Re: Points, was Re: grav

John Atkinson wrote:

> > Masses of size 4 armour 1 vehicles - gee, that
> > sounds very much like today's USAR with their Bradleys,
>
>GMS/H, RFAC/1 (T), 6 dismounts.  Sounds solidly size 3
>to me.  And with armor 2.

It *sounds* like size 3, sure. But put it side by side with a BMP-3 (6
or 8 
dismounts, RFAC/1, GMS/H and a 100mm low-velocity cannon which has no 
equivalent in vanilla DS2), and you'll notice that the Bradley is 
physically much bigger (particularly taller) than the BMP - and there's
no 
way in hell the BMP-3's payload can fit in a DS2 size 2 vehicle.
'Course, 
you could say that all Russian vehicles get one level of Stealth in DS2 
terms...

>And it's USA.	USAR is United States Army Reserve.

Interesting. Armor magazine (don't remember which issue though) seemed
to 
use the  USAR acronym to include US units deployed in Europe as well?
IIRC 
they did this because the acronym "USA" is often used to refer to the 
United States of America - ie., what you Americans simply refer to as
"US".

> >and the soon-to-be-purchased LAVs even more so! OK, with the latest 
> add-on >armour they probably rank as size 4 armour 2...
>
>LAV: RFAC 1 (T) and what, 8 dismounts?  Just a hair over size 2.

Take another look at its physical size. If that is size 2, it has -2
levels 
of Stealth slapped on to make its effective signature 4.

> > If you answer b), you have to include a rule that
> > the US player always gets at least 5 times as much
> >money to spend on equipping his forces as the
> > opponent, or else he'll lose all the time. In real
> > life the US has all that money, of course, but do
> >you really think that this should be explicitly
> > included in the game rules?
>
>Modern scenarios include a specific background.
>Namely: Today, or a reasonable facsimile thereof.

Your point is? Most SF scenarios also include a specific background. The

difference is that those backgrounds are fictous, so you don't know the 
procurement/manufacturing costs of the various combat vehicles - and
often 
you also don't know the economic strength of the warring factions.

You didn't answer the question, though. Do you choose your points system
to 
reflect a) combat power or b) procurement/manufacturing cost?

> >>I never buy anything but Superior.
> >
> >In other words, you deliberately exploit one of the
> >biggest faults of the design system :-)
>
>OK. . . I know I'm going to regret this, but exactally
>how much of a difference does it make, firing at size
>2 and 3 targets (most of my opponents don't use many
>size 4 vehicles)?  Statistically speaking?

If both sides use the same weapons but different FCSs, Superior FCS
scores...

Range band	Vs Basic	Vs Enhanced
Close		+45-55% +15-20%
Medium	+75-80% +25-30%
Long		+133%		+40%

...more hits against size 2 and 3 targets than its lower-tech siblings
(and 
the other sizes don't differ very much either). If the two sides use 
different weapons - ie., so the range bands aren't the same - the table 
becomes huge, but I can put one together if you like. It'll take a while

though.

Scoring on average X% more hits improves the combat power of your tank
in a 
shoot-out by the square root of (1+X), so even at close range a tank
with 
Superior FCS is some 7-10% stronger than an otherwise identical tank
with 
Enhanced FCS and 20-25% more powerful than an otherwise identical tank
with 
Basic FCS. (At longer ranges, the Superior FCS gets correspondingly
better.)

Being X% more powerful should, in a working points system, mean that the

vehicle costs X% more points - which is a bit difficult, since X in this

case varies with the range! :-/ (Why the square root? Because the enemy 
shoots back given half a chance. Read F.W.Lanchester's works for a
detailed 
explanation.)

However, the DS2 points system doesn't even catch the differences
between 
the different FCSs at Close range - even with a size/5 gun the cost 
difference between SUP and BAS FCS is only 20 pts... and very few tanks 
with size/5 weapons cost as little as 80-100 pts total (where that 20-pt

difference would be appropriate at Close range). For John's "Basil I 
Bulgaroctonus" tank, the difference in combat value between BAS and SUP
FCS 
at Close range is around 100 pts (the tank costs 474 pts in the DS2
points 
system); for the smaller "Heraclius" design it is around 65 pts (the
tank 
costs 331 pts).

> >Which would have contributed more - the Stealth you used, or the
20-30%
> >extra vehicles you could've had if you hadn't used Stealth?
>
>If I had 20% more points,

You don't get 20% more points overall; you only get another 20-30% of
the 
points you spent on those stealthed vehicles.

>I probably would generally
>not increase the size of my maneuver elements, but add
>more supports.  I generally build around a reinforced
>company task force.  But I have noticed a decided
>trend among my vehicles for my stealth to make them
>more survivable--because armor doesn't help much vs.
>size 3-5 weapons.

Stealth does make them more survivable, certainly. One level of Stealth 
reduces the number of hits on that vehicle by 15-25% (depending on the 
vehicle's size and the enemy FCS quality), which in turn improves the 
combat power by 7-12% - the same square root formula as in the FCS 
evaluation above applies here as well. Two levels of Stealth reduces the

number of hits by 25-40%, boosting the combat power by 10-20% (again 
depending on vehicle size and enemy FCS quality).

But it costs more than it tastes. The Heraclius tank mentioned above
costs 
331 including 1 level of Stealth. Without the Stealth it would cost only

271 pts, so it increases its cost by 60/271 = 22% in order to boost its 
combat power by a mere 12%. The Basil I B. is even worse; without its 2 
levels of Stealth it'd only cost 314 pts so it increases its cost by 
160/314 = 51% by buying Stealth, but that Stealth only increases its
combat 
power by ~20%.

As you can see, the discrepancies between the cost of Stealth and the 
increase in combat power it gives these tanks are similar in size, but 
opposite in direction, to the discrepancies between the cost and power
of 
Superior FCSs at close range.

>I generally do use only one level of stealth.	And one
>of my most sucesful set-ups doesn't use stealth.
>stealth everything down to d10.  It just isn't
>cost-effective past that.

As you can see above Stealth isn't cost-effective, period. If you cut
the 
cost of Stealth in half (to 10*Level*Size) you get it roughly correct
for 
Grav tanks with Superior everything, but it is still overpriced for
pretty 
much everything else.

> >In other words, your battles are multi-factor
> >experiments. Did you keep track of which factors
> >contributed with what amount?
>
>Not formally.

Then you have no way of determining which factors did what. All you have
is 
your impressions, and impressions aren't very reliable - remember your 
first impression of the FB2 Kra'Vak?

> >If not, how do you know that the Stealth
> >contributed to your success, rather than detracted
> >from it?
>
>If my opponent keeps missing, I figure I'm doing something right.

This is your impression. How do you *know* that it is your Stealth which

causes him to miss more often than you do, as opposed to your Superior
FCSs 
which causes *you* to *hit* more often than he does?

[snip design sequence which essentially says that John doesn't really
use 
the points system for setting up battles, but instead plays more 
scenario-driven games than equal-point one-offs]

Regards,

Oerjan
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

"Life is like a sewer.
  What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."