Re: [FT] Defending with SMLs

At 11:46 AM 1/2/01 +0100, you wrote:
>John Crimmins wrote:
>
>>This is a bit odd, though: I've been converting the ships using Jared
>>Nobel's Excel spreadsheet -- I enter the data for the ship as it is in
>the
>>Fleet Book, and then change the weapon mix around.  This has lead >to
>a truly obscene Foch Class SDN, which should be really nasty in >play,
>but I've run into a problem with the Jeanne D'Arc carrier.  I've
>>entered all the data, and the mass is fine, but the point value comes
>>out to 892 instead of the 955 given in the book. I need to do the
>>calculations by hand, I suppose.
>
>63 points? Sounds as if the spreadsheet only charges 2xMass for fighter
>bays rather than 3xMass - IIRC some of the early spreadsheets had this
>bug. (FB2 also says that KV and Phalon fighter bays cost 2xMass, which
>is completely wrong - all bays cost 3xMass.)

Got it.  I have yet to put a ship together without using somebody's
program
-- spreadsheets, the old web-based builder and other such items -- so I
don't think that I would have caught it.  And to think: I used to use a
pencil and paper to design my Car Wars vehicles....

>Other explanations could be that you forgot to enter 21 Mass of
>equipment or that you used the wrong TMF (TMF 250 instead of 280 should
>give about this cost reduction) - but in both cases the spreadsheet
>should've indicated that the Mass was too large or too small, so I
>don't think these are very likely.
>
>The best ship design spreadsheet I know of at the moment is Dean
>Gundberg's, available from http://star_ranger.homestead.com/ . Based on
>Jared's, but updated to include FB2 and I haven't found any bugs in the
>latest version yet <g>

Just downloaded it -- thanks.  I *was* just going to use ESU stats for
my
BFG ships, but I enjoyed rebuilding the FSE ships so much that I'm going
to
create these guys from scratch.

John X Crimmins
johncrim@voicenet.com
  "...is one of the secret masters of the world: a librarian.
They control information.  Don't ever piss one off."
  --Spider Robinson, The Callahan Touch.