About the Narn...

[skavendan]

Well I might be wrong here but aren't variants a ship that has been upgraded / refitted?

 

[Jim?]

Well I might be wrong here but aren't variants a ship that has been upgraded / refitted?

Some come in under the starting PL of the original version (Assault Hyperion/Rail Hyperion, Veshatan, Ashinta ect).

 

[skavendan]

Not all refits would put you up as the same. PL or higher if the ships moded for perpose then it's PL could change to whatever best suits.

 

[Da Boss]

I always asssumed a variant was merely a ship using the same basic hull for a different purpose

 

[Clanger]

Vampires myth is actually based on a medical condition. It is a rare form of blood disorder which the body cannot produce its own iron. It causes the infected to have fair skin which does hurt when it is subjected to sun light. The skin is paler. The gums receed and the teeth are more pronounced. Though this is not a vampire as such, thye do not drink blood. To a medeval mind this would look like a supernatural creature.

Witches are fact (not the spell casting type) They were the wise women and herbalists of the time. It is a bas*ardisation of Wicca. If you read about the Wicca rites and such the church used these rites and twisted them into dealing with Dark Forces. Also the the spate of witch burnings in Europe and America have been proven that these "witches" visions etc were nothing more than the women eating tainted wheat (type of LSD trip) and the ancient mind could only come up with a supernatural answer.

Werewolfism is based on animalistic psychotic behaviour where the sufferes though they were beasts. It was psychological and not physical. Also a lot of stories come about from made berserkers wearing animal skins etc.

All legends are based in fact. A lot of unexplained things at the time are given a supernatural / mysterious slant for the masses to understand.

 

[Rawwar]

@Burger

But all based on something real to elicit the desired response from the reader, viewer or flock.

There's no escaping it.

 

[Jim?]

please don't run too far off topic... there is another forum for that sort of thing

 

[Tzarevitch]

I always asssumed a variant was merely a ship using the same basic hull for a different purpose

That's correct. A refit is basically an upgrade. A refit can however sometimes produce such a change that becomes a variant design.

Tzarevitch

 

[Tzarevitch]

It really comes down to how you want the G'Quan to play, from screen evidence or as part of the playstyle that you want the Narn to have in ACTA.

On screen, the G'Quan is mostly seen using it's beam... but does that mean that the beam's hyper powered, or that it's the weapon system most commonly in range? The G'Quan v. Primus shoot out showed that the ship is capable of up close brawling, too.

If you want the Narn to be a tough, roll with the punches and keep swinging fleet, then they need a brawler in there, somewhere... if that job goes to that's the G'Quan or the Bin'Tak is pretty much up to how you want to make it. Upping the G'Quan's beam, making the E-Mine a Slow Loader and giving it a few more damage really won't turn it into that style of ship... it'll still be a sniper with a weaker than Omega main beam that will sit at the back and require loads of support from other elements in the fleet to prevent it from being outflanked.

The only real options there are the G'Sten and Rongoth/Rothan, which are both sub-par choices for their PL, the G'Karith or the T'Loth (which isn't as effective at the job as an EA Nova/Olympus or Artemis). Frazis aren't able to reliably deal with a ship that has good AF, and so can't hold the flanks either.

Maybe changing the G'Quonth completely to a Battle Level brawler, or introducing a Raid Level G'Quan varient without the main beam/e-mine but with range 12 burst beams in each arc (say 2 dice each) would do it.

Thing is, no matter what you do at 5 Raid it's not going to be easy to fit a G'Quan and anti-flanking cover in there... and to make it a ship that punches it's weight a 5 dice beam and S/L E-mines would probably be OK if it had good support, but the ships that you can choose for the job really aren't up to it.

