I'm getting sick of "Lumbering"

[tneva82]

Any scenario that requires maneuvering of ships is instantly lost by fleets featuring multiple lumbering vessels.

I presume you have dozenz and dozens of games under your belt with lumbering fleet then if you make such a blanket statement?

Dozens and dozens as a minimum.

 

[storeylf]

Captain Jonah, You seem to be pointing out what I was earlier. That in FedCom the Gorns and Feds are almost identical when it comes to manouverability. They have largley the same turn modes, and both have quite energy intensive weapons (which means less power for movement). So lumbering in ACTA gives them a turning penalty that simply isn't justified based on any argument relating to the source game (or the Feds are provided with an unjustified advantage if you want to look at it that way).

In FedCom all ships (bar freighters and BBs) get a free auto success HET, and all subsequent HETs after that have the same chance of failure for all ships. So again lumberig has given the Gorns a penalty that isn't justified on any argument relating to the source game.

It appears to me that either they were given lumbering for balance reasons, or just to make them a lot different to other empires.

As I said earlier, I don't understand the earlier comment about replicating the feel of FedCom which it clearly doesn't IMO, but I'm not commenting on whether the game is good or bad (or balanced or not), that's a different argument.

 

[Myrm]

How much of a penalty is lumbering though on a turn 6 vessel compared to one without?

For general movement with a 12" max move if you move less than 12" for any reason there is no difference for normal moves and there are plenty of reasons not to move the full 12" - terrain, avoiding another ship. Cruising round in circles with the gorn moving 6 and turning and the fed moving 12 and turning twice (to take advantage of its superior move) it takes 5 turns or so circling for the fed to get a serious firing solution with its photons from my view of the geometry. OK Klingons its a different matter, you are in serious mobilty trouble but frankly the Feds have somewhat of the same issue with them.

Bearing in mind that a plasma armed vessel will be using the Reload at least every other turn, and possibly more frequently if they are firing off different arcs at different times, lets see what that does - at least every other turn they will be Power Drained, and 6" move is one of those options - with plenty of phasers to fire however its not the automatic choice but if you are firing heavies from various anges out of sequence and don't need more than 6" move and you have as many phasers as the Gorns, the 6" move choice is attractive.

Any crit taken to impulse or dilithium and the trait becomes irrelevant in normal movement compared to a 6 turn ships.

Its the 'no HET' that seems to be the biggest limitation on Lumbering ships to me, no get out of jail spin and sit on the target. That one off, haul ass of out of trouble move is not there. Although the angles of fire from the Gorn are moderately wide, especially with the biggest ships.

Thats assuming you take an all lumbering fleet. As soon as you use smaller vessels to escort the big boys, things do change in the fleet as a whole. Lt Thach made that point against zeroes with individually hopelessly out manoeuvred planes.

I will have to wait and see but Im not so sure that all this dicussion about turn modes and so on is where the problem lies in Lumbering - I think it is the HET restriction. Even then, Im not sure yet how limiting it is in a fleet action - I mean ACTA B5 had no HETs and lumbering ships there were perfectly viable in fleets when opposition had all sorts of other turnng goodness. If you everything lumbering then yes, problems - but some could be managed with good tactics - although inexperienced players would die horribly with lumbering ships.

And all this has to be in context of 'did they knock the points down to take into account the limits' - if the ships are cheap enough, then it matters not how unbendy they are.

 

[Da Boss]

There is def more of a disparity between ships/fleets than in B5.

Klingons, many Romulans and most Frigates / Destroyers are more agile than a White Star. But I have seen posters on ADB forums say how slow and clumsy even these ships are!

The Gorn are even less agile than a Narn Dreadnought as some of the ways to use a Lumbeirng ship have been removed:

- No "All Stop and Pivot"
- The equivalent of "Come About" can actually damage your ship even if you were allowed to do it which you are not.
- No using planets gravity wells to get extra turns
- if they use a power drain SA, the big lumbering ships can't turn at all

The only real advantge the big ships seem to have over previous behmoths is that they are as fast as anyone else (except the "fast" ships)

 

[Greg Smith]

The Gorn are even less agile than a Narn Dreadnought as some of the ways to use a Lumbeirng ship have been removed:

- No "All Stop and Pivot"
- The equivalent of "Come About" can actually damage your ship even if you were allowed to do it which you are not.
- No using planets gravity wells to get extra turns
- if they use a power drain SA, the big lumbering ships can't turn at all

I disagree.

