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mj12games.com/forum → Posts by warrenss2
The shot goes right into the ship.
With the release of Klingon Armada, Romulan Armada, and Alien Armada, I wonder if there is going to be a Scenario Book release?
The Star Fleet Battles rules and supplements had a huge amount of scenarios for gamers to play. I'd buy that book in a nanosecond... especially if it had the Planet Killer and Juggernaut solo play scenarios with the mini-campaign The Lone Wolf.
I'm waiting to get Alien Armada from a local gaming store. Once I get that I'll start working on translating some of SFB scenarios over for my gaming group. If I get permission from the folks at the Amarillo Design Bureau I'll post them here for everyone to enjoy.
Warren
I actually believe smaller ships have an inherent advantage to larger ships... But I have no data to back that up.
--- Maybe it's because you can't stomp on them all? 
If a dreadnought went up against a huge multiple flight of fighters, where the combat values are equal... I'd put my money on the fighters. 8-)
Starmada is now my favorite spaceship combat game!
Easy to learn, but with major tactics, ship and weapon design. It's going to be a lot of fun trying new things in this game!
The uses of small ships are limited.
In my last game I commanded 2 heavy cruisers and 2 destroyers. The destroyers were basically fly eggs... easy to crack open and cook. I used the destroyers to take out some fighter squadrons and draw fire away from my 2 cruisers long enough for one of them to win the day.
Bigger is better... and in space there's a lot of room for size.
I think there should not be an upper limit on "Hull".
I had thought about making them seekers, but since the only thing they are carrying is a homing sensor/targeting package and a massive (for their size) drive... why not make them fast enough to be direct fire weapons.
Their targeting sensor has more of a chance to make minute corrections to the flight path of the missile the longer range it covers... That's why the Inverted Range Mods. Plus, with the longer ranges meaning the missile had longer to accelerate, it does more damage nearer to the end of it's flight... Inverted Damage Mods.
I'd recommend using the limit ammo option because I don't want these ships thinking they can just stand off at a long range and sniper the enemy into defeat.
Now that I think about it, a compromise might be to use a variation plasma torp rules from Romulan Armada which only allows them to fire in torpedo mode and uses ammo each shot. Just a thought.
--- I like this ideas too, now that you mention it. I still like the Inverted Range Mods idea so maybe the missiles hit with a 6+ on the 1st turn, 5+ on the 2nd, and a 4+ on the third?
Sounds a bit like the high drive missiles from David Drake's Leary-Mundy books.
-- This is were I pretty much got the idea.
The missiles are for long range engagements for the most part, since they hit better and do more damage at the long range band.
These are missiles that have no warhead. All they consist of are a homing device and an engine that propels them at near light speed. Since E=MC[size=85]2[/size] when they hit their target their mass is awesome.
HVKM, RANGE 15, ACC +4, IMP 1, DAM 1
Inverted Range Mods - the further it travels the longer the onboard targeting sensor has to get a better lock.
Inverted Dam. Mods - the longer it travels the faster it accelerates - giving more mass and damage.
The ships usually have a limited supply of these missiles available. Give it an ammo limit.
I've been toying with this idea since I first got Starmada.
A sailing ship game. The weapons would be a snap to design. Movement would be based on the attitude of the wind in comparison to your ship and to the size of your ship.
Starmada would make it easy to play one-on-one or huge battles like the Nile.
I used the USS Enterprise (form Star trek) to figure this out.
I want my Heavy Cruisers to have about 10 hull. In the Star Fleet Tech Manual it states the Enterprise is 190,000 tons. I divided this 10, giving 19,000.
I then looked at their Destroyer Class, 95,000 tons, divided by 19,000, giving a 5 Hull. Sounds about right to me.
Scout Class, 94,500... giving a 4.9, rounded to 5. Again about right for me.
Dreadnought, 285,000... gives us a Hull of 15.
Tug Class... Alone gives 126,500. Comes out to 7 Hull. The various containers it can pull along can be calculated and added on to the tug's Hull.
Using this formula, if we have the tonnage of the ship, we can calculate it's hull no matter what universe it comes from (Babylon 5, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, etc.).
That way we can have battles between the separate universes on an even keel (pun).
Problem is this... we would need to find the information for the tonnage of those other ships.
The Battlestar Galactica has been figured out to 20,000,000 tons!
At he bottom of http://www.tecr.com/galactica/capships/battlestar.htm
Giving a Hull of 1053!!! 
:shock:
Oh well! This was typed up as I was doing the calculations and I guess I'm back to the ol' drawing board. :roll:
Some fun sites from my research...
http://www.st-minutiae.com/misc/compari … _small.png
http://www.st-minutiae.com/misc/compari … medium.png
http://www.st-minutiae.com/misc/compari … _large.png
http://www.st-minutiae.com/misc/compari … n_huge.png
Saved the best for last... http://www.merzo.net/
Enjoy!
Warren
There were some things that some of my friends and myself didn't like about Star Fleet Battles. We didn't care for the fact that, eventually, every ship seemed to be armed with the same weapons. Call us purist it you must but we made changes to our Klingon & Romulan Armada ships to reflect our attitudes.
