Proto-High Guard 5, take three

[mike wightman]

Highguard involves an awful lot of dice rolls. The board game combat matix generates a number of hits based on total attack factor vs defence and one roll of the dice.

There is a way to convert this to a certain number of critical. heavy and light hits...

 

[aramis]

Highguard involves an awful lot of dice rolls. The board game combat matix generates a number of hits based on total attack factor vs defence and one roll of the dice.

There is a way to convert this to a certain number of critical. heavy and light hits...

You're making a wild over-generalization there.

Many wargames do have extensive tables and multiple rolls to resolve - but it's scale dependent.

For a wargame of its scale, HG is NOT an overly high number ... Tactical scale... it compares to Star Fleet Battles, Renegade Legion: Interceptor, Battlespace/Aerotech, Battlewagon, Starfire. All of which are individual ship scale, damage to specific systems, and 10's to dozens of rolls per turn.

The next scale up, often called supertactical, isn't well represented. It has individual ships or vehicles, and squads or platoons of Infantry, and generally Full/dead or full/damaged/dead level based damage systems; maneuver matters, facing usually doesn't. Ogre rides the border... Ogres are treated like tactical, but everything else is classic supertactical. Boots & saddles, GEV, Striker, Battleforce, Battleforce 2. Usually, these play tactically, but with few rolls per turn.

Then we get to Operational - where most games reduce combat to a roll or two, ounters generally are 1-3 ships, and platoon, company or regiment, and a single combat round is an engagement; the main board is days to weeks, and supply rules typically show up.

Then to strategy. Turns in months, engagements aren't ranged, couters range from ship/regiment to fleet/army. Combats range from comparable to supertactical (Imperium 3rd edition), to one roll for a month or more of combat.

One can create whole taxonomies in each category...

 

[mike wightman]

No, I am not.

High Guard uses a lot of dice rolls, the Traveller boardgames reduce it to one.

Even if you use statistical resolution for one high guard BB you will roll once to attack for each weapon factor (5 rolls). You then need to roll to penetrate with the ones that hit, you may have to roll to penetrate again if there is a layered defence (that could be anywhere from 3 to 6 rolls). Total so far 8 to 11.
You then roll damage on up to four different tables depending on outcome - and if one of the hits is a spinal you may be rolling multiple hits... you could end up with dozens of damage rolls.

That's per capital ship.

That is an awful lot of dice rolls.

 

[flykiller]

Highguard involves an awful lot of dice rolls.

"too many notes"?

 

[kilemall]

"too many notes"?

Heh, some friends of mine created a never-incorporated but semi-active game design org called C&C Game Factory.

They took on two or three subjects, including notably America's Cup races, but their game design 'philosophy' such as it was, was to create die rolling at every opportunity, that one could never have too many die rolls.

High Guard blows anything they ever created out of the water for die rolling. It's numbing, and of course having to have TCS mass die rolling norm tables is your big clue you have Gone Too Far.

 

[flykiller]

They took on two or three subjects, including notably America's Cup races ... High Guard blows anything they ever created out of the water for die rolling.

imagine america's cup - with a thousand ships - per contestant - shooting at each other - and perhaps it doesn't look so bad.

the two fleets, each at $1 trillion Cr, come together. range is obtained. the dreadnoughts line up their weapons. firing commences ...

"roll 2d6."

"9!"

"10!"

"10 wins. 9 loses. shall we play again?"

 

[whartung]

i
the two fleets, each at $1 trillion Cr, come together. range is obtained. the dreadnoughts line up their weapons. firing commences ...

"roll 2d6."

"9!"

"10!"

"10 wins. 9 loses. shall we play again?"

Of course, that's how HG is played. The game is mostly decided before it starts anyway. May as well reduce it to a die roll.

 

[kilemall]

imagine america's cup - with a thousand ships - per contestant - shooting at each other - and perhaps it doesn't look so bad.

the two fleets, each at $1 trillion Cr, come together. range is obtained. the dreadnoughts line up their weapons. firing commences ...

"roll 2d6."

"9!"

"10!"

"10 wins. 9 loses. shall we play again?"

They had lawyer rolls and whale rolls and random carrier rolls.

So, not so different, especially the lawyer point defense/sand mechanic.

 

[robject]

Bay weapons are the primary weapons of lower TL BBs.
You are not thinking across the TL ranges.
At the lower TLs missile bays and PA bays may well decide battles more than the spinals that are available.
Remember a TL9 BB is very different to a TL11 BB is very different to a TL13 BB is very different to a TL15 BB.

I thought about this a bit this morning, and decided that I don't need to think across the TL ranges when dealing with the attack tasks and damage mechanics.

I think that is an issue for design, and (perhaps) operations. Which I'm not at yet.

 

[flykiller]

The game is mostly decided before it starts anyway.

