> laserlight wrote:
> I'd still like some kind of critical hit which doesn't require
I really like the Full Thrust threshold checks as opposed to just about every
other critical hit system I've ever seen because they don't occur very often.
Rolling for criticals on every hit, or every hit that does X or more damage,
is much harder to balance. If criticals occur slightly too often, too many
games get decided by the criticals.
Try playing 'A Call to Arms' from Mongoose Publishing as an example.
cheers,
> On 7/7/06, Hugh Fisher <laranzu@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
> I really like the Full Thrust threshold checks as opposed
I prefer the system in _Silent Death_, myself. It's major failing is
that critical hits are very predictable.
One thing that bugs me about Full Thrust is the fact that you can be attacked
primarily from one direction and lose the weapons on the other side of the
ship. I know people have PSB to cover it, and I know there is no easy fix to
the problem.
(Funny enough, I don't have that much of a problem with it in Full Steam, but
beams don't "plunge" into a specific part of a ship.)
I've never been crazy about the break point idea. A ship takes a pounding but
is fully functional until it loses that one point on a hull row... and then,
bang!, it loses all its weapons. Again, no easy way to fix it, and it is a big
part of FT. It just bugs me.
> On Jul 7, 2006, at 10:46 AM, Allan Goodall wrote:
> On 7/7/06, Hugh Fisher <laranzu@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
I prefer any system damage done outside of thresholds to simply be "leak"
damage (i.e. not critical) of a random system here or there.
> One thing that bugs me about Full Thrust is the fact that you can be
The most logical PSB comes from the fact that we are simulating a 3D system in
2D. If we force all port fire to only hit port systems we are forcing a highly
unrealistic Flatland 2D system. Allowing fire from the port to rake across to
damage starboard systems (for example) implies the ships can be at slight
angles to one another, or
"above" and "below" each other in 3-D space.
> On 7/7/06, Noam Izenberg <noam.izenberg@jhuapl.edu> wrote:
That doesn't explain why the attacking commander allowed his weapon batteries
to fire on the weapons of his opponent's far side when they should have been
targeting the closer weapons (i.e. the ones firing back at him).
This is why I generally dislike PSB. I just say, "cause the game plays easier
that way" and I'm done with it.
Feels a bit like a contradiction, hate the breakpoint, but the Silent Death
damage losses are absolute breakpoints as opposed to random generations, but I
think I get your feeling.
Core systems rules do break it up a bit, as catastrophic damage can occur only
after other systems have had to check.
Would breaking it down even further into external systems, protected systems,
and core systems, give you enough possible finer granularity? Strictly as a
house rule, of course.
Say, at the first threshold, you can blow off SM racks and PDF's, but only
next threshold for FC's and shields, and maybe pushing core to third; I'm sure
the order of systems in this structure would be the source of vigorous
discussions, but you get my drift. And, in those cases where massive damage
crosses multiple thresholds, you can still roll for most everything.
Otherwise, you could take a page from SD, and put limited threshold checks as
icons in the hull boxes, which would negate some of the variable hull row
build differences.
I won't go into the 'other side of the ship' topic, as the whole 'roll the
ship' discussion still rankles me.
The_Beast
Allen wrote on 07/07/2006 09:46:52 AM:
> On 7/7/06, Hugh Fisher <laranzu@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
Allan(sorry about the typo last post) wrote on 07/07/2006 10:05:22 AM:
***snippage***
> That doesn't explain why the attacking commander allowed his weapon
Whoa! I have to call you on this one; you're ascribing needle beam accuracy to
all the rest of the weapons. With all others, you target the ship, not a
specific part, right?
The_Beast
> I prefer any system damage done outside of thresholds to simply be
Something like, for every DCP hull box eliminated, a single randomly
chosen system takes a threshold check on 4+ (or 3-) ? Just an even
salting throughout the damage track of points where a system might or might
not go away.
> One thing that bugs me about Full Thrust is the fact that you can be
> there is no easy fix to the problem.
For directional damage, you'd start getting into the old supership builds,
with separate quadrants of the ship having separate damage tracks and separate
systems.
I suppose one could get by with separate damage tracks for quadrants, and then
threshold checks on a track would be more likely to affect nearby systems.
Losing the second row on the port damage track means a
check on 3+ for port-bearing weapons and 5+ for other systems, for
example.
Yeah, I'd have to say the game plays better as is.
> On Jul 7, 2006, at 11:05 AM, Allan Goodall wrote:
> On 7/7/06, Noam Izenberg <noam.izenberg@jhuapl.edu> wrote:
Well, Commander, the if ship I'm targeting at 12 mu (roughly 12,000 km if we
go with the common 1mu = 1000 km unit) were a 200 meter diameter sphere, it
takes up 3.44 arcseconds of my sky. Considering
it's usually more like an edge-on blade shape maneuvering at several
G with a distorting grav gradient behind it, be glad we can hit the thing at
all.
