Re: FT: Damage Track Sliding Scale Suggestion

On 24 Feb 1997, Alun Thomas wrote:
> How about changing the damage track, so that it forms a triangle, with
each
> row being 2 or 3 boxes shorter than the one above it?
> 
> eg:
> a mass 32 ship (16 hits) could have a damage track like this:
> 
>     XXXXXXX
>     XXXXX
>     XXX
>     X

There's a problem with this: "the poor get poorer". Once a ship has
taken about 1/2 damage, it starts to degenerate into a drifting lump of
wires & circuit boards as more and more systems fail due to all those 
threshhold checks.  This would make it easier to destroy the ships in 
the game, especially the large, "fear-of-ghod" capital ship. For
example,
I assume a mass-84 superdreadnaught would look something like this:

     damage boxes   Threshhold roll:
(12) XXXXXXXXXXXX	     6
(10) XXXXXXXXXX 	   5,6
 (8) XXXXXXXX		 4,5,6
 (6) XXXXXX		 4,5,6
 (4) XXXX		 4,5,6
 (2) XX 		  dead

As compared to the current system:

(11) XXXXXXXXXXX	     6
(11) XXXXXXXXXXX	   5,6
(10) XXXXXXXXXX 	 4,5,6
(10) XXXXXXXXXX 	  dead

In the current system, a heavily damaged capital ship can still present
a considerable threat, while the in new system, it can be neutralized
somewhat more easily.

Here's an extreme example for a 98-mass capital ship:

     damage boxes   Threshhold roll:
(13) XXXXXXXXXXXXX	      6
(11) XXXXXXXXXXX	    5,6
 (9) XXXXXXXXX		  4,5,6
 (7) XXXXXXX		  4,5,6
 (5) XXXXX		  4,5,6
 (3) XXX		  4,5,6
 (1) X			   dead

As compared to the current system:

(13) XXXXXXXXXXXXX	       6
(12) XXXXXXXXXXXX	     5,6
(12) XXXXXXXXXXXX	   4,5,6
(12) XXXXXXXXXXXX	    dead

Rick Rutherford       rickr@digex.net	    The above opinions are mine.
"It seems to me that the nearer painting approaches sculpture the better
it is, and that sculpture is the worse the nearer it approaches
painting."
					     -- Michelangelo