mj12games wrote:As others noted, this was something available in a previous edition of Starmada, of which the Expendable trait is an adaptation. Based on your feedback, and that from others, the "Ammo" rule is likely to be among the first to be re-implemented in a supplement.
Mj12games, thanks for the reply. I'm actually glad to hear I was correct in my assessment of the game. Not because I may have detected any serious flaw, but because it means I am picking up the rules correctly. Its always a little bit of a worry when I follow a rabbit hole and come out the other end that I understood everything correctly. I am after all new to these rules with no experience with previous editions.
I'm glad to hear that launchers and magazines will likely see a return as an option. I understand the desire and the need to simplify a game when and where possible. Needless complexity is the death of any good game, however I do believe this is a good trait to offer as an option. I do say option and not requirement. Here's a short list of setting that I know use this system.
David Webers "Honor Harrington" series.
John G. Hemry "The Lost Fleet" series.
Starfleet Battles: "Drones"
Renegade Legion: Leviathan
The Expanse (Sci-fi TV show, watch this if you haven't!), also a book series.
For the moment I'm thinking Ill limit myself to a base seeker limit equal to the "hull" value of the launching ship. So seekers in excess of this are just considered in the magazine. Perhaps what we need are two systems...
1. Use the current Seeker system with limit on the total seekers a single ship can control at one time. Seekers could still be destroyed by weapon loss.
2. A Launcher and Magazine configuration, where the launchers can be destroyed, but the magazine remains secure except maybe to some kind of major critical.
Consequently, I was able to design a seeker that was 2+ accuracy, damage 5, "expendable" and "catastrophic" that require 3.1 spaces each. So a thousand spaces would allow me to load 322 of them. I don't have the experience with the game to call that a fleet killer, but I'm not prepared to say its not balanced, fair, or fun.
Ironically, this very situation is how David Weber directed the evolution of starship combat in his Honor'verse. Ships eventually just became massive launching platforms for scatterpack missiles, utterly overwhelming any hope of a battlegroups point defense.