Missiles and Submunitions are fun weapons, the problem many people have with
them is that they are basically all or nothing weapons. Well, here are a few
ideas for fixing them.
As I understand the cargo rules, a merchant ship can carry 1 missile per Mass
unit of cargo space. Actually, the cargo rules aren't worked out anywhere that
I could find, but that seemed about right.
So why not develop some rules for ships which can transfer missiles or
submunitions from cargo to launcher?
So for 4 Mass a ship could have 1 missile launcher and a total of three
missiles for 18 points. One provision I'd make is that it takes a full turn to
reload a missile. Missile Phase 1) Fire loaded missile 2) Load missile from
cargo 3) Fire 2nd missile.
For 6 Mass and 6 cost a ship could have an automated rearming bay that quickly
shifts missiles and submunitions from a central bay. This bay can handle 12
Mass of submunitions and missiles, or 6 missiles or 12 submunitions or any
combination. The bay can be larger than 6 Mass, but each bay is treated as a
system for purposes of threshold checks. Instead of having to figure out how
much cargo is lost due to damage treat this special cargo bay as a system.
Another modification: Instead of limiting all missile launchers to firing
through the 12-arc, when the missile launcher is
built define its launch arc. A ship with two launchers
might have a 10-arc and a 2-arc launch.
The advantage of having an automated reload bay is that you load new armaments
during the Write Orders phase. This enables the Captain to select what kind of
missile he wants to fire.
Or he can swap the current missiles with missiles in the reload bay instead of
firing them.
With a 6 Mass requirement this system is probably only going to be used by
large Cruisers and Capital ships. It gives a middle ground between the
endlessly reusable but not too effective Pulse Torpedo
and the cheap one-shot submunition volley.
Heavy missile Cruiser: 36 Mass Thrust 4
3 Missile Launchers, courses 10, 12, 2 Initial loads, 2 standard, one needle
missile
Level-2 Shields
6 Mass automated reload bay with 3 standard missiles 2 needle missiles 1 EMP
missile
total cost:
72 + 36 + 72 + 50 + 18 + 6 + 36 = 290
> On Mon, 8 Dec 1997, Michael Sandy wrote:
> Missiles and Submunitions are fun weapons, the problem
<snip>
Our group is considering missile reloads from the "cargo bay" of our warships.
Players mark the damage track with small dots, denoting where the missiles
are. We are developing rules for uniform missile placement on the damage
track.
Here's the catch... if you take damage and a missile bay was hit (ie. one of
the marked damage boxes), the missile has a 50% chance of exploding. If it
does, roll for damage normally. If more missiles are hit by this damage, roll
to see if they blow up, etc... Could lead to a spectacular chain reaction;)
Pete
> Missiles and Submunitions are fun weapons, the problem
The weapons were designed to be 1 shot weapons. They do, after all, deliver
awsome firepower. I think that it might be better to introduce new weapons
that are not as deadly but have similar characteristics.
John
Somewhere in the world there is defeat for everyone. Some are destroyed by
defeat, and some made small and mean by victory. Greatness lives in one who
triumphs equally over defeat and victory.
John Steinbeck -- The Acts of King Arthur and His
Noble Knights
> Here's the catch... if you take damage and a missile bay was
I think it would be easier to keep track of if the missiles were in a defined
magazine. I was going to object to missiles exploding in storage because I
hate it when Holywood has an atomic bomb being triggered by shock. However,
with all the volatiles involved, a magazine explosion should be pretty
impressive. Early model magazines I can see having a lot of problems. While I
could see any loss of the magazine resulting in a total loss of the magazine,
if they have the magazine set up so that it channels and vents any explosion
out of the ship that should alleviate the problem. So an ordinary threshold
check that damages the magazine usually can't be repaired. Maybe it should do
damage equal to the number of threshold levels already lost.
> Pete
Are you using 1 Mass of Cargo Space can contain 2 Mass of replacement
missiles? Going as high as 3 Mass seemed unbalancing.
I suppose a lot of the volatilty of missile fuel depends on what sort of fuel
you use. If the missiles engines are fusion powered then a purely fuel
explosion wouldn't be very impressive. If you are using hyperglogic (sp?)
fuels, fuels which ignite upon mixing, a couple of cracked tanks results in
burnt Battlestar.
Since noone talks about chain reactions for normal engine threshold checks the
assumption seems to be that the fuel for at least some drive systems won't
cause a chain reaction.
I'd really feel sorry for merchant vessels carrying missile resupply. One
point of damage could blow a 100 Mass ship apart! One point of damage could
correspond to 2 Mass of
Cargo, or two+ missiles. Of course, missiles transported
by merchant ships aren't carried fully fueled and armed...
I'd at least allow Damage Control Parties some chance of preventing a chain
reaction, if they have read the handbook, "When the Blast Door is your
Friend."
This sort of thing would generally occur in campaign games (necessity when you
use missiles & submunitions a lot). Also, no screens while reloading.
I wouldn't mind having to do this during a scenario. If you're paying for a
merchant ship as part of a fleet, there needs to be some benefit in doing so.
'Neath Southern Skies
> o why not develop some rules for ships which can
This is OK if both ships are within 1" of each other and stopped or on the
same course and velocity.
Also I would make the team with the reloader pay for the reloading ship (in
points) for fleet design, victory conditions, and game balace.
Both ships would have to spend the turn just reloading the missiles (No
firing, no *DAF, no course change, no velocity change).
Also I would say that any attack on a reloading ship (or the supplier ship)
would have a 50% (1-3 d6) chance of exploding the missile (due to a
direct hit, or missload of the missile).
I think this is a good idea for a specialty scenerio (attack the
refueling/rearming point) but should not happen during a normal battle.
> This is OK if both ships are within 1" of each other and stopped or on
????
No, that isn't what I meant at all. Take a single 8 Mass ship It has 2 Mass
for a launcher and 2 Mass for Cargo containing two more missiles.
It can fire 3 missiles over the course of 5 turns. Sound fair?
I suppose transfering cargo from hold to launcher might be a little difficult
if the ship is doing violent maneuvering unless you've spent the points for an
automated reload device. (Invent house rule to fit...)
Obviously, you've never seen what happens to military ammo carriers that
get canned by an incoming explosive round - afterall, ammo carriers are
nothing more than a box with treads/wheels and the fireworks display is
spectacular!
Gil Murphy's Laws of Combat #42
"Professional soldiers are predictable -
> The world is full of dangerous amatuers!"
> ----------
<SNIP>
> I think it would be easier to keep track of if the missiles
<SNIP>
> [quoted text omitted]
Perhaps I misunderstood you. Are you proposing a new re-loadable missile
ans submunitions sytem? If so, you would need to make room on the firing ship.
One turn to reload seems fair.
If you are talking about reloading from another ship, it does not seem very
fair. To try to do anything, the 2 ships would need to be on a parallel course
and at matched velocities. Otherwise it would be like a jet plane trying to
rearm another while they made a head to head pass. Even with mid-air
refueling (a much simpler task) the 2 planess must be on parallel courses and
matched speed. And it takes much longer to reload a missile than to fire it.
It would need to be removed from the supply ship, moved between the ships, and
placed on a mounting pylon. This is assuming that the missiles are externally
fired (rather than in a torpedo tube fassion) and all data links are within
the firing pylon. Such a mount should be more susceptible to threshold checks
and needle attacks. If the situation is different, it would be more
complicated (hatches, data wires, secure pins, arming pins, etc.).