Redundancy

[Reaverman]

Ok, Hash and I were heading to Burgers place this evening. While in the car, we were discussing about how swarms of ships tend to bring down larger ships of equal points. When it struck me, an easy way to balance out the Little vs Large issue........Redundancy!

Every ship will have rendundancy systems, designed to shortcut, or replace damaged flight systems. So why not incorporate into the game. No its not going to unbalance things, but it is going to give those larger ships a fighting chance.

Starting at Skirmish, each level has a Redundancy level. This will be a tick box, and it will be used to ignore the first critical hit suffered on the ship. The larger the ship, the greater the redundancy level. This represents the numerous systems, scattered around the ship.

See the list below for further info;

Skirmish-1

Raid-2

Battle-3

War-4

Armageddon-5

So imagine a Sharlin is attacked, and suffers a 4/6 crit from a Ka'Toc, this would normally take the Sharlins weapons offline, but with this the Minbari player ticks off one box and carries on playing. The Sharlin would then have a Redundancy level of 3, and then 2 when it suffers another crit. This means it does not overpower one side, and also gives larger ships a fighting chance. Since smaller ship, have a lower tolerance. In fact, Patrol level ships have not rendundancy.

The redunduncy levels cannot be repaired in battle, and cost 3 RR's each to replace, after a battle (Campaign). So yes, if you cant afford to repair your War level ship, its going in naked.

Now this is just an idea, and the three of us are going to play test it next week. But I thought I would throw the idea to the lions..errrm I mean forum for a response :wink:

 

[Chewy]

I actually like your idea and several of us are going to playtest it this weekend with a slight modification. I think the scale should start with Raid and not Skirmish. Here is what we are going to test:

Raid-1
Battle-2
War-3
Armageddon-4

The reason I think we should exclude Skirmish from receiving redundancy points is to deter the common practice of players commonly fielding just skirmish ships in Raid and higher PL skirmishes and to slightly reduce the overall redundancy crits a ship can absorb. By allowing redundancy to start with Raid and higher ships it encourages players to use the larger ships more.

Great idea, I look forward to testing it tomorow.


Chewy
_________
Semper Fi

 

[Ripple]

Whole heartedly agree. Great idea.

Will have to think about the exact levels. I do not have too many war level ships to use, so not sure the effect of three/four crit armor there. But very nice and outside the box.

Ripple

 

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

What an ingenious thought, I like it!

 

[Nomad]

Very interesting idea, I look forward to the playtest reports.

 

[CZuschlag]

I had been mulling something similar, and was considering it for "fighters only". However, we're messing with some pretty fundamental balance here. This is only because we have one race that (disproportionately) relies on criticals, the Dilgar, and uptuning something that gets relatively few criticals (Emine property ships). I'd suggest

A). The Raid: 1, Battle: 2, War:3, Armageddon: 4 (or 5 may even be better?) chart earlier mentioned. I may even want Battle:1, War:2, Armageddon:4, but ... well ... if previous Mongoose releases and rule changes are any indication, it's that any new change should be introduced as gradually as possible.... eh? We may need to be careful here.

B). Damage is always applied, but the special effect is blocked by Redundancy. So, if that Pulse gets a 1-6, you take 3 damage and 1 crew, but aren't parked. C'mon, do you want the Drakh to get redundancy to stop any possibility of certain damage from getting through the GEG? The Adira is definitely the nightmare here. Yes, the 6-5 and 6-6 still suck.

C). Lose any and all Redundancy upon the ship's being cripped (the score becomes zero). If the damage and crew loss from the critical -- which cannot be blocked -- are enough to cripple the ship, Redundancy may not be used.

D). Redundancy fails on a 1 in 6, even when invoked. If a fighter causes the critical that Redundancy is invoked upon, Redundancy is automatic (anti-fighter swarm mechanic). Ship Experience dice may not be used to reroll Redundancy.

E). Civilian ships, space stations and Vorlon/Shadows/Things of that type get no redundancy.

F). Redundancy must be decided upon at the instant of determining the critical. You cannot observe the rest of the criticals in the salvo and then determine which one to use Redundancy upon.

