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Federation Commander A NEW fast paced board game of starship combat!
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storeylf Fleet Captain
Joined: 24 Jul 2008 Posts: 1897
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 7:29 pm Post subject: |
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Actually, just realised that I didn't show the right long range stats for your photons above - I had 3+ at short range and 4+ at long range (I forgot to add in an additonal -1, which you just reminded me of). I'll correct above post shortly. [Done] |
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archon96 Lieutenant JG
Joined: 20 Aug 2011 Posts: 65
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 7:36 pm Post subject: |
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My biggest issues were.
1. the rules as would teach them based on the book something would be changed.
2. the fact that it has taken over a year to flush out all of the fleets.
3. Some of the systems seem to either be under powered in effect or more powerful then their FC counter parts. Example we dabbled with FC and drones seemed more of an inconvenience that forced you to rethink youre movement same with plasma. In ACTA a smart drone user never has to get with phaser range and to beat the crap out of with drones. And back to plasma they are too easy to shoot down. I under stand the overwhelming blah factor when you do hit a ship it usually dies. But its been taken us about 4-5 ships to land 1 plasma strike and i tend to loose half of those to the barrage of photons. Mind you we just got the Gorn fleet painted and used only once before interest waned. Ill keep watching like I have been for a year and half. Im interested to see the squadron strike rules variant. |
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storeylf Fleet Captain
Joined: 24 Jul 2008 Posts: 1897
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 7:47 pm Post subject: |
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Have to say I'm not keen on the seeker rules. But my experience with plasma is very much the opposite, I got into playing Gorns (mainly because people were saying how bad they were) and found that they tended to crush everyone or certainly Feds and klingons, not sure they ever got played against Kzinti. |
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Savedfromwhat Commander
Joined: 23 Aug 2007 Posts: 657
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 7:54 pm Post subject: |
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Lincon,
Would something like Kill Zone but for accuracy work?
Short Range X - This weapon receives +1 to Dice rolls within X.
It could be tweaked this way pretty easily. |
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archon96 Lieutenant JG
Joined: 20 Aug 2011 Posts: 65
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 7:59 pm Post subject: |
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i like the fact that in FC seeker made you change course. I could through up a wall of plasma make my opponent run around and get away from while I repositioned for better phaser shots. Yes plasma die to easy but manly do to IDF. If you removed accuracy from the IDF shot then I think it would balance a bit. Escorts are a whole different issue. What my mind cant process is this, I have to relod a photon, but a drone never needs reloaded and can with luck do more damage to shields. Even though it can be shot down I think the plain jane simple drone that youve put this huge engine on to get the 36inch range should do a set amount of damage, maybe a 2points worth. This would leave room later for bigger shorter range drones. |
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lincolnlog Lieutenant SG
Joined: 18 Jun 2011 Posts: 111 Location: St. Louis, MO
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 8:04 pm Post subject: |
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Savedfromwhat wrote: | Lincon,
Would something like Kill Zone but for accuracy work?
Short Range X - This weapon receives +1 to Dice rolls within X.
It could be tweaked this way pretty easily. |
Sure, that would work. But see like I said previously to make it all fit, you"ll have to special rule everything. Remember, there are lots more weapons coming. How many special case do we create to incorporate them all. |
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Savedfromwhat Commander
Joined: 23 Aug 2007 Posts: 657
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 8:08 pm Post subject: |
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That's why I think a trait would be best. This way it could be applied to other weapons, like the Fusion Beam, etc. |
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lincolnlog Lieutenant SG
Joined: 18 Jun 2011 Posts: 111 Location: St. Louis, MO
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 8:13 pm Post subject: |
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The problem with Plasma is it's multi-hit D6. But when you shoot at the plasma with phasers your not just reducing single damage points, your eliminating entire dice of damage.
Plasma by the way is already broken into 3 range brackets due to the energy bleed trait. I would create an energy bleed table and show actual damage points that bleed versus D6 damage. That would bulk up plasma. If a plasma R is 42 damage instead of 7 AD Multi-hit D6, yuo would have to score 42 damage to kill off all the damage. Or 24 Damage at 16" after it energy bleeds. |
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archon96 Lieutenant JG
Joined: 20 Aug 2011 Posts: 65
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 8:19 pm Post subject: |
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What about this
I fire 7ad of plasma range 12
Follow the steps to assess damage.
step 1: remove 2 ad for range.
step 2: roll 5ad to determine the actual damage of the plasma torp. (roll come up 1
step 3: defensive fire takes out 10points of plasma damage.
step 4: ship gets hit for 8 points of damage.