Lumbering isn't as bad - you can move afterwards.

You can still AS&P, you just don't need a special action. And you don't need to all stop the previous turn. And you can fire all your guns while doing it.

Lumbering ships were prohibited from using a gravity well for extra turns anyway.

I will concur that not using Come about/HETs is bad.

 

[Da Boss]

The Gorn are even less agile than a Narn Dreadnought as some of the ways to use a Lumbeirng ship have been removed:

- No "All Stop and Pivot"
- The equivalent of "Come About" can actually damage your ship even if you were allowed to do it which you are not.
- No using planets gravity wells to get extra turns
- if they use a power drain SA, the big lumbering ships can't turn at all

I disagree.

Lumbering isn't as bad - you can move afterwards.

Its different I agree but the big turn numbers on some ships do mean that under power drain they can't turn at all??

You can still AS&P, you just don't need a special action. And you don't need to all stop the previous turn. And you can fire all your guns while doing it.

both true, but you could also turn 90 degrees rather than 45 - the new move rules mean that non lumbering ships won't miss it but lumbering ones may?

Lumbering ships were prohibited from using a gravity well for extra turns anyway.

Ah yes Adrian pointed that one out to em as well - silly me!

I will concur that not using Come about/HETs is bad.

 

[Captain Jonah]

Any scenario that requires manoeuvring of ships is instantly lost by fleets featuring multiple lumbering vessels.

I presume you have dozenz and dozens of games under your belt with lumbering fleet then if you make such a blanket statement?

Dozens and dozens as a minimum.

I’m going to step in here to defend what Deadshane said. A number of us have been talking about lumbering for a while now. Check the back posts We haven’t played hundreds of game. In fact I was being generous a month or more ago and saying we should wait and see because tactics could win out and maybe it isn’t that bad.

Well I haven’t played a hundred games and I’m sure if I do play a hundred games it’s not going to prove a magic way to overcome Lumbering.

I and many here have played enough games over the years to have an eye for what works and what doesn’t. If someone tells me they have invented a 20ton mech with an AC20 so it’s a killer, but they had to drop the speed because the AC20 is so big, oh and it didn’t have space for much armour I don’t need to play them or even watch the battle to know what is going to happen to a lance of them.

Thanks Storyelf, more evidence of Bias against the Gorn’s if they are no worse than the feds in FC

Myrn (and Greg) you ask how much worse is it with only one turn instead of 2. The Fed (the turn D equivalent from FC) can make two turns but need to move 12” to do so. They have a more restricted firing arc on the photons meaning they need to move more to get them into arc.
The Gorn can move 6”, turn and move 6” again. But then next turn they need to move 6” before they can turn again. A Gorn can move 6”, turn and stop, the Fed moves 6” turns, moves 6” and turns again. Both have exactly the same turning circle but one makes that turn twice as fast as the other. Remember that you need to move 6" before you are allowed to turn or you must be stationary. Moving 6", turning once and moving again means that next turn you are going to be in a fairly small area since you must either be stationary OR move 6" forward before you can turn again, anyone with 24" disruptors can move to bring that area under fire where they are in range and you cannot fire back,

Yes crits which reduce you to less than 12” move which levels the field, you can repair crits though.

The feds have one block of heavy weapons, they fire the photons and reload, on a reload turn they can move 12”, fire all Phaser’s and not fire the empty photons or a Drone. The Gorn fires off the side plasmas, does he then reload and move 6” so he can fire other plasmas or give up the ability to fire other plasmas. Consider that the Gorn are having Phaser’s taken away to make them match the SSDs, Gorn Phaser fire isn’t going to win the war. When the choice is fire plasmas or move 12” you sacrifice mobility or firepower.

