Which ships don't you use, and why?

[storeylf]

Actually, let me expand on that a minute. Strict dominance is the idea that one option is strictly better than another.

Ships that are strictly dominated, if we ignore point values, and Enhanced Bridge, which tends not to matter much:

...

All of these should be upgraded if you have the points.

italics mine.

So you haven't ignored the points. Sure ship A may be better ignoring points, but if you look at things taking points into account, as you are indeed eventaully saying, then ship A may be terrible. Would you buy a royal hawk over 2 King eagles, or 3 king eagles, or 10 king eagles?


But what is your scale for deciding what 'dominates'?

The King eagle, for example, you say should always be ignored in favor of the Royal hawk, but the king eagle has the highest plasma throw weight per point in the game (if I remember correctly). So how are you weighting other factors such that you would never take it. Have you some algorithm, or are just going on what seems obvious to you

 

[McKinstry]

I am not arguing that the classic CA is a bad ship, just that it is hardly 20% superior to the D6 and that three alternate Fed vessels at essentially identical points, the CS, the NCA and the CF are ensuring that the most iconic of vessels is a rarity on tables.

The D6 and D7 get taken because they are worthwhile at their pont cost (D7 less so) within the Klingon fleet. The classic CA does not because within the Fed fleet, it is not a worthwhile choice compared to the alternatives. If the cost of the ship does not make it a sensible alternative within its' own fleet to the point it is not getting taken, then there is a problem.

Another example is the OCL.The OCL is a neat ship and probably right at 130, in a vacum. Within the same fleet and for any tournament when a Kzinti will show up, the OCL makes zero sense when the DWD is available at identical points. Drop the OCL to 120 where the alternate is the regular DW and the choices get much more interesting.

If there were some divisons by time as with the Early, Mid, Late war of FOW, that might also solve the issues.

 

[MongooseMatt]

I think part of the comments by some of the players is that when you have the pick of all the ships in the game, there are better ships point-wise. They are basically playing pickup games or tournament where any ship is available.

I am not speaking about any other kind of game (the campaign rules for CTA:SF hardly restrict you in ship choice).

With 2,000 points to spend on a campaign fleet, I first picked 2 Battlecruisers. Next up were three Heavy Cruisers - those five ships were always going to form the ciore of my fleet and the rest (the frigates, fast cruisers, light cruiser and dreadnought) were 'fluff' in comparison.

If I didn't want the variety, I would quite happily do the entire campaign (or an entire tournament) with nothing but heavy cruisers and battlecruisers).

 

[MongooseMatt]

I am not arguing that the classic CA is a bad ship, just that it is hardly 20% superior to the D6

Tell that to the D6 the USS Valiant pwned (did I get that right?) this week

and that three alternate Fed vessels at essentially identical points, the CS, the NCA and the CF are ensuring that the most iconic of vessels is a rarity on tables.

You would _always_ take the Strike Cruiser over the Heavy? Interesting - why?

As for the New Heavy, well, it has turret phasers-1, which is nice, but you have lighter all round phaser-3 coverage (important for anti-drone work), and less damage. I would take the New Heavy any day, don't get me wrong, but it would not automatically get preference over its older brother.

Another example is the OCL.The OCL is a neat ship and probably right at 130, in a vacum. Within the same fleet and for any tournament when a Kzinti will show up, the OCL makes zero sense when the DWD is available at identical points. Drop the OCL to 120 where the alternate is the regular DW and the choices get much more interesting.

120 points is too cheap for an OCL. You have to also factor in that not every one wil play tournaments all the time... There are plenty of scenarios where an OCL makes a greadt deal more sense than the Ortega.

This is one thing I want to avoid with CTA:SF - in B5, people had a tendency to only play 5 point Raid, and only Call to Arms or Space Superiority. They regarded that as the 'standard' in the same way that Cleanse/Dawn Attack was used (at 1,500 points, natch) for 40k.

Stick to things like that, and people are going to miss a huge portion of what makes CTA: SF cool.

 

[Rerednaw]

Avoid:
=====
Any DN. I prefer agile maneuvers over pregnant rhinos trying to make turns on ice skates.
Same for any Lumbering heavy/battleship/cruiser.

Hey thats half my fleet you are talking about there. :roll:
Pregnant Rhinos indeed

Gorn: Anything bigger than the Stegasaurus.

Heys thats over half my flee........

