Re: FT Newtonian Acceleration

Roger Burton West wrote:

>In vector, what I've done is to add a drift marker. Leave drift-1
>in place where the ship would end up without acceleration; move drift-2
>in accordance with the ship's manoeuvres; put the ship half-way between
>them, and use the vector from (ship's original position) to (drift-2)
to
>calculate velocity for the next turn.
>
>Naturally, this cuts the size of the manoeuvre envelope (for purposes
of
>missile avoidance and such like) even further, and missile/PB attack
>ranges should probably be dropped further when this is in use.
>
Having slept on the problem of realistic acceleration with vector 
movement, I might have a solution (without needing that 10' cattle prod 
:) )  I'm not clear on Roger's solution, but I think that we are 
thinking along the same lines.

Currently, the game turn starts with the ship counter/miniature oriented

to its current facing, a direction arrow for its heading and a starting 
V (Vs) on the record sheet.  Currently, the ship is moved a number of MU

equal to its Vs (its "drift"), then maneuvers and/or MD burn, then 
compute new heading and the ending V (Ve) and finally move the direction

arrow to the new ship position representing new direction of travel.   I

assume everyone works this way for the current vector rules (excluding 
any house rules).

To get a "more realistic" effect of the acceleration, assuming that 1 MD

thrust point represents acceleration, not distance moved, try this
option:

 From the same setup at the beginning of the game turn, move the ship a 
number of MU equal to its Vs (the "drift"), then move a temporary marker

in the same manner as described above for the ship maneuver/MD burn. 
 Leaving this temporary marker on the board (in the position where the 
ship would be in the sequence above), move the ship from its position at

the end of it's initial drift as per the written orders, but only at 1/2

rate for all MD burns and thruster/retro pushes.  Compute the Ve and new

heading using the start position and the temporary marker (rather than 
the ship position), but place the new direction arrow on the actual 
ship, pointing parallel to the line between the initial position and the

temporary position.  Finally, remove the temporary marker.

The effect of this change is that the ship gets 1/2 the immediate 
benefit of acceleration in terms of physical position and full benefit 
of the acceleration to its velocity vector (speed and heading).

This is slightly more complicated than the the solution for Cinematic, 
but I don't think it is out of proportion to the complexity difference 
basically inherent between the Cinematic and Vector systems.

J