Re: [FT] Simple cloaking system proposal

Staged Cloak is a perfect segue into what has been
flipping abou tin my mind on this topic.

In Traveller we had Black Globes, and a simple(ish)
way to reconcile cloak/blackglobes/energy expediture
is this (IIRC):

Primer: Black globes 'flicker'. They _could_ be left
at 'full-on', but no information(energy) passes in
either direction so the ship is in danger of
overheating AND of running into stuff blindly. In the
Trav universe one could set the flicker rate to limit
the amount of incoming fire, but it would also have
the effect of limiting thrust and firing (energy OUT
of the system). Black globes held incming energy in
capacitors of finite capacity, so flickering allowed
for energy to be spit back out (though I only recall
using the incoming (bad) energy to fire weapons being
available at a very high tech level. I could be wrong.

So say you have a T6 ship. If you want to charge your
cloak/globe, you have to allot x amount of available
energy ( in this case lets say it is your allowed
thrust) which will NOT be available for thrust in the
FOLLOWING turn (or in the same turn if you want to be
difficult ;->).
Weapons allocation would have to be metered in a
similar way, though it smacks of another chart (and
that is anethema to the FT-Way).

So in summation, deciding just how well protected you
wanted to be VS how effective you want to be, decided
each turn, would be the key IMO. reduce your overall #
of dice by the rough percentage of protection you
want, perhaps? Thrust by the same factor, rounded
down?