Let's look at the Narn list, and split it into Good/Average/Bad for a second (obviously, this is only my opinion based on stats and performance at their role in the fleet compared to other races' ships at the same job):

Too Good         Good                OK                  Bad              Ugly 
G'Vrahn          Ka'Bin'Tak          Var'Nic             G'Quan           G'Sten
                 Dag'Kar             Bin'Tak             G'Tal            Rothan
                                     Thentus             Ka'Tan           T'Rann
                                     Ka'Toc              Rongoth          Sho'Kos
                                     G'Lan               T'Rakk           G'Quonth
                                     G'Karith            T'Loth           Gorith
                                     Sho'Kar             Frazi
                                     Sho'Kov

Now, that doesn't look that bad at first glance, however, the "good" stuff is at either high PL's, or is extremely specialized. Most of the OK stuff needs lots of support, and most of the stuff you'd want to be doing the supporting is in the Bad or Ugly categories.

Let's compare with the Centauri, for a second...

Too Good        Good                  OK                  Bad             Ugly 
Demos           Sulust                Elutarian           Altarian
                Darkner               Primus              Octurion
                Vorchan               Secondus            Magnus
                Liati                 Dargan              Morgrath*
                Kutai                 Maximus
                Haven                 Corvan
                Rutarian              Adira
                                      Balvarin
                                      Rasik
                                      Sentri

*unless hyperspace is allowed, then it goes to good

As you can see... in my opinion, the Centauri list is a lot better balanced than the Narn one. Ideally, all ships would be in the OK bracket for every race, but going to Good/Bad is OK. Most of the Good/OK Centauri ships are Patrol, Skirmish, Raid or Battle, and they're not great at War.

Given that the majority of games are played at 5 Raid, that is not a problem for them. Also, their lack of boresights and good initiative mean that their ships can effectively operate without much support and still be expected to perform reasonably well.

I don't think the Narn fleet plays like anything other than a flimsy EA fleet with E-Mines and bad secondaries... don't think PnP can really fix the entire fleet, so *overgunning* the G'Quan slightly may be the way forward for now... not breaking it, but making it *good* rather than *Average* if you catch my meaning?

I agree wholeheartedly. The biggest problem with the Narn is they have NO viable battle level ships and most of their raid ships are iffy or hyper-specialized. That leaves a big ugly hole in the middle of their fleet that is hard to fill.

I have some disagreements with which categories individual ships belong but that is obviously a personal choice. I personally don't think the Frazi is that bad. I classify it as OK. It is a decent, cheap assault fighter if rather short ranged. The T'Loth varies depending on opponent. If there are no interceptors present it is OK. If there are, it is bad.

Tzarevitch

 

[Burger]

@Burger

But all based on something real to elicit the desired response from the reader, viewer or flock.

There's no escaping it.

Yes, a vampire is based on stories of a blood disorder, just like Narn might be based on some real life example. Sufferers of the blood disorder do not really drink blood, therefore why should a Narn have the same characteristics as that on which it is based? That is what fiction is. Making things up. You can't apply real world values to fictional races because they have been changed.

 

[Locutus9956]

Good god. Even by the normal standards of this forum this is one hell of a diversion from anything resembling the topic.....

Yes it's all fictional, but I will agree to the point that sci fi is better if it is grounded in reality. Too much fi and not enough sci and you just end up with nonsense.

However to go back to what started all this off in the first place as far as I can see, Burger was absolutely right regarding the G'Vrahn. The question was where does the ISA tech come in and that and the Ka'Bin'Tak are your answers right there. Theres already 3 varients of the G'Quan and so another was not introduced. The GQuan the discussion is about is a ship predating the ISA era and the game is supposed to represent its vanilla version so if ISA tech has no relavence there whatsoever.

In closing:

There is no reason the Narn should have crap weapons but not ONE of the reasons given for them NOT having crap weapons has grounding as far as I can see. It IS fiction and theres no 'evidience' one way or the other so if Mongoose want to make crappy armed Narns with tough ships or insanely well armed fragile Narns its up to them. My preference stems purely from the narns apparent character as a race in the show and the fact that it would balance them whilst keeping them distinct from the other main races from a play point.

