Idear for swarm fleet "problem"

[Grimbart_Kriegsaxt]

@Ripple
I fail to see your problem... especially with the shield thingie.

But in the case of 6 DD hits against 10 Armour you would have to roll dice in a row. Since the last hit is a possivle crit. Oh there is an easy solution to that, just take one dice which a special colour and make it the last hit. So you know what the possible breach would do.

 

[Burger]

Nice try, but I think Redundancy is a much simpler, easier, less book-keeping and less rebalancing fix to the swarm problem.

 

[Grimbart_Kriegsaxt]

Nice try, but I think Redundancy is a much simpler, easier, less book-keeping and less rebalancing fix to the swarm problem.

thanks i guess but i posted on page two i think, why i dont believe that to be true. Actually i think redundancy doesnt help that much at all.

But in the end i did only post an idear, and those who like it, can try it out.

 

[Greg Smith]

Rolling dice in order, or differentiating dice with different colours is something that we playtesters specifically went out of our way to avoid when working on 2e.

Abbai shields function the way the do to stop dice rolling in order. Interceptors augnmented by fighters work the way they do so that you don't have to roll different coloured dice.

I have to ask, if the damage is not getting through the armour, how can bulkhead hits still apply?

While the armour proposal is an interesting one, have you seen how Victory at Sea does hits, armour, attack dice and damage dice? Although, that this was something many people did not fit with ACTA and space combat, so was not introduced in ACTA 2e.

 

[Burger]

Rolling dice in order, or differentiating dice with different colours is something that we playtesters specifically went out of our way to avoid when working on 2e.

Absolutely, and well done for doing so!

At Q-Con tournament last year, there was this guy who would roll all his dice one at a time. Not because he only had 1 dice, but for some unfathomable reason. He would pick up all 20 dice, and let them roll painstakingly out of his hand, one at a time. Every time he rolled dice he'd do that. It was like Chinese water torture. It was just SO DAMN ANNOYING that you just wanted to THROTTLE him. And I wasn't even his opponent, just watching!

 

[Grimbart_Kriegsaxt]

@Greg
No i dont know how victory at sea works...

Bulkhead: i happen to not even know what that means but replace the word with "bad angle hit".

Using different dice to complicated (on example of 6 DD hits against armour 10) just roll 5 dice if all 5 hits are normal the dice number 6 can make a crit. if two of those are "bad angle hits" roll as well but ignore critical hit.

Thats not complicated at all... it just needs a little math in some cases.

EDIT: And still a solution that may not be perfect is still better than living with no solution at all (the status right now).

 

[Greg Smith]

Bulkhead is a wall inside a ship, usually a strong watertight one.

 

[The Hobbybox]

I have to say that I really like this idea, it's simpler than the Redundancy X idea, requires no extra record keeping (due to less crits being scored it actually reduces some of the workload!)

And I'll point out to a few people that the effect on the Precise trait is pretty negligible because those ships will also have armour added.

I think that the overall effect of this on gameplay will be that small ships still die relatively easily, but that larger ships will at least be able to survive an initial pounding, and last for an extra turn.

And having both inflicted, and suffered, many lucky 6/6 crits recently in the first turn of a game, I would welcome this as it would remove a little of the luck from the outcome.

 

[Burger]

I have to say that I really like this idea, it's simpler than the Redundancy X idea, requires no extra record keeping (due to less crits being scored it actually reduces some of the workload!)

You think this is simpler than a number which is decreased by one whenever a crit is rolled, and until it gets to 0 the crit is ignored:

Using different dice to complicated (on example of 6 DD hits against armour 10) just roll 5 dice if all 5 hits are normal the dice number 6 can make a crit. if two of those are "bad angle hits" roll as well but ignore critical hit.

How does this interact with Close Blast Doors or the Pak'Ma'Ra bonus? If the damage is prevented do you have to go back and re-roll the potential crits, because you suddenly have your armour back again? Or....... way too many cases. Redundancy is a much simpler idea.

 

[Tank]

I have to agree with Burger, redundancy is much simpler and easier it is also not something that is inherent in the current ship stats.

Armour is inherent as part of the hull value, besides which, I personally do not think armour is relevant to crit prevention but a redundancy trait is. After all offense always wins out over defense and there is always the chance of a vital system being hit from a lucky shot.

