The following are the rules we have been using since I got my hands on FB.
They seem to be working out pretty well. Mostly, these are just a remake of a
set of rules I posted some time ago (before I was forced to 'crash'
move  a military thing). I'll post a set of ships as soon as I get
the chance (as soon as I can make up some 'Kra'Vak' sounding names).
#####################################################################
Armoured hulls We dropped the concept of Kra'Vak Armoured hulls and instead
limit the Kra'Vak to armor only.
Railgun
Class Mass Cost Damage
1 1 3 1
2 2 6 2
3 3 9 3
All Railguns follow the following table for range and chance to hit
Range: 0-6 6-12 12-18 18-24 24-30
Hit: 2+ 3+ 4+ 5+ 6+
Railguns ignore shields when doing damage. All Railguns may only be mounted
through one arc. When attacking ships with armor damage is marked against
armor first before moving to internals. The Double damage concept was also
dropped.
'Charge' Weapons.
Scattergun Charge
Mass: 1 Cost: 10
The Scattergun charge is a one shot type weapon that fires a large number
of solid shot projectiles. It is designed to intercept and destroy
fighters and missiles that are attacking the Kra'Vak fleet. The Scattergun
round can engage any target within 360 of the ship and has a range out to 6".
The Scattergun may only engage one target (missile or fighter) and is expanded
and marked off the sheet after it is fired. The Scattergun may not damage
ships. Against a missile the Shotgun charge has the effect of destroying the
missile on a roll of 4,5, or 6. Against Salvo Missiles a d6 is rolled and that
number of missiles are destroyed. The Scattergun chooses its targets during
its fire turn and is not limited to those missiles targeting the ship itself.
Cannon Charge
Mass: 1 Cost: 10
The Cannon round is a one shot type weapon that fires a single (or fewer and
bigger projectile than the Shotgun) larger caliber projectile designed to
damage ships. Any ship within 6" may be targeted, but only one ship per Cannon
Charge. Roll a d6 and the result is the amount of damage inflicted on the
target. Shields have no effect, but the Mass Caster below has the result of
subtracting one point of damage from the dice roll. Damage is sustained with
half going to armor (if any) and half to internals. The Cannon Charge has no
effect on missiles and fighters.
Mass Caster Charge
Mass: 1 Cost: 10
The Mass Caster Charge is designed to give a ship suffering heavy fire a short
term means of defense. When used it blows a large quantity of
small/fine mass (sand, ice crystals, etc) into one arc. For the
remainder of the turn (until the ship moves) the discharged mass will have the
effect of reducing the chance of a weapon targeting the ship by one through
one arc. Against Battery weapon fire it has the effect of granting one level
of screen. Casters discharged from one ship cannot be used to protect another
ship and only one caster will have an effect through any one arc. This system
is 'fired' during the ships normal firing opportunity (and so some enemy ships
may have the chance to fire before the charge is discharged) and the choice of
what arc is to be defended is chosen then.
Class 10 Weapons. These two weapons are an attempt to give the Kra'Vak some
weapon systems that are the equivalent of the spinal mount weapons (Nova
Cannon, etc.).
If your group doesn't use such weapons then I would suggest ignoring the
following two systems. In addition we usually restrict these kind of
weapons to 200+ mass ships (since FB) and further restrict them to no
more than one such weapon per ship, but that again is a group specific thing.
Both of these weapons use the concept of limited ammo. For each weapon you
must buy a number of 'rounds'. These should be displayed on the ship diagram
and can be destroyed by threshold checks. When the weapon is fired one round
is marked off the ship display. When there are no further rounds to mark off
the weapon may not fire as it is out of ammo.
Class 10 Railgun Mass: 10 Cost: 30
The Class 10 Rail Gun is 'spinal mount' version of the normal Rail Gun. It
fires a single large projectile that can cause critical shock damage to a
target it hits. The game mechanics are much like the normal rail gun. The
Class 10 will deliver 10 points of damage to its target with damage being
marked off of armor first and the chance of hit being as per the normal rail
gun.
It is a spinal mount weapon, but may fire into the forward arc (rather than
directly ahead).
