Let's say you wanted to develop rules for CT High Guard for a "point blank" range. Perhaps it's a Sword Worlds fleet that wants to overcome the Imperial advantage in computers by getting close enough to negate their ECM advantage. Perhaps the weaker fleet wants to get close enough to inflict serious damage, accepting their own probable destruction so the stronger fleet emerges with a pyrrhic victory and is reluctant to drive further into their space. Fleets are at short range, the winner of the initiative roll decides to get even closer to the opposing fleet. Both fleets are now within about 5000 km or less of each other, in what amounts to the same hex if a hex board were being used. How would you go about it? Range might preclude use of spinal mount weapons. MegaTraveller suggests secondary beam weapons would be much more damaging, perhaps too damaging. What rules would you make to model this situation?
CT High Guard: point blank range
- Thread starter Carlobrand
- Start date
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Agility no longer counts as a universal defensive DM - only spinals are affected.
Energy weapons, lasers, PAWS and meson bays are +2 to hit (not spinals)
Energy weapons, lasers PAWS and meson bays are +2 to penetrate (not spinals)
Damage - non-spinal weapons no longer suffer the +6DM on the damage table
Energy weapons, lasers, PAWS and meson bays are +2 to hit (not spinals)
Energy weapons, lasers PAWS and meson bays are +2 to penetrate (not spinals)
Damage - non-spinal weapons no longer suffer the +6DM on the damage table
My way which requires a new CRT/tonnage paradigm does the following-
For all particle/energy weapons, the baseline range for battery at full strength is 100000 km.
For every 10000km closer then full, the battery strength goes up by 1. To hit goes to the new battery strength and damage calc of 10 tons per Black Globe EP is increased too. The new battery number is also the increased armor penetration.
If the battery number exceeds 9, each increment above gets +1 to hit per level past 9, and damage is calced at the new battery number. No reference is made to spinal to hit or damage.
For all particle/energy weapons, the baseline range for battery at full strength is 100000 km.
For every 10000km closer then full, the battery strength goes up by 1. To hit goes to the new battery strength and damage calc of 10 tons per Black Globe EP is increased too. The new battery number is also the increased armor penetration.
If the battery number exceeds 9, each increment above gets +1 to hit per level past 9, and damage is calced at the new battery number. No reference is made to spinal to hit or damage.
My current idea, influenced a bit by Battle Rider and the old GURPS (not GT) combat system, is to make the basic negative DM to hit: (Range + Target Agility)/2.
For a HG range band system, I could use:
Point blank/knife fight range: 0
Short range: 5
Long range: 10.
Extreme range: 15.
For a HG range band system, I could use:
Point blank/knife fight range: 0
Short range: 5
Long range: 10.
Extreme range: 15.
Problem with that is your computer discrepancy dictates range. Well I suppose agility too.
Do you mean spinals hit easier at point blank range, or only spinals are affected by agility?
I get the energy weapons, lasers, and maybe PAWS (I don't know enough physics to know why they'd be stronger up close but weaker farther out), but why do the mesons get a +2 to penetrate?
"Damage - non-spinal weapons no longer suffer the +6DM on the damage table": except maybe missiles? They're not flying as far.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
Only spinals affected by agility.
Inverse square law -if i can melt holes in your armour or penetrate screens at 50,000km, at 1000km the weapons are way more effective.
"Realistically" there should be a range at which turret weapons and bays auto hit depending on the size of th4e target
.
The flaw in10tons of damage equivalent is also that inverse square law, in that if I am casing 10 tons of damage at 50,000km, at 1,000km I should be doing nearly four orders of magnitude more penetration and damage -
Inverse square law -if i can melt holes in your armour or penetrate screens at 50,000km, at 1000km the weapons are way more effective.
"Realistically" there should be a range at which turret weapons and bays auto hit depending on the size of th4e target
.
The flaw in10tons of damage equivalent is also that inverse square law, in that if I am casing 10 tons of damage at 50,000km, at 1,000km I should be doing nearly four orders of magnitude more penetration and damage -
I'm actually considering nixing the computer's defensive value altogether, or at least roll it into the same scheme (which would effectively mean only 1/2 computer rating counts for defense.)
I'm also considering having the computer work offensively like Battle Rider's fire control does, i.e. it can mitigate negative DMs, but not generate positive DMs.
