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mj12games.com/forum → Posts by GamingGlen
Some weapon traits (i.e., Piercing, Anti-Fighter Batteries) at some ranges (e.g., 3,15,18,24) changes the ORAT, and CRAT, when you change the Weapons Tech Level.
2.) The game wasn't designed to be realistic; this is why I left SFB/StarFire for it.
Realistic? SFB/Starfire? REALISTIC?
1) Remember that Starmada is played under artificial constraints -- i.e., the game board itself. Any ship that accelerates to the point where it can move from maximum weapons range to point-blank in a single move will end up flying off the opposite edge of the board, thus being "destroyed" itself.
I hate fix maps for space ship combat as space does not have borders. I refuse to play such games or with such rules; we have always used floating maps in space ship combat games I've played, including Starmada. Never had a problem doing so. What I would have problems with is "being boxed into a corner" when playing a space ship combat game.
I've played Full Thrust and have seen speeds of 45+ (sometimes with my own ships). We had to semi-abstract some ship locations "off the map" by noting direction (perpendicular to the map edge) and distance from the miniature sitting on the edge of the table. This has worked fine. But speeds of 20+ were rare, and even then I rarely moved off the current playing area or had to float the map. So I'd worry less about high speeds or map edges and get the movement system right. I wouldn't even bother with a maximum speed; IMO, even 300 is too slow for light speed.
The boom and zoom method might just be how space combat might be fought realistically. That might not be as much fun for gaming, though.
Steve... 5 shields?
This is for a convention scenario, they only have a short amount of time to play. Save the 5 shields for X ships. 
andyskinner wrote:I'd like to reduce the amount of paper I print, so at the very least I'd like 2 ships per page.
This was a concern of mine, as well. But I couldn't figure out how to make Excel print two copies onto a single sheet... :?:
Have another Data Card worksheet that prints the design twice on one sheet.
I did this with my modified S:X shipbuilder. I had two design worksheets (Design1, Design2), and many SSD worksheet variants to choose from: Design1, Design2, 2xDesign1, 2xDesign2, Design1 & Design2, and trimming some options (only 2 weapon types, max of 6 special equipment options) let me have 4 SSDs (2x2) per page for small ships.
I've increased the hull size of several ships without using the space. You could call it "redundant hull". 
I had even modified my version of the S:X shipbuilder to show the smallest hull size that could hold the current selections of equipment.
Especially in S:X with ships equipped with spinal mounts, extra hull is about as good as having armor plating or any other hull protection as it adds to your offensive potential as well as survivability.
You can also fill in that extra SU with medical facilities, science labs, and :wink: bowling alleys.
PS: Great tho Starfire was, Starmada is superior in all aspects
You're just sucking up, Steve.
The game Imperium by GDW used the term dreadnought for classes of ships that were not as powerful as battleships. This game predates Star Fleet Battles by two years.
2) When and how did "Dreadnought" become synonymous with "larger than a battleship"? Not only has the term been out of vogue in naval circles for nigh on a century, the fact is that (almost) all WW1- and WW2-era battleships were in fact "Dreadnoughts".
And, finally, the mere existence of the term "superdreadnought" makes my skin crawl...
Because it sounds "kewl" ? 8)
Just because it went out of vogue doesn't mean it cannot come back.
I just used the ship builder to try making a size 20 and size 12 ship, and the 12 looks plenty big. So it looks like:
Scout: 1
Corvette: 2
Frigate: 3
Destroyer: 4
Heavy Destroyer: 5
Light Cruiser: 6
Escort Cruiser: 7
Heavy Cruiser: 8
Battlecruiser: 9
battleship: 10
dreadnought: 11
superdreadnought: 12And if a heavy frigate is as big as a destroyer, so what?
Do you try to fill all the space units, or do you commonly leave some unused?
andy
This looks limited to me. Maximum size on the current sheet is 24, so scale everything to that. You're also missing classifications for auxillaries and bases.
Besides, this is a space game, not a game based on some real world wet navy ship-class naming convention. Don't let that limit your imagination.
BeowulfJB wrote:I have just finished reading thru the New Starmada Admiralty rules and am very, very impressed with them. There are so many good things here, that I almost don't know where to start.
I may miss over-thrusters because my main warships are WW2 battleships, cruisers, destroyers, etc made into 14 to 4 hulled space ships.
I'm not sure how those two statements are related (did WW2 battleships have overthrusters?
Essentially, treat them as allowing a "free" pivot -- e.g. if a ship with overthrusters plots a +2 pivot, it only adds 1 to the thrust requirement.
NOOOOOO!!! No more overthrusters!!! :shock: :shock:
I want maneuvering to mean something. Overthrusters negated that a great deal in X.
