Re: New AoG "Fleet Scale" ships? [LONG]

This from the B5W mailing list, reprinted for your convenience

Date: Thu, 15 Jul 1999 16:48:21 -0400
From: Robert Glass <aog@agentsofgaming.com>
Subject: [B5W] Fleet Action update

Here is an update on the status of the Fleet Action rules.

The basic playtest rules are complete.	I am currently working on the
ship
sheets and have just finished all of the Earth Alliance sheets and the
White Star.  There will be a demo at GenCon centering around the Earth
Civil War.  The demo will of course be small so that it can be run
quickly
and easily.  We do our first playtest here on Sunday and this will be of
about the size I plan on for the demo game.  I am hoping the fleets
involved will prove to be very small and allow very fast play as I want
the
normal fleets involved to be at least twice or three times the size.

To give you an idea of scale, here is a list of what the loyalist fleet
consists of.  This is a 10,000 point fleet (roughly 30,000 B5W 2nd
Edition
points):

Flag Group:
				Avenger Heavy Carrier
				Sagittarius Missile Gruiser
				Omega-B Destroyer
				Olympus Corvette
				Tethys-K Cutter

1st Squadron:
				4xOmega-A Destroyers

2nd Squadron:
				Hyperion Heavy Cruiser
				3x Sagittarius Missile Cruisers

3rd Squadron:
				4xArtemis Heavy Frigates

4th Squadron:
				2xHyperion Heavy Cruiser
				Nova Dreadnought
				Olympus Corvette

Fighters:
				17 flights of Starfuries (102 fighters)
				14 flights of Thunderbolts (84 fighters)
				4 flights of Badgers (24 fighters)

I've written three version of the rules now (SoP when I'm creating a new
game) with each pass reducing the complexity of the game.  A basic
synopsis
of the rules as they stand now are:

General:
			There is no information that needs to be
tracked about ships (beyond the
damage they have taken) between turns.	This means there is much less
paperwork involved in the game (a must for a game of this scale). 
Players
alternate moving squadrons of ships and they must determine what order
they
will move their squadrons before the turn begins (at the same time they
issue orders).

Movement:
			At the start of each turn, you must give
movement orders to each
squadron.  These movement orders are general orders such as maintain
course, turn port, come about and so on.  Stuff like how much thrust it
actually takes to do this does not matter.  A ship's class limits what
orders you can give it.  For example,  while a White Star can be given a
'come about (turn 180 degrees)' order, a Omega could only be given a
'turn
to port,starboard (60 degree turn)' order.  Pivots and rolls do not play
a
roll in the game due to the scale it operates at.

Combat:
			Sensors lock ons, EW and such have been removed
as they added to many
mechanics for too little gain.	Combat procede as follows:
			You can fire weapons at the beginning of the
end of moving your ships. A
weapon system has a 'max x/turn'.  This is a represnetation of how many
of
that type of weapon a ship mounts.  Ship sheets then have small diagrams
that show how many 'x' a weapon system can put into any paricular arc.
When you fire, your roll one die for your sensor rating (this shows how
solid a lock you have on the target) and one die per 'x' factor (this
die
is based on the fire control for the weapon).  Each sensor+FC die that
meets or exceeds the target's defense hits.  If you get good enough a
hit,
you can cause a crit.  Each weapon that hits rolls damage.  Simply roll
the
dice shown and each one the meets or exceeds the armor rating does a
point
of damage.  Weapons that do a lot of damage get more dice.  For example,
an
EA standard particle beam has a d8 damage die while a heavy laser cannon
has 4d10 for damage.

This is a basic synopsis and there is actually a good deal more. 
Fighters
are going to be key and there are a number of tactics that will have to
be
developed.  After GenCon, we will be doing our outside playtesting.  We
may
or may not make the packs available for sale, I haven't decided yet.
Regardless, playtest packs will likely only include the Narn and
Centauri
fleets.

Next week, we will be posting pictures of the miniatures we have thus
far
(Fighters, Vorchan, Olympus, Primus and Hyperion), give more info on the
game, show a couple of the ship record forms and so on.

Robert

At 12:02 PM -0700 7/16/99, Chris Lowrey wrote:
>AoG is coming out with a "Fleet Scale" game of B5 combat.  They will be
>demo-ing it at GenCon in a couple of weeks.  The FA scale fighters and
>ships
>are going to be much smaller than the current line of figures they
>produce,
>and will therefore be less expensive.	In addition, all of the ships
>will be
>closer to scale with each other instead of the 4 or 5 different ship
>scales
>they have now (a "scale" for bases, another scale for cap ships,
>another for
>medium ships, and yet another for fighters).
>
>They did come out with a .pdf file that had the actual sizes of the
Fleet
>Action scale minis.  It used to be on their web site.
>
>Currently, the Fleet Action fighters (Nial, Starfury, Frazi, and Sentri
I
>believe) are supposed to be out within a couple of weeks.  They had a
>problem with the stand so it had to be recast.  Fleet Action Hyperions
and
>Vorchans should also be out around that time.	Due out soon afterwards
are
>the FA Primus and Olympus.
>
>Chris
>
>>
>>Hey guys,
>>
>>Has anyone heard anything about the "Fleet Scale" minis that AoG list
as
>>"Coming Soon" on their product list? (see below)
>>
>>Thanks.
>>
>>Jeff
>>
>>-----
>>
>>>"FLEET SCALE" MINIATURES COMING SOON
>>>
>>>  BW-401 Earth Omega Destroyer: August $9.95
>>>  BW-402 Minbari Sharlin War Cruiser: September $9.95
>>>  BW-406 Earth Starfury Fighter (18): June $7.95
>>>  BW-407 Narn Frazi Fighter (18): June $7.95
>>>  BW-408 Centauri Sentri Fighter (18): June $7.95
>>>  BW-409 Minbari Nial Fighter (18): June $7.95
>>>  BW-410 Earth Nova Dreadnought: August $9.95
>>>  BW-412 Earth Hyperion Heavy Cruiser: August $9.95
>>>  BW-417 Minbari Flyers & Tishats: September $7.95
>>>  BW-420 Earth Olympus Corvette: August $9.95
>>>  BW-422 Minbari White Star: September $7.95
>>>  BW-424 Minbari Tinashi War Frigate: September $9.95
>>>  BW-444 Earth Thunderbolt Fighter (18): June $7.95
>>

Michael Carter Llaneza
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