[Review] CEE Earthforce Sourcebook

Hi all. Two things to keep in mind for this review:

(1) I play lots of FT, but I don't know half as much about B5, so while I can
comment on whether things make sense for gaming, I cannot tell you if it's
right for the B5 universe.

(2) I'm only going to review the bits that are of interest to FT players,
namely the Space Combat Section.

Those caviats aside, lets get down to brass tacks.

General Layout: As with all of CEE's B5 material, the entire book is glossy
color with illustrations about every 4th page on the average. It has a very
nice cover and two identical card sheets of counters bound into the rear of
the book. Supposedly, some people have had difficulty with ink smudges or
other misprints, but I didn't find a single one. CEE will replace any
defective book anyway, so I don't really see any problem. My only criticism
about the layout is the four "grooves" across the text portion of the page.
Though not too distracting, I found the lines of text that shared space with
them to be slightly harder to read.

Turn Sequence: If you've played FT (and I assume that all of you have) then
this will seem extremely familiar. In fact, other than a slight difference in
layout (i.e. 4a & 4b instead of 4 & 5) it's virtually identicle to FT2.

Orders: Same here. They're called slightly different things in some cases
(i.e. RP = rotate port instead of TP = turn port), but are otherwise identicle
to FT3. It also includes things unique to the B5 milieu (JP = jump point, LEM
= launch energy mine).

Movement: This is identicle to the FT3 vector system (for reaction drives)
with the exception that rotation works differently. Instead of 1 thruster
point turning your ship any number of facings, it's one thruster point PER
facing. I assume that this reflects the enormous mass and momentum of these
leviathans. The "Older" races, as they call them, also have what's called
gravimetric drives. The movement for these drives is similar to the cinematic
system from FT2&3, but the drive itself provides turning power. So a drive
rated at 4 could have an acceleration of 2 and turn 2 points (60°), but that
would use up its entire rating. One thing that they do that I think should
also be applied to FT3 is the breaking down of drives into discrete units. So
a thrust 4 ship has two drive units, each supplying 2 thrust and 1 thruster
point. When threshold time comes around, each unit makes a roll. So, in an
extreme case, a thrust 10 ship might loose only 2 points to a threshold check,
but then again it might loose all 10. This makes much more sense to me than
the current FT method of halving the rating [Hint, hint Jon].

Combat: The arc system used is a sort of hybrid between FT2&3, there are only
four arcs, but they correspond to 30° increments, sort of. Fore and Aft are
the same FT3 60° slices, but port and starboard are bigger 120° chunks. It
makes sense for the milieu, but I wish they'd represented it differently on
the SSDs. Looking at the SSDs as a FT player, they make me want to get out my
FT2 firing arc "rings." I would rather that they had made the SSDs more like
those in FT3 and graphically depict the arcs, as opposed to the "nubs" pointed
in one of the four cardinal directions. Fire control is similar, but one is
needed for each seperate
target. Defensive systems and weapons, including anti-fighter systems,
do not require a fire control. Pulse batteries act in almost every way like
FT3 beam batteries, except the ranges are divisions of 10 instead of 12. Also,
they may be countered by defenses, as if their rounds were tiny missiles.
Normal "Beam Batteries" are like powerful, short range FT3 beams, with dandge
reduced every 6" (MU). Also, they have a master capacitor that can project to
any battery on the ship, which is recharged at a variable rate at the
beginning of each turn. One interesting addition not present in the FT rules
is the catastrophic damage and chain reaction rules. If, over one turn, a ship
takes an entire row of damage, the ship makes an additional check. If this
check fails, the entire next row of damage is filled in and another
complete threshold check is made. This represents chain reactions and/or
magazines exploding. I like the concept, but I don't think it would work as
well with FT, especially with smaller ships. Point Defense is called
Interceptors, which threw me off at first, being more familiar with the FT
fighter variety, and they only cover one arc each. So full coverage calls for
four of them. They can act against either fighters or pulse battery fire each
turn, but not both. Against pulse fire, they act as FT screens; against
fighters they act as PDSs.
There are also regular anti-fighter batteries, which act just like FT
PDSs.

Fighters: Other than launch rates, half of the ship's compliment per turn, and
slight differences in movement distances, the fighter system is the same as
FT2. Scrambling and screens (the fighter variety) are also included. One
notable difference, which I think is a big improvement, particularly if you're
using the vector movement system in FT3, is movement of the turn of launch.
Launch occurs before ship movement. Move the fighter group 6" (MU) along the
ship's HEADING, and then move it the ship's velocity along its course. I think
that this should become a standard for
FT3 [Should I bother hinting again - nah].
Fighters are obviously pivotal in this game, and their management will make or
break the battle. Fighter screens are essential, and dogfights will be much
more common than in FT.

Small Craft: There are also rules for shuttles and small craft, which are
essentially fighters with two damage points. Seeing as how there are now
shuttle figures for FT (FT-320, GF-12, GF-14, GF-15), they should be
adapted to FT3