• From: Denver, CO
  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 3,578

Topic: Fleet Ops update

Working on an update to Fleet Ops, and I have hit a stumbling block. See the example ship below, based on a Full Thrust design. Everything makes sense, except how to handle damage to systems (the string of characters at far right). The Tiger CS has a level-1 screen (@), a jump drive (J), and two point defense systems (P). I can't simply do a proportional degradation as for thrust and weapons, since it matters which specific systems are damaged. Any ideas?

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Daniel Kast
Majestic Twelve Games
cricket@mj12games.com

mj12games's Website

2 Reply by TheJayster (edited by TheJayster 2022-12-11 21:23:02)

  • From: Montreal, Canada
  • Registered: 2022-12-11
  • Posts: 14

Re: Fleet Ops update

I'm not sure I totally understand how the degradation system works for weapons and thrust, and what happens to be the overall hull rating of the ship. With that caveat, how about something where at 50% of the hull being destroyed, the player must roll a saving throw of 4+ for each system on the far right?

  • From: Denver, CO
  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 3,578

Re: Fleet Ops update

Okay, so the thrust/weapons are reduced as the ship takes damage. For example, the Tiger starts with a thrust of "1-2-1" (4 MPs/turn broken into three segments); after it takes seven hits (three shields at the top and then four hull boxes in the first row), its thrust is reduced to "1-1-1". Likewise, after three more hull hits, Tiger has no more Beam-1 or Torpedo weapons, and only has a single Beam-2 that can fire forward or to the sides.

The idea of rolling for each system after X damage has been taken is where I'm leaning, even though I've always been wary of threshold checks--they seem to slow the game down for me.

Daniel Kast
Majestic Twelve Games
cricket@mj12games.com

mj12games's Website

  • From: Montreal, Canada
  • Registered: 2022-12-11
  • Posts: 14

Re: Fleet Ops update

Thank you, now I fully understand. I get what you're trying to do, and avoiding further dice rolls is a good idea. Therefore, I have the following suggestion: how about assigning 'priorities' or levels to each type of special equipment, so that some special equipment would get destroyed by type before other ones? Example, with 'X' being the hull rows (from the Tiger stats):

XXXX : at the end of that row, you lose (say) shields   
XXX : at the end of that row, you lose point-defence (both)
XXX : at the end of that row, you lose your jump engine

That being said, I'm not enamored with my own suggestion, but as I'm bed ridden with a massive migraine, that's then best I could come up with so far!

  • From: Denver, CO
  • Registered: 2005-03-27
  • Posts: 3,578

Re: Fleet Ops update

I appreciate the suggestion, and it's not bad. I wonder about the effect of always losing systems in the same order; it encourages "padding" (i.e. adding a bunch of unimportant systems to make sure you never lose the important stuff). But at this scale I suppose it's not a huge issue.

Daniel Kast
Majestic Twelve Games
cricket@mj12games.com

mj12games's Website

  • Registered: 2008-12-22
  • Posts: 654

Re: Fleet Ops update

Myself, I would prefer a more randomized loss of specials rather than a set order along the track. At this scale ships aren't really loaded with lots of systems to soak up "criticals"/system damage.

Maybe a single die roll at each threshold to determine the # of systems lost, modified by row? Justs as a spitball...for example at the first threshold level roll 1d6-4 with a minimum of one...with my luck I would roll a 6 here (rolling ones everywhere I need sixes and the Universe demands balance) so I lose 2 systems of my choice and choose a PDS and the Jump drive (WE FIGHT TO THE DEATH!). At the Second threshold the roll the 1d6-3, again minimum of 1, and this time I roll a 2 so I only lose 1 system and choose the other PDS.
Not sure about how much of a modifier or how to determine it simply on a ship by ship basis if that would make more sense, but I think 1 die roll rather than a bucket o' dice type of saving throw roll could be doable.

Cheers!
Erik