Now stop arguing over semantics and get back to discussing the Narn fleet

 

[Foxmeister]

???? Since when do they fire in a F arc motion? *Throws petrol onto his fire*

They don't - but the story goes that the WS was given F arc in the game so as to simulate their ability to whip around quickly and acquire new targets - personally, I'd have though Vree style SM would have been a better choice coupled with a Boresight weapon.

Regards,

Dave

 

[Da Boss]

It really comes down to how you want the G'Quan to play, from screen evidence or as part of the playstyle that you want the Narn to have in ACTA.

On screen, the G'Quan is mostly seen using it's beam... but does that mean that the beam's hyper powered, or that it's the weapon system most commonly in range? The G'Quan v. Primus shoot out showed that the ship is capable of up close brawling, too.

If you want the Narn to be a tough, roll with the punches and keep swinging fleet, then they need a brawler in there, somewhere... if that job goes to that's the G'Quan or the Bin'Tak is pretty much up to how you want to make it. Upping the G'Quan's beam, making the E-Mine a Slow Loader and giving it a few more damage really won't turn it into that style of ship... it'll still be a sniper with a weaker than Omega main beam that will sit at the back and require loads of support from other elements in the fleet to prevent it from being outflanked.

The only real options there are the G'Sten and Rongoth/Rothan, which are both sub-par choices for their PL, the G'Karith or the T'Loth (which isn't as effective at the job as an EA Nova/Olympus or Artemis). Frazis aren't able to reliably deal with a ship that has good AF, and so can't hold the flanks either.

Maybe changing the G'Quonth completely to a Battle Level brawler, or introducing a Raid Level G'Quan varient without the main beam/e-mine but with range 12 burst beams in each arc (say 2 dice each) would do it.

Thing is, no matter what you do at 5 Raid it's not going to be easy to fit a G'Quan and anti-flanking cover in there... and to make it a ship that punches it's weight a 5 dice beam and S/L E-mines would probably be OK if it had good support, but the ships that you can choose for the job really aren't up to it.

Let's look at the Narn list, and split it into Good/Average/Bad for a second (obviously, this is only my opinion based on stats and performance at their role in the fleet compared to other races' ships at the same job):

Too Good         Good                OK                  Bad              Ugly 
G'Vrahn          Ka'Bin'Tak          Var'Nic             G'Quan           G'Sten
                 Dag'Kar             Bin'Tak             G'Tal            Rothan
                                     Thentus             Ka'Tan           T'Rann
                                     Ka'Toc              Rongoth          Sho'Kos
                                     G'Lan               T'Rakk           G'Quonth
                                     G'Karith            T'Loth           Gorith
                                     Sho'Kar             Frazi
                                     Sho'Kov

Now, that doesn't look that bad at first glance, however, the "good" stuff is at either high PL's, or is extremely specialized. Most of the OK stuff needs lots of support, and most of the stuff you'd want to be doing the supporting is in the Bad or Ugly categories.

Let's compare with the Centauri, for a second...

Too Good        Good                  OK                  Bad             Ugly 
Demos           Sulust                Elutarian           Altarian
                Darkner               Primus              Octurion
                Vorchan               Secondus            Magnus
                Liati                 Dargan              Morgrath*
                Kutai                 Maximus
                Haven                 Corvan
                Rutarian              Adira
                                      Balvarin
                                      Rasik
                                      Sentri

*unless hyperspace is allowed, then it goes to good

As you can see... in my opinion, the Centauri list is a lot better balanced than the Narn one. Ideally, all ships would be in the OK bracket for every race, but going to Good/Bad is OK. Most of the Good/OK Centauri ships are Patrol, Skirmish, Raid or Battle, and they're not great at War.

Given that the majority of games are played at 5 Raid, that is not a problem for them. Also, their lack of boresights and good initiative mean that their ships can effectively operate without much support and still be expected to perform reasonably well.

I don't think the Narn fleet plays like anything other than a flimsy EA fleet with E-Mines and bad secondaries... don't think PnP can really fix the entire fleet, so *overgunning* the G'Quan slightly may be the way forward for now... not breaking it, but making it *good* rather than *Average* if you catch my meaning?

