John Atkinson wrote (in two different posts):
> Try it in cinematic? Why would I want to do that?
Because Cinematic is the "official" standard movement system around which the
entire game (including the ship design system) was created, whereas the
optional Vector movement system was only patched on as an afterthought?
<g>
> Who plays cinematic?
Jon Tuffley is one, I'm another... <g>
> Are you saying the K'V are more or less balanced in vector?
The KV are considerably weaker in Vector than they are in Cinematic, yes (or,
at least, than they are in Cinematic played on large or floating tables
simulating unlimited space). More accurately, the KV *themselves* don't
change all that much - it is how their *enemies* change from Cinematic
to Vector which has the biggest impact.
The most important difference is that *any* Vector-moving ship, even a
thrust-1 one, is able to rotate to any facing in a single turn even if
it is moving at the same time. In Cinematic this is only possible if the ship
both begins and ends the turn at velocity 0; otherwise the ship can only
change facing by 30 degrees per thrust point spent on course changes and must
always face in the direction it is moving.
This means that a Vector-moving low-thrust ship armed mainly with
single-arc
weapons - eg. your "KV hunters" - is almost always able to point those
weapons at their intended target (the only real exception being if the range
is very short), whereas in Cinematic the same ship would have to give up all
tactical mobility (and thus initiative) to do so after the first exchange of
fire (ie., during the opening meeting engagement, if there is one at
all).
If your "KV hunters" attempt to move in *Cinematic*, they're dead meat to
the Kra'Vak - too unmanoeuvrable to keep the KV in their own (F) arcs,
and also too unmanoeuvrable to stay out of the *KV* (F) arcs for very long.
If you want to be able to both move and shoot at Kra'Vak ships at the same
time in Cinematic, you either need wide fire arcs or very manoeuvrable
ships, or preferrably both. Unfortunately for the humans, a high-thrust
ship
with wide-arc weapons will by necessity have fewer weapons (and thus a
lower, usually considerably lower, total firepower) than a low-thrust
ship
with mostly single-arc weapons; so instead of outgunning the KV by a
comfortable margin it has to do some fancy flying to stay out of the KVs' main
weapon arcs while using its own wider firing arcs to wear the KV down.
If you do the maths like you told the rest of us to do <g>, you'll find that
while the single-arc P-torp is the only human weapon which outguns or
equals
its own points value of K-gun at *every* range (and equals it only
beyond 30
mu, ie. where neither the P-torp nor the K-gun is able to fire at all),
both
the B2-3 and the B3-1 beat their own cost of K-guns against unscreened
targets (eg. Kra'Vak ships) everywhere except for one single 6-mu
interval
(0-6 mu in the B3-1 case; 24-30 mu in the B2-3 case) - and at most
ranges,
they beat the K-gun by a much wider margin than the P-torp does :-/
However, this is not true for wider-arced weapons - particularly not for
those wider-arced weapons which can match or exceed the K-gun range! And
in
Cinematic, the human force needs either decent-ranged, wide-arced
weapons or very powerful engines in order to be able to shoot at the KV at
all...
All in all this means that where a Vector-optimized human force (with
low or
at best moderate thrust ratings and lots of single-arc weapons) can
safely expect to both outgun and outhull the Kra'Vak, and also runs no real
risk of being outmanoeuvred by the KV (since it can always rotate to face), a
human force in Cinematic pretty much has to accept to be either outgunned by
the
Kra'Vak in a head-on encounter because much of its own mass is tied up
in large engines, or to be unable to bring its main batteries to bear because
the engines aren't powerful enough <g>
***
> Jaime Tiempo wrote:
> In vector. Try it in cinematic and see what happens.
You get carrier fleets in Vector as well... and regardless of which movement
system you use, the Kra'Vak are relatively well equipped to handle enemy
carrier fleets <g>
***
> Tim Bancroft wrote:
> I've found that whilst at a capital ships level the fleets may be
compared
> with human ships B1/2 and a few 3 (Markgraf/Voroshilev and below).
Has
> anyone else experienced this (or has no-one used such small squadrons
The FB1 human force you describe above - FB1 ships only (ie., no custom
jobs), with thrust-4 cruisers forming the core of the force - is one the
easiest target a Kra'Vak commander could wish for :-/
Depending on the movement system and table size you use:
If you play Vector, then the KV force can quite safely hang around at range
25-30 mu; at that range every K-gun in the fleet can hit the human
ships, and the humans can only reply with a small fraction of their own
firepower. Note that this *only* works because the FB1 ship designs are not
optimized
for Vector movement - from a Vector point of view the mass the FB1
designs spend on extra arcs for the B3s and on B2s and smaller weapons is
pretty much wasted.
