Alternate Beams

[Locutus9956]

I'm planning to try out the idea of basically using the beam rules out of Full Thrust (for Full Thrust is the answer to life the universe and everything where space based wargames are concerned ).

Basically exactly the same as the current beam rules but with 2 changes:

1) CAF/Scout etc allow you to reroll the initial dice rolls
2) You still hit on a 4+ but you only roll an aditional dice on a roll of 6.

This should have two effects, firstly that with the reroll ability the initial volley should be more reliable and less prone to randomly doing sod all, and with only rerolling 6s you'll still get some extra damage and the potential for beams to hit a bit harder than they might otherwise but you wont get the runaway hits like you might otherwise.

It should be noted that you COULD under this rule choose to reroll a CAFed beams initial dice that score 4s and 5s in the hope of getting more 6s and thus a bigger hit but if the rerolls come up 1-3 you must take the second result and miss completely with those dice.

Thoughts people?

 

[Burger]

You could extend this idea, why not make beams roll against the hull value of the target ship, like other weapons? Then you could have AP and SAP beams too, making the initial volley more effective. And, to stop endless beam rerolling, increase the target number by 1 for each subsequent hit - always hitting on a 6 of course. :wink:

 

[Na-Po]

Often playing Shadows having Scout reroling beams
(even only the first volley) is a dream
how many times I said oh oh a 433212 it's one hit
(or 0 hit with the stalker 3 dice ... yes sometimes I'm very lucky lol).

I like your idea it's a kind of OLD accurate (first volley hit is automatic and then reroll)

But giving the 6's a new roll is maybe a bit too much imo.

 

[Locutus9956]

its hardly an automatic hit, you still have to roll 4+, the reroll ability just seems fair if your stripping the rerolls to 6s.

And Burger, joking aside I actually really LIKE the hits on 4+ irrespective of hull part of current beams/minibeams as it does very nicely bring lower hull higher dmg ships into the game more than the 'hull 6 > all' mentality first ed suffered from somewhat. The problem I have at the moment is beams can go berserk too easily whilst they are also rather unreliable at others. Giving them rerolls on the initial shot (potentially at least) and severely hamstringing their ability to chain would I think solve things nicely without the need to restat current lists. Of course it needs playtesting to see how well it works but frankly, it works well in full thrust so I dont see why it shouldnt work for ACTA

 

[Burger]

Well I do appreciate what you're trying to do, it is true that currently the standard deviation of beam hits is way too high. For the mathematically challenged, that means it is too easy to get vey low or very high numbers of hits. But beams will take an effectiveness nerf from your suggestion. Currently the average hits per AD is 1. But with your method it would be 0.6 without rerolls or 0.9 with. Since rerolls are by no means guaranteed (scout rerolls require a scout to be in the fleet and a CQ check, and CAF has CQ check and other drawbacks such as not shooting othe targets - and both can be lost if the scout is destroyed or the ship takes an NSA crit), this change would be a major nerf to beams effectiveness.

If you were to give beams an automatic reroll of the first volley then I'd support the idea fully! But relying on CAF/Scout is no good. In fact giving them automatic rerolls (effectively make Twin-Linked built in to the Beam trait) then they would go to the opposite end of the spectrum to currently. You would get a pretty low deviation of hits; the number of beam hits would be much more predictable, which IMO is a better representation of how a beam would work.

 

[Na-Po]

That's what I was trying to say with my old "accurate"

An automatic hit first time and rerolls on 4+ (instead of 3+)

Have to try it but pretty sure my shadows will love it ;-)

 

[Burger]

No way, that is much too good. You'd double beams' effectiveness. Your Shadows wouldn't love it because they'd spend the entire game pinned.

 

[Na-Po]

that's true ...

