High Guard 1.5 (<1979 edition)

[AnotherDilbert]

It’s not just you. I’ve been unceremoniously ignoring three voices: Dilbert, Mike, and Rob all have this urge to throw things out and start over.

No problem, it's your project.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Thus HG1 can’t do factors like HG2, because it represents two dimensions flattened into one factor, like TCS flattens multiple batteries into one statistical roll.

In fact, that might be the primary strength of HG1: in pre-calculating batteries at design time into a factor with massed-battery statistical characteristics.

That would be ideal, but it doesn't as far as I can see, it just ignores the second dimension, hence battleships and frigates have the same firepower (outside spinals).

 

[robject]

That would be ideal, but it doesn't as far as I can see, it just ignores the second dimension, hence battleships and frigates have the same firepower (outside spinals).

And I have to ask: in HG2, how different are the Kokirrak and Plankwell really, effectively? Is one simply superior to the other, or is there a role differentiation that is meaningful?

That question then applies to, for example, the midsize BCS in Supplement 9. Do they matter?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

ON THE OTHER HAND.

How does this compare with HG2? Are all cruisers interestingly different? Because I really don’t know, and when I look at HG2 USPs I tend to see a lot of similarities. How many meaningful and useful variations are there? To what degree do the choices made in designing a ship in HG2 create a meaningful impact in the design (in a good way)?

If you really care, you don't build ships, you build riders...

I would say the main choices are spinal type and missile bays. Do you mount missile bays on big ships or separate frigates (you need some)? How many PAs vs. Meson spinals (mesons kills everything [eventually], but PAs are better at killing some targets [including meson riders]).

Paying for the energy point budget forces hard choices, at TL-15 you can just go with Agility-6, but at lower TLs you have to choose between armour or agility. TL-12 can be very different from TL-13... None of this is in HG'79.


HG'79 seems to have vastly different trade-offs around spinals, and you can't do battlefield repairs on weapons, so are spinals even worth it? Can anything stand against a swarm of missile (or laser, fusion?) frigates simply scraping weapons and crew off enemy hulls?

On the other hand, some “choices” were not actually choices at all. You must install the best possible computer. That was never a choice. Ditto dampers and screens. And the spines we already know about.

Agreed.

Screens are actually somewhat expensive (or rather their power consumption), and there are a cut-off, under which they are not affordable.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

And I have to ask: in HG2, how different are the Kokirrak and Plankwell really, effectively? Is one simply superior to the other, or is there a role differentiation that is meaningful?

They are both basically helpless victims, but at a guess a Kokirrak would win with better agility, meson screen, and armour.

They are a typical example of forced trade-offs: Even at TL-15 you can't build an armoured, screened, J-4, 6 G warship. You have to sacrifice something, the Kokirrak sacrifices jump capability, being only J-3. The Plankwell sacrifices everything else.

In HG'79 this isn't a problem, since there is no power budget and you don't need the M-drive in battle.

That question then applies to, for example, the midsize BCS in Supplement 9. Do they matter?

For cruisers the trade-offs gets even worse, but S9 cheated by just ditching any semblance of defences in cruisers and escorts.

The difference between a Gionetti with no missile bays and an Arakoine with plenty of bays is vast... The Gionetti has a Meson-J, so is much cheaper and therefore more plentiful. The Arakoine has a better main gun, much better secondary armaments, much better screen, but less agility, and some useless fighters. Both completely lack armour, so will disappear in a radioactive cloud in the presence of nukes... At a guess the Arakoine's bays will decide the fight long before a spinal hits?

Any weapons apart from the spinal and missiles are basically there to soak weapon hits, so it only matters how many hits can be soaked. Here we can choose between many small batteries or one large, with fairly simple trade-offs. But it's vital to soak these hits to keep the main armaments alive...

In HG'80 it matters a great deal if we choose a Meson-J or a Meson-N, the N gun being bigger but more cost effective. Both mission-kills an enemy with a single hit, unlike HG'79. Do we go for armour or not? Armour doesn't matter in a meson fight, but if the enemy has missile bays or PAs it's vital.

At lower TLs we don't have economical access to large mesons, so we use smaller meson spinals that don't automatically kill with a single hit, so how many hits will we try to survive with spare systems and frozen watches?

In HG'80 it matters a great deal how many batteries we have, since each battery can produce one damage roll, so more batteries, more damage rolls. In HG'79 you only get one damage roll regardless.

 

[mike wightman]

Look at the counters for games such as Imperium, Dark nebula, Invasion:Earth and Fifth Frontier War.

Even less data and yet the different types of BatRon and CruRon squadrons can be easily identified, so it should be possible to come up with different cruiser and battleship designs.