G). I know it's one my races and all, but this really means that the Mass Driver (which can realistically only get used against ships with irregular criticals) will do nothing in over 99 out of 100 of all games; certainly the 1-6, 2-6, 3-6 crits will be blocked. So I suggest: all ships with modified speed scores of 1" or less may be attacked by Mass Drivers, if they were reduced to this speed on the previous turn. That'll still be rare -- you'll typically need another speed crit as well as crippled, but gives the weapon a prayer in hell of actually being fired. Discuss. That's only a stab at it, I don't quite know how to fix this one.

H). In a campaign, any ship of Green crew quality loses 1 from its Redundancy score. In any campaign, any ship of Civilian crew quality is considered to have a Redundancy of zero (the crew has the components, but are not adept at switching over to the alternate systems).

I). Rebuilding one point of Redundancy on a ship in a campaign costs 1 RR, and cannot be done on crippled ships. You may also expend one experience die to replace Redundancy. This cannot be done in the middle of a battle.

J). The Space Docks, Ship Graveyard, and Scrap Yard strategic locations can repair one point of Redundancy per turn for free.

 

[CZuschlag]

We could also use Redundancy to tune ships we think are broken. Say, the Targrath, Prefect, Sulust, and Ka'T** are down 1 on redundancy?

Shrug.

 

[Ripple]

Wow, simple rule and turned into a nightmare to handle the concerns of one race. Too many special instances and rolls to make it worth the time. Why not look into simpler alternatives to adapting the idea. I'll get back to this later and try one or two ideas.

Ripple

 

[Reaverman]

I actually like your idea and several of us are going to playtest it this weekend with a slight modification. I think the scale should start with Raid and not Skirmish. Here is what we are going to test:

Raid-1
Battle-2
War-3
Armageddon-4

The reason I think we should exclude Skirmish from receiving redundancy points is to deter the common practice of players commonly fielding just skirmish ships in Raid and higher PL skirmishes and to slightly reduce the overall redundancy crits a ship can absorb. By allowing redundancy to start with Raid and higher ships it encourages players to use the larger ships more.

Great idea, I look forward to testing it tomorow.


Chewy
_________
Semper Fi

This actually did cross my mind, so hey why not do it that way instead. I dont want to get this to get too overcomplicated, as too dominate the game. As for stations, well they dont have critical systms, which reflects their vast size.

 

[CZuschlag]

Oh, c'mon Ripple. I know we've had conversations where you've dumped over the whole critical system, but none of this is complicated, and it affects the balance not just on the Dilgar but between Battle and War versus Skirmish hulls.

A player has 4 ways to silence another player's ships: Destruction, critical irrelevance, Stand Down and Prepare to Be Boarded, and Marine Boarding/Capture. One of these, in particular, applies to War-level hulls, critical irrelevance. By changing this rule, we are fundamanetally changing the balance between War and Skirmish -- forget just the Dilgar issue! We need to do this right!

ACtA is (as you've said about SFB) a threshold game. Without criticals, there is virtually no way in God that a reasonably healthy Raid+ ship can be affected (SolarH excluded) by one other ship's firepower. You just don't have enough to get to threshold. Do we want a game where tweaking out damage and hits is all there is to it? Without criticals, we're getting there. I'm not looking for a game where all you have to do is grind out math and hits rates ala (one opf our local players) Chris Isaacson. Crits change ship dynamics. This game needs 'em.

You say you want them to happen less often. Fine. What we have here is a mechanic that does just that. But, didn't you just get done arguing arguing if favor of the right answer instead of the easily available one with fighter swarms? What's the difference here?

Rule by rule:

A). Just a rebalance of the table. The existence of the table already existed. No complication added.

B). Change in the mechanic of an existing rule (what happens when I use Redundancy, definition of Redundancy). No complication added.

C). Yes, complication added. Is the same as if we treated Redundancy as a Special Trait.

D). Yes, complication added.

E). No complication added, clarifiying that if there isn't a critical hit, (just the base/anchient damage table reroll) it still applies. No complication added; actually, a possible rule question avoided!

F). Clarification added, placing use of Redundancy in the sequence of play. No complication.

G). Request for help on a retune. I want the Mass Driver to be "Mostly Pointless", not "For All Intents and Purposes, Pointless". With the relative elimination of speed zero crits, have I to find some way of making this useful again. Complication of the Mass Driver.

H). Campaign rules. Ignorable over the table top.