> This is why I generally dislike PSB. I just say, "cause the game plays
I like _this_ PSB because it's not very high on the B part
-N
----
The stupid are not equal, but we need their purchasing power. -
Uncle Al
Another issue with directional damage, is that the system HAS to become more
complex. You either have to modify the SSD and start to approach Star Fleet
Battles (ew!) or do something similar. It's fine to say that
the Mk 14 Pulselaser turret can be hit from the directions that it can fire
through, but where's the fire con located? How about the hyperdrive?
Another way to PSB the random damage is that the component doesn't have to be
directly destroyed. It could be a spike in the power conduits, sliced fire
control link, or any other "collateral damage" explanation. Otherwise, how
could the damage control parties repair things?;)
J
John K. Lerchey Assistant Director for Incident Response Information Security
Office Carnegie Mellon University
> On Fri, 7 Jul 2006, McCarthy, Tom (xwave) wrote:
> I prefer any system damage done outside of thresholds to simply be
Ok, whoa to everybody else. Allan already admitted PSB for
non-directional
damage, and it couldn't be fixed without complications. He was just venting he
didn't like it.
See? SOMEBODY noticed. ;->=
On the other hand, a little thinking about ways to do with it without major
complications are worth the effort. Just, not for me.
The_Beast
> On 7/7/06, Noam Izenberg <noam.izenberg@jhuapl.edu> wrote:
OTOH, you're assuming the target ship can't rotate slightly to present a
minimum target profile/most heavily armored face. It's like saying that
when you shoot at a tank, you're just as likely to hit the rear face as the
front.
> From: Doug Evans
That's what I'd like. Traveller had "surface hits" and "penetrating hits", as
I recall, and depending on the modifiers for your ship size and armor vs the
weapon, you had a range of results possible. At the low end, you'd risk losing
a little fuel or a weapon battery; at the high end, your ship goes boom.
And the notorious Red Chicken Rising, as a game design decision, dispensed
with damage tracks and only tracked critical hits.
> -----Original Message-----
> On 7/7/06, Noam Izenberg <noam.izenberg@jhuapl.edu> wrote:
And now we're suggesting that those same beams can hit individual robotic
fighters pulling 25 g at the same range?
I understand the PSB. It's just something that bugs me, and it bugs me with
some models more than other models. It doesn't bug me as much with the flat
NAC and FSE ships. I can see how a slight rise in the Z axis can expose the
far side of an FSE ship. It bugs me more with the squared off NSL ships. You'd
have to fire at one of those from a very oblique angle to hit something on the
far side.
It doesn't bug me as much as the "passing through arcs" problem. It
bugs me slightly less than the "non-vector fighters and missiles"
problem.
I understand that it's a fix that's too complicated to be worth fixing.
> On 7/7/06, Doug Evans <devans@nebraska.edu> wrote:
> In a message dated 7/7/06 11:28:00 AM, lerchey@andrew.cmu.edu writes:
> Otherwise, how could the damage control parties repair things? ;)
U mean the guy holding wire A and wire B together so the firecon can "allow"
targeting for Beam Battery. It could be worse, he could be the fool
trying
to get a B3 to fire by holding those power couplings together. :-)
> On Jul 7, 2006, at 11:50 AM, Allan Goodall wrote:
> On 7/7/06, Noam Izenberg <noam.izenberg@jhuapl.edu> wrote:
I have no problem with that. I think of beams in this context as flyswatters
of coherent light.
P-torps as buckshot vs. dragonflies.
I understand and accept your dislike of it, though.
> [quoted text omitted]
---
"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a
means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us."
-- Western Union internal memo, 1876
Calculating critical hits is a continum - at one extreme you ignore
critical hits, at the other you calculate the probability of thousands of
individual systems failing on a given hit. FT has decided to add a few
critical hit checks (at each threshold) rather than checking at each hit. In
addition it has bundled the hit locations into a generic space rather than try
to determing direction of shots etc.
In short I think that FT has done a reasonable job of adding detail without
too much additional work - for instance if you had to roll addtional
critical hit checks every time your ship was hit, you'd have tons more dice
rolling for little additional result.
For example - if a cruiser loses its SML to a hit, does it matter that
it was hit from the port side with a Mk.XXXI energy torpedo that penetrated
the second missile outer hull door as a salvo was being fired which
prematurely detonated the fusion igniter detonation booster in the missile and
the blast travelled back down the tube, but the blast doors deflected most of
the force outward through the blow out panels, but the high magenetic field
generated an EMP that fried the fire control station at that weapon and the
back-up circuits failed to kick in vs. the SML is out of action?
If you're argument is that it's too predictable as to when critical hits
happen (i.e. only a threshold checks vs.not every time you're hit) again that
comes down how much detail you want. In theory each system should roll
for a critical constantly, not just when hit - i.e. parts wear out under
normal use. If we wanted to simulate that, then each ship would roll for some
small chance of critical hit every turn, but again, diminishing returns as
you'd have a lot of effort for very little result, especially if the chance of
any particular system failing is very low.
Other possibilities - special critical check cards - these would be a
deck of cards with one drawn at the beginning of the turn by each player which
would force the drawing player to roll for a critical hit against a card
specified ship class and system (i.e. check for a FTL on a carrier, or one
beam battery or one missile system on a cruiser) if the player doesn't have
that particular class, the card is ignored. To balance the deck, it would also
include some free DCP cards to repair damage that would be immediately used to
repair a system.
--Binhan
> On 7/7/06, Allan Goodall <agoodall@hyperbear.com> wrote:
> On Friday 07 July 2006 12:04 pm, DOCAgren@aol.com wrote:
Maybe we should allow re-rolls of DCP rolls but only after the player
crosses
out a DCP crew factor from his SSD to represent heroic/stupid efforts on
the
part of the red-shirts to get the systems working...
(kidding!)
I like to distinguish between critical hits and steady attrition of a unit's
strengths.
In Silent Death, for example, many boxes on the damage track are marked to
show a particular system being degraded or destroyed. A few squares directed
you to a table with results ranging from a momentary movement penalty to
instant annihilation. The former were simple attrition, the latter were true
critical hits.
In FT, checking systems at the end of a row of hull boxes is a simple
mechanism for attrition of systems. The core systems (and striking the
colours) are, for all intents and purposes, the critical hits in the game.
________________________________
From: Binhan Lin [mailto:binhan.lin@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, July 07, 2006 12:14 PM
To: gzg@firedrake.org
Subject: Re: Critical hits (was Limits on armour?)
Calculating critical hits is a continum - at one extreme you ignore
critical hits, at the other you calculate the probability of thousands of
individual systems failing on a given hit. FT has decided to add a few
critical hit checks (at each threshold) rather than checking at each hit. In
addition it has bundled the hit locations into a generic space rather than try
to determing direction of shots etc.
In short I think that FT has done a reasonable job of adding detail
without too much additional work - for instance if you had to roll
addtional critical hit checks every time your ship was hit, you'd have tons
more dice rolling for little additional result.
For example - if a cruiser loses its SML to a hit, does it matter that
it was hit from the port side with a Mk.XXXI energy torpedo that penetrated
the second missile outer hull door as a salvo was being fired which
prematurely detonated the fusion igniter detonation booster in the missile and
the blast travelled back down the tube, but the blast doors deflected most of
the force outward through the blow out panels, but the high magenetic field
generated an EMP that fried the fire control
station at that weapon and the back-up circuits failed to kick in vs.
the SML is out of action?
If you're argument is that it's too predictable as to when critical hits
happen (i.e. only a threshold checks vs.not every time you're hit) again that
comes down how much detail you want. In theory each system should
roll for a critical constantly, not just when hit - i.e. parts wear out
under normal use. If we wanted to simulate that, then each ship would roll for
some small chance of critical hit every turn, but again, diminishing returns
as you'd have a lot of effort for very little result, especially if the chance
of any particular system failing is very low.
Other possibilities - special critical check cards - these would be a
deck of cards with one drawn at the beginning of the turn by each player which
would force the drawing player to roll for a critical hit against a card
specified ship class and system ( i.e. check for a FTL on a carrier, or one
beam battery or one missile system on a cruiser) if the player doesn't have
that particular class, the card is ignored. To balance the deck, it would also
include some free DCP cards to repair damage that would be immediately used to
repair a system.
--Binhan
> On 7/7/06, Allan Goodall <agoodall@hyperbear.com> wrote:
> On 7/7/06, Hugh Fisher <laranzu@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
> I really like the Full Thrust threshold checks as opposed
I prefer the system in _Silent Death_, myself. It's major failing is
that critical hits are very predictable.
One thing that bugs me about Full Thrust is the fact that you can be attacked
primarily from one direction and lose the weapons on the other side of the
ship. I know people have PSB to cover it, and I know there is no easy fix to
the problem.
(Funny enough, I don't have that much of a problem with it in Full Steam, but
beams don't "plunge" into a specific part of a ship.)
