have made them aquamarines for the impeller (it dosn't go off often, but when it does, its probably the most satisfying thing ever)
I have no idea WHY your diamond turned (maybe it did so to not get shot) but I would advise against turning the diamond, Its tough enough to just go in all guns blazing, even against scourge, considering your enemy didn't have any battleship of his own you should have been executing 1 cruiser a turn with the diamond. if not 2 on WF.
while 2 turquoise are a good option, because the scourge are close combat specalists, I would have opted for 2 ambers (also because they are in a group with the basalt you don't want to lose group coherence) I would have hung back with that group and used it to 'clean up' after the Diamond, and provide fighters for when the diamond goes shields up.

There are a few other comments I have but most of those are subjective to my play style.

How many points was this? Both fleets seem light on drop elements.

I want to say 1250.

A 1250 point shaltari list that isn't dropping 10 ground assets a turn is pretty hosed against scourge. You are going to lose in the air, there's really no good way around it. Shaltari ships are not only outgunned by Scourge, scald makes them no more durable even with shields. However, it's pretty easy to win on the ground by just dropping way more tokens than him, focusing on killing any Chimeras on the board, and overwhelming him on the ground using relocation to always have enough tokens to win any ground battle at every location.

scald makes them no more durable even with shields.

5+ shield save is objectively better than a 5+ armor save, and even stronger than the 6+ armor save you'd get if you were in scald range. Scourge attacks are fairly high quality, and they crit 50% of the time. Here the number for an Oculus Beam Phalanx (3+ loc, 3 attacks, 2 damage):

6+: 3.67
5+: 3.33
4+: 3.00
3+: 2.67
4++: 2.00
5++: 2.67

The 5++ (5+ shield save) is equal to the 3+ armor save for this particular weapon profile (and true for all other 3+ lock weapons, which is almost all of the Scourge arsenal).