Fleets, IN organization, and general TO&E.

[The Oz]

Sigg:

What I think would do, to rebuild HG to be more big-ship friendly, would be to change the way damage is handled. As it stands a hit by a single beam laser does as much damage as a hit by an entire factor-9 beam laser battery (not counting automatic critical hits, of course), and the Maneuver-6 drive of a 10 ton fighter can take as many hits (from the same size weapon!) as the Maneuver-6 drive of a 200,000 ton dreadnought.

The damage system needs to be based on the tonnage of the components, and weapons rated for how many "tons of damage" they do per hit.

I like your idea about adding more range bands, and I would change the weapon ranges too, perhaps to something like this?

</font>

• Extreme Range: Bay missiles at -1 to hit, all other weapons out of range.</font>
• Long Range: Bay missiles at full effect, turret missiles at -1, all other weapons out of range.</font>
• Medium Range: All missiles at full effect, spinal mounts at -1 to hit, all other weapons out of range.</font>
• Close Range: All missiles at -1 to hit, meson guns at +1 to hit, all other weapons at normal effect.</font>
• Visual Range: All missiles and spinal mounts unable to fire, bay/turret beam weapons at +1 to hit.</font>

I'm not sure about adding in an extra DM for big spinal mounts, that's already built into the HG system although it does top out quickly for meson guns.

As you can see from my proposed range bands, I would make beam weapons (including spinal mounts) unable to effectively reach out to missile ranges. I like the dichotomy of "missile vs. beam" combat.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by The Oz:
Bhoins:

Here's how I work the math in this kind of problem, using a TL-12 missile fighter I've designed.

YOu have the numbers but you are static. Now that you have me relooking at the numbers and capabilities the same thing works at any tech level. I just never threw that many fighters at a single ship because I don't believe in purely defensive operations. And thanks to history and TCS, the main problem any military service has ever had was trained skilled pilots. The other problem with this type of force is it lets the enemy pick the time and place of the attack. YOu may have 4000 fighters but if he brings a BatRon with escorts you lose and can't run. You can't take the fight to him. It is like building Riders without the tender. You are stuck in one system.
YOu are subject to total defeat by an overwhelming force. And if your fighters settle for an agility disadvantage then you are even inviting the enemy to pound you both strategically and tactically on his terms.

As soon as you add carriers to make your force offensive you lose your serious number advantage that you must maintain to be a viable force.

 

[The Oz]

Bhoins:

I don't think that Larsen or I are saying that fighters are the way to go at lower TLs, and that any fleet that builds anything else is silly. What I'm saying is that =going strictly by HG design/combat rules= it is possible at lower TLs for sufficently large numbers of fighters to overwhelm a BB of the same TL, and that =going by cost alone= it is possible to build those fighters more cheaply than it is to build the BB.

No one ever argued that fighters alone were the same in operational/strategic flexibility as a jump-capable battleship, or that other CT rules (TCS, as you mentioned) did not effectively rule out the use of fighter swarms (although TCS does say that the number of pilots available is effectively unlimited in a campaign game).

Think of it this way: at high TLs fighters are completely useless against any real warship, even an escort: no matter how many fighters you have, or whatever else you have to go with them, fighters are just not worth it because they can't hit anything.

At lower TLs, a swarm of fighters (say, 300 to 500 fighters, a possible force to have at a major fleet battle) =can= be a serious threat to smaller warships, especially as part of an force that includes battleships, cruisers, and escorts. And they make a dandy sacrificial rearguard to cover a retreat, if necessary.

So yes, fighters alone are at best an attritional defensive force, and fielding enough fighters (and pilots) to mount a serious defense is not really practical, but as part of an overall force structure at lower TLs (7-12) fighters can be an effective addition.

By the way, I took a little time and designed a Jump-2 carrier for 1,500 of my missile fighters; the total cost of the CV and the 1,500 VM is equal to the cost of one of your BBs. 1,500 of my fighters can still overwhelm one of your BBs, it just takes a little longer and a few more fighters are lost.

