High Guard Update 2022 - Coming July 29th!

[adzling]

To get off the editing / typo tip for a minute: Thank you for the section on Boarding that gives actual mechanics for damage caused to the ship from high penetration weapons and also penalizes long-weapon use inside ships!
Now we finally have mechanical reasons for why Cutlasses and Snub Pistols exist, hoorah!

 

[Weiland]

p. 122 Morale. Which skill is used for this roll and what Characteristic? Who is rolling, the leader of both sides or each ship? Is this somehow connected to Morale rules in the Traveller Companion? Is there a missing table of the effect on crew skill score that is mentioned in the text?

 

[tempest13]

Errors and clarifications noted here and NOT fixed on the current pdf released today (8-12-2022):

p.27 Crew Critical Hit Table - Are the results cumulative with all lower values? -if it is then the table should reflect this or at least note it.
p31 Missile Barbette section last sentence "barbetttes"
p82 Medium Bay: Plasma-pulse Cannon - Cost: MCr 15 (should be MCr 30)
p.154 Shuttle Power plant is 3 power points short of being able to run Basic Ship Systems AND Manoeuvre Drive at the same time.
p.166 Deck Plan, Serpent Class Scout, missing the Double Turret. Access to the turret should go in the Common Area (4) near the Air Lock (3).
p.182 Close Escort Deck plan does not need docking space as Gig is connected by a docking clamp.
p.192 6. should be Cutter dock NOT Full Hangar.
p.196 Type P Corsair 10 standard staterooms stuffed into 16 dTons of volume... what a bargain.
p.239 Valiant Hull points should be 16500 not 528.

 

[Tupper]

Thanks for all the edits to the book!

I did note that the spinal mount rules didn't get a change. Here's my synopsis of the problem.

p35-36, Spinal mounts. Treatment of particle and railgun spinal mount contradicts general rule on damage multiples from p29. p29 rule says subtract armour and then multiply by 1000. p36 has particle accelerator losing 3*armour as percentage of damage, railgun losing 2*armour as percentage of damage. Mass driver spinal mount has no bespoke rule for handling armour.

Suggested fix: either

(a) remove the sentences "The damage dealt by a particle spinal mount is reduced by 3% per point of armour possessed by the target before applying the Damage Multiple" and "The damage dealt by a railgun spinal mount is reduced by 2% per point of armour possessed by the target before applying the Damage Multiple" [this option uses the general rule from p29, and the armour piercing effects on page 35 make railguns more effective against armour]

or

(b) add a sentence on page 35: "The damage dealt by a mass driver spinal mount is reduced by X% per point of armour possessed by the target before applying the Damage Multiple" (where X is the effectiveness of armour ... maybe 2?). If this route is taken, I'd suggest deleting the AP effects from the table on page 35, since railguns and mass drivers are already getting better armour penetration than particle accelerators due to the 3%/2% differential.

 

[Tupper]

(Deleted this post, because my thinking was wrong).

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

I'm not sure there is a problem with spinal weapons - they may be working as intended.

It would mean armor 'works twice' against them, but I believe it's a matter of balance and the way armour and damage multiplication work.

Let's compare: In the old High Guard, the smallest particle spinal did 1DD damage, which on average added up to 3,000-4,000 damage (can't roll 3,5 on 1D6). Armour was practically irrelevant.

The new High Guard changes the base damage to 8D, for an average of 28 damage. Let's assume our target has armour 10. That leaves 18 damage after armour. 3% damage reduction per point of armour means 30% damage reduction, 0.3x18 = 5.4, let's round up to 6.
18 - 6 = 12 final damage, multiplied by 1,000 gives us 12,000 damage. That's three times as much as the previous version, against a well-armoured ship! If the % reduction hadn't been there, the damage had been off the charts!

But why not just lower base damage? I believe it needs to be high, like now, since armour and screens reduce the raw dice damage, and the damage multiplication doesn't happen until it's time to apply damage, meaning armour and screens are actually somewhat relevant even against spinal weapons.

TLDR: Working as intended, imho

 

[MonkeyX]

Wow the math on the new damage is horribly complex compared to what it originally was.

