Thoughts on 2e... Game favors fleets of smaller ships. Why?

[MustEatBrains]

But surely the point of the PL system, is that it should favour taking ships at the PL of the scenario? Currently, it favours taking swarms of ships of 1 or even 2 PLs below it. This kind of game is not fun to play at all, time-consuming, lots of papework and the result is predictable. You argue that taking ships above the PL is bad because it is not what is intended... but why shoudl taking ships equally far below the PL be good?

I think the point of the PL system is to allow players to field balanced fleets most of all. CTA favours squadrons of ships, not the 2 or 3 ship fleets that were at the core of B5Wars. And I don´t see why those games are not fun, or why they are predictable either. As I said, it basically comes down to fleet selection.

I guess it compares to Federation commander vs. Star Fleet Battles; the one is a "big fleets" game, and the other a "small fleetss" game.


I´m not saying that it is better that the game favours swarms, I just see it as "built in". When building a fleet, I try to use at least 1 canon ship at the core, no bigger than 1 PL above the scenario, and fill the rest with what makes sense to me at that moment, initiative sinks and such. However, if I feel like it, I also play a fleet consisting of nothing but Aviokis for example, knowing that the game will likely be an uphill struggle and a real challenge for me, because it is not the optimum under the current rules.

I do like the system of confirming criticals, however - might be interesting to do a CTA rules conversion focusing on smaller fleets (a bit like B5W, but not that complex or unbalanced), and such a rule could be one of the core features of it ( a bit like GW´s Apocalypse, just the other way around)

 

[Goldritter]

Another Idea.

Why not give an Initiative-penality if one Player uses to much Ships of lower PL ?

If you have more ships it´s harder to coordinate your Fleet, and so the Initiative is more for the side, which has fewer ships.
(And so a better communication/command chain.)

Only my 0.02€.

 

[katadder]

Another Idea.

Why not give an Initiative-penality if one Player uses to much Ships of lower PL ?

If you have more ships it´s harder to coordinate your Fleet, and so the Initiative is more for the side, which has fewer ships.
(And so a better communication/command chain.)

Only my 0.02€.

i quite like this one actually. if use twice as many ships as FAPs -1 init penalty, 3 times as many ships -2 etc etc.
means if someone brings 40 havens to a 5pt raid they are at -9 init

 

[Burger]

Another Idea.

Why not give an Initiative-penality if one Player uses to much Ships of lower PL ?

If you have more ships it´s harder to coordinate your Fleet, and so the Initiative is more for the side, which has fewer ships.
(And so a better communication/command chain.)

Only my 0.02€.

i quite like this one actually. if use twice as many ships as FAPs -1 init penalty, 3 times as many ships -2 etc etc.
means if someone brings 40 havens to a 5pt raid they are at -9 init

Why would someone with 40 ships care about losing initiative??

 

[Goldritter]

And it will force you to use "Commandships" if you want to use big fleets.

(And as opposite to the penalty for many ships you can get a bonus if you use fewer ships.)

 

[Goldritter]

Why would someone with 40 ships care about losing initiative??

Right too.

If you can´t force the Player to use Squadrons of x-Ships he has many Initiativesinks .

**Edit**
But with this Penality the side with the fewer Ships has a better chance to get the first(s) shot(s).
So the effect of the Inititivesinks is alittlebit reduced.
Or?
And many ships on a normal table means, that the possbility exists, that on an Explosion other enemy ships will suffer too.
**/Edit**

 

[nekomata fuyu]

I think the only way we'll fix the problem of having so many ship that you don't care about initiative will be to overhaul the activation system. Somehow make it so that if you have the most ships (counting squadrons as a single ship), you have to activate multiple ships at a time.

 

[MustEatBrains]

Like "all ships bought for a single fleet point must be activated at the same time (or alternatively: must be used to form squadrons of equal size, with as many ships in each squadron as possible)"?

 

[Goldritter]

BattleTech had such an Initiative Order (I don´t know anymore, if it was a houserule ore not).

You divide the number of "Ships" from the side with the most ships through the side with the fewer ships.
Round up and this is the number of ships the bigger side must move befor the other move one ship.

So if one Side has 20 ships and the other 10.
The first move two ships avery time it has to mive and the other side only one.

 

[greenboy]

Like "all ships bought for a single fleet point must be activated at the same time (or alternatively: must be used to form squadrons of equal size, with as many ships in each squadron as possible)"?

I like this idea it scale well with the PL system when you trade down you don't buy individual ships you buy squadrons speeds up big games as wel

 

[MustEatBrains]

Like "all ships bought for a single fleet point must be activated at the same time (or alternatively: must be used to form squadrons of equal size, with as many ships in each squadron as possible)"?

I like this idea it scale well with the PL system when you trade down you don't buy individual ships you buy squadrons speeds up big games as wel

a bit like the company cards in epic...

 

[H]

Like "all ships bought for a single fleet point must be activated at the same time (or alternatively: must be used to form squadrons of equal size, with as many ships in each squadron as possible)"?

I like this idea it scale well with the PL system when you trade down you don't buy individual ships you buy squadrons speeds up big games as wel

a bit like the company cards in epic...

seems a bit harsh on the ole boresighters, so you bought down to get initiative sinks to line up those boresights eh? well guess what..... were kicking you in the crotch!

 

[MongooseMatt]

If everything had its damage and crew scores reduced, across the board, and the critical table was significantly changed to remove a lot of the ship-killer criticals, I think you'd see a lot more use for bigger ships in general. They'd be the ones with the big guns that could kill ships quickly, while little patrol boats would be just fodder to them. That's what people want, isn't it?

I can tell you they don't - on an entertainment level, crits are a large part of the game. Put another way, if the game is changed as you suggest, it would no longer be CTA.

 

[inq101]

The only way I could see this working is something along the lines of moving 1PL worth of ships at once. I don't like the idea, too much mid game maths slows it down, reduces the affect of initiative sinks.

 

[Hannibal]

If the problem is big ships being critted to death by little ships, then why not fix that problem? How about something like:

Option 1:
A ship cannot inflict a Critical on an enemy ship of a higher PL.

That's an extreme solution and very clunky logic, but then again, so is the new beam rule. If people would like a ship to do crits, but reduce the chance, tyr this.

Option 2:
If a ship inflicts a Critical on an enemy ship that is one PL higher, the firing ship must roll a 4+ or the Critical is not applied. At 2 PLs higher, the ship needs a 5+. At 3 or more PLs higher the ship needs a 6+.

So it becomes possible for a ship to inflict a critical but harder.

 

[Burger]

seems a bit harsh on the ole boresighters, so you bought down to get initiative sinks to line up those boresights eh? well guess what..... were kicking you in the crotch!

Yeah poor Drazi... they are supposed to be the ones doing the crotch-kicking!

 

[H]

you know.... some kind of redundancy on big ships might help to reduce the mass crit effect... hmm, I've heard that idea somewhere before. . .

 

[greenboy]

I like this idea it scale well with the PL system when you trade down you don't buy individual ships you buy squadrons speeds up big games as wel

a bit like the company cards in epic...

seems a bit harsh on the ole boresighters, so you bought down to get initiative sinks to line up those boresights eh? well guess what..... were kicking you in the crotch!

Would be better if they reduced the number of ships in a squadron. I also like the idea of buying predetermined packages as the core of a fleet i think teh army cards for space marine were one of mu favorite ways to pick and army you got iconic formations with less min maxing

 

[Burger]

you know.... some kind of redundancy on big ships might help to reduce the mass crit effect... hmm, I've heard that idea somewhere before. . .

What a fantastic idea! Good one hiff! :lol:

 

[H]

:lol: