Re: [FT\DS2] Fleet and Army sizes for games

G'day John,

 >XXX
 >     The 'cargo' would not be able to take any
 >'hull' boxes with it if it should be 'disconnected'
 >from the hull.   I can accept the premise that
 >the module can (and possibly should) have a
 >weak (10% of mass) hull of its own.	These
 >hull boxes would be added to the ships hull
 >during combat.
 >XXX

Sorry poor wording on my part, basically what I'd been playing around
with 
was having the 'hull' boxes associated with the module drawn on the
module 
so when you lost the module (link broke) you lost the lot.

 >The additional module costs for one ship will
 >be a large enough penalty.

That it is.

 >The other thing one
 >must consider if the limited arc of fire for an
 >imbedded module weapons mount, I would think that
 >180 degrees would be the maximum.   The fore/aft
 >arcs are pretty much off limits to the bay mounts.

I ended up doing something like this, beams in modules being installed
in 
broadsides and the B1 module was always placed at the front of the ship
(so 
nothing in its F arc to get in the way... that was my justification
anyway).

 >     A single ship might have to build.....

Basically I have cargo modules to fully fit out all my cargo ships then
I 
had a smaller and limited number of 'weapons' modules stockpiled at home

ports. I can't ever fit out all my ships as warships (less than half).
This 
came out of my background being sci first then a fleet to protect
itself, 
something I was trying to stay true to but probably not to everyone's
taste 
in an all out campaign.

 >   A few of these things could be of use in a
 >secondary theater of war but faced with real
 >warships in primary operations; too much (point)
 >cost, not enough ability, underutilized assets.

True, which is why the IAS now have a small dedicated fleet, but the 
modular ships still help quite a lot to bulk out a force or serve as the

primary force in a pinch. There maybe a small factor of sentimentality 
attached to their long and faithful service too ;)
For the small nations which pepper the space we often play in they're a 
good way of having an OK fleet that pays for itself in many ways.

Cheers

Beth

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Elizabeth Fulton
c/o CSIRO Division of Marine Research
GPO Box 1538
HOBART
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email: beth.fulton@marine.csiro.au