Couple of questions

[Da Boss]

IIRC it was ruled that emines break stealth as an attack so they do give a +1 as long as the ship that fired them is still active..............

I don't think ship explosions, asteroid collisions and JPB's do - or at least we dont play them as they do - but then under RAW.............

so its not very logical at present I am afraid...................

 

[Greg Smith]

There was a long discussion about this when 2e first came out. It was ruled on here: http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=30135

 

[Dr Stubbsberg]

surely the concept goes that they have broken stealth enough to get a targeting solution for the area it's in, they then fire the mine and once it goes off use the data from the explosion to pinpoint the ship, forwarding the data to the rest of the fleet (their torpedoes are fired at the same time as the emine, explaining why they don't benefit from the bonus themselves)

 

[AdrianH]

There was a long discussion about this when 2e first came out. It was ruled on here: http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=30135

Indeed:

A ship hit by an Energy Mine has certainly been attacked by the ship that fired it. Think of is as the explosion silhouetting the target, lighting it up like a Christmas tree.

As for the other question, under normal circumstances to get the 'attacked' bonus against Stealth, a ship first needs to see the target ship, then roll dice against it, i.e, make an attack. Whether it causes damage or not is immaterial.

This, incidentally, is why energy mines grant the bonus - you are rolling dice against said ship, thus attacking it. The energy mine trait specifically says you skip the Steath rolling stage.

It's all there

So basically, if you're rolling dice against the ship, it's being attacked. The e-mine explosion lights up the ship.

Which does not explain why the ship which fired the e-mine must relay data to the rest of the fleet who, being stupid or blind, can't see the ship which now resembles a Christmas tree.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

Aye, in fact it draws into question the whole issue of any ships needing to survive. Presumable, a non-emine ship while show up the enemy by laser pointer or creating a string of shots which mysteriously disappear as they hit the stealthed ship. other ships then know where to concentrate their scans on (concentrate where the shots disappeared). If the ship which originally fired those shots then is destroyed, why would the allied ships then ignore where the already fired shots were pointing to?

 

[stryve]

As I more than halfway expected, a new turn has generated yet more quetions:

1. Can the Psi Corps 'HEL Track Array' refit be gained more than once by the same ship?

2. How would the Psychic Crew special action 'Cause Confusion' interact with, say, 'All Stop and Pivot'?

3. Can space staions gain experience dice?

 

[Greg Smith]

1. Can the Psi Corps 'HEL Track Array' refit be gained more than once by the same ship?

I wouldn't think so. There is no reason to have it more than once.

2. How would the Psychic Crew special action 'Cause Confusion' interact with, say, 'All Stop and Pivot'?

It doesn't. AS&P is over and done by the time Cause Confusion gets used.

3. Can space staions gain experience dice?

Good question, that's never come up before. From a fluff perspective, I would say not, since they are assumed to have such a large crew that there is no effective crew score. However from a games perspective, they need all the help they can get to repair all of those hundreds of damage points.

 

[Dr Stubbsberg]

1) Nope, same as advanced sensors in other fleets

2) Near as i can tell this would have no effect on Pivot, nor on any other purely movement based SA.

3) Pretty sure they can't, for the same justification as the CQ always being 4 (also given that they aren't technically part of a fleet list then they have no Refits or Duties tables to spend them on)

 

[nekomata fuyu]

Sorry to burst your bubble guys, but HEL Track is not the same as Advanced Sensors.
Advanced Sensors specifically says that it can only be applied once. HEL Track has no such limitation. What's more, the rules at the top of the page for the Psi Corps table specifically states that "Unless otherwise stated, multiple results of the same type can be applied to the same ship."

In short, yes, you can have multiple HEL Track results on the same ship. Think of it as such a new experimental breakthrough that continued refinements cause an increase in effectiveness.

 

[Greg Smith]

Sorry to burst your bubble guys, but HEL Track is not the same as Advanced Sensors.

It serves the same purpose.

In short, yes, you can have multiple HEL Track results on the same ship. Think of it as such a new experimental breakthrough that continued refinements cause an increase in effectiveness.

To what end? It isn't cumulative.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

In short, yes, you can have multiple HEL Track results on the same ship. Think of it as such a new experimental breakthrough that continued refinements cause an increase in effectiveness.

To what end? It isn't cumulative.

How do you come to a conclusion that it the exact opposite of what the rules specifically state? I'm curious.

 

[katadder]

yes you can have multiple heltracks by the rules. but you only get one +1 for having a hel track. its still the same system no matter how many are on the ship, its also probably something that was just missed before as why would you want more than one.
how do you come by the conclusion that having another one is a refinement? its still a hel track

 

[nekomata fuyu]

Thinking of it as a refinement is just a way to think about it that makes more sense storywise.
Ruleswise, it just says that such upgrades can be taken multiple times, with the example showing that they stack their effects. Even if you want to think of it has having multiple HEL Tracks on an individual ship, there's still nothing to stop them stacking in either the Stealth rule or the HEL Track rule.

 

[katadder]

well I am requesting the wording is changed then to stop people who are obviously only interested in powergaming.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

How the hell is it powergaming?
You're unlikely enough to get the HEL Track upgrade once on a ship, nevermind twice. Even then, if you eventually do get such a ship, and you're fighting against an opponent who's actually going to give a damn, you can bet that the ship in question will very quickly be a twisted mess of metal floating through space.
If you want to crack down on powergaming results, maybe you should get the Centauri dodge result changed so that it doesn't stack. That smells much more of powergaming than HEL Track stacking. Or maybe get the interceptor rules changed so that they don't automagically shoot down only the shots which you will fail to dodge a few seconds in the future.

 

[katadder]

Powergaming often involves an expert knowledge of the rules of the game, and knowing how to apply the rules to get maximal results with minimal penalties (often referred to as min-maxing). This implies one willingly takes actions which should be illogical within the game world, or following the rules to the letter rather than in their spirit.

thats how its powergaming.
its already fairly easy to break stealth, having a nemesis already with heltrack gaining another one and the fleet having patrol level scouts with CQ5 means that you can pretty much get a +3 against stealth straight away meaning even a sharlin is seen on 2+ pretty damn easily.
no other fleet including the masters of stealth, the minbari can gain these sorts of bonuses so why would the relatively inferior tech humans manage to refine something so much.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

So this is powergaming because... it doesn't involve an expert knowledge of the rules, doesn't involve applying the rules in any special way, and follows the spirit of the rules as well as the letter of the rules.
I know, you don't like it because it involves a player getting lucky. I guess anyone who rolls a critical explosion is also a powergamer, as they got lucky too.
And you're right, it's unthinkable that shadowtech using ship designers could possibly come up with something more advanced than an Omega :roll:

 

[stryve]

Alright, since there's a split in opinions, with convincing arguments on either side, I'm going to toss the HEL Track question over to the Rulemasters. Please keep any discusion here in this thread.

 

[nekomata fuyu]

That's probably the best approach to clear up if Matt intended what's written, or if he just messed up and gave the same refit twice, once being a miswrite.

 

[stryve]

No, they do not stack.

(http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=37423)

Alright, guess that clears that up.