Re: [FT] Yet Another Fighters Suggestion

Alan Brain wrote:

 >>This and and several similar numerical limitations (including Alan's
 >>proposal and variants thereof) have already been tested. They all run
into
 >>the above problem with making dreadnoughts and larger even more
desirable
 >>than they already are; some of them have additional problems as well.
 >
 >>BTW Alan, you still haven't answered my questions about whether or
not you
 >>have actually playtested this proposed rules yourself...?
 >
 >Here's some of the raw data/notes:

In other words "yes" :-) Good.

 >1. 24 Fighter Groups vs Death Star ( with 40 PDS ) - conclusion,
 >needed to limit PDS per arc as well as fighters attacking.
 >(Exercise on paper)

A not entirely unexpected result, I think <g>

 >2. Marianas Turkey Shoot Revisited: 4 Ark Royals each with 2
 >Furious escort and no fighters left vs 24 Fighter groups (standard).
 >a) With existing rules : CVs wiped out with few losses to fighters.
 >b) With new rules : 1 CV down, all Furious down, 1 CV at 2nd
threshold,
 >others untouched, (needs repeating, as rolls were odd, though my
 >notes didn't say whether too good or too bad, and it was a long time
ago...
 >I recall a lot of 6s and a lot of 1s being rolled)

Looks pretty similar to the results I got when playtesting your proposal

last spring.

If you have the time, I'd suggest that you try this match-up a few more 
times, but also run another series of tests where you replace the 8 
Furiouses by the same points value of extra empty Ark Royals or SDNs.
Then 
check which of these two target forces did best against the 24-group 
fighter strike - the all-capital one, or the capitals+CEs one.

(Don't worry about "realistic fleet compositions" for your tests, BTW -
the 
"2 cruisers/escorts per capital" thingy is mostly a 20th century feature

anyway; all-capital battle fleets were quite realistic in the Napoleonic

era and earlier... and the extremes of the fleet-mix spectrum are always

more likely to turn up unbalanced than the middle ground.)

 >I've also played a number of battles using these rules, but as no
massed
 >fighters were used (both sides used FB1 ships), they didn't have much 
effect.

CanCon-style "balanced" fleet mixes, yesno?

 >One minor thing : it was always better to use "cherry" Fighters vs
 >the big boys, [...]

Matches my results from last spring as well.

 >In cases where only 1 side has 1-2 Fighter Groups, they were always
used
 >as anti-missile escorts, or to snipe Frigates/Destroyers attempting to
 >get in the aft arc.

IOW no different from the current situation.

 >Areas I have done *none or insufficient* playtesting with:

[...]

 >In fact, the only games I'm confident of are FB1 vs FB1 battles using
 >cinematic.

Ouch. That's not exactly where the main fighter balance problems are,
I'm 
afraid...

Regards,

Oerjan
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

"Life is like a sewer.
  What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
-Hen3ry