Federation Commander

[DorianManhattan]

Bit of a lore question but if ships can just warp out anytime - wouldn't an outnumber fleet always just refuse combat and just warp out anytime they face a superior fleet?

Can ships stay at warp indefinitely or do they have to recharge after each jump?

Lastly off topic but do ships shields have to be down in order for the opponent to thoroughly scan you and see all your weapon configuration etc?

[djdood]

Disengagement is a not-insignificant outcome in SFU battles. Gloriously dying for the cause is great on tri-video, but real starship captains know their trained crew and expensive ship is almost always worth more intact than some temporary goal. There are exceptions, but more often than not "discretion is the better part of valor", even for the Klingons.

Usually when a battle is forced, its because circumstances didn't permit the defender to just get out of there. Sometimes it's an ongoing thing that must be maintained, sometimes its because they were trapped by other opposing forces.

One thing that cannot be allowed is to take fire while at high ("strategic warp") speeds. Ships are incredibly vulnerable when travelling that fast and must drop to combat speeds ("tactical warp") to prevent instant and easy destruction from trivial damage. This is "speed 32" in SFB and FedCom.

To accelerate past that, you need to have met specific criteria to allow your ship to accelerate to high warp.
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Ships in the SFU have a finite range. Travelling at high warp speeds burns fuel (deuterium slush) at a prodigious rate and strains the engineering systems. Ships usually only travel at strategic speeds between bases, where they can refuel and perform maintenance on their engines.

This range limitation can be a problem for ships fleeing from a fight. At some point, they're going to have to stop and give battle, before they run out of fuel or break something and end up stuck. Chasing down crippled ships fleeing major battles was something of a full time job for some of the fast light cruiser ships.
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In Federation Commander, everyone can see everything about each others ships and weapons, at all times. The more-complex game Star Fleet Battles uses a similar approach, but has optional rules for "tactical intelligence" to obscure details from opponents unless they put the work in to learn it. The added complexity is why most people don't use those rules.

The only thing a shield (just one, not all of them) need to be dropped for is transporter operations. The shield facing the intended transport destination needs to be dropped for a specific period of time.
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[Nerroth]

To expand upon the above, there is an extract from the GURPS Prime Directive 4th Edition rulebook which discusses how warp speed in the Star Fleet Universe works.

In the "modern" (GURPS Prime Directive's Tech Level 12) era, a Constitution-class heavy cruiser can fight at Warp 3.14 (Speed 31 in Star Fleet Battles terms); can "cruise" at Warp 7 (which counts as six hexes' worth of "operational movement" on the hex map used in the strategic-level game Federation and Empire); and has a "dash" speed of Warp 9.25 (which in F&E is treated as "strategic movement", and which must make use of "strategic movement nodes", such as bases).

These speeds are adjusted depending on which technology era one is looking at. For example, the Republic-class early heavy cruiser, the forerunner of the Constitution-class (and a Tech Level 11 starship in GPD4e terms), could go no faster than SFB Speed 25 tactically, had a "cruising" speed of Warp 6, and had no "dash warp" capability. On the other hand, the Vincennes-class advanced cruiser, a first-generation X-ship (at GPD4e Tech Level 13), is no faster than the Constitution-class tactically (but is far more capable of fighting at speeds close to that limit), yet had more powerful engines that can "cruise" at Warp 7.25 and "dash" at Warp 9.5.

As noted in the prior post, ships are forced to slow to tactical warp speeds if approaching (or being approached by) an opponent within weapons range. In FC, this range is reduced relative to SFB, where long-range direct-fire weapons such as phaser-4s can oblige a ship to slow at a more significant distance from, say, an enemy base (or a pursuing Juggernaut).

Also, most civilian transports have less powerful engines than naval (or police) ships; a raiding vessel (from an enemy empire, an Orion Pirate, or suchlike) has an easier time of forcing an engagement against a civilian convoy, while a "sheepdog" frigate or police cutter is obliged to defend its charges.

And in addition, not every empire uses the same concepts of operational and strategic warp. Perhaps the most prominent example of this is with the Andromedan Invaders: their ships are somewhat slower than "modern" Alpha Octant warships in operational terms (though exactly how much slower may not be clarified until F&E Andromedan War is eventually published), yet their unique Rapid Transit Network allows them to move at blistering strategic speeds of Warp 15 between satellite bases, while their Intergalactic Trunk Line seemingly enables even faster speeds for ships deploying to an Andromedan Desecrator starbase from the M31 galaxy.

However, the means by which the RTN was possible also led to their eventual downfall. The only Andromedan ships capable of traversing the RTN are those equipped with displacement devices. However, a side-effect of DisDev operations is that no more than two Andromedan ships can use their DisDevs in the same tactical engagement (though an Andro base on the scene with its positional stabilizers active can use its DisDevs over and above that limit).

Once the Galactic Survey Cruiser NCC-1802 USS Darwin uncovered the truth about how the Rapid Transit Network operated, the Alpha Octant empires were able to hunt down and destroy the satellite bases (and other, larger RTN nodes) used to facilitate Andromedan strategic operations - and the DisDev limit meant that even if the Andros chose to stay and fight over a given base, they could not amass the combat power in one place needed to hold out against a determined Galactic task force.

Although, this only worked because the Alpha Octant empires still had enough resources left to mount such offensives. One wonders what kind of dark future might have entailed had the Darwin somehow vanished prior to passing on this key information in a timely manner...
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FC Omega Discussion (v3)
FC LMC Discussion

[Magnum357]

Nerroth, thank you for this information about the RTN and Andromedan Displacement devices. I have read a little of there technology over the years but I have always had trouble understanding the rules to it. Most of my time is in the Early Years and Basic Era of vessel designs. Guess I'm just old fashion I suppose.

Last I checked, only Toropedo style weapons have any amount of accuracy at Strategic Warp Speeds. At lease according to Star Trek.