• Registered: 2005-03-29
  • Posts: 330

Topic: Directional shield values

When someone mentioned having maneuvering be a bigger part of games, I had an idea about directional shielding.

Each arc of the ship has a shield rating as oppose to a total shield value.  When damage occurs and takes out a shield, instead of taking one from the total shield value, it lowers the values where the damage actually came from.

There is two ways to handle it and I'm torn between which one I like the best so I will state both and let people decide which one they like (pending this is worthwhile). The bad part about this is a little extra work to see which arc the incoming fire is coming from to determine what's the target's shield value.

The two ideas:

1.  When a shield hit is determined, the shield value from the arc where the damage came from as well as the adjacent arcs loses 2 points.

For example: if a ship with a shield value of 3 takes damage that crosses the front hexside, it and well as the adjacent hexes have only a shield of 1.  The back three hexsides still have a value of 3.

2.  When a shield hit is determined, the shield value from the arc where the damage came loses 3 points and the adjacent arcs lose a point.

In this case, the same ship from above would have 0 shields in the front hexside and a shield value of 2 in the adjacent hexsides.

The first way (1) works great in keeping the numbers correct.   Since we basically mulitplied the number of shield points by 6 (shield value by number of arcs), each shield hit should lower the total by 6.  Of course with three arcs taking the same amount of 'damage', it might be too easy to maneuver for a good shot once the shields are damaged.

The second way (2) makes the arc that the shield hit occurred in more vulnerable, but it doesn't add up to 6.

I haven't figured out what happens to a ship when it doesn't have any shields in that arc for damage purposes or when there isn't enough shield point to pay for the shield hit (but I'm working on it).

Thoughts?
-Bren

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 359

Re: Directional shield values

I'd also love to add an idea making shields a little different from screens, but still allow the directional shielding. Right now, in order to gain one additional shield rating on one facing, you lose 3 on the opposite side. I would propose allowing a ship to permanently move up to 3 levels of shielding...

This would simulate the Klingon tendancy to have strong foward shields for their strafe style attacks.... i.e. a ship pays for a shield 3, but has a rating of 4 on the 3 foward arcs, but only 2 on the 3 aft arcs....It would also make maneuvering important, as the ships would need to set up for their runs, and keep themselves from being swarmed, or caught in a bad position.... it would also allow a ship to move maybe one shield rating... in the same example having a 4 in the foward arc, 3 on the side arcs, and a 2 aft.....

This would, of course, be declared before the battle, and could not be moved around once the fighting started, although ships could then use the normal strengthen shields option, with the limitations as normal.

John

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 158

Re: Directional shield values

In the discussions of "Ablative Armor" in other parts of the boards, it has often occured to me that, rather than giving ablative armor, making "Ablative Shielding" would make sense.

In other words, treat shielding as it is in SFB. I have have a ship with shields in all six weapon arc (name them the same: A, B, C, D, E, anf F). Normal annotation of shielding could be:

Shields:
A/B: 9
C/D: 7
E/F: 5

So, for example, this ship has 9 shields in the A arc, and 9 in the B arc; i has 7 shields in the C arc, and 7 in the D arc; and so on. Make the shielding completely ablative (ie: the first 9 points of damage that slap into the 'A' side are absorbed by the A-side shields).

Some adjustments to the definition of PEN might be in order at that point, but...

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 740

Re: Directional shield values

This is an excellent idea!  I think that the cost for this should not be different than the cost for regular shielding, much the same as an arc that is "AB"  costs the same as one that is "EF".  This new type of shielding will make maneuvering even more important, as ships try to get behind to the weaker back shields of hostile ships.  It will also make overthrusters more important and challenging to use.   You will have to consider changing facing to either bring more weapons to bear or to bring a stronger shield to face a close hostile ship; can't always do both!

In yesterday's battle here in Jacksonville, a USS California design of mine got behind a friend's ship during the battle.   All of the screens of the target ship were facing forward and it only had PDS for defense to the rear.  My ship has weapons that "re-roll penetration" so  c 3/4 of the hits penetrated.  His ship vanished in a size 3 explosion... :shock:   

If players use this creative shielding, this can happen if someone moves behind you... Maneuver will become more important.   I hope that we are not overwhelming the game designers with too many new ideas.  I love this game, and plan to play it again, and again...  big_smile

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 359

Re: Directional shield values

I like the idea of "ablative shields", it allows you to both simulate the effects you see in Star Wars, and Star Trek, especially as used in the novels. Both of those sources have added quite a bit to the genre, and being able to simulate battles from those sources, as well as simular universes would be just awesome. For that matter, we could also add a weapon ability "extra shield damage" to augment "ignores shields" or "halves shields" as a means of damaging enemy ships.