 

[Arkathan]

Wow the math on the new damage is horribly complex compared to what it originally was.

You must not remember the vector movement for ship combat...

 

[Sigtrygg]

Vector movement as plotted by past position and future position tokens is not exactly hard to do or understand.

 

[Arkathan]

Tell that to a bunch of rednecks with a beer or two in them, in the 80's. Before VTT's. On a dining table. With ships going the wrong way (off table).

 

[MonkeyX]

You must not remember the vector movement for ship combat...

Ahh I don’t use vector movement. Maybe it’s just the “look” of the math but d6x10 seems easier than perecentages

 

[Arkathan]

Ahh I don’t use vector movement. Maybe it’s just the “look” of the math but d6x10 seems easier than perecentages

I don't use it either, anymore... But in the LBB's that was what we had.

 

[Annatar Giftbringer]

Wow the math on the new damage is horribly complex compared to what it originally was.

It's not really complex though, it's just that there's several steps to work through. Apologies if it seemed that way, tried to be as clear as possible with each step and how it affected the end result

 

[Arkathan]

Going through the book and checking that I didn't miss anything else by running the High Guard designs through my ship designer.
It looks like the Express Boat, pg 158, Jump drives cost is calculated incorrectly. It has the budget option with the bulky disadvantage for a 25% reduction in price.
18.75 x MCr1.5=28.125
28.125 x 0.75 = MCr21.09375
Or is the calculation not based on the final volume? (15 tons x MCr1.5/ton x 0.75)?
Listed cost on pg 158 is MCr 16.875 which matches the latter.

Also, the TL 10 Cargo Shuttle on pg 154 is equipped with a TL 12 power plant.

 

[Tupper]

@Annatar Giftbringer Thanks for the explanation. Spinal mounts completely makes sense to me now!

 

[Surge]

So against my own advice, I've just bought it, and even though it's already had a huge number of errors corrected thanks to the community spotting it, I have already found two of my own in the first 20 minutes of looking. Unbelievable.

These errors are found in the 120822 version. (Thank you for dating the versions, but you should probably date them yymmdd so that they can be correctly sorted by date)

p.31 Bay Weapons :- Damage shown for the specific Bay, and multiply the result by the factor shown in the Damage column above. For example, a Medium Meson Gun Bay would do 6D x 20 damage.

The way this text reads contradicts the explanation of Damage Multiples in the sidebar on p.29, which explains that you shouldn't multiple anything until after accounting for Armour and AP. The text on p.31 does not read like that.

p.38 End of the page and into p.39 :- The listed cost is for three torpedoes." Then, break to a new paragraph before "Torpedoes are much larger and more resilient. Torpedoes are much larger and more resilient than missiles, allowing them to punch through point defences to reach their targets.

You seem to have included an editors note in the body.

 

[kevinknight]

P. 41 -
MESON SCREEN
Meson screens block attacks from meson weapons by preventing meson decay. A successful use of a meson screen reduces the damage of a meson weapon by 2D x 10 and removes its Radiation trait. When used to ward off a single attack, screens are grouped in batteries, requiring only a single Gunner (screens) check for an unlimited number of screens.

Shouldn't the "x 10" be taken off of this? or is the logic on this is that a single meson screen is only reasonably effective against a small bay?

 

[Surge]

So is Mongoose just done with the problems in this book now? Half done again and calling it quits, off to the printers with these?

Can I at least get some clarification on this bit?

The way the text below reads, it contradicts the explanation of Damage Multiples in the sidebar on p.29, which explains that you shouldn't multiply anything until after accounting for Armour and AP. The text on p.31 does not read like that.

p.31 Bay Weapons :- "Damage shown for the specific Bay, and multiply the result by the factor shown in the Damage column above. For example, a Medium Meson Gun Bay would do 6D x 20 damage."

 

[MongooseMatt]

Another (hopefully last) update later this week!

 

[Sigtrygg]

Take as much time as is needed. Do not send to print until the latest version has been checked, I'd rather have it late than have it full of mistakes, however minor.