Gorn cruisers have 4AD of Phaser-1s that can fire at a target anywhere round them (not centre lined), the BCH has 5AD. If you reload and move 12” that reduces the cruiser to the firepower of a DD. If you move 6” so you can fire plasmas you are being outrun by freighters and the next slowest ships (the Feds) have twice the speed AND twice the turn speed that you do while trying to bring the shortest range heavy weapon in the game to bear. Yes I know plasmas have a technical range of 16” but they lose 3AD at that range meaning a salvo of 2 Plasma-Ss and two Fs does a whole 2AD at that range (scary)

You say don’t use lumbering fleets. Well that leaves us with the CL (which is a bit crap), the HDD (which most of us end up taking 3 of) and BDDs or DDs. If you have ANY lumbering ships you need to cover them against people getting behind them, Gorn have one or two Plasma-Fs to fire backwards, all the big stuff is strictly pointing Forward and turning enough to bring even a FH plasma-S into arc is painful. A few Plasma-Fs are not going to kill that enemy cruiser or group of DDs that is flanking you so you need to post smaller ships to guard the rear. Doesn’t matter how agile those ships are if they spend the entire battle guarding the lumbering ships back sides, they may as well be lumbering themselves for all they can manoeuvre and influence the battle.

Allow HETs. Oh good so a crew check or I take at least two Impulse crits.

As regards points costs:
Gorn BC (CA) 200, Fed CA 180
Gorn CM 210, Fed NCA 190
Gorn HBC 240, Fed BCH 240.

The CM has better shields but other than that I’m not seeing anything to suggest Gorn are cheaper because of Lumbering.

 

[Greg Smith]

Its different I agree but the big turn numbers on some ships do mean that under power drain they can't turn at all??

Unless they don't take the move penalty part of Power Drain.

You can still AS&P, you just don't need a special action. And you don't need to all stop the previous turn. And you can fire all your guns while doing it.

both true, but you could also turn 90 degrees rather than 45 - the new move rules mean that non lumbering ships won't miss it but lumbering ones may?

True. But using AS&P required 2 turns - one to stop and one to turn 90 degrees. On the second turn they could only fire one weapon. Now it takes two turns and they can fire all their guns on both turns.

Which doesn't mean I don't think lumbering is poor, just not as bad as for B5 ships.

 

[Da Boss]

Its different I agree but the big turn numbers on some ships do mean that under power drain they can't turn at all??

Unless they don't take the move penalty part of Power Drain.

You can still AS&P, you just don't need a special action. And you don't need to all stop the previous turn. And you can fire all your guns while doing it.

both true, but you could also turn 90 degrees rather than 45 - the new move rules mean that non lumbering ships won't miss it but lumbering ones may?

True. But using AS&P required 2 turns - one to stop and one to turn 90 degrees. On the second turn they could only fire one weapon. Now it takes two turns and they can fire all their guns on both turns.

Which doesn't mean I don't think lumbering is poor, just not as bad as for B5 ships.

Its definately different but you could use the "turret" AS&P method on the third turn and consecutive turns to keep turning 90 degrees which could be very annoying. But yes B5 lumbering ships did tend to have a big gun so they could act like a turret. .............

I do take your point re the Power Drain and other options - although it makes plasma fire less likely as you would only get to fire one tube?

 

[deadshane]

Any scenario that requires maneuvering of ships is instantly lost by fleets featuring multiple lumbering vessels.

I presume you have dozenz and dozens of games under your belt with lumbering fleet then if you make such a blanket statement?

Dozens and dozens as a minimum.

Check.
8)

 

[Kirksfolly]

I think it would be interesting for some of you involved in this debate to play a couple of 1500-2000pt games using Gorn fleets (proxied or using counters) and post a game report here. Might change some perceptions...might not!

 

[DM]

They were huge, very expensive and very rare spenting most of their time as part of a fleet group because they were very cost effective targets so they did mostly shore bombing or anti-aircraft defense of carriers. They were obsolete as the central fleet vessel. What did it? Small manueverable vessels, submarines and aircraft and their weapons

Nope still wrong util you got to aircraft. Battleships were quite capable of giving smaller, more manoeuvrable ships a real kicking (and in many cases were as manoeuvrable as those smaller ships - in fact Yamato had a smaller turn radius than many destroyers). Submarines were too slow to operate in a fleet context and had to be very lucky to get a shot in at a battleship. It was aircraft that finally did for the concept of the battleship, and you are right, in the Pacific they did mostly spent their time bombarding islands and escorting carriers (mainly because there was sod all else for them to do), but elsewhere in the world battleships were operating in more traditional roles until late 43 at least.

