From: JAMES BUTLER <JAMESBUTLER@worldnet.att.net>
> Subject: Full Thrust
[MUNCH]
> So here's the problem--how in the world do you stop a 1500 point force
Including
> an FTL drive, these little battlepods come out to 15 points total!
Hello James...
Here are some ideas:
1) Use a campaign setting. These little battlepods from Hell may be able to
kill ships, but they won't be able to do anything else. Their endurance time
will be nil, their ability to land troops will be nil, a host of mediating
factors will come into play to sevrely punish somebody who uses the above gang
tactics....
2) An idea that might work; use fighters. Since these battlepods will
"pop" when you hit them, just build a super mega-carrier and launch
hordes of fighters at them. They may get the carrier, but you manage to kill
off all those battlepods.
3) Use the Nova Cannon or the Wave Gun to set up a "cone of death" that the
pods can't get through. Especially if you're on a somewhat restricted playing
surface; just get a whole bunch of capital ships firing these area effect
weapons.
4) Use optional rules... the above concept, while it works, goes against what
can be argued the "spirit" of the rules. Make FTL drives extremely expensive,
or rare a la Battletech. Use the "AEGIS" optional rule that some people have
played with the render missiles not as effective. Develop a weapon system
with some sort of area/fragmentation effect; since these pods have no
endurance, they'll pop really easily. (Use an extremely large fusion bomb or
something.)
I feel that the best idea though is 1). That's the reason why the oceans have
carriers and cruisers on them, not a whole bunch of hydrofoils armed with
SSMs. A Swarm of battlepods, while a viable game tactic, seems to go against
the "spirit" of the game system.
Hope this helps,
J.
> From: JAMES BUTLER <JAMESBUTLER@worldnet.att.net>
> endurance time will be nil, their ability to land troops will be nil,
Right. using "battle pods" like this is not that far from using hordes and
hordes of fighters. n a single battle, you might succeed with
these pods, but in the second one, your enemy will have them, too... Or you'll
notice you're fast running out of capable pod pilots! Training a crew of three
hundred for a ship is easier on the long term than training three hundred
fighter (or pod) pilots. After all, the only one who has to think in similar
terms as a fighter pilot on a bigger ship is the captain, and he doesn't even
have to carry the actions out by himself! Everyone else will just have to be
trained to do a little piece of the total.
> 2) An idea that might work; use fighters. Since these battlepods
I agree on this bit totally.
> 3) Use the Nova Cannon or the Wave Gun to set up a "cone of death"
that
> the pods can't get through. Especially if you're on a somewhat
This is definitely a "gamey" tactic, except where the restricted combat area
can be justified: Asteroid belt or similar. Otherwise, using the edges of an
infinite gameboard (=space) against your opponent is a classical example of
munchkinism. But then again, unless the background can adequatly explain them,
so are the battle pods...
> I feel that the best idea though is 1). That's the reason why the
Just my two cents worth.. No wait, we're floating the Finnish Mark... So
now it's only cent and a half... Better grab it quick before it disappears!
/GNiko
> Niko Mikkanen wrote:
[BELCH] (8-)
> > 3) Use the Nova Cannon or the Wave Gun to set up a "cone of death"
that
> > the pods can't get through. Especially if you're on a somewhat
Oh, it's definately a "gamey" tactic, but if the opponent, after all the
above, is willing to send 100 battlepod type ships at you, I figure that fair
is fair. Besides, it isn't that gamey... figure two capital ships (not
impossible in large task forces, or if you're refighting Jutland or
something to that effect (8-) ), and they can "sterilize" a cone 36"
long, and 24" across at the base?
Actually, if you're in games where tossing Nova Cannon blasts around is a
good thing (8-) has anybody tried play testing the idea of allowing
shields to subtract from Nova Cannon damage? Some sort of "contested" die
rolling system where the person with the Cannon rolls damage as normal, while
the person who got hammered rolls D6 equivalent to the level of shielding
available. Subtract... if the total is reduced to zero or lower, then the
cannon shot does no damage. "Captain! The shields have been
reduced 50%, but they're holding!" That type of thing. (8-)
> Just my two cents worth.. No wait, we're floating the Finnish Mark...
So
> now it's only cent and a half... Better grab it quick before it
Hee. Watch how the Canandian dollar bounces around some days. (8-)
J.
> > > 3) Use the Nova Cannon or the Wave Gun to set up a "cone of death"
that
> > > the pods can't get through. Especially if you're on a somewhat
long,
> and 24" across at the base?
