Carriers

I tyhink the system will definately be 'one-shot' one kill, but feel that one fighter to a stand (or build a flight) option is more likely. Also, i tend to feel that dodge would be a non-starter for fighters, just state that they are 'tiny' targets and attack as drones for targeting.

Or, as i am more happy with, a 'tiny' special ability that means they ALWAYS count as at long range (-1 accurate at half/-2 accurate at over half), so any system can shot at fighters - Ph-1's would kill a fighter at up to 18" 50% of the time. The one hit-one kill balances with the changes made to Plasma (Phasers are lethal to plasma now), and if using the one fighter (x X) fight sytem mentioned, each hit would redue the effect.

As far as drones, either 'one shot' alpha strikes (late general war fighters WILL kill stuff) or a continuous low AD ability to fire drones (as most games last 6-8 turns, this is an option).

We do need fighters - and what people might be overlooking is the ActA tends to look at carriers as 'Fully Loaded' when brought, so expensive, than empty then 'buy' - if i remember NA worked like SFB, where you brought fighters for your carriers, so this option has some basis in the current system development.
 
andypalmer said:
Part of book-keeping is the maneuver aspect and maneuvering 60-120 fighters is not going to be enjoyable. Also, the one shot one kill doesn't work in SFU - General War fighters take 10-16 points of damage to destroy, even the earlier ones take 6-12.

Book keeping those 60-120 fighters=60-120 stands. Lot faster than tracking damage and amount of damage output on separate tracks.

What's the difference anyway if you record "this stand has X fighters left" than having separate stands that would result in faster...With individual fighters vs one flight stand with damage track you see instantly how much there's left and there's no need to pull up pen&paper for that. And clutter the board with more paper.

And as for one shot, one kill not working...THIS IS FLEET SCALE ACTION! Abstractions are neccessary for fleet scale action.

If you want micro manage things then play SFB ;)

(also frankly one shot, one dead fighter is more realistic anyway. If ship mounted weapon can't do better than damage fighter without impacting it's combat performance how they are supposed to dent better protected capital ships? Albeit it's sci-fi but since we can't know what future is it's not bad idea to draw comparisons from how things currently work and in IRL fighter that gets hit by missile is not likely going to be combat shape anymore. If not flat out destroyed then it's going to need to disengage for repairs)
 
Keeper Nilbog said:
Also, i tend to feel that dodge would be a non-starter for fighters, just state that they are 'tiny' targets and attack as drones for targeting.

Are fighters any more difficult to hit in SFB than shuttles?
 
One shot one kill will have the SFB players up in arms, which will pressure ADB to be on their side, even if they wouldn't be already (likely IMO).

Sorry but I think it's a non-starter. Fighters don't die to a phaser-1 at long range in the SFU; heck, fighters don't die to a phaser-1 at anything other than point blank range, and even then, only the small ones. Many fighters can take a photon torpedo hit and keep on coming with no reduction in capability.

As for difficulty of hitting, they are equally difficult to hit as shuttles, but not as difficult as drones. That said, they have built in ECM and the ability to perform erratic maneuvers - I'm not sure how that will translate to ACTA. In general terms, in SFB you wouldn't fire anything but a seeking weapon or a disruptor at a fighter outside overload range.

SFU fighters do dogfight, though it was rarely used by players in SFB - I think many of us would be interested in seeing a more workable system for it.
 
One shot one kill will have the SFB players up in arms, which will pressure ADB to be on their side, even if they wouldn't be already (likely IMO).

To be fair complex tracking for fighters will have the same effect on many players over hear who will put pressure on MGP.......

Sorry but I think it's a non-starter. Fighters don't die to a phaser-1 at long range in the SFU; heck, fighters don't die to a phaser-1 at anything other than point blank range, and even then, only the small ones. Many fighters can take a photon torpedo hit and keep on coming with no reduction in capability.

Which may be why they are apparenly a source of considerable discussion and controversy in SFB and hardly in FC? Given that they sound like unkillable, devestating weapon platforms I can sort of see why

As for difficulty of hitting, they are equally difficult to hit as shuttles, but not as difficult as drones. That said, they have built in ECM and the ability to perform erratic maneuvers - I'm not sure how that will translate to ACTA. In general terms, in SFB you wouldn't fire anything but a seeking weapon or a disruptor at a fighter outside overload range.

You could easily represent this with a Dodge "save" of X+ on a D6.

SFU fighters do dogfight, though it was rarely used by players in SFB - I think many of us would be interested in seeing a more workable system for it.

It simple and effective:

Once you move into base contact with an enemy flight, you are considered to be dogfi ghting and so follow these rules. A dogfight starts automatically once two or more flights are in contact with one another and no flight involved may move until the enemy has been destroyed. Every flight has a Dogfight score (usually -2 to +4), a reflection of a fighter’s potential to move into position and destroy its enemy.
You resolve all dogfights your flights are involved in when you nominate your fighters to attack in the Attack Phase. When two opposing flights are engaged in a dogfight, both players roll one dice and add the Dogfight scores of their flight.The player who scores the highest will win the dogfight and automatically destroy the enemy flight that attacked it (it will not destroy flights that merely supported). If the scores are equal then all flights involved will be locked together and may
not move until another dogfight has been fought and won. You may only destroy one enemy flight in each dogfight, no matter how many are arrayed against you. Once a flight has won a dogfight it still counts as being in a dogfi ght for the rest
of the current turn.
 