 

[mike wightman]

Oz,
great minds think alike and all that. The damage system is definitely the stumbling block.
The trouble with a "tons of damage" system is bookkeeping and matching it to the USP.

I've been thinking about a variant combat matrix where weapons can potentialy cause 1 damage for each energy point so that, for example, a factor 9 laser battery could cause up to 30 damage on an exceptional roll or at very close range. Range to target and target agility would heavily effect the number of hits scored/damage caused since so many shots are wasted filling the projected position cone.
This damage potential then causes hits on the damage tables based on a damage threshold determined by the size of the target ship e.g for size 1 ships and below 1 hit causes 1 damage roll, for a size A ship 10 hits cause 1 damage etc.

It's starting to get complicated

There must be a simpler way...

Oh, and by the way, how about allowing the big meson guns a +1 to hit at long range instead of +2. It still preserves the PAWS accuracy advantage but makes the big guns a bit more effective at range versus mid-sized spinal meson armed cruisers and battle riders.

 

[The Oz]

Sigg:

Sadly, I don't think there's any way to revamp the HG damage system without revamping the USP and even suggesting that gets both complicated and risks making lots of canon designs obsolete.

So I think we're stuck with the USP and the current HG damage system. The most that can be proposed are changes that are "transparent" to the USP.

Giving larger meson guns a +1 to hit at long range would make them somewhat superior to smaller weapons, but my suggestion about meson screens is another way to get the same effect. Under my meson screen-armor rule, the classic "meson sled" factor-J mount would only get 1 damage roll per table when opposed by a factor-9 meson screen, not 10 per table (assuming it's not a "full" penetration). A factor-T spinal mount would get still get 10 die rolls on each table.

Given that the factor-J has a much worse chance of penetrating the meson screen in the first place and the bigger meson guns start to look better and better.

 

[aramis]

The fundamental problem with HG (and by extension, MT SS Cbt) is that there is no provision for cumulative hull damage.

The problem with T20 is that critical hits from Spinals are way too easy, and defeat the cumulative hull damage process.

Using a system similar to MT's Vehicle rules provides a very different result: Fighters and Battleships both become viable, as they are both opposite ends of the DP system. A Battleship can take 3-10 times the damage that a similar armament rider can (Dependant upon many other design elements).

If the spinal crit mod goes away, T20 provides similar (but lesser) benefits for larger ships, although T20 tends to be a bit heavier on the system damages.

The USP system itself is not the problem, per se; the method by wich small low-USP weapons combine is. The results of 30 separate lasers under T20 (or HG) are not the same as 10x tripple laser shots, nor the same as 30 single laser shots. This is in part a viable model, but not entirely. In t20, that 10 tripple shots will do more damage at most ranges than will the 30 as a single... well, that's a problem.

 

[BetterThanLife]

OZ,
Actually looking at the numbers from this perspective, Tech Level is irrelavent. all you need is tech level to be even. (Actually what you need is computer to be even.) Since most Canon Carriers carry between 60 and 450 fighters I never actually considered throwing thousands of fighters at the enemy. As long as the enemy can't force your to hit or to pen number to be 13+ you can do it. In the 50KTon range it gets easier for a Cruiser to force 13s to be rolled to hit. The 1001 ton to 10,000 Ton ships make it even easier.

The most absurd thing is that two fighters with equal computers and an agility of 6 can't hit each other. (Regardless of armament.) One of the hardest targets to hit in Traveller Canon is the 200T SDB in Supp 9. Not that it can hit anything either but it is a bitch to hit it.

 

[mike wightman]

Oz.
How about a nice simple rule variant for damage to large ships:
</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Hull Size Damage Variant

L to P 2 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1

Q+ 3 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1</pre>[/QUOTE]I really like the meson screen variant, it is a nice simple fix.

How would you determine a high penetration result?
A roll of a natural 12, plus it has to be at least 4 greater than the roll to penetrate, e.g. if you need an 8 (after computer modifiers) or less to penetrate the meson screen you can get a high penetration by rolling a natural 12, if you need a 9 or greater to penetrate the meson screen then you can not acieve a high penetration result?

