Playtest Rules 1.2 - The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

[Everyman]

Well at least the Good, the Bad, and the Not sure abouts from my first take on the new changes.

The Good:

Reduced range on the White Star Neutron Lasers rather than the rule about reducing it to 1 AD. Perhaps 12" would be a better range though.

The addition of shields, an aft Molecular Slicer and increased range of Molecular Slicers on the Shadow Omega. Not sure about the change to the side weapons. They will now do more against Hull 6 on average but less on lower hulls.

The inclusion of Pak'ma'ra and Abbai admirals.

Claweagles becoming a two for one patrol choice.

League of Non-aligned Worlds allowed again but with more limited ship choices based on Service Date.

Two for one patrol choice ships not forced to squadron in Patrol/Skirmish level games.


The Bad:

The lack of admirals for numerous races.

The changes to the White Star Enforcer. This ship is inferior to the Gunship now. The addion of +1 Command (which the ISA only barely needed) and Scout trait (which they really did not need another scout) does not compensate for the loss of range on the Neutron Lasers and removal of fighters.

The lack of a skirmish level Shadow variant or any variants for the Psi-corp or Pak'ma'ra (both of which could use some).

Vree initiate extraction special action being allowed by their Patrol (and perhaps Skirmish level ships). They can actually win Patrol level battles without firing a shot (especially against crew poor races like the ISA). Either disallow it for smaller ships or make it 1d3 crew or even just 1 crew.

The Fireraptor still not getting any decent changes.

The new Vorlon Dreadnought still being inferior to the Heavy Cruiser (what they need is a Battle or War Level Carrier variant of the Light Cruiser).

Space Station rules are getting better especially for those small stations but some of the one hardpoint weapons are still too powerful (i.e. Centauri skirmish level stations with 15 AD of AP,Double Damage Matter Cannons at range 27) and some heavy weapons are still over the top as well (i.e. Gaim battle level stations with 24 AD of photon bombs at range 45).


The Not-So-Sure About:

Earth Alliance still have the e-mine style Fusion missiles.

The Demos being reduced to 6AD rather than 8AD.

Z'trikk still not getting the Fleet Carrier trait.

 

[katadder]

well the z'trikk has been totally ruined from its original conception and I wouldnt take one over a z'takk.

original z'trikk:

Z’Trikk-class Heavy Carrier (Z’Takk variant) War
Noting other races high use of fighters the vree decided they needed a heavy carrier of their own and thus the Z’Trikk was born. Able to carry whole wings of vree fighters and also contribute to the battle from afar with its antimatter torpedos the Z’Trikk has been nicknamed the basestar by Earth Force personnel after its resemblance to something in an early 21st century TV show.

Speed: 8 Damage: 80/14 Craft: 10 Tzymm flights, 10 Zorth Flights
Turn: 1/90 Crew: 112/18 Special Rules: Anti-Fighter 10, Carrier 6,
Command +3, Fleet Carrier,
Jump Engine
Hull: 6 Troops: 3 In Service: 2272+

Weapon Range Arc AD Special
Antimatter Torpedo 25 T 8 Precise, Slow-Loading, Super AP, Triple Damage
Antimatter Torpedo 25 T 8 Precise, Slow-Loading, Super AP, Triple Damage

on the demos, i agree would prefer 8AD as 6 seems to far but am talking to myself on that one.
more admirals is quite hard to come up with ideas for all the races. the abbai and pak ones were just 2 i had finished and if i manage to finish more then maybe they will appear in S&P, if we can get an ACTA article in

 

[Da Boss]

there were a series of Admirals for each race posted before:

for instance some very very nice ones here:

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=36713&start=15

these, others and even mine from DR could be adapted.............

 

[Everyman]

there were a series of Admirals for each race posted before:

for instance some very very nice ones here:

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=36713&start=15

these, others and even mine from DR could be adapted.............

I am rather familiar with those actually and thanks for the compliment on them

 

[tschuma]

If they would just address the Critical Hit table, then I might start playing again. I know that the number of people here in Cincinccati have dropped becasue the game is so dependent on Critical hits and can turn with 1 roll. This is, in my point of view, why we never take a larger ship in all of our games. Make it a re-roll like VAS or something, but I have had too many larger ships die to Critical Hits from Fighters than I care to think about.

