Playtest rules: FAP breakdown

[CZuschlag]

The rules as they currently function almost totally change our perceptions on the Drazi. I hate the ramming thing with a passion, but the attack run rule is cool and NASTY. A Drazi player will use it a lot. They'll have to. The fleet will have the right feel as a result of it.

I'm just not sure that the Attack Run is enough. The rule that you have to reroll all successful hits to confirm them is rather major, espeically given that there's a CQ check to even do the action in the first place. What is this in a real over the table? No clue. I suggest that the Drazi be the second most tested race in the game after the Abbai.

I expect that due to Attack Run alone, Drazi will become the race that demands the most fleet co-ordination effect from its commander.

 

[Foxmeister]

The rule that you have to reroll all successful hits to confirm them is rather major, espeically given that there's a CQ check to even do the action in the first place.

I agree that re-rolling hits is probably a little tough on the Drazi. I'd suggest a compromise, and that is that when performing an attack run, beams are treated as mini-beams and twin-linked weapons lose the trait for the duration of the attack run. That leaves a handful of weapons that are unaffected, but I don't see that being a particular issue.

Regards,

Dave

 

[Centauri_Admiral]

FF sake - is everyone at MGP on smack? Why, just for once, can't you leave SOMETHING unchanged through an update to this game, so that we can get some kind of consistency. Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it. If I was using drazi, which everyone seems to constantly bitch and whine about, I'd use tactics to get around the problem. Constantly chopping and changing rules, in every update, and in every version does nothing but p*** me right off.

 

[Burger]

if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it

Please, tell me how you'd deal with 40 Sagittarius in a 5pt War game!
Swarm fleets are severely overpowered in the current rules.

 

[katadder]

exactly. thats one of the forums major complaints and matt trys to deal with it but gets loads of stuff like this.
the drazi top end ships are not that bad, war isnt good but the battle and raid are fine. yes you need init sinks to target something, but if you lose init unless the enemy has ships not involved in the battle you should only lose one ships firing and not even that if it goes for forward arc for the turn. if you win it there should always be a target available (unless again your opponent is hiding ships), maybe not the one you want but then a target is a target.

 

[ATN082268]

Nobody buys down more than 1 or 2 levels anyway. So only the "2,3" part of the sequence really affects most games.

Making it "2, 3, 6, 12, 18" meant that Drazi actually stood a chance in War or Armageddon level games. "2, 3, 4, 6, 8" doesn't really hinder swarmy cheesy players because they only go 2 or 3 levels down, but it totally screws Drazi.

Don't those two statements contradict each other?

Sincerely,

Andrew Norris

 

[Burger]

Semantics.

 

[Triggy]

FF sake - is everyone at MGP on smack? Why, just for once, can't you leave SOMETHING unchanged through an update to this game, so that we can get some kind of consistency. Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it. If I was using drazi, which everyone seems to constantly bitch and whine about, I'd use tactics to get around the problem. Constantly chopping and changing rules, in every update, and in every version does nothing but p*** me right off.

Nice :roll:

The main 2nd ed. rules are the abberation in the FAP charts, not everything else. The breakdowns came in very late in the day, weren't playtested or even noticed by anyone until the rules were in print. Until that point we'd all really been using Armageddon breakdowns. This is an attempt at the Armageddon breakdowns but with the same differences between every PL gap.

 

[l33tpenguin]

FF sake - is everyone at MGP on smack? Why, just for once, can't you leave SOMETHING unchanged through an update to this game, so that we can get some kind of consistency. Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it. If I was using drazi, which everyone seems to constantly bitch and whine about, I'd use tactics to get around the problem. Constantly chopping and changing rules, in every update, and in every version does nothing but p*** me right off.

Nice :roll:

The main 2nd ed. rules are the abberation in the FAP charts, not everything else. The breakdowns came in very late in the day, weren't playtested or even noticed by anyone until the rules were in print. Until that point we'd all really been using Armageddon breakdowns. This is an attempt at the Armageddon breakdowns but with the same differences between every PL gap.

No worries Trig. its the 'Some of the people some of the time' rule

 

[Shut Up Hippie!]

FF sake - is everyone at MGP on smack? Why, just for once, can't you leave SOMETHING unchanged through an update to this game, so that we can get some kind of consistency. Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it. If I was using drazi, which everyone seems to constantly bitch and whine about, I'd use tactics to get around the problem. Constantly chopping and changing rules, in every update, and in every version does nothing but p*** me right off.

Please, tell me how you'd deal with 40 Sagittarius in a 5pt War game!
Swarm fleets are severely overpowered in the current rules.

Knowing the Centauri Admiral as I do I sure he won't mind if I say that he would probably launch himself accross the table and t**T the opponent in question who had the nerve to bring that EU size Cheese mountain to our club!

Failing that he would probably sit their muttering threats under his breath, as I am sure anyone watching Centauri Admiral and Da Boss (or was it Lord David?) play against Ben's Gaim fleet at at the Earth-Centauri War would testify

 

[Da Boss]

It was David on that occassion - with Ken's Minbari cruising about smacking ships about and feeling a bit bad about it all (very in character for the Minbari really).

