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Has anyone ever given thought to adding a Special Equipment item that functions as ECM but can be loaned to other ships? Sort of like a jammer. How would this be pointed and what kind of strengths/weaknesses would you suggest?
Has anyone ever given thought to adding a Special Equipment item that functions as ECM but can be loaned to other ships? Sort of like a jammer. How would this be pointed and what kind of strengths/weaknesses would you suggest?
It has been suggested ... the stumbling block has been the point-costing of it.
The obvious abuse would be to put the ECM 'master' on a weak ship and the ECM 'slaves' on powerful ones. So, I would think the point cost would have to take into account the value of the group as a whole.
So, I would think the point cost would have to take into account the value of the group as a whole.
How about tying the effectiveness of the system to the size of the vessel that it is mounted on? Say it can only loan ECM to a number of hull points of ships equal to its own hull size (or some other such number). That way you can kind of ball park the number and strength of ships receiving the benefit. It makes sense especially if the Jammer's SU is based off of a percentage of the mounting ship's SU. A jammer mounted on a HS 10 (1900 SU) ship should be more powerful than a jammer mounted on a HS 5 (700 SU) ship. Then the jammer mounted on the 10 HS ship can provide a -1 to-be-hit mod for a total of 10 HS (or whatever) of other ships.
One option might be to require the ship carrying the equipment to have a number of ECM equipment boxes equal to the number of ships it's covering (including itself) multiplied by the range to the farthest ship it is covering. So a ship that wanted to jam for itself and two other ships (3 total), one of which was 2 hexes away would need 6 ECM boxes. If it wanted to jam for only the two other ships but not itself, it could do so up to 3 hexes away.
If you want to be more restrictive, you could require the jamming ship to have enough ECM boxes equal to the sum of the ranges to all the ships it is jamming for (counting itself as range 1).
For damage, I'd treat an EW equipment hit like a drones hit (1d6 boxes eliminated for each hit).
A simple idea would be to mount the ECM unit on any ship that is to be covered by ECM; <LOL>. Another option is using fighters in a screening role or having the ship designed with higher speed to use evasive manuvers.
But if there is enough interest in ECM units with slave, perhaps the system used in the 'Compendium-version could be revampped, and introduced into the Starmada "X" game. Advanced ECM that is unblockable would be useful also... :idea:
Just a thought 
Steven Gilchrist; Jacksonville, Fla, USA
Well, the thought was to add an electronics warfare platform to the game (similar to special sensors in SFB) that can provide electronic warfare above what the covering ship could generate. If the enemy is pounding your flagship, the scout/jammer/whatever platform could throw up a wall of electronic support. Of course your opponent will then make killing the scout/jammer/whatever unit a priority.
So if a ship mounted ECM the scout/jammer/thingy could still loan it another -1 to be hit.
One option might be to require the ship carrying the equipment to have a number of ECM equipment boxes equal to the number of ships it's covering (including itself) multiplied by the range to the farthest ship it is covering.
I like this, it is simple and elegant. Of course each installation of ECM is 5% of the ships SU so one obvious work around is to put them ion the smaller hulls so they use less of your total SU.
wombatzoner wrote:One option might be to require the ship carrying the equipment to have a number of ECM equipment boxes equal to the number of ships it's covering (including itself) multiplied by the range to the farthest ship it is covering.
I like this, it is simple and elegant. Of course each installation of ECM is 5% of the ships SU so one obvious work around is to put them ion the smaller hulls so they use less of your total SU.
Thank you. On the smaller hull issue, a smaller ship would be easier to destroy, so might that balance out somewhat?
Just a possible house rule: Limit the ECM effect to a radius of 6 hexes or something and leave it at the -1 effect. Ships have to fly in close formation to gain benefits which could leave them vulnerable to other things.
I like this, it is simple and elegant. Of course each installation of ECM is 5% of the ships SU so one obvious work around is to put them ion the smaller hulls so they use less of your total SU.
True. Which is why, if a ship is to be 'loaning' protection to other vessels, the cost would have to be moved to an absolute, rather than percentage-based.
This looks to me like the Advanced ECM (10%SU)/ECM Slave Unit (5%SU) combo.
Having just the Advanced ECM at a fixed SU which precludes it being put on small ships makes sense.
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