Re: [FT] Banked Weapons

On Wed, 23 May 2001, David Griffin wrote:

> In other words, a
> class 3 plasma torpedo would be 3 pulse torpedoes
> in one bank. They would fire together on one roll
> and either all hit or all miss. Further, they 
> would only have one roll on threshholds, all going
> out or all staying up.

It's an interesting idea.

> Would that be more powerful, less powerful, or
> the same as buying the same number of pulse 
> torpedoes to fire normally?

They aren't more powerful. What they are is more random.

The odds are the same, over time, as non-banked weapons. With any one
roll, the chance of them all hitting is MUCH higher, but it also means
that the chance of them all missing is much higher. On average, they
will do exactly the same damage... On average. This is of little
consequence to the player who gets hit twice in a row with the entire
bank (though that player is likely to ignore the time or two when the
bank misses).

It adds more randomness to the result. It's more "all or nothing". In
previous posts you've mentioned that you don't like luck getting in the
way of skill in FT's initiative system. This kind of weapon will
introduce a greater luck element to the game.

As for toning them down, I think the single threshold check will more
than compensate for them, if the mass and point totals are the same. The
official word from Jon is that he's leaning away from requiring a
dedicated fire control for pulse torpedoes, so that wouldn't be an
issue. However, if I were allowing these kinds of weapon banks, I WOULD
require a dedicated Firecon to fire a bank of torpedoes.

Allan Goodall - agoodall@canada.com
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