From: djwj <djwj@e...>
Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 16:15:41 -0700
Subject: Re: DS2 FMA Enhancement Invulnerability and Auto kills
> Andrew wrote: > When rolling a number of dice equal to the weapon class and of type to > 50% (D12) chance of kill, no matter what the defender rolls. Similarly This is one reason why I am advocating the added dice vs. static armor number method as the standard. The big problem I see here is not one of automatic kill or automatic defence, but a class 5 laser failing to do any damage to an abalative class 1 armor. The chit draw system was additive, so that the larger the weapon the more raw damage it did in an attack. It is true that this will generate automatic kills where the chit draw system didn't (a class 5 weapon minimum is a 5, class 1 armor can only take a three, while in chit draw it was concieveable to draw five zeros) but these should only be at the natural extremes of the scale (auto kill for a large weapon attacking a small vehicle, auto defend for a small weapon attacking a large vehicle), but if you use my proposed critical hit and the roll of the die is equal to the vehicle's armor level, you could end up with five mobility hits and no other damage, rare but possible. This will still leave some tanks invulnerable to critical hits from certain kinds of weapon fire: class 5 and up abalative armors vs. HEL and RFAC/HVC at long range, class 7 armors against HEL and MDC at long range, ect. but this is only against that individual type of weapon or in most cases a specific range on a single weapon. Remember that only tanks invulnerable to critical hits are invulnerable, 1/4th of all crits on the table are "BOOM". So even if a class 1 laser fires at a fully armored class 4 tank with abalative, there is a 1 in 5 chance of hurting the tank and a 1 in 16 chance that the tank will go up with a spectacular fireworks display, not bad for a class 1 peashooter. As far as losing time to the adding of dice I'm really not that concerned. I haven't proposed any really massive changes to the fire and damage procedures, which is very fast relative to every other game on the market, and it works extremely well. I am not really concerned with the timing of the procedure as much as the hassle of drawing chits over rolling dice, not to mention that chits get lost (I have a homemade "M" to replace one I couldn't retrieve after my chits got spilled near a ventilation duct. I could see it, I could see the little blue "M" on it but I couldn't reach it.) and this changes the effects of the damage resolution (and/or creates accusations of cheating with "Marked Chits" because the replacement dosen't feel the same as the rest.) Anyways I'm not trying to make this enhancement an accellerator, but a FMA dice damage resolution for Dirtside II By the way: What does FMA stand for? I know I've seen it, or heard it somewhere but I can't rember where so I can go back and look. With my luck I will read it five seconds after I post this message.