Beyond the Abyss - Groups and Fleet listings

[Greg Smith]

I still say there should be a mechanic for crews surrendering when all the friendly troops are dead rather than being killed to a man. Even the most savage races in B5 would hesitate to unleash that kind of slaughter without need...

Well there is a rule for surrender - Stand Down...! But I have personally never seen it used. It seems in most battles the players are quite happy to blast a ship to slag rather than ask for surrender.

...seems to indicate that if you board a ship and your troops kill off all the troops and crew on board, all your troops then automatically die and the ship runs adrift for the rest of the game...

Hence the rule that your own troops don't die due to damage.

 

[Burger]

Stand Down is an order given by the attacker, with pretty hefty requirements. It's not a surrender offered by the defender.

 

[Greg Smith]

Stand Down is an order given by the attacker, with pretty hefty requirements. It's not a surrender offered by the defender.

True, but the essence of LDD's statement still applies, you are more likely to blast a ship to slag than ask for surrender. If a player has a crippled ship, does he continue to fight or surrender? There are no morale rules in ACTA, why should there be for this one situation?

In the situation where a G'Quan has its troops killed but there is one surviving attacking troop and the ship still has 60-odd crew aboard, would they surrender?

 

[Greg Smith]

However the 1/5 crit on a ship that moves less than speed 8 would technically limit you to moving less than 1/2 your speed.

You are correct. I hadn't considered that. There are indeed three results.

Why the no special action crit effects boarding: You cant use the all stop SA in order to counter board.

I don't follow you on that at all. Surely its other ships that counter-board. A no SA crit on a different ship makes it more difficult to rescue a boarded ship, but it doesn't make the original ship more susceptible.

 

[Da Boss]

Well the Narn response to B5 being boarded seemed to be to charge the breach and try and block it with their bodies - not to actually use the guns they were issued - but then thats Narn for you! :roll:

Presume if someone actually offered to surrender in a game - the opponent would take it and the double victory points? I have seen games conceded but not actual ships surrender. Its a war game without Morale so we mostly fight to the death!!

Plus some crew of the ship being boarded are trying to continue to pilot, man the guns keep the engines running etc - last week My Laiti got boarded by a bunch of Narn - did we stop trying to fix the forward guns, did we stop firing - no we didn't we damn well carried on till we were all dead - course the Narn captured the ship but that was all they had left

I like the boarding rules

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Perhaps there should be morale rules, Greg. Just commenting that there are no rules for a situation when I suggested there ought to be isn't a very constructive response.

Perhaps a CQ check to keep fighting the boarders and attempt to keep running the ship after the defending troops are all dead and the crew starts taking casualties directly resulting from the boarders' actions (as in, not from ship-to-ship shooting or fighter attacks) each turn would do the job? Fail the check and the ship stands down and takes no further action á la the Stand Down... special action.

After all, a PoW camp is prefereble to a body bag for most people - Narn vs Centauri fights excepted, of course.

 

[CZuschlag]

Lord David,

I think we want Marines and the Boarding action to be LESS lethal, not moreso. Introducing Morale would make it far worse. Especially given that I have a few .... unpleasant .... strategies that work on base size denial to force all stop orders and thereby force boarding actions (you stop short of bases now, instead of moving through ... a bit difference!).

 

[Lord David the Denied]

I realise injecting sense into this game isn't popular, but I keep pulling for it... so shoot me.

 

[Davesaint]

However the 1/5 crit on a ship that moves less than speed 8 would technically limit you to moving less than 1/2 your speed.

You are correct. I hadn't considered that. There are indeed three results.

Why the no special action crit effects boarding: You cant use the all stop SA in order to counter board.

I don't follow you on that at all. Surely its other ships that counter-board. A no SA crit on a different ship makes it more difficult to rescue a boarded ship, but it doesn't make the original ship more susceptible.

Actually it does. The target ship must meet the following restrictions in order to be boarded. It must be either stopped, running adrift, or moving 1/2 its speed. Thus lets say the ship takes a running adrift critical and is boarded. The ship, a large hull say battle or higher repairs the critical and is now moving. The ship then takes a no special actions critical. It can no longer move at less than 1/2 it's speed by use of the all stop special action. It therefore cannot be counter boarded by your own ships because it is moving to fast. Kind of silly, but thats the rule.


Dave

 

[Davesaint]

I realise injecting sense into this game isn't popular, but I keep pulling for it... so shoot me.

Bang. Just kidding.

I still never saw a boarding action in the series that did not involve a space station being boarded, and none of the troopers were wearing vaccum suits. The only scenes where you see boarding taking place is in B4 and B5. The combat abilities of troops are significantly degraded by the use of envionrmental suits. Ask anyone in the military that has used their chemical protective suits. This would significantly degrade the abilities of the troops.

As far as the crew of the ship not being armed in the scenes, I would certianly assume that as soon as a breaching pod latches on to a ship, or a shuttle crashes the shuttle bay, the crew breaks open the arms lockers and arms themselves to the teeth, especially the bridge and engine room crews.