If I'm reading the rules right (and I may not be; I haven't gotten any on-table experience with the game as if yet) it seems that the rules covering Hydran Stingers in Starmada: Admiralty Edition already have them as one-hit-one-kill units. So, if ACtA:SF went a similar route for Stingers (or other one-space fighters) here, there would be a SFU-based precedent for it.


Although, it should probably be (re-) emphasised that even if we see true carriers show up, it's far more likely that the range of fighters, carriers and weapon options will be significantly more streamlined here than they are in SFB; perhaps more in line with the aforementioned Borders of Madness material. As in, one type of superiority fighter per empire, and one or two strike fighters (depending on how many heavy weapon types are available to this or that fleet; one fighter type per heavy weapon).

Which isn't too far off how things are in ACtA:NA, as it currently stands.


In terms of heavier fighters, I would guess (for what it's worth) that the only type we'd be likely to see would be the F-111; and even then, perhaps offered at the same time that other Alpha Octant powers get their gunboats. (But in that case, if the Feds have the option of getting their "conjectural" PFs in ACtA:SF anyway, I wouldn,t be surprised if it ended up being an either/or between it and the F-111.)
 
To be honest in a fleet scale game you simply don't nned ten differing tyes of fighter.

Early, mid war, torpedo, heavy. Basicly covers it.
 
Greg Smith said:
Lincolnlog said:
In SF they do carry Photons, Disruptors, and Phasers (yes and even Plasma). They also carry drones. But in supplement J of SFB a fighter is limited to firing 2 drones per turn. Also, remember, there would be no reloads on the drones. :?

Do SF fighters carry the same drones/photons/disruptors as starships? How much ammo/power do these things have? How big are they?

In SF if you lose a fighter from a flight, you lose phasers, drones and possibly photons (or insert heavy weapon of choice). How do you adjust the fire power of the loss of a single fighter from a flight. It's easier to use single craft versus flights, and a hit on the fighter kills it. Firepower reduced, no fuss no muss. 8)

Noble Armada uses one fighter per stand. It would seem to me that that would be the way to go. B5 ACTA is all or nothing for the flight - either you kill the flight or it is intact (something that probably won't wash with the SFB players :) ).

Sorry folks been busy. Various fighters carry various numbers of drones. But the rate of fire for drones per turn is not variable. This prevents fighters from being too powerful.

By the way, I would agree that abstraction does not necessarily negate from the game, but not abstracting or limiting abstraction does not neccessarily have to add burdensome complication.

For instance, if fighters were treated as seperate (meaning individual) craft, but killed on a single hit (they are dead or they are alive), with a max of 24 fighter to a side, this is not going to over complicate a game. Drones are still simultaneous, a phaser is still a phaser, a photon still a phont etc...
 
I'm not sure I want to clean, prime, paint and mount 24 fighters per ship to play the game and I certainly don't want an ugly stack of cardboard counters in lieu.

However fighters get treated, it needs to acknowledge that this is a miniatures game and the process must include manageable numbers of miniatures that don't demand a disproportionate investment either in cost or painting time and effort yet still maintain the aesthetic standards of the 2500 series miniatures.
 
In that case, it would be as well to only port over carriers with more manageable fighter complements; such as, say, the Kzinti CVS?

There's no particular reason to expect the full array of carrier options to be on the table, any more than there is to envision every last fighter (and variant) to show up either.

Plus, if the pattern laid out in ACtA:NA is followed (where the carrier's hangar bays are empty when purchased, and each individual fighter has to be paid for separately) the costs of even a CVS would start to add up fairly quickly; providing a built-in pressure valve in terms of on-table miniature requirements.


Of the Alpha Octant powers in the Main Era, only the Hydrans should really be planning on getting a lot of Stingers ready, due to their hybrid-carrier doctrine; but that is part and parcel of what makes that fleet what it is.



Speaking of carriers, one other handy thing in ACtA:NA is the difference between the Craft and Carrier traits. If you take the example of the Kurgan Arigaba-class carrier in the Fleets of the Fading Suns preview pdf, you'll see that while it has a Craft value of 16, its Carrier trait is only 4. This means that while it can carry a total of sixteen fighters, it can only launch four at a given time.

This dovetails nicely into a feature which many SFB carriers have; launch tubes. These help certain (but not all) carriers get more fighters on the board at the one time, but are rarely able to allow a ship's entire fighter complement to set out all at once. So, a CV in ACtA:SF could have the Craft score to show its total complement, and a numbered Carrier trait based on the amount of fighters its SFB counterpart can launch (with or without launch tubes) in a given impulse.