The Class 10 Rail Gun has the same chance of hitting as a normal Rail Gun and
may target only one ship at a time (it is not an area affect weapon).
The Class 10 Rail Gun will cause 10 points of damage if it hits.
In addition to the damage normally caused the Rail Gun will also cause the
ship struck to suffer an additional threshold check from the shock of such a
single large projectile hitting it. This additional threshold check is made on
the current (after all damage this volley) level. The Class 10 may only be
mounted through the forward arc. Any ship that takes internal damage from a
volley that includes the Class 10 will sustain a special
6+
threshold check. All systems are checked as per a normal threshold check
and this check has no effect on any other/further checks the target ship
may suffer.
Class 10 Rail Gun Charge Mass: 1 Cost: 3
Class 10 shotgun Mass: 10 Cost: 30
The Class 10 Scattergun is a 'spinal mount' version of the normal Scattergun.
It fires a large number of solid shot projectiles that spread out over the
course of their trajectory, the game mechanics are much like the Wave Gun. The
Class 10 has a range of 30 inches. Over the first 10 inches move a 2 inch
template, all ships hit take 3d6 damage. Over the
second 10-20 inches move a 3 inch template, all ships hit take 2d6
damage.
Over the last 20-30 inches move a 4 inch template and all ships struck
suffer 1d6 damage. All damage ignores shields.
The Class 10 may fire every turn. It may fire only directly forward of the
ship.
Class 10 Shotgun Charge Mass: 1 Cost: 10
High Maneuverability
Cost is 5% of ship's MASS. An alternate method would be to cost it as an
additional cost to thrust, making each point of thrust cost 6% or 7% of MASS
instead of 5%.
All other costs are as per normal FB rules (thrust, FTL, etc.)
#####################################################################
Armoured Hulls We had actually dropped this and gone to an armor concept prior
to seeing the Fleet Book. We were using 1 mass gives 6 points of protection to
balance it against the mass 3 ft/mt shields. I was kind of disappointed
that FB gave armor rules. The idea that the Kra'Vak were the only ones that
used this form of protection helped give them a different feel and reinforced
their 'we got to do it now' feel that other fleets didn't have.
.
Rail Guns The Rail Gun is slightly more effective than the similar pulse torp.
However, this is balanced by having all of the damage from the Rail Gun effect
against armor first and then internals and limiting the RG to one arc. For my
money the Rail Gun still has concept problems. The Class 1 is no different
from the Class 3. This problem was well handled with Beams by
giving the class 1 the pd ability and restricting/costing arcs of fire
for all batteries. Something along these lines needs to be added to the
Kra'Vak Rail Guns so there is a reason, beyond limited mass, to take a class 1
over a class 3.
We dropped the double damage for balance reasons and discovered it also
speeded up play (large fleets and all that).
Charge Weapons The Changes to the Scattergun were at first to bring the weapon
into balance. That d6 damage range 12" made even us die hard Kra'Vak fans
blush (mass 1 cost 5 also). However, after playing with the 'split' system I
have found that it is actually a lot more fun to design Kra'Vak ships ('now,
what do I want this one to do) and to use them in play. The addition of the
Mass Caster Charge just improved the above by giving more
choices and allowing further development of class/mission specific
ships. Note that the Scattergun Charge now is able to target missiles (mt and
salvo). Even the Kra'Vak deserve some kind of missile defense and if it is
going to be a one shot it needed to be good. They are still very vulnerable to
heavy fighter and follow on missile attacks just the same.
The Mass Caster should probably have an effect on missiles/fighters, but
doing so would rob the scattergun of some of its specific function. I wanted
well defined systems with a specific function to force players to balance the
needs of a ship, not choose a system that did a little bit of everything.
Class 10 weapons The Class 10 weapons were added to balance all the other
centerline type weapons races can choose from. It seemed to me that the
Kra'Vak might design something like these weapons and the addition of limited
ammo also fit the concept I had floating around in my mind.
High maneuver An alternate method would be to cost it as an additional cost to
thrust, making each point of thrust cost 6% or 7% of MASS instead of 5%. This
would probably be best, but just prefer working with multiples of '5', call me
a math wimp.
