Swarm fleets

[Target]

A-Would it help if Only Raid ships & above +all ancients got to double/triple their crit damage as per normal while Skirmish & below couldn't, all weapons acted single dam. Dilgar MOD might still workfor all their ships, wasn't sure on that.

B-The Redundancy idea is good, How many people actually play with it eg raid ship has 1 so ignores the first crit & battle has 2 & so on. What system do people use if they use it

C-How about a new SA- Re-Orientate Firepower( bad spelling sorry)
Raid ships & above CQ 8- Can bring 1/2 the dice from same weapon types from opposite arc F/A, P/S but not boresight to the arc you are firing. Opposite arc can't fire this round. Thinking maybe next as well as weapons move back to position not so sure as could be a little tough but then it would be pretty good SA.
This might give your bigger ships that little extra they need to survive.

D- Maybe CBD should be stops crits on a 5+ instead with only weapon per arc being able to fire.

Just throwing some idea's out there.

 

[Taran]

I prefer after rolling for damage, if you get a 6, then before rolling on the crit table, roll another D6. On a 4 or more, you still get a crit. 3 or less, no crit.

 

[Target]

I prefer after rolling for damage, if you get a 6, then before rolling on the crit table, roll another D6. On a 4 or more, you still get a crit. 3 or less, no crit.

Sorry wasn't clear with D, not saving the damage but a save vs crits. 5+ to stop the crit before it is rolled

 

[desiredtoe]

When my single Sharlin and Morshin Carrier ripped through a swarm of Earth vessels, that made me very happy.

 

[Tolwyn]

We play by the rules at our LGS and saw no problems right as nobody tries to field a swarm fleet.

Perhaps the critical system from VAS could be adepted, meaning that you
have to confirm a critical.

 

[locarno24]

A-Would it help if Only Raid ships & above +all ancients got to double/triple their crit damage as per normal while Skirmish & below couldn't, all weapons acted single dam. Dilgar MOD might still workfor all their ships, wasn't sure on that.

There's nothing really wrong with critical hits doing extra damage, and warships/battleships usually have pretty sizable hit point tanks. People object (when they object) to the critical hit effects - a 4-6 or 6-4 critical on the frontal arc means potentially 4 raid point's worth of firepower wiped out with a single lucky missile.

We play with the normal rules, and it's not too big a deal. All hands on deck! being automatic is the big one (which we now have), to be honest - other than that, the boresight mechanic is annoying but you can't really balance that up without fundamentally changing the way initiative works (I know some people use the mechwarrior mechanics).

Things like redundance to reduce the instance of critical hits I'm wary of. As a trait maybe - so a ship has 'redundancy X' on its statline - but a generic level of redundancy for a priority level (a) adds something else to remember and (b) not all ships are equal in this regard; a Drakh fleet becomes next to bloody invincible if you reduce the number of critical hits it takes due to the GEG mechanics. Equally, Vorlons and Shadows already auto-repair any critical hit at the first opportunity to do so, so such a game mechanic is of less value to them - so what do they get to balance it all up?

 

[Target]

If your big ships aren't taking extra damage from the likes of a Vorchan for an example they they can last longer to be able to use the all hands on deck SA, doubling some of the crit damage can take a lot of hits real quick even on a War ship.

Remember your ships are also ignoring the first few crits as well. The longer your ship operates at 100% the more crits you do. It doesn't take long to chew through & with system that has been touted in previous threads. Raid ships ignore 1 crit , battle 2 war 3 & arm 4. I do agree that some ships should have more or less dependant on ship rather priority but that would mean altering the stats individualy rather just have it universal so you could apply it to current lists.
Shadow still go a turn with the crit so not having it probably is worth something to them.
Don't believe a Drakh fleet would become invincble at all with redundancy. A lot of the Drakh fleet is built around raiders which are skirmish. The Drakh have reduced hull for their GEG already built into their balancing.
The initiative system could have a bonus if have to the roll if have less ships than your opponent. Thinking +1 for less, +2 half as many. +3 quarter or less. Might give big boresight ships a better chance of not having any targets.

 

[Ripple]

Folks most certainly do complain about the extra damage. One of the big parts of that discussion is that the All Hands to Deck change isn't relevant because ships don't survive to use it due to the high damage totals (as well as the common No SA crits).

