Point Defense Batteries - January Update

[Nerhesi]

Consider - the TL9 and 10 PD batteries (Type 1 and Type 2) would never be purchased. They cost 8/4 hardpoints, tons of power, tons of tons (space), and tons of cost. They also only work sometimes (8+ or 7+)

Putting a triple beam or pulse laser instead of hardpoints is infinitely better. It is cheaper, more effective, takes up less space, takes up less power, and has offensive capability. Point defense batters need to be better than lasers at PD, otherwise, why buy them? Lets make it real simple via a comparison:

A triple beam laser. 3 missiles defeated on average. Costs 1 hardpoint. 3 Mcr. 13 power.
A PD system we are saying intercepts incoming salvos. But it costs, at best. 2 hardpoints, 20 tons (!!!). 80 Mcr (!!!!). 240 power (!!!!!). And because it only works on a 6+, it is actually only going to intercept as much as two turrets.

Also, does it make sense that PD can potentially reduce 3D of every salvo? whether you get 3000 salvos or 3? Also what if I want to defend another ship with my PD software? so I get DM-1s because I'm defending a bigger ship?

I think this is simple folks, as phavoc has been indicating. All PD batteries should be is simply a different kind of hardpoint usage, one that is superior to lasers. Very simply, PD batteries should basically be hardpoint that is twice as good as a triple beam laser at defending, but it can't go offensive at all:

PD Battery, TL10: 1 Hardpoint.10 tons. 5 MCr, 5 power. Can automatically reduce one salvo by 1D (halved for torpedoes).
PD Battery, TL12: 1 Hardpoint. 5 tons. 10 MCr, 10 power. Can automatically reduce one salvo by 2D (halved for torpedoes).
PD Battery, TL14: 1 Hardpoint. 3 tons. 15 MCr, 10 power. Can automatically reduce one salvo by 2D (halved for torpedoes).

You dont need to worry about PD batteries being sub-optimal now. Or how to figure out your ship size versus the size of the ship youre protecting (PD software). Or about how does it make sense to protect vs 15000 or 500 missiles. Or about making a very random all-or-nothing roll to see if they work.

Thoughts?

 

[arcador]

Btw I thought the new January Batteries always reduce the #missiles in the salvo by 3D and the 7+,6+ was leftover from before.

 

[Nerhesi]

Btw I thought the new January Batteries always reduce the #missiles in the salvo by 3D and the 7+,6+ was leftover from before.

If that is the intent then it is a bit of an improvement. The only problem left then is how do you reconcile that an 2-hard point PD battery will stop 3D from 1 salvo or 100? and how will it effectively protect both the 1,000 ton ship or with software, the 100,000 ton ship it is escorting?

I think just as per screens, pd turrets, and so on, we just allow it to be a "use once per turn" and it removes X missiles. The more you stack on, the more you can do

 

[MongooseMatt]

The only problem left then is how do you reconcile that an 2-hard point PD battery will stop 3D from 1 salvo or 100?

Those salvos are coming in over a period of six minutes, and the PD is active only during the last seconds of each...

 

[Nerhesi]

The only problem left then is how do you reconcile that an 2-hard point PD battery will stop 3D from 1 salvo or 100?

Those salvos are coming in over a period of six minutes, and the PD is active only during the last seconds of each...

Ok Matt - so my understanding is that the PD batteries operate on every Salvo. Sort of a Hedgehog - mini spikey layer thats effecting everything incoming. That would make sense that you can't use them to defend others as well. Ok - so the only thing missing now is that I should be able to have a thicker, denser coat of quills if I want.

Now that I understand what you're going for - forget the initial proposal - I like your idea. I do recommend the following to make PDB attractive though - currently it is very very very limited:

1) Toss/drop the Intercept roll. This should be a sure thing given the investment in power, cost and weight. Make it a guaranteed reduction of just 1D.
2) Rather than having size constraints allow players to purchase more of these Point Defense Batteries for more effect. The size of the ship doesn't matter (keep reading )
3) Reduce MCR cost and power requirements to literally 10% of what you have now.

What this results in is:

a) Ship A wants to buy point defense, but only wants to give up 2 hardpoints. It purchases one PDB system, allowing it to remove 1D from every incoming salvo.
b) Ship B wants to invest a bit more, 10 hardpoints worth. It purchases 5 PDB systems, allowing it to remove 5D from all incoming salvos. Remember, this is literally using all of your hardpoints on a 1,000-ton ship to stop 21 missiles from every salvo (where as 10 small bays would be launching 120 missiles a turn).
c) Ship C, a giant capital ship, wants to spend 200 hardpoints on Point Defense Batteries (thats 20,000 dtons worth of given hardpoints). This will allow it to reduce EVERY incoming Salvo by 100D. This of course seems impressive (350 missiles or 175 torps stopped per salvo) - until you realise that for the same 200 hardpoints, an enemy can be firing 4800 missiles or 600 torps - way more than the PD can handle.

Honestly, I think this is a much better fit - because right now, just limited to 3D, the PD batteries have very very very limited use. Really great vs a couple of missile launchers, useless otherwise. It also doesn't make sense that I can't get "more PDB to have better PDB".

