How about each Ship roll an initiative die (d6/2 round up).
The inititive indicates what phase the ship will fire in (1-3).
If you wish, you could weight this 1d6 all 6's fire in the 1st phase; all 1's
fire in the 3rd phase; all other fire in the 2nd phase. All damage within a
phase is simultaneous. This prevents a player from making his largest ship the
one that always gets initiative
You could augment this by giving each player a number of initiative counters.
Each player could turn in an inititive counter to allow a ship to fire 1 phase
earlier (phase 1 ships cannot be shifted). You could also give the Admiral of
each side an extra number of initiative counters to pass down to his captains.
I would suggest providing no more than 3 initiative counters to each player
and 1 per player extra to the admiral.
-----
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
http://www.ftsr.org
As GZGECC registration rolls around, our thoughts turn to the Prestige and
Glory that Four Victors will win. One of the ideas for speeding play, you will
recall, was to designate 1st round, 2nd round, 3rd round targets and have all
damage from each round be simultaneous. However, no one has sent me playtest
reports on how well the idea worked. I'm waiting....
Alternate idea: designate 20% of your NPV (ie 300pts/player) as
"superior" ships, which fire in 1st round; 50% would be normal ships and fire
in second round; 30% would fire in third round. These ratings would be
permanent, ie you wouldn't get another "superior" just because you lost one.
This would avoid the time and mental anguish needed to place fire control
markers. First tier ships should also get a couple extra DCP, while third tier
should lose a couple.
A quick comment, our group tried out a simultaneous fire and damage format
recently and the upshot was to have a very quick and decisive couple of combat
turns preceeded by a number of sniping and maneuvering and then followed by a
couple of "run away!" turns. It was quick and fun but felt a little different.
Tactics and ship usage would need to be re-evaluated in light of such
changes. Any comments?
Please advise Thanks Pat Connaughton
e-mail - patconnaughton@earthlink.net
homepage - www.home.earthink.net/~patconnaughton
ICQ # 2535086 "but I am one with the dark side.. Come my friend, let your
anger at the disgraced Mac and fragmented UNIX
platforms feed your hatred - Let the darkness in..."
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