Star Fleet Battles Open Community

I am sorely tempted to join in to this discussion with 25 pages of ranting text. But we are so far behind on Council prep, and I've got other stuff going on too, that I have to exercise the willpower to resist. Maybe after Council.

Please carry on without me. But I'll probably be reading...

-DC

Yeah, I dunno--Sabbot plasma is really handy, apparently. And makes plasma ships a lot more competitive in late war game when everyone has a billion fast drones and PFs and whatever. They are pretty simple, rules wise, and interesting. I like'em.

Carronade is pretty much the same way. They give the Gorns at least *something* unique and interesting. And are simple enough to not make trouble or require new SSDs or something. I still want them to stick those on the Gorn TCC.

Their real purpose is to fire Type III over a massive range, so really dont need the drone control. Though the D6D is a special case because its an awesome front line ship as well. If building a Klingon fleet youd be crazy to not load up on them. Especically if youre up against Kzinti.

Recent rules added that I like:

Sabot

Makes plasma more competitive in a greater number of scenario circumstances, including even on an open map. I think they're still disadvantaged on an open map, but Sabot mitigates this quite a bit.

Carronades

At last, something for the Gorns other than GAS shuttles. And it's utility in shooting down drones in addition to cloak-hunting and knife-fighting makes an excellent alternative firing mode.

ECP

Even though I'm not a plasma fan, I liked the idea of the plasma races getting "something" for EW defense. But EW in general...(see below)

Ones that I don't like:

Remote-control fighters

I'm not even sure why this rules was created. I don't know anybody that's actually used it. A waste of space.

Bombers

Again, unecessary and with the restrictions imposed on their deployment, virtually unusable in any event. Why would I want one of these instead of an INT or PF (unless playing in a year when INT/PF are not available)? Even then, not sure I'd want one over regular or heavy fighters...

Drogues

Expensive and unecessary. Just gives an excuse to pack more cheap weapons into a ship.

Rules that either need some tweaking, or I feel "meh" about:

Mega-packed fighters

This is just force escalation. Anyone who plays with fighters will also try to mega-pack them as much as possible. I'm certainly guilty of this as the Fed using "the Third Way" in the Far Stars Campaign. I'm quickly going to reach the point where you won't see an A20 of F111 group that won't be mega-packed, and 20% of my standard fighters will be mega-packed as well. The way the rule works, it's actually better to have 2 mega-packed fighters than 3 that are not. In particular, the A20FM is one of the scariest units for its cost (27 plus at most 4 points for drone speed upgrades...but in the campaign, this cost is only 17.5 at most) in the game now. While I like the idea of fighters being as fast or faster than ships (dare I use the word "realistic?"), I'm not convinced this was the way to do it.

X ships

While the idea that the X ship rules were in dire need of revision is absolutely true, and these did make some positive changes, I'm still left looking at ships suffering from more than the usual bit of cookie-cutterism that makes me feel just kind of...well..."meh." Nevertheless, rest assured there will be a Federation X Squadron of Death appearing in Far Stars...after all, I have to maintain pace or surpass my opponents!

Core rules I'd like to see changed:

EW - Although I said I like ECPs above, I only say that to balance against the ECM drone-using empires. Really, what I'd rather see is that most of the EW rules tossed out the window. My ideal? No ECM drones or ECP. No EM except for attrition units. No built-in EW (no freebies, except maybe for the Orions). No generated EW except by scouts using their channels, or carriers loaning to fighters. Natural EW is ok (except EM, and no, I don't really consider EM to be natural EW in the first place...if it's something your ship can do, it ain't natural).

Attrition Units:

I'd like to see these scaled waaaay back. But so much has been printed, that ain't never gonna happen. My ideal? No PFs of any kind. No WBP or megapacks. No EW fighters. No built-in EW. The ONLY races that get any kind of attrition units are:

Romulan - Gets the G-I and later versions of that same fighter. That's it. No carriers in service that carry more than 6 fighters (exception: Superhawk)
Kzinti - gets the AAS and HAAS. That's it.
Hydran - A speed 15 Stinger-1. That's it.
Lyran - gets the INT, gets WBP after Y180. No more than 4 on any ship, no more than 6 total in any force. NO LYRAN FIGHTERS. NO LYRAN DRONES. EVER.

Ships and refits

Don't get me started. Radical changes here. Ask Tos Crawford or Andy White (I think that's Andy's last name) about a project we worked on years ago called "Star Fleet Classic" or "Star Fleet Gold." Suffice to say, most war classes...gone. Most refits...modified, scaled back, or just gone. Oh yeah, and the Feds don't have drones anymore. Instead they got something called an "ASW" defense (anti-seeking weapon). It's reloadeable munition functioned as an ADD against drones, but could also be used against plasma. The Gorns? No plasma-Rs. The Romulans? No plasma-Ss. The Kzintis? No extra disruptors or DERFACS. The Klingons? no P1s (except command ships) or UIMs, and other limits. I could go on and on...

Drones

The whole drone construction thing is horribly complicated now. My ideal? Scale it back. You still have drone speed upgrades. You still can have armor or swordfish, just for a little variance and to shake things up and make lab identification still important. You still have type I and IV drones. Everything else? gone.

Mines

Wow. Did we ever need these rules? Gone, including TB.

Shuttles

SPs...gone. They were a silly idea. SS and WW are ok, unless we make even more radical changes to plasma...but then we're starting to look like FC...and I don't like that.

Everything is either just fine, or are so minor as to be not worth mentioning...

I like

Bombers - but they should have limited ship options.

Mega fighters

Sabot

Carronades

I don't like

EW- could be SOOO much simpler and still give you the same affect.

Remote Control Fighters - pain with no gain... In 200 years I would assume that fighters will all be remote controlled, we didn't need special rules.

The super remote controlled ship rule

Drogues

X-Ships - Even the revisions are bad. They should have given them new system names and rules to go with those systems. Partial X refits are problematic as well

Early Years - Would have liked to see a greater diversity of ship designs.

Mines - Overly complex, need simplification

Shuttles - Eliminate WW, SP, and SS. SS should be a monster only option. SP are taken care of by fighters. Limit WW to MRS shuttles.

F-101 - This is a SVC attempt to nerf the Feds

PF - Again overly complex, they shouldn't need a EA form.

There are also plenty of physical phenomena that produce myopic zones. This isn't to say that the SFB use is physically correct...but SFB and physics are like the banker and the hooker. They're walking down opposite sides of Main Street in different directions at 6 AM, giving each other polite nods due to professionals* in related but not identical fields going to the end and beginning of their respective business days.

*My apologies to any sex workers offended by impugning their professionalism by comparing it to bankers.

...

It's like standard-load photons. A non-OL photon can't hit at R0-1. Why not is anyone's guess. It may have been canon, but I expect it's there to make the game more interesting.

I can't see that it's really a balance issue: being tractored and PPDd does only 24 (36 with OL), whereas a tractor and plasma-S does 30 or 60.

Out of curiousity, does anyone use the Klingon mutiny rule? I never have, just seems like it adds more complication than it needs. Same with the UIM burnout, since the tourny version doesn't burn out, neither does our regular SFB version. YMMV.