The main reason I suggested taking another look at HG79 is that you can actually 'play' the combat system, while HG80 requires statistical resolution. It is all well and good saying more batteries mean more potential damage, but when you run the numbers using statistical resolution it takes lots of bays to actually achieve that one damage roll. All HG79 does or at least try to do is to do the statistical thing and roll it into the rolls to penetrate layered defences.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

You can get multiple batteries in HG'79, just use many smaller cheaper ships. At first sight it seems to make even less sense to use larger ships than in HG'80.

A large missile battery (factor-9) seems to have about the same chance to hit and penetrate in HG'79 and HG'80. If you have 50 bays you would do 50 times as much damage in HG'80.


As missile frigates seems to have about the same firepower and durability as battleships in HG'79, the winning strategy seems to devolve to drowning the enemy in more ships, forcing massive amounts of dice rolls. I would say HG'79 is forgotten for a reason...

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Looking at the hit chances, the best weapon seems to be the lowly laser turret. In high factor batteries nothing short of black globes seriously inconveniences them, so damage chance is high. You don't need all that many hits to explode the target, any target, via M-drive hits.

Fusion guns are even better, but only works at short range, so less reliable.

So, forget the missile frigate, behold the mighty laser frigate, destroyer of fleets!

 

[robject]

You can get multiple batteries in HG'79, just use many smaller cheaper ships. At first sight it seems to make even less sense to use larger ships than in HG'80.
...
As missile frigates seems to have about the same firepower and durability as battleships in HG'79, the winning strategy seems to devolve to drowning the enemy in more ships, forcing massive amounts of dice rolls. I would say HG'79 is forgotten for a reason...

This seems a deeper problem than the normalization problem. I am under the impression that, in the OTU, the larger the ship, the “tourgher” it is, more durable, more able to take the damage dished out to it.

 

[robject]

Is there a rock-paper-scissors relationship between weapons and defenses in the OTU? Maybe that would help give ships a reason to be more than the same set of weapons in the same amounts. (I actually don’t mind that lasers and missiles are the most effective weapons in many cases...)

Maybe Mike is right about adding Laser bays. Can it help bring Balance to the Force?

How can larger hulls be tougher, when any size of ship can have Factor-9 armor?

Offhand, I see that a +DM would help on the combat tables for larger hulls, and extended combat tables (say, going up to 15) for those extremes. The DM would go to all defenses (armor, damper, screen, and globe).

The DM would be pretty coarse. Maybe something like
DM+1 for 100,000 tons.
DM+2 for 300,000 tons.
DM+3 for 600,000 tons.

Meh too coarse. I don't know.

 

[robject]

I noticed the J columns on page 47 for Screens and Globes are both incorrect.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

This seems a deeper problem than the normalization problem. I am under the impression that, in the OTU, the larger the ship, the “tourgher” it is, more durable, more able to take the damage dished out to it.

According to S9 the reason to use battleships is that they are easier to retreat.

S9, p9:
... the Fourth Frontier War (1082 to 1084) also brought about a minor counter-revolution in naval tactics.
...
When faced with superior numbers, the riders were unable to withdraw and jump out-system due to the time required to secure them in their tenders. Thus, rider BatRons suffered disproportionate losses in the early stages of the war.
The solution arrived at was to concentrate all rider BatRons in the strategic reserves while manning the frontier delaying forces exclusively with ships. (Note: in naval parlance, the term ship is reserved for jump-capable vessels, while non-jump capable vessels are referred to as boats, riders, or monitors).

Frontier trip-wire forces (like the fleet in the Spinward Marches) use battleships for a fighting withdrawal. The main battle-fleets of the Imperium use riders. (Ironically LBB5 makes it easier to retreat riders...)

As long as we have crits that can incapacitate a ship with a lucky hit, battleships will not we worth it. They must have much higher survivability to pay for their massive bulk. MgT2 solves this with a purely attritional damage system with hit points (hull points), giving large ships more hit points per Dt, so higher survivability.

It's not enough to make them a little harder to hit, they have to be able to soak a lot of hits, or perhaps be effectively invulnerable to smaller ships.

But I think the OTU has internalised the LBB5'80 concept of one spinal hit is a kill, e.g. see the Sabmiqys.
Consequence: Battleships are not really survivable.

 

[mike wightman]

Maybe we do have to borrow a little bit from HG80 - the hull size DM.
Add it as a bonus number of damage rolls
Add it to the number required to penetrate armour thus bigger ships are harder to damage than smaller ships.
Add it as a DM to the damage table.

 

[robject]

It's not enough to make them a little harder to hit, they have to be able to soak a lot of hits, or perhaps be effectively invulnerable to smaller ships.

