Although it's not consistent with the rules as written, I'd like to propose the following simplification of the explosion rules:

During the end phase, ALL explosions (even fresh ones) do damage.  Then ALL Explosions are degraded.  Launching of fighters and then sunbursts happens after this.

Consequences of this rule:

* There's no need to remember which explosions are new.

* It becomes a bad idea to stack your ships in the same hex.  This is a good thing, because it makes maneuvering more interesting and makes life easier for players using miniatures.

* Sunbursts and big explosions are terrain for the next round.  Size-1 ship explosions damage others in the same hex, but do not stay around long enough to be terrain.

* You can't launch fighters if something big exploded in your hex this turn (they would be annihilated upon leaving the carrier).  A size-1 explosion would be gone by fighter-launching time.

* Sunbursts cannot be used to keep carriers from launching, because the fighters have time to move before damage is done in the following end phase.  (This depends on a very precise interpretation of the rule that fighters are eliminated upon entering an explosion hex.  They didn't enter the sunburst hex, it entered their hex.  Without this interpretation, dropping a sunburst onto a pile of freshly-launched fighters is probably too powerful.)

Explosions occur at the end of the Combat Phase, and they do damage in the End Phase -- so yes, they do damage on their first turn.

The Compendium had an end-phase sequence which for some reason I never got around to updating for X:

I. Game Board Effects
   A. Explosion Counters
II. Movement
   A. Hyperspace
   B. Interdictor Fields
   C. Stutterdrives
III. Launching
   A. Battle Satellites
   B. Boarding Pods
   C. Drones
   D. Energy Leeches
   E. Fighters
   F. Mines
IV. Sensors
   A. Anime-Style Spinal Mount Declaration
   B. Bogey Revelation
   C. Sensor Locks
   D. Tachyon Detection & Ranging Locks
V. Combat & Weapon Effects
   A. Bore Missiles
   B. Greek Firebombs
   C. Q-Ship Conversion
   D. Shipboard Combat
VI. Repairs
   A. Auto-Repair System
   B. Damage Control
   C. Organic Hull

Not everything applies, but it gives you something to reference.

This has nothing to do with the format. I saw your message... I just didn't feel like answering yet.

Dan

For the record, that's the table from the Compendium.  For example, the X rules don't list anything called an energy leech.

Incidentally, why the rule that fresh ship explosions aren't reduced?  I suspect the answer was so that size-1 explosions still cause terrain.  It seems slightly unwieldy, though, to have to keep track of which explosions are fresh.  Better to reduce all of them, and accept the consequence that an exploding gunboat can damage other ships in its hex, but doesn't leave terrain.

But maybe that's just me.

BTW, I like the new forum.  No &^%$# advertisements!

Last night we had a large star base raid and one player was able to slip two destroyers next to the station.  They fired 4 of the following weapon:

Skysweepers [1/2/3, 3+, Expendable, Range-Based ROF, Repeating,
Re-Rolls To-Hit Dice] (A total of 12 to hit dice to begin with)

This resulted in 198 hits before I said uncle, and the attacker still had 5 or 6 active dice they could have continued to attack with.  After all that rolling we realized that we had skipped the fighter phase and the results were completely different

I really liked the addition of expendable weapons but combinations like this are really over powerful.

We re-rolled all misses of the repeaters each set of rolls.  Afterward we wondered if the re-roll should only be on the first roll for repeaters.  What is the official call?

In an earlier campaign we found that a corvette with only expendible rockets was cheap and completely devastating.  I am starting to think that the current expendable cost is too low.

Spencer

Dan:

I should clarify that these weapons are repeaters AND they re-roll misses.

One wonders if this is a combo that should be outlawed?

That logic is a simle, if blunt, solution to this abuse, and is consistent with some of the other combinatino limits already in the rules.

I dis-like any other solutions proposed here cause they risk more general impact on the entire game.

I think I can basically see what Jimmy is saying. Basically, all repeating dice can only re-roll a miss -ONCE- and does not reset with a new hit. The point costs should balance it out if handled properly.

Personally, if this combination is really a problem then just ban it. There is plenty of precedence for banning certain combinations since custom weapons was originally conceived in XG-2. I don't think that there is a need to limit special abilities to only two. As for the other solution, I half wonder if certain combinations need increased cost over the product due to "gestalt" and synergy, but is that too much for this game engine? If push comes to shove, then ban it, but don't let it become a habit. IMO

Jerry

Absolutely not. I think almost every major weapon I've designed has three features...

re roll to hit can only be used once.

I'd quote the book, but I'm a lousy typer and the damn pdf is password locked!

Dan, when you lock the pdfs, please allow copying text.

jim

My Friend who I play with in Jacksonville has expendible weapons that have this combination: {Repeating+RerollsToHit+RerollsPenetration}.  The way we deal with this combination is to only the repeating weapon to reroll any misses once, the first time it makes its rolls to hit.  Then those iniaial hits + the Rerolls that hit are rerolled as normal again, and again 'til they are done, or have made six shots.  We only allow repeating weapons to shoot only up to six times because if they are hitting on a 2+ this rerolling can go on and on and on and... <LOL>.

StevenGilchrist
Jacksonville, Fla, USA