I dunno Paul, I'm not convinced either for tournament or regular SFB. Let's look at it from the perspective of a tractor anchor at one hex distance.

A type S plasma will deliver 30 pts of damage to the facing shield and of course the F will do 20 pts. And there is no chance to miss.

A helbore will deliver 20 standard or 30 OL with the advantage of not having to face a weak shield. There is a slight change to miss i.e. 1 out of 12.

A Fusion will do 8 or 12 or 16 depending depending on the loading to the facing shield on the best roll with no chance to miss.

A photon 8 or 16 (of course standards can't hit at range 1) but the OL has no chance to miss at this distance.

Disruptors 5 or 10 with a 1 in 5 chance to hit (and can do it again the following turn of course).

The PPD (if it could hit at range 1) would do 16 standard or 24 OL, to a facing shield with 4 or 6 damage on the two side shields. There is a 3 in 12 chance of a miss (if we use the same to-hit as ranges 4-10).

I don't see the PPD as 'out of bounds' on damage caused for a several reasons. First, other weapons such as the HB or Pl-S cause about the same or more damage with virtually no chance/no chance of a miss. The HB has the added advantage of damaging all shields plus half through the weak/down shield regardless of where it is i.e. TAC isn't going to help the target ship. Second, the PPD could miss 25% of the time, even at this range and while subsequent pulses will probably hit, we are now getting into lower damage ranges. Lastly, the target ship can TAC whereby the full damage isn't necessarily blowing through a shield like in most other cases.

I would submit that the PPD could/should be able to fire at 0-3 without major issue and perhaps even increase the to-hit from 1-9 to 1-10. That's my thoughts.

My second general thought is that any weapon that can fire at 0 or 1 as an OL but not as a standard is....well, stupid. It's the same weapon so why would an OL be able to hit but not a standard? That just doesn't make logical sense to me.

I understand what you're saying about the torpedo arming at a distance from the ship, but regarding OL's, that usually isn't an combat emergency situation. For the most part it is usually SOP to OL to blow the doors off the enemy. Just a thought.

That was HIS justification for why the PPD couldn't target within range 3. I think it's also the one ADB accepts.

Having four more hexes of overload range makes it all but certain that 6 pulses of PPD damage will hit on an overload, as opposed to now, where it impacts the use of the weapon.

Also, it's not JUST the PPD hitting at range <3. It's the PPD plus plasmas plus phasers. With the PPD stripping weapons away as a separate volley.

The power to damage output on a PPD is 3:1 inside range 10. Each pulse that hits converts 2 energy into 6 damage. The only non-phaser direct fire weapons that do better than this:

TR-Heavy inside of range 3. (6 power for 19 average damage)
Fusion Beam at range 1 (2 power for 6.33 damage on average; a phaser-1 does 1 point less damage for half the power.)

I suppose it's really that the ISC were designed to justify the echelon. While the PPD would obviously be better without hypermetropia,and this would screw up the existing tournament balance, no sensible engineer would design it that way.

It could be argued that someone insisted on software to stop it operating at short range, lest an overzealous ISC captain decided to engage the enemy too closely and hence risk his expensive capital ship.

Maybe astigmatism might be an alternative house rule? Or strabismus.

How do they hold up in fleet battles? Does the Echelon work?

on a fixed map they hold up fine, on an open map they don't stand a chance. Also, like most races, they do best without any SC4 ships and all flown in the same hex.

Bakija:

If you are talking tournaments, yeah, open maps are not good. However, plenty of scenarios need open maps to work, like the classic "Refiner's Fire" (which I just played the FC version).

(sorry, couldn't resist)

Plenty of scenarios used fixed maps, many more than open. The option is with those who set up the scenario. If its an option that works well in some forms a rule that should never have existed? Some of my faves play on open maps. I mentioned "Refiner's Fire," I'll add one I played two weeks ago, "Mutiny on the Demonslayer." Neither would work on a closed or floating map.

In fact, i have very little problem with options, unless the options become the norm. I don't care much for SFB because every game I played the group would vote on options, and they loved PFs and fighters. So every game had to have them. And ADB has kind of pushed that because so much later material almost depends on it.

What really gets me is the rules that should be special cases, like scatterpacks, which should have been designed with more disadvantages so that it is a rare use thing... instead they are used all the time. In fact, i asked a friend to play Fed Com, and the first thing out of his mouth was "does it have scatterpacks."

>>(sorry, couldn't resist)>>

Couldn't resist what?

>>Plenty of scenarios used fixed maps, many more than open. The option is with those who set up the scenario. If its an option that works well in some forms a rule that should never have existed?>>

Again, here is the thing. SFB is primarily about ship combat. Ship combat is unlikely to be interesting on floating maps, as someone will always have an incentive to keep the range open. So you have a rule that discourages actual combat in a game that is designed to emphasize combat. Which is a horrible idea.

>>Some of my faves play on open maps. I mentioned "Refiner's Fire," I'll add one I played two weeks ago, "Mutiny on the Demonslayer." Neither would work on a closed or floating map.>>

Sure. IIRC, neither of which actually involve combat as a goal, however. They involve running from combat. Which works fine on a floating map. As noted, floating maps are fine for scenarios that are designed such that they aren't a problem. Stand up fights on open maps, however, don't work.

>>Couldn't resist what?

I couldn't resist the play on your name. Bakija/Back at ya. LOL

>>SFB is primarily about ship combat. Ship combat is unlikely to be interesting on floating maps, as someone will always have an incentive to keep the range open. So you have a rule that discourages actual combat in a game that is designed to emphasize combat. Which is a horrible idea.<<

The floating rule is an option, based on your scenario. If it was "all scenarios use floating maps" then your argument would be better. In fact, I think you come fro, a flawed perspective on SFB.

SFB is a space combat game, much as Halo is a first person shooter. But like Halo, there are many ways to play. Halo can be free for all, capture the flag, team slayer, bomb rush, etc. Each are a different game with a different feel, and the objective ones are not about killing, but getting something done. This is the flexibility SFB has given since the beginning. It can be a classic fight, where fixed maps are best, but if the scenario give you objectives and time limits you are forced not to disengage because not getting your objective done IS losing.

The tournament rules are a scenario in themselves, and are not in the core rules. For me, if there was no objective scenarios these games would have lost interest for me. I like dueling, but playing scenarios with new exciting goals is what I am about. And writing a good scenario is a mix of story, goals, ship selection, and map type.

Last night I played a really cool game playing SH135 "Rescue the Supply Tug" on FCOL. The floating map was NEVER an impediment to this scenario. In fact, I had a total blast playing it.

An open map scenario that I remember as very entertaining was the CL story with the Helbore armed Hydran ship trying to get away from the D6 and F5. It was a running battle on an open map, but worked well and was fun.

I can see an open map getting untenable depending on the amount of players and or ships if people are all over the place though. And I can see seeking weapon races lacking a bit against a non-aggressive opponent.

How about speed 64 plasma (wink)!

>>I mean seriously, if your opponent's entire tactical plan is run away, why bother playing him.>>

There is only so far that can get you.