I). Campaign rules. Ignorable over the table top, also already covered in the rule proposal.

J). Campaign rules. Ignorable over the table top. Added complication.

I added two mechanics to the game above -- C and D -- as admitted complications. Two! That's a nightmare for you? You've played SFB (as spoken in a previous thread), and that's a nightmare?

Or do you just not like specific items? If that's the case, then say that instead.

 

[SylvrDragon]

Wow, simple rule and turned into a nightmare to handle the concerns of one race. Too many special instances and rolls to make it worth the time. Why not look into simpler alternatives to adapting the idea. I'll get back to this later and try one or two ideas.

Ripple

No offense dude, but if a rule this simple is too complicated for you then I may I suggest a game that's more on your level such as checkers?

And before you say anything, I have just one word to say. Battletech.

 

[CZuschlag]

He's played Star Fleet Battles, it's not like Ripple can handle the above. He just doesn't like parts of it -- I think -- and that I'm willing to discuss.

 

[SylvrDragon]

He's played Star Fleet Battles, it's not like Ripple can handle the above. He just doesn't like parts of it -- I think -- and that I'm willing to discuss.

I'm just saying that the rule you suggested is hardly a "nightmare" as he claims it to be. If such a simple thing is a "nightmare" to him then I don't see how he could play Star Fleet Battles. Sure the rule's more complicated, but adding a little complication to what's probably the simplist of space combat games isn't a bad thing. I personally like the mechanic thas was provided by Reaverman and then adjusted by you. I'm sick of my War/Battle level ships getting toasted in one round due to some stupid crit from a skirmish level ship. A War level ship should be able to toast several skirmishers before going down and, quite frankly, right now they're not capable of delivering that in the manner they should. Now, I'm not saying they're not good, I love them and make extensive use of them. It's just that they do tend to drop faster, due mostly to crits, than an amount of skirmishers of the same point value.

 

[Captain Kremmen]

I like chewy's version of Reaverman's original idea. 1 raid redundancy and then work up from there. It would fundamentally make the larger ships much tougher. Fine by me...

Kremmen

 

[Calistan]

I like the redundancy idea and keeping it simple makes sense. I could see something like:

Raid = 1
Battle = 2
War = 4
Armageddon = 8

I know that we are not using ship size, but I could see larger ships having secondary bridges, extra shielding for the crew, or extra armor around critical systems. Has anybody tried to test test this to see if it unbalances the game?

 

[Benjamen the Wolf]

I like the idea of Reduncancy. It would allow the larger ships to survive longer.

I'd use the table craeted by Chewy, I believe

Raid - 1

Battle - 2

War - 3

Armageddon - 4

However, I think I would have it that the redundancy requires a crew quality check. The systems may be there, but can the crew reroute power supplies, subsytems, or whatever? Succed, you to get to eliminate the critical effect, certainly not the extra damage.

You'd have to use the redundancy rule at the time the crit was caused. Example, Omega fires its Laser Cannon causing a crit, you'd have to decide to use redundancy before the Omega fired any of the other weapons targeting the ship.

Also, I'd have to say that Redundancy could not be used to eliminate Vital Systems hits. The hit has caused to much widespread damage for the redundant systems to be effective.

Just my suggestions. I like the idea, and may look into seeing if we can playtest it on monday when we get together.

 

[CZuschlag]

What CQ you thinking of, 7, 8? Certainly not 9, that would make it too rare, and I don't like Elite crews automatically succeeding with a target number of 7. Elite crews are nasty enough as it is. Remember, they repair crits 2/3 of the time already!

 

[Ripple]

Okay, since folks have a problem with the term nightmare, lets discuss it. Keep in mind I am quite a bit in favor of the redundancy rule, see my first post, so it obviously not the redundancy I had issue with.

This games dynamic is quite smooth and most important fairly consistent. Oddly, we fairly often get the damage numbers wrong at the table the first time or two someone adds it up. Why is that? Because we're stupid? Because we need to go back to checkers? Hmm...maybe, I'll check with someone smarter than me and see if they can tell me.

Oh wait, could it be that when counting objects in front of you that mean different things but look essentially the same it gets a tad confusing at times? This could be why we sometimes (frankly often) do not read the bulkhead hits right on double/triple damage rolls. This could be why anyone not playing the dilgar in our little group has to ask the damage rule most games to remind themselves of what they are taking.