So something fair would be an auto reroll which would flatten the dispersion and give a good average n° of hit

edit : without doubling beam power

edit 2 :
We could have a twin linked text saying for beams only the first volley can be rerolled and therefore having beams with TL and some without

 

[CZuschlag]

From another thread, but on topic in case you hadn't seen it:
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We have discussed, but never implemented, a mechanic that gives much more predictable beams:

For every AD, roll one die. If the number is 3 or greater, score one hit, and keep these dice. Then, for every hit in the previosu roll, roll another die. If the number is 4 or greater, score one hit, and keep these dice. Finally, with the remaining dice, roll them, and score one hit for every 5 or greater. No single die can score more than 3 hits.

The average number of hits is then:
(2/3)*(1/2)*1 hit + (2/3)*(1/2)*(2/3)* 2 hits + (2/3)*(1/2)*(1/3)*3 hits = 1.11111 hits.

This amounts to an 11% upgrade to beam weapons in total output -- the current average is 1 hit per beam die (It's the classic Geometric Series from Calculus II). I agree this upgrade is nontrivial. However, it also dramatically reduces the probability of spectacular rollups and outright misses. It is my brief experience that the possibility of a rollup and the wide variances in results favors the attacker, who may eliminate an entire ship before it fires by lucky hits. My guess is that eliminating the spectacular rollup reduces the value of beam, so the balance may be close.

It's worth noting that if you want spot-on balance in output, just rolling for 3's and then 4's (skip the third step) keeps the expected yield exactly the same, but for the arguments I outline above, it results in a degradation of the value of beam; and the ability for a beam to slice at least 3 dice worth feel B5-ish. I admit to having no reasonable counterarguments to the 2-die sequence above other than that; 3's, 4's, and 6's forever feels even better but doesn't roll of the tongue at all and feels very forced, even if the math is best (1.05555 as an average is excellent).
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I strongly dislike beam CAF effects, and I run a lot of Drakh. If nothing else, does anyone else think that the new Whitestar II with Scout Redirect and CAF (succeeds on a 3+!) available for its two dice of beam would be just busted? How about Vorlons who aren't allowed to CAF (the special action doesn't exist for them)? I don't think Shadows have it either, they must rely on scouts alone -- you'd be down on the arms wars, mate. How would you feel about alternately CAFing and CBDing Haltonas? Vree-backed Drazi with their new, and effective, Solarhawk?

I'd love to CAF with Heavy Raiders. It's not like I can CBD with only 1 weapon system. I frequently just go for Come About for no other reason other than I can't think of anything else to do. But even I must admit that this would be just too much. Too bad, too --- it'd make my Drakh scouts worth something. C'est la vie.

 

[Locutus9956]

Not bad but getting a bit more complicated there. I do actually quite like Burgers idea of basically taking my original idea but basically making all beams twin linked (effectively).

An alternate idea is to use full thrust beams EXACTLY. Which is to say you hit on a 4 or 5 and on a 6 you score 2 hits and roll an extra dice. This brings things back up a little. Personally I like the idea of beams benefitting from scouts/rerolls more than just rerolling automatically as it adds to the game I think if you have more things to think about etc.

 

[Burger]

An ideal fix would be to keep the average beam hits exactly the same - so it wouldn't require extensive playtesting or adjustment of ADs or beam's other traits. FT rules as you describe will again nerf beams by 33%.

How about, a roll of 4 does one hit, roll of 5 does 2 hits, roll of 6 does 3 hits. Average would remain as 1, so no ships stats would need changing.

EDIT: Your FT rules, with an automatic reroll of any misses, works perfectly as well! Average hits per AD is maintained as 1 so all current ship stats are valid. And has better distribution (less chance of a total miss, less chance of a massive hit) but still has the potential to do double the number of AD in hits. So, great idea, add in the automatic rerolls and I am on board

 

[Triggy]

An ideal fix would be to keep the average beam hits exactly the same - so it wouldn't require extensive playtesting or adjustment of ADs or beam's other traits. FT rules as you describe will again nerf beams by 33%.

How about, a roll of 4 does one hit, roll of 5 does 2 hits, roll of 6 does 3 hits. Average would remain as 1, so no ships stats would need changing.