When you are playing a competitive game vs someone, you can generally assume that your opponent is going to do what they need to do to win the game. And they might not go into the game thinking "my whole tactical plan is to run away". But when you are actually playing the game, when you launch 40x fast drones at them, or a few dozen enveloping S torps, running away for a couple turns suddenly seems like a completely reasonable plan.

Which is only really a possibility on an open map.

If you are playing a campaign (where you care if your ships live or die) or playing a competitive scenario (say, a squadron based tournament or something), or heck, just a pick up fight, people are going to do what gives them an edge. And when there is an open map, once and a while, what gives you an edge is running away from drones or plasmas or fighters for a few turns. Which leads to long, boring, silly games.

As noted, if the game had been balanced from the get go assuming some sort of a closed map, and then you have, like, optional rules for an open map for use in specific scenarios that are balanced to use an open map, but the game is up front and clear that the game is balanced assuming a closed map, everything would have worked out fine.

"Also, SFB is a simulation of space combat. Last time I checked, there were no map borders in space."

This is definitely the #1 reason given for not using a fixed map. It is undeniably true (though, conveniently ignores that SFB is 2D and space is not). The problem is that it fails to address the primary concern for any game: fun and balanced.

If you ever actually played against someone who took advantage of an open map (as I did in college just to get my group to stop using them) you would find immediately that it would be the last BPV based battle royale you ever fought on an open map. It essentially results in massed p-1 fire from extreme range, with plasma launched at R35, en masse, just to force the opponent to turn off and open the range up to the fifties again to restart the phaser fight.

It is a stupid, boring game in which nothing will be accomplished. But, it is also the only game plasma should ever play, because coming into closer range means allowing the other side to use HWs when you have none.

It is, in fact, a perfect simulation (apart from the whole 2D thing) of what should happen if a plasma fleet meets a non-plasma fleet in open space, but it is also terribly dull.

It also does not just apply to plasma. That is exactly how a Fed or Hydran fleet should operate too, but for them coming into R30 of the disruptor fleet.

Also, SFB is a simulation of space combat. Last time I checked, there were no map borders in space.

SFB is a game. It's a game based off of a science fiction series that ran before the Apollo program put footprints on the moon. The science fiction series was based strongly on both Western television programs and Horatio Hornblower.

The game has to work, first and foremost.

Just so we can put the "SFB is a simulation" argument down once and for all, let's run the numbers given in the game.

What SFB has to do with combat in space is appreciably zero. It's probably negative.

* Ships do not have vectors, they move like speed boats. Including the inability to rotate 180 degrees and fly backwards on their prior course.
* Ships can go from speed 31 (31 x the speed of light) to 'stopped' in an instant over a turn break, or in two impulses with emer decel. In space, 'stopping' requires applying thrust in the opposite direction for the same amount of velocity change as used to build up your velocity. (Because your ship is probably lighter, this may take less time to stop - but it's still appreciable.)
* Waste heat dissipation from power systems is ignored.
* Reaction mass is ignored.
* Kinetic energy is ignored.
* The third dimension is ignored.

In SFB, speed 1 is the speed of light. One hex is 10,000 kilometers, and light would cover 30 hexes in one second.

Therefore, the length of an SFB turn is 1/30th of a second. One impulse is 1/960th of a second.

In 1/960th of a second, a marine boarding party can:
A) Beam onto an enemy ship.
B) Fight guards there
C) Plant an explosive device
D) Beam home.

Not bad for redshirts. :)

To handle F&E movement, the ships have to be able to cover 6-7 500 parsec hexes in 6 months.

One parsec is 3.26 light years. One hex is 1,630 light years across. Covering 6 of them in half a year means that you've got an average speed of 19,560 x the speed of light. In round numbers, this is an average of warp 26 in Trek blither.

Ship detection in SFB is short ranged (about 250 hexes with a scout), or about 8 light seconds.

One F&E hex is 1,630 light years. One day is 86,400 seconds; one year is 365.25 days or 31,557,600 seconds. That means there are 31,557,600 light seconds per light year.

The area of an F&E hex is equal to (3*√3/2)*r^2. Plugging in numbers, we get:

(3*1.732/2)=2.598 * (1630/2)^2 = (1.299 * 1630)^2=4,483,255.71 square light years. (For anyone writing wargames measured in hexes, with a defined hex scale, that final formula: (1.299 *N)^2 is a useful one to memorize.)

4,483,255.71 square light years times 31,557,600 gives 141,480,790,611,643.44 light seconds.

The detection radius of an SFB ship is a circle 8 light seconds in radius, so area is (3.14*8) or 631 light seconds.

141,480,790,611,643/631 = 224,216,783,853 scouts needed to guarantee detection of anything moving through the hex. In proper logistics, you'd actually need 3x that number.

(Hey, Joe - would you play F&E with 224.2 billion scouts per hex? :) )

It gets significantly worse if you assume the hex has a height of 1,630 light years, and thus a volume of 7,277,614,542,423,755,772,984,000 cubic light seconds, and the scout has a spherical detection radius of 37,393 cubic light seconds. 194,621,243,565,263,640,872 scouts are needed if the F&E hex has depth. 200 quadrillion scouts to keep track of sure sounds like fun.

Which means that in canonical scale numbers, the only time you're going to have a fight is if both sides REALLY REALLY REALLY want it. As in, they give engraved invitations with exact times and dates 75 days in advance, and full coordinates.

Or, every fight is over a starbase or planet.

Either of those is as good a justification for "closed map" as anything. Using "SFB is a simulation of space combat" as a justification is sort of like saying "Because the Earth is flat, the key to interstellar travel is getting to the bottom layer of turtles and giving it a good kick in the tail-plate"

Wow Ken, calm down. This is about if open maps are a bad rule in SFB, not if SFB is real or not.

BTW: SFB is a simulation game, accurate to its own universe, just not accurate to our universe. A simulation game does not mean accurate, especially if you are simulation something imaginary. IMO Warhammer is a simulation game as much as Advanced Squad Leader, or even RISK, some are more accurate than others, some are based in real situations, or imaginary worlds. Of course, my definition of simulation may be broader than yours, YMMV.

However, you cannot argue that on the old Star Trek there were no borders in space that stop you moving or instantly cause disengagement, and because you can define scenarios with whatever kind of map you want, the argument that open maps are bad for SFB is moot.

So, Bakija, it comes down to this, we are both right to ourselves, and wrong to each other. I have no problem with open maps, you do, and further argument wont change our opinions.

I enjoyed it though.

Its like movies, they are simulations of reality, but they can have things real life does not have, like magic. As long as they universe in a movie is self consistent, that is what keeps the suspension of disbelief. Even with minor flaws in self-consistency (like retcons in Star Trek, or the whole background of Doctor Who), fans can be very forgiving.

BTW: When we going to play our Lyran vs. Klingon game. Can you play any afternoon?

I am available next week M,T,Th,F needing to end a session at apx. 6PM Pacific time.

However, you cannot argue that on the old Star Trek there were no borders in space that stop you moving or instantly cause disengagement, and because you can define scenarios with whatever kind of map you want, the argument that open maps are bad for SFB is moot.

is provably false. There's a border that prevents the Enterprise from leaving the Milky Way Galaxy.