OK, point taken.

I'm on board with damage soak.

I was thinking of invulnerability as well, but I'm not sure how that can be done _well_.

Maybe we do have to borrow a little bit from HG80 - the hull size DM.
Add it as a bonus number of damage rolls
Add it to the number required to penetrate armour thus bigger ships are harder to damage than smaller ships.
Add it as a DM to the damage table.

 

[robject]

DAMAGE SOAK

I don't know if I like this, but I'm setting it down: we could use the hull size scale to compute the number of hits required to damage the ship:

1 to A = 1 hit
B to K = 2 hits
L to P = 3 hits
Q+     = 4 hits

Not Enough

All that means is it takes (for example) four times the number of smaller ships to take down a larger ship. That doesn't solve the problem.

So we need something like what Dilbert ALSO promoted, that big ships are (somehow) immune to small ships.


ABLATION / BOOK 2 / HIT POINTS

And we can think about "hit points". After all, Book 2 had this as drives "ablated" as they were damaged. High Guard does not use drive letters. But they could still receive partial damage.

So, consider weapons damaging by tonnage, as yes has been mentioned in the discussion already. This is the theoretical border with Traveller5, where the ship hit location boxes are created by dividing up the hull tonnage.

 

[mike wightman]

It draws the battle out to tedium.

The game should be fun when cruisers and battleships are engaged, which probably makes escort class and below easier to take out.

Which I why I suggested the size code DM use.

Another thing to consider if we manage to scale weapon factors correctly is that the higher factors could get bonus damage rolls too.

 

[robject]

To roast a sacred cow, how about removing entirely:

In all cases, apply a DM equal to the difference between the firing and target ship’s computers. For example, the firing ship has a computer model 7 and the target has a computer model 4; apply a DM of +3 to the die roll to penetrate each defense. (p43)

and replacing it with

In all cases, apply a DM equal to the difference between the firing and target ship’s size code. For example, the firing ship is size 7 and the target is size 4; apply a +3 DM to the rolls to penetrate each defense. (p43)

 

[mike wightman]

I posted this:

Maybe we do have to borrow a little bit from HG80 - the hull size DM.
Add it as a bonus number of damage rolls (so ships will inflict 1, 2 or 3 hits as size increases)
Add it to the number required to penetrate armour (thus bigger ships are harder to damage than smaller ships).
Add it as a DM to the damage table.

The bonus damage rolls of spinals should also be a thing.

 

[robject]

And I was just about to quote you, because I now understand why those are better ideas.

So, use the concept of the HG2 hull size DM table for multiple uses across all attack types in HG1.

HULL SIZE MODIFIER

Below 100K            No modifier.
100K and above        Modifier = Volume/100,000

* Toughness. Adds to all defensive ratings (armor, screen, damper, globe)?
* Strafe. Adds that number of damage rolls on a hit. A mod of 1 deals 1 extra damage roll per hit to the target?
* Power. A -DM on the damage table roll when attacking?


This would extend the combat tables to accommodate extended defensive ratings?


HG2 SPINE DAMAGE

In HG2, more advanced spines get more damage rolls on a hit. It's reasonable, because you guys have pointed out that spines are really wimpy in HG1, and there's no real advantage to having them.

IS THIS DOABLE?

I'd also be up for a spine-only CRT with ship explodes in it, as long as the ship size modifier protects capitals against that.

Or, very coarsely, something like

• If the spine's code meets or exceeds the target's hull code, then a hit "kills" the ship.

So an "A" spine autokills ships 1,000 tons and under, an "L" spine autokills ships 20,000 tons and under, a "Q" spine autokills ships 75,000 tons and under. If that's modified further by the "Hull Size Modifier" then capital hulls could be immunified.


DOESN'T REALLY FIX THE SPINE TABLE

It might make the spines table slightly more useful. TL13 ships would be able to one-shot-kill Nolikians with the L spine, and (better) TL15 ships with the svelte N-spine, so there's a strategy, I guess. Maybe that would create an economy where riders are out to kill other riders so the battleships can ... do something else? But that's still largely a rider-rider battle.

 

[mike wightman]

* Toughness. Adds to all defensive ratings (armor, screen, damper, globe) - yes but being a -DM to the attacker rather than extending the tables.
* Strafe. Adds that number of damage rolls on a hit. A mod of 1 deals 1 extra damage roll per hit to the target? Yes, so a BB will get 3 hits.
* Power. A -DM on the damage table roll when attacking? You could also grant it as a +DM when defending.

Another thing that would bring this into line with AotI is the meson screen could suffer the same way as the black globe.