Re: Strategic Thrust using BR25

In a message dated 4/2/99 8:41:40 AM Mountain Daylight Time, 
atomicat@geocities.com writes:

<< ShldWulf@aol.com wrote:
 
 >> I was figuring on the ships being unable to do constant
accelleration, so
 >> your fleet speed, (using the lowest thrust in the fleet) determined
the
 >> "orbital track) you could take. Higher thrusts could take a more
direct
 >> orbit, while low thrusts had to take more "Homann" type orbits to
reach 
thier
 >> target planet.
 
 >That's a good idea.  I hadn't really thought about anything except a 
constant
> acceleration type of movement.  But I like your idea here much better.
 
What do
> you propose as the specifics of this rule?

I hadn't quite gotten that far yet. (Still waiting on the game I got off
EBay 
to get here :)
But I recall someone once mentioning a plan to divide the orbit tracks
up 
into (basicaly) out-tracks, (away from the sun) and in-tracks (towards
the 
sun), which might work. I'd think you'd need to assign a "thrust
rateing" to 
each track arc. IE: to take a "short" track you need a higher thrust
than a 
longer, (but more fuel efficient) track. Thrust 8 can pretty much cut a 
striaght shot across orbits, while Thrust of 1 or 2 has to take a long 
shallow arc to the target.
 
>> I'd also considered adding some rules for detection and stealth. It
might 
be
>> possible for the various planets to know your coming, or for you to
hide as
>> you come in.
 
 >I like that idea a great deal, but all the ideas I've had on making
that
 >happen require way too much in the game mechanics department and hence
 >playability suffers greatly.	If you have any ideas on this I'd be
very
 >interested.  So far, the best idea I've had in this regard is to have 
counters on
 >the board that correspond to the fleets and then keep each fleet's
ships' 
records
 >in a separate pile clearly marked with the same symbol, letter,
number, 
color,
 >whatever as the fleet's counter on the board.  You'd have to trust the

opposing
 >player when his fleets meet in space and he starts to shuffle papers
between
 >fleets, or you'd have to have a referee.  It just seems like a lot of
work 
and
 >you still don't get to have a genuine sneak attack.
 
Very true, but then again I was kinda assuming a refree'd type game :)
The 
only "genuine" sneak attacks were going to be slashing pass'. ie: Your
fleet 
boosts up to transfer speed and then pass' the target planet at transfer

speed, dropping bombs and shooting up anything they can range on and
keeping 
going along the orbital track. No manuvers or stand up fighting. Very
similar 
to the "passing" fight below. Other than that the only thing "detection"
was 
going to allow was less collateral damage to the planet (Civil defense
has 
more time to kick in) and more defensive preparedness. The whole thing
was 
loosely based on the ECM rules and stuff in MT. A fleet ship with Area
ECM 
would give the defense less time to prepare for your arrival. This would
also 
have given more incentive to use the longer orbits as I was assuming,
the 
more Thrust you use to slow from transfer speed, the more visable you
become 
to the defenders. I was using a similar rule for my Star Trek conversion
to 
track cloaked ships. Both have gone missing since I came back from
Korea. so 
I'll have to reconstitue em when I can.
 
>> I'd also considered adding an ability to have a "passing" fight
>> if two fleets were traveling through the same circle along the path.
No
>> actual stand up fights as the transfer velocity would be too high.
 
>That's not a bad idea.  I had thought about having this occur when the
roll
> to determine intercept is tied.

Again this was going to require a "detection" roll in my thinking as
space is 
big enough that you have to be LOOKING for enemies in interplanetary
space. 
And if you did spot em, it was one good shot with everything and worst
odds 
to hit, basically hope for the best. 

Either way, the compication factor may be too high. I'll keep thinking
on it 
and would appriciate input also :)

Randy