The only Federation ships we allowed to have Drones and or Plasma Torpedoes were the "New" ones. And even then these ships carried a lot less, and/or weaker versions, that the species that the weapons were native to.
The Kzinti used their Drones as their major offensive weapon. We bumped up the drone racks by one on those ships.
The old "Eagle" class Romulan ships, those that were converted over from the old sub-light-speed class, were given "Armor Plating". They had that in the original Star Fleet Battles game.
Overall... the game is a h#ll of a lot more enjoyable, faster, and easier to play now. I tip my hat to the MJ12 and ADB for coming up with this idea!!!
So I noticed! 
Which supplement would you folks recommend if I'm looking for ready-made ships & a variety of weapons?
I've never talked to anyone at M12 Games, but, then again, I've never felt to need to either.
Learning curve? To me it was pretty much learned before I played my first game(with my one reading). The first game reinforced it with very little rule checking. Second game was done with out the rulebook handy. Plus, my 9 year old understood it well enough to hand me my hind quarters in a hand basket on our first game. I have since read through certain rule sections, mainly the optional rules, multiple traits for weapons, fighters, and seekers. I think I pretty much have it all down now. While the rules are easy to learn the tactics of the game are vast and enjoyable.
Scenarios? I've been translating some Star Fleet Battles scenarios over without a single hitch! I'm working on a mini-campaign right now, from that system, called the Lone Wolf.
Adaptability... I've seen Babylon 5, Battlestar Gallactica, Starfire, Honor Harrington, Star Wars, Star Trek, and various other sci-fi books, movies, games, and shows done in this system.
Playing time... Largest amount of ships we have used to date has been about 8 all at the same time. The game lasted about an hour. I feel the game can easily handle fleet actions. But do not think that small actions are not good. We've had some very awesome ship-to-ship duels too.
I have played Star Fleet Battles, Full Thrust, A Sky Full of Ships, Starfire, and various others covering the spectrum of simple to ultra-complicated... like Little Miss. Bo-peep said.... Starmada is "just right"!
Like they say... "Simple, but not simplistic, is the guiding principle." And they have hit the nail on the head IMHO!
Sorry if this was a bit much. :oops:
A "General Products hull"... is basically an indestructable hull that onlly allows light to pass through.
--- Armor trait.
I'm re-reading Ringworld right now.
Tell him to design a ship that has a majority of it's weapons aimed into the EF arcs. Then he can run AND still unload a good blast.
That might be a good design for a race created by author Larry Niven... The Pierson's Puppeteers. They are cowardly. Their governmental leader is called The Hind Most.
Would it not cost his his forward thrust + the speed he wants to go in reverse?
Ex: speed last turn = 3. Desired speed in reverse in the next turn = 4.
3+4=7 thrust factors.
6 turns later, 5 hours had passed.
--- :shock: That would be way too much time for my short attention spanned friends!!!
Are there any unit counters that could be used? Either based on 1 inch or half inch hexes? A little like the old Melee and Wizard games except the are units instead of individuals.
Just to save space until the "miniatures" can be bought, based, and painted.
I think the hull rating is relative to what you are going to fight.
If I was going to do a strictly nothing but Star Wars game then everything will be fine. I could design the Death Star and go all they way down to a fighter.
But...
How would they compare to something out of the Star Wars universe? What if you wanted to put those Star Wars ships against a Babylon 5 ship? Against a Star Trek ship (short battle IMHO)? A Battlestar Gallactica ship? It's all relative.
Having said that, I would probably keep it in the same universe and scale everything down hull-wise.
I'm wondering if this is what he means... (and correct me if I ass-u-me wrong or if my explanation is NOT accurate.)
Say you have a weapon...
Zapmaster ROF 1, ACC 4+, IMP 3, DAM 1
This would mean that, if the weapon hit with a roll of 4+, you would roll 3 dice to see if that one weapon pierced the enemy's shields... giving you 3 chances to do that. If any of the weapon's 3 dice penetrate the shields the weapon only makes 1 DAM roll (regardless of how many of the IMP dice beat the shield rating).
Ex: I shoot one Zapmaster. It hits. I roll the 3 IMP against the target's shield rating of 2. I get a 1,3,6. Even though I got 2 successes, the 3 & 6, I only roll 1 DAM dice.
Is that what you meant?
Both of you have provided good logical answers.
I know I will get used to those arcs pretty soon.
I tend to go with Escorts down around 4, light cruisers at 6, cruisers at 8-10, battlecruisers 10-12, and battleships 12+.
-- These are like the sizes I'm thinking about. I want to leave the upper hull sizes open for larger things, be it cross genre ships (Star Trek vs Bab5 vs Star Wars vs Battlestar Gallactica vs whatever) or like I said above, "Deathstars, Leviathans, Borg Cubes, Planet Killers, etc...".
By Bill Baldwin? I think I remember those.
1.The Helmsman
2. Galactic Convoy
3. The Trophy
4. The Mercenaries
5. The Defenders
6. The Siege
7. The Defiance
You'd have to dig around a used book store for those. 
There was also another series that I don't remember written in the 70s that was pretty good.
--- go0gleplex, you d@mn tease!!!
mj12games.com/forum → Posts by warrenss2
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