Re: FT cloaking

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From: "Bell, Brian K" <Brian_Bell@dscc.dla.mil>
Subject: RE: cloaking rules

I posted the rules to which you refer.
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Glen:
Then I thank you for them.  I got to playtest them this weekend
after I made a few more modifications.	I played the cloaked 
ship (a "Rom warbird") vs a "Fed destroyer".  I won because
I finally got him in the narrow Wave Gun ("plasma torpedo")
arc, I had taken 3 hits to armor mostly because I uncloaked for
a few turns when he was in front of me and I was behind him.  
The DD had 1 180 degree pulse torpedo and 1 360 degree class-2
beam with 2 fire controls.  I still couldn't get a shot lined up 
so I went back to cloak for a few more turns.  
The combat lasted 21 turns.
He protested a lot about the "super" weapon Wave Gun mixed with
the cloaking device, I figure it was "sour grapes".  I went from
blind mode to off mode in 1 turn and took my shot, he complained
that a cloaked ship should have to go through stages (blind to
standard to off modes) so that the enemy has a chance to respond.
I disagree, what do others think?

Modifications:
Blind mode cloaked ship can change velocity and turn up to 2
thrust points.	I thought 1 was too severe, 2 was sufficient
in my scenario (the warbird only had a thrust of 2 anyway).
If you want to change more than go to standard mode is my
reasoning.

Detecting a standard-mode cloaked ship mod:
-1 if the cloaked ship made no velocity changes or turns,
0 if the cloaked ship made thrust changes up to 2,
+1 if the cloaked ship made thrust changes of 3 or more.

I was always making course changes so if he picked the right arc,
which he did in all but one instance, he had a chance (1 in 6)
to find me.  When he did detect me one time I put the ship at its
exact location, it was easier to figure things out.

btw, we were using a hex grid (and he complained about that, yes 
this is the same guy that's a GW weenie).  I think it would make it 
much harder to play with cloaked ships on a non-hex grid area.

He did complain a bit, but most of it was at playing "devil's
advocate" to try to break the cloaking rules.  Although, it was
hard at times to determine what "mode" he was in.  :)

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Brian:
I did not understand from your post if the Advanced Cloaking put 
the cloaked ship in standard mode or blind mode cloaking with the 
additional ability to fire.
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Glen:
I put the Advanced Cloaking at the last minute.  The normal cloaking
rules still apply, i.e., no firing in Blind mode.  I haven't given
it much thought yet, working at ironing out the "normal" rules.

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Brian:
I also have a concern about the ranges you stated for scanning. Can 
a FCS be used to search for a cloaked ship and then be used to fire 
on that ship? If not, the cloaked ship is immune to all standard 
ships below Light Cruisers (since they only have one FCS). Also, 
most ships of Light Cruiser to Battlecruiser (1/2 of the Fleetbook 
Battlecruisers have 2 FCS) could only attack cloaked ships at 12" or 
less (one FCS to scan, one FCS to shoot). At a the bare minimum, the 
weapons of the cloaked ship should be reduced to 12" and the FCS 
should be allowed to fire on the cloaked ship as well as search
for it (if it finds it). 
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Glen:
Hmm.  My designed ships have more FCS than the FB's, then.  So I'm
paranoid about losing all my FCS and then cannot fire.
I'll think on it.

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Brian:
A cloaked ship should have the same difficulty locking onto a ship 
through the cloak. It should require a 6+ on a d6 modified as below 
to lock onto the target (and then normal chances of hitting with the 
weapons).
Target ship used MD, +1
Target ship fired during the Firing Phase +1
Target ship scanned area of cloaked ship +2 (regardless of if the 
cloaked ship was found or not)
Target ship is powering up for FTL +1
Target ship has taken damage this turn +1

I still prefer to not allow a cloaked ship fire, as it adds a lot of
complication and unbalances the game. At the MOST, a cloaking field 
should add no more value than level 2 screens (<shudder> Think of a 
Komarov SDN with a cloaking field instead of level 2 screens).
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Glen:
If using the +n to detect, where n is the number of weapons fired by
the cloaked ship, then that Komarov is probably detectable by 
everyone if it fires everything.  Now you are paying a high price
for beating initiative, which is a 50/50 proposition anyway.
Firing direct fire under cloak is really optional, and twice the
price of regular cloak at my first guess at a point cost.

