I'm getting sick of "Lumbering"

[AdmiralGrafSpee]

I also think lumbering is terrible. I think it should just be plain removed. Ships that don't have lumbering should get a slight bonus to High energy turns, and ships that are agile should lose the 90 degree turn and instead get an even bigger bonus to high energy turns.

I also think that if a ship moves less than its turn mode it should be allowed to get one turn at the end of its move. It really is very sad that a Condor can't turn at all when cloaked unless it remains stationary. The penalty for being crippled basically also means that almost no crippled ships can turn either - why?

-Tim

 

[Totenkopf]

Matt has already stated elsewhere that carriers/fighters are being looked at for summer 2013 with the third expansion to ACTA.

 

[Da Boss]

I also think lumbering is terrible. I think it should just be plain removed. Ships that don't have lumbering should get a slight bonus to High energy turns, and ships that are agile should lose the 90 degree turn and instead get an even bigger bonus to high energy turns.

I also think that if a ship moves less than its turn mode it should be allowed to get one turn at the end of its move. It really is very sad that a Condor can't turn at all when cloaked unless it remains stationary. The penalty for being crippled basically also means that almost no crippled ships can turn either - why?

-Tim

I have some sympathy with the ACTA:SF lumbering issue - it was never this severe in previous incarantation and I assumed that it had been changed (like most apsects of the game) to fit in with the SFU.

re agile - confusing this - other SFB/FC players are saying that ships in ACTA:SF are all way too slow and lumbering..........again the move and turning mechanism were changed ot fit in with SFU.

re turning and allowing ship to just ignore the rules for minimum movement - well that just makes less agile ships suddenly capable of much better turns........

lastly
"The penalty for being crippled basically also means that almost no crippled ships can turn either - why?"

Seems pretty self explanatory to me - its crippled and burning - it's unlikely to sudenely become more agile ?

 

[cylence]

Turn Modes / Lumbering are just off as a reflection of how the ships perform in SFB & FC. I've already lost one player because of it, and the other three of us honestly find the game not enjoyable because of it. At any point range, the ideal fleet is just a large number of Turn 4 Agile Ships - The smaller point cost means you outnumber the enemy fleet giving you initiative advantage in the early phase of the game, which allows you to outmaneuver the other side. Even though your weaker ships may die easier, you pretty much get to dictate the flow of the game and the less manueverable ships are at a severe disadvantage.

SFU ships are not huge lumbering whales - we're talking ships travelling within warp bubbles and equipped with enough engines to (in most cases) be able to maneuver appropriately. A quick look at FC turn ratings demonstrates this: (Turn mode changes with base speed, but even looking at all three speed bands we can see how small the difference is. If we consider this case using 1" hexes, we have something to easily compare to ACTA:SF. Turn mode is number of hexes that must be moved before making a 60%/1 hex facing change.)
Turn Mode (ACTA Equiv): Speed 8 | Speed 16 | Speed 24
Turn Mode A (3 Agile): 1 | 2 | 4
Turn Mode B (4 Agile): 2 | 3 | 4
Turn Mode C (4): 2 | 3 | 5
Turn Mode D (6): 2 | 4 | 5
Turn Mode E (9 Lumbering): 3 | 5 | 6
Turn Mode F (Unseen, but most likely 12 Lumbering): 3 | 5 |7

As you can see, the difference in ACTA is vastly larger than how these ships perform in the parent games.

So far, in an effort to house-rule the game into something we want to play, we've tried eliminating the lumbering 1 turn / turn penalty, and allowing ships to make a turn at any point in their movement, but then must move the appropriate distance before turning again. This makes the larger ships perform better, but also increases the smaller ships performance, and didn't turn out to be a good solution. I've seen another proposal to dramatically reduce the turn rates of all ships, which would be more in line with the source material, but I have to manage to convince the others to play again in order to try it out.

I honestly can't see why turn ratings ended up the way they did - it appears to be some way to force differentiation between ships, but does so in a matter that doesn't work very well. I haven't played the other ACTA games, but if what I'm hearing in that they didn't have such huge differentiation either is correct, this makes even less sense.

 

[Da Boss]

Interesting - the main difference is that apparently all SFU ships have to travel the same speed - in other ACTA Games max speed was different for each ship.

re turning both previous versions of ACTA worked like this:

A ship had a maximum move rate from 4-16".
Normally a ship had to move half of its maximum movement before it could turn and an extra 2" before it can turn again
Without SA (Like All Stop!) always had to move at least half it maximum move
Ships had a set maximum of turns (unjless again a SA like Come About!- bit like HETs)
1 x 45, 2x 45, 1 x 90 or 2 x90

Agile: The ship can pull very high-G turns, allowing it to out-manoeuvre other vessels with ease. This ship need only move ¼ of its Speed in a straight line before making turns, and need only move 1” in a straight line before making subsequent
turns.