EDIT: Your FT rules, with an automatic reroll of any misses, works perfectly as well! Average hits per AD is maintained as 1 so all current ship stats are valid. And has better distribution (less chance of a total miss, less chance of a massive hit) but still has the potential to do double the numbe of AD in hits. So, great idea, I am on board

This is the mechanism that would get my vote if I had to choose anything different. However, despite seeing extreme beams every so often, I don't see them as game breaking as some people do.

 

[goom]

How about keeping it simple. Beams always hit on 2+ avoid interceptors but get no reroll. Not sure how it affects game balance with some fleets but would make beams more reliable but not plain silly with the endless rerolls

just another idea i've seen lots of games where ships go all power to engines then blaze off every weapon in every direction. I think all power to engines should allow only 1 weapon system to fire. After all the orders are ALL power to engines!

 

[Locutus9956]

1 thing though I'd like to query, I may have missed something here but how do you figure the average hits per AD as 1 for current beams, it does come out that way if you round everything off granted but surely thats not all that accurate? I would go through the maths more in detail myself but I basically cant be bothered (and rather supsect Burger has already done so anyway so I'll take the lazy option and aks for an explanation )

 

[Burger]

1 thing though I'd like to query, I may have missed something here but how do you figure the average hits per AD as 1 for current beams

Odds of a hit are always 1/2, multiplied by the chance of the previous hit, hitting.

1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + ... = 1.

 

[Da Boss]

An ideal fix would be to keep the average beam hits exactly the same - so it wouldn't require extensive playtesting or adjustment of ADs or beam's other traits. FT rules as you describe will again nerf beams by 33%.

How about, a roll of 4 does one hit, roll of 5 does 2 hits, roll of 6 does 3 hits. Average would remain as 1, so no ships stats would need changing.

EDIT: Your FT rules, with an automatic reroll of any misses, works perfectly as well! Average hits per AD is maintained as 1 so all current ship stats are valid. And has better distribution (less chance of a total miss, less chance of a massive hit) but still has the potential to do double the numbe of AD in hits. So, great idea, I am on board

This is the mechanism that would get my vote if I had to choose anything different. However, despite seeing extreme beams every so often, I don't see them as game breaking as some people do.

In games I play in it usually happens twice per game on average - one massive hit and one complete miss with the rest being about average. Of course if you are on the end of the massive hit or miss (or both!) you tend to remember it and often it has a disproportionate effect on a game.

 

[Burger]

often it has a disproportionate effect on a game.

Yes, especially if it happens at the beginning of the game.

 

[Greg Smith]

1 thing though I'd like to query, I may have missed something here but how do you figure the average hits per AD as 1 for current beams

Odds of a hit are always 1/2, multiplied by the chance of the previous hit, hitting.

1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + ... = 1.

Mathematically speaking the average number of hits tends towards 1.

 

[Locutus9956]

ah but you see thats the crux of it, it TENDS TOWARDS 1 assuming an infinite pool of attack dice, in practical terms:

I have an 8AD beam.

On average I get 4 initial hits: Total hits 4.
Reroll those 4, getting on average 2 more hits: Total hits 6.
Reroll those 2 again getting on average 1 more hit: Total hits 7.
Reroll that final dice which has a 50% chance of hitting (now if we round up this is 8 hits but its more accurate to say its 7.5 hits since you will get 7 hits as often as youll get 8).

The lower the number of dice you have for your initial pool the more innacurate is to say it tends towards 1 however you look at it. Statistics is all well and good in theory but can only be applied to certain degree in reality where limits slightly lower than infinity apply

In any case though I find myself leaning rather towards the hits on 4s rerolls on 6s and rerolls on all initial AD.

I dont think beams are overpowered as they stand currently, just far too erratic and that DOES need a change I think.

 

[Silvereye]

How about, a roll of 4 does one hit, roll of 5 does 2 hits, roll of 6 does 3 hits. Average would remain as 1, so no ships stats would need changing.

Nice idea