This seems like a tedious process but i bet if the players were on the ball it would go very quickly. |
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storeylf Fleet Captain
Joined: 24 Jul 2008 Posts: 1897
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Posted: Tue Jul 02, 2013 10:27 pm Post subject: |
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Quote: | Plasma by the way is already broken into 3 range brackets due to the energy bleed trait. I would create an energy bleed table and show actual damage points that bleed versus D6 damage. That would bulk up plasma. If a plasma R is 42 damage instead of 7 AD Multi-hit D6, yuo would have to score 42 damage to kill off all the damage. Or 24 Damage at 16" after it energy bleeds. |
That makes plasma unbeatable. Serioulsy, plasma is probably the most powerful weapon in ACTA at the moment. Plasma's problem is that it is so binary - you get to 8" and win or you effectively lose the game before firing because you lost too many ships too early. As I discussed several times on the mongoose forums there is a fairly fine line between not having enough AD to beat out defensive fire and therefore do nothing of note and having enough to overwhelm it and win in one strike, this is exacerbated by the 50/50 nature of IDF meaning that against plasma in particular you can beat it on a good day or have no chance on a bad day. More reliable SAs would temper that factor a lot, and then allow a re-evaluation of plasma in light of better and more reliable IDF.
A Gorn chucks out 12 AD, or 72 damage by your chart, and my phasers may knock off 10? 62 damage remains which takes out any cruiser. That is a 1 cruiser kills another cruiser strike with almost no defense. Then the Gorn add in their phasers to finish off any stragglers. Another example of why just because in a plasma strike it looks like it can do 100 damage on the weapon chart, and kill a cruiser, in FC/SFB you cannot translate it directly and have anything like a balanced game.
Last edited by storeylf on Wed Jul 03, 2013 11:56 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Marauder Lieutenant JG
Joined: 23 Sep 2011 Posts: 28 Location: Vancouver BC
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Posted: Wed Jul 03, 2013 5:16 am Post subject: |
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storeylf wrote: | Quote: | Plasma by the way is already broken into 3 range brackets due to the energy bleed trait. I would create an energy bleed table and show actual damage points that bleed versus D6 damage. That would bulk up plasma. If a plasma R is 42 damage instead of 7 AD Multi-hit D6, yuo would have to score 42 damage to kill off all the damage. Or 24 Damage at 16" after it energy bleeds. |
That makes plasma unbeatable. Serioulsy, plasma is probably the most powerful weapon in ACTA at the moment. Plasma's problem is that it is so binary - you get to 8" and win or you effectively lose the game before firing because you lost too many ships too early. As I discussed several times on the mongoose forums there is a fairly fine line between not having enough AD to beat out defensive fire and therefore do nothing of note and having enough to overwhelm it and win in one strike, this is exacerbated by the 50/50 nature of IDF meaning that against plasma in particular you can beat it on a good day or have no chance on a bad day. More reliable SAs would temper that factor a lot, and then allow a re-evaluation of plasma in light of better and more reliable IDF.
A Gorn chucks out 12 AD, or 72 damage by your chart, and my phasers may knock off 10? 62 damage remains which takes out any cruiser. That is a 1 cruiser kills another cruiser strike with almost no defense. Then the Gorn add in their phasers to finish off any stragglers. Another example of why just because in a plasma strike looks like it can do 100 damage on the weapon chart and kill a cruiser in FC/SFB you cannot translate it directly and have anything like a balanced game. |
I agree. Fix IDF - seriously anything that you can reliably do in FC should not require a crew check in ACTA - and then re-evaluate both plasma and drones.
-Tim |
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storeylf Fleet Captain
Joined: 24 Jul 2008 Posts: 1897
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Posted: Wed Jul 03, 2013 12:12 pm Post subject: |
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Marauder wrote: |
I agree. Fix IDF - seriously anything that you can reliably do in FC should not require a crew check in ACTA - and then re-evaluate both plasma and drones.
-Tim |
I thought that at one point, but the idea that some of these things don't work on occasion doesn't bother me, just that as it stands it is very very variable, and hence hard to make any meaningful plan. It also makes seekers in particular problematic as highly variable defenses can have a huge effect on the outcome through no fault nor plan of either player.
At least partly why I like the idea of non-automatic SAs is that ACTA also has a decent crew quality concept. Auto SAs reduces the effect of that. If 'basic' SAs were a target 6+ then standard crews would normally succeed but a few would fail. That can be seen not just as some technical aspect, but simple happenstance, like the command confusion mid battle (which should be more a factor in a battle than a 1 vs 1), that affects your average crew/captain. The target of 6+ however would make veteran and elite crews auto pass those actions, which provides a nice strong differentiation between the average crew and the battle hardened vets. Want to be absolutely sure that you get the best IDF coverage on that vital ship - then send your veterans to handle it. Is a HET at a vital moment needed for your plan? you 'should' be ok with your standard crew, but that elite crew won't even break a sweat.
The crew check -1 crit would bring Vets down to a level where they might sometimes fail, but your super elite crews can cope with even that.
