[FT] The Cloaking Device v0.2

The Cloaking Device v0.2

Ships equipped with a cloaking device are able to operate virtually
invisibly.  The benefit is not without its drawbacks, as from time to
time
the cloaked vessel's image will quickly blink in and out of a ships
sensors,
and a cloaked sensors are virtually blinded while in cloak.  To simulate
this the following rules can be used,

CLOAKING:  When plotting movement a ship may be plotted to cloak.  The
player then pre-plots any number of moves.  When movement is conducted,
the
player marks his cloaked vessels as now CLOAKED.  In the movement
portion of
the turn that the ships last plot is used, the player moves his still
cloaked vessel through all of his plotted moves.  The vessel is still
cloaked, but has appeared momentarily as a blip on all ships sensors. 
To
uncloak must also be plotted as a movement action, therefore must be
plotted
in advance.

DETECTION:  In the fire phase, just prior to firing weapons, the
detection
value of all cloaked ships is determined.  Each non-cloaked ship rolls 1
dice and detects all cloaked vessels where the dice roll was less than
the
detection value.  If a Nova gun effect is on the table, no detections
are
possible.  A ship may not detect a cloaked vessel in its own aft arc if
main
thrust was used.  No detection of cloaked vessels is possible the turn
after
a wave gun is fired.

DETECTION VALUE=Thrust used of cloaked vessel (so that a vessel that
accelerated by 2 and turned by 2 has a detection value of 4).

DETECTION VALUE DIE ROLL MODIFIERS
  +1 per thrust used by scanning vessel.
  +1 per thrust used by the uncloaked ship using the most thrust.
  +1 Scanning Vessel is a non-military vessel (may not apply to
scientific
vessels, not cumulative with enhanced or superior sensors)
  -1 Scanning Vessel is equiped with enhanced sensors.
  -2 Scanning Vessel is equiped with superior sensors.

All detected cloaked vessels are moved by their movement plots to their
current position and marked as detected.

Ships may fire dumb weapons at the DETECTED vessel, counting the range
as
DOUBLE (or add 12", whichever is greater) the actual range.  Dumb
weapons
are:  Beam Batteries, Pulse Torpedoes, Needle Beams, Submunition Packs,
PDS,
K-guns, MKP Packs, Scatterguns, Stinger Nodes, Lance Pods, Leech Pods,
Spicules, and Pulser Batteries.  Basically, if the weapon is guided,
steered, or in any other way is homing, it cannot be used.  Note that
Needle
Beams only do hull damage.

FIRE CONTROL SOLUTION:	Cloaked vessels may be fired at normally if a
Fire
Control Solution can be achieved.  In any turn that a cloaked vessel is
detected, and has been detected by more than one vessel for 2 of the
last 3
consecutive turns, or 6 of the last 10 conecutive turns if detected only
by
a single vessel, a Fire Control Solution is achieved on the cloaked
target.
In this case all weapons, to include fighters, may attack the cloaked
vessel.

ALTERNATIVE:  Instead of keeping track of the number of turns of
detection
roll a dice:  If the cloaked vessel was only detected by one ship this
turn,
a roll of 1 on a d6 results in a Fire Control Solution.  If two or more
vessels detected the cloaked ship a roll of 1-3 on d6 results in a Fire
Control Solution.  IF THIS IS THE FIRST DETECTION SINCE CLOAKING NO FIRE
CONTROL SOLUTION IS POSSIBLE.  A Fire Control solution is possible only
on
the 2nd and later detections after cloaking.

TACTICAL COM-NET:  It is assumed that all vessels in a task force are
linked
in a COM-NET, and may fire on any detected cloaked vessel.  It is not
necessary for a ship to detect a cloaked vessel to fire on a detected
cloaked vessel.  Players may wish to rule that allied vessels not of the
same nationality have not linked their tactical systems and must
independently detect cloaked vessels.

ACTIVE SENSOR SWEEPS(VERY OPTIONAL):  These rules assume all detection
is
passive.  If you are willing to let vesseles fire while cloaked, then
use
this rule as well.  Active sensing drowns out passive sensing, so if any
ships are actively searching for cloaked vessels, passive detections may
not
be made.  The searching player designates all ships that are actively
scanning, then rolls 1d6 for each cloaked vessel on the table.	If the
roll
is less than the total number of actively scanning ships (or 6 in any
case),
then that cloaked vessel is found and a FIRE CONTROL SOLUTION is
achieved.
The cloaked ship is moved to its current position.  Cloaked ships, found
or
not, can fire on any ship using active searching.  Any cloaked ship that
fires that is not found must be moved to its current position, and is
considered to have been detected for purposes of "first detection" found
above.