I agree wholeheartedly. The biggest problem with the Narn is they have NO viable battle level ships and most of their raid ships are iffy or hyper-specialized. That leaves a big ugly hole in the middle of their fleet that is hard to fill.

I have some disagreements with which categories individual ships belong but that is obviously a personal choice. I personally don't think the Frazi is that bad. I classify it as OK. It is a decent, cheap assault fighter if rather short ranged. The T'Loth varies depending on opponent. If there are no interceptors present it is OK. If there are, it is bad.

Tzarevitch

I concur

 

[Foxmeister]

Ok so a real world comparison

Any post beginning like that, is made of fail.
Its a fictional universe with fictional races in the fictional future.

All of this is true - however, you could also argue that ACTA is a pseudo-historical game (for want of a better phrase).

Why?

Well, because whilst everything in the B5 universe is fictional, within that fiction there "historical facts" concerning events, people, and places, and for the most part anything that JMS regards as canon falls into that category.

If you take something like 40k, it isn't pseudo-historical because the game itself begat the "universe" and the "history" of that universe.

Ok, slightly O/T admittedly, and most of the ships in ACTA are complete fictions as opposed to canon, but I'd like to see the Narn heavy cruiser (AKA the G'Quan) perform at the level it does according to the "history" of the B5 universe.

Regards,

Dave

 

[Burger]

I'd like to see the Narn heavy cruiser (AKA the G'Quan) perform at the level it does according to the "history" of the B5 universe.

Absolutely, me too! But I would rather not see an "ISA Era" G'Quan variant, which is what begat this silly discussion.

 

[Rawwar]

Now stop arguing over semantics and get back to discussing the Narn fleet

Ok I for my part will drop the subject Burger can pm me for my msn addi or something if he wants to carry on this debate.

The problem is the Narn other than a few hit points aren't tough, other non-tough races with active defense systems fare a lot better. The loads of Crits they take is the problem alter that then give us some time to field test it and see where we go from there.

 

[Rawwar]

Absolutely, me too! But I would rather not see an "ISA Era" G'Quan variant, which is what begat this silly discussion.

Perhaps you should look at the the line I've taken throughout the thread not one post. I'm consistently cautious about making huge changes & pushing the balance the other way.

With Crusade EA, the ISA, Drakk and Minbari around why would it be a bad idea to give the Narn a boost. I don't care how it's legitimised but the simple fact is we have to face them & therefore need to be able to compete.

 

[Burger]

With Crusade EA, the ISA, Drakk and Minbari around why would it be a bad idea to give the Narn a boost. I don't care how it's legitimised but the simple fact is we have to face them & therefore need to be able to compete.

I never said it was a bad idea. In fact I just wholehartedly agreed with you, in the post you replied to. "Absolutely, me too!". But I don't agree that a Crusade-era G'Quan is the way to go. The existing one, pre-ISA, needs to be fixed to represent its abilities, rather than spruced up with bells and whistles from the future.

 

[Foxmeister]

But I don't agree that a Crusade-era G'Quan is the way to go.

Plus, Katadders G'Kar fits that bill nicely - now if only it were official.....

Regards,

Dave

 

[Rawwar]

Well you do see a G'Quon destroy a Primus so something needs doing because at the moment it'd be the other way round.

I don't see why the Narn should have second rate weapons to anyone. 'The Narn will sell arms to anyone.' We learn that early on. They will buy arms from anyone too we learn that during their problems with the Centari/Shadows. They supply Sheridan with the nukes he hits Zahadoom (which you can see I can't spell) with. They're also supposed to benefit from weapons tech assistance off the ISA, where's the evidence of that?

I don't wanna own a Primus but I'd like the reasult to be in the balance which at the moment it isn't.

Also much of the Narn way of fighting has been shaped by the Centari so why wouldn't there be some similarities?

That's the post you responded to and it's entirely consistent with everything I've said before.

"Absolutely, me too!".

I'd check that one because I don't recall absolutely agreeing with anyone :lol: & I can't find an instance of me saying it. Could be wrong though it's been a busy day.