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mj12games.com/forum → Posts by Nahuris
Yes, I was replying to Jygro's comments....
Right now, I tend towards a fleet mix with about 40 percent frigates and 30 percent destroyers... and use my heavier ships to support the lighter ones.....
John
That's similar to the system I use, but instead of escort, I use the term corvette.
I tried the "Triangle" method for a while, but found that I tended to prefer a lot more of the frigate and destroyer class ships.
My frigates are used as light fast pickets and to support other ships in close... my destroyers are tailored for specific missions......
My fleets would rarely have anything larger than hull 15 or so....
Not sure until I get a few games under me for the Admiralty Edition, but I suspect that my fleet styles won't change dramatically.
John
Another way to deal with fighters is to create dedicated anti-fighter escort ships. Make them small, and therefore cheap, with range 6 high ROF weaponry, and keep them near your other ships. If you mix that with some AOE weapons, and fighters of your own, you should be able to deal with incoming fighters without too much difficulty.
Although the idea of a counter measure is interesting to explore.
John
LOL...
I also got Serenity and the entire Firefly series, to include the episodes not shown on television for $30.00
I'll start keeping an eye out for specials for you all.... we have some video stores up this way that run awesome specials.
John
I got real lucky when it first came out.... they were running a deal on it, and I picked it up for about $15.00
And yes, the shows are awesome...
John
Awesome......LOL
Getting my copy shortly.
John
OK..... I am sitting here, wanting to make ships on the spreadsheet, and knowing that anything I design is going to need to be re-done in a week or so.....LOL
How am I supposed to use up my last half an hour of my work day, over the next week? I normally design a few ships based on video game images, from the net...... now, I am sort of just looking at pics.
John
I'd go for an early PDF release, as well.
And Dan, it's not stupid.... but if you have a rules system, there will always be a way to circumvent those rules, and people who will look for those ways.
Considering how many variables are involved in a game like this..... These have to be some of the best rules written.
Most other games work from the principle of firing once per turn, per weapon. Battletech and Full Thrust are good examples of this. I do appreciate the ability to create scatter weapons, and multi-barrel turrets, as well as cluster style weapons (rof 3 with variable rate of fire....ect.)
Now..... I'm just waiting.....
John
Naw... that was the experimental, heat absorbing armor layer currently in design for the Golian Space Fleet.....LOL
I know those days all too well....LOL
Fortunately, I now live in an area where that is rare.
John
Yep !!
Definitely looking foward to the new spreadsheet.....LOL
Then again, games are usually last minute decisions around here, and the spreadsheets help us get started quicker.
Nahuris
I'm in Tacoma, Washington.... lot's of rain here, but the highways south of me are either under water, or under the mud created by the water......
Land Slides are a pain.....
Nahuris
Yes to the seeking, and Thank You.
Looking foward to the new spreadsheet for designing ships....LOL
And for fortifications, I basically design them in sections without engines..... each section is an individual ship... that way, some sections can be destroyed, while others remain to continue fighting. We decided that there is no explosion until all the sections went up... that keeps one exploding section from wiping the whole base.
John
Excellent.... More options for fighters is always welcome.
I am already planning on getting my copy...
One question, and a simple yes or no is fine, are there going to be options for "torpedo" type weapons?
A lot of the games we run are set in a Starlancer/Freespace/Wing Commander type universe, where Torpedos provide heavy hits.... but can be shot down.
John
We have been experimenting with this.... and yes, I see the issue with counters, but since I use specific "torpedo ships".... with the rest of the fleet being more standard, it does seem to be working so far.
John
I'd be interested in new material...
John
I had an idea... ran it past my other players, but none of us could come up with a point value for this. We basically created a weapon ability called slow ballistics. It immediately changes the range to 36, but the weapon moves a number of hexes per turn equal to the original range. This represents a torpedo class weapon, similar to drones in that it homes in on one target. Once fired it proceeds against the chosen target, and flies until it hits, or until it moves 36 hexes, at which point it explodes. The target is chosen at the time of fire, and cannot change, and rate of fire is the number of lock on systems within the torpedo itself. All damage is handled as per a normal weapon. The weakness with the weapon is that it can be shot down via fighters or ship weapons (capital ships fire on it as though it were a fighter wing... but with an additional -1 due to it's very small size), and if a ship can get out of range before it hits... then it reaches maximum range and explodes. Although you can make a the weapon cheaply (make a range 3 weapon, 3+ to hit, and 3/3/3...), it would be slow enough for most capital ships to outrun. Range is always counted as medium range for targeting numbers.