Gorn are my favorite race. :mrgreen: Space Barneys!
I love you, you love me!
Eat hot plasma Klingon creep! :mrgreen:

That said Gorn turn painfully slow. :shock:

If the Gorn don't get some kind of bump (strong port/starboard?) I'd like to see at least one plasma system per ship on a turret.

 

[TJHairball]

120 points is too cheap for an OCL. You have to also factor in that not every one wil play tournaments all the time... There are plenty of scenarios where an OCL makes a greadt deal more sense than the Ortega.

I really have to agree with this. The Texas has -2 shields and +8/2 hull, which is nearly a wash in terms of durability.

It loses one photon torpedo in exchange for two additional phaser-1s (in the PH/SH), gains an extra ninety degree of arc on its front phasers, and changes the phaser-3s to turreted. It is, as currently written, an amazing phaser vehicle.

So you haven't ignored the points. Sure ship A may be better ignoring points, but if you look at things taking points into account, as you are indeed eventaully saying, then ship A may be terrible. Would you buy a royal hawk over 2 King eagles, or 3 king eagles, or 10 king eagles?

Right. That's why it's not a big deal that the King Eagle is strictly worse than the Royalhawk - 65 points is a lot - or the Behemoth (+160 points is enough to buy another entire ship).

It is a bigger deal that the King Eagle is strictly better than the War Eagle, since +35 points isn't actually that hard to come up with, and when we're talking about the Ramius, +10 points is pretty easy to find.

But what is your scale for deciding what 'dominates'?

All of them at once, except for points, as I mentioned.

That's how it's "strict." This is a game theoretic concept, I didn't invent it.

Before the errata that bumped up the BCJ's point value, it was strictly dominant in all ways over the NCC, even including pointing, which means that no rational player would ever choose to take the NCC given they could take the BCJ instead.

Overall the one ship that seems to be a consensus on 'not worth it at that price' is the Fed CA which is a real problem in that it, along with the D6/D7 are THE signature ships for the game and in reality, the whole Trek thing.

Even compared to a D7, the basic CA, between poor handling (Turn 6)and inadequate drone defense, is about 15 points too high. I think damage points and photons/plasma are being overstated since critical hits seal most ships fate long before the final damage point is ticked off and big thumping F arc weapons with 8" range aren't that useful against opponents unobliging enough to blunder into a front arc despite agile ships, racial initiative bonuses and generally cheaper fleets for initiative sink purposes.

If the game offered a guide to 'historic' eras it might be a fine ship for pre or early war but if ranked by points with all other ships for the whole period, it is too high.

The CA doesn't actually compare too badly next to the official pointing for the D7. The two are 5 points apart.

The D7 has 8 phasers, 3 phaser-1s and 5 phaser-2s, delivering a maximum firepower at 3/4/0 on a boresight and 3/2/0 in an arc. The CA has 10 phasers, 8 of which are phaser-1s and 2 of which are phaser-2s, delivering a maximum of 6/0/2 on a boresight and 4/0/2 on an arc. The CA has a significant edge in phasers, which is worth the disadvantage in drones; it also has an edge in overall durability to make up for its loss of agility.

But the D7 is also, IMO, overpointed. You'd rather take a D5 + D5W than 2 D7s; better overall phaser power (10/2/6 vs 6/12/0, with better arcs to boot), better disruptor arcs, and significantly better durability (ADD 2 and 20 shields each, which is +2d6 on a boost).

 

[McKinstry]

I may be still prejudiced by playing against the Kzinti a lot but in all cases, I regard Fed ships with ADD 1 as significantly inferior to an equally priced ship with ADD 2 or better, regardless of extra phasers or damage points. I also regard the DW's 20 shield rating (and thus 2 x d6 on enhancing shields) as worth much more than a mere 2 shield point absolute difference.

I do see the CA and D7 as very equivalent and both suffer compared to the later war equivalents and where no scenario restrictions on age/period of use exist, they will be rarely taken in favor of comparable designs such as the NCA and D5W.

My perception after playing for a couple of months is that a few extra damage points don't matter at all. They just let the wreck hang around an extra turn. It is critical hits that effectively create mission kill.

 

[storeylf]

All of them at once, except for points, as I mentioned.

That's how it's "strict." This is a game theoretic concept, I didn't invent it.

Before the errata that bumped up the BCJ's point value, it was strictly dominant in all ways over the NCC, even including pointing, which means that no rational player would ever choose to take the NCC given they could take the BCJ instead.

The idea that points are not relevant in a points based game is just wrong. You don't even seem to be able divorce the two yourself. Is the BCJ dominant - well yes because points aren't included in deciding dominance, er but, it was only dominant until the points got boosted???