I don't want to over complicate the game, but I have noticed (at least in my games) that most of the battles were tending to get larger and larger in points, but with the same number of ships.... people were building larger and larger hulls to have ships survive the head on attacks we were seeing. One player even went so far as to create hull 18 - 20 ships with all the weapons in the AB arcs, and screens so that he could concentrate his shields foward (also, he uses a low movement value, and keeps near his starting point... making you rush his guns), and then he would just advance on you. Unfortunately, due to the nature of damage, anything under hull 12 or so was getting turned into paste, and it was extremely hard to get a ship to survive enough to exploit his weaknesses..... or if they did survive, they were crippled enough to make it hard to effectively do any real damage. He would have most of his ships in a line, with a couple in a second line set to cover the front line...... ships do not block line of sight, so his front line pummels you, and his second line mops up.

The tactic can be countered with large numbers of fighters, drones, battle-satellites, and sun bursts.... but requires you to know what you are facing, and have a fleet taylored to counter his. He was one of the reasons we divided up the die rolls, as I mentioned in other posts, which lowers the damage capabilities across the board, and increases the surviveabiliy of the smaller hulls.

Ablative Shields and Armor would just serve to increase the surviveability of ships, and make maneuver that much more important.

I'd like to pursue this line of thought, even if it doesn't go anywhere, as I believe that maneuver should be at least half the battle, and I also feel that the smaller hulls should be a little more than just "escort ships" designed to suck off the fire long enough for the dreadnoughts to kill things. They should be able to add to the overall battle, and even provide the flanking strikes, or support at the right time, to turn the battle.

John

  • Registered: 2022-11-16
  • Posts: 516

Re: Directional shield values

Nahuris wrote:

I don't want to over complicate the game, but I have noticed (at least in my games) that most of the battles were tending to get larger and larger in points, but with the same number of ships.... people were building larger and larger hulls to have ships survive the head on attacks we were seeing. One player even went so far as to create hull 18 - 20 ships with all the weapons in the AB arcs, and screens so that he could concentrate his shields foward (also, he uses a low movement value, and keeps near his starting point... making you rush his guns), and then he would just advance on you. Unfortunately, due to the nature of damage, anything under hull 12 or so was getting turned into paste, and it was extremely hard to get a ship to survive enough to exploit his weaknesses..... or if they did survive, they were crippled enough to make it hard to effectively do any real damage. He would have most of his ships in a line, with a couple in a second line set to cover the front line...... ships do not block line of sight, so his front line pummels you, and his second line mops up.

Well this sure sounds "fun."
Excuse me while I stifle a huge yawn.
:wink: 
Frankly, I can't think of anything that sounds more boring than the above.

Nahuris wrote:

I'd like to pursue this line of thought, even if it doesn't go anywhere, as I believe that maneuver should be at least half the battle, and I also feel that the smaller hulls should be a little more than just "escort ships" designed to suck off the fire long enough for the dreadnoughts to kill things. They should be able to add to the overall battle, and even provide the flanking strikes, or support at the right time, to turn the battle.

Maybe one solution would be the introduction of five or six different scenario types that you roll for after the fleets are designed and before the game starts.
I'd be willing to bet that after a stern chase or two, with those bad-ass 18 to 20 hull ships with all of their weapons in the AB arc being the force being chased, that more reasonable ship designs would start becoming the norm.
Kevin

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 359

Re: Directional shield values

I know... however, the stern chase is really the only scenario that completely negated the bonuses with his designs.... and he usually just turned around and tried to turn it into a slugging match.  :roll:

There are ways to counter it... but it involved having to design a fleet specifically to counter it.....

I'm more hoping we can increase some of the survivability of "standard" designs, so that tactics can come into play. The ability to send some "frigates" to take damage, and hold the enemy in place, while you bring up other ships is good.... but if those frigates die in one turn, then you haven't done much other than sacrifice part of your fleet, while handing your opponent victory points.

Any stern chase then becomes messy.... unless both fleets decide to keep their ships together, which is a slugging match, then the person fleeing ends up with his light fast ships ahead of his slower, heavier designs. The same applies to the chaser..... which puts his smaller ships up against the opponents heavier designs. If the player trying to flee does happen to use more fire arcs, then he has the advantage of heavier designs able to hammer his light pursuers.

John

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 158

Re: Directional shield values

If you have Hull 20 ships running about... please define the hull size of a "frigate" in such a game.

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 359

Re: Directional shield values

Each of the players in my group uses a different designation for thier own fleets.... the one player mentioned refers to his ships as "destroyers" and has that listed as his heaviest class... above cruisers, ect.

For me, frigates are usually around hull 6 or so... I have a light frigate that is a 5, and heavy and battle frigates at 7 and 8 respectively..... but usually use the hull 6 ones.

my fleet from lightest to heaviest:
Corvettes Hulls 1-5
Frigates  Hulls 5-7
Destroyers Hulls 7-8
Cruisers Hulls 8-12
Carriers, and Battle Cruisers Hulls 12-16
Dreadnoughts Hulls 15-18

I rarely field anything larger than 18....

this is subjective to the role of the ship..... certain hull sizes (such as 5, which has both a corvette class, and a light frigate class) have more than one design class.