Lumbering: Either under-powered or simply too massive for the most advanced engines, this ship is ungainly and turns slowly. It may only make a single turn during a Movement Phase, and may never make more under any circumstances. In addition, the ship may not move forward any further after making this turn

However you could also use Planets like this (even if lumbering):

Slingshot
There is another way to use a gravity well – to accelerate your vessel to incredible speeds. This is called a Slingshot. In order to do this, a ship must move towards a planet (in other words, end up closer than when it started) and end its movement within the planet’s gravity well. In addition, the ship must also keep any part of the planet in its Fore fi re arc. If it accomplishes these conditions, then the ship will automatically be moved an extra distance forward equal to that shown on the Planetary Table and may also make an additional 45o turn (or less) at any time during this movement. Even ships reduced to 0 Speed or Running Adrift (but not those with the Immobile trait) may take advantage of this Speed increase if
they are within the gravity well and the planet is in their Fore arc.

To give an idea of how it worked for Centauri fleet:

A Primus was a relatively quick but ungainly Battlecruiser
Max Speed 8, Turn 1x45, Lumbering
A Elutarian was a Bombardment cruiser with average agility
Max Speed 8, Turn 1x45,
A Vorchan was a sleek fast attack ship
Max Speed 14, Turn 2x45, Agile
The Liati, a stunningly agile battlecruiser designed to hunt down White Stars
Max Speed 14, Turn 2 x90, Agile

 

[Nomad]

Perhaps a thread should be started to list ideas for the second edition?

There's clearly some unhappiness about Lumbering, and about manouvering in general. Some people think the Kzinti are overpowered (i.e. may win the odd game?) and some think that the Gorns are disadvantaged. Boarding to capture, definition of 'a weapon' and the division of weapon group lines on the damage chart could be other things to look at.

There will be a second edition at some point, we might as well start thinking early.

 

[crosswiredmind]

Wouldn't it be simple to simply rely on the turn number? Ships that are agile have turn: 4, normal ships are turn: 6, and the largest ships are turn: 8. I would also add carry over for turn requirements. It would not be hard to place a marker next to a ship with a number of inches carrying over to the next turn.

 

[Da Boss]

I would also add carry over for turn requirements. It would not be hard to place a marker next to a ship with a number of inches carrying over to the next turn.

Really not keen on that idea - what happens if you can't carry out the movement - say be being sent adrift - you have gained an advantage......

If there is a an issue with Lumbering I would rather that rule is adjusted or dropped...........

 

[Reynard]

"There will be a second edition at some point, we might as well start thinking early."

ACTA:SF, the Munchkin edition.

 

[Sgt_G]

Da Boss, I think you have CrossWiredMind's idea backwards. If I'm reading him right, this is what he wants:

Game-turn #1: Move 8", turn 45 deg, move 4", place a marker "4".
Game-turn #2: Move 4" which when added to the "4" is a total of 8" moved since previous 45-deg turn, turn 45 deg, move 8", turn 45 deg.

Game-turn #1: Move 9", turn 45 deg, move 3", place a marker "3".
Game-turn #2: Move 6" which when added to the "3" is a total of 9" moved since previous 45-deg turn, turn 45 deg, move 6", place a marker "6"
Game-turn #3: Move 3" which when added to the "6" is a total of 9" moved since previous 45-deg turn, turn 45 deg, move 9", turn 45 deg

When I talked to old SFB/FedCmdr players, they had no problem with this idea; talking with old ACTA:B5/NA players, they were very adamantly opposed to this and block-voted it down.

 

[Greg Smith]

That is pretty easy with one ship. With a dozen ships, on each side, it becomes very cluttered. Also tracking stuff from one turn to the next is something we try to avoid in ACTA. ACTA is about fleet tactics, not how each individual ship works in detail.

Not saying I am opposed to changing lumbering. I do see agile as a bit too good too.

 

[deadshane]

The ONLY thing I don't like about this game is 'Lumbering'.

I'm willing to work past it though because it IS "part" of the game. Quitting this game b/c it's too hard to maneuver your ships, IMHO, is nothing but pure laziness and admitting that a game is just too hard for you to play. That's cool though, there are plenty of "clix" games out there and peeps are still playing pokemon, checkers, and candyland if thats more your taste and simple enough.

Everything else about this game...I love. I love starship combat games, and I'm totally gay for 'Trek.

This game is win.

I think you could fix lumbering with one simple fix. Make high energy turns availiable for lumbering ships.

They're availiable in starfleet battles...your breakdown value is worse than smaller ships, but HET's are availiable nonetheless.

Make HET's availible for lumbering ships on crew check results of 9. Now at least you can maneuver when the battle takes an unexpected turn. You can actually respond now tactically instead of steaming forward obliviously.

