Barrier Net

Greeting all,

Speaking of mines, I was thumbing through the "Aliens Colonial Marine
Tech
Manual" the other day, and one of the anti-ship weapons they portrayed
was an
"Orbital Barrier Minefield," which is essentially a big net "tens of
kilometers acoss", with a frame to hold it rigid and small thrusters to
maintain position. The idea is that such a net would be very difficult
to
detect and any ship that hits it at high speeds (many kps, according to
the
book) is going to take lots of damage. I'm not sure the PSB makes any
real
sense, but I thought it might be fun to play with anyway. 

Say the defender in a system invasion scenario gets "x" inches of net to
deploy across the table, seperately or in one long line. The nets are
deployed secretly, so the invader doesn't know where they are. (This
could be
hard to work unless you have a ref, or are playing PBeM.) Any ship that
passes through the net takes 1 point of damage per point of velocity! 

The invader can scan for the nets: designate an arc to be scanned, and
any
nets are detected on a 6 for enhanced sensors, or a 5-6 for superior
sensors
-- ships with basic sensors had better stay back until the nets are
located!
(Alternately, you could make the roll easier, but apply penalties based
on
the scanning ship's speed.) Detected nets can be destroyed by 1 point of
damage from beams, torpedoes or whatever.

The object of this system would be not so much to damage/ destroy enemy
ships, as to slow them down and give the defender a chance to maneuver
--
which is really what most modern battlefield obstacles are designed to
do.

Just a thought,
Scott Field

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