 

[AndrewW]

Sort of a Hedgehog - mini spikey layer thats effecting everything incoming.

 

[Chas]

I have to admit I am struggling to apply the PD rules as written into actual builds. 240 power points for 2 tons of short range lasers? It is more like we are trying to throw up a force field

 

[arcador]

@Nerhesi's suggestion seems pretty straightforward and effective on first read. The only drawback I see at this point is that there is no limit on how much missiles per salvo the battery can stop, yet practically there is limit depending on how much hardpoints one wants to invest in the battery. The same tonnage of missile launches will overwhelm it, so it's not immunity.

It becomes an interesting option, easy to scale and comprehensible.

 

[phavoc]

My preference is to have point defense be hard-point based, and be able to engage a defined X number of missiles per turn. This would work for any ship size, just multiply your PD turrets. So they would be much more efficient at engaging missiles and torpedoes, but more or less useless against anything else. Make your trade-off.

PD Turret - 1 hardpoint, 1 energy. Destroys 4 missiles or 2 torps per turn. TL15 gets +2 additional hits, TL 14-13 gets +1 additional hits. No other TL enhancements available.
No gunner needed, system automatically engages when activated. No To Hit roll required. It's essentially a gatling laser optimized for shooting tiny things down.

Smaller adventure class ships might install one, but it also means they have no offensive power with that hardpoint. And it does nothing against a beam armed enemy. So it's a really good one-trick defensive weapon. For the armored torps, just use the missile number with any bonus and divide by two, rounding down.

Since it scales pretty easily up or down it's not a pain to calculate things. Just add a line on the mythical ship sheet that lists your ATT and DEF numbers to show how many missiles are absorbed per turn. Use a slash for people who don't divide well by two...

 

[Nerhesi]

Originally my preference as well - PD stops X missiles/torps per turn per Hardpoint dedicated.

However, it seems Matt's preference is otherwise, which is fine.

What is key to making Matt's preference not over-powered however, is:

a) PD Batteries cannot be used to defend other ships. They're that flat "hedgehog" prickly defense thats always stopping some X amount of missiles PER SALVO. This amount of missiles stopped needs to be low though (1D per salvo per 2 hardpoints)
b) We have to make sure we allow people to stack more PD Batteries so that it's a thicker, more pricklier, hegehog That stops even more missiles, PER SALVO. (So if you lets say devote 10 hardpoints, it's 5D stopped per salvo)

 

[phavoc]

If this were Shadowrun, with it's sometimes massive dice pools, I wouldn't have as much issue. But Traveller is predicated upon the 2D system. Now we are getting into big dice pools. Doesn't that strike you as odd?

 

[Nerhesi]

If this were Shadowrun, with it's sometimes massive dice pools, I wouldn't have as much issue. But Traveller is predicated upon the 2D system. Now we are getting into big dice pools. Doesn't that strike you as odd?

To be perfectly honest, I find no-dice odder than lots of dice

Remember, I do agree with our original proposal of something as simple as 1D missiles intercepted, per hardpoint, per turn (No offensive value, cannot be used to protect nearby ships unless they're adjacent or docked or so).

But I am trying to stick to Matt's direction of a flat-affects-every-salvo approach

 

[Chas]

The Effect / Salvo has one big issue that needs careful consideration as to how you define a salvo. If you have 20 ships all firing at a big ship the numbers of missiles should accumulate, otherwise the small ships never get the chance to overwhelm the big ship's PD. So effectively we should term this Effect / Turn I believe and work on that basis.

The hard point + tonnage paradigm works and I think we should just keep it to number of missiles destroyed / hard point + tonnage. The big ships will be nigh invulnerable to anything less than an overwhelming assault, smaller ships can choose how much resources they want to devote to it. Make point defence approximately 2x as effective as standards lasers as noted, and away you go.

 

[Nerhesi]

I think thats the way Matt is going - the PD battery makes you immune to smaller Salvos

However, with Fleet combat, you probably will have Flights of fighters and smallcraft and SDBs, not singles. So 1 salvo from multiple craft.
At this point however, Matt - I would again request we move from a per/salvo defense to a X missiles stopped per turn defense. I think it is a lot cleaner and much less open to abuse, and is a lot simpler to play with

Example:
TL10 Point Defense Battery - 4 tons, 6 power, 1 hardpoint, 1 MCr, 1D missile stopped per turn (half as many torps)
TL12 Point Defense Battery - 2 tons, 3 power, 1 hardpoint, 2 MCr, 1D missiles stopped per turn (half as many torps)
TL14 Point Defense Battery - 1 ton, 2 power, 1 hardpoint, 4 MCr , 1D missiles stopped per turn (half as many torps)

 

[phavoc]

Ships operating as a squadron should have the option to fire their missiles as a datalinked group, or by individual salvoes. That would fit with tech.

Whenever fleet combat rules are written I hope they include concepts such as escorts and squadrons firing operating and firing/Defending as one group. Its fair enough to be able to target individual ships in that group though.

Fighter squadrons attacking a single target should always have their launches treated as a single salvo.