(if only the Kra'Vak in Full Thrust had Overthrusters... *gets misty eyed*)
Designed a ship, size 24, engine 2, transport x4000 (size doesn't really matter :shock: but I went up to the highest setting to see what happens) with no weapons: ORAT = 0, DRAT = 57.6, CRAT = 0. (designing troop transport combinations to determine troop use/movement for the campaign)
Yes, it has no combat capability, but I was designing this while working on a campaign ruleset. If the CRAT is 0, and this is the base number to determine what the players can purchase, then the players could have an infinite number of such hulls and this will not do. Should a ship, any ship, have some minimum CRAT?
I put in the cheapest weapon possbile (1 arc, RNG 3, ACC 6+, IMP 1, DMG 1) and this gave a ORAT of 3.3, CRAT of 14.
An observation: Did you know that a teleporter has an ORAT of 20? This is more than having a real weapon (even modifying the previous one to RNG 12, ACC 3+ : ORAT 18.7).
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Unprotect the black areas on the Data Card sheet so people can alter the colors of those areas. Makes it useful for taking a quick look and seeing what fleet/universe it belongs to (says one having Star Trek/SFB, Babylon 5, and Star Wars miniatures). Would also allow people to change it from the more ink-using black color. (I've already downloaded the spreadsheet and unprotected it myself, but I see I already have to download a newer version ).
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If Shields/Screens are 0, why bother putting in 0s in the shield damage track? Same might go for engines (for bases).
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I purchased my copy of Excel.
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I've yet to buy the book as I'm waiting for my own game store to get a copy. But from what I've seen in the shipbuilder and reading the PDF, I really like the Admiralty edition so far. It has got me interested again in trying to set up a campaign game (visit Dragon's Lair Games in the Ft. Lauderdale, FL, area for future details).
Glen
Sorry, no. Steve left town already and I'll be busy.
Do BatSats operate independently? Or should they be grouped, possibly similar to how Drones are grouped (all those launched at the same time from a ship are in a group)?
Next scheduled game is for Monday, June 11, starting at 1 PM. Each player gets 4000 points.
We played two games, one each on Wednesday and Thursday, 6000 points per play at my suggestion since I wanted to play a full fleet of newly designed 'Klingon' ships.
We went with a house rule that a weapon can only have one option; although allowing any ROF, PEN, or DMG (from 1 to 3). We were trying to stay with the Compendium version of weapons as we find some X combinations seem a bit more powerful than the point system indicates.
Wednesday's game concluded that we outlaw Repeating as a weapon option. When one ship loaded with repeating weapons that had about 1/6 the rating points of the fleet did more damage than the entire other fleet (both sides had equivalent defenses) then something is quite amiss about the Repeating rating cost. But since I've hashed this out before I won't bother going on about it.
No VBAM, please, at least officially.
The setting books are a nice idea. Have some ships designs, but also have a page for guidelines for designing ships for each race/nation/etc. That way a player can make new ships belonging to the race/nation/etc with the same flavor(s) as the "official" ships.
I prefer the way LRS works in X, actually. LRS in X means that you don't get an insanely long range over your opponent, and means that its more about weapons layout.
"insanely"? An extra 6 inches at maximum? :?
Oh, that's right, you people like speed 2 ships, and think speed 3 is blazingly fast. :shock: No wonder the optional tactic of Evasive Action is never used. Let's see, -1 for long range, -1 for EA, that's -2. So let them get one shot at long range (okay, with EA they might get 2). Oh yeah, 1-3 movement points gets you -0 EA mod.
You do realize that YOU can put LRS in your ship, also.
I never design a ship with less than a speed of 4.
There's more to ship design than weapon layouts.
You mean that I, the uncheesiest of them all, found the cheesy broken combo? Me? Oh well, me bad. :twisted: Guess I'll have to retire that design.
I prefer the LRS in the Compendium over the LRS in X. LRS in X means there are 2 ranges in effect, short and long-ranged medium. About the only time long range matters is fighting someone with the Stealth Generator. And, SG is just as broken in X as IRM is in the Compendium; I prefer the 50% increase to range for the SG.
Some other thoughts while I was rereading the posts...
I like the damage allocation from X better. I like that you can get Q hits and what weapon batteries are hit. I even powergamed and put in several Laser Cannons (fighter defense, you know :wink:) to be taken as weapons hits before hitting my main batteries for the Compendium battles. Not that it mattered much, Mr. Mass Driver-armed fleet destroyed my main warship and barely scratched weapons and shields.
I prefer the amount of repair rolls from the Compendium; in that there are fewer rolls.
It there any problem using the X-damage allocation method with the Compendium rules?
(Now, if a certain person would remove the now-unofficial Teleporters from his ship designs so he can't take those as cheesy Q hits... :roll: ).
