Beth's emines and Heavy Beams.......

Beth & Oerjan,

Just some quick input on your rule clarifications. I'm following along with
Beth et all with the HBW's max range. We're playing that max range is 36",
however if you've got screens and the net modifier is
-6 or more but you're still within range... you've got to get reroll
dice to actually damage the target. However we carry over the spill over
modifiers for the first reroll. What do I mean..

Say screen-2 ship at range 31"  (aka -6 for range, -2 for screens)

So: attacker has to roll a 6 to hit (0 damage)
     Then reroll.  Subtract the spill over (-8 total, -6 on 1st die, so
-2 for
     this die) aka -2 and calc damage.
Aka attacker rolls a 3 on his reroll die..: net = 1 pt of damage! (Whoopie!)

if the attacker rolled a 6 on his 1st reroll (He'd score 4 pts for that roll)
and then roll again, this time straight damage.

Also on to the Capacitor stuff.

We're playing with 1st hit = 1/2 value.  2nd hit = 0 (just like drives).

However we play that you can always repair them... (just like drives).

But we play that a needle beam can only hit the projector, it can't target the
capictor. We did this primarily because we felt that the capacitor was buried
within the ship and not a valid external target. Also we play that cap
explosion is applied to hull in full.

I think that this makes sense and seems to work fairly well. However my

players seem concerned that they are really not all that powerful or
worthwhile. I keep hearing the following complaints:

1. Range bites (~ really they're like pulse torps... its probably my group is
                   into the class-3/4 beam thing right now )
2. Not enough damage for the Mass (? could be that we're only using
cap-2's mostly (NAC furious conversions).

3.  Limited arcs - limit effective shots we can put in (We're flying
cinematic... I assume vector this really isn't a problem)

Anyway..... just throwing in my thoughts on the subject.

Chuck

You're using different modifiers to EFSB, as it's -1 per full 6" (so
range
31 is only -5).

        PT      EFSB beam       -1 EFSB beam (chuck's group)
                cap 1+projector (5 mass)
0-6:    2.91    4.18            3.18
6-12:   2.33    3.18            2.34
12-18:  1.75    2.34            1.68
18-24:  1.16    1.68            1.18
24-30:  0.58    1.18            0.85
30-36:  0       0.85            0.68

The way you use them Chuck, they average higher than the equivalent PTorp, but
only have 1 arc fire available. Even using your group's interpretation, they
still do more damage than pulsetorps & the problem is exaggerated the larger
the capacitor is, as the projecters can throw out 6d damage. Maybe if each
projector is limited to 2 die worth of power, it will balance out the larger
capacitors?

Neath Southern Skies - http://users.mcmedia.com.au/~denian/
[mkw] Admiral Peter Rollins; Task Force Zulu

> -----Original Message-----
        Eg. screen-2 ship at range 31"  (aka -6 for range, -2 for
screens)

<snip>
> 1. Range bites (~ really they're like pulse torps... its probably my

G'day Chuck,

> 1. Range bites (~ really they're like pulse torps... its probably my

Unfortunately there's got to be a downside to everything;)

> 2. Not enough damage for the Mass (? could be that we're only using

So far we haven't found this problem, even with cap-2's which are the
perfect size to be recharged every turn. In the campaign we're playing my
most cost effective ships are little guys with only a cap-2 and
projector on board.

> 3. Limited arcs - limit effective shots we can put in (We're flying

Well we only use vector so we haven't run into a major arc problem, guess it
could be a bigger issue in cinematic.

Cheers

Beth