The best fighter hits on a 4+ (bomber) therefore perhaps just adjust the table...
1-3 flights on a 1
4-8 flights on a 1-2
9+ on a 1-3

And of course make it incremental as all other fighter rules are. Then the first 3 flights moved into position are treated normally but the forth flags the higher attack rating.

i think that people who complain fighters are super powerful and undercosted simply lack imagination
i played CREW KILLING SHIPS and was able to beat fighters
make no mistake, fighters are powerful, but not invincible
if you believe fighters are ultra powerful, use interceptor fighters, they specialize in attacking other fighters
BTW, nice idea with the sundrone

Hello everyone!

     I have another design for another anti-fighter weapon that is much less expensive than the "5 Inch Guns" I mentioned earlier.  This weapon expendable and so costs  much less.  Once you fire them, they are gone, but (hopefully) so are the fighters!  I call them "Tartar Missiles".   Just fill up the C-battery with them on a few Anti-aircraft ships.  And you still have "A" & "B" batteries for heavier weapons. 

{Tartar Missiles; expendable, 3+ to hit, range=18,  3/1/1, Rerolls To-hit }

     0f course, if there are no fighters, then this barrage of Tartar Missiles can also damage hostile ships...

Steven Gilchrist; former US Navy GunnersMate, Jacksonville, Fla, USA

Odd... my working document says +20 to OR/DR. But I see that the published book has +30... :?:

Anyway, yes-- go with +40.

Some time ago, I wrote Dan and proposed a supplement to Starmada -- I called it the EXTENDED APPENDICES (XA for short). One of the chapters of this particular volume was a Fighter Design System [size=59](1)[/size] that allowed you to design fighters (and non-combatant smallcraft) in much the same way you design other starships. He has the document, and last I spoke with him, decided against the idea of publishing it as a whole.

I believe what he wants to do is this: break up the XA into several, smalleroptional rules volumes. No word on where he is on that approach yet.

[size=59](1) -- In addition, I had a chapter that allowed you more options for the standard Customeised Fighter Rules.[/size]

For a while I really liked drones. One battle we played out was with two size-20 ships with heavy weapons, strong shields, little if any speed (both were speed 2) and around 3-5 full salvoes of drones. The turns took a while to resolve...:)

Now I'm for heavy weapons. Full stop. Including plasma and ion weapons, but my favorite is rail cannons. Nowadays I tend to keep direct-fire weapons (K or E weapons in the KEB system) with a range of 12 or lower (only base-mounted weapons go higher) and B weapons with 15 or 18 range. I noticed that you could, theoretically, have a ship with range 3 missiles and that, in a CSCR encounter, it could batter a ship with range 12 weapons (K or E-type) from the safety of the flag squadron, and that didn't appeal to me at all.

I don't really understand how a range three weapon can do anything from within the safety of the flag quadron?

You'd still have to close to within three hexes???

Hehe...

Hopefully all players would use the honour system when designing Starmada ships for VBAM conversion. I know I do, and that anyone who played against me using that tactic would be out of the group so fast they'd have friction burns.

One thing I have liked, though, is missile boats. I don't know what it is, but for the last few months I've liked building support ships for the cruisers which have missiles in 'em. Put them into a flag squadron with a scout cruiser, and you've got some serious firepower which you can keep back, and let the cruisers do their job.

I didn't want to get too complicated, and I wanted to allow players to just swap out one type of fighter flight for another.

Since SU cost doesn't impact gameplay at all, I thought it an appropriate sacrifice in "realism"; however, if you wanted to apply the same modifiers to SU as are applied to CR, that would be good place to start.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the small and large fighter modification does not refer to the size of the fighter but the flight, giving:-
Small = 4 fighters
Basic = 6 fighters
Large = 8 fighters
Plus fighter bay to match.
Starmada X p.38

I would vote for having the same SU/CR mod.

On the same subject, the Starmada/VBAM crossover has the Jump capable ability for fighters with a CR rating mod of 1.
This would make them the same as the Long Range (Deep Space) fighters which have a hyperdrive and a CR of 60. Therefore should the CR Rating Mod be increased to 1.2 or do you consider these different in some way?

How about changing the Anti Fighter Batteries to:-
Range 1
Fires at all Flights (or groups of drones) actually attacking the ship.
Throw of 4 = 1 Hit
Throw of 5 = 2 Hits
Throw of 6 = 2 Hits + Re Roll
Fires before the fighters. I cannot imagine any system being made with the Kirk syndrome "I will not fire first".

Place marker - ignore.

Just want to keep up to date, and hit the wrong button...
:-)

Changing the shipyard to allow fighter bays to be costed for all fighter mods to be paid for in SU would be easy.

Perhaps it is wrong to think that a Fighter Bay should only come in one size.

However, If acceptable, This way you would be paying for a fighter bay to fit the flight (as you buy both at the same time). When buying a fighter flight, this includes a Bay and fighter equipment, staff, etc as a package.

There is a fair bit of fighter design already allowed for.
Two sizes of fighter.
Basic and Heavy

Three engine sizes.
Basic, Slow (small engine) and Fast (larger engine)

Four Weapon fits.
Basic, Assault, Extended Range and Bomber

Of course, I have not put Fighter Tech levels on the main sheet but did allow for this on the fighter sheet. Stll who would want a tech level +2 flight of 8 robot fighters? These would come out much smaller than Human (Basic) fighters.