I did not play Ben - I wasted an hour letting him move several hundred counters and then when he got close enough to be a threat jumped out so as not to waste resources - amusing in some ways but not what I had come to do - blow stuff up :roll:

 

[Ripple]

I personally like the new breakdowns in general, as I always thought the beauty of the PL system was it made you take different types of fleets for different types of battles as opposed to just the same strategy bigger or smaller.

That said I'm a primary Drazi player/secondary Abbai player and both of these have only been achieving victories by buying down. The changes make that much less viable... and the Raid to War band on both races has issues.

Ripple

 

[ATN082268]

<Snip Post>

Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it.

This begs the question of how effective your tactics were against swarm fleets. I'll take specific examples of scenarios along with unbiased third party observations

Sincerely,

Andrew Norris

 

[katadder]

I personally like the new breakdowns in general, as I always thought the beauty of the PL system was it made you take different types of fleets for different types of battles as opposed to just the same strategy bigger or smaller.

That said I'm a primary Drazi player/secondary Abbai player and both of these have only been achieving victories by buying down. The changes make that much less viable... and the Raid to War band on both races has issues.

Ripple

i'm a huge abbai player and to be honest have used the new breakdowns ok. the bimith has been sorted a bit so isnt a major flaw buyingdown by levels. usually in say a 5pt war where you need to buy down I take my juyaca, then lakaras down to milanis (occasional tiracas maybe) which gives you a respectable fleet.

 

[Centauri_Admiral]

FF sake - is everyone at MGP on smack? Why, just for once, can't you leave SOMETHING unchanged through an update to this game, so that we can get some kind of consistency. Leave FAP alone for goodness sake, if I encounter a swarm fleet, you know what? I use tactics to deal with it. If I was using drazi, which everyone seems to constantly bitch and whine about, I'd use tactics to get around the problem. Constantly chopping and changing rules, in every update, and in every version does nothing but p*** me right off.

Nice :roll:

The main 2nd ed. rules are the abberation in the FAP charts, not everything else. The breakdowns came in very late in the day, weren't playtested or even noticed by anyone until the rules were in print. Until that point we'd all really been using Armageddon breakdowns. This is an attempt at the Armageddon breakdowns but with the same differences between every PL gap.

No worries Trig. its the 'Some of the people some of the time' rule

I'm decent enough to direct my comments to a few people as a whole, who I personally think ruin this game with every tamper they make, but if you want to make it personal then you'd just better hope you never have the misfortune to meet me, and I'll show you just how personal I can get.

With regards to your comment Trig, it makes very little difference to me what breakdowns are used, my comments are directed at the constant "chopping and changing" rather than sticking with one system to provide some consistency.

With regards to Burgers comment, I may be inclined to use 40 Demos against an opponent that wanted to use 40 Sagittarius, get on with the game and attempt to out-think my opponent. I certainly wouldn't bitch and whine about it; if a person would be so unbelievably sad and beardy to take such a fleet, I may instead give the game to them and go down the pub and spend some time in the company of decent blokes rather than beardus maximus.

I'm not slating this particular FAP breakdown; I'm slating the fact that ITS YET ANOTHER FAP breakdown . . . . what I want is for it to be left alone to provide some consistency to the FAP through updates. If a few people can't deal with swarm fleets thats their tactical numpt problem, not mine, might I dare to say that most people don't encounter massive swarm fleets on burger's scale very often. And to those people that do use swarm fleets on that scale regularly; GO OUT MORE AND GET A LIFE.

 

[noobdelux]

noob question from a noob


explain again to me how i buy up again i got 5 pts battle campain and so i want to buy up..

so 1 armageddon ship costs me 3 pts battle?

 

[Greg Smith]

No, there is no change to buying up, so an Armageddon ship cost 4 battle points.

 

[noobdelux]

hmm cant realy wrap my head arround that list : \

 

[Triggy]

Centauri_Admiral - I too wish for there to be stability in the rules but I'd rather get things right than leave them alone and it seems a majority would too.

Most of the time if somebody takes the "beardy fleet" as you describe it you don't have the option of walking away (i.e. it is normally a tournament or you are playing an unfamiliar opponent) - if we can stop this from starting then surely that has to be a good thing. In any wargame some people will try and "beat" the system - this is a good thing and if we can provide a robust enough system to allow the challenge to exist for both them and the "fluff" player then surely we should aim for this (even if it's the unobtainable holy grail).

No need to make things personal, I don't see why you even wanted to in the first place.

 

[Burger]

With regards to Burgers comment, I may be inclined to use 40 Demos against an opponent that wanted to use 40 Sagittarius

Using a swarm to beat a swarm is missing the whole point.
Swarm fleets are broken versus big ships.

Yes it is beardy and sad to use fleets such as 40 Sag, and indeed I would much rather go down the pub than play someone who would bring that fleet. But, if you're not interested in making this game fair and balanced, I suggest you do just that rather than trolling this thread.