Greetings,
Some time ago the list came to a pseudo-consensus that each inch (or cm
for those with 12 km long ship) was about 1000km. And at 1g it took about 15
minutes to travel that distance so the turn length was about 15 minutes. If I
have the distance figures wrong, please forgive me.
It has also been noted that weapons in FT are abstracted. That is a Class 3
beam may be one huge coherent energy weapon or a number of smaller weapons.
Also, that damage may be from one or numerous volleys over the length of a
turn.
Now, it would seem silly that a huge ship could perform an end for end
cart-wheel, but only fire its weapons once during a 15 minute period.
Which would lead me to believe that damage comes from multiple volleys during
that turn.
That having been said, how do we still justify sequential rather than
simultaneous firing and damage to ships? If damage is done over the 15 minute
period, then each ship would have a chance to damage and, possibly, take out
weapons of the other ship.
Now don't take me wrong, sequential firing and damage is one of the charms of
Full Thrust. I just need some reasonable PSB to justify it.
---
There are several possible PSB explanations you could try. 1. The ship firing
first manages to bracket the target faster & starts inflicting hits earlier.
(ie. the first volley hits, whereas the target misses it's first volley.) If
just a single hit can cause the target to vibrate or momentarily lose power
(all those movie combats where the lights flicker or a rotation starts from
damage). This would have a sequential effect, with more guns refining their
targetting as the target struggles to bring it's guns back to it's firing
vector. With the light ships, they simply go pop anyway & larger ships usually
still get to fire back. 2. Ship X's crew have tweaked the weapons so they have
a slightly better range or rate of fire than Ship Y, which gives them a small
advantage. You could possibly explain this as the optimum power being
allocated or available at the moment of firing (engines momentarily shut down,
computer has a perfect deflection shot for 3 seconds, etc) 3. The gunnery
officer on the target is a fraction slow in ordering available weapons to
fire, or allocates a target out of range & needs to recompute, which proves
fatal. (How many times in various games have you done this sort of thing
yourself?)
I'm sure there'll be a few more PSB ideas floating around out there.
'Neath Southern Skies - http://users.mcmedia.com.au/~denian/
> -----Original Message-----
> Now don't take me wrong, sequential firing and damage is one of the
I'm curious: is my group the only one that uses simultaneous fire? We used
sequential early on, but everyone prefered the alternative.
I find sequential fire adds an extra level of tactics in face-to-face
games.
I generally use simultaneous fire in PBeM games. It adds the element of
uncertainty when allocating weapons. On several occasions, entire fleets have
targetted a cruiser or destroyer only to ignore the dreadnought firing
back. Usually that ship has been massively overkilled (+22 hits to -22
hits in one turn!)
'Neath Southern Skies - http://users.mcmedia.com.au/~denian/
> -----Original Message-----
> Greetings,
You do, we will, try 7.5 minutes and 1000km.
> That having been said, how do we still justify sequential
We don't, we just do simultaneous shooting. But you could define it as
"EFFECTIVE" shots (everything else is spoofed or hits armor or just misses) in
which case the timing would be important. If your 100 shots and his 100 shots
both occupy the same time, but you start getting hits on the 20th iteration
and he doesn't start till the 75th, then you're in better shape than he is.
> That having been said, how do we still justify sequential rather than
Regardless of how you look at it, single shots or volleys, one side is always
going to have the "telling blow" or otherwise get the advantage before the
other.
I see no reason to even PSB it. It makes sense to me.
> Now don't take me wrong, sequential firing and damage is one of the
I use both sequential fire and simultaneous fire, depending on whom I'm
playing with, the scenario constraints (if any), how I'm feeling that day, and
the phase of the Moon.:)
Though lately I have been, like Brendan, using simultaneous fire for PBeM
games, sequential for live games.
Mk
> Regardless of how you look at it, single shots or volleys, one side is
See Bismark and the Hood, the germans better gunnery took out the Hood before
it had got the range, same at Jutland the germans used ladder ranging shots
and so got the range quicker.
> I'm curious: is my group the only one that uses simultaneous
simultaneous for me too. I'm just a FT1 retro gamer though.
> John Crimmins wrote:
Nope.
The gaming group I landed in had always used simultaneous fire. Sometimes
with large battles, pre-allocating fire can take a little while, but it
isn't too bad.
Everyone seems to like it and no one ever protested in favor of the
alternative.
> John Crimmins wrote:
> I'm curious: is my group the only one that uses simultaneous fire? We
You are not alone!
We use a modified format where the low thrust move first and high
thrust move last. The high thrust fire first (7/8) and low thrust
(1/2) fire last. All damage is resolved at each thrust level.
This allows for faster play, larger fleets, and the little ships last long
enough to get in a shot of two before 'departing'.
Bye for now,
> I'm curious: is my group the only one that uses simultaneous fire?
We used
> You are not alone!
Urrrr.....[raises hand]...question: why the 'low thrust move first, high
thrust move last'? Or do you guys not do preplotted movement?
And if so, how do you handle all the 5/6 and 3/4 ships with respect
to each other?
Mk
> Hmmm. Single syllables. A formidable opponent. (The Tick) wrote:
> Urrrr.....[raises hand]...question: why the 'low thrust move first,
You are correct, we do not pre-plot moves. This is also a
way to save time. Yes, the MT missiles move first, and no real
difference has been noted in the 'accuracy' of the MT missiles.
Sequence: 1) MT missiles.
2) Thrust 1/2 ships.
3) Thrust 3/4 ships.
4) Thrust 5/6 ships.
5) Thrust 7/8 ships.
6) Fighters 7) Firing occures in reverse order.
Note that the fighters have no ranged fire and move into 'base to base'
contact to have combat (with both ships and enemy fighters).
Bye for now,