There is maths involved, and that maths must vary by game. So what is the maths you used to work out that Royal Hawk is always better than King Eagle. How did you arrive at a conclusion that the higher plasma throw weight per point, armor and better shields (impotant 30 point threshold) still made the king eagle the suboptimal choice over the Royal Hawk. What are your weightings for things like turn mode, damage rating, weapon arcs, ranges etc etc.

You are stating as fact that the above ships are always dominated by others, but have not actually backed that statement up.

If we are ignorong points, and not showing the maths then you may as well just say that every ship for each empire is dominated by its dreadnaught, and always take them if you can afford it.

What is 'dominant' in this game is almost certainly based on the strategy the other guy uses - is he drone heavy, more manouverable, going for intiative sinks. Even terrain can make a big difference, not to mention the victory conditions (was it even just a straight up fight, or a lab dependent condition). Your theory does not really apply to choosing ships on such a scale as you state.

 

[TJHairball]

The idea that points are not relevant in a points based game is just wrong.

You don't quite understand what I'm getting at. If, neglecting points, ship A is strictly better than ship B (i.e., equal or better in every regard), then if you have enough points remaining in your allowance and ship A is present in your list, you did something wrong.

If you have 10 points left and you got a Ramius, you made a force composition mistake.

ED: Does look like I forgot the Royalhawk's shield value. The King Eagle is still strictly dominated by the Behemoth, though, ignoring points.

 

[storeylf]

The idea that points are not relevant in a points based game is just wrong.

You don't quite understand what I'm getting at. If, neglecting points, ship A is better than ship B, then if you have enough points remaining in your allowance and ship A is present in your list, you did something wrong.

If you have 10 points left and you got a Ramius, you made a force composition mistake.

That makes more sense, in that case. But taken wider, it is not necessarily true.

Take the extreme case, you effectively say the KE should be upgraded to a KC9R, if I have 165 points left. Why? how did you decide that the KC9R and Royal hawk (but not others in between) dominated the KE. I most cases I'd not upgrade but just go for an extra ship - a KR is spot on 165 pts, our group consider the Dreadnaughts to be generaly bad value. In other less extreme cases I may well be looking at what else I might drop to add to the fewer points otherwise left over to have something totally different.


Even in the case of the Ramius/DW, how have you accounted for the extra 10 points it gives up in VP? Does the extra hull generate more than 10 extra VP for you? I don't know the answer, but that is why I find your assertions hard to accept without question, what is the maths you are using? Or is it just a gut instinct rather than hard maths?

 

[Nerroth]

Personally, I would be somewhat uncomfortable with the idea that any fleet selection made (even in pick-up games) should only be to try and aim for the most utilitarian option available; with no care or interest taken in trying to give a given fleet some historical flavour, or perhaps some individual character.

Even if, after tweaks and edits, some ships seem to be less useful than others (either in the same weight class, or perhaps in relative terms to smaller or larger hulls) should that stop someone who wants to take the path less travelled in order to give their force some personality?

If a player wants to take a "sub-optimal" force in order to reflect an historical squadron (in order to reflect how squadron commodores in-universe had to make do with what they had, not what they might have preferred) or perhaps to make a point of doing well with choices other players may eschew, is that necessarily any less rational an option for a player to take?


There are, or at least ought to be, many ways to approach this game; I'd not like to see only one viewpoint drive away all others.

 

[Finlos]

I honestly don't think it's fair to disregard points. Some of the ships 'dominated by' other ships have a 50+ point difference from the ships they dominate. That starts to add up fairly quickly in real games.

 

[tneva82]

Personally, I would be somewhat uncomfortable with the idea that any fleet selection made (even in pick-up games) should only be to try and aim for the most utilitarian option available; with no care or interest taken in trying to give a given fleet some historical flavour, or perhaps some individual character.

If you aren't trying to balance the lists for that type of gaming there's no point in having point values in a first place. For historical fleets and scenarios you can just slap them and go with it.

But if you add point values to list then you are obviously trying to cater for those who just want to pick their fleet and go for it in supposedly balanced game.

In that scenario any fluff and background doesn't matter. Rules do. And they need to be balanced. Any background info("there was only 1 of these ships built" or whatever) shouldn't be used as excuse for point imbalances.

Point values are by their very nature catering toward "just pick your fleet and have a go at in theory balanced game" idea. Non-tournament types of games don't really even NEED point values(there's games out there without point values of any kind! It's literally choose what you want for both sides game type).