If you play Cinematic on a small table, ie. one where you can't manoeuvre
outside the enemy's weapon envelope, the Kra'Vak are in serious trouble at any
points values. They need to be able to set up their attack runs from
outside the enemy's weapon range - cf. the "boom'n'zoom" comments in my
other post. Real space doesn't have table edges which force you to stay in
the enemy's range :-/
If you play Cinematic on a large table, which is the case the Fleet Book ship
design system (and the Fleet Book ship designs themselves) is intended for,
the KV can have problems at *very* low point levels (IME 400 pts or less) if
you use the "official" designs only. This is because the light KV ships in FB2
(Ka'Tak 'FF' and smaller) are very much designed for strike duties in support
of (and supported by) heavier units and don't do very well
on their own - and at such low point values, they *are* on their own.
At higher point values (including the 7-900 pts range you indicated),
the KV
can afford to bring some of their light and medium cruisers - and unlike
the small fry these cruisers are designed for independent operations, and are
quite capable of holding their own against similarly-priced human
ships...
as long as they have enough table space to use their superior manoeuvrability,
that is.
Given a large enough table, Cinematic movement and a KV cruiser squadron,
how do you defeat an FB1 human cruiser/escort force like the one you
describe above? Well...
- If the humans give up all hopes of manoeuvring and instead come to a
full stop to spin in place, you use the tactics described for for Vector above
(only fight at range 25-30 so you can pit all of your K-guns against a
small part of his armament). Remember that you can't move backwards in
Cinematic though, so you can't afford to slow down too much yourself or
they'll catch you eventually.
- If the FB1 human force attempts to manoeuvre against you but stay
concentrated, move into their AP/A/AS arcs and stay outside range 12 mu
(outside range 24 mu is even better since the human ships don't have any
weapons able to hit you there, but it also takes much longer for you to
inflict any serious damage on them from that range).
- If the humans split up to bring at least *some* of their weapons to
bear against you, use your superior manoeuvrability to concentrate your entire
force against each small part of theirs in turn and defeat them in detail.
Regards,
> --- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote:
> >Are you saying the K'V are more or less balanced
in Cinematic played on large or floating tables
> simulating unlimited space). More accurately, the KV
Hrmm... I dunno. Seems to me that when Fleet Book 2 first came out, I was not
the only one that felt the K'V were extremely powerful, and even questioned
the balance thereof. Maybe my memory is faulty, but there were a lot of battle
reports which indicated the K'V walked through standard designs pretty easily.
Now that people have largely learned to adapt to their oddities (and have
gotten over the fact that a single capital ship weapon inflicts 10 points of
damage if it
hits, and yes I know there's a 1/6 chance of it only
doing 5) there's hubub about them being too costly?
> If your "KV hunters" attempt to move in *Cinematic*,
OK, I'll buy that. Sounds to me like K'V should be hell on wheels in
Cinematic. They are still tough against your standard warships in Vector, just
not overpowering.
> If you play Vector, then the KV force can quite
I've heard of this but never seen it in practice. Usually we end up closing
because we begin on converging vectors in scenario setup. Hanging back only
works if you've got more speed, and your opponent doesn't mind. Otherwise you
end up having to go through some gyrations.
> If you play Cinematic on a small table, ie. one
This I've never done. Always been floating. Of
course, 90%+ of my opponents are old SFB players so
floating tables are no big deal to them.
> John Atkinson wrote:
> Are you saying the K'V are more or less balanced
They can hold their own against *FB1-style* designs (including most of
your NRE designs) in Vector. During the first few months after FB2 was
published several players who didn't know how to fight the KV in Vector made
some fundamental tactical mistakes leading to a series of quite spectacular
human defeats; now that they've learned better anti-KV tactics the
honours are a lot more even.
However, FB1-style designs are in no way "standard designs", and
treating them as such is IMO badly misleading.
The FB1 designs were created for Cinematic movement, and in gaming groups
which use Cinematic movement they and designs similar to them are fairly
common; in this sense they can be thought of as "standard CINEMATIC warships".