Which in my system, sort of happens.
A laser battery 1 doing 10 tons at 100000km, does battery 6 and 60 tons at 50000km and battery 11 (with +2 to hit over battery 9) yielding 110 tons. In my system that means it’s punching through Armor 10 too.
Or properly first hit surface of weapons/hull/fuel/maneuver up to 55 tons, remainder of damage on any system potentially including critical.
If both hit hull on a Type S, the ship would disintegrate. On a Type A, that’s streamlining and partial streamlining gone and severely reduced sensors.
Not your criteria, but I am figuring weapons fire a spread anyway to ensure hits, and the black globe rules define a single weapon of energy transfer anyway. The pluses of increased battery value plus damage gives an acceptable simulacrum of suicide range drama/don’t let those fighters close.
Go VRF Gauss gun with californium rounds if you want fighter tears up battleship. Dear heavens don’t let it match course and vee…
There's an upper limit to that. Beam weapons will over-penetrate and waste some of the energy they would have transferred to the target.
Which I do too. The split damage in half/second hit applies what’s left has a limit. If the second hit does more then 10 tons and say it hits a 10 ton drive, the excess goes in space.
Same thing with IMTU Striker hit location, PGMP hits a leg that leg is gone but does not necessarily kill the whole person.
I'm sorely tempted to make spinals unusable at point blank range simply because the entire craft is having to make very fine movements for accuracy far more quickly than they would at short or long range. They're having to make turn angles ten times as large for an agile target at 5000 km as they would for one at 50,000 km. I could increase the effect of agility instead; they probably deserve a shot at lumbering targets.
I get the inverse square law as it applies to lasers or energy weapons. Not sure how it applies to neutral particle beams: does a neutral particle beam emitter have a problem with the particles spreading out perpendicular to the direction of the beam? I don't know enough about particle accelerators.
Same question for meson beams: it's magic-tech but it's based on the idea of using relativity by precisely accelerating the mesons, a particle with a half-life, so their half-life is extended and the maximum percentage of them decay inside the target rather than earlier or later. However, from the point of view of the meson the same amount of time has passed whether you place the aim point at 5000 km or 50,000 km because relativity, so same number of mesons decaying at that aim point (or close enough to it that it's still inside the target). Since they're not penetrating armor, how much they spread is irrelevant to their decaying inside the target, unless we're saying the spread is wide enough that the entire cross section of the target is affected and some mesons are decaying outside the craft perpendicular to the aim point at longer ranges - which might be true for spinals given the amount of damage spinals do, but the bay mesons don't do that level of additional hits unless the target is rather small.
Agreed, unless you're so close that you're defeating the turret's ability to turn and track you. Targets should be much easier to hit up close.
I'm having the same problem with the traditional damage model. Best case, the TL8 beam laser cuts through 11 more ratings of armor at point blank range than it would at short range. Worst case the TL14 fusion gun is cutting through 17 more ratings of armor at point blank range, which presumably means it's penetrated the armor, pierced through the item it damaged, and spent its remaining energy either making its way through the living spaces or whatnot on the way to the opposite side or trying to burn through the armor on the opposite side. (At short range, the base TL14 fusion gun should be getting a -5 DM over the base laser, but that's a separate issue). This could be nice until you consider that a thousand fighters at point blank range will pretty much make swiss cheese of an equal weight of capital ships unless something is making it very difficult for them to hit and, while the capital ship could kill a lot of fighters in the same turn, it is nowhere near an equitable exchange.
I like that too except for the above-mentioned swiss cheese problem.
The inverse square law applies to energies which have no focussing methods implemented whatsoever. A beam weapon for which this applies would be a very poor design.
And if you back-engineered it like that, you would have to posit that at 1 km or for sake of argument even less, your standard laser battery is basiscally the Death Star. And I don't see that. If using STRIKER, and I'm increasingly of the opinion you should not, a single-lens pulse laser with 250 Mw input strikes with 250 MJ output (at point blank range). Leaving aside the physical impossibility of this: While that is quite a lot of energy, a large explosive artillery round or medium-sized bomb will inflict the same.
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The general gist here is (spawned by STRIKER, I am increasingly convinced): "Weapons should be fantastically powerful, basically able to nuke large areas on a second-by-second basis... while defense should be... I don't know, maybe 2.5 times better than 1970s tank armor?"