Concept
The changes above seemed to work well for us. The Kra'Vak became a
race/fleet that works against time. Many of its systems are one shots
and the capital weapons are limited on ammo. This fact meant that Kra'Vak
fleets had to be designed with a specific tactic in mind and ships needed to
be designed to perform in their roles. At least IMHO it became more fun to
design Kra'Vak ships. J
Hope this helps Chad
> chadtaylor wrote:
> The following are the rules we have been using since I got my hands on
Thanks for the rules Chad. We'll be testingthes eout in about two weeks. They
look good.
> Chad wrote:
[Note: I've snipped most of the actual rules, since the concept
discussion at the end is more interesting and include most of the points
anyway. Also note that, due to my Starfire background, I'm a bit allergic to
weapons which seem to work in the same way physically but have
different characteristics in the rules - in Starfire, they all too often
lead to serious balance problems :-( In FT, where the weapon
descriptions
are a lot hazier anyway, it usually doesn't - but the Kra'Vak weapons
aren't nearly as hazy as the standard beam weapons.]
> 'Charge' Weapons.
Hm - you seem to have left out how the scattergun works against
fighters. Same as in MT (ie, same as against salvo missiles above), or as MT
missiles?
> Cannon Charge
> the Mass Caster below has the result of subtracting one point of
> from the dice roll. Damage is sustained with half going to armor (if
If the Cannon Charge (which is described pretty much as one-shot railgun
round) penetrates armour, why doesn't the other railgun rounds (esp. the
Class 10) do this? (I see why game-balance-wise, but not in-game-wise -
this is an allergic reaction as per my note at the top of this post).
> Mass Caster Charge
[snip]
Given how vulnerable a ship which doesn't maneuver - ie, uses its
thrusters or main engines to change its course and/or heading - is to
missiles, salvo missiles and fighters, I don't mind letting the ship keep its
mass cloud for as long as it doesn't spend any thrust. The cloud has the same
velocity as the ship when it is launched; if the ship doesn't change its
velocity, it'll stay close to the ship.
However, the cloud would seem to affect the ship's own fire as well as
incoming, no?
> High Maneuverability
Ouch. This means that it doesn't cost any more to give a Thrust 8 ship High
Maneuverability than to give it to a Thrust 2 ship, no?
> ##################################################################
*6* points? Ouch... The most I've gone was 2 armour points per Mass, and that
proved quite a lot better than the screens except for very large vessels.
Replacing one Mass 3 screen generator with your armour would give a ship *18*
extra damage boxes, and only large capitals commonly get that much use out of
their screen generators. This has become even more
true with the re-rolls introduced in FB, since the re-roll damage can
inflict treshold checks surprisingly early.
> I was kind of disappointed
My thoughts are more along the Theban vs Federation lines from Weber's Crusade
- ie, the humans use armour, but the Kra'Vak have had far longer to
develop efficient armour materials than we. OTOH, the Kra'Vak/Theban
armour is more expensive - a *lot* more expensive - than the human
version. I've experimented with 2 armour boxes per Mass at a cost of 6 per
Mass (ie, 3 per damage box), but this points cost may well be a bit too low.
> Rail Guns
There are two differences:
First, if you have 3 Class 1 instead of 1 Class 3, the risk of losing *some*
of your armament to treshold checks go up but the risk of losing *all* your
firepower in a single go goes down dramatically. You're also a lot less
vulnerable to needle beam fire (...though I've only seen one successful use of
needle beams against Kra'Vak so far <g>).
Second, 3 Class 1 inflict the same *average* damage per Mass as 1 Class 3
Railgun, but the Class 3 is more "all or nothing". Eg, at range 30 the
*average* total damage per turn for both weapon configurations is 0.5, but the
Class 3 has only a 16.7% chance to inflict *any* damage (in which case it'll
be 3 pts) while 3 Class 1 have a 42% chance to inflict *at least* 1 point
(including the chance to infict 2 or 3 points), but only a 0.5% chance to
actually inflict the maximum 3 points possible. (Unless it's Indy who rolls
the dice, of course, in which case none of the
railguns hit ;-)
> This problem was well handled with Beams by
I'd rather think it is the other way around - right now 3 Class 1 cost
as much and inflict (on average) just as much damage as 1 Class 3 railgun,
but they're less vulnerable to damage themselves - and inflict a
constant
dribble of damage rather than the all-or-nothing hits of the Class 3
(not very important against capital ships or at ranges of 12 or less, but it
is important against cruisers and escorts and at longer ranges IME).
