Re: Sandcasters

On my "sandcasters as one-shot screens" idea, Roger Books wrote:

>1 mass and 3 points is too cheap, I'll put them on all my big boys
because
>they are MUCH less than the 5% [...]
>
>Otherwise my SDN (250 mass) is going to rip out its level II screens
>(25 mass) and replace it with 14 mass of sandcasters.

At the end of my post you'll note I suggested having "charges" of sand
cost
1 mass per 100 mass of ship, rounded up (to prevent just this sort of
abuse).  In that case, your mass 250 SDN needs 3 mass per shot.  Using
15
mass for sandcasters, you'd get 5 shots.  Since it takes 1 shot per
level of
screens, you'd get level 2 screens for two turns, and level 1 screens
for
one turn.

If you only need screens for two turns during each battle, then you're
right, sand will be much better than screens.  I think in most cases,
sand
would be a last-ditch thing for the merchie dashing for the jump limit,
or
for a suicide boat trying to last an extra turn on the way in (and in
either
case, armor might be better anyhow...).

Keep 'Em Flying,

Kent