I would love to order some Centauri ships to finsh out a friends fleet hat he has given me, but I would rather spend my money somewere else at this time.

Fix the wya tcritical hits work and a lot of the aurgments I suspect will go away. P&P is the chance to get it right.

Now it's off to some AT-43 stuff.

tschuma
Aim Small Miss Small

 

[inq101]

Don't like the Claweagles becoming twofers. There are other ways to fix them without giving the Drazi a twofer ship (and I am a Drazi admiral).

 

[silashand]

If they would just address the Critical Hit table, then I might start playing again. I know that the number of people here in Cincinccati have dropped becasue the game is so dependent on Critical hits and can turn with 1 roll.

That's my main complaint with the game as well and why I don't particularly enjoy it as much as I do other games such as BFG. I do like the variety of crits possible, but IMO they are far too easy to achieve. Either limit the table or give ships a form of redundancy against them with the larger the ship, the more resilient it is versus being critically hurt. I don't care how they do it, but this is probably the single biggest thing I hate about ACtA and frankly, it has had more of an impact on turning a game unenjoyable than any other rule from *any* system I can think of right now. I want to like ACtA more than I do, but it always seems to be the crits that for me make it less than it could be.

Cheers, Gary

 

[tschuma]

Gary

Thanks, I am glad I am not the only one out there!

tschuma

 

[Kaizen Zanshin]

In regards to criticals it seems like an easy fix to me. For weaker ships firing on stronger ones if they roll a 6 for the crit they have to roll another 6 (or a 5 or 6) for each level lower they are. If they fail then it just turns into a solid hit (perhaps with double damage).

So a ship worth a Battle point has been attacked by a Skirmish Point ship.

The Skirmish point ship rolls a critical. He needs to roll two more 6's (or 5's or 6's) to actually get the critical.

That would stop the "more is better" strategy and start looking at larger ships if you want to score criticals.

Simple - or at least it is IMO.

What are your thoughts on this?

 

[inq101]

Technically it looks OK, but it does seem like potentially a lot of extra dice rolls slowing the game down. I also don't think that a smaller ship is less likely to cause a crit rather than the bigger ships being able to survive it.

 

[EDFDarkAngel1]

Certain weapons should have critical abilities, others shouldn't. Reduce the ability for a crit, and increase the overall damage of weapons.

Dark Angel

 

[Kaizen Zanshin]

Hmm... You are right - small ships with the same weapons should not get a penalty. Perhaps if you get a crit then you have to roll a 4-6 to roll on the crit table, otherwise on a 1-3 the hit does double damage.

Again nice and simple. It could work.

 

[l33tpenguin]

A nicely balanced and scaling redundancy trait is a smooth, beautiful and easy solution, adding more flexability to ship design at the same time.

 

[ATN082268]

If they would just address the Critical Hit table, then I might start playing again. I know that the number of people here in Cincinccati have dropped becasue the game is so dependent on Critical hits and can turn with 1 roll. This is, in my point of view, why we never take a larger ship in all of our games. Make it a re-roll like VAS or something, but I have had too many larger ships die to Critical Hits from Fighters than I care to think about.

I would love to order some Centauri ships to finsh out a friends fleet hat he has given me, but I would rather spend my money somewere else at this time.

Fix the wya tcritical hits work and a lot of the aurgments I suspect will go away. P&P is the chance to get it right.

Now it's off to some AT-43 stuff.

tschuma
Aim Small Miss Small

In my view, A Call to Arms (ACTA) has 3 areas which need vast improvement:

1. The Fleet Allocation Point (FAP) System. If the ships aren't balanced in general, then the game isn't worth playing. This is true not only for ships within a particular race but also how ships from different races stack up again other races in general. Basically make smaller ships significantly more costly in a revised FAP.

2. Critical hits. You could give Armageddon ships the ability to ignore 3 critical hits of their choice and War level ships could ignore 2 critical hit of their choice and Battle could ignore 1 critical hit of their choice; If you combine this with a more balanced FAP, then things might work out.