 

[The Oz]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
OZ,
Actually looking at the numbers from this perspective, Tech Level is irrelavent. all you need is tech level to be even. (Actually what you need is computer to be even.) Since most Canon Carriers carry between 60 and 450 fighters I never actually considered throwing thousands of fighters at the enemy. As long as the enemy can't force your to hit or to pen number to be 13+ you can do it. In the 50KTon range it gets easier for a Cruiser to force 13s to be rolled to hit. The 1001 ton to 10,000 Ton ships make it even easier.

Yes, it's the computers that count. But it does get more difficult to put a good computer into a fighter at higher TLs (you can get a Mod/9 into a fighter, but it becomes a really =big= fighter) and the cost of the computer rapidly becomes the cost of the fighter, driving the number of fighters down from sheer cost.

The most absurd thing is that two fighters with equal computers and an agility of 6 can't hit each other. (Regardless of armament.)

Yes, this is nothing but silly. I've always used a "dogfighting" rule that gives fighters a big enough bonus to allow them to hit each other. If I were to revamp HG for a new campaign, I'd extend that "dogfighting" rule into a rule for "visual range" combat.

 

[The Oz]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
Oz.
How about a nice simple rule variant for damage to large ships:
</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Hull Size Damage Variant

L to P 2 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1

Q+ 3 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1</pre>

[/quote]
I really like this idea, Sigg: it's simple and fairly easy to use. I'd change it to read this way:
</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Hull Size Damage Variant

K to Q 2 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1

R+ 4 drive, fuel or crew hits are required to reduce the USP rating by 1</pre>[/QUOTE]

I really like the meson screen variant, it is a nice simple fix.
How would you determine a high penetration result?
A roll of a natural 12, plus it has to be at least 4 greater than the roll to penetrate, e.g. if you need an 8 (after computer modifiers) or less to penetrate the meson screen you can get a high penetration by rolling a natural 12, if you need a 9 or greater to penetrate the meson screen then you can not acieve a high penetration result?

Here's how I've thought of the "high penetration" rule:

When rolling to penetrate the meson screen, a roll of +5 or more than the minimum needed is a "full penetration.

So if you need a 5+ to penetrate, an 10+ is a full penetration. If you need a 8+ to penetrate, you can't get a full penetration without a positive DM on the roll (from relative computer size).

 

[The Oz]

Something else I thought of a while ago is that the whole concept of the battlerider makes more sense at lower tech levels because the size of armor and powerplants at those lower TLs puts a real squeeze on a ship that also has to carry its own jump fuel. At higher TLs (14, 15) it's easier to design a combat-worthy jump-capable warship (especially if you keep it at Jump-3).

 

[mike wightman]

At the higher TL's it's possible for battleriders to become meson rocks and missile boats combined because they can afford maximum armour for TL, something no cruiser or battleship can do unless it drops to jump 2 or 3, as you say.
The TL14-15 battlerider has another advantage in HG combat, if you construct it at 19999t maximum then it is harder to hit than the cruisers and batttleships it has to fight

I think we've both mentioned before that a combination of high jump tender carrying jump 1 (or 2) battle "riders" is a tempting option at TL15

 

[The Oz]

Originally posted by Sigg Oddra:
The TL14-15 battlerider has another advantage in HG combat, if you construct it at 19999t maximum then it is harder to hit than the cruisers and batttleships it has to fight

I think we've both mentioned before that a combination of high jump tender carrying jump 1 (or 2) battle "riders" is a tempting option at TL15

Keeping the riders under 20,000 tons is tempting. Adding Jump-1 drives and fuel to them is a sneaky thing to do to your enemy....

I have played around with a TL-15 battle between six BRs (factor-R meson spinals) and a roughly equivalent cost of 200,000 BBs, with the BBs having my "meson gun turrets" (factor-T spinal and two factor-N turrets), everyone having one backup for everything and using the "meson screen armor" rule and your new rule about bigger ships requiring more hits before their drives, fuel and crew are damaged. The six BTs plus the tender cost about MCr200,000; one BB costs about MCr150,000.