However, the FB1 designs were not designed for Vector movement, and are in
fact quite *poor* combattants in Vector - and so are any ships designed
with similar wide-arc weapon layouts, including most of your NRE ships.
In those Vector-playing groups whose designs I've seen and who haven't
consciously or unconsciously enforced an adherence to the FB1 wide-arced
design style the way you have with your NRE, the most common design style
by far is similar to your "KV hunters" - ie., low-to-moderate thrust
ratings and armed with very heavy single-arc, long-range batteries
(usually
a mix of B4s, B3s and P-torps) and only a few secondary wide-arc weapons
for use when the enemy finally manages to get close. (This is not a new
development, BTW, nor a reaction to the FB2 Kra'Vak - I first saw ships
of this type in early 1999, ie. less than a year after FB1 was published and
before we had even begun work on FB2. I suspect that the only reason I didn't
see them even earlier was that I didn't begin to study and record
what players did with the then-new FB1 ship design system until January
1999 :-/ )
*This* style, not the FB1 one, is the closest you get to a "standard VECTOR
warship" style... and as you have found out, ships of this type are quite good
indeed at beating Kra'Vak in Vector. They're also quite good indeed at beating
any human ships designed for Cinematic, eg. the FB1 ships and their
NRE clones or derivatives <g> - but you don't seem to have experienced
this yet :-/
The root of the problem is that the basic "KV concept" is essentially to be
manoeuvrable enough to use single-arc weapons effectively, and in
Cinematic that pretty much requires Advanced drives (unless *all* your enemies
use
thrust-2 standard drives) - and the vastly improved manoeuvrability you
get from those Advanced drives is worth the extra points they cost to
install. Their K-guns are really only window dressing - the basic
concept
would've worked just as well with P-torps instead, or even beams.
In Vector however, *anyone* can use single-arc weapons effectively no
matter what drives they're using, and the extra cost for Advanced drives is
rather higher than the extra manoeuvrability they give is worth in
Vector -
with the result that pretty much everyone who designs their own ships for
Vector *uses* single-arc weapons - but only the KV have to pay extra for
the Advanced drives.
(As far as I can tell from the designs I've seen used by various groups all
over the world, those who design their own FB1-style wide-arced ships
for use in Vector form a fairly small minority. Most other Vector groups I
know
of which use wide-arc designs at all don't allow any home-grown ships at
all - they tend to use the designs in FB1 only, or *maybe* the FB1 ships
supplemented by Dean's (Star Ranger's) "FB Reinforcement" designs. The vector
groups who do allow homegrown designs usually seem to gravitate
towards the single-arc style quite fast, and reject the FB1-style wide
firing arcs.)
So, well... I guess that one way to describe the problem is that the human
tech base described in FB1 is flexible enough to let you optimize your designs
either for Cinematic or for Vector (but not for both at once, since those
different optimizations look very different from one another), whereas the FB2
Kra'Vak tech base essentially only allows you to build
Cinematic ships with no way to re-optimize them for use in Vector.
> If your "KV hunters" attempt to move in *Cinematic*,
Not really. When fighting FB1-style human forces in Cinematic, they're
like
a man with a rapier fighting a thug with a club - the rapier is a
precision weapon which can kill swiftly and cleanly if used well, but if the
wielder isn't careful when he attacks he'll get mashed to pulp by the club.
Same
with the Kra'Vak; if they're not careful when they set up their attack runs
they can get crushed very fast by human close-range wide-arc beam fire.
> They are still tough against your standard warships in Vector, just
Define "standard warships" - *after* you've read what I wrote about the
subject above :-/
Yes, in Vector the KV (which are designed for Cinematic) are tough against
*FB1-style* warships (which are *also* designed for Cinematic, and which
are even *less* suitable for Vector movement than the KV ships are).
If the KV run into designs which can be considered "standard VECTOR warships",
then they aren't tough at all. Of course, those "standard VECTOR
warships" also tend to make mincemeat out of any FB1-style wide-arced
human ships they meet in Vector... just like they'd be turned into mincemeat
themselves, should they try to fight in Cinematic.
> If you play Vector, then the KV force can quite
It depends quite a bit on the set-up, yes. The KV player needs to plan
for it from the very start of the battle... but if he does, it is quite
doable.