I'm one of those Florida gamers that played against Steve, and even was on his side once, over the holidays. I pretty much agree with his assessments of using the Compendium rules over the X rules. We debated whether to try the Compendium rules or making some houserules and use the X rules; we chose the Compendium. One house rule for X we thought about was limiting weapons to one option. I also disagree on the value of some of those options in X (i.e., Repeating is too cheap. Let's see, the Compendium's repeating weapon, Pulse Laser, is a size 3 weapon and can shoot at fighters while the extra hull weapon, Mass Driver, is a size 2 weapon and cannot shoot at fighters. Now, in X, the Repeating option has a 2.4 multiplier while the Extra Hull damage option has a 3.0 multiplier; both can shoot at fighters. Hmm, I smell a pay off from the Repeating weapons arms dealer :wink: Edit: and what makes Repeating even more offensive (sic) is the change for Long Range Sensors special equipment. At long range in the Compendium the modifier for long range still exists; while in X with LRS it does not. And this is NOT reflected in the Repeating weapons cost and it very much should).
I've modified my version of the SXCA spreadsheet (v2.61 base version) and switched it over for the Compendium. So far my numbers for ship designs match with the website, except when TL mods are altered. Then my spreadsheet tends to be a point or two higher in CR and use up an extra SU or two. This could be due to rounding. Are numbers rounded in the middle of the equations or only at the very end? Also, I made the SSDs similar to my modified X-rules SSDs.
Also, it seems that the TL mods for special equipment do apply to everything except the hyperdrive (as it should); and not at all to the Interdictor Field and as far as I know it should. Should the ruling about what equipment is modified by TL apply to the Compendium rules as well?
I disagree with the weapon ranges. That makes me suspect everything else.
In SFB, at range 30, a fleet of ships armed with Phaser-1s/Phaser-2s can cripple a ship (I've been there, had a D7 crippled by a Hydran fleet). An equivalent sized fleet armed with Plasma-Rs cannot. Me thinks someone really likes Plasma weapons. Plasma weapons are short ranged weapons, at longer ranges ships just run away from them.
Phaser-1s should be the longest ranged weapons in the conversion. As for Phaser-IVs, they're main strength is in their short-ranged punch. As for longer ranges, stations double the ranges of their weapons so that takes care of the range issue of the Phaser-IV (as for other weapons, just design them with half the range.. they don't need as much stabilization gear on a station as they do on a ship :roll: ).
Decide an effective range for weapons in SFB, then halve it. I say use 30, since Photon torpedoes and Disruptors have a maximum range of 30 (or used to until they added all that other-range Disruptor crap to pad their rules :evil: ), this makes the maximum range of 15. Phaser-1s, Photon Torpedoes, Disruptors, and probably Hellbores (never played with them much) should have a range of 15, Fusion Beams and Phaser-2s are ranged 9, Phaser-3s have a range of 3. Ranged-based damage is a good option on most, except for the Photon Torpedo. Range-based ToHit should apply to Disruptors and Photon Torpedoes, with Disruptors having a base damage of 2 and Photon Torpedoes have a base damage of 3. Hellbores might have the Halve Shields option, since that seems to be the only anti-shield option for weapons at the moment.
Plasmas should be treated as a special drone type. One problem with adding more seeking weapons is the time it adds to the play time.
As for hulls, I think those sizes are a bit low.
House rules are fine and dandy, until you want to talk about your experiences on message forums or go play other people outside your immediate circle, such as cons. Campaign enforced rules are distinct and remembered as such.
GamingGlen wrote:"Spot on points wise"? Then why is there this big discussion if several are seeing problems with it? Evidently you love space fighters, and it shows in how you favor them: they're too cheap, and there's no effective ship based system to counter them that isn't a kludge.
Wow. You've got a serious chip on your shoulder about this, huh?
Yep, ever since SFB introduced the fighters' expansion (first or second expansion?); that was the beginning of the end of SFB for me, although it took a few years, and quite a few dollars :cry: , for me to realize it. SFB was a great ship to ship game, ruined by fighters, among other reasons (the 101 things you do during an IMPULSE). So it wasn't you I aimed my dislike for the current gaming so-called space fighters paradigm. Although having 6 fighters per unit instead of 6 individual fighters is a much better system than SFB had.
And with UCAV (un-manned combat air vehicle) becoming more and more feasible with today's military, manned "fighters" may never get to space. Or, the only sole-purpose combat space vehicles might be small ships, perhaps 1-5 people. Large ships might have to be multi-purpose (like the original Enterprise from Star Trek), with some combat capabilities (e.g., only half the SU space can be used for weapons, shields, engines, etc). But this is beyond what the rules are trying to portray.