Personally, I don't know if that's realistic. But I do know it's no fun.
Personally, I don't know if that's realistic. But I do know it's no fun.
Ok....
Thought to be honest this thread sent me scurrying back to do a compare and contrast of the various iterations of these rules... BTW, I prefer the 1st edition armor mechanic. And it's battle line mechanic.
HG1 had a lot of good elements: The armor penetration mechanic, you did not have to roll for dozens of batteries, the idea that configurations have advantages and drawbacks, the fact that the computer was not as all-deciding (same mechanic as in HG2, but capped at model 7), all damage results were potentially meaningful etc.
Admittedly there were problems, mainly concerning implementation; for example the tables were designed in such a way that high-level batteries basically could not miss anything. HG1 also lacked some design options from HG2 I would not like to do without (energy points, varying levels of armor). For designing ships, HG2 is IMHO clearly better.
But for the combat, HG2 basically threw out the baby with the bathwater, I feel. Instead of overhauling the system found in HG1, it scrapped most of its concepts and replaced them with new ones that, while more smoothly implemented, were fundamentally flawed - moreso than the concepts(!) from HG1.
Admittedly there were problems, mainly concerning implementation; for example the tables were designed in such a way that high-level batteries basically could not miss anything. HG1 also lacked some design options from HG2 I would not like to do without (energy points, varying levels of armor). For designing ships, HG2 is IMHO clearly better.
But for the combat, HG2 basically threw out the baby with the bathwater, I feel. Instead of overhauling the system found in HG1, it scrapped most of its concepts and replaced them with new ones that, while more smoothly implemented, were fundamentally flawed - moreso than the concepts(!) from HG1.
CT HG1 is worth mining, but I can't say I'm a fan of it. I don't like the armor mechanic, but I don't want to sideslip into a debate about its pros and cons so I'll leave it at that. It's sufficient to say CT HG 2's armor system could use some serious tweaking, and I'm thinking of starting a post just to focus on that.
I do like their treatment of configuration. It always struck me that something shaped like a scout-courier would be harder to damage than something like a Broadsword, those sharp angles being a significant advantage against beam weapons and non-nuclear missiles in particular, especially if we're considering the latter to apply some or most of their damage through kinetics. Bringing that into HG 2 is definitely worthwhile, in my opinion. The description of ships being screened by placing them behind the line clarifies the reserve a bit better, there are embellishments like planetary defense and blockade-running and such that are worth a look, it introduces the jump governor (which I don't see mentioned elsewhere), and there's a nice paragraph after "Options and other possibilities" with ideas for things to add if you're actually doing deck plans.
On those embellishments, one of the issues with HG2 is the basic assumption of the line. It looks rather like two fleets opposing each other just outside the 100-diameter limit of some target world, doing very little movement other than what it takes to try and come to a preferred range, apparently because most of their maneuver energy is taken up in evasive maneuvers to reduce the chance of being hit. That being said, if point blank range is wicked enough that a fleet really wants to avoid it, all they have to do is accelerate away from the approaching attackers to try to maintain their preferred range and snipe at the attackers from range. At that point, we might be dealing with a contest of how much of their agility they're willing to spend (i.e. reduce) to accelerate away from the attacker, and then how much agility the attacker's willing to spend to try to catch them, and then we're dealing with range bands and part of the opposing fleet at long range and part of the fleet at short range and momentum and such - all of which might be necessary if we're going to have a point blank range because no one actually sits there and waits for the enemy to come carve them up with lasers like a Christmas turkey. So I'm thinking we need to move to at least a range-band map if we want to play with point blank range
That also raises the question of the stern chase and what that means for missile attacks - which we maybe should discuss anyway because that's basically what's happening when one side tries to break away by acceleration and isn't fast enough to get away from pursuers. Another idea for a new thread.
On an unrelated subject: is there a Forum Rules kind of post someplace? I came across a very old thread dealing with something I'm considering, it has a lot of useful stuff I'd like to draw on and add to, but I'm not sure resurrecting a 5-year-old post is a good idea.
If it is useful bring it up. Please note through the membership and the age of this board there are nearly 40 years of conversations on many topics that can be visited again and referanced.
There appears to be a hard 10-page limit to search results, unless someone knows a way around that.
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