Speaking of screens, my friend thought that a cloaked ship should
have the effect of screens if fired at when cloaked.  I figure if
they detect the cloaked ship they know where it is.

But I did just think of another detection mod:
+1 if the cloaked ship has active screens.  
A ship can decide to turn them off at the beginning of a turn, at
the same time as deciding cloak mode.

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Brian:
When I set up the rules for standard cloaking, I may have been 
unclear.

The distance of 12" (6" for vector) was set so that it was 2x the 
range of salvo missiles. This allowed the area to be saturated by 
salvo missiles to simulate depth charges, but a single salvo missile 
had little (but some) chance of catching the cloaked ship.
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Glen:
I limited firing at cloaked ships to direct fire only as detection is
in the fire phase.  I did this so that you didn't have to remember
what FCS were used in attempting detection in a previous step.	
This also added some more tactical decisions: do I have a large ship
try to detect and fire upon a cloaked ship so my other ships have
some extra mods to detect it and may not need FCS to detect it; 
my enemy has cloaking so I have to design some ships to deal with it 
(i.e., better sensors, more FCS).
Also, this made cloaked ships immune to missiles and fighters, but 
then I figured those weapon systems have sensors too small to get a 
lock onto a cloaked ship.  Plus, any defensive measures taken by a 
cloaked ship would give it away.
A submunitions pack could simulate "depth charges".

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Brian:
The clock direction and range from the cloaked ship to the marker 
did NOT have to remain constant from turn to turn. It just needed to 
be written down when it changed. This could make the cloaked ship's 
movement seem erratic.
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Glen:
Ah, I wondered about that.  But it may be hard to determine these
things on a non-hex grid playing area.

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Brian:
I was trying to avoid giving the cloaked ship a free shot at other 
ships.	If you allow a cloaked ship to fire, the player will always 
(or almost always) wait until the cloaked ship is the last ship to 
fire. Other ships having fired would not be able to return fire. And 
the next turn the ship would have to be searched for in order to find 
it. (Under your Advanced Cloak, do the bonuses last through the next 
turn? If not the problem persists with Advanced Cloaking system.)  I 
felt that this was too lopsided.  I had wanted to allow the cloaked 
ship to fire at a penalty, but the mechanics of Full Thrust use 
different methods to determine a hit with different weapons.  A -1 
penalty for beam weapons is very different from a -1 for pulse 
torpedoes (especially after shields are taken into account).
Because of this, I did not include allowing a cloaked ship to fire.
I had also thought about allowing return fire through the next fire 
phase, but this would not be possible unless the location of the 
cloaked ship was made known in the next turn. I felt that this was 
unacceptable (I wanted to keep disclosure to the current turn only). 

I also added rules that if a ship was in standard mode, and the 
location of his ship was scanned (regardless to if the ship was found 
or not), the standard cloaked ship could then fire on the scanning 
ship (but would pinpoint his location). This would make scanning for 
a cloaked ship a 2 edged proposition. If you scan and find the ship, 
you can fire on it. If you scan and don't find the cloaked ship, it 
will probably get a free shot at you.
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Glen:
You're allowing cloaked ships to fire without paying extra for
it.  I, at least, said that you have to pay double the normal point
cost for this feature, although you don't have to wait for any
enemy activity to fire.

Firing under cloak is VERY effective.  Look at a particular ST
movie (yeah, its a movie, not real life <g>).  Because J.T.K. gets 
to cheat and find a way to detect it, the E wins (audience applauds).
For fairness, firing under cloak in a game is a 
matter of balancing point costs and combat options.  I don't
want to use it myself, but thought I'd throw it out to see what
others think.

Thanks for the critique.

Glen