 

[McKinstry]

Wasn't it Warspite that entered Narvik fjord and kicked the stuffing out of an entire German flotilla of DD's in 1941? Warspite was a modernized WW1 battleship and still quite a handful for the German DD's in what should have been their ideal spot, restricted waters and limited range.

 

[deadshane]

I've just posted a bunch of things I had to say about this subject and the Gorn fleet in general on my blog.

(I started a blog about this game....since I basically cannot get enough :shock: )

http://thetantalusproject.blogspot.com/

 

[Tolwyn]

Lumbering was crap back in the B5 days and it is still crap in SF: ACTA.

 

[GalagaGalaxian]

Here is a chart some people might find interesting. Didn't do Kzinti cause I lent my book (our store's only book so far) to a friend to read over the night and I haven't made Kzinti ship sheets yet.

Granted Turn Mode might not be the only thing factoring into the CTA:SF turn rating. The HET Break-down rating isn't on the FedCom sheets (just the HET energy cost) so I'm not sure how HET breakdowns work in FedCom compared to Star Fleet Battles.

 

[Myrm]

Myrn (and Greg) you ask how much worse is it with only one turn instead of 2. The Fed (the turn D equivalent from FC) can make two turns but need to move 12” to do so. They have a more restricted firing arc on the photons meaning they need to move more to get them into arc.
The Gorn can move 6”, turn and move 6” again. But then next turn they need to move 6” before they can turn again. A Gorn can move 6”, turn and stop, the Fed moves 6” turns, moves 6” and turns again. Both have exactly the same turning circle but one makes that turn twice as fast as the other.

Yes but if you have a Fed flying full speed to get that second turn whch they have to, the last thing you do is try and maintain the same space on him, you will fly outside his arc and they can turn back and shoot you using their superior manoeuvreability- its a really bad idea.
The Fed can turn round 360 in 4 turns compared to your 8, yes and if they end up on you backside with a full load of overload and at that point you are now as extinct as the dinosaur you ship is named after. However if in the meantime you move the 6", turn and stop - or come to a halt and turn on the odd occasion.
It takes 5 or 6 turns for their big arc to get into that firing solution as because you are moving inside the Fed movement arc and they cannotdo that lethal turn back inside you, even if turning slower because you are inside them. During his big big loop thats twice the size you maintain a lot of weapons on target for some considerable time and as you are doing 6" or less you can take power drain and fire everything as the guy crosses in front of you and that's your chance. So I would suggest that the simple full speed and turn as best as possible comparison is not taking tactical options into account in terms of how bad is it...the simple full speed comparison makes it look worse that your options give you. Yes HETs mean they can cut the corner, but if you are doing the go slow they do have to risk the HET and either cross in front of you or come down your teeth.

This tactic worked with Lumbering in B5, it works in a number of air combat games with poorly manoeuvrable elements (add Luffberry Circles to that as well). Lumbering in B5 is in some ways worse (turn in B5 and you stop there and then) and there's nothing in SF that seems to invalidate the tactic other than HETs - and again we are back to HETs as the problem with lumbering as I felt first time.

Allow HETs. Oh good so a crew check or I take at least two Impulse crits.

This is the bit I don't understand why they took it out. And the lack of the option is a big loss, the worst because when that Klingon gets behind you, you are in trouble. I still think the HET issue is the big one with respect to Lumbering not the basic turn rate.

 

[Captain Jonah]

GG a much nicer and more colourful presentation than mine :lol:

So let’s have a look:

Fed CA, CS, NCA, BCH all have turn mode D and are NOT lumbering
Klink C8 has turn mode D and not only isn’t lumbering but it retains turn 6
Rom BH, WE, KE, KC9R all have turn mode D and are NOT lumbering
Gorn CL has turn mode D and is NOT lumbering

The fed have a Lumbering DN, the Klinks have NO lumbering ships, The Romulan’s have a Lumbering DN and a non Lumbering DN, The Gorn’s have every ship above CL as Lumbering.