Of course I'd leave the other crew check type things, e.g. repair as is at 8+ and 9+ |
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storeylf Fleet Captain
Joined: 24 Jul 2008 Posts: 1897
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Posted: Wed Jul 03, 2013 12:49 pm Post subject: |
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lincolnlog wrote: |
Plasma by the way is already broken into 3 range brackets due to the energy bleed trait. |
That's true. Though in practise because of the interaction with defensive fire, for plasma there is only really 1 (and a bit) brackets of any interest. The 12+ range bracket is only extremely situationally useful, almost a non bracket, the 8-12 bracket is useful at times, but you should nearly always be heading straight for range 8, probably even if it means losing an extra ship.
If the average Gorn has 4 plasma (small ones 3, big ones 5, but probably about 4 on average). then being 8-12" is 4AD per ship you lose in energy bleed, that is significant across a fleet of say 9 ships, possibly 36AD all told. You are usually going to be better losing a cruiser and its 12AD whilst holding fire so the remaining 8 ships get their extra 32 AD (you still delivered a net +24AD compared to firing at 8-12"). Otherwise 8-12" is generally only useful when most of your fleet is 8" but a couple of your ships haven't made it but you need those extra dice to properly overwhelm IDF. There are a couple of other times 8-12" might be useful, especially once the battle is a mass swirl and ships are facing all over and you may just have to take whatever shot you can get, but at least to start with <8" is the only bracket you will be heading for.
Or to look at it another way, if you thought losing AD to defensive fire was crippling you then you should be seeing firing at 8-12" as being almost as crippling because of the bleed alone.
Last edited by storeylf on Wed Jul 03, 2013 5:37 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Steve Cole Site Admin
Joined: 11 Oct 2006 Posts: 3833
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Posted: Wed Jul 03, 2013 4:07 pm Post subject: |
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The problem with seekers is that they mostly force the enemy to move, rather than destroy him, at least, in real SFB/FC. The primary defense against seeking weapons is to move out of their way, run them out, lead them around, and kill them only when you have to.
ACTASF treats seekers as direct-fire weapons, meaning they have no effect on movement, and are far more effective for that.
My idea was to make seekers a two-turn weapon (beyond a certain range, maybe 6 or 12 inches). Launch a seeker, it moves 12 inches toward the target, and you place a numbered marker on the table. The number then corresponds to a written list that says #3 is four drones targeted on the USS Nicholas Baruche. On the next turn, I can (after the Baruch moves) move the marker to impact, up to a certain range, anyway. Drones might get two "nights" on the board and move three times. Plasma moves twice (but is faster).
But Matthew said "no" because that required record keeping and record keeping is anathema to the ACTA concept. (I can see that, BUT, it makes seekers just direct-fire weapons you get to shoot at and changes the entire game. It's just not realistic, and it's just not SFU.) _________________ The Guy Who Designed Fed Commander
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Bill Stec Lieutenant SG
Joined: 25 Jan 2012 Posts: 158
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Posted: Wed Jul 03, 2013 4:35 pm Post subject: |
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Steve, re: drones
Would it be viable to reduce damage done by drones from 1d6 to a fixed value? Say 2 damage per drone? While this does not address the rate at which said drones hit a target, it does reduce damage taken.
Or another idea: I have seen naval games that specified that if a ship is fired upon by torpedoes (sub or ship launched) and the ship did not make a radical turn and try to evade the torpedoes, that the chances of a hit went up enormously.
Applying this to ACTA:SF, in that drones at 18" or less are already auto-hit, might require something creative to make it work. Something like add a seeking weapon fiiring step before movement... Specify a target for your seeking weapons, and if during it's next move the target does not make at least a 45 degree turn and move X inches, that the seeking weapons get a major bonus if they hit. Something like convert a drone from doing 1d6 damage (variable damage due to possible detonation short of the target) to doing maximum damage (6) because you didn't evade and the drone scored a direct hit. Similarly, if you fired a S-torp (4 dice damage) at a target and the target did not turn at least 45 and move X inches, that S-torp scores maximum damage (24 pts).
You would calculate hit chances based upon the range to target during the Attack phase. So if the enemy remained within 18", the seeking weapons (drones in this case) would auto-hit. If the target of drones moved beyond 18" away, use the 5-6 on a D6 to hit per drone.
While this would add some minor record keeping, it isn't as bad as having seeking weapons on the map and having to track them over multiple turns. You'd only need a token marking the target ship, or in smaller games a verbal announcement that so and so is shooting this ship with seeking weapons... It surely would encourage the target to be darn sure it can shoot down the incoming seeking weapons or get really hammered when they all score direct hits (maximum damage per die) because it did not evade.
Which would accomplish the goal of forcing the enemy ships to maneuver to evade seeking weapons or pay the price if they don't shoot them all down.
If we can't change the game mechanic that turns seeking weapons into direct fire seeking weapons, I would think changing the way they work while maintaining that direct-fire property would be beneficial. |
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