Spinal Mount Combat - Am I doing it right?

[korpz]

Tigress Spinal Mount combat example using Standard and Fleet combat rules. I just want to make sure I have this correct.

Using the standard starship combat rules

• Meson-15, Factor 11
  • 66,000 Tn with a base of 7500Tn and 20% tech discount = 6000 tn base x 11
• 6D per factor damage profile, giving an average of 21 damage per factor multiplied by 1000
• Avg Damage per shot = 11 x 21,000 = 231,000 damage.

Applied against a Zho Nechtliaz Battleship with 166,666 Hull points and Meson Screen 20.

• Meson Screen 20 x 2D x 10 = 20 x 70 (mean) = 1400 damage reduction.
• Zho ship ends with -62,934 Hull points

Net result - The Zhodani ship is reduced to an expanding ash cloud.


Using the Fleet combat rules from High Guard.

• Meson -15, Factor 11 as above.
• Damage is 6 X 1000 per factor = 66,000

Applied against a Zho Nechtliaz Battleship with 166,666 / 3.5 = 47,619 Hull points and Meson Screen 20.

• Meson screen 20 x (2D /3.5) x 10
• Meson Screen 20 x 2 x 10 = 400
• Zho ship ends with -17,981 hull points

Net Result - The Zhodanio ship is reduced to an expanding ash cloud.

All good?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Using the standard starship combat rules

• Meson-15, Factor 11
  • 66,000 Tn with a base of 7500Tn and 20% tech discount = 6000 tn base x 11
• 6D per factor damage profile, giving an average of 21 damage per factor multiplied by 1000
• Avg Damage per shot = 11 x 21,000 = 231,000 damage.

Yes.

Applied against a Zho Nechtliaz Battleship with 166,666 Hull points and Meson Screen 20.

• Meson Screen 20 x 2D x 10 = 20 x 70 (mean) = 1400 damage reduction.
• Zho ship ends with -62,934 Hull points

Net result - The Zhodani ship is reduced to an expanding ash cloud.

Meson screen should use the Angle Screen reaction (HG, p41 textbox), so multiply by the Effect of the Angle Screen roll.

Still, 20 meson screens are mostly decoration... A few hundred Dtons of screens will not stop 66 000 Dtons of spinal.

Using the Fleet combat rules from High Guard.

• Meson -15, Factor 11 as above.
• Damage is 6 X 1000 per factor = 66,000

Applied against a Zho Nechtliaz Battleship with 166,666 / 3.5 = 47,619 Hull points and Meson Screen 20.

• Meson screen 20 x (2D /3.5) x 10
• Meson Screen 20 x 2 x 10 = 400
• Zho ship ends with -17,981 hull points

Net Result - The Zhodanio ship is reduced to an expanding ash cloud.

HG'22, p113:
Screens: Separate scores are recorded for meson screens and nuclear dampers. For each, add Crew Skill score to 3.5, multiply that by 10 and then multiply the resulting figure by the number of screens.

So, 20 screens, each preventing (CrewSkill + 3.5)×10. If crew skill is 2, then 20×(2+3.5)×10 = 1100.


There's an obvious bug there, in the basic system meson screens does 2D×10×Effect and a damper does 2D×Effect, but here they both do ×10.


In conclusion: yes, if a 66 000 Dt meson spinal hits a 250 000 Dt ship, it explodes...
1000 screens (or so ≈ 10 000 Dtons) would have stopped the attack.

 

[korpz]

Much obliged.

 

[collins355]

HG Fleet Combat is unfortunately FUBAR. I can't imagine it was playtested very rigorously based on what we find in the published book.

 

[korpz]

I rather liked the ship summary info in the GDW Battleriders game. I prefer dice to card draw mechanics but beyond that it was a respectable starship combat game.

 

[BaalAdvocate]

HG Fleet Combat is unfortunately FUBAR. I can't imagine it was playtested very rigorously based on what we find in the published book.

I've tossed around the idea of gaming it out in Full Thrust, as with many of Mongoose auxiliary rules, it doesn't work well (mercenary for instance).

 

[rinku]

Per p29, damage multiples are applied after defenses.

The fleet combat section doesn't specifically mention this for meson screens the way it does for armour, but it all makes a lot more sense if that's how it's meant to work.

A factor 6 meson hit only needs 6 points from the meson pool to stop it cold.

 

[collins355]

I've tossed around the idea of gaming it out in Full Thrust, as with many of Mongoose auxiliary rules, it doesn't work well (mercenary for instance).

Power Projection: Fleet was an attempt to Traveller-ise Full Thrust if that is of interest. It has rules for importing Classic Traveller ships, but not Mongoose-designs.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Per p29, damage multiples are applied after defenses.

No, screens prevent actual inflicted damage, as per p41.

It makes no sense whatsoever for 60 Dtons of screens to automatically stop 7500 Dtons worth of spinal.

 

[rinku]

I don't see a problem with p41 and p29 working together.

Armour is applied before a spinal particle weapon's multiple is applied:



...as well as "other countermeasures". Screens logically come into effect before armour does - a laser doesn't hit the armour and THEN pass through sand, so to be honest it makes a lot of sense that the screen result disrupts the meson beam so that it doesn't decay inside the ship, at which point it won't much matter if it's a spinal mount or a smaller one. A miss is a miss.

Damage is what's rolled. Defenses are applied. Then any remaining damage is multiplied and applied to the target.

If this means that meson weapons will struggle against massed meson screens, I'm good with that. However, as laid out in the fleet combat section, meson screens can be overwhelmed by massed fire, since the meson screen pool is a finite resource on a given turn.

 

[J. L. Brown]

I don't see a problem with p41 and p29 working together.

Armour is applied before a spinal particle weapon's multiple is applied:

View attachment 7287

...as well as "other countermeasures". Screens logically come into effect before armour does - a laser doesn't hit the armour and THEN pass through sand, so to be honest it makes a lot of sense that the screen result disrupts the meson beam so that it doesn't decay inside the ship, at which point it won't much matter if it's a spinal mount or a smaller one. A miss is a miss.

Damage is what's rolled. Defenses are applied. Then any remaining damage is multiplied and applied to the target.

If this means that meson weapons will struggle against massed meson screens, I'm good with that. However, as laid out in the fleet combat section, meson screens can be overwhelmed by massed fire, since the meson screen pool is a finite resource on a given turn.

That is a well reasoned, logical argument -- and the quoted text supports it well. Unfortunately, it is incorrect.

The official Mongoose stance is that screens reduce damage AFTER multipliers. This is covered in several threads. Your interpretation is a common house-rule.

 

[Sigtrygg]

In addition to sensors needing a complete re-write the rules for spinal mounts and screens need a complete re-write.

 

[korpz]

I would have though that screens work to prevent the ship being hit (a negative roll modifier) and Armour (if applicable) works to reduce the damage when hit, but thats just my thoughts. It does appear that the fleet combat rules need a un-FUBAR-ing, to use the term above.

I'm interested though, should these rules be more of a board / war game or more of an aid to the role playing? As a role playing aid do they need to be more or less abstract / simplified. I do like the idea of a fleet combat wargame that can be played out of the strategic and tactical level. A mamoth project I suspect to get something more playable than previous attempts (Fifth Frontier War etc...)