Regarding the nice AAR:
You've just discovered the DS2 quantity vs. quality argument. This is the same
point system
that makes an army of jeeps with GMS/H just
about the most powerful force you can field per point. High tech isn't quite
worth what you pay for it, and quantity has, as one famous fellow once said, a
quality all its own. I'd suggest that in these kinds of battles, you consider
your board layout very carefully, you provide inexact detail to the two sides
about what they may face thus forcing them to consider arty and air threats,
and you consider giving the high tech
force 10-15% more forces.
Regarding the questions:
Immobilized VTOL - I agree with Brian - Low
mode or Hovering - hard landing. High mode,
crash, though why particularly off-board I can't
see. What I did in SG2 when low mode VTOLs were shot down was roll 2d12, move
them that many inches along their line of flight, and then crash them there.
During the GZG ECC III scenario Grey Day To Die, one actually crashed on top
of some of the forces that shot it down. The DS2 equivalent might be to roll
d4 and move it that many inches and crash it. If in high mode, this might be
d8" or d12". You could also randomize direction (or just say it is off board,
but that lacks the chance for a SAR
mission....) :)
As for the ADS issue - every ADS I've seen or
heard of probably uses direct sensors in order to get fast enough feedback to
engage with guns or (in concept designs) with lasers. Larger scale ZAD or TAD
systems probably use missiles
and have ranges that make out-of-LoS sensing
a requirement. But I suspect most ADS in DS2 are laser or gun based and thus
line of sight should be required.
Alternately, if it is only light woods, you might want to let it fire with
some seriously degraded capability.
In a message dated 7/16/2001 2:01:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
> owner-gzg-digest@lists.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU writes:
<< High tech isn't quite worth what you pay for it, >>
One thing I did during my "World War- In the Balance Campaign is
slightly modify the firecons as follows.
Basic- one weapon, one target (as written)
Enhanced- All Weapons may fire at the same target.
Superior- All Weapons may engage different targets.
A high tech vehicle with multiple weapons systems and superior Firecon can
quickly chew through lots of cheap stuff.
> On Mon, 16 Jul 2001 08:08:44 EDT MEFaircloth@aol.com writes:
Have you play tested it a lot? I *like* the idea especially since it
might give "high-tech" forces a bit of a balance towards "Low Tech"
numbers.
What do most people defines as "High Tech" and "Low Tech"?
I assume wheeled/tracks might be a Low tech indicator and Grav a High
tech; That HVC (and those KE (?) WW2 systems I saw a set of rules for) would
be Low, with HEL and MDC High but unsure if DFFG is High or Mid with HKP Mid.
Slam Mid or Low? Ablative armor High? Reactive Low? GMS Mid? It's more then
'just' the components though, more the mix of
them...
Gracias,
> At 8:08 AM -0400 7/16/01, MEFaircloth@aol.com wrote:
Not very practical against vehicles with a conventional weapon system (ie one
main gun) but great when suppressing infantry with massed fire. All the APSWs
and the main gun are firing at infantry in a tree line. Ala the Cav units in
Vietnam.
> Superior- All Weapons may engage different targets.
I'm not certain how this happens when you only have one turret....
> At 10:19 AM -0400 7/16/01, Glenn M Wilson wrote:
I sometimes look at it not just as Low/High Tech indicators.
Sometimes its a logistics issue. Naturally if Grav has a high cost of
transport for components (where are the field generating coils made? Can they
be serviced in the field or do they require a clean room to work on? Are they
terribly maintenance intense during service intervals? Are they high cost for
repairs? If much of this holds true, it seems basing much of your transport
off of wheels would be a logistics issue by far.
Replacing a wheel bearing in the field on a planet 30 days high speed FTL
travel from the nearest depot level service area could be trivial to
rebuilding a field generator coil for a GRAV vehicle. I suspect that is a
driving factor in the NAC's primary use of High Mibility Wheeled vehicles in
their forces. The fact that wheeled can self deploy and aren't as service
intense as tracked also indicates their
preference. Look at South Africa's propensity for Wheeled on the G-6,
the Buffel, the Ratel and other units.
Likewise some other weapon systems could fall under this kind of constraint.
Even though the society is high tech, it may use slightly lower technology
hardware.
On Mon, 16 Jul 2001 12:03:06 -0400 Ryan M Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com>
writes:
> At 8:08 AM -0400 7/16/01, MEFaircloth@aol.com wrote:
When i first joined the list I asked some questions about some designs I had
been pencil and paper playing with (Say a double turret with a
DFFG-4
and a HEL-1 as coax (36" 2 chits versus infantry and a sniping weapon
against light recon stuff) and other mixed weapons [non-APSW] stuff.
