mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
In which case they line up with their new side.
Agility - thoughts
- Thread starter Carlobrand
- Start date
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 5K
Oh ... so duplicitous backstabbing isn't a thing ...?
Again, maneuver matters. Abstraction may be fine as all the plot support your players want, but it takes away agency and unique environment Dorothy we’re not in Kansas anymore we’re in space.The scenario I was drawing was that one faction needing to fight on TWO FRONTS ... meaning two lines of battle for a single fleet to defend.
If Fleet B commits ALL of their "line of battle" to holding off Fleet A ... meaning that there are no assets available to intercept/waylay Fleet C (for whatever reason) coming in for a pincer attack from the opposite(-ish) side ... then Fleet C is facing "no offensive weapons" fielded by Fleet B and can Breakthrough Step into firing on Fleet B's reserves.
- Fleet A = Attacker 1
- Fleet B = Defender
- Fleet C = Attacker 2
How could this happen?
Well, as described Fleet B committed ALL of their combatants to the "line of battle" with Fleet A ... leaving NO combatants capable of intercepting/waylaying Fleet C when they pincer attack Fleet B from a different direction.
If you need an example of what this can possibly look like in practice ... try this 2 minute fleet on fleet simulation on for size ...
In the previous OVA it was rendered Sitolet, a less jarring spelling.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
RAW - no.Oh ... so duplicitous backstabbing isn't a thing ...?
House rules - do whatever you want.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
It also takes away the kind of dumb mistakes a player on a map board might make that an experienced spacer with a ship's computer at hand wouldn't, like overshooting your target because you miscalculated the turnaround point. Mind, a newtonian fight can be immense fun, but asking a player to play a skilled pilot on a map board is like asking the shy introvert playing the 18 charisma bard to roleplay out his interactions.
But that's the RPG element. The reality is the CT Book 5 reserve rule is an arbitrary mechanic introduced to make the abstract game more fun, and it works, but it doesn't translate to the mapboard and translating mapboard possibilities to the abstract can get decidedly complicated.
Getting back to agility per se, one issue is that CT agility doesn't care about mass. Given the same size, the same percentage allocated to drives, and the same amount of energy dedicated to agility, your tanker with 3/4 of its volume in l-hyd has the same agility as that densely armored battlerider. There's no penalty for being 4 or 5 times as massive, so a heavily armored fighter can dance as gracefully as its unarmored counterpart. That's kind of a having-your-cake-and-eating-it-too situation.
MT conversely figures mass into it but doesn't care how big your maneuver drive is; you can get 6 agility out of a 1G drive, assuming sufficient power - which leaves you wondering how that agility works.
It's possible to figure mass for a CT Book 5 craft. I'm just not sure it's worth it.
Spinward Flow
SOC-14 5K
It does.
The reserve is "further back" away from the action within weapons fire ranges.
You aren't going have the ENTIRE fleet all in a single clump if there are some on the Line and some in Reserve (because you'll have 2 clumps, and the Reserve clump should be placed well out of range of adversaries).
There is no "further back" that doesn't fall within weapon range of the opposing line.
CT High Guard has a 20-minute turn. In 20 minutes, a craft can change position from 7200 km (1g) to 43, 200 km (6g) and is then left with a velocity change of 12 to 72 kps in that direction. If it accelerates then decelerates to match vector with friendlies already on the line (or reserve), then those numbers become 1800 km to 10,800 km. That's not enough to take the reserve out of range of opposing weapons, especially when the lines are at short range.
You have to postulate some method for the line to foul the targeting sensors of the opposing force to prevent locks on the craft behind them, and then you're left asking why the opposing line doesn't just send a flanking group to go around the line and hit the reserve, and then you're postulating a counter-flanking force to stop the flankers, and then you're stretching your line left, right, up, and down to intercept flankers until your flanks are no longer able to support each other because they're too far apart.
Remember, under the abstract rules it only takes one ship able to fire offensive weapons to screen all the craft in the reserve, no matter how many craft are on the opposing line. There's no way to emulate that on a mapboard without opposing craft simply going around that one ship to attack the reserve.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
You can switch between the Line and reserve without agility or even a M-drive. It's not that far away...
Which my rules cover.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Why don't you publish them?
Far enough as for close ships being unable to use their long range weapons (missiles) against it...
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Which invalidates the HG/Mayday crossover rules and MT weapon ranges.
I’ve posted 90% of it by now, just in driblets per topic so people can lift what they want.
The main sticky part is the spinals, cause you really have to do damage reduction per TL grouping since they gain efficiency and so EP based damage means lower TL weapons do more damage. It’s a bit more complicated to handle.
OTOH, way fewer die rolls for the big guns. More 4000 ton hits in one shot to a major system.
I'm not sure if I understood this. Can you elaborate?
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
Close enough to use any weapons, as soon as the screening ships are silenced.
The reserve is not far away, it's screened. Kill the screen and they are fair game.
And that's the key. In order for a reserve to work on the map, the reserve and line need to be close enough to move between each other with courses matched so someone doesn't end up flying out of the formation. Not a lot of distance given a 20-minute turn, and not enough to keep from taking pot shots at the reserve - unless the reserve has gone silent, passive sensors only, no weapons powered, power plant down to the minimum needed to maintain formation while the line is lit up like a Christmas tree with active ECM painting opposing sensors while active EM tries to lock weapons. The reserve huddles close to hide its signature among the noise created by the line.
Only issue there is one ship with one working weapon is not going to be able to hide a dozen friendlies who are still emitting a lot of neutrinos from those power plants. Of course, we could say neutrinos and passive IR can't provide a bearing tight enough to lock weapons in realtime. Still, all of that together pretty much means the line and reserve are in the same hex.
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AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
Quite, I have no idea how it can actually work, just that the rules say it works.
As you said earlier, it's a simplified abstraction, but it works.
Transfers over better than I had expected too.