And a fixed map doesn't mean the ship is destroyed if it leaves - it means it's run away from the fight and will not return.

My 'twitch' is on saying SFB is a simulation of space combat. Without additional qualifiers.

SFB's numbers are pretty silly when examined for internal consistency, adherence to physics or even when logic is laid near them to rest. :)

And SFB's numbers really don't matter so long as the game is fun.

And a side note for Ken, there is no border on the edge of the galaxy that prevented the Enterprise from leaving. It just turns your best friend into a telekinetic freak with delusions of god-hood LOL.

Almost everything about Orions, including engine doubling, comes from Mission to Babel. Indeed, this is the Trek episode that provides the most 'canonical' information for Star Fleet Universe combat on the screen.

It provides numbered shields, shield reinforcement and overloaded weapons (albeit as something the Orions do to increase firepower), as well orion engine doubling.

Ah, but remember Spock's comments on the power curve of the Orion ship? He stated that this vessel was in effect a suicide ship that never intended to return to its home base.

Additionally, the Orion vessel was only armed with phasers, no heavy weapons of any type.

What I'm saying is that if anyone really likes the Orions 'as-is' then by all means enjoy them. We don't use them 'as-is' because they are far too powerful for what they actually are and what they actually do i.e. pirates that go after unarmed or poorly armed civilian freighters. They shouldn't be able to seriously challenge a fleet naval vessel.

As always YMMV :)

>>Seriously though, I think that is a person who is not playing the game with the intent it is meant and would not play them again.>>

Yeah, see, that is a world I'm not at all interested in--the world of "I don't like the way my opponent is using the legal rules of the game to his advantage, so I'm either not ever going to play with him again (or I'm going to browbeat him into playing the way I think is appropriate)", which is an incredibly common issue in wargaming (every game ever has the endless argument of "that strategy/tactic/plan/unit/whatever is cheesy and not actually playing in the spirit of the game!", which is the result of someone using some broken rule to their advantage, and rather than actually addressing the broken rule, people focus on trying to get people to not abuse said broken rule through peer pressure/shame/whatever). I'm a big fan of playing the game using the rules and doing my best to kill my opponent, and assuming that they are going to do the same thing. If I wanted to play a game that was governed by assumed intent, I'd play an RPG where there is an impartial judge.

I'd much rather that the rules of the game just work regardless of the player's different views of what is the "intent" of the game.

>>Additionally, I think the ability to force a person into a non-existent corner is a cheat.>>

If the game is designed to work that way, then it isn't a cheat.

>> You should use skill and tactics to force the engagement not some arbitrary rule.>>

You can't use skill and tactics to force engagement on an open map, no matter how hard you try. If your opponent wants to keep the range open and snipe endlessly at R50 with P1s and never get closer than that? No amount of skill and tactics is going to prevent them from doing that. All that is going to prevent that is either a built in objective that prevents that (i.e. attacking or defending a fixed base/convoy/planet/crippled ship/mcguffin/whatever) or having a closed map of some type.

>>Understand, I wouldn't have a problem with a disengage due to distance rule (should be an rather large number) but feel that basing your tactics on forcing a player into a corner like a boxer on the ropes is just as bad as running away.>>

See, but if that is how the game is designed and balanced, it isn't as "bad" as anything. The tournament, for example, is designed and balanced for playing on a fixed map. The whole system revolves around the existence of a closed map, and was developed with the closed map. So forcing someone into a corner is just part of the game by intent.

>>Part of our difference I think comes down to you are apparently play mostly fleet/squardron actions and I did not.>>

Nah. Really, I almost exclusively play tournament games. I play occasional goofy scenarios; I had a good time with the Size Class 4 Squadron Tournament recently on SFBOL; I played the FF Captain's campaign on SFBOL a couple years ago, and the whole thing collapsed, primarily 'cause we all had to play 3x FF duels, which were on open maps, and it turned out that everyone hated that.

>> I very rarely ever played in campaigns/fleet actions. Our typical fight was either 1v1 or 3v3 (typically CA & 2xDD but occasionally a carrier with escorts) so facing 40 drones or EPT's (which we almost never did) was not a issue that arose.>>

Sure. But that is something that you can face. And the game is, at least on some level, designed to facilitate that. But even one on one, an open map is silly--if one side gets a seeking weapon advantage (i.e. I launch a SP or have 4 drones on the map compared to your 2 drones on the map even), you just turn and run away for 3 turns. The drones fall off the map and then you come back.

If you are playing a simple fight on an open map, the two players are either going to (explicitly or implicitly) agree to just close and fight (which is just as arbitrary as using a closed map) or they aren't, at which point the fact that the open map is open leads to really long and ridiculous games, and some empires are considerably less effective than others.

"See, but if that is how the game is designed and balanced, it isn't as "bad" as anything. The tournament, for example, is designed and balanced for playing on a fixed map. The whole system revolves around the existence of a closed map, and was developed with the closed map. So forcing someone into a corner is just part of the game by intent."

Where do you get this idea? This is not true. In fact, it may be the complete opposite. Look at the scenarios in the core rules:

SG1.0 "The Duel" is the basic ship-on-ship contest. It is on a floating map. SG2.0 "Fleet Action" is on a floating map. SG3.0 is the first fixed map, but it is a base defense scenario. In fact, more than half of the scenarios in the Basic Edition used floating maps.

This continues into Advanced Missions, with SG11.0 "First of its Kind" has a base and FRD and is on a floating map.

I think you think this whole game is about tournament play. Well, the tournament scenario came later (and is published in in a later book), with specialized ships geared for that scenario.

Also, I would say if you are in a duel and someone is sniping for (at most) 1 point of damage per PH-1 per turn, he is not trying to win. Probably someone you should not play against.

You said "The whole system revolves around the existence of a closed map, and was developed with the closed map."

Your argument is all maps should be closed, because that how the game is. My point is that is not how the game was conceived. You base all your arguments on the tournament scenario which IS NOT the game itself, but a scenario designed for tournament play.

You said: "Uh, no? I think the game is about space combat. And historically speaking, games about space combat that exist on infinite open maps tend to blow."

In your opinion. IMO, I have enjoyed many scenarios based in open maps. None blow, however they are not tournament scenarios, but objective ones. i have mentioned several scenarios I have recently played and loved on open maps. As an analogy, just because you like bananas does not mean everyone likes the taste. I really think you are in the minority here; but you feel that most would agree with you.

So, if your enemy is greater sniping at range 50, you don't reinforce? For goodness sake, at range 50 a D7 would do an average of 0.83 in his most effective volley (3 x PH-1, 2 x PH-2). If he keeps moving away, I think this is a violation of the non-aggression tournament rules.

I would still like you to answer my one point, which you effectively ignored: Fighting in an asteroid field makes drone and plasma races less effective than direct fire races. If your opinion is that open maps should not be in SFB because of the points you made, do you also think asteroid rules should not be in the game? Because that is the logic you are applying here.