I've never been crazy about the break point idea. A ship takes a pounding but
is fully functional until it loses that one point on a hull row... and then,
bang!, it loses all its weapons. Again, no easy way to fix it, and it is a big
part of FT. It just bugs me.
> On 7/7/06, McCarthy, Tom (xwave) <Tom.McCarthy@xwave.com> wrote:
I like attrition. I'm just not crazy about the lack of granularity in the FT
system. The ship is perfectly okay up through the point where there is one
hull point left on that hull row line... then things fall apart with one
damage point suffered.
That having been said, the cure is far worse than the disease from what I've
seen.
Oh, and the Command and Colors games (Memoir 44, Battle Cry, Command & Colors:
Ancients) has an even more severe lack of granularity. An infantry unit has 4
figures. It is 100% effective until it loses the last figure, then it
disappears. And yet this system is my favourite board game system. Go figure.
> From: Binhan Lin
TomM's worry was not that thresholds happen a t a predictable point, but
rather that the predictable point can be a long time after first taking
fire--ie that a heavily armored ship last quite a while without having
*any* chance of losing *any* system.
Personally, I find the second threshold check to be huge. Many ships are still
nasty combatants until that 2nd threshold check. And then, suddenly, they
become almost toothless.
And that's why I find ships with lots of armour and screens really annoying.
Against standard beams, you might have to throw huge amounts of dice to force
that second threshold check.
> -----Original Message-----
Well, one other option to the attrition system would be what starmada does.
Roll a damage die for each "hit" and kill off systems. More attritive (is that
a word?) than FT, more predictable (every damage point kills *some* system),
but not reaonable for ships with as large a damage
track as is avialable for FT ships. And, quite frankly, it would no longer
feel like FT.
While FT's attrition system can be frustrating:
- threshold checks only after full rows are killed...
- threshold checks end up with random results (good dice, little or no
systems damaged, bad dice, the whole ship can become disfunctional)...
It *is* rather unique to this game, and since all ships have to do it, it's
reasonabley balanced. Adding criticals, IMHO, would he hard to do.
The idea of "for any individual weapon that scores 6 points" just begs to not
amass dice. I like amassing dice. Given that there are different kinds of D6
results, and that some weapons have special effects (needle beams, for
example) makes it even harder.
I consider it to be a "critical hit" when I blow a pile of threshold rolls and
watch my ship fall apart.;)
J
John K. Lerchey Assistant Director for Incident Response Information Security
Office Carnegie Mellon University
> On Fri, 7 Jul 2006, Allan Goodall wrote:
> On 7/7/06, McCarthy, Tom (xwave) <Tom.McCarthy@xwave.com> wrote:
> On Jul 7, 2006, at 2:23 PM, McCarthy, Tom ((xwave)) wrote:
> Personally, I find the second threshold check to be huge. Many ships
I agree with everything but the "toothless" adjective. Threshold level 2 is
where ships are more likely to have some serious fighting capability reduced.
I tend to care much less about threshold 1 on any ship with two or more
firecons, and want to maximize damage
absorption/deflection/avoidance capability to the end of the second
row, if I can.
"It is I, NRI"
Sorry, should have been "can become almost toothless"
> -----Original Message-----
JohnL said
> [FT's threshold system] *is* rather unique to this game
which doesn't mean it's *good*, just unusual.
> The idea of "for any individual weapon that scores 6 points" just begs
I don't understand why you couldn't amass dice. You have to roll Beam dice,
EMP dice, PTorps, Grasers, missiles and submunitions all separate
from each other--but you do anyway.
Note that I'm NOT saying to roll a B3 as three dice, then roll a B2 as
two dice--I'm saying roll all the beam dice at once, then do all the
rerolls, then all the rererolls.
To make thresholds less predictable:
At the end of any turn where a ship takes a hull hit, check to see if it takes
a threshold check.
If the current hull row is destroyed, take the threshold automatically as per
the current rules. If not, then roll one die as follows:
If the current hull row is less than or equal to 1/3 damage,
then take a threshold check if roll 6 on the die.
If the current hull row is more than 1/3 damaged but less than
or
equal to 2/3's damaged, then take a threshold check if you
roll 5 or 6 on the die.
If the current hull row is more than 2/3's damaged, take the
threshold check on a 3, 4, 5, 6 on the die.
Only one actual threshold check per row. If damage for the turn
finishes one row and starts a another. Roll for the next row as
above. This may cause a second or more threshold check.
It would make those easily ignored hits potentially much more painful and
unpredictable. This probably enhances the value of shields and any other
system that prevents hull hits. Of course, that one point that leaks through
might kill you. Rerolls become very important.
Grant
> On 7/7/06, McCarthy, Tom (xwave) <Tom.McCarthy@xwave.com> wrote: