Dumb High Guard Question.

[jawillroy]

And it really is; I just can't find a statement in the rules. (I've been away from High Guard for some few years, and I'm brushing up on it again.)

Okay: a two-ship engagement in High Guard.
One ship loses its M-drive, but the ship's weapons are still up. Not out of the fight, because it can shoot, but logic says it can't maneuver at all, at all.

However, near as I can tell, even though it has (naturally) lower agility than its undamaged opponent, it is possible for this driveless wonder to win initiative, and thereby determine range.

That don't seem quite right, do it? Surely I'm missing a rule somewhere, but it seems like that really shouldn't happen.

 

[HG_B]

And it really is; I just can't find a statement in the rules. (I've been away from High Guard for some few years, and I'm brushing up on it again.)

Okay: a two-ship engagement in High Guard.
One ship loses its M-drive, but the ship's weapons are still up. Not out of the fight, because it can shoot, but logic says it can't maneuver at all, at all.

However, near as I can tell, even though it has (naturally) lower agility than its undamaged opponent, it is possible for this driveless wonder to win initiative, and thereby determine range.

That don't seem quite right, do it? Surely I'm missing a rule somewhere, but it seems like that really shouldn't happen.

I don't recall the exact rule. Think of this, you are standing (you can't walk) in the middle of a plain without cover, you both have rifles. Your opponent is 500 yards away and can run. Does anyone have init advantage (can shoot 1st) ?

 

[BlackBat242]

Quit looking for a rule for every possible nitpicking sub-sub-side-situation!

There is no rule for how many times a day a PC needs to take a dump, why look for one that covers whether a maneuver-less ship can maneuver.

IT CAN"T!!!

Therefore, while it might gain initiative and thus be able to do what it still can first, gaining initiative won't let it do something it can't do!

Think, man... think!

Use your brain, and make the ruling.

 

[jawillroy]

I don't recall the exact rule. Think of this, you are standing (you can't walk) in the middle of a plain without cover, you both have rifles. Your opponent is 500 yards away and can run. Does anyone have init advantage (can shoot 1st) ?

The thing is, initiative in High Guard isn't actually about who can shoot first. It's about who can choose the range at which the shooting occurs.

Now, I can see that if both ships end a turn at a given range, the immobile one can ensure that the shooting begins at that range. But I have a harder time getting behind the idea that an immobile ship has the option of opening range, or closing it.

So turn 1 takes place at short range. Ship A doesn't get its paint scratched. Ship B loses its M drive.

Turn 2 begins. Ship A gets a +2 bonus to its init roll (faster fleet, and larger fleet, since ship B can't be counted for the purpose, being unable to maneuver.) A rolls a 2. B rolls a 5, and declares the range to be Long. What did B's captain do, get his engineering staff to get out and push?

 

[jawillroy]

Quit looking for a rule for every possible nitpicking sub-sub-side-situation!.

Oy. MY GLAVEN! Enough, please not to be hitting mit tha whacking stick on the head, nice man...

I'm not nitpicking, I'm just not entirely sure of the rule's intent, here, given the not-making-sense result.

Anx I gotta say, at the PC level, this ain't no sub sub anything sub situation... I ran an R vs. T fight, twice with different arms loads on the R, and the situation came up more than once....

 

[vitalis6969]

It is space, the ship with no drive is still moving, innit?

It can't change direction, it can't stop, it can't speed up, but it IS still moving.

As for the ruling there, seriously, use common sense and make a judgment call, that is why you are the GM.

-V

 

[jawillroy]

Yeah, yeah. I'm GM, player and audience over here. Bah.

My big takeaway from my re-experience with HG thus far is that I much prefer LBB2 for ship-to-ship combat. I'm sure if I were dealing with huge battlefleets I'd feel differently (and would be much less likely to end up with one side unable to maneuver at all...)

In any case, you misunderstand me: it's not that I'm so worthless and weak a GM that I can't, or wouldn't make the call. It's that I'm trying to see if there's some other rationale behind the rule as stated that I'm missing. GDW was a wargaming outfit first and an RPG outfit later, and I would have thought High Guard to be an example of playing to their strengths, you know?

 

[Cryton]

Dudes! Unnecessary roughness!

Please quit flaming on the guy for asking a question , PLEASE!

 

[far-trader]

OK, yeah, everybody try to be a little more civil in the helping, and the asking. I suspect the frankness of the rougher answers were (in part at least) inspired by the very title of the thread. So I'm gonna change that and everybody can take the riot act as read again. Good?

 

[far-trader]

You know, I was sure this was covered in the rules, but I had a quick look and don't see it. Maybe it was in TCS? I don't have it handy to check. Or perhaps as suggested, we houseruled it.

I seem to recall a rule that any ship without Maneuver had no initiative and was effectively out of action.

In a two ship engagement that would mean it could still fire but the maneuverable combatant always has initiative and determines range, even being able to break off automatically if desired.

In a fleet action the ship would be out of the line automatically (other ships reform the line) but could not join the reserve until maneuver was restored. Any ships that were tasked to defend or assist the disabled ship would also be automatically removed from the line or reserve as long as so engaged.

 

[DonM]

Actually, the Agility rule (p 28) says that a ship's agility can never exceed its maneuver rating, so if M=0, A=0. And remember that emergency agility is limited to the lowest of the power plant or maneuver ratings, so if M=0, EA=0.