It's not like these huge ships don't have massive warp engines to accomplish this. One turn/turn is bad enough....if that turn can be an HET then that alleviates much of the "problem" while still leaving the lumbering ships....restricted.

 

[Reynard]

Best rule for any game is if you don't like a rule don't use it. The team that created this game thought it was workable and fitting. I like the rule and I'm sure so do many others. Removing it means others who buy the game would be deprived for the sake of a few.

No really, if it bothers you that bad, houserule it out with a pen as well as any other rule. Same for houseruling rules you create. It's about everyone having fun.

 

[shiba-tenchi]

As a B5:ACTA player I've dealt with lumbering for a while, and it was just a limitation you made sure you designed your fleet to deal with. Fleet, is probably the operative word here.

However, in B5 there were a couple of special actions that allowed lumbering ships to be effective when out manouevred. Particularly "all stop and pivot" and "track that target". Neither is probably able to be ported directly to SF, but perhaps a variation of either could be added IF lumbering turns out to be unbalancing.

 

[Myrm]

All Stop and Pivot should port over as an expression of the Tactical Warp Manoeuvres option in SFB (not sure if its FC or not) - and in fact I'd say you don't need the restriction of having not moved the turn before for All Stop and Pivot in its SF incarnation.

 

[Greg Smith]

All stop & pivot is lot more restrictive that the SF version, which is just 'don't move and turn'. Not even an SA.

 

[Sgt_G]

Here's something I posted on the ADB board a while back:

In SFB/FedCmdr, turn mode is partly based on the ship's speed. In ACTA, it appears that they assume a ship will always move at the the full 12" allowed. My idea would be to allow a ship to "down shift" to a slower speed to make tighter turns.

A ship would be allowed to make a turn once it has moved more than (call it at least one-quarter inch) one-half its turn-mode distance. However, it would count as if it had moved the full turn-mode distance for total distance traveled during the movement phase.

Example, a Fed CA has a turn mode of 6". By my rule, it could move 3-1/4", turn, move another 3-1/4", turn again, and MUST stop at that point. Even though it has only moved 6-1/2", it has used up its 12" movement allowance.

It need not use the same distance between the first and second turns as it used before the first turn. In other words, it could move 6", turn, move 3-1/4", turn and stop. Or move 3-1/4", turn, move 6", turn and stop. It could move any distance between 3-1/4" and 6" before turning, but it still counts as moving 6" for total distance moved during the phase.

Opinions?

 

[Da Boss]

As I understand it, the all ships move the same speed was a SFU imposition - at least its new to ACTA...

My first thoughts:
It does seem very complicated at first read.
Also do we really have to have partial measurements........I think its best to avoid if we can?

Could we not just go back to the previous system and use:
Ships must move half movement before turning, and then can made additional turns - if able - after a further 2" movement. You would probably need to bring back the Come About SA to allow those extra turns (or to make a 45 into a 90 or a 90 into a 135) - CQ 8 to do it.

Turn Mode A = 2 x 90, Agile (B5 version (*see below))
Turn Mode B = 1 X 90 or 2 x45, Agile (B5 version (*see below))
Turn Mode C = 2 x 45
Turn Mode D = 1 x 45
Turn Mode E = 1 x45 Lumbering (but allow HET)
Turn Mode f = 1 X45 Lumbering, No HET

note: I don't know what ships have what turn mode so not sure how it effects current ships.

Agile: The ship can pull very high-G turns, allowing it to out-manoeuvre other vessels with ease. This ship need only move ¼ of its Speed in a straight line before making turns, and need only move 1” in a straight line before making subsequent
turns.

Lumbering: Either under-powered or simply too massive for the most advanced engines, this ship is ungainly and turns slowly. It may only make a single turn during a Movement Phase. In addition, the ship may not move forward any further after making this turn.

 

[Kirksfolly]

Having played a squadron sized action, where ships were going hither and thither (and boom!) I think carrying over movement would just over-complicate things. We're aiming to triple and quadruple the number of ships on the table as we become more adept and I think carrying over movement would just get confusing. Maybe it's just my simple mind! :lol:

As has been stated by others, lumbering won't be such a penalty in big games where there's a target rich environment.

I wouldn't propose rule changes until we've had chance to play plenty of big games. When we have by all means review the game objectively but let's not propose changes off what we think from reading rules, playing with squadrons (or less) and our experience in other rulesets. I'm willing to trust the play-testers...for a good while at least! :wink:

 

[Da Boss]

I am more than happy to do as you suggest but even if we do have to change and it think its a still a big maybe rather than tweek things, it might be best to look at a sytem designed for use in fleet actions rather than ship on ship actions

I agree with both yourself and Greg that carrying over movement is just too complicated for me......it also changes the whole tactics as at present you know how a given ship is likely to move and act.....

I do think ACTA should officially be saying more thats it is designed for actions of 4+ ships a side - and ideally 6-8 ships aside or more.