My frigates and destroyers form the backbone of my fleet, corvettes fill in for strike roles, and cruisers support, and bring heavy firepower to bear. The larger classes are too "expensive" for there to be many, so you see them in extremely large battles..... and rarely at other times.... but they are not usually present in every battle. Dreadnoughts are only sent in when there is a major objective, as my alliance only has 5 of them, and 2 are listed as permanent guard over our capital, and one is permanent guard for our major shipyard and production system. With only 2 available, and having 14 worlds..... well, they get out occasionally, but not everywhere.

John

  • Registered: 2005-03-29
  • Posts: 859

Re: Directional shield values

KDLadage wrote:

If you have Hull 20 ships running about... please define the hull size of a "frigate" in such a game.

Well, I do.

Hulls Designation
1  Attack Boat
2  Corvette
3-4 Frigate
5-6 Destroyer
7-8 Light Cruiser
9-10 Medium Cruiser
11-12 Heavy Cruiser
13-16 Battlecruiser
17-20 Dreadnought
21-30 Superdreadnought
31+ Juggernaut

Typically, those units below Dreadnought size are common, as are dreadnoughts. SDs are uncommon, whereas juggernauts tend to be one-of-a-kind or single task force units (which can deploy fighters and the like)

  • Registered: 2006-01-17
  • Posts: 359

Re: Directional shield values

I think we de-railed this thread....

Let's get back to working on ideas for shields. Anyone else want to jump in?

John

  • Registered: 2006-03-23
  • Posts: 241

Re: Directional shield values

Nahuris wrote:

Anyone else want to jump in?

Well with the Ablative armor semi-defined you could use it to simulate shields. Just have no Shields per say and add in a lot of Ablative Armor. All attacks would hit the Ablative Armor and must destroy all of it before penetrating into the ship and forcing rolls on the Damage Track. It would make sense to me that to duplicate SFB style shields simply divide the Ablative Armor value to cover each of the 6 arcs and divide the cost by 6 as well so if you have:

Shields
AB 9
CD 7
EF 5

That is 42 shield boxes which would equal 7 Ablative Armor boxes as far as cost and DRat value. In this way you couldn't move them to cover downed shields though. I think it would add a lot of maneuver to battles as ships turned to keep opponents facing stronger shields.

  • Registered: 2006-03-23
  • Posts: 241

Re: Directional shield values

Directional Shields ( Deflectors )

Using the discussions on Ablative Armor, it seems relatively straight forward  to adapt them to modeling Directional Shields ( ala SFB ) in a Starmada context. So far to date, Ablative Armor has been valued at:

SU Cost:    ( Armor Value / HS ) ^ 2 x Original SU
Base DRat:    (( 2 / 3 x Armor Value ) + HS ) x 2 x Shield Factor

Given that, a HS 6 ship with an Ablative Armor value of 3 and no shields would use 225 SU for the Armor and have a base DRat of 16.0.

This Ablative Armor stops all damage from 360 degrees. After it is destroyed, damage proceeds on to the Damage Track as normal. So the above ship would take the first three points of damage it received on its Ablative Armor before rolling any additional damage as normal.

Now, couldn't we simply multiply this Ablative Armor by six and assign it to one of the six hex faces surrounding the ship and have it simulate Directional Shields? So the above 3 Ablative Armor could actually represent 18 Shield boxes that would need to be permanently assigned to one of the six facings, say 4/4/2/2 which would represent 4 boxes on the forward (#1) shield, 4 boxes on the #2 and #6, 3 boxes on the #3 and #5, and finally 3 boxes on the rear (#4) shield. Thus any damage that comes in through that facing would first have to destroy those boxes before proceeding onto the Damage Track but the other shield facings would be unaffected and later the ship could maneuver to interpose these undamaged shields.

The shield assignment should take place during the design process and be permanent for that class. Obviously, small ships will have paper thin shields, while HS 20 behemoths will have tons. As there are no conventional Starmada shields to penetrate (or maybe you did equip them?) PEN values become straight multiples to damage, like DMG is. So a 3+ 3/2/2 weapon would have three shots each causing 4 points of damage if/when they hit.

I think that a TL modifier could also be applied so that a race with low tech will have minimal shields while a high tech race would have oodles.

So the final Shield calculations would be:

SU Cost:    (( Total Shield Boxes / 6) / HS ) ^ 2 x Original SU
Base DRat:    ((( 2 / 3 x ( Total Shield Boxes / 6 )) + HS ) x 2 x original Starmada Shield Factor

This will add an element of maneuver to the game as you try to keep an opponent away from a weakened or down shield. Also to avoid confusion with the existing Starmada Shields, perhaps we should call this type "Deflectors" although the reverse seems more appropriate. Maybe the next version of Starmada will switch the names?