I agree about Nukes in space. That's why the submarine concept is feasible. The first to make contact with the enemy fires it's nuke payload and scrams (a nuke payload could be a nuke-pumped directed energy weapon). Just how big the ship has to be is really unknown. We've downsized our largest non-carrier surface ships, so bigger is not always better.
While I have listened (read?) with great interest regarding the feedback on fighters in this thread, my own experience has been that they are spot-on points wise. And as others have pointed out, there are many different ways of countering their threat -- the most effective of which is to have your own fighters; which makes sense if you're associating them with wet-navy air power.
"Spot on points wise"? Then why is there this big discussion if several are seeing problems with it? Evidently you love space fighters, and it shows in how you favor them: they're too cheap, and there's no effective ship based system to counter them that isn't a kludge.
I hate the concept that I HAVE to have fighters to counter theirs. I really do. I don't want to play WW2 Pacific carrier battles in space (I do plenty of that in the WW2 games I play).
Space is not air or water. You cannot base space-fighter technology on man's experience with AIRcraft, and in comparison to WATERcraft. The two crafts work in a different medium. Space fighters and space ships will operate in the same medium (or lack of one): space. Since we don't know how space craft will eventually work, especially concerning combat, we make guesses. But too many, not just you, have made wrong guesses at thinking "fighters = aircraft, ships = surface naval craft". ALL space craft will be space craft. As an aside, I attended a discussion on possible future war craft in space and the speaker's theory was summed up that they will be similar to submarines: stealth in for the kill shot. But it's a theory, and it doesn't make for a good space battles game .
I have a question: has there been any extensive playtesting of fighter-based fleets vs non-fighter based fleets? As in, not just a battle or two as bad or good dice rolls, or bad or good tactics, can make a difference, but many battles having one side or the other having a much better winning percentage?
For the record, if you were to build a ship with 3 hull points (because there are 6 fighters in a flight, but they take a hull hit twice as often), movement of 13 (for the 10-hex radius plus 3 for the fact that they effectively get to turn all the way around for free), six range-1, 1/1/1 weapons with Halves Shields, and Electronic Countermeasures, it would have a combat rating of 36 and take up 233 SUs.
The reason fighters are worth 50 is that I threw in a x2 multiplier for their ability to move and attack in their own phase. Even if you cranked the special modifier up to x3, that still only makes them worth 60 points.
The reason they take up 50 SUs is that they are short-ranged-- plus, most of that mass is taken up by the engines, which are computed for a hull-3 ship, but really take up much less space since we're talking about craft smaller than size 1. I can conceive of making fighter bays take up as much as 100 points, but the SU cost has nothing to do with their effectiveness on the battlefield.
You (of all people :wink: ) forgot Anti-Fighter Batteries, since fighters attacking this ship would kill themselves when they roll a 1, like they would when attacking another figher flight.
Your hull comparison is flawed. It's the weapons that matter. 3 Hull? You could take out the entire "flight" with 3 hits instead of 6.
You really cannot compare a ship to a fighter flight. Fighters are a weapon system, not an entire spacecraft. That's why I compared a flight with a single weapon.
Fighters do not operate alone. They have to arrive with a mothership (not counting the too-cheap long-range option). The mothership's cost has to be added in. But you can make a small ship have LOTS of fighters. Way too many, IMO. If you're basing carriers on modern, and science fiction equivalents (which are modelled after the modern concept most likely), then Starmada's carriers are way too small. Increasing the SU cost of fighter bays increases the the size of their carriers thus indirectly increasing the CR cost per fighter flight.
Hmm.. fuzzy math? 36x2=72, not 50. So, 36x3 = 108. And 36 is now suspect, due to needing AFB.
I think their SU cost is way too low.
I designed 2 ships, both with 2 engines and a hyperdrive:
hull 5 can hold 12 fighters bays;
takes a hull 15 to hold 12 weapons that are to-hit 5+, range 12 (closest to 11), using 3 ROF and 2 PEN to get 6 effective shots, all arcs, halves shields, no range mod. And these weapons don't get to have their damage be effective IMMEDIATELY.
Of course comparing the two might not be quite that easy, but we're just talking SU, not combat cost.
ok, let me fiddle with the spreadsheet and see what SU the fighter bays might be to be more equivalent... ...200 SU per fighter bay.
Then I calculated by hand the the SU of the weapon: 212 (using ROF of 6). (I should have thought of this sooner :roll: ).
Make the fighter bays larger, thus making their carriers larger, thus increasing the cost of fighters indirectly. You should also look at making the long range option for fighters a lot costlier. A LOT. (something near what it would cost to bring the same number of not-long-range flights with a carrier).
mj12games.com/forum → Posts by GamingGlen
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