--- Eric Foley <stiltman@teleport.com> wrote:
> Okay, replied to my own post.
> 
> I guess I wouldn't have much objection to perhaps
> having a staged cloak of
> sorts, where there's a "full cloak" that goes by the
> traditional rules and
> fully phased out of reality, while there's a
> "partial cloak" that allows
> limited visibility under the means given here. 
> Although I still like the
> regular rules better.
> 
> E
> (aka StiltMan)
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Eric Foley" <stiltman@teleport.com>
> To: <gzg-l@csua.berkeley.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2004 10:57 AM
> Subject: Re: [FT] Simple cloaking system proposal
> 
> 
> > I hate to be a poo-poo on this, but this cloaking
> system would be
> completely
> > useless in my circles.  Especially with the half
> thrust.  If I could see
> > those guys
> > coming I'd hose them down with every plasma bolt
> in the fleet.  In a 5000
> > point engagement, if I'm carrying them at all I'm
> probably sporting around
> > fourty
> > dice worth of them.  If you've actually got enough
> thrust that I'm in
> doubt
> > as to
> > where you'll be under cloak I'll fire them in half
> bursts in continuous
> fire
> > along
> > the arc you'd have to travel to bring your weapons
> to bear.  So what if
> I've
> > got
> > a -3 DRM?  It's not like you're going to be
> shooting back while you're
> still
> > cloaked.
> >
> > I'll stick with the regular cloaking rules, with a
> few house rules to make
> > dealing
> > with area effect weapons simpler.  Our house rules
> for that go like this:
> >
> > 1.	Area effect weapons.... simply ignored while
> cloaked.  (PSB:  phasing
> > cloak.)
> >
> > 2.	Planets and asteroids... not ignored.  (Our
> asteroids and planets
> don't
> > move,
> > so this is easy to deal with.  PSB:  large gravity
> wells pull you back
> into
> > phase if you
> > fly that close to them.)
> >
> > 3.	Your _own_ area effect weapons... can't be
> fired until the next turn
> > after you
> > decloak.  Turn rationale is that cloaking and
> decloaking happens during
> the
> > movement
> > phase, and you can't write move orders with area
> effect weapons included
> if
> > you don't
> > know where you are.  (PSB:	it takes a little
> while to get your bearings
> to
> > be able to put
> > your weapons into an accurate point of space, and
> the disorientation of it
> > is too much to
> > be able to do it on short notice once you're
> decloaking.  Not sure how
> this
> > works out
> > for the turn when you go _into_ cloak, but I guess
> there's nothing
> stopping
> > you.)
> >
> > 4.	Wave guns... cannot be charged while cloaked. 
> This balances out the
> > idea of
> > charging tons of cloaked wave guns and firing them
> and then recloaking to
> > protect
> > yourself from retaliation.	(PSB:  Too much energy
> buildup and it's
> > impossible to conceal.)
> >
> > 5.	If you have cloak-capable ships, you _are_
> allowed to have them start
> > the game
> > cloaked, as long as you put down a mooring point
> in space at your start
> > location on the
> > board to state where you're tracking from.
> >
> > 6.	Fighters... _are_ allowed to be launched in
> the act of decloaking, but
> > must be
> > recovered with secondary moves if they're landing,
> if at all.
> >
> > This'll also make cloaking systems easier to work
> with, balances them out
> > with area
> > effects in both directions, while still giving
> enough of the feel of
> > submarine warfare that
> > it's a bit of an interesting game trying to play
> with them.  They can work
> > against you as
> > much as they work for you, since setting up
> grandiose ambushes from long
> > range is
> > vulnerable to your enemy pulling unexpected
> maneuvers that put them in the
> > wrong place
> > when you come out of cloak.  However, short cloaks
> are still rather
> > effective in tactical
> > maneuvers if you use them intelligently (and
> against fast ships, it's
> still
> > a little bit of a
> > crapshoot, although against slow ones they're just
> deadly).  Some of this
> is
> > usually
> > useful enough that they mostly make up for the
> expense of packing cloaking
> > devices
> > in the first place.
> >
> > Cloaked carriers have been used before in our
> games, but over time that
> > concept kind
> > of fell by the wayside because even cloaked soap
> bubbles are still
> expensive
> > enough that
> > the fighter numbers go down enough that if they're
> prepared for massed
> > fighters much at all it
> > ceases to be particularly effective.
> >
> > E
> > (aka StiltMan)
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message ----- 
> > From: "matt tope" <mptope@omnihybrid.com>
> > To: <gzg-l@csua.berkeley.edu>
> > Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2004 8:40 AM
> > Subject: Re: [FT] Simple cloaking system proposal
> >
> >
> > > Grant wrote:
> > >
> > > >I've been thinking about this some more.  One
> possibility would be to
> > >  >require the cloaked ship to plot one
> additional turn in advance.  This
> > would
> > >  >further restrict it's maneuvering with regards
> to other ships without
> > making
> > >  >it completely out of touch.  The PSB would be
> that the cloak reduces
> the
> > >  >incoming navigation data and makes the ship
> slower to respond to
> outside
> > >  >activity.
> > >
> > > Another interesting idea. Personally I prefer
> your idea limiting the
> > cloaked vessel to half thrust,
> > > but there is no reason why the above idea
> couldn't be substituted in
> place
> > of the half thrust option
> > > if people liked that better.
> > >
> > >
> > > >The basic idea would be to reduce the effect of
> missiles by about half.
> > >
> > > I was also thinking about this some more this
> afternoon and came to a
> > similar conclusion myself. I like the -3 from the
> salvo missile lock on
> > roll, but as the cloaked vessel couldn't shoot any
> missiles down and if
> it's
> > thrust is halved as well it could be in real
> trouble. At least against
> PBL's
> > a cloaked vessel could be screened as well and
> gain some measure of
> > protection. So, in response, I was thinking of
> limiting the salvo missiles
> > detection radius to 3mu. That way cloaked vessels
> are hard to hit with
> salvo
> > missiles but if the salvo is especially well
> placed then the cloaked
> vessel
> > is still at risk. If cloaked vessels are subs then
> PBL's are depth charges
> > and salvo missiles are anti submarine mortars.
> > >
> > > >I'd reduce the impact of Nova cannon and Wave
> Motion Guns similarly.
> > >
> > > Hmmm...tempted to let area effect weapons work
> as normal, but then
> again,
> > the cloaked vessel would be easier to hit with
> them...mmm. How about (as I
> > think you were suggesting) reducing the number of
> dice rolled to reflect
> the
> > uncertainty of the targets exact location, half
> the number of dice (round
> > up), but leaving the blast radius as normal?
> > >
> > > Thanks,
> > >
> > > Matt Tope
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> 
> 
> 

=====
Jeff "My dice hate me!" Fearnow  
Gaming to keep War out of RealTime!

"Who's Daddy's favorite weapon, huh? Is it Choo-Choo? Is it Choo-Choo?
Yes it is! Such a good hand-to-hand weapon you are!"- S*P 041002

XT350/DOD#1890

	
		
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