Balanced (?) weapons ideas

Hello, 

The anal-retentive game balancer speaks:
(uhh - writes, I mean)

If you don't like trying to balance weapons, stop reading here. You'll 
only get irritated <g> Otherwise, please go on:

Being a Starfire campaigner, I'm rather obsessed with the need to
balance 
different technologies. Each weapon has to have some advantage - be it 
small size, massive damage, long range, low cost, or whatever - over 
other weapons, because otherwise, it won't be used in the campaign (or, 
if certain tech items are restricted to certain players only, one side
or 
the other will suffer). Above all, I want to have a reason to use all of

the various weapons available, and not only because they are available.

My starting point was Ludo Toen's beam variant, where all beam batteries
roll one single die but modifies the roll (A +2, B +1, C no modifier; -1
per full 12 m.u. between firer and target, no fixed max range). I like 
this variant better than the original; no real reason, though.

The ranges turned out to be a little too long; A batteries got a max
range
of 60 m.u., which means a ship with 3-arc A batteries can cover pretty
much my entire gaming table without having to move. By using a range
modifier of -1 per 9 m.u. instead, ranges for the various beam batteries
fell back to about the same as they are in FT. 

The next step was the AA battery. I like the idea of 'burn-out', so I
let 
it roll 2 dice with a +2 modifier; range modifier -1 per 12 m.u. (which 
gives it its range advantage). If you roll snake-eyes, the weapon is 
destroyed (just as for the original AA battery at long range).

Then came the fun part: determining 'proper' masses for the weapons. I 
calculated average damage per mass unit the weapons could inflict at all

ranges; and did this for various weapon masses as well as for a target 
armour level of 0, 1 and 2 (since shields only really affect beams, I 
didn't bother with them). I won't repeat the charts here, but the end 
result was:

Weapon: Mass:	    Cost:     Max # arcs: Notes:
   C	  1	    1+1/arc	   3	  Anti fighter/missile
capabilities
   B	1 if 1-arc  3+2/cost	   3
	2 if multi-arc
   A	1 + 1/arc   4+3/arc	   3
   AA	  5	    15		   1	  Risk of burn-out

The mass-effectiveness (in average damage/weapon mass) ranges from 1 
(single-arc B batteries at close (<9 m.u.) range against an unprotected 
target) to 0.04 (three-arc A-batteries at extreme range against level 2 
armour); for most armour/range/mass combos it lies between 0.08 and
0.33.

This makes the single-arc B battery VERY effective - about 80% of the
mass-
effectiveness of the railguns from MT - but also a very expensive weapon

(measured in cost/mass). And, of course, it needs to be pointed in the 
right direction <g>.

Next step: Do the same thing for railguns. Easy to do - all railguns
have
the same mass- and cost-efficency (Hm. Then why should I use anything
but
R1? Sure, they don't hurt as much each when they hit, but they are far
less vulnerable to treshold rolls, and as AdamDe (can't call you just 
AdamD now when Adam Dixon has joined!) pointed out: they deliver just as

much damage, but more evenly spread out over time...). Besides, they
make 
a fixed points cost (here we go again!) of Kra'Vak escorts far more 
effective than the same cost in Kra'Vak capital ships, since the escorts

pay far less for engines - and the armour benefit against railguns
really 
isn't very big.

The mass-effectiveness for railguns at close range is 1.25 against
unprotected targets, 1.11 agaist armour level 1 and 0.97 against armour
level 2, dropping off in 20% increments with range. Ouch. 

My solution was to increase the mass of all railgun batteries by 1,
which
makes the R3 50% harder-hitting than the same mass of R1s - but also 50%
more expensive. Thus, there is a real difference between them;
mass-effectiveness at close range varies from 0.49 (R1 against armour
level 2) to 0.97 (R3 against an unprotected target). As for costs -
well,
the effectiveness-curve was mostly similar to the single-arc B, which
costs 5 per mass, but railguns ignore shields - say 6 per class (ie, R1 
costs 6, R3 costs 18).

So, what's left?

Well, missiles, nova cannon, waveguns and needle beams are all 
sufficiently different not to fit into this analysis. That leaves the 
scattergun, submunition pack and pulse torp.

As I've said before: Since scattergun fire spreads out in a cone, the 
density of the projectile cloud falls off with range (as the square of 
the range, to be exact - but that's too complicated). Thus my suggestion

is to reduce scattergun damage by 1 for each full 3 m.u. to the target 
while firing at starships, or by 1 for each 2 m.u. when fired against 
fighters. Armour, too, ought to protect against these things; so reduce 
damage by 1 for each armour level the target has (after all, Kra'Vak 
armour should probably protect against Kra'Vak weapons, and not just 
against Hu'Man ones!) The short range is a handicap; but OTOH it is 
allowed to fire into all four arcs. The mass and cost seem fair.

Subpacks - well, no changes here. The 'rocket density' should fall off
for
them too, so the varying number of dice can be explained; I consider
them
as single-arc weapons, and they don't have any anti-fighter
capabilities, 
so the lower cost for them (compared to the scatterguns) is justified.

That leaves the pulse torps. IIRC, the pulse torp hits on 3+, -1 per
full
6 m.u. range; unfortunately, I can't check (since my copy of FT is
somewhere else entirely :( ) Now, compared to the railguns, this weapon
is
large, expensive, and very inefficient - in fact, worse than many beam
configurations, even against protection. By cutting the mass to four,
and
the cost to ten, it gets competitive again - the mass decrease is far
more
important than the cost decrease, of course. 

So - the end result:

Weapon: Mass:	    Cost:     Max # arcs: Notes:
   C	  1	    1+1/arc	   3	  Anti-fighter/missile
capabilities
   B	1 if 1-arc  3+2/cost	   3
	2 if multi-arc
   A	1 + 1/arc   4+3/arc	   3
   AA	  5	    15		   1	  Risk of burn-out
   R1	  2	     6		   1
   R2	  3	    12		   1
   R3	  4	    18		   1
Pulse t.  4	    10		   1
Scatterg. 1	     5		   4	  Anti-fighter(missile)
capabilities
Subpack   1	     3		   1

Anyone still with me..? No? 

Later,

Oerjan Ohlson

( Snailmail: Ljuskarrsvagen 44N1, 133 31  Saltsjobaden, SWEDEN		
     )
( Telephone: +46 - (0)8-7177891 					
     )
( Email: f92-ooh@nada.kth.se						
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