Ripple

 

[CheesyRobMan]

The first suggestion would really cripple fleets like Drazi who rely on large numbers of small ships.

 

[Enalut]

I still think the best way to address swarm fleets was to go back to the Armegeddon point breakdowns when if you broke a point down 2 levels (without spliting it at theat first level) you only got 3 ships instead of 4.

 

[No. 1 Bear]

The main problem i see with redundancy is balancing. You can't balance it by PL as a White Star and Explorer are totally different. You would have to balance it by ship which means allot of work.

 

[Target]

The first suggestion would really cripple fleets like Drazi who rely on large numbers of small ships.

A - would only effect the solarhawk, nothing else is DD or better

 

[Methos5000]

I like the idea of redundancy because if prevents the crit effect in the first place. Twice now in campaigns (once in 1st Ed, once in 2nd Ed) I have had a ship hit with a bad crit and then suffer the dreaded vital system hit no damage control.
In 1st Ed my Victory was hit with a 4-6 (all weapons offline) and then hit with a no damage control vital hit. In 2nd Ed my Takata mine cruiser was hit with a running adrift with its front arc pointing away from the main bulk of his fleet and then hit with a no damage control vital hit. Both the weapon loss and running adrift crits happened on the first or second crit, so even if i would have gotten the no damage control vital hit after the redundancy was depleted it would have negated the no weapons or the running adrift and it would have made a big difference.

 

[Target]

Never liked that crit, seems a little stupid as well. why can't you fix anything. Enginnering is where the engines are not all your techs personal. Maybe everyone keeps the spanners in the same place so they know where to find them. Tech A "Oh god they hit the tool box" Tech B "Guess we can knock off for the day"
Maybe replace it with, -2 to DC rolls, or Ship behaves as skeleton crewed till fixed or crippled. Not being able fix anything is ridiculous, actually im suprised they keep it. Suppose people were distracted by all weapons out crit more.

 

[Taran]

Damage Control on today's warships (and on the ships of games and stories set in the future that spend some time applying a semi-realistic gloss to them) is an entirely different department. And is Damage Control Central (as it's usually called) gets hit, you aren't repairing anything anytime soon...

 

[Target]

Guess it all depends on what gets hit. I find hard to believe that one spot on warship contains everything that required fix something at the other end of the ship. I still consider it a fairly silly crit.
The game is better off with out it. Nobody like a crit that you can't fix especially when crits can a huge effect on the game. Your main ship gets that crit & it's time to withdraw, you would still probably withdraw if was at -2 dc rolls but then elite crew might not as they know they could fix it & still be in the fight.

 

[Taran]

It's not going to completely prevent repairs, but it's going to eliminate your repair coordination abilities.
Basically, it will slow down your repairs so much that you're not going to have them done in a half hour battle...

 

[Frohike]

but they you could also argue that the bigger the ship the more back up and additional facilities are available, which brings me back to the redundant systems house rule - surely a Warlock is going to have more than one damage control centre, bridge etc so should not be in such a bind thanks to one crit

 

[Target]

Maybe the size of the ship should give a bonus to DC rolls as well.
+1 for Battle & War & +2 for armagedon.

Would this work
No damage control crit is changed to -2 or -3 DC roll
Battle & War ships +1 DC
Armagedon +2 DC
Only Raid +, Dilgar, Ancients gain ability to DD/TD/QD crit damage

This would make lots of small ships still able to do many crits but bigger ships can take the damage for longer & coupled with All hands on deck SA able to fix them far more easily & stay in the fight.
Reckon this could work.

 

[Hannibal]

but they you could also argue that the bigger the ship the more back up and additional facilities are available, which brings me back to the redundant systems house rule - surely a Warlock is going to have more than one damage control centre, bridge etc so should not be in such a bind thanks to one crit

Absolutely. Redundant systems shouls exist. The solution that I like is an across the board redunancy trait:

Armageddon: Redundancy 10
War: Redundancy 8
Battle: Redundancy 5
Raid: Redundancy 2
Skirmish: Redundancy 1
Patrol: (nothing)

The player chooses whether or not to negate a critical hit. The theory here is that you can let through the 1 : 1 crit and save it for the 5 : 6 crit. Because when you think about it, what are you more likely to back up first, the ship nintendo or the containment relay for the singularity engine?