First pass analysis: the BB can render one BR per turn relatively ineffective through Wpn-1 hits (via missile surface and radiation hits) that reduce the factor-R spinal to where it can't get a full penetration of a factor-9 meson screen. Add in an average of 1 BR per 4 turns for meson gun damage (no full penetrations assumed). The BR meson guns can do an average of about 18 radiation and interior explosion hits per turn, most importantly getting damage to screens and computers. It's likely the BB will lose enough screen and computer function to be vulnerable after only two or three turns, even with backups all around.

The BB needs more backups to give additional ability to absorb interior explosion damage. Having 3 or 4 backups for computers and screens (especially meson screens) might give the BB enough durability to last until it cripples the BRs. There is enough space and budget left in the BB to fit additional backups (especially since backups require no EP until used).

And of course whoever gets a full penetration with a meson gun likely wins the battle, especially if the BRs do it first (and they get twice the number of shots, have a better chance to hit, and are all shooting at the same target).

 

[Whipsnade]

Mr. Bhoins,

Mr. Oz beat me to it in his post. I am not arguing that fighters are the way to go at lower tech levels. Eurisko aside, there is no perfect HG2 design at any TL. The Rock-Paper-Scissors nature of HG2 combat prevents that. Insisting that that X is a 'perfect' design or that Y is a 'perfect' design betrays a lack of understanding of HG2. There are no perfect designs and making unqualified statements like such as 'fighters are worthless' is little but nonsense.

If you build an 'extreme' design; like the previously mentioned meson sleds, you'll find yourself trumped by another extreme design; in the case of meson sleds, missile boats. In order to survive most of the design options a HG2 opponent can throw at you, you must design 'generalist' type vessels.

Now on to some other odd bits in your posts:

Pilot Availability - the pilot limits found in TCS are primarily for tourney play at conventions and not campaign play. TCS is normally played without them, just as it usually played without the refueling strictures; mandating 50% streamlined hulls, or fixed budgets; everyone gets on trillion credits instead of their planetary budget modified by government and peace/war status. You may have read TCS, however you have not understood TCS.

Pilot training - Like your claim at another forum regarding air crashes due to hostile action, the training of military pilots is not precisely what you may believe. As Mr. Thrash proved, in the case of your air crash claims, simple research disproves your 'pilots are very special' claim. Google the follwing phrases - United States, WW2, pilot training and prepare to be shocked by the numbers you find. Here's a hint; its in the FIVE digit range. If the US; a nation of ~150 million at the time, could train over 10,000 pilots in a little over three years, how many pilots could a planet of one billion train?

Attritional warfare - all warfare is attritional and lives are expended for results that later seem to be not worth the cost. You carp about the fighter losses required to mission kill a battleship in our examples. Again, here's another website to put the numbers in perspective for you. Surf over to www.combinedfleet.com and read up on the sinking of the IJN BB Yamato. Late in the war, that vessel was sent on what was essentially a kamikaze mission to Okinawa. The USN 'expended' a number of pilots you may find shockingly high in order to sink Yamato and this despite the fact that an extremely powerful battleline of USN BBs, CAs, and DDs had been pulled from the waters around Okinawa and dispatched to intercept Yamato. Why? Because it was better to risk much cheaper aircraft and the 1-2 men aboard than expensive warships and their 1000+ crewmen. Coldblooded? Yes. Logical too.

Finally, I've yet to run your TL12 BB against any fighers - either the cheapies used years ago at 'ct-starships' or Mr. Oz' better variety. I'll do so once I return home and have my HG2 copy at hand. I suspect your BB will fair rather well a you've designed it to be fighter 'resistant' if not fighter 'proof'. However, your design is one of the 'extremes' I spoke about earlier. It may mop the floor with fighters, but what happens when it runs into a normal BB? Without any armor, the first spinal gun hit could be the only one needed. Extreme designs are like rare flowers - they need very specific enviroments in which to thrive, otherwise they die.