For me, that's a strong reason not to use the bigger weapons - and so I
think the bigger railguns need a boost compared to the smaller ones, rather
than the other way around.
What I've done so far is to give the Railguns a Mass of (Class + 1), but
allow them re-rolls just like the beam weapons (ie, if you roll a 6 you
get to roll again). This forces me to choose between the (significantly) lower
damage of 2 R1 and the higher damage but (significantly) higher risk of being
completely disarmed of the R3 (or bigger). I've also toyed with a restriction
on how small a ship can mount a railgun: no ship can
carry a spinal-mount (F or A arcs) railgun bigger than the ship Mass/10,
nor can it mount any railguns firing through any *other* arc bigger than
the ship Mass/20. A Mass 50 ship could therefore carry R2s firing
forward or aft, and R1s firing through the side arcs.
The problem with this Mass scheme is that it makes the R1 and R2 weaker
than the Pulse Torp, which is clearly a Bad Thing :-( (They are also
weaker than the short-ranged beams against unscreened targets, but they
beat them in range and against screened targets.)
> Charge Weapons
[snip]
> The Mass Caster should probably have an effect on missiles/fighters,
It already *has* an effect on (most) fighters. Their weapons count as beams
(except Kra'Vak fighters, but they should suffer the penalty as well since
normal railgun fire is weakened).
[snip]
> High maneuver
<g> I've used 7.5% Mass per Thrust point for Kra'Vak/Centauri drives. As
long as you only use even thrust values, you end up with multiples of
"5"
anyway (OK, multiples of 15, really). It seems to work OK, but it makes the
Kra'Vak ships feel rather undergunned.
However, I more and more lean towards using the points system instead, using
the same Mass% value for the Kra'Vak drives but costing them at 5 points or so
per Mass rather than the 2 human drives cost. I haven't had time enough to
test it thoroughly, but so far it looks as if it might
work. (And it makes the points system more useful - instead of just
being
a 3.4x multiplier of the ship Mass <g> The FB NPV/TMF varies between
3.28 and 3.5, IIRC.)
Later,
> >
yeah, the same as in MT - d6 fighters destroyed
> > Cannon Charge
the
> Class 10) do this? (I see why game-balance-wise, but not in-game-wise
First, you are correct, the cannon should hit armor first (like systems should
always behave in like ways). This is a very good example of what can happen
when you send something off without having *someone else* proof
it for you. As I said, this is basically a re-write of an original set
that was based on ft/mt - actually it is a generation after that
(started using armor instead of screens for Kra'Vak). Now, since the original
there have been changes (a couple of 'generations') and those changes didn't
always make it fully into the written rules. You see this sort of thing
all the time, the writer _knows_ what the rules are supposed to say and
because of that when he proofs it there is sort of an 'auto' edit and it is
very easy to skip over things like this. That is why I think it is so
important to have someone who _wasn't_ involved in the design and
playtest go over the rules before they are published. It takes someone from
the outside to really catch this sort of thing (the other example is the
'missed' text from the scattergun). By the way, it was this function that I
often looked to the list to provide for me back when I used to put up
alternate rules. Anybody who does programming knows what I am talking about,
better than I can explain it anyhow:) A good example of a company that doesn't
use true outside (or at least didn't in the past) play test IMHO is GW. Their
games have always be screwed with 'but we don't play that way' problems.
> > Mass Caster Charge
That was actually the original concept. It got dropped because it made the
caster too useful (one shot at long range and you had protection for several
'closing' turns) and was a bit of a pain to keep track of. I like
LARGE fleets so even minor things (re-rolls, etc) become a bit of a pain
and I try to get rid of them.
The PSB was that the cloud would be expanding as it moved and thus would only
provide protection for a limited amount of time.
