Re: Fighters and Hangers

Randall wrote:

>>Since Bob's fighter groups still can't jump more than 1 enemy fighter 
>>each, it makes exactly zero difference if Bob jumps the ones that have

>>already moved or the ones which haven't moved yet.
>
>Erm... Actually... It does make some difference. By tieing up his not
yet 
>involved fighters, you lessen the number available to gang-up... If he 
>assigns one to each ship,

Fighters aren't assigned targets until after they have finished moving,
so 
when Bob moves his fighters he still isn't entirely sure which targets 
Jack's fighters will attack.

Since fighters have a 6mu attack range Jack can put his first two 
individual fighters 12mu apart and still have them attack the same ship,
so 
unless Bob's fighter bases are 12mu in diameter (or larger) Bob's
fighter 
groups won't be able to engage more than 1 of Jack's fighters each even
if 
Jack sends the first two against the same ship.

>>>And there's some easy rules to deal with this problem. (Dirtside has 
>>>solved this problem, in an elegent way, IMHO)
>>>One- Balance Initiative, he who has the most figures/counters/etc
moves 
>>>until a balance has been reached: Ie. Bob has 1, Jack has 4, Jack
moves 
>>>3, then Bob move his 1,
>>
>>Since allows Jack to move first he moves one of his groups into a 
>>dogfight with Bob's single group, which means that Bob can't move his 
>>group without Jack's group getting a free shot at it. Your other
variants 
>>all share this same problem too: they allow Jack to engage most or
even 
>>all of Bob's fighter groups in dogfights before Bob can move them.
>
>If he's in a dogfight, he can't be fired apon by any other group. No
real 
>problem (the simultanious fire changes the calculations though) as
those 
>23 other fighters can't fire at the six that are dogfighting. Per rule
2, 
>above.

See the other post. However, Jack's purpose here isn't to destroy Bob's 
fighters; it is sufficient to make sure 1) that they don't move
anywhere, 
eg. to attack Jack's ships or interfere with his other fighters (or if
they 
do move, that get shot in the back first) and 2) that they only kill *1*
of 
Jack's fighters per turn, instead of the 4-6 fighters they could've
killed 
if Jack's fighters had been organized in standard 6-fighter groups. 
('Course, if they stay in the dogfight it is entirely possible that they

won't be able to catch up either with Bob's ships or with Jack's other 
fighters for several turns!) This leaves Jack's remaining fighters free
to 
attack Bob's ships instead.

>Oh, and that same rule keeps a furball from happening...

Nope; see my other post.

>If they can't be fired apon, they're not in a furball, eh?

There is no rule which keeps you from putting multiple groups into 
base-to-base contact with a single enemy group and thereby create a 
furball. All fighters in a furball can fire at any enemy fighters in the

same furball.

>>That's a nice solution. Causes a rather nasty book-keeping mess when
the 
>>fighters from a squadron have to move away in different directions,
but I 
>>could live with that.
>
>I didn't say they were elegant, or effiecient solutions. :) (Did I?)

For once I wasn't sarcastic <g> - it *is* a nice solution, at least in
that 
it solves the problem without a large bunch of new rules and without 
causing new balance problems - its only major drawback is the 
much-increased	book-keeping.

>>>Alpha: Per PDS can target up to 6 fighters, with 6's and re-rolls 
>>>spilling over group's until 6 fighters are destroyed, or the re-rolls
stop.
>>
>>So why can't you do this against salvo missile salvoes that roll less 
>>than a "6"? (Or if you use scatterguns, against strength-1 plasma
bolts?)
>
>You really want to open this can of beans? One problem at a time... :)

I prefer using a holistic approach. That way I don't spend too much work
on 
hashing out minor issues before I run into something which crashes the 
entire concept...

>>>Beta: Fighter's in groups less than 6 no longer get 2 points of
damage 
>>>per 6, and no re-rolls.
>>
>>So as soon as any of Bob's groups takes a single casualty, each of its

>>*surviving* fighters lose three-eights of its firepower? I'm afraid I 
>>don't quite see the PSB logic behind this.
>
>PSB? That can be invented, for anything, if you're willing to suspend 
>disbelief... Honestly, anyone can come up with PSB for any rule, that 
>makes the game more playable/fun.
>
>I fell into the trap of trying to PSB a rule that hadn't been seen as 
>necessary once before.

Yeah, but since no other weapons in the game change characteristics in
this 
way - they're either operational or not, never half-way-inbetween like 
these fighters become after the first casualty - this rule will be much 
harder than average to sell to the players. Players often argue about
PSB 
explanations, but when you deal with munchkins (and let's face it,
they're 
the main reason why this rule would be needed) believable PSB
explanations 
are several orders of magnitude easier to sell than the game-balance 
argument is.  Munchkins aren't interested in balancing the game; their
goal 
is to exploit the *im*balances as much as possible...

>What's the PSB for groups of 6? Why not 7? 8? 12? (rhetorical
question.)

There isn't any PSB for it. It simply follows a surprisingly old
tradition 
of 6-fighter groups in space combat games (dating at least as far back
as 
StarFire II in 1980, but I doubt that that's the original source) and is

therefore familiar enough that the munchkins rarely argue against it... 
*unless* something makes them start to think about it :-/

Later,

Oerjan
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

"Life is like a sewer.
  What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
-Hen3ry