Re: [GZG] Hugh's New Fighter/Point Defence rules

-----Original Message-----
>From: Hugh Fisher <laranzu@ozemail.com.au>

>Noam Izenberg wrote:
>>A couple quick thoughts, because I've still missed most of the
conversation.
>>My first reaction is I think they (the new roles) weaken Heavy 
>>missiles and fighters significantly (It doesn't take a great deal of 
>>fleet modification/sacrifice to make a task force effectively HM and 
>>fighter proof.) and leave salvo missiles almost intact, unless 
>>you're going to convert PDS systems in to %ship mass systems. I 
>>think any system that grants virtual invulnerability after a 
>>certain, relatively low threshold is too flawed. An average PD of 11 
>>is granted with an array of 14 PDS - not too much to ask from a DN, 
>>or even a BC going up against a known Fighter heavy fleet.

>I thought it was reasonable, the 14 PDS needed for safety
>against regular fighters (not attack or torpedo) requires a
>capital and two escort cruisers for any of the FB 1 fleets or
>their expanded versions at star-ranger.com. And you still
>have to make the rolls, it's not automatic. The new rules
>also make it practical for the fighters to divide across
>multiple targets, splitting the ADFC escorts.

Yes, but that was always a consideration.  Even when I was up against
150 PDS in a game, I threw my fighters at as many targets as I thought I
could reasonably expect to get some hits on.

>But point taken, even short-term invulnerability is a Bad Thing.
>Slightly modified "December" version of the new rules now has
>heavy missiles / plasma bolts now hitting on a 6 but doing
>one or two die less of damage at the top bands, and the fighter
>assistance rules no longer optional. So now it's always possible
>to do some damage.

That should help, although it may depend very greatly still on how high
up the bands are.  And even at that, it's still an extra set of tables
we'd have to consult for a special case.

>I'm trying for no new systems, and as far as possible no changes
>to the mass of existing systems. Redrawing SSDs is much more
>annoying than changing points costs or rules. If it's between
>changing human fleets and changing aliens, keep the humans.

Eh.  If the GZGverse humans really ran into the Cylons, I think they'd
start changing their PDS balance to be something closer to what you'd
see in my campaigns.  They don't need it now because none of the other
GZGverse powers use a whole lot of fighters either.

>The first idea is that point defence should be screen like rather
>than individually aimed. The table is designed to give diminishing
>returns from more PDS. At the bottom, even a small amount helps,
>but it gets increasingly difficult to 'level up' from there.
>Because it's random rather than fixed, even a weakly defended
>ship can make itself almost invulnerable with a series of good
>rolls - but only for that turn.

Well, now that I've thought about it a little longer, there's a flaw
here.  It assumes that whatever intelligence that controls fighters
cares any more about preserving them than the intelligences that control
missiles.  Sure, we have morale rules to suggest that Full Thrust
fighters are crewed, but a casual glance at the rate at which air forces
around the world are moving to remote-piloted drones even before we've
gotten off our own planet in real life would tend to cast doubts on
whether there'd still likely be crewed fighters in use by humans in the
late 22nd century -- which also happens to be the same reason I'm not a
fan of the morale rules in the books, either.

Kra'Vak, if crewed, get _more_ aggressive rather than less so.	Sa'Vasku
drones probably don't care much if they survive.  Phalons might, they're
fairly selfish creatures but they might well just bio-engineer their
fighters and/or the pilots.  Playing the Cylons against these rules
would be a little bit of a misnomer, both because the Cylons are
literally robotic and even what self-preserving consciousness they have
can just download to another Raider if they die.  The Sopovar/Sopi in my
own campaign are sufficiently genocidally religious that their attack
fighter pilots would welcome martyrdom.  The Teracrons use borged pilots
whose self-preservation instincts have been programmed away.  And so on.

>The other idea is to split casualties from effectiveness. In
>these rules fighters are always at risk of some casualties, but
>it gets rid of the current feedback effect where more PDS both
>reduces the damage you take AND inflicts more on the enemy, as
>if screens not only blocked beam fire but actually bounced it
>back.

Well, there is the matter that screens are basically a different form of
armor, while PDS actually is a weapon that's firing at the fighters
coming in...

>On salvo missiles, my thinking is to leave them alone for now.
>To me, the priority is fixing the massed fighter problem that
>is a sore spot for many FT players. If I seem cavalier about
>dismissing issues with missiles or plasma bolts, it's not that
>I don't care, but the fighter issues need to be resolved first.

Well, I'm far less concerned about the issue of Fleet Book ships getting
killed too easily by fighters -- at some point, they're just not
designed to deal with Cylons, they're designed to provide an interesting
sample fleet that plays well against normal cross-sections of the fleets
displayed in the book (e.g. there's 24 carriers and 336 ships between
frigate and battlecruiser size in the NAC navy; if you're proposing to
bring a fleet with 2 carriers and less than 30 of the others, you're a
little out of whack).  They work well when played within their own
universe and present a fun game, which is what they're supposed to do. 
I'm more concerned about the issue of fighters either being overwhelming
or useless... although I'm not _that_ concerned because I've generally
found that there are things that can be done about both.  If somebody
can present a better solution than what we've got in the regular rules
that doesn't have fatal flaws in it and doesn't completely wreck any o
 f the game systems that are presently there, I'm all for it.  So far...
well, I don't know that I've seen one, but I can try the December
version of this one out.

E
_______________________________________________
Gzg-l mailing list
Gzg-l@mail.csua.berkeley.edu
http://mail.csua.berkeley.edu:8080/mailman/listinfo/gzg-l