> However, the cloud would seem to affect the ship's own fire as well as
If the caster is too useful then yes, if not then no. If you go with the
above - protection for several turns - I would say a good way to balance
it is to have it affect the ship's own fire. Kind of like SFB erratic
maneuvers.
> > High Maneuverability
<g> I know I know, it is a problem - I'm just not comfortable with the
solution yet. The idea was the ship was 'reinforced' to stand the extra stress
rather than the engines being better. It is all in how you look at it. I would
rather go with increased engine cost, but see below.
> > ##################################################################
remember, that number was only for the ft/mt rules. I came up with that
number by going through a set of ship/mass/screen calculations. I
believe it was mass: 20, 40, 60, 80, 100. I then figured out how much damage a
screen would absorb before the ship was destroyed at each mass/screen
level (1,2,3) and then divided the whole to get an average of how much
protection a screen mass gave. I think that was the way I did it, anyhow, the
number I got was huge. I cut that down to 6 since I hadn't allowed for screens
being taken out by threshold checks. What you got was the reverse of the
screens, small ships benefit from armor far more than large ships. I was never
comfortable with it, and since I play the Kra'Vak and I never abused
the situation....................
> > I was kind of disappointed
I think for this you will need a higher cost than 6, maybe 9.
They need, IMHO, some kind of 'different' defense system from the terrans.
Maybe ecm that adds virtual range to the kra'vak ship when it is targeted.
each level makes the range count as being 6" longer. Something. Then,
make the railgun ignore screens/armor and just do internals - thus the
reason the Kra'Vak never developed such technology and instead went with ecm.
Just a thought.
> > Rail Guns
> There are two differences:
snip
I remember this argument from before. I was never strongly swayed in either
direction and that is the problem. I want a strong reason to take one and
another strong reason to take the other. I don't want just one strong reason
for one choice, because then I just take that one system.
> For me, that's a strong reason not to use the bigger weapons - and so
You could get by with this (railgun v pulse torp) if you allowed the railgun
to ignore screens and armor both. I'm afraid that if I had to
choose between two R1 and one R3 I would take the R3 every time - unless
I ended up with two extra mass and nothing to spend it on. What is needed is a
special effect for each class that will drive you to select one class for one
'mission' and another class for a second 'mission'.
Perhaps a different approach. What if we dropped the idea of 'three versions
of the same system'? After all, the humans do this and we want these guys to
be different. Instead, lets design three different systems that perform each
of the class 1,2,3 batt functions.
First off, you want a long range ship killer - something like the class
1 human batt. I would call that the class 3 rail gun and stay with that system
as described.
Next I want something short ranged and deadly for an escort weapon, something
like the class 1 batt. Make it a 'gattling' gun. Maybe it fires more than one
time (multiple dice of damage) and it can target more than one ship (spreading
its dice). It would also need to have arcs of course.
Give it good damage and very close range and have it drop off sharply -
but never going beyond say 12". Given the high maneuver Kra'Vak ships I could
see them designing such a system with the idea being that such a ship would
drive into the heart of an enemy fleet and then stay there for several turns
dishing out damage to multiple ships. Such a system would work well with the
ecm concept from above, or it would also work well with the mass caster.
You still need something to perform the 'middle' mission of the class 2
battery of course. Maybe, instead we keep the class 2 railgun for this mission
and mess with the class 3 above changing it so that it has poor accuracy at
close range and better at long range. The two systems still don't feel
different enough though.
Kind of like the class 1 becomes a submachine gun, the class 2 an assault
rifle, and the class 3 a recoilless rifle. I don't know, just rambling off the
top of my head.
Thing is, you could still retain the over all 'same tech' feel if the above
used 'fixed' damage (doing 1, 2, 3, or whatever points of damage), used a to
hit roll and interacted with screens and armor the same way.
Just a few more thoughts.
> > Charge Weapons
> It already *has* an effect on (most) fighters. Their weapons count as
again the problem of knowing what the rules are _supposed_ to include
because you always play that way, we just resolved the fighter attacks
ignoring the flak. No, it doesn't make any sense - but it was a balance
and effect issue. I'm sure there is a good PSB reason for it someplace
:)
Really, I think it just comes down to if you think the caster doesn't give you
enough bang for your buck since you can PSB your way out of most anything.