There are some thing I specifically do not like. Some of them I do not like from the Dilgar book as is. I do not like and have never liked the MoD dynamic. I understand it quite well and how it changes the damage structure of the race, but I do think it adds level of math at the rolls that was not necessary. I have seen even CZuschlag get his numbers wrong on more than one occasion due counting a die as one type of damage when it was really another. Mass Drivers firing at moving objects I have discussed before. This is a weapon system I think is intended for planetary assault and giving it an anti-ship function was for me a break from the fluff that added nothing to the game. That said I'm also against 'speed 0' being a crit effect. I tend to think it should be 'adrift' moving at half speed forward, no turns no sa's.

Specifics I do not like

A) You seem to want there to be very few Redundancies. I am not sure I do. I see it as a bit like interceptors, the more rare you make them the harder they are to balance as the effect is not equal across the board. My drazi depend on getting good crits to be effective. I mean how can I CAF without my speed zero crits, but I am not sure I ever happy about my bimith being stopped dead, or degunned by a single shot getting through from a Ikorta.

B) Do not like this as you still have the crits that just damage you out. Whether its the triple damage hit that 6/12 or one of the big hits in the vitals table. This is just as much an issue as the 'no weapons fire' effects when your dealing with certain ships, particularly critcal at raid.

C) Crippled is a big deal as is, and on larger ships is likely already used. I did not see the need to add in another layer to crippled status. One more thing for someone to forget that likely has no effect on the game. This is how starfleet became starfleet, they fill the books with limited effect rules that you only needed to know once, but you did need to know.

D) Do not like the idea of redundancy failing. Here again you just re-introducing the 'golden beebee' after you went through the effort of stoping it. And a different rule for fighters is not something I like to do too often. By preference I would limit fighter crits not fighter effects on redundancy if I am going to saddle myself with another exception.

E) Why? I see no reason that civilians would not have it, station certainly would and Vorlons etc, why on earth would they not? I just do not see the fluff supporting this. It is exception that do not need to be there.

F) where did redundancy become optional? The suggested rule was that it stopped the first critcal that effected the ship.

G) Mass Drivers - see above for some, but again, I do not see where it was suggested that you be able to pick and choose the crits you stop. So I see no reason to start changing 'other' rules to fix a precieved problem that does not really exist. Yes you will slightly fewer chances to mass drive a raid/skirmish or higher level ship, but everyone else loses out on ships becoming vulnerable in some way too.

H) Why? When a new crew comes on do they not get the gift pack that includes the spares? Why tie one penalty to another? Should Elite get more?

I) One more thing to track on the campaign sheets I guess that's already taken care of. You can't repair anything on a ship that is crippled until you spend a 5 RR premium. This does not 'uncripple' its damage score, just allows further repair. So unnecessary.

J) eh...if you want, these areas already give something of value so didn't see the need but don't see a penalty either. Well again one more thing to track on the campaign sheet. Those always get overwhelm by creeping detail so just being cautious on that.

There you go, the nightmare as I've seen it. Something that took all of a couple of paragraphs to explain does not need to have an entire page of exceptions, clarifications and special cases added to rules completely unrelated. Star Fleet battles was a relatively small book until someone said well cargo should be handled differently if...and spawned shuttle, transporter, dangerous, not dangerous, civilain, orion rules to handle something that rarely if ever effects a table.

Ripple

 

[Twin-Linked Aldades]

As such, all hail Fleet Commander for the starfleet game...

The only thing extra rule upon extra rule will produce imho is a resetted, basic version for all to play and a detailed game for the die hards...

 

[Benjamen the Wolf]

Ripple, if I understand you correctly, you like Redundancy, but not the exceptions?

ex. Raid level ship has redundancy level of 1. Ship will stop the first critical effect that it takes. Whether you wanted it to stop the 4-6 crit rather than the 1-1 crit it did stop.

Am I understanding you correctly?

After thinking about it, no CQ check, no choice. You stop the first critical effect that the ship takes, up to a ships redundancy level. Vital hits can not be stopped. Ship has a redundancy level set by the level of the ship. Raid - 1, Battle - 2, War - 3, Armageddon - 4.