Dave

 

[Lord David the Denied]

They almost do arm themselves when the "prepare to repel boarders" alarm goes out. They're probably armed routinely on active ops, anyway, and we never saw it.

Problem is, there's a big difference between a crewman with a sidearm or even longarm, and a marine. Navy crewmen train for their shipboard duties and do basic combat training. A marine's shipboard duty is combat, so the crew are badly outclassed by the boarders.

Still, I'm sure boarding is complex enough without adding in morale, but an official comment on my suggestion would be nice...

 

[Greg Smith]

Perhaps there should be morale rules, Greg. Just commenting that there are no rules for a situation when I suggested there ought to be isn't a very constructive response.

You mentioned surrender in one specific instance. If crews should surrender when they are boarded, why should they not surrender when the ship is crippled, when their sister ship explodes in a fireball and so on?

Applying morale to one instance, as you suggested seems wrong when there are far more common circumstances to which morale would apply.

 

[Greg Smith]

Actually it does. The target ship must meet the following restrictions in order to be boarded. It must be either stopped, running adrift, or moving 1/2 its speed. Thus lets say the ship takes a running adrift critical and is boarded. The ship, a large hull say battle or higher repairs the critical and is now moving. The ship then takes a no special actions critical. It can no longer move at less than 1/2 it's speed by use of the all stop special action. It therefore cannot be counter boarded by your own ships because it is moving to fast. Kind of silly, but thats the rule.

Dave

Ah, I see. It doesn't actually make it more susceptible to boarding, just difficult to counter-board if you repair the original crit. If you intend to counter-board wouldn't it be better to repair the speed crit afterwards?

It probably is a little silly, as in theory an enemy ship should be able to match speed and heading to launch assualt shuttles. However it does fit in with the simplified, arbitarary momentum rules that ACTA uses.

 

[katadder]

As far as the crew of the ship not being armed in the scenes, I would certianly assume that as soon as a breaching pod latches on to a ship, or a shuttle crashes the shuttle bay, the crew breaks open the arms lockers and arms themselves to the teeth, especially the bridge and engine room crews.


Dave

the B5 C&C crew never did when they got boarded. you rely on your troopers to stop the boarders, if this doesnt work your are screwed. trained marines versus basic crewmen is going to be bloody wether they are armed or not anyway.

 

[LaranosTZ]

*shrugs* Not even assuming a naval situation, ask a real marine that's been in combat the difference between trained military defenders and relatively untrained crew, with or without weapons. I happen to game quite frequently with military and ex-military types...one on active duty that has spent time training local militia into a true military/swat force. He's told me the stories...as 'militia' they had training, but still were as effective as whipping someone with a wet noodle.

 

[Burger]

As an aside I thought the "half speed" restriction for boarding actions applied against the ship's current speed, rather than its starting speed... the same as you must move half your current speed before turning. So a 1-5 crit on a ship with speed less than 8, would not make it more susceptible to boarding at all... though its speed might be reduced to 2, but it can still move more than 1" and be safe from boarding.

 

[Davesaint]

I would like to have someone find me one scene in B5 in which a boarding action was committed against a combat ship. We know that B5 was boarded, but we never, ever saw a ship on ship boarding action.


Personally in regards to Victory Points my suggestion is as follows -

You Do Not gain Double Victory Points for boarding a ship and "Capturing" it if you reduced it to Zero crew due to fire. This is a Beardus Maximus rule. If you want to allow salvaging the hull for campaign purposes, fine, but double VPs is rediculous.


As far as Boarding Actions - The only way to board a vessel is with breaching pods. All ships should have at least 1 Troop. At raid level, at least 2, and battle, at least 3, and war or higher at least 4.

For those who state that people who aren't trained as "marines" cant beat a marine boarding force going down a hallway trying to get to the bridge or the engineering area, your sadly mistaken. 20 crewmen with PPG's can lay down enough fire to pin down any marines in a hallway for as long as their ammo holds out. The suggestion that there would be no weapons available for defense of the Bridge or the Main Engineering section of a warship, especially since we are using a game mechanic that indicating boarding is pretty darn possible, is ludicris. In fact, IIRC I do believe that when the EA ships surrendered at Proxima, the XOs pulled a PPG on their captians. I wonder where they got those? :roll:


Dave

 

[tneva82]

20 crewmen with PPG's can lay down enough fire to pin down any marines in a hallway for as long as their ammo holds out

Or until marines kill them. Guns work both way

In fact, IIRC I do believe that when the EA ships surrendered at Proxima, the XOs pulled a PPG on their captians. I wonder where they got those? :roll:

Correct.

Now while all this is fascinating what's the status of tournament? Noticed there had to be rematch. Has that been played? If yes what was result? Who won? If not when is the rematch?

 

[katadder]

romu is on holiday, believe its trying to be played 1st sunday of september but thats down to dave and romu.

 

[Triggy]

Looking forward to the final if it is going to be this weekend...should be a lot of fun to actually see it this time!