Re: B5/FT: Combining Armor and Interceptors?

At 11:18 AM 3/7/97 +0000, you wrote:
>>>I think that you will find armoured ships just a little bit to long
lived
>>>if you go for a system like this - especially if they are large. 
This BTW
>>>is a fault with many armour systems - large ships benefit far more
than
>>>small ships from them. 
>>
>>That's only logical though, Look at the Battleship Iowa and a Light
cruiser
>>of the same period. They might have the same percentage of mass as
armor,
>>but the Iowa's armor is much thicker and makes the ship more
survivable.
>>But the Iowa is also much more expensive and would probably not be
used for
>>convoy escort duty.
>>
>> Marshall Grover
>
I kinda like the extra damage boxes idea myself.  I played around with
the
idea last night and this is what I came up with:

Armor
Mass 0 Cost 50% hull cost/Level
	Every level of armor adds additional damage points to the ship's
first row
of damage boxes, equal to 15% of the total number of damage points for
that
ship (rounded down, but never less than 1 box per level).  These extra
damage points should be shaded to distinguish them as armor, as they do
not
count towards determining crew as regular damage points do.
	Cost is 50% of the hull cost per level, with a maximum of 2
levels.  Every
level of armor reduces the maximum thrust of that ship by 1, but does
not
subtract from the ship's actual thrust rating (e.g. A ship with two
levels
of armor may have a maximum thrust of 6).
	(Note: these rules completely replace the Kra'vak Armor rules on
MT p. 25;
armor no longer gives bonuses to manuvering, nor does it convey any
special
resistance to any particular weapon).

Yes, I realize that the "minimum of one extra point" part can be
munchkinized into allowing very small ships to get one or two pts of
armor
on the cheap, but I justify this as an effect of the 2 square law: if
you
increase the size of a ship, you increase surface area by 4, (or
something
like that; it's been a while since Mrs. Billy's High School Geometry).
Comments?

Take care,

Tre