No, Paul, I have always argued that it depends on scenario and Peter has made it quite clear that I am wrong in that opinion. Look at his words: "The whole system revolves around the existence of a closed map, and was developed with the closed map." This is not true. His assertions is "balance the whole game to closed maps and use open when you want." Actually, it is opposite, it is based on open, with the tournament scenario narrowing the possibilities for that particular milieu.

it would be proper to say "the tournament scenario is based around a closed map."

As I have shown, most of the scenarios in the core books are on open maps. So therefore "the whole system" was not developed around closed maps, which he feel it should be.

But most scenarios are on open maps. it is balanced by the need to win by accomplishing objectives. in "rescue the tug" the tug could not go fast until it repaired. The Klingons win y capturing it. The Feds need to defend it, or lose if they do not. So an open ,map is appropriate (as the tug is trying to escpape.

My point is that a closed map is fine for tournament play, as the tournament is a specific scenario for SFB, but not the only scenario. If his argument is tournamet play should not be on open maps, that is exactly how it is. But he has also talked about other scenarios, responding to the ones I have recently played, and feels that they shoul also be on closed maps.

I guess I feel that SFB has become more of a dueliong game than a scenario game, which really limits its fun.

The system and game are independent of the tournament. Also, the tournament scenario is specifically on a closed map. So I don't know what his argument is them.

From the tournament book: (P17.1) MAP: The map is fixed; it does not float.

So, I still do not uinderstand why he is against open maps when the tounament does not have them?

In fact, his first point was not about tournaments:

"Yeah, I think the #1 "Rule That Should Have Never Been" is "Open Maps".

"I realize that closed maps are "unrealistic" and all, but the game tends to be virtually unplayable in any sort of "this is a good game" sense when you have an open map and no reason to stay anywhere in particular. My recent (limited) experiences with open maps is that games on them are just silly, endless, and generally unfun. My past (extensive) experiences with open maps is that they are just silly, endless, and generally unfun."

I then mentioned how much I enjoyed "refiner's fire" which is open map. Never did he say he was talking specifically about torunaments, and he could have just told me that, instead he came back with this:

"I'm sure that there are the occasional scenario where an open map is all that makes it work--some situation where force A is running and force B is chasing, and the victory conditions don't revolve around ships just blowing each other up. Which are exceptions to the general. But in situations where you have ships fighting, and the desired result is that one side beats the other side in combat? Open maps are horrible."

His contention is that there should be no open maps, even though "occasional" scenario works. My contention is that it is dependent on the scenario itself to define limits.

What ever. If you think i am out for a fight, fine, then i will drop it. End of discussion.

>>I would still like you to answer my one point, which you effectively ignored: Fighting in an asteroid field makes drone and plasma races less effective than direct fire races. If your opinion is that open maps should not be in SFB because of the points you made, do you also think asteroid rules should not be in the game?>>

Well, no, my opinion is not "open maps should not be in SFB". It is "SFB should be balanced assuming a closed map, and you can have special rules for open maps for scenarios that are balanced specifically for open maps, but be clear that the game is balanced, in general, for a closed map". Which I have said in multiple places.

>> Because that is the logic you are applying here.>>

Well, no. I agree that asteroid fields are disadvantageous for drone and plasma races. No one is going to run a campaign, however, where every fight is in an asteroid field (well, I suppose someone might. But it is obviously a bad idea...)

Which makes open maps a bit more viable is that weapons all got the same maximum range.

So the "Retrograde at range 50 lobbing torps at idiots" strategy is harder to execute.

I skipped quite a few posts once they started going back and forth on open/closed maps, so pardon me if I missed a similar comment. Someone mentioned that in an equal BPV fight, it's better to bring as many large ships as possible. This is a serious problem, IMO, and is probably one of the biggest things that needs to be fixed. Some campaigns address this to some degree by restricting build options, but that doesn't help non-campaign games. I personally would like to try making one point of movement equal to one point of EW, but I understand that many people don't like using EW.

I made the comment you are paraphrasing and you get it not quite right. What you are looking to do when min/maxing fleet composition is, generally (there are some exceptions - e.g. monitors), to maximize fire power. Generally (again, not always) this means maximizing heavy weapons.

If you are the Fed, SC4 is totally fine - as long as it is the DD+ (+ is the AWR refit, right?). For a bit over 100 points, the DD+ brings 90% of the firepower of a CC/NCA/NCC. This is because: 1. the DD has a full cruiser HW load (4 phots) and as a bonus has most of what the other cruisers bring in p-1s; and 2. Photons don't change based on the ship.

Klingons and Roms are the other extreme. Every SC4 ship you bring means 1. a lot fewer HW for the cost and 2. shorter range on those HW. For example, an F5 has 2 Disruptors limited to range 15. A D7 has 4 Disruptors that go to 30. the Roms are in even worse shape, because they can't even really use their NCLs. A FH has standard heavy plasma cruiser armament - 2S, 2F. The SpH+ is 1S, 2F and the SkyH/SeaH is just 2F.

So, if I have 1000 points to put together a fleet, I can probably maximize my photons by having a lot of DD+s. The smallest useful ship a Rom is going to be able to field is a KE. The smallest useful Klingon is probably the F6 (I think - the ship based off the F5 but with 3 Disruptors and 5 p-1), though even there you are loosing 1 HW, but it may be that for the points you would maximize HW by including a couple. Maybe, maybe not.

Different empires are effected differently by this. Most Disruptor and Plasma races can't really touch their small ships, Feds are totally unaffected and Andromedans and Hydrans are in between (both mitigate this effect with "fighters", the Andro "fighters just happen to be huge).

>>To me its also about common sense.>>

One person's "common sense" is another person's "horrible idea", so there is only so far that is going to get you.

>> The US wouldnt send a Cruiser and 8 Carriers to a war zone without any smaller ships.>>

Sure. But the US is constrained by reality. In SFB, not so much. In F+E, foe example, small ships see fights all the time--you have, by virtue of the fleets you start with and your construction, a lot of frigates and destroyers. Yeah, when you have a main battle fleet over an opposing Star Base, you are going to be a DN and 10 cruisers (more or less). But a lot of the time, you put DDs/FFs on the line to take damage or 'cause you don't have enough big ships to fill in the space or 'cause you don't want to risk more important units. In an SFB pickup game, you aren't constrained by reality or fleet composition or fleet positions. So you tend to just buy the best, biggest ships you can. As that tends to make the most effective fighting force.

>>Much like a space fleet would still want the smaller screening ships.>>

Not really. The way SFB works, there are few advantages (if any) to spending X BPV on small ships when you can spend it on big ships. The little ships don't move faster than the big ships, aren't harder to hit than the big ships, and don't result in proportionally more guns than with the big ships. There are ways that small ships could have been more effective in SFB--if, say, smaller ships could move faster (say, DNs had a maximum speed of 20, CAs had a maximum speed of 24, CLs a maximum speed of 26, DDs a maximum speed of 28, and FFs a maximum speed of 30 or something), then small ships would have a concrete advantage. Or if smaller ships had penalties to be hit (or free ECM or something), they'd be worth the effort. But that would have required a lot of reorganizing the game from the ground up. As it is, small ships, generally speaking, are just not really worth getting if you can get bigger ships instead.

