Repairing Critical Hits in combat/campaign

[jimmor]

Hi,
I've recently found an interesting thing - engineers of all fleets seem to work much better with bullets flying around them. Perheaps they need a marine standing over them with his blaster pointed at them. Why?

If you make succesfull damage control roll during battle you negate a critical hit effect without cost. Repairing similar damage in campaign after the battle costs you RR. Are the engineers stealing spare parts or what?

 

[Burger]

I always found that quite strange too.

I think the idea is that in battle they are just jury-rigging the thing to work in the short term, with whatever bits and pieces they have lying around. Whereas repairing back at base is doing a proper job. It does seem silly that you can repair for free in the field though... if you make an agreement with your opponent you could both hang around for a couple of turns at the end of the battle, to do some repairs

 

[Lord David the Denied]

I'd argue that if your DC parties get the damage repaired in the field, it represents damage being less serious than thought - burned out cabling, a few smashed components easily replaced from the ship's stores, etc. - whereas if you fail the DC rolls and have to repair afterwards it's serious damage needing parts to be brought in and plenty of time spent on the work. Then you've got the ships so badly mauled they have to go back to base for repair, representing serious yard time and rebuilding efforts, not just welding new plates onto the hull and stripping out ruined equipment.

That's my take on it, anyway. Although I'm sure there are races out there that would menace DC parties at gunpoint to motivate them, my own Centauri being one of them...

 

[Burger]

Schrödinger's critical? The severity of the critical is in a state of quantum flux until you attempt to repair it?

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Very witty, Burger...

In point of fact, the severity of damage is unknown until DC parties get a look at the affected systems. All you know on the bridge is that XYZ system has stopped functioning. Why that is has to be determined by DC parties.

Failed DC rolls in game clearly represent serious damage that can't be repaired in the field, either by jury-rigging something or replacing blown parts or any other means.

After all, the readiness of your entire fleet is in a state of quantum flux until the game is resolved...

 

[jimmor]

The subject became obvious to me when me drakh fleet fled in 3rd round of Space Superiority and my opponent declared that for the next 9 tuns his vree repair all the critical hits, except from vital. The scenario does not end when one of the opponents is destroyed or runs away but after 12 rounds.

We consider making a 'home rule', that the DC in battle is only temporary and to make proper rapair you'll have to pay RR anyway.

 

[H]

The subject became obvious to me when me drakh fleet fled in 3rd round of Space Superiority and my opponent declared that for the next 9 tuns his vree repair all the critical hits, except from vital. The scenario does not end when one of the opponents is destroyed or runs away but after 12 rounds.

We consider making a 'home rule', that the DC in battle is only temporary and to make proper rapair you'll have to pay RR anyway.

it's more paperwork i guess, but makes sense for sure.
I like Schrodingers critical ;-)

 

[Burger]

Very witty, Burger...

In point of fact, the severity of damage is unknown until DC parties get a look at the affected systems. All you know on the bridge is that XYZ system has stopped functioning. Why that is has to be determined by DC parties.

Failed DC rolls in game clearly represent serious damage that can't be repaired in the field, either by jury-rigging something or replacing blown parts or any other means.

After all, the readiness of your entire fleet is in a state of quantum flux until the game is resolved...

But what you're saying is that if you don't get a chance to try to repair the damage on the field (maybe other crits need repairing more urgently, or the crit happens in the last turn, or you just forget DC rolls) then it will always be a severe one that requires RR to repair. Whereas if you try to repair it in the field then it might be a minor one. In fact the more you look at it (read: make more DC rolls) the more it looks like it isn't that bad after all..... in fact given a few spare turns at the end of a game, with All Hands On Deck, you can probably fix pretty much everything except vital system hits!

Jimmor's suggestion makes more sense. When you repair a crit in the field, don't "erase" it... just ignore its effects until the end of the battle. If you don't pay RR to fix it properly the ship will suffer it again at the start of the next (and subsequent) battles.

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Well excuse me for trying to make some kind of sense out of the rules... :wink:

The suggested rule is pretty fair, actually, and I'd support it as a revision to the campaign rules in future.

 

[Burger]

Well excuse me for trying to make some kind of sense out of the rules... :wink:

Hehe, you're excused Just don't do it again! :lol:

 

[Delthos]

I'd like to see it that all criticals are automatically repaired at the end of a campaign battle, except for vital systems criticals. Vital System criticals would need to be repaired via RR points.

Another way to look at it is that if you don't repair them via RR points, they are still there on the ship the next time it goes into battle so you deploy a sub-par ship into battle. You are spending those RR points to guarantee that they are repaired before the battle. Those RR points don't just represent materials, they also represent the ability to devote man power to fixing the repairs. During battle you are diverting manpower to fixing something when they could be doing something else, if using All Hands To Deck to ensure something is fixed. They can be considered to have spare parts on board the ship to replace commonly damaged items.

It is a little unfortunate that some scenarios allow your opponent to repair ships like that, but then if you didn't leave the game so early he wouldn't have had the opportunity. I'm not saying you were wrong, it is a bit fishy for him to say he was sticking around for the nine turns. It's not like your opponents fleet knows the battle will last for 12 rounds. In my opinion, once you left the field the scenario is over, no matter how many turns the scenario states the game lasts.

All in all I think either my suggestion at the start or the current method work equally well and make just as much sense.

 

[lastbesthope]

Schrödinger's critical? The severity of the critical is in a state of quantum flux until you attempt to repair it?

That's more true to life than you might think.

LBH

 

[Lord David the Denied]

Which is pretty much what I said...

 

[Ripple]

Keep both ideas and you get one roll after the game to repair each critical, if you fail it's a bad one. That solves some of the 'last turn, forgot, etc.' situation and requires only 'after battle' book keeping.

Shrug...it's an idea.

Ripple

 

[Silvereye]

Elegant and simple idea there Ripple. Though would you allow the All Hands On Deck! to be used?

 

[Ripple]

Damn... knew there was still some sand in those gears.

Ripple