Re: [FT\DS2] Fleet and Army sizes for games

stiltman@teleport.com wrote:
> 

> My usual tactics for a carrier force these days usually involve one of
two
> backup tactics.  Either I'll have a front-line force of capital ships
> equipped with PBLs, or I'll have a skirmisher attachment stacked with
> needle beams.  In the former case, I'm figuring on simply overwhelming
your
> PDS with plasma, with the escorts being the first things to go.  In
the
> latter case, the escorts lose their ADFC's to surgical needle strikes
> before the bombers make their run.
> 
> About the only thing that can much hope to survive one or the other
tactic
> is something loaded with scatterguns.
> 
> > A dedicated cruiser escort, a-la Atlanta class from WWII (mass 60,
MD 4,
> > FTL, 18 hull boxes,2xscreen, 2xADFC, 14xPDS), costs 202 and, with
the
> > fighter break off rule, can fend off 2, maybe 3, fighter squadrons
> > simultaneously.  The tyranny of numbers means that it does have a
> > limited anti-ship capability with its PDS suite, allowing it to
finish
> > off the defenceless 45 pt carrierlettes that tried to attack it.  A
high
> > acceleration ship with a single class-4 beam can snipe away several
of
> > the carrierlettes while dodging the fighters (mass 50, MD 10, FTL,
10
> > hull boxes, FC, PDS, class-4(F), cost 161).  In a desperate
situation, a
> > quickly produced design of small escort(mass 12, MD 2, FTL, hull
box,
> > ADFC, 7xPDS, cost 47) should negate the power of min. pts per ftr
> > carrierlettes for less cost.
> 
> There are several failed assumptions in this paragraph.
> 
> A typical carrier-based task force for me will consist of most or all
of the
> following elements:
> 
> 1.  A front line of three or four SDN sized ships, average hulls, mass
250,
> MD2, two B3's (4 arcs), 6 B2's (all arcs), six fighter bays. 
Optionally, I
> might yank some of the beams off and put in PBL's instead, but I
haven't
> actually ever used that variant yet.	(I typically call these "Star
Destroyers"
> though they're not intended as literal copies of their namesakes from
SW.)
> 
> 2.  A backup line of five or six "Clams", weak hulls, mass 60, MD1,
four
> fighter bays.
> 
> 3.  A skirmisher detachment of either "Needle Shrikes" (cloaking light
> escort cruisers with 8 needles, MD6) or "Armor Shrikes" (non cloaking
armored
> strong-hulled battlecruisers, MD 6, 10 needles).
> 
> The total task force will probably have around 30-40 apiece of needles
and
> fighters.
> 
> Pretty much everything you describe above would get shredded pretty
trivially
> by this force.  Your escort cruisers would have Shrikes all over them,
if you
> went all-PDS the Star Destroyers will munch them, if you went fast-B4
they're
> not going to stay out of both fighter and STD reach very long on a
fixed board,
> and if you went balanced I'd simply take my pick of going ship-to-ship
if you
> specialized against my fighters or letting my fighters chew you up if
you
> specialized to go ship-to-ship.  Since the prerequisite assumption in
this
> campaign is that I've got the early resource advantage behind this
carrier
> force, you've got a nightmarish task ahead of you playing catch-up
against me.
> 
> All I need to do is press this advantage against your production
centers, and
> a carrier force against a battleship force will nearly always win a
war of
> resource attrition once they've got the early lead -- the fighters are
far
> cheaper to replace than the ships they destroy.  With the luxury of a
resource
> advantage, the initial cheap fighters that the carrier-based navy lost
in order
> to secure this early advantage can be replaced with much higher
quality stock.
> And in simple terms of resource attrition on a fixed-board tactical
field,
> there simply is no playing catchup against a well balanced carrier
force that
> can achieve fighter superiority at will and has heavy torpedo bombers
to burn.
> --

A human or phalon force cannot stand up to this set of tactics, except
by being initially unbalanced to start.  A Sa'Vasku force of mass 240
SDN's with 20 pod launchers, and the power to use them, backed up by a
stinger heavy ship that jumps in on turn 6 may clean up, except that
Sa'Vasku are easy prey for needle beams, and the closed map kills them
(unless power generators are not allowed to be needle beam targets due
to their distributed nature).  Against a Kra'Vak force that is
rediculously paranoid about fighters and needle beams, this force could
be toast (mass 240 SDN, MD 4, FTL, 72 hull, 10xFCS, 14xMKP (F?), 4xK-3
(F), 10xK-1, 32xSG, cost 1038?)  I think that a squadron of these would
cause some difficulty as they are not dependent on ADFC's and will
destroy all the fighters plus a ship or two
on the first pass.  I suspect that the MKP's are reserved for the
shrikes.

It occurs to me that the only simple and balanced way to prevent this
problem is by excluding fighters from your campaign altogether.