Re: FB designs and SLMs

In a message dated 98-09-09 14:01:30 EDT, you write:

<< I've played around a bit with both book designs and some of my own,
and 
 my comments on SLMs are as follows:
 
 Mass:	You gotta have a LOT of SLMs to be worthwhile.	If you have one 
 or two racks, forget it.  You gotta a lot of salvos to blanket the 
 enemy's projected endpoints.

Tell that to the Komarov that I killed, in my mind SMLs should be used
to kill
the slow ships, hears an idea: use Pulse Torps and Beams to slow ships
down so
that they can be picked off by your SMLs, this works, but if the enemy
has
fast ships you need a lot of launchers. 

 Maneuver:  If you're facing SLMs and you don't, you're dead.  Flying in

 a straight line is all well and got, but makes you an easy target.  I 
 can't count the times I've gotten a salvo of SLMs in base-to-base 
 contact with an enemy capital ship that isn't using it's imagination.	
 This is where pickup games can be harder to use SLMs in that against 
 your regular opponents.  I can guess 99 times out of 100 what my 
 brother is going to do with his fleet, total strangers sometimes 
 surprise me.

Not only that but you need fast ships, if using the VMS then if you have
a
Komarov, Konstantin, Der Theuerdank, Von Tegetthoff, Szent Istvan or
Maria Von
Burgund you will not survive, and some of the others if you get a check
on
thrust.
 
 Escorts:  Gotta have 'em.  
 
 Variety:  SLMs don't kill large ships except in unusual cases.  SLMs 
 strip off the escorts and damage capitals, sometimes inflicting that 
 all-important first systems check.  If you don't have a beam-based 
 punch to back up the missles, you're dead. >>

Bye
Stephen