 

[The Hobbybox]

Ok, maybe I didn't fully get the redundancy idea, but I still prefer this one.

As for CBD and Pak problems:

CBD - works as it does now, I see no reason to change it.

Pak'Ma'Ra - don't play them so don't know how that works. Can you explain to me?

 

[The Hobbybox]

After all offense always wins out over defense and there is always the chance of a vital system being hit from a lucky shot.

I think the main problem is that there are too many cases of a vital system being taken out by a lucky shot, and the main hub of a fleet becoming a bystander because of it.

 

[Tank]

Which is why I think that redundancy is a better and more pertinent trait to include in the game, it will negate X number of criticals through the game and it is easy to keep track of.

then once the redundancy is used up that is a better representation for cumulative battle damage

 

[The Hobbybox]

I just think Redundancy doesn't solve the main problem, i.e. The most powerful ships in the game getting vaporised by 1 lucky shot.

I'll give an example to illustrate:

2 stand of fighters attack a ship (let's say a Narn battleship with no Anti-fighter) with Redundancy 1.

Both fighters are lucky enough to score crits.

1 crit is negated and the other is a 6/6 crit. Ship goes BOOM!

 

[Burger]

The Pak'Ma'Ra bonus is that they get a 6+ save to each damage and crew point, similar to Close Blast Doors but saved on a 6 not 5. It's automatic, not a special action.


How would this armour idea work then, lets say I have 6 points of armour left and soneone scored 10 Double Damage hits on me.

First I work out how many double damage hits I can take before armour is breached: 3. Roll the first 3 hits.

Lets say one is a bulkhead hit and one is a critical. The critical is reduced to a solid hit. So 5 damage, 4 crew lost.

I roll my Pak bonus, get one 6, so one point of damage is removed. Total damage for those 3 hits is 4.

I now have 2 points of armour left. So I must roll another hit, since I have enough armour to contain it. Lets say its a solid hit. I roll my Pak bonus, get 2 sixes! Great! The damage is prevented.

I now still have 2 points of armour left so I roll another hit. A solid hit, and the Pak bonus saves 1.

So now I have 1 point of armour left, what happens? Its double damage, so my armour is depleted, I can roll the rest of my hits... was it 5 or 6 I had left? 3 rolled originally, then another, and another... how many did I start with? Oh yes, 10. So 5 left.

Too much to do and remember in the heat of battle. Its difficult enough remembering how many interceptors you have left, and what number they need!

Lets not even bother asking what would happen if I had a GEG or Adaptive Armour!!!!!!!!!


Sorry, don't mean to shoot the idea down in flames. It is a good idea, simple and with very little book-keeping. Unfortunately the implementation is HIDEOUSLY more complicated than Redundancy!!! The original idea for redundancy was that the entire crit is ignored, including damage... that is the version I support.

 

[The Hobbybox]

Burger,

Yep, I agree that for Pak it's complicated, but the example you gave is only as complicated as using CBD against a double damage weapon and getting a NSA crit, so I fail to see the problem.

 

[Burger]

Burger,

Yep, I agree that for Pak it's complicated, but the example you gave is only as complicated as using CBD against a double damage weapon and getting a NSA crit, so I fail to see the problem.

Crit effects are applied after the damage, so thats not complicated at all. You get the saves, then lose the SA afterwards. You don't have to roll the damage dice one at a time, checking for NSA crits with each one...

 

[Tank]

@Hobbybox

I can see your point but I dont think that you have chosen the best example.

As far as resundancy is concerned I think it should be scaled according to priority level, thus a Battleship is unlikely to have only redundancy 1.

as an example:

Patrol: 1
Skirmish: 2
Raid: 3
Battle: 4

of course if you want to have a different kind of formula you could try it that for every 10 boxes of damage a ship has 1 redundancy, thus 100 boxes equals redudancy 10 (OTT but a formula such as that may tie in closer with the ships and flavour the races with an extra facet)

 

[The Hobbybox]

Tank,

Ok, I can support the idea of scaled redundancy per ship class, rather than redundancy on a ship by ship basis.

I think I'd go with something like:

Patrol: 0 redundancy (You're small, you're squishy, you're gonna die if they hit you!)

Skirmish: 1
Raid: 2
Battle: 3
War: 4
Armag: 5

 

[Burger]

Yep I'd go with 0/1/2/3/4/5 too, or maybe even 0/0/1/2/4/6.