That would help how the difference between a ship that happens to carry a lot of fighters, and a true fit-for-purpose carrier.
 
They are looking at altering the NA fighter rules according to a previous post by Mathew.

There used to be Craft, Carrier and Fleet Carrier but yes it should all work well with the fighters in SFU
 
I've heard very good things about the ACTA/NA fighter rules and from game pictures I've seen, the numbers of miniatures seem quite manageable.
 
I could see fighters being abstracted similar to what happened to drones.

Extreme abstraction:
- There are no fighter stands.
- Carriers have unlimited fighters and the number available each turn is scaled back to "make them last the entire battle".
- Each type of fighter carried is treated as a different Weapon System and has matching range/attack as appropriate.
- Ships being attacked have defensive fire options similar to what is available for seeking weapons.
- Dog fights may be possible if a carrier is targeted, or within a radius like IDF special action.

I don't think the Extreme would be as fun since it doesn't allow the flights to flank the enemy (important vs Klingon) and may prevent the big "furballs" from happening.


Moderate abstraction:
- Fighter models are to scale, and one stand will have a few fighters represented (tiny paintbrush time).
- Fighter stands (flights) will be treated just like ships and will have Hull/Cripple, Weapon Systems, speed?, etc.
- The Cripple value could be higher than normal, to simulate destroyed fighters.
- The number of fighters in a flight is standardized for each type of fighter within a race.
- Dog fights happen when 2 opposing flights are in base contact (as posted above).
- Multiple flights can be grouped into a Squadron (just like the capital ships).
- Fighter stands are targeted just like ships in the Attack phase.

Trying to track how many unlaunched fighters are on each carrier may be unwanted paperwork. I played ACtA:B5 once and remember all of the flights started off launched in base contact which would solve it. Of course shuttles and marines are tracked currently, but they also are less critical to battle outcome. An example of flight standardization is Hydran ships with 2, 3, or 4 in the other games get a stand with 3 fighters in ACtA. Setting this "grain size" based on the race would make balancing within said race easier since a stand of 6 fighters wouldn't fit the Hydrans at all.


Without abstraction:
A lot of this has already been proposed in more detail, so I just wanted to mention that F&E had a limit to the number of fighters that could be "on the front line" in a round of combat. Doing something like this to set the max single-fighter stands on table and keeping track of how many fighters are in reserve may be a no-no for the ACtA system though.
 
There is one other factor to consider; any new fighter minis for Starline 2500 would need to work for SFB, as well as both FC and Starmada (for the Stingers, at least). That in itself might lend weight to a more ACtA:NA-ey basing option.
 
Nerroth said:
In that case, it would be as well to only port over carriers with more manageable fighter complements; such as, say, the Kzinti CVS?

In addition, if the follow the possibility in the Fed Com Borders of Medness, the Strike Cruisers will be toned down to 8.

Nerroth said:
There is one other factor to consider; any new fighter minis for Starline 2500 would need to work for SFB, as well as both FC and Starmada (for the Stingers, at least). That in itself might lend weight to a more ACtA:NA-ey basing option.

That is a very good point.
 
McKinstry said:
I'm not sure I want to clean, prime, paint and mount 24 fighters per ship to play the game and I certainly don't want an ugly stack of cardboard counters in lieu.

The obvious answer would be not to play with carriers then. :P

Using fighter counters is pretty normal for us in B5 ACTA.
 
Greg Smith said:
McKinstry said:
I'm not sure I want to clean, prime, paint and mount 24 fighters per ship to play the game and I certainly don't want an ugly stack of cardboard counters in lieu.

The obvious answer would be not to play with carriers then. :P

Using fighter counters is pretty normal for us in B5 ACTA.

Heretic. :lol:

It's a miniatures game. Even the hint of counters opens the game to accusations of consorting with the unwashed, pox ridden heathen of a boardgame persuasion. Better no carriers than cardboard sullying the pristine felt of the true and righteous miniatures game. :twisted:
 
McKinstry said:
I'm not sure I want to clean, prime, paint and mount 24 fighters per ship to play the game and I certainly don't want an ugly stack of cardboard counters in lieu.

However fighters get treated, it needs to acknowledge that this is a miniatures game and the process must include manageable numbers of miniatures that don't demand a disproportionate investment either in cost or painting time and effort yet still maintain the aesthetic standards of the 2500 series miniatures.

Well whether it's 1 fighter per stand or 6 fighters per stand you'll end up painting 24 anyway...

Good news is that fighters being so small are dead easy to paint ;)

edit: 2nd good news: Just 'cause there's fighters in game doens't mean YOU have to play with them ;) Especially by judging from previous track record of fighters telling that most likely fighters are either going to be "worthwhile but not broken" or "seriously underpowered" so "I need them to win" argument is not going to work.
 
I'm fine with painting 24 fighters for a fleet but not with 24 for a ship and needing 6 ships worth for a fleet. Numbers in the eighties or nineties make my skin crawl, both from the painting burden and from the game clogging, complexity adding burden.
 
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