But Initiative simply means the other fleet has the advantage for initiative, not that they win it automatically. If I were the referee, I'd say the winning fleet just did something dramatically stupid, and the ship with the gaping hole got incredibly lucky, but that's what happens in battles.

From a logical standpoint, I see an issue; from a game play standpoint, I like the possibility that the almost victorious enemy makes one desperate attempt to clutch defeat out of the jaws of victory.

The only errata directly affecting initiative changes the roll from 2D6 to 1D6.

 

[robject]

And here's a thought about weapons fire. Even if your maneuver drive is slag, your ship might use internal gyros to turn.

 

[HG_B]

The thing is, initiative in High Guard isn't actually about who can shoot first. It's about who can choose the range at which the shooting occurs.

Yes, I had forgotten. Probably because I house ruled that one out because it was beyond strange.

 

[Matt123]

There are several things to consider;
First that HG was intended for fleet actions. Strategically fighting your fleet to the last ship standing is not usually a great idea.
Second, initiative can reflect anumber of variables including moral. "No sir, no way we are getting closer." It can take twenty minutes to sort out these minor issues.

But on the whole I'd house rule that a fleet with MD-0 automatically loses initiative.

Something for Don to ponder on tho', if he hasn't already got it covered, is that under your scenario once all your offensive armament is dead, you cannot be boarded. The last ship will always occupy the Line and the "fleet" cannot retreat to leave it vulnerable to boarding.

I suggest an addition something like (pg 43)
Second, it must be separated from protecting freindly ships; this is assumed to occur if, FOR EXAMPLE at any point after...

 

[jawillroy]

In retrospect, and reflecting on some comments here and on my blog, I can imagine how the ability for a mobile fleet/ship could lose initiative to an immobile one - Like Matt says, it can be rationalized as a "fog of war" issue. The target's not maneuvering, but it's weapons are active... could this be a trap? and the hesitation results in the next exchange of fire occurring at a disadvantageous range.

I can see running into this ambiguity in different contexts, and ruling it different ways. I'm generally pretty cautious about "houserule bloat" and as such, I like to take some time to get my head around the framework of rules as stated so I'm better equipped to take these things as they come.

 

[Supplement Four]

My big takeaway from my re-experience with HG thus far is that I much prefer LBB2 for ship-to-ship combat. I'm sure if I were dealing with huge battlefleets I'd feel differently ...

The way I think if the HG space combat system is to think of them as simplified, mass combat rules. Let's say you are running an adventure on Aramanx in the Aramis subsector, and two of the countries of that world are at war. You're focussing on the PC's, but you might use the simple, abstract rules for mass combat provided in Book 4 to determine the outcome of a major battle that takes place near (or includes) the PC's.

The HG rules are meant, imo, to be used the same way. They're for large, multi-ship battles among capital ships.

If you used the Book 2 or Mayday combat system, the space battle could easily become unmanageable. Think of it. You'd have, say, ten ships one one side and seven ships on the other. It would take you FOREVER to get through a single combat round.

It would be like playing a mass ground combat using the normal Traveller combat rules. That would be hard to do if you had two platoons going after each other.

Thus, the combats are abstracted and simplified enough to allow some uncertainty to the outcome of the engagement to remain without taking hours and hours to play out the combat.

Think of the HG space combat system as just another tool in your GM kit. Use it when needed.

If you've only got one capital ship and the player's ship, then use Book 2 or Mayday (or even the Starter Traveller version of Book 2). But, if you've got seven SDB's going after a squadron of 12 pirate corsairs, then HG is probably the better choice to resolve the engagement.

 

[jawillroy]

The way I think if the HG space combat system is to think of them as simplified, mass combat rules.

That they certainly are.

If you used the Book 2 or Mayday combat system, the space battle could easily become unmanageable. Think of it...It would take you FOREVER

I don't need to! I've done it. It's insane. It does take forever, and lots of space which I ain't got anymore.

Nowadays, I mainly do LBB2 combat, only using Mayday hexes and chits at a 1 hex= 10,000km scale.

 

[aramis]

Having run 10-to-a-side mayday battles, I've no idea what y'all are nattering on about. it takes a mere 1-3 min per ship per turn, and if you've multiple players, much of that can overlap...

More seriously, the best solution for the OP might be to use the mayday movement with HG.

 

[HG_B]

Having run 10-to-a-side mayday battles, I've no idea what y'all are nattering on about. it takes a mere 1-3 min per ship per turn, and if you've multiple players, much of that can overlap...

More seriously, the best solution for the OP might be to use the mayday movement with HG.

aramis, you know what would be really cool. A computer program that displayed the "playing field" that you could point and click on to set the markers, move, etc. Zoomable so you can play around in a whole system. Networkable would be even better.

 

[jawillroy]

Oooh, me too: this, from another thread:

What I would dearly love to see (I myself have no programming skills, and can only dream) is a computer-based platform to handle classic book-2 vector combat, so that you could plug in the ships' attributes, programs and so forth, and then click & drag your vector changes (measured and minded by the computer.) If you could have many multiple ships/objects active, think of the complex engagements you could handle! One could actually manage small fleet actions in LBB2 with a tool like that, where before it would have required hours and hours and hours on a floor the size of a tennis court.

To dreeeeeeeeam the impossible dreeeeeeeeeeeam..