> Hanging back only works if you've got more speed, and your opponent
Er... shouldn't that "and" be an "or"? Kra'Vak ships quite often have more
useable thrust than human ships (which sooner or later translates into more
speed), and if you have more useable thrust than your opponent he usually
can't do much about your keeping the range open even if he *does* mind
:-/
> If you play Cinematic on a small table, ie. one
I very much prefer large floating tables as well, but there are at least
some groups who don't. Competitions often don't do it either, due to lack
of suitably large tables and/or time restrictions.
For some strange reason, there's a very strong correlation between the
groups which play on cramped non-floating tables and the groups who
consider the FB2 Kra'Vak to be underpowered and the Phalon Pulser-C
tuning to be way overpowered <g>
Regards,
> --- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote:
> In those Vector-playing groups whose designs I've
I started checking and found the following mass could be freed up by dropping
arcs:
Under CE: 0--no multiarc Class 3s or 360 Class 2s.
CA: 2 CB: 5 BB: 7 DN: 6 DNK: 2 DNL: 6 DNLK: 6
Dunno about you, but that looks fairly trivial to me for the benefits gained.
Maybe I'm a moron, but I occasionally have targets out of the forward arc. Of
course, I don't run computer programs to determine all possible locations of
enemy vessels during a game. Maybe on the BB I might want to add another
battery, though. But at max, I could squeeze another torpedo and a secondary
battery on the Dreadnought and I'm not sure it's worth it.
> most common design style
My main difference between the KV Hunters and the base ships they are derived
from is stripping off the shields, armor, and secondary armament. They are
extremely vulnerable to Human beam weapons, but are intended to survive hits
from rail guns. The 'low thrust' is an artifact of them being capital ships,
and even then they have more thrust than some nation's capitals.
> with the result that pretty much everyone who
So... in vector eliminate or reduce the KV cost for advanced drives?
John/Oerjan - It's worth bearing in mind that I think I've thrown a
non-standard spanner here due to the size of ships in the forces I use:
whilst I have larger, the largest I tend to use is a CH, possible a BC
(I
just like small-ship squabbles - C18 as well as SF). This enhances the
effect of the points disparity Oerjan has already confirmed between the
low-end K-guns and the Beams, especially in vector where it looks that
the
MD-A is overcosted.
Have fun,
--- Tim Bancroft <tim@dragonshome.freeserve.co.uk>
wrote:
> John/Oerjan - It's worth bearing in mind that I
Cool--not many people focus on this end.
If we assume that KV drives are overcosted by 1 pt per mass (dropping them to
the same price as Human drives)
this drops the price of the Thrust-6 KV by 7.5%. Is
that enough to cover the disparity? I doubt it. In a 1000 pt game, that's a 75
point discount, enough to buy a Ka'Tak class corvette at it's new point cost
of 73. Is that enough to make a dif? I'm guessing the answer would likely be
no, but you've got more experience with that scale game.
I'd also tend to say (no fancy math here, just gut
feeling) that the point where K-guns become well worth
the investment is K4, where you get the double damage more often than not.
> I'd also tend to say (no fancy math here, just gut
IIRC, K3 is the optimum for avg damage per points cost. You don't get double
damage as often but you get more chances to hit for a given mass of weapons,
and that makes up for it. However, a K5 hit as a certain psychological impact.
"A hit. Double damage as usual, that's ten hull.
That's a complete row on your battleship, isn't it?"
> John Atkinson wrote:
> In those Vector-playing groups whose designs I've
That's because you aren't nearly radical enough. B2s are one of the best
all-round weapon in *Cinematic*, but in Vector they are relegated to
fourth
place after B3-1s, P-torps and B4-1s; B1s are relatively weak in
Cinematic (unless their PD capability is needed) and weaker still in Vector.
Your NRE ships have quite a few of both B1s and B2s which can easily be
exchanged
for B3-1s or P-torps to improve the firepower.
A quick look through the NRE "Jane's" listing gives the following:
Belisarius, Maniakes, Cimbalongus, Constantine Isoapostolis (FF, FH, DD,
CE): Replace 2xB2-3 with 1xB3-1.
Milvian Bridge (DH): Replace 4xB2-3 with 2xB3-1.
Thessalonika (CL): Either replace all weapons with 2xB3-1, or replace
2xB2-3 with 1xB3-1 and keep the other B2-3 and both B1-6s.
St. Symeon (CA): Replace B3-3+B2-3 with 2xB3-1.
St. John Chrysostum (CB): Replace B2-3+B2-6+2xB3-3 with 4xB3-1+1xB1-6.
