Re: [FT] FB2 Balancing Corrections Proposed

I've been giving Brendan Pratt's reactions to FB2 some thought, and
I think he has a point.

Basically, he has shown ways that both Phalons and SuVasku can
get into short range (12") either with little damage or giving as good
or better than they get. And has shown that the firepower they can
generate at 12" is unbalancing.

Now any solution that we come up with must not change either
in any significant way, except to remove the grossossity, as in
other ways they're well balanced. It's also important to make
very few changes in FB2, the best would be only a few characters
(not words or paragraphs).

So I propose the following:

SV Spicules take power from the D pool not the A pool ( as discussed )

SV Stingers take an additional 1 pt of power per die. So instead of
1-2-4-8 etc it's 1+1, 2+1, 4+1, 8+1 etc. This weakens them
insignificantly
at long ranges ( 33 vs 32 PP) but halves their FP at Point Blank range,
so
the big fellas do 15 dice instead of 30. This is still comparable with
most
SDs. But no longer can a SV fleet sit at the edge of the board and
just overkill anything by making 1 move (1 turn of max move at 36" then
hit the opponent with 3x his Firepower)

Phalons do 1-2-4 instead of 1-2-6 dice with their pulsers. Again, this
makes
no change except at absolute point-blank range. The estimable OO at one
stage
had 1-2-4 but changed it as the result of mathematical analysis. I think
the
original should stand as the result of playtesting.

I expect that in Vector, there are fewer firing opportunities at this
short
range,
so the balance is not greatly disturbed. In cinematic, where the problem
is,
there is still no change except at under 12" for the Phalons, and not
that
much
for the SuVasku. (Yes, in vector there are still lots of 12" ranges, but
tend to
be individual ships not 90% of a fleet in one turn. In Vector Range is
difficult
to control, but relative bearing easy. In cinematic, it's the reverse.
But I
digress.)

What it means is that the Phalons still have an advantage at short
range,
but
not an outrageous one. The SuVasku OTOH must make more use of their
special powers of movement, they can no longer just close to one
opponent
and shred it with one salvo. Instead they must go for weak areas, and
make
more
use of their pod launchers at short range.

I'd like to see how this goes in playtesting. To those who see no
problem,
it
should make little difference. If you don't have a Phalon fleet armed
with
nothing
but C-class Pulsers, it will make little or no difference. If your
SuVasku
use
their movement powers to zap behind an enemy to avoid counterfire rather
than just materialise next to their opponents En Masse and vape them
before
they can return fire, then again there will be little effect. (eg at 36"
it
costs
5PP vs 4 PP per die).
To those who see a big problem with Phalons armed with nothing but S
range
pulsers, and shortrange-single-salvo-shredding-SSuVasku it will reduce
the
firepower by 1/3 and 1/2 respectively.

Finally, it needs 2 characters changed ( 'D' instead of 'A', '4' instead
of
'6'),
 8 characters added ("+1 per die") and a table and some examples amended
accordingly. Which IMHO is below the threshold of pain for errata in
anyone's
book (pun intentional).