If a player wants to take a "sub-optimal" force in order to reflect an historical squadron (in order to reflect how squadron commodores in-universe had to make do with what they had, not what they might have preferred) or perhaps to make a point of doing well with choices other players may eschew, is that necessarily any less rational an option for a player to take?

No but it's not excuse for point imbalances and unequal ships be left...

Obviously every ship can't be equally good but this needs to be reflected in the point values!

Or to put it otherway around: Having point values as good as they can be doesn't take away ANYTHING from historical "let's recreate this battle" or "let's take fleets that might appear" type of playing. However having those incorrect leads to less interesting tournament style games...

By trying to get them as good as possible(truly balanced is blindingly obviously impossible goal but you should aim to get as far as possible. Probably something like 80% of the ultimate perfect is attainable goal) you cater for both sides

 

[MongooseMatt]

My perception after playing for a couple of months is that a few extra damage points don't matter at all. They just let the wreck hang around an extra turn. It is critical hits that effectively create mission kill.

Then you might need to look at All Hands on Deck! a little more...

 

[MongooseMatt]

Obviously every ship can't be equally good but this needs to be reflected in the point values!

It is also worth pointing out that ships are not equally good at all tasks. A ship might suck at a general 'line of battle-tournament' style game but be well worth taking in maybe every other engagement.

We generally assume the points value of a ship is marked somewhere around where the ship is expected to perform its best. The Texas is a brilliant example of that.

 

[Captain Jonah]

My perception after playing for a couple of months is that a few extra damage points don't matter at all. They just let the wreck hang around an extra turn. It is critical hits that effectively create mission kill.

Then you might need to look at All Hands on Deck! a little more...

Or a lot more, Crits shouldn't be killing you, lack of hull damage should :lol: :wink:

 

[billclo]

My perception after playing for a couple of months is that a few extra damage points don't matter at all. They just let the wreck hang around an extra turn. It is critical hits that effectively create mission kill.

Then you might need to look at All Hands on Deck! a little more...

My opponent used this in my first game. It was irritating to see most of the crits I'd worked to get repaired quite rapidly.

 

[storeylf]

Obviously every ship can't be equally good but this needs to be reflected in the point values!

It is also worth pointing out that ships are not equally good at all tasks. A ship might suck at a general 'line of battle-tournament' style game but be well worth taking in maybe every other engagement.

We generally assume the points value of a ship is marked somewhere around where the ship is expected to perform its best. The Texas is a brilliant example of that.

In our game so far (probably not as many as others by any stretch) I've pondered that action a few times, but discounted it. The problem seems to be that a ship goes down fast in this game. If you need it at the start of the turn then you are probably not surviving till the end of the turn when it takes effect, may as well do something else along the lines of 'at hells gate I stab at thee'. If you don't need it at the start of the turn then you are guessing which ship is about to take a hammering, and may be wasting actions on several ships.

That action would be so much more useful if repairs were done during a ships activation for movement.

The general point made about damage is why we don't favor dreadnaughts either, they look chunky but they go down almost as fast a smaller ships as they have no extra ability to withstand criticals, or the extra damage that racks up from them.

 

[MongooseMatt]

In our game so far (probably not as many as others by any stretch) I've pondered that action a few times, but discounted it. The problem seems to be that a ship goes down fast in this game. If you need it at the start of the turn then you are probably not surviving till the end of the turn when it takes effect, may as well do something else along the lines of 'at hells gate I stab at thee'. If you don't need it at the start of the turn then you are guessing which ship is about to take a hammering, and may be wasting actions on several ships.

Like so much about CTA, it is about prediction!

The general point made about damage is why we don't favor dreadnaughts either, they look chunky but they go down almost as fast a smaller ships as they have no extra ability to withstand criticals, or the extra damage that racks up from them.

Well, they do, if you use All Hands - a Dreadnought has enough Damage points to be extremely survivable (which is what they are good at). What are you doing to them that they go down as quickly as a cruiser?

 

[McKinstry]

My perception after playing for a couple of months is that a few extra damage points don't matter at all. They just let the wreck hang around an extra turn. It is critical hits that effectively create mission kill.

Then you might need to look at All Hands on Deck! a little more...

The few times we've tried it about 50% of the crits went away but with the ship already hurting, the shields down and the only special action used on 'All Hands"' they died easily in the next round.

Absent handy terrain, any shields down plus multiple crits ship that has to use 'All Hands' leaving it in the open with no shields should be an easy kill, usually from drones.