>> Each ship serves a role.>>

Well, except that the roles of ships in SFB don't really differentiate that well. Scouts are scouts and carriers are carriers and escorts are escorts, but a basic warship is a warship, and speding 150 BPV on a strong cruiser is almost *always* going to be better than spending 150 BPV on a couple FFs.

>> And if you are going to have a campaign, there is no reason to not use a sensible arbitrary rule.>>

Sure. If you are setting up a campaign, your forces are probably going to be bound by position and fleet size, and as a result, you'll probably end up using SC4 ships where you need to. If you are playing a pick up squadron/fleet battle, it makes complete sense to me to arbitrarily say "half of your BPV needs to be spent on SC4 units" or whatever, as a way to approximate a "realistic" force.

>>Id assume most people are adult enough to allow common sense. And if they arent adult enough, maybe they arent worth playing against.>>

Again, you can't really assume that. And setting yourself up to be disappointed 'cause your opponent brings a C8 and 10xD5s when you have a historically accurate, "realistic" fleet built is something you are best avoiding from the get go. If you want people to build fleets based on your expectations, make the scenario such that that is how the fleets will send up.

>>Dont the S rules already address this (I know SPP updated things a while back but I dont recall actually seeing the final result)>>

Not really. The S rules legislate how you can use specialty ships (CVs, escorts, leaders/command variants, maulers, wazoo ships, whatever), but not really so much the use of SC4 ships. It is notable, however, that most "Battle Force" articles/scenarios specify that you need to spend a certain amount of your force allocation on SC4 units.

>>As I said, if you are so opposed to the way the other player wants to play the game, dont play against them.>>

Why not just invent scenario rules that make fleets look the way you want them instead of refusing to play people?

>>There are many ways of restricting things. Capping BPV. SC limits. Minimum number of ships/Maximum number of ships. Even looking at F&E Construction you get a lot of smaller ships, fewer larger ships, so there is no reason to not follow similar logic.>>

Yes? What I've been saying here all along is that if you want fleets to look a particular way, make scenario rules that make them look a particular way. Have a fight where both sides have 1000 BPV, half of that BPV needs to be spent on SC4 ships, and you need to have exactly 8 ships. That is going to end up with a "realistic" looking fleet.

>>I like having smaller ships which can be used for point defence, or thrown forward and challenge the enemy to focus fire on them, or risk them getting to point blank range and throwing out drones/ESG/OL HWs/etc.>>

The problem with that is, again, that small ships don't operate any differently than bigger ships, except that they are easier to take apart piecemeal. You can do the exact same thing with big ships. Or by pushing your little ships ahead, your opponent just kills them from effective range while your big ships are too far away to hurt your opponent's main force (which is why the ISC are uniquely goodish at this particular plan).

Again, if small ships had something going for them over and above big ships, there would be a concrete reason to take them--I think in the Omega side of the universe, I think little ships were faster than bigger ships (CAs could move, like, 26; FFs could move 30 or something, just based on their engine sizes). Which was interesting--if FFs/DDs could move faster across the board than CA/DNs, it would be advantageous to have FF/DDs in your fleet and there would be in game reasons (that aren't arbitrary) to get them.

>>Having fleets made up from a range of ships introduces far more tactics than "stay at range and bombard/sabre dance/knife fight when it involves all 11 ships doing exactly the same thing.>>

I don't know that it does. I mean, yeah, having carriers and maulers and scouts make you do things differently than just having basic warships, but having DDs and FFs instead of just cruisers doesn't really. Except in that if you have DDs and FFs with disruptor and plasma ships, you are stuck with a lot of short ranged weapons (putting you at a disadvantage) compared to Photons or Hellbores or whatever.

" In an SFB pickup game, you aren't constrained by reality "

That's why I never liked the argument from SFB players that F&E wasn't realistic (relative to SFB). Unless one plays campaigns, SFB players don't have realistic constraints; if the losses in reality matched SFB scenarios, fleet commanders would lose their jobs.

Not to say that the scenarios are bad; quite the contrary, many of them are fantastic. But there are no consequences for getting your forces torn up beyond a few VPs

"That's why I never liked the argument from SFB players that F&E wasn't realistic (relative to SFB)."

This complaint (which was never mine, since I just didn't enjoy F&E for completely different reasons) is not based on fleet construction. It is based on the fact that fleets and units in F&E that fought each other and would be, for example, closely matched because of the Off/Def points assigned to each ship would, in SFB, be totally one sided. F&E abstracted (as, of course, it must do) the combat abilities of a ship down to a number.

Frankly, if the ships played tactically (SFB) were as well balanced as the ships played strategically (F&E) then SFB would have been a better game. None the less, a Fed fleet in SFB just crushes almost any similarly pointed Romulan fleet, for example. Where in F&E, by definition, a similarly pointed Fed Fleet and Rom fleet are, in fact, a completely even match.

There were also things like maulers (completely pointless in SFB) having exceptional value in F&E.

I think the complaint is correct - and that same complaint carries in SFB campaigns. So it is not just the "no consequences" pick-up games in SFB that don't match outcomes with F&E.

The complaint, mind you, although "correct" in stating that F&E outcomes don't match SFB outcomes is no reason to slight F&E. When it comes to a point system for rating ship strength, F&E has SFB beat by kilometers.

If Im Fed and youre Klink, then I get 900 BPV, you get 1,000.

>>So is small ship BPV wrong, or is this a fleet-only effect?>>

I don't know that it is either. Comparing individual small ships, BPV is not a horrible measure (i.e. a 75 point Fed FF is about as useful as a 75 point Klingon FF). And on a fleet level, numbers of small ships are about as useful as similar numbers of small ships (i.e. 300 points spent on 4 Fed FFs are about as useful as 300 points spent on 4 Klingon FFs. On a closed map of some type...). The issue comes when you compare X BPV on one big ship vs 2 or more small ships. 'Cause small ships are easier to kill piecmeal (i.e. 30 damage on a 150 point CA isn't hurting the ship much, but 30 damage on a 75 point FF is doing significant internal damage), smaller ships have shorter ranged guns, and smaller ships tend to have less power for things like EW.

>>If it's not worth taking SC4 ships in a BPV pickup battle, the BPV is clearly wrong.>>

Well, they *are* worth taking, if your opponent has to take them too, generally speaking. If we have 750 BPV to spend and I get 3xCA and 4xFF, and you get 3xCA and 4xFF, the game will be roughly even (all other things being equal). On the other hand, if I have 5xCA and you have 3xCA and 4xFF, I'm going to have an advantage, generally speaking. [If the SC4 ships in question are Fed DD+, all this goes out the window, as the Fed DD+ is just stupid...].

BPV works reasonably well based on everything being average. If we both have the same stuff, more or less, we'll be roughly balanced. But me having 3xDN and you having 9xFF? Probably not.

Just used that as an extreme example. Unless you are restricting the Fed SC4 ship to the FF, then you are hitting a significant (50% per ship) HW disadvantage. The Fed FFB or DW (essentially identical ships) carry 3 Phots and 3 P-1 and they do so for the similar BVP to the F5 (or F5W) - the Feds are around 95, the F5 is around 85 and the F5W around 105 (drone costs could make them more). In each case, every time the Feds take an FFB or DW as compared to the Klinks F5/F5W, the Feds gain a Heavy Weapon.

