Re: Scatterguns and SMPs... and PDAF

On Thu, 17 Apr 1997, David Brewer wrote:

> Ah, but a fighter group costs both 20 points and 6 mass. A 1 mass
> scattergun priced at half the cost of a fighter group, by your
> mass<->points juju would go for 20 points itself... add on the AS 
> capability and I'm saying at least 30 points.

Yes, I was ignoring mass for a while. It wouldn't be exactly fair to 
limit AF weapons to completely equal trades. Fighters can do other 
things, you have to stick protection on all ships etc. etc.

If your AF weapon has AS capability, that should be priced separately.
 
> I don't, however, think that a PDAF should be priced w.r.t fighter
> groups in this manner. When you outfit a fleet, it's unlikely that 
> more than one ship will be engaged by fighters, and that one ship 
> will cop the lot. 

And most likely, it will be your biggest ship. If you want to gamble,
put 
all the PDAFs on that one.

> Most PDAF's are wasted points/mass. 

And if no one shoots at you, your shields are just wasted points/mass. 
It's the nature of all defensive systems.

> This isn't so 
> for scatterguns, because of the dual function.

So they'll pay extra for that function. Frankly, I don't see the big 
point here. Assuming there was a AS Scatter and a AF Scatter, should the

regular Scatter, in your opinion, cost/mass more or less than those two 
combined? IMHO, less.

> It seems odd that such high-tech ships come with so few DP's w.r.t
> the outrageous offensive capabilities that they carry. 

How so? Seems very "modern" to me. Extreme range, lethal firepower, but 
the aluminum tin cans just can't take a hit. The KV's have just hit this

bend in the eternal offense-defense cycle.

> I'm not
> saying that this isn't justifiable, but I'll still call it odd. The
> minimum human ship to take a PTT carries enough DP to take the
> average PTT hit. The minimum Kra'Vak ship to carry an RG-2 cannot
> take the least-damaging RG-2 hit. Civil wars must be pretty darn
> swift out there in Kra'Vakia. 

Well, the average DD can't eat a torpedo hit.

> If they play with simultaneous
> combat resolution out there, they must often find that they simply
> annihilate each other.

I do... It would promote the use of smaller vessels in quantity.

> Is it? More than the 2 point difference? 

Debatable.

> Average damage would be 2 (if we round the die up). 

Is there any other way to roll 1d3?

> Would you swap out a PDAF for a one-shot one-arc weapon that got you 
> three dice against fighters?

Probably not.

> Only w.r.t. the Kra'Vak technology. That's where an overhaul is
> needed.

Exactly my point. The original system is clean and simple, but the more 
things you tack on it, the more oddities, discrepancies, conflicting 
rules sections and simple oversights you have.

You need to overhaul it before you have special rules for each ship
type, 
like the "Evil Overlord of Miniatures Gaming" games.
 
> I would also suppose that
> a minimum number of DP's would have to be taken.

It only changes the math. As long as there are weapon systems that let 
you fight out of everyone else's range, you don't really lose anything 
taking the minimum possible DP for the stand-off ships. To a lesser 
extent, it applies to one-shot strike ships too.

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