Looking at the ion cannon, which one typical application will be masses of barbettes on ships of the line, there could be a few points to address:
An example might help, say having x power points lost, and then the ship owner player deciding how to spend their remaining power points the next turn.
There should be a clear ruling about what happens when the power for Basic requirements are reduced.
This and the maneuver drive are the fundamental users of power, everything else is well secondary to the maneuver drive actually and this will always be the likely first victim of power reduction.
But I would suggest there needs to be something very serious happen when the power for the basic functions of the ship is eaten into. Make it so bad that this is the last thing that power should ever be lost from. Say at 75% power reduction of Basic the ship is totally non-functional in any way for 2-6 turns, even if power is restored. This would force players into choosing to drop maneuver completely and/or start eating into weapons.
It should be noted that you need an awfully high superiority of firepower to affect a ship smaller than you. 100 barbettes hitting is 1d6 x 10 x 100 =3,500 power points (+effect, not sure how this averages out actually). A TL12 maneuver 6 drive uses 12,000 power points for a 20 kton ship. I'm not sure the power damage couldn't be raised a notch.
An example might help, say having x power points lost, and then the ship owner player deciding how to spend their remaining power points the next turn.
There should be a clear ruling about what happens when the power for Basic requirements are reduced.
This and the maneuver drive are the fundamental users of power, everything else is well secondary to the maneuver drive actually and this will always be the likely first victim of power reduction.
But I would suggest there needs to be something very serious happen when the power for the basic functions of the ship is eaten into. Make it so bad that this is the last thing that power should ever be lost from. Say at 75% power reduction of Basic the ship is totally non-functional in any way for 2-6 turns, even if power is restored. This would force players into choosing to drop maneuver completely and/or start eating into weapons.
It should be noted that you need an awfully high superiority of firepower to affect a ship smaller than you. 100 barbettes hitting is 1d6 x 10 x 100 =3,500 power points (+effect, not sure how this averages out actually). A TL12 maneuver 6 drive uses 12,000 power points for a 20 kton ship. I'm not sure the power damage couldn't be raised a notch.