> [snip]
This
> > would probably be best, but just prefer working with multiples of
As
> long as you only use even thrust values, you end up with multiples of
either of these would probably be better. In fact I had also considered
increasing the cost of thrust points for the high maneuver engines. To be
honest, I'm a little timid about doing that sort of thing since FB came out.
Most things, by and large, are balanced by mass and that seems to be the
preferred method. I would rather use a more expensive thrust though
-
just cleaner and easier to calculate. I had it figured at cost 3 per engine
mass (going with the concept that they are 50% more effective), but cost five
would probably be better now that I think about it. I just have balance
concerns because mass isn't part of the cost. It wouldn't be hard to get me to
change my mind though:)
> Later,
Thanks for the reply. This is the sort of thing that helps out an enormous
amount.
Chad
> Chad Taylor wrote:
> First, you are correct, the cannon should hit armor first (like
Don't I know it :-/ We have these very problems in Starfire too - there
are always some new details turning up, new interpretations of our rules that
we hadn't expected, etc. We do our best to write clearly, but,
well... <sigh>
> > > Mass Caster Charge
Counters are nice for this one. I vaguely remember seeing one player using
tufts of either (metal wool? The stuff you scrub *really* dirty
kettles etc with, anyway) or silver-sprayed cotton to mark ships
"streaming air" once. Not sure which game system, but it looked good.
As I said above, if you don't maneuver you'll get *badly* hit by
missiles, provided the enemy have any - the higher maneuverability is
the
#1 Kra'Vak anti-missile defence IMO!. Getting the equivalent of level-1
screens isn't that powerful in comparision to losing that protection :-/
> I like LARGE fleets so even minor things (re-rolls, etc) become a bit
How large is LARGE?
To me, large fleets are 40+ ships. 20 or so are standard. (Fielding
*all*
my ships... not that's a HUGE fleet, but unfortunately I don't have any
table big enough to even deploy them on, much less maneuver :-( )
> > > Armoured Hulls
> remember, that number was only for the ft/mt rules.
Doesn't help much, see below...
> I came up with that
Uh-oh - you woke the number-cruncher within me again...
If you take the treshold checks into account but ignore damage control crews
(since their impact depends on how long they are allowed to work and how many
of *them* survive the treshold checks, etc), you get the following numbers of
damage points saved by the screens in the FT2 rules:
Mass: lvl-1: lvl-2: lvl-3:
12 1.8 5.4 17.3 (Note: Escort hull, only 1 treshold) 20 2.6 7.3 19.5 (Note:
Cruiser hull, only 2 tresholds) 40 4.4 12.4 32.6 60 6.5 18.0 47.0 80 8.9 24.7
65.2
100 10.9 30.3 79.5
There may be some errors here - the figures are old, and I haven't
re-checked them, but they shouldn't be off more than .2 or so at most..
As you see, the really horrendous value is for level-3 screens and for
large ships. (This is, of course, the reason why level-3 screens were
disallowed in the FB and why large ships pay more Mass for their screen
generators!)
Taking the averages of the (extra damage points/screen Mass) for the
Mass
20-100 ships in the table above, I get a value of 3.6 rather than 6.
Even adjusted for damage control parties (the MT variant), I don't think you
could get higher than 4. If you ignore the treshold rolls, you get the
value 6.2 damage saved/mass of screens instead - quite a difference. I
strongly suspect that you seriously underestimated the impact of the treshold
checks on the screen efficiency; I know I did initially.
Because of this miscalculation, your value of 6 extra armour boxes per
Mass beats all values in the above table except those for lvl-3 screens
on Mass 80 and 100 ships - the "break-even point" where armour and
screens give equivalent protection is somewhere around Mass 70 for
lvl-3,
Mass 120 for lvl-2 and a whooping Mass 165 for lvl-1 screens. Below
these
Mass values, the 6-box/Mass armour is flat out better than using screens
- so unless your opponents regularly use either *very* large or
massively screened, relatively large ships your Kra'Vak have just gotten a
very powerful boost.
