RE: [FT] various subsystems (arc specific armor)

Before FB1, I (among others) came up with ablative armor ideas (see
http://members.nbci.com/rlyehable/ft/techlibrary/armor.html). 

Armor could be applied to each arc. I had the amount of protection based
on
ship mass (as a given ton of armor on a smaller vessel would provide
more
protection than the same ton of armor spread over a larger vessel [i.e.
thicker armor]).

When presented to the list, it was deemed to provide too much
protection,
which is probably the case. 

I was disappointed in FB1 that a ton of armor gave no more protection
when
applied to a corvette than to a superdreadnought. Take a Nanuchuka and a
Komorov. Over 10x the mass and more than that in surface volume (compare
the
miniatures). Each mass of armor would be at least 10x thicker on the
Nanuchka as the Komorov, but it provides the same 1 pip of protection.
It
should have been based on percent of ship mass (at least in part as the
screens are). But I seen no way to correct this without invalidating the
existing SSDs. [heavy sigh]

Given the current system, I am unsure what to suggest. 

My gut reaction was to say 3 per specific arc, but this may be too
little. 

6 seems too many as it provides much more protection just by turning the
hull slightly. But with the number of penetration weapons (beams,
K-Guns,
etc.) it may not be the case. 

4 may be reasonable. Provides less protection than standard armor, but
may
be distributed to reinforce a specific arc.

Perhaps Orejan has statistics from play-testing to provide the value of
overall protection to specific arc protection.

Out on a Limb:
Or you could adapt the current protection scheme:
Armor provides 6 points of protection. 1 per arc per armor mass. A ship
also
gains a bonus of +0.3 per arc of reduced protection (ARP). APRs must be
ship-wide to gain bonus. Bonus points may NOT be placed in any ARP. If a
ship has both 5 arc and 2-4 arc ARPs the 2-4 arc ARPs must be within the
5
arc ARP. Thus:
ARPs   Protection Pips per mass:
0-1		     6
2-4		     7*   
5		     8**  
* To gain the bonus points, the same 2 arcs ship-wide must be of reduced
protection.
** To gain the bonus points, the same 5 arcs ship-wide must be of
reduced
protection. 

Probably, the base should be reduced to 4 and gain 1 for each ton of
armor
with 3 ARPs and gain an additional 1 for each ton of armor with 5 ARPs.
But
this would require choosing which ARPs existing ships have.

To confuse the matter with an example:
Richthofen BC has 6 armor points. Using the new system, it would have 6
points of protection per arc (1 per armor mass):
	6
       ---
  6   /   \   6
     /	   \
     \	   /  
  6   \   /   6
       ---
	6
If it took 3 mass of the armor and reinforced the FP,F,FS arcs of the
ship,
it would gain 3 points to place in the FP,F,FS arcs:
	10
       ---
 10   /   \   10
     /	   \
     \	   /  
  3   \   /   3
       ---
	3
It has the same 3 ARPS (AS,A,AP).
It could redistribute the 3 mass of armor to reinforce AP,FP,F and
F,FS,AS
but would not gain any bonus pips as the ship would not have the same
ARPs:
	9
       ---
  6   /   \   6
     /	   \
     \	   /  
  6   \   /   6
       ---
	3
It could place 3 mass of armor in the F arc to gain an extra 6 armor
pips:
	27
       ---
  3   /   \   3
     /	   \
     \	   /  
  3   \   /   3
       ---
	3
This ship has 5 ARPs (FS,AS,A,AP,FP)
But could place 1 mass of armor in FP, 1 in F and one in FS, but would
only
gain 3 extra pips as the ship shares only 3 APRs (it would be the same
as
the second example), and thus gain 3, not 6 more points.
	11
       ---
 11   /   \   11
     /WRONG\
     \=====/  
  3   \   /   3
       ---
	3
It could take 2 mass of armor to reinforce FP,F,FS (ARPs of AS,A,AP) and
1
mass of armor to additionally reinforce F (ARPs of FS,AS,A,AP,FP) to
produce
the following:
	17
       ---
  7   /   \   7 
     /	   \
     \	   /  
  3   \   /   3
       ---
	3
All the EXTRA pips had to be placed in the F arc (the only non ARP on
the
ship).


-----
Brian Bell
bkb@beol.net
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/ft/	   
-----

> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Leary [SMTP:john_t_leary@yahoo.com]
> Sent: Sunday, September 24, 2000 12:41 PM
> To:	gzg-l@CSUA.Berkeley.EDU
> Subject:	Re: [FT] various subsystems
> 
> 
> --- Laserlight <laserlight@quixnet.net> wrote:
> ...
> > I haven't figured out a resonable way to make
> > fractional-coverage
> > armor, though.
> > 
>      I would suggest that a single six arc
> FT armor box be turned into double three arc
> or six single arc armor.
> 
> Bye for now,
> John L.