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mj12games.com/forum → Starmada → Full Thrust Cinematic Movement System
Alright, the poll has me trying to access long lost reaches of grey matter as I try to recall what the "cinematic" movement system from Full Thrust was.
I recall Full Thrust (I played it for about 6-8 months or so). And I have a fair recollection of the movement system it used. What is the "cinematic" movement system?
Full thrust Cinematic:
All ships have a Thrust Rating.
All ships have a Velocity
A ships velocity is carried over from one turn to the next
A ship may apply its full thrust rating to increase or decrease its velocity (I belive this change is applied at the beginning of the turn)
A ship may apply up to half its thrust rating to change its heading, unless it has Advanced Drives. Advanced Drives are found only (in the fluff setting) on two alien races, and are not available to humans. Advance drive ships may spend all their thrust to change facing.
Every point spent to change the ships heading turns it 30 degress, one 'clock facing'.
The thrust spent on turning is divided as evenly as possible between the first and second halves of the ships move.. thus a ship that begins the turn at velocity 6, with a thrust of 4, could apply 2 thrust to raise its velocity to 8, and 2 to turn to port. The ship would turn 30* to port, move forward 4", turn 30* more to port, then move forward a final 4"
This is from memory, and some details may be wrong.
On the whole, a good movement system. I like that ending locations are fairly unpredictable, especially at higher velocities. In fact, that lack of predictability is part of what makes broader arc weapons a good thing, and is integral to the play balance of certain placed-marker ordinance.
On the whole, I have the same problem with it that I have with any accelleration based, retained-velocity system... ships frequently end up with very large velocities, such that closing through and out of a ships rangebands and arcs is very easily done. Ships end up manuvering more like very, very large (and somewhat clumsy!) fighter craft, jockeying for an aft arc shot, rather than like wet-navy ships (this is likely more realistic, in the setting, but as a matter of feel, I prefer wet-navy to space-fighters).
This is the movement system I recall... I was thinking that the "cinematic" moniker reffered to something above and beyond what I recall as the movement system of FT.
This is the movement system I recall... I was thinking that the "cinematic" moniker reffered to something above and beyond what I recall as the movement system of FT.
I think the reason they called it cinematic was in reference to 'movement like in the movies' where the laws of physics and momentum have been suspended indefinitely. 
The above-described system is called 'Cinematic', in contrast to the 'Vector' system laid out in, IIRC, Fleet Book 1.
Additionally, ships with high velocities cannot "turn on a dime". Now captains must consider their maneuvers a little bit more -- "Do I slow down for a tighter turn or make a wider turn now". This definitely affects tactics for getting or keeping weapons in arc and ship designs.
Before discovering Starmada, my friends in south Florida and I played Full Thrust. We used the cinematic movement that Marcus accurately describes and analyses. My ships tended to be a little slower, but had many long ranged weapons. The designs were similar to the Starmada designs I use now. Some friends had very fast ships that would zip in and out of battle going from far out of range to sometimes pointblank range. It made fro some interesting games! If Starmada gamers decide to use this method, make sure you have Overthrusters. These allow you to compensate for the unpredictable maneuvers of your opponents. (They are unpredictable to you, as well as to them!)
I personally prefer the simple manuvering system that the Starmada games has. If players wanted to make smaller ships more nimble, a chart similar to what the Starfire game has would not be to hard to put together. This chart has biger ships unable to turn as quickly as smaller ones. The bigger the ship, the more strait movement between turns; that is a bigger turn mode.
Since discovering Starmada, we have not played a single game of Full Thrust.
Make sure you vote in Dan's poll, then.
mj12games.com/forum → Starmada → Full Thrust Cinematic Movement System
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