3. Initiative. A side with more units will always have an advanatage, with all other things being equal. Even if you don't want a proportional type system which would probably work better than the existing system in general, you still have options. Limit numbers for particular levels of scenarios. Or give the side with a smaller force a bonus of some kind, which could include more forces.

Sincerely,

Andrew Norris

 

[Tolwyn]

Gary

Thanks, I am glad I am not the only one out there!

tschuma

I'm with you too.
Here in Germany the community designed a house rule to make larger ships more viable. We use an armor point system depending on the ships starting damage meaning larger ships can suck much more crits then small ones before suffering from them.

I see P&P getting into the same direction like the Armageddon desaster

 

[l33tpenguin]

In my view, A Call to Arms (ACTA) has 3 areas which need vast improvement:

1. The Fleet Allocation Point (FAP) System. If the ships aren't balanced in general, then the game isn't worth playing. This is true not only for ships within a particular race but also how ships from different races stack up again other races in general. Basically make smaller ships significantly more costly in a revised FAP.

2. Critical hits. You could give Armageddon ships the ability to ignore 3 critical hits of their choice and War level ships could ignore 2 critical hit of their choice and Battle could ignore 1 critical hit of their choice; If you combine this with a more balanced FAP, then things might work out.


3. Initiative. A side with more units will always have an advanatage, with all other things being equal. Even if you don't want a proportional type system which would probably work better than the existing system in general, you still have options. Limit numbers for particular levels of scenarios. Or give the side with a smaller force a bonus of some kind, which could include more forces.

Sincerely,

Andrew Norris

All three of these are really balance problems.

Right now large ships aren't balanced against small ships. Large ships need to be reworked for balance to include how they suffer crits and how initiative sinking works. They aren't. Infact, they are horribly broken. If ships became worth their weight in regards to crits and sinking as they became bigger, then the problems would go away.

So, either ships are balanced in these regards or rules are changed to balance ships...

 

[Hindsight]

I am happy with, and grateful for, the inclusion of the knife fight White Star in this latest play test document. I feel that all that time paid off, I hope it tests well, and this can be put to rest.

 

[Da Boss]

I am little worried it may have in fact gone the other way with the WS being overly vulnerable to Centauri, Pak, Shadows (esp with their new accurate SA), Gaim and other fleets but am probably wrong - need to test..............

 

[Kaizen Zanshin]

In my view, A Call to Arms (ACTA) has 3 areas which need vast improvement:

1. The Fleet Allocation Point (FAP) System. If the ships aren't balanced in general, then the game isn't worth playing. This is true not only for ships within a particular race but also how ships from different races stack up again other races in general. Basically make smaller ships significantly more costly in a revised FAP.

2. Critical hits. You could give Armageddon ships the ability to ignore 3 critical hits of their choice and War level ships could ignore 2 critical hit of their choice and Battle could ignore 1 critical hit of their choice; If you combine this with a more balanced FAP, then things might work out.


3. Initiative. A side with more units will always have an advanatage, with all other things being equal. Even if you don't want a proportional type system which would probably work better than the existing system in general, you still have options. Limit numbers for particular levels of scenarios. Or give the side with a smaller force a bonus of some kind, which could include more forces.

Sincerely,

Andrew Norris

1. I totally agree with this. If they simply came up with a point system for each of the chassis and for each weapon it would improve the game dramatically. There could be two number values - one for the race specific and one for everyone else. That way everyone could take anything (purchased off the black market) but it would cost them alot of points to do it.

2. I like this idea - it's clean and just can be thought of as the bigger ships are denser, beefier ships.

3. For initiative you could make it that if you were placing a certain amount of points - say a 5 point raid game - you could make it so you have to move 1 point of raid in any combination you wish. this would force the people who are using the small ships as "time sinks" to move 4 of them if they were patrol on one move. That evens things out quite nicely!

 

[Tolwyn]

I fully agree, a point system would be much more better, but as said somewhere before ACTA will not change to a point system as the designers believe the PL system to be an integral part of the game :? .

I remember any games where the PL cbhart just made good games worse coupled with the inbalances.

If you like I could post our house rules here so you could see the ideas we have came up already.