We had wanted to have a torpedo class weapon for use in battles based on the Freespace and Starlancer computer games. Unfortunately, drones were too small to simulate the torpedoes seen in the game, and making them normal weapons made them no different than any other laser or cannon in game.
I was wondering if anyone else here has any thoughts on this?
John
I like it Dan....
We have also used different ideas... nebulas that negate shields, floating radiation fields ( area of space where there are random pockets of radiation... they moved 1 or 2 d6 each turn randomly, after the movement was plotted but before the ships themselves were moved, and if a ship passed through one, they lost a crew unit on a die roll of 5 or 6).... and we love asteroid fields.
As I was sitting here and typing, I had another idea.....a micro-meteor field... instead of huge rocks, they are smaller... maybe the size of footballs. If you are going slow enough, they don't do any damage, but the faster you move, the more they hurt. If you are moving at speeds 0-1, no damage... 2-3 and it counts as a 5+ hit from a 1/1/1 weapon, 4-5 is a 4+, 6-7 is a 3+ roll, and 8 or more is a 2+. All of these are rolled per hex that you pass through, and can be used with either the Full Thrust type movement, or the standard Starmada movement point system.
John
I believe it is because area of effect weapons in B5Wars were referred to as "Flash Weapons".
Also, after looking it up, it was used in Star Fleet Battles.
The only other reference I can find is an old military slang referring to the area of effect of grenades as "Flash Area" or "Flash Damage".
By the time I was in the military, we referred to it as "Blast Radius...." and "Splash Damage."
Don't know if this helps much...... but here you go
John
I was more thinking of the Scorpion Clan from Legend of the 5 Rings.......
I hadn't really read up much on the Bothans, other than the X-wing series.... it always seemed to me that they were doomed to self destruction. To properly pull off an independent espionage service like this, the members would all have to be extremely loyal to their organization first..... and the backstabbing politics that we see among the Bothans would doom it to failure.
John
P.S. Sorry RiflemanIII if we are pulling your thread away........
Now, I'm having thoughts of an entire race that excels in spycraft. They train the best infiltrators and sell their product to whoever can pay them..... They utilize the best surveilance ships.... and no one crosses them because they have the dirt on everyone. If you mess with one of them, you are messing with the whole race.
Might have to consider this for my own campaign....LOL
John
Sweet....
The question would be..... do they sell some of these ships?
I am thinking of a clan of pirates/intel brokers.... with a small group of these ships, using them for covert surveilance and then selling the intel to other powers.....
John
Most of the players that used the insane thrust levels eventually reigned themselves in. Especially if they had a mix of faster and slower ships.... as their slower ships got pounded while the fast ones were out of range, decelerating, and trying to get back into the battle. We prefer this movement style, as it requires the players to do more that stack as many weapons as possible in a limited fire arc, and attempt to keep people there.... which also tends to get boring.
John
As Dan said, you need wider arcs if you use the Full Thrust movement...
I have found that drones and fighters, along with a floating battlefield, tend to get rid of the "battle's edge" campers......
In addition, in our group and dependent on the race of your fleet, we also use a modified fire arc system, with the arcs following the hexsides for movement... we number them 1 through 6... with 1 being foward, 2 being port foward, 3 being starboard foward, 4 is port aft, 5 is starboard aft, and 6 is directly aft.
It works without changing the spreadsheets, and allows one of our fleets (based on the Homeworld computer game) to use the frigates as designed in the game.... he has an "Ion Frigate" which uses a 3/2/2 weapon in the 1 fire arc as it's sole weapon (the 3 rof is to simulate the duration of fire). In addition, it also allows his "Assault Frigates to carry the plasma bomb launchers in the 1 arc, to support the turrets, during the initial advance... and then the railgun turrets as the ship moves around the battle edge.
Our Trek style player actually uses both fire arc styles, to simulate the "Phaser Strips" on the TNG ships.... he uses the overlapping arcs to simulate what is seen on the show.... and if he loses a weapon, we assume that it simulates damage to a portion of the strip, but that the rest is working.
John
I tend to use ACE and BDF for a lot of my designs.....
John
A lot of us already use that.... pretty much the same as Full Thrust movement. It works quite well with Starmada.
John
mj12games.com/forum → Posts by Nahuris
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