There was some *very* unofficial, not for the Canon answers (even from Jon)
that should or should not a second target be allowed in fixed
and/or
turreted mixed weapons configurations.)
My original thought was because I played a lot with designing configuration
consistent armies (favors multiple "whatever" in a turret
on a large vehicle; favors the "Big Gun" approach - the largest single
weapon one can fit - i.e., a single size 5 in a turret on a size 3
frame; Favors a particular technology; Favors the mixed one relatively big gun
plus a complementary (HEL with DFFG, HKP with DFFG, DFFG with
HEL) smaller (5/1, 4/1, 4/2, 3/2) coax weapon for back up and anti
infantry role instead of a coax APSW); Favors multiple 180 degree turrets;
favors fixed main gun plus secondary turreted direct fire
weapons (a la' the Early WW2 desert war GRANTs/LEEs); etc., etc., etc.)
then fit my campaign races/nations into those systems.
I had considered that the multiple weapons systems would fire at least at
the same azimuth, if not the same unit/target (Use the DFFG3/HEL2 combo
at the max range of the DFFG and there are two chances of damage/kill
OR use the HEL On the IFV's in a supported advance of dismounted infantry
while using the DFFG (3 chits) on the infantry. Made more sense then you could
use the main gun *or* the coax APSW but not both during fire at a supported
Infantry attack on a position...especially in light of historical facts
(Zumbro's book about armor in Vietnam) and DS2 Turn lengths.) There was some
surprise that someone would use mixed weaponry in the same turret but it makes
sense in my mind (and fit the campaign
setting) to allow that for certain nations/races.)
An example, my Pre-GW Space Marines (1970's rules) Klackon "Crustacean"
races loves dual weaponry in space and AFV's (There is a limit to infantry
weaponry even for horse sized 'crabs') so their AFV's sport dual mounts. The
Amphibian Nektons like lots of weapons but rely predominately on the Biggest
Main weapon that they can fit on an AFV. The Native People's Circle humans
like GMS's including multiple mounts despite the fact there is leftover
capacity at large sizes (and that is seldom why you see a 'pure Canon' NPC
vehicle running at size 5 with 5
GMS/H's but it is likely you would see single size 1 GMS/H Scouts, Size
2
LBT's with 2 GMS/H, and Size 3 MBT's with 3 GMS/H - supported by Size 3
APC's carrying two fire teams and a GMS/H (plus something in a turret to
make up the capacity and occasionally Size 4 IFV's with two Fire Teams, a
GMS/H and "a turreted weapon plus" [ (size 2) and a Basic PDS] or [Size
1
and a LAD/Enhanced PDS] .) The last two design are anomalies (and not
particularly popular design with the foot sloggers) based on the NPC
design being 'filled in' to see what would happen when I min-Max'ed
their love of GMS technology.
Yes, the conventional "one main gun in a turret setting doesn't take such
configurations into mind but I was looking at all the possibilities for a
campaign setting. The Aliens especially shouldn't just be 'actors in a
rubber mask' but have their own quirks/personalities. And there is
plenty of room in a sector of space for unconventional military designs to
take root and an army be built on such designs.
And the idea that military lessons learned are not lost has of course
proven to be false - let an army go a generation with out a major war to
participate or at least observe and the corporate knowledge base is
diluted/corrupted significantly. Further what is impractical now might
be practical if an army has been tested against a particular foe with
unconventional practices (non-human or cultural biased human based) but
prove less then ideal when a 'standard' army shows up to confront it. YMMV.
FWIW, those are my dos centavos.
Gracias,
> At 11:06 AM -0400 7/17/01, Glenn M Wilson wrote:
Some of it bears on the principle of the firecon and how the vehicle is
fought. A Bradly is a primary example of this. There is one gunner and one
sight mechanism. The Commander can share what the gunner see's but his job is
not to fire the gun, his job is to look for targets and direct the gunner and
driver as to what to do. The Bradly has a 25mm gun, a 7.62mm MG and a 2 round
TOW launcher as well as a
set of smoke dischargers. Certainly 3 weapons. But one firecon/gunner.
How does a vehicle with one firecon and one turret engage two separate
targets?
I'm asking real mechanics here as that is the basis for the game mechanics. Or
are we implying that both weapons are able to fire over the abstracted turn.