Of course, this assumes you decided from the start that the "historically" more common DD+ was not allowed. So you are already making non-rules based changes to shoehorn a fight into BVP.

That is just one example, but I think if we went race by race in Historical fights, you will find one race's SC4 is going to have an edge.

Shift this fight from Klink v. Fed to Klink v. Kzinti and now we are seeing the same number of HW for each ship, but with the Kz having essentially twice the drones for the same (or often less) BVP.

Shift it to Rom v. Gorn and we are looking at the Gorns always having a large Heavy Torp advantage and also the Roms (because Cloak is just too expensive outside of the 1st Gen Roms) likely having fewer ships to boot.

Shift to Gorn v. ISC and we have the same deal (at the SC4 level) where the ISC ships have no Heavy Torps but cost a lot more.

The closest to even on the SC4 thing is Klink/Lyran v. Hydran. Historically all three races had P-2s, so the smaller ships have more of those. The Hydran, as always, has options involving fighters, but that comes at the expense of losing Hellbores. Assuming, however, that we aren't doing something pointless - e.g. playing on an open map with no fixed point objectives - I think that Hydrans are better off with an all or mostly all fusion fleet (because Hydran fighters other than the Stinger I are underpointed). But even so, looking only at the SC4 ships, the Hydran suffer almost as much as the Klingons or Lyrans when forced to spend points on them (assuming S8 is in force and I can't just load up with 5-gatt escorts).

I think John and Jim are mostly correct. BVP, flawed as it is at all times, is at its worst when looking at SC4 ships. This is where you see the largest balance problems looking at similarly pointed ships. Outside of a few ships this is not true of SC3 and mostly non-existent in the class of ships labeled CA or CC. The game is just better balanced (if looking at BVP) at the Cruiser level than at any other point.

Well, the problem is that simply counting heavy weapons - or weapons in general - is NOT a good way to figure cost. There's a lot of other things that have as much or more effect on how useful a ship is. In the case of the Fed DD, you have ship that has the firepower of a cruiser, but is next to useless at anything other than base assaults.

I have no problem with things being balanced against a single class, such as a CA. Ships are fairly well balanced within their own class, but when comparing value between an FF and CA there is clearly a disparity.

Paul said "Cloak is just too expensive outside of the 1st Gen Roms"

A Skyhawk-A can cloak very nicely (6). More to the point, it can cloak off batteries, so it can do it on a whim, shedding that 100-point plasma stack you just dumped on it. That said, it needs a proper torpedo because it can't fight usefully outside R8 or so. On a smallish map this may not be a problem (lurk under cloak, pop up at a suitably irritating moment) but you don't get to do this very often.

in terms of BPV, not in terms of energy cost. All Roms, except the Kestrals, cloak just fine in terms of energy.

The SkyHawk, however, is a 105 BVP ship with 2 F-torps. Good luck with that.

"Well, the problem is that simply counting heavy weapons - or weapons in general - is NOT a good way to figure cost."

If I come into a fight with a 50-100% heavy weapon advantage over you, that fight will be pointless. You are right in that just counting up the HW is not the entire equation, but when it gets as lopsided as you see with SC4 Feds as compared to SC4 Klinks, Lyrans and Roms, then you don't need to go much further.

Someone once made a comment that the cloak was as much to the opponents advantage as the user.
I am not sure there should be a Bpv cost to it.
Perhaps activating it gives the opponent Victory points, only.
Still, I can live with the SPA and FH being expensive because they can choose fight uncloaked. It would have been nice if the SKA fit the curve too.

You need to look at the number of shuttles. If the ship has 2, then that is a HUGE amount of firepower in 2 scatter packs.

"FFB is like 100 points. F5 is like 71"

The FFB is 94 points. The F5 is 81. The F5W is 108 points. All of those assume speed 20 drones and nothing fancy. From the points, these are all reasonably close fights. The reality is that the FFB is going to dominate both of those ships in a 1 on 1. More importantly to the conversation taking place, however, is that the FFB is going to add something constructive to a fleet - 3 photons and the F5 and F5W are adding considerably less.

"The FFK is gonna cost 20 points more than a Lyran DD."

FFK = 90 points, DD = 83. Again, Speed 20 drones, nothing fancy. Sure, you could speed a ton of points on the drones, but at the point speed 32 are in service, we aren't looking at a DD anymore. I am saying 7 points does not represent the huge advantage the FFK has 1 on 1. It does an even worse job of accounting for teh relative value of both ships to a fleet.

Remember that this all starts from a conversation about "forcing" fleets to each take SC4 ships. Doing that, generally, helps Feds, Kzinti and Hydrans and hurts all plasma (unless just fighting plasma), but mostly hurts ISC and Rom and hurts Klinks and Lyrans.

a SkyH+ vrs a Fed DW is probably fairly balanced..... especially if you are playing with hidden mines. The utter fear value of running over a NSM (you did buy one right?) will effect the way a Fed flys and the shields of a SkyH+ will survive a long range shot to allow the SkyH to climb up on top of the DW before the torps are reloaded.

5 DW + 1DWL vs 1SkyL + 5 SkyH+ is a total runaway victory for the Feds. (at least on an open map) Manuver is a lot less improtant when the 2 relevant questions are: Is the EW situation going to get better or worse? Am I going to get closer (as in, do I WANT to get closer).

On an open map, I'm going to load std torps (not prox) and fire the wad at R30 and turn off to reload. You are going to end up with a beat up SkyH+, maybe dead if I roll lots of 1s. If you cloak and try to get close, I will convert those torps to OVS and blow two ships up as you come out of cloak and point blank and then HET and run away or hide under WW. Either way, I pretty much win.

There is a campaign on the BBS showing this effect. Day of the Eagle comes Early. Without closed maps, the Roms would NEVER EVER EVER win a battle. Even with closed maps, Dale builds as many heavy torps per BVP as he can.

Its not total damage that matters so much, its busting a shield. Std torps allow 2 things:

1) to utterly wreck you if I get lucky.
2) convert to OVS if you cloak out on batts.

Proxes have to be ejected and rearmed.... that's asking to get mugged. A SkyH that climb on top of a DW will have little to no trouble anchoring it with its 6 batts.

A common problem with Rules that Should Not Be is a size imbalance. If a unit is too good for its size, it is probably a bad rule, and needs to be fixed in a bodge somewhere else.

For example:

1) Mines, specifically T-bombs. A mine is the only thing apart from a ship explosion that affects more than one hex, but it's the size of a drone, which is ridiculous. A T-bomb has to be this small because it needs to be transportable. Naturally enough, it's a very useful thing and everyone buys lots. But except for "minesweepers", no ship comes equipped with them and there's a cack-handed rule to say that they're available only with COs and you can't buy more than 2 or 4 or 6 because there's nowhere to put them. Any sane ship designer would add a cargo box and fill it with 50 spaces of the things.

It's not just T-bombs. A large drone captor mine is 3 cu and holds 6 cu of drones. duh...what? A small photon captor mine is the size of a type-1 drone. Please can I take the drones off my F-18 and put 2 of them on instead? And in related news, exactly how do 3 type-6 drones fit into a type-1-MW drone?

A mine ought to be SC6. If you had to replace a shuttle with a mine, they'd still be balanced and people would still sometimes take them. And SC7 T-bombs should have an explosion strength of no more than 5, within 1 hex.

See also Defsat, also SC7 but potentially mounting 4 phasers and 2 photons, all fully operational.

2) ECM drones. A drone is how big? And you expect it to generate and lend how much ECM? And my frigate, with immeasurably more electronics built in, can't do that?

3) MRS. Apparently incredibly expensive and hard to build (which makes sense, considering its size and how much gets stuffed into it) but only 10 BPV. So unsurprisingly there are various post-hoc justifications about why you can't have one. Essentially, it's too good or too cheap.

4) PFs. They're too good in an EW environment, because for no obvious reason they can do things that bigger ships can't. Conversely, frigates don't get this advantage so become obsolete. And how, exactly, can a destroyer (eg Gorn DDP) tow six of these things with no increase in its movement cost? There is currently no significant bodge fix to this, which is why they dominate after Y180.

5) Gatlings. There's no good reason for Hydran ships to mount fusion beams if the alternative is this.

6) Drogues. How much plasma can I wedge into this thing?

7) Bombers. Not from ships. Uh-huh. Desperate rationalisation going on here. J2 was not a high point in ADB's history.

Jim,

Reading through your post here and in the EW thread and one of your comments really jumped out at me;

>>5) Gatlings. There's no good reason for Hydran ships to mount fusion beams if the alternative is this.>>

Never thought about this before, but your right. A standard Fusion costs 2 points and is essentially a 2-turn weapon. It has pretty much the same firing range. The Gatling costs half the power and can fire every turn. And the kicker is that at the closest range, the very worst rolls of a Gatling will produce one point less than the one very best roll of a Fusion. At all the other effective ranges the Gatling does far more damage.

And at OL levels, only the very best roll at R0 will produce more damage than the probable rolls of the Gatling at the same range. And it cost 4 times the amount of energy to do it and is still a 2-turn weapon.

So other than not being 'official', why wouldn't the Hydrans replace the Fusions with Gatlings? I know, they can't make enough Gatlings (wink). But then, if they stopped making fusions they'd have enough resources to built more Gatlings. I think someone flubbed on the Fusion beams personally.

Uh oh...I feel another 'house rule' revision coming on......

"5) Gatlings. There's no good reason for Hydran ships to mount fusion beams if the alternative is this"

Well, it SHOULD be cost. If it were substantially more expensive, it'd make sense.

Your comment re: MRS is why I HATE HATE HATE the E2C and E3A in F&E. I've told several players that I'd give up stasis if they'd give up E2's, and that was BEFORE stasis was reduced by "Ex-Fix" (and subsequently nerfed again at a later time).

They do to much for a small, cheap unit.

re: bombers

I could see them on a ship, but only the largest of ships, and they should probably displace more regular fighters than they do.

Other than that, I think your list is (spot on )^ 23343

Being as how I've flown the Hydrans a LOT, I would personally love to have Fusions be one turn weapons. I know that a lot of my adversaries, though, would HATE such a thing. I've smoked plenty of ships with fusion armed ships and my fighters. I love the fusion armed ships with fighters. I never cared for the hellbore armed ships with less fighters, and the hybrids were quite decent.

Should gatlings be more expensive? Probably. They certainly dish out plenty of damage. I hated going against Orion cartels that could mount gatlings because the ships were so darn cheap and they could tear people up at close range. Of course, making gatlings more expensive would likely make Stinger 2s more expensive, and I'm positive my adversaries would love that as well.

My personal belief, though, it that fusions are fine as they are. Take away the tactics that must be learned with fusion armed ships by making fusions better all around simply dilutes the flavor of the ships.

While we're on the subject of gatlings, how did the Feds manage to get them on some of their fighters? I thought ADB decided against the tech-sloshing thing. The Feds aren't exactly close to the Hydrans and if anybody was to get them I figured it would have been the Kzinti as they had the mutual pact with them.

And certainly not the LDR, after all, they're still Lyrans. For gatling technology they should have given the Hydrans ESG's.

The P1 is the best general purpose weapon in the game, of course. The only reason why it doesn't get picked for all options (except gatling) in the tournament is that the Orion and Aux have lots of spare power which the phaser can't use. So they generally get some heavy weapons (usually HB) or drones for tractoring. Nevertheless, the g1g1 pig was pretty horrific back in the day, as is the g1b1 now. The Orion phaser boat was everyone's favourite Andro-killer, though now clearly redundant.

The exception is the shark, which has plenty of phasers already, is a bit power-starved and needs drone throw weight to get some impact.

Never mind mere power-to-damage ratios; there's also hold for nothing, no penalty against drones, shoots plasma, downfiring, range 75, power-sharing capacitors, easy repair, reliability. If this were introduced now, it would be seen as a major cheesefest. Considering all these advantages, compared to most heavy weapons, the Phaser-TWO is actually quite balanced.

The Gat would be a lot less cheesy (in fact, fairly well balanced) if it could fire only 1 shot per impulse.

I mean, yeah, the Gat is too cheap (BPV wise), but assuming that you just go with cannon designs (and avoid ships with option mounts, as they tend to be stupidly unbalanced anyway, Gatlings or no), so what?

I mean, yeah, if the Hydrans replaced all their Fusions with Gatlings, their ships would be better. This is true. It is also true that if they doubled all their shields or added 20 Warp engines to all their ships, they'd be better that way too.

Hydran Fusion ships work fine. They have some limitations (i.e. they need to get close to work, generally speaking) and some advantages (they have fighters). Fusions aren't the best weapon in the world, but if you use them effectively, they are effective. Removing the cooling turn would certainly make fusion beams better, but they don't really need to be better--Hydrans are very far from being difficult to play, and often, they teeter on the edge of Wildly Overpowered (see: Hydran fusion/fighter heavy force on a closed map).

It was the other way around, replacing fusions with a gat. Sorry if I wasn't clear :(

>>Now here is a powerful weapon, capable of damaging a ship and destroying various systems aboard, yet one photon isn't capable of killing many single fighters. >>

Well, what a Photon is capable of doing is scoring 8 points of damage which marks off 8 boxes on an opposing unit. So if a fighter has 10 damage points, a photon hit not destroying it makes sense. As the photon marks off 8 boxes. Leaving 2 left over.

You can't get too hung up on the make believe physics here or whatever. There are plenty of reasons to object to fighters. That they don't get killed by a single photon hit, however, isn't really one of the good ones.

SFB uses a bodge for small units, giving them many more hp than they deserve. Arguably, a drone should have 1 hp, a shuttle 2 and a fighter 3, coming with a thumping great ECM bonus for being tiny and hard to hit. So if you could somehow land the photon on that pesky little Z-Y, you would blow it to atoms.

Warp Squadron does it like that. But that's not the way it works in SFB, for better or worse.

Mudfoot,

Totally Agree about fragility of small units. hit == dead, period. That hit should be hard to get....

But really.... do you want to face a pile of Stingers coming at you with a 4 shift? :)