Re: UNSC beta and FB3

John Leahy wrote:

> >In short, yes; if
> >you only _have_ 3 or fewer hull rows because you
> >don't have enough boxes
> >to put one in the others, you ought to pay for it.
>
>      Reguarding boxes and hull row equality -
>This is an unfortunite choice (Paying for 'unused'
>hull rows),

You don't pay for "unused" hull rows. You pay for each hull box the ship

actually has; and since the ship has less than 4 hull boxes (and
therefore 
less than 4 hull rows) each of those boxes costs extra to compensate for

the *advantages* of never having to take the 3rd threshold check and not

having to waste any Mass on hull boxes in the relatively useless 4th
hull row.

IOW, a ship with 2 hull boxes pays the 3-row cost for each box, ie. 3
pts 
per box; thus it pays 2*3 = 6 pts for its hull integrity.

>as it will drive the game to larger ships.

When people complain about "larger ships" being overly powerful, they 
usually think about ships of TMF 100 and above - often quite far above.

The change discussed here mostly affects ships with TMF 12 and less,
though 
weak-hulled ships (eg. the Phalon escorts) can be a bit larger; the
largest 
legal ship affected by it is a Fragile-hulled TMF 34 destroyer or small 
freighter. (TMF 35 and larger ships must have at least 4 hull boxes, so
are 
allowed to use 4-row hulls if they want to.)

At most this change might "drive" some players from using *very* small 
ships (corvettes and strikeboats) to using small ships (frigates and 
destroyers); but there is no risk whatsoever that it will drive anyone
to 
use more *large* ships :-/

Regards,

Oerjan
oerjan.ohlson@telia.com

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