St. Cyril (BB): Replace B2-6+3xB3-3 with 5xB3-1+1xB1-6
...and so on.
For the lighter ships you "move" one die from the 0-12 range band to the
24-36 band - which means that you get to use that firepower a lot
earlier. Inflicting damage early is considerably better than inflicting it
later on since "later on" can easily mean "never", particularly for small
ships. (And, of course, any *enemy* ship you knock out early on is one less
ship which can damage you at close range.)
For the larger ships you typically increase the firepower in the 24-36
mu
range band by around 50%, and in the 12-24 range band by around 25%.
Again
the trade-off is reduced close-range firepower; but again it is much
better to inflict damage early than to inflict it late.
If the enemy tries to exploit your weakness at point-blank range, he
must first close through your outer range bands without taking excessive
losses
- and those outer range bands is right where your firepower has just
increased significantly.
> Maybe I'm a moron, but I occasionally have targets out of the forward
Then you're letting them get too close to you - which isn't terribly
surprising, since you probably want to bring all your own B1s and especially
B2s into play and those only come into their own at close ranges. Outside 12mu
range, each firing arc is so wide that a ship only rarely is able end up in
more than one of your arcs.
> Of course, I don't run computer programs to determine all
<snort> You don't need a computer for that in either of the movement systems.
You know where they are now; you know what vector they have now; you know at
least roughly what thrust rating they have. This gives you a
very good idea of where they could end up.
In Vector you have the additional information that all of their possible
end locations are clustered on or inside within a circle with a radius equal
to their thrust rating centered on the point where they'd end up if
they used no thrust this turn - so if you keep the range open and point
your ship to face as closely as you can towards that point, the chance for
them to be outside your (F) arc is very small indeed.
> Maybe on the BB I might want to add another battery, though.
Why *one*, when you could easily have *two* more main batteries by reducing
the secondary battery?
> But at max, I could squeeze another torpedo
Why would you want another *secondary* battery on this ship? For a Vector
combattant, it already has too many of those. Replace one of the
secondaries and the three B3-3s with five single-arc batteries (either
P-torps or B3-1s, your choice).
> My main difference between the KV Hunters and the base
The St.Andrews and St.Theodores are only vulnerable to Human beam weapons
*once those beam weapons get into range*. But the important thing isn't their
defences (or lack thereof); it is their offensive armament.
Have you ever tried to pit, say, a St.Andrew against a Virgin Mary?
If you have done this, you already know that the *only* range at which your
Virgin Mary-class DNL can inflict more damage on average than a
St.Andrew
DNLK can hit it back with is range 30-36. At range 30 or less, the Andy
inflicts 30-50% more damage on the Mary than the Mary can inflict on the
Andy - as long as the Andy can keep the Mary in its (F) arc.
What is even more interesting is that if you replace three to six of the
Andy's P-torps with B3-1s, it will outgun the Mary (F) arc to (F) arc at
*all* ranges - in spite of the Mary's heavy screens.
The only way (barring extreme luck with the dice) a Virgin Mary-class
ship has to defeat a St.Andrew modified as above (ie., replacing three of its
P-torps with B3-1s) is to stay out of the Andrew's (F) arc - and that
means to get inside range 12 and stay there for several turns in a row.
(Against an unmodified St.Andrew, the Mary also has the option to keep the
range to more than 30 mu.)
However... if the closure speed was so low that the Mary is able to stay at
point-blank range for several turns in a row, it was also so low that
the Mary spent many turns closing through the outer range bands... in which
case the Mary will be in considerably worse shape than the Andrew when it
finally reaches close range :-/
> So. . . in vector eliminate or reduce the KV cost for advanced drives?
In Vector, accept that the special Kra'Vak concept isn't special at all
-
everyone uses it, and most do it better than the Kra'Vak themselves. Or change
the way Kra'Vak (or Standard) drives work in Vector, to give the KV their
manoeuvrability advantage back. Or introduce a whole bunch of new KV weapons,
to give them the same design flexibility as the humans already
have :-/
Regards,
> --- Oerjan Ohlson <oerjan.ohlson@telia.com> wrote:
> That's because you aren't nearly radical enough. B2s
It generally is. Remember, I slug it out with IFed and FSE on a regular basis.