Sincerely,
Larsen

 

[mike wightman]

Oz,
I've just realised that your "small spinal mounts as turrets/bays" rule has some precedent - in TNE and T4 ships can carry one full size spinal, or/and smaller spinal class weapons fitted as "parallel" mounts.
And it works


There's still the problem of that "fuel tanks shattered" IE which unbalances thing though. I've always thought it should be on the critical hit table instead...

 

[The Oz]

Sigg:

I put that "fuel tanks shattered" on the critical hit table a long time ago IMTU, swapping it with the Crew-1 critical hit (which isn't so critical).

I am thinking of just eliminating the "full penetration" of meson screens. I'm not sure about it, but keeping that chance of a "lucky hit" that can cripple or kill any ship means that fleet designers are still better off building lots of little ships (so you don't lose too much when the inevitable lucky hit happens). Eliminating the "full penetration" would also make smaller meson screens more useful as they would still provide some protection.

And something I myself forgot in my BR vs. BB battle: even a "partial penetration" by a meson gun still gets the automatic criticals for exceeding the target size. The meson screen rating acts as "armor" to reduce the number of auto crits (by 1/2 the meson screen rating, rounded down) but that would give the BB an advantage as its factor-T spinal would still get 3 auto-crits every time it hit a BR, while the BR meson guns can never get any auto-crits.

Larsen:

I built a quick Excel spreadsheet to play around with the VM vs. BB battle and I've found that as few as 1000 of my VM can overwhelm Bhoin's TL-12 BB, losing about 340 of the fighters in the process. 1500 VM only lose about 100 fighters to kill the BB, and 2000 VM lose about 75 fighters. So an equal-cost force of VM+CV against the BB will take only about 7% fighter losses which is quite sustainable.

 

[mike wightman]

I don't like the crew 1 hits much either
A strict interpretation of the HG damage result means a ship with a crew 1 hit can't fire its weapons at all until the frozen watch is activated, 3 turns later. That's pretty serious for a non critical hit.
I prefer the HG 1st edition result which means the crew code must be reduced to 0 before the shp loses the ability to fire.

Then there's the house rule that penalises the initiative roll by the level of crew damage


How about full penetration can only occur at visual/boarding range?

 

[The Oz]

Having full penetrations only possible at close/visual range is one possibility, or we could go back to your idea about needing a natural 12 for a full penetration, as long as that is also +5 or more than the minimum needed for penetration. Or we could keep it simple and just drop full penetration altogether.

According to HG2, a ship gets one damage control roll per 10,000 tons (or fraction thereof) of ship. I'd just use this as the Crew factor on the USP: divide the ship's tonnage by 10,000 and that's both the Crew USP and the number of damage control rolls available. As the ship takes Crew hits, it loses damage control rolls.

And that's all I'd worry about. I would eliminate the rule about Crew losses causing loss of offensive capability (until all the Crew are lost, that is) since I think it's unnecessary: a ship will usually lose its offensive power through Weapon hits long before it loses all its crew. Any ship lightly enough protected that it's taking lots of Crew hits is probably going to be vaporized before it loses all the Crew.

I notice that this would make BBs even more resilient against BRs, assuming that there are at least two BBs (so one can fall back to the reserve for repairs). A 20kton BR would have only two damage control teams, while a 200kton BB would have twenty. That's a lot of damage control.

And for those Black Globe lovers out there, I would also adopt the way TNE handled BGs: flickering BGs do =not= affect outgoing fire (the ship's weapons are synchronized with the BG flicker) but still provide normal protection against incoming fire. Flickering BGs still negatively affect a ship's Agility, and of course a full-on BG blocks everything in both directions.

 

[Antony]

Also in TNE you can build weapons for turrets and bays of any size, subject to having sufficient power and surface area available for them.

 

[mike wightman]

One other thought Oz,
with respect to your meson screens as armour rule, do you also use the meson screen "armour" as a positive DM on the IE and Radiation damage tables?
If so that would prevent any crew hits for a factor 9 screen.