The battle pods have such a high thrust value that they could manuever around
the "spinal mounts" of the Nova Cannon and the Wave Gun. The Wave Gun doesn't
have a reliable rate of fire either! Catching them in your "cones of fire"
would be nontrivial.
I think a better method for dealing with these "flies" are light cruisers with
triple arc B batteries and extra firecons. Or a munchkin fleet of corvettes
with a single triple arc A battery each. Your fleet would manuever to keep
the battle pods at 18"+ range and whittle them down to vapor.
> The battle pods have such a high thrust value that they could manuever
What fun, thinking up anti-munchkin munchkins! Here's my idea:
Merchant-hulled, Mass-38 Q-Ships with Thrust-1 and a Nova Cannon and 3
empty mass points. This horrible lump of iron can be churned out for 182
points, so that's 8 of them for 1456 points. They would sit stationary,
perhaps in 2 groups to permit a star attack. At least half would be firing and
the rest realigning, if necessary, each turn. They can be placed in 2 "ranks"
so that the "rear" vessels' warheads pass their "front rank" ships before
igniting.
Rob
Another daft idea! Unarmed Drone Warpedoes! Mass-1, thrust 8. Cost 5
points each, so the battlepods are thoroughly outnumbered. Tactic? Roar up to
the enemy and initiate FTL drive!
> Robin Paul wrote:
so
> that the "rear" vessels' warheads pass their "front rank" ships before
> Another daft idea! Unarmed Drone Warpedoes! Mass-1, thrust 8. Cost
Roar up
> to the enemy and initiate FTL drive!
We are getting sick!
How about the stealthed moving minefield? You could buy 1500 pts. of cloaked
mines with an initial velocity...:)
Speaking of minefields...
I've never been too impressed with the FT rules for mines and minelayers. My
idea for a mine field are battle "satellites" that mount a four arc B
battery and take one pt. of damage.
This idea was inspired by the Centauri minefield placed around the Ranger
training base.
Date sent: 12-JUL-1996 08:46:19
> You know, although the battle pod idea would work extremely well in a
> Adam
I would. I ran this through last night. OK so 100 ships is more than I
have. (Yes, even I have only got 97 escort sized ships 8-) ), so I
reduced the points down to 150 a side. Side A (The imperial navy) had ten
battlepods. Side b (NAC) had one standard medium cruiser. I ran through the
battle several times and here is what happened.
The cruiser at thrust 4 found it hard to outmaneuver the pods BUT with only a
forward fire arc, and an effective range of only 6", the pods were having
difficulty tracking the cruiser. The cruiser could 'pop' two pods per turn
with unnerving regularity within 24", but in order to do enough damage the
pods HAD to close to point blank (at range they would simply scratch the paint
work without causing crippling damage). The end result was that the cruiser
won every single time, either due to killing all the pods, or by surviving
after all the pods had fired.
Another example of good on paper but crap in practice?
Date sent: 12-JUL-1996 09:07:03
> Speaking of minefields...
> I've never been too impressed with the FT rules for mines and
> This idea was inspired by the Centauri minefield placed around the
OK. But arn't the FT mines supposed to be detonation lasers, just like the
missiles? So why not have mines = a missile with no drive unit that hangs
about indefinatly? I think the mass and cost warents it. (Although you should
only use this idea if you have lots of room to maneuver)
> In a message dated 96-07-12 03:58:13 EDT, A. Delafield wrote:
> You know, although the battle pod idea would work extremely well in a
<snip>
> Another example of good on paper but crap in practice?
There's a time and a place for everything. Consider dumping a planet of
battlepod users into a campaign as an NPC planet. Picture a low-tech
world fielding not much more than space shuttles with missle packs. The
players have to defeat this cloud of gnats before the world can be claimed.
The NPC swarm player could try to hide in the shadow of the planet until the
attacking player closed enough for the swarm to be effective (or perhaps be
scrambled from ground bases??). Perhaps a treaty could be negotiated with the
NPC swarm providing the guts for a player provided battlerider tender?
OK, the swarm may not be much more than aggressive terrain to most players,
but use some imagination! There is a time and a place for everything!
(yes, I'm back, and slowly catching up on the archives; saw this and
thought I'd throw in my $0.02 - American ;) - out for fun)
> davisje@ash.crd.ge.com (Jonathan Davis) wrote:
> Speaking of minefields...
I was leaning more towards them being C-battery platforms, 1 or 2 4-arc
C-batts
on a 1 or 2 damage pt platform.
I've played with that idea a *little* (re: once), but not enough to really do
anything. They fell victim to long-range fire relatively early in the
battle.
Mk