> Belisarius, Maniakes, Cimbalongus, Constantine
The function of these small ships includes escort. They focus on the clouds of
small ships that frequently hang about enemy capital ships. While my capitals
are shooting up the enemy's cruisers and capitals, the escort ships are trying
to minimize the time the enemy destroyers spend hanging around the flanks
shooting. Since I've faced multiple opponents who like to string out their
escorts to the left and right and move in towards my formation, I tend to want
more arcs on my small ships.
> Then you're letting them get too close to you -
Ah, but a formation can. And as for letting them get
close, maybe I'm doing something wrong, but a thrust-4
ship can easily hop range bands unless you know what he's going to be doing
each turn. Thrust 6, it's even easier. Especially if they spend the first
couple
turns kicking their speed up to 12-20.
> The St. Andrews and St. Theodores are only
Those beam weapons have more range than the PTorps those are armed with.
> Have you ever tried to pit, say, a St.Andrew against
Yes. The Andrew carries considerably more tonnage of weapons than the Mary
does. No protective measures are worthwhile against Kra'Vak. Only a moron goes
into combat against KV with shields, and armor is only marginally more useful.
> 30 or less, the Andy
Right.
> The only way (barring extreme luck with the dice) a
But the Mary class is not intended to hunt St.Andrews. It's intended to fight
in line of battle against IFed fleet, and I'm fairly sure that it could take
down a Arabia class SDN (depending on what goes in the spinal armament slot,
theoretically could be a class 5 beam weapon, or 4 PTs or 4 CL3s[1]). More
importantly, a squadron built around a Mary could take down a squadron built
around an Arabia and still have the Mary as a functional combatant. She
doesn't do me much good stuck in drydock. I'm thinking campaign here. The
shields and armor stay.
John
[1]Neither know nor care 'bout Laserlight's universe,
but in mine there are no area affect weapons. No nova cannons, wave guns, or
plasma bolts. Given the energy required to do damage to everything in a large
volume of space, it would take only a trivial amount of focusing of that
energy to inflict massive damage on a point target. If you can generate it,
it's much better to focus it.
OO>
> In Vector, accept that the special Kra'Vak concept isn't special at all
Or change HM drives so they have to pay 1 point of thrust per 1 or 2 facing
changes. Or better, change the movement so that you have to turn, then thrust,
rather than the reverse (if you spend the whole turn thrusting in direction
12, why should you be able to turn at the last instant and fire your F arc
weapons in direction 6 just as if you'd faced 6 all turn?). Then the KV
ability to thrust in any direction starts looking much better.
> But the Mary class is not intended to hunt St.
Andrews. It's intended to fight in line of battle against IFed fleet, and I'm
fairly sure that it could take down a Arabia class SDN
Given that Mary masses 250 and Arabiya masses 204, I should expect so.
> in the spinal armament slot, theoretically could be a
I'm inclined to a heavy PTorp or two. Usually. But you never know, it might be
16 submunition packs.
> importantly, a squadron built around a Mary could take
That rather depends on the squadron, methinks.
> [1]Neither know nor care 'bout Laserlight's universe,
Tunguska class AE system defense cruiser is known to carry an antimatter cloud
weapon which has the same effects as a wave gun. Aside from that, no.
--- "laserlight@quixnet.net" <laserlight@quixnet.net>
wrote:
> >But the Mary class is not intended to hunt St.
And there we have it.
> >in the spinal armament slot, theoretically could be
WTF is a "Heavy PTorp"
Remember, I habitually delete WoW threads.
And please use 16 submunitions. They don't penetrate armor! PTorps are the
biggest nuisance.
> >importantly, a squadron built around a Mary could
Sure.
[quoted original message omitted]
In a message dated 12/5/02 12:29:01 AM,
> owner-gzg-digest@lists.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU writes:
<<Date: Wed, 4 Dec 2002 11:04:29 -0800 (PST)
From: John Atkinson <johnmatkinson@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Points balance on K-guns vs Beams, part 2
Hrmm... I dunno. Seems to me that when Fleet Book 2 first came out, I was not
the only one that felt the K'V were extremely powerful, and even questioned
the balance thereof. Maybe my memory is faulty, but there were a lot of battle
reports which indicated the K'V walked through standard designs pretty easily.
>>
I don't know the 1st time I saw K'V was at a convention, and I was 1 of the
human players, and the GM told us that the best we could do was hold the line
for a while but would lose. Not only did we hold the line, we won and would
have been boarding a few ships. Which lost engines and firepower..
And what we had were standard FB1 designs.