Under the FB design and combat rules where everyone takes 3 treshold
checks, screen masses depend on the ship mass, lvl-3 screens are
disallowed, and provided you use the re-rolls, the corresponding numbers
are:
DP: lvl-1: lvl-2:
6 1.2 (3) 3.1 (6)
10 1.8 (3) 4.9 (6)
20 3.5 (3) 9.0 (6)
30 5.4 (3) 13.8 (6) 40 7.0 (4) 17.9 (8) 50 8.9 (5) 22.8 (10)
The figure in brackets are the minimum Mass needed for the screen generators
assuming the smallest hull (ie, the highest hull integrity)
which can cram them in together with an FTL drive and a Thrust-2 engine.
(The only case in the table above where you *can't* use a Super hull
under these restrictions is the 6 DP/lvl-2 screen one, but in that
particular case it doesn't matter for the screen size anyway.)
The average damage saved/Screen Mass value for the DP 10-50 ships in the
table above is 1.44. If you assume Average hulls instead of Super, you get a
measly 1.06; Weak and Fragile hulls give even lower values.
In both these cases, the damage control parties should increase the
figure somewhat - but then again there are several weapons which ignore
the screens completely while being at least partially absorbed by the armour.
To paraphrase Monte Python: "6 is right out..." <g>
Small ships (or ships with fragile hulls) benefit more from armour than from
screens as well, which would make the NSL designs with strong hulls
*and* armour seem a bit strange had their arch-enemies the FSE not
relied
so heavily on (screen-ignoring) salvo missiles. On average, I think
armour is a little worse than screens on a per-Mass count, but it is
also somewhat cheaper. The two balance reasonably well IMO.
> > My thoughts are more along the Theban vs Federation lines from
Hm... maybe. Let's see - each Mass of armour is supported by some 0.5-1
Mass of hull, engines and FTL drive, so in effect human armour "costs"
about 4-5 points per armour box (with a slight discount for the fraction
of a hull box included in that supporting Mass). 1 Mass of Kra'Vak
armour, with 2 boxes for the Mass of 1, "costs" 8-9 points using my
value
and 11-12 points using your, ie, 4-4.5 and 5.5-6 pts per armour box
respectively. You're right - 6 is too little (makes it slightly cheaper
than human armour); 9 is better. I don't want to make it too expensive
either, though - if it is cheaper to simply get another ship, people
won't use it. Screens, using the same vague way of counting, cost 5-6
points per Mass (which, as we saw above, is roughly the same as the amount of
damage they stopped) as well.
[Railgun discussion snipped for now - I'll take that in another post]
> > > High maneuver
This
> > > would probably be best, but just prefer working with multiples of
As
> > long as you only use even thrust values, you end up with multiples
To be
> honest, I'm a little timid about doing that sort of thing since FB
Don't be timid. The entire point with the FB points system is that it
doesn't really tell you anything - FB balances most things by Mass
rather than by points. The big exceptions are the Nova Cannon and Wavegun, the
Reflex field and the Cloaking field, none of which have been extensively
playtested AFAIK (since they aren't included in the GZG human universe). This
is all because it is so much easier to figure out game balance if you only
have one balancing factor... but it also means that you can't
have any small, super-lethal ships (such as the Kra'Vak tended to be
under the MT rules). Having small, lethal (but correspondingly expensive)
ships would be markedly different from the human tubs.
> I would rather use a more expensive thrust though -
The entire engine cost issue is a bit vague. IMO the FB *mass* balance between
engines, weapons and hull works pretty OK, but I don't entirely agree that
more engines (at the expense of weaons) should *lower* the
cost of the ship - which is the case now.
Also, even if you increase the cost of the engines by 50%, it only
increases the cost of your *ship* by 10-15% - and that is if the ship
has
Thrust-8 engines (which don't gain as much efficiency from the High
Maneuverability as, say, a Thrust-2 ship). Similarly, increasing the
*mass* of the engines by 50% makes the ship *cheaper* (though in this
case the weapon payload is *seriously* reduced for high-thrust ships,
which is why I'm leaning towards small but expensive engines instead).
> It wouldn't be hard
> Thanks for the reply. This is the sort of thing that helps out an
<g> That's what playtesters are for, isn't it?
Later,