So why is the Fed CA not lumbering, why is the Gorn CL not lumbering. They all have the same turn mode source???

I keep asking the question and I keep getting silence, I’m beginning to think it’s that sort of embarrassed silence you get when everyone forgot and no one wants to admit it.
Did someone lock the door, feed the dog, close the lounge window, play test the Gorn?

Myrm. Yep. You can stop and turn 45 degrees each time to keep the Fed in arc.

However you are sacrificing any control over the situation, you are a turret. The fed breaks away out of range and can go pick on someone else. Another fed ship can swing in behind you from somewhere else. You can keep one fed in arc but to do so you have effectively taken your ship out of the battle. You can let the Fed or anyone else turn inside you and speed away but you then cannot turn to re-engage them or anyone else. You can end up stuck in an area of the map with map edges or terrain and the enemy no where near.

Fighter tactics don’t work so well with lumbering, you are more like bombers fighting off fighters. Except that the fighters have longer range weapons. The circles have the same problem, everyone has better manoeuvrability and longer range weapons. Where the Knzinti to be lumbering with drones it would be significantly less of a problem, as it is you have the least manouvrable ships with the shortest range weapons.

Once the Hydrans arrive with Fusions and phaser-Gs they have turn mode C on the cruisers so with shorter range weapons they are not going to be lumbering, it isn't until the ISC arrive that we see another fleet with turn mode D ships and I suspect they may end up Lumbering as well for the same unknown reason as the Gorn but getting behind an ISC fleet is a lot more dangerous due to the storm of rear plasma-Fs.

With lumbering even against the next slowest (Feds) if you make a wrong move it will take you a number of turns to recover. Going round an asteroid field, get back to me in three or four turns. It’s not a matter of speed, if the enemy is in two fleets and you turn to engage one fleet it will take you three or four turns to swing around to engage the other fleet.

Against Gorn you should operate in squadrons just for this reason, try to make them commit to one part of your fleet and swing that squadron away then come in with the other squadron. If the Gorn’s go with a mobile squadron to offset the elephant herd (which we seem to do as it’s the best tactic so far) then engage the HDD/BDD/DD group and avoid the lumbering stuff which is facing the wrong way.

With the exception of the Feds the other races are all manoeuvrable enough to go from facing one way to being several feet away and facing the other way in a few turns.

So do the Gorn’s keep the entire fleet together and not swing the lumbering stuff towards any enemy, boring game. Lots of terrain, good to hide behind. Yes till you try going round it with lumbering. Asteroids are so much fun to go round one 45 degree turn at a time and when your lumbering ships are out of sight of the enemy then the entire enemy fleet is out of sight of you.

HETS are a crew check or fail which means its yet another random tactic. If it was a case of making a het knowing I was going to take crits but accepting it as I needed to turn or die then that would be fine. However it’s a crew check or not move at all and take the crits. So you try and fail, the enemy is still behind you and you just burned out your engines for nothing.
Again its randomness deciding your tactics for you.

Try a HET and fail and you take crits. Trying for a turn of 135 degrees gets you most of the way turned round and does two Imluse crits if you fail. THat does you one damage, drops you to speed 8 and takes two or more turns of All hands on deck to fix. Try a 180 degree turn and you set yourself on fire, kill marines and take three damage.

Thats a lot of damage if you FAIL and you most likely die anyway since you have someone on your 4 shield (rear arc).

There are things you can do against say the Fed but against more mobile fleets (which is most everyone else) you are at a massive disadvantage.

 

[deadshane]

I'm betting that the Gorn Fleet box doesnt sell very well when it's released.

...an Errata in the favor of Gorn movement somehow might change this. Otherwise, Mongoose won't need to stockpile the Dino fleets like they're going to need to do with all others.

 

[MongooseMatt]

So why is the Fed CA not lumbering, why is the Gorn CL not lumbering. They all have the same turn mode source???

I keep asking the question and I keep getting silence, I’m beginning to think it’s that sort of embarrassed silence you get when everyone forgot and no one wants to admit it.

We keep giving the same answer; CTA: SF is _not_ FC or SFB. They are different games replicating different things from the same universe.