Re: FT Fleet formations was Re: [GZG] FT vector movement systems

[Oerjan Ariander <oerjan.ariander@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Richard Bell wrote:

> > Or do you maintain the screen is omniscient enough to always know where
> > the enemy will be, so that you can give it an order like, "Screen us" and
> > they will then always be in position?
>
> You have nicely hit the point that I was trying to make.  If you have not 
> experimented with it beforehand and "drilled your ship handlers" (by 
> writing down what actually worked onto a reference card), you are not 
> going to get it right during a battle, without immense amounts of luck  or 
> analysis paralysis.  The most important word in your first paragraph is 
> "try".

Um... Richard? A day or two ago, you stated that you had only played FT 
twice - once in Cinematic, and once in Vector.

If as you say you have only played each FT movement system *once*, then it 
is no surprise if you can't work out correct formation-changing orders on 
the fly.

If OTOH you had played half a dozen games with either movement system, then 
I would've mildly surprised if you *couldn't* work out appropriate 
formation-change orders with at most a few seconds' extra effort.

And if you had been a veteran FT player with scores or hundreds of games 
under your belt, then I would've been *extremely* surprised to hear that 
you had problems working out formation-change orders on the fly - with that 
much experience it would, as Roger Books wrote, be trivial.

FWIW I'm prepared to bet quite a lot of money that I would not be able to 
work out correct formation-change orders in my first-ever game of AT:V or 
SITS without doing some experimentation first.

> The sticking point is working backwards from the desired endpoint of a 
> formation to orders needed to get there from the current point.  Being 
> able to predict what each possible order will do is of marginal utility if 
> none of them do what you want.

And at least for Full Thrust, a few games will give you enough experience 
to do that working-backwards stuff (or at least it has for all FT newbies 
I've taught over the years, so I would expect it to do so for you too).

Since I've neither played nor read either AV:T or SITS I can't compare how 
easy or hard it is to learn formation-flying in those games, but IMO you're 
making an entire henhouse out of a feather over how hard FT formation 
changes are supposed to be <shrug>

Regards,

Oerjan
oerjan.ariander@xxxxxxxxxx

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

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