"Gunner, BRDM, 2 o'clock, AP!" "Target Acquired!" "Fire" "On the WAY!" "TANK,
3 o'clock, TOW!" "Target Acquired, Elevating!....READY!" "FIRE" "Missile
AWAY!"
If both weapons can fire, why can not the same weapon fire twice?
Such an issue in some cases doesn't involve changing settings. Turning the
turret to fire the 25mm at another BRDM would take less
time than elevating the Launch container to fire the TOW at that T-72
would it?
> My original thought was because I played a lot with designing
But an M3 has two fire cons doesn't it? Two gunners, two loaders. One
Commander right? Thats not an advanced fire con firing at different targets,
its a different crewman operating a different weapon.
There's two things here. Design doctrine _and_ firecon/multiple
weapon use over a single activation.
> I had considered that the multiple weapons systems would fire at least
Well in some cases it does make sense as one weapon has one function vs the
other weapon's function. At the design stage for the M3 Grant tank, the 75mm
was meant to fire HE shot for supporting infantry. The
37mm was for anti-tank use. Both could do the other job, but each was
better than the other until 75mm AP shot came in to use. Naturally the 75mm
Howitzer was more effective as an infantry support weapon due to the higher HE
content, but still you get the idea.
The question lies in how we move to change the game turn for an individual
group of vehicles.
4 tanks with single turreted weapons targeting a group of opposing tanks would
fire once each.
your proposed 4 IFVs would be able to fire twice each based on having an added
weapon but no additional firecon. How does that work in a balanced game
concept? At least fitting and mounting an added firecon system would redress
the issue slightly. It'd make the space issue more correct too.
[snip]
> And the idea that military lessons learned are not lost has of course
Or in some cases they fixate on what worked 30 years ago and don't pay
attention to the new lessons and technological changes.
> At 10:48 AM -0400 7/19/01, Glenn M Wilson wrote:
though.)
The grant had a smaller commanders MG cupola above the 37mm mounted turret. In
that situation for anything larger than a MG, you should be paying for an
additional turret.
> Maybe. The turn in DS2 is 'variable' from a few seconds to (for
on
> page 20 - those AI's *never* lose track of a unit once it is revealed!
Though again. 4 shots vs 8. Thats a serious balance issue.
> No reason. But the issue of different guns targeting different targets
Probably due to the fact that a combined mount would have to lay the gun at
one angle for one variety of weapon and in a different manner
for the other weapon. An MDC/5 will have to account for correolliss
effect, crosswind, target/firer movement, barometric pressure, etc. A
HEL/2 would not, an RFAC/2 would have different parameters for the
compensation against he above factors.
> Not to mention more and more dice rolls. Not necessarily something I
Full Metal Anorak. Its the D4/D6/D8/D10/D12 system concept in
general. Both DS and SG are FMA systems, FT is not.
> I prefer one target, all weapons in the turret in range; roll for the
The die rolls aren't the hard part. Its pull a chit, put it back.
Pull a chit, put it back, etc, etc, etc. I've build one with HEL/2's
but it's not so effective against the bigger stuff. I'd rather be
guaranteed a hit with an MDC/5 most of the time than hope for that
odd Boom chit.
> But an M3 has two fire cons doesn't it? Two gunners, two loaders.
7.
Commander Gunner 37mm Loader 37mm Driver Radio Operator Gunner 75mm Loader
75mm
> And would be forbidden in DS2. Even using the Hull 75mm and the Coax
That is one thing that is slightly different. If the Commander orders the crew
to engage infantry targets in a Treeline, Its not a big jump for them to halt
behind a berm and the gunner starts engaging with HE rounds while the
Commander cranks off rounds with the Cupola MG. Against dispersed targets like
that, you aren't going for point targets. You're engaging an area and trying
to create a beaten zone. 4 tanks doing this (especially when using Beehive
rounds) are going to create a nasty place for infantry to be.
> >>
Different bearing leads too, if the target is moving while you do as well. One
weapon will have a different time of flight compared to another which changes
the lead angle.
> Yes, and it's a possible route for munchkinism to start in DS2. But
But the Single weapon vehicles shouldn't have 1/2 the number of shots
as the doubly fitted units.
On Sun, 15 Jul 2001 03:32:01 -0400, "Thomas Barclay"
<kaladorn@fox.nstn.ca> wrote:
> During the GZG ECC III
I'm just going through some e-mail that I didn't get a chance to read
while on vacation...
What is it with this? I had this happen in one of my scenarios, too. A VTOL
gunship crashed into the GEV AA missile launcher vehicle that took it out. It
was quite hilarious...