I'm reading jutland: 1916. much of the battle was decided in the shipyards.

They had lawyer rolls and whale rolls and random carrier rolls.

that actually sounds kind of cool ....

random carrier? my ship was down under for the america's cup, they were practicing all around us, we lined the flight deck and elevators to watch them, you mean that?

 

[kilemall]

I'm reading jutland: 1916. much of the battle was decided in the shipyards.

That's the POINT of High Guard- to validate/trial by battle your design choices.

Imperium is trial by battle of fleet design/economics/political management.

So, again, what is scope/POV of OP's game.

Course, who am I to talk, the 'do-it-all' guy? Well, I'm nuts to try for one thing, but I think you learn a lot more about going over the design top to bottom, then you KNOW why you made X choice rather then drift on a sea of 'it's always been done this GDW/SPI/AH/TSR/TFG/ADB/WOTC way'.

that actually sounds kind of cool ....

random carrier? my ship was down under for the america's cup, they were practicing all around us, we lined the flight deck and elevators to watch them, you mean that?

As I recall, there was an incident where a carrier intruded on a course and the result was to mimic that.

Ah here we go, Lincoln and San Diego-

http://www.nytimes.com/1995/02/05/sports/yacht-racing-a-surprise-cup-entry-an-aircraft-carrier.html

 

[Condottiere]

Jutland - Wilhelm could either have a first class navy or a first class army.

In the end, it came down to the budget allocations.

 

[robject]

High Guard uses a lot of dice rolls, the Traveller boardgames reduce it to one.

And I'm landing closer to HG than FFW.

Ships with spines roll once to attack, then applicable defenses fire to defend (assume there are typically two active defenses), and if those fail then the attacker rolls damage to pen.

Then there's a roll to determine which "characteristic" got hit. Maybe that can be combined that with the to-pen roll, but I doubt it.

So attacking from a cruiser or capital ship requires at least three rolls, and perhaps typically five rolls.

Auxiliaries defend the ships with spines. If your squadrons have no spines, then they switch their auxiliaries to attack tasks. This may well make combat far too messy to enjoy.

 

[mike wightman]

A typical fleet in an FFW engagement could be a couple of BatRons plus a few CruRons.

That's a lot of ships to roll 5 dice for.

Are you aiming to model combat at the individual ship level or the fleet level?

 

[robject]

It's better than High Guard. In other words, I'm moving in the correct direction, even if I'm not there yet.


On the plane home Friday I decided that auxiliaries are best modeled at the squadron level, and fighters by wing. Spine-bearers are individual ships. The reason for these is that the damage system seems to work well with that arrangement.

Since I've figured out a damage system, and a High-Guard-based layered-defense, mainly what's left is some haggling over details. Marc's already suggested I take the simple route with movement (in essence, to take the CT route with range bands).


What I'm hearing you say is that Big Ship wargaming needs to be at the level of its purposes: namely, fleet combat. Therefore, the combat and damage mechanics need to be much more abstract than High Guard. Forty dice rolls is too much detail. One 1D roll is too little detail.


First, though, I'm finishing what I started. Then I can switch focus to a proto-FCS (Fleet Combat System).

 

[mike wightman]

What is the purpose behind each roll of the dice?
An attack roll is a given.
One per spine, missile salvo and secondary battery factor.
Every time you roll for a layered defence you are lowering your chance of success - combine them into one defensive. roll/roll to penetrate.
So that is one roll fore each of the three that hits (either the defender is rolling to mitigate the attack or the attacker is rolling to penetrate defences).
Damage roll - critical and major damage only, minor stuff is fluff for individual/small task force only.

 

[kilemall]

What is the purpose behind each roll of the dice?
An attack roll is a given.
One per spine, missile salvo and secondary battery factor.
Every time you roll for a layered defence you are lowering your chance of success - combine them into one defensive. roll/roll to penetrate.
So that is one roll fore each of the three that hits (either the defender is rolling to mitigate the attack or the attacker is rolling to penetrate defences).
Damage roll - critical and major damage only, minor stuff is fluff for individual/small task force only.

If this is Big Fleet Battle, sure, although the Seekrieg guy in me says that losing that fusebox tied to fire direction can be a mission kill too.

Just make sure it doesn't get abstracted to the point the differing flavor of each ship is lost. Someone goes to the trouble of designing the beastie, it should get it's day in the sun.

 

[robject]

An attack roll is a given.
...combine [defenses] into one defensive [roll]. roll/roll to penetrate.
...
Damage roll - critical and major damage only, minor stuff is fluff for individual/small task force only.

You're tempting me to not finish something. I must resist.

However, if I were to do something like the above, I would try to combine all elements into one roll. The result of the roll is how deadly the damage is, if any.

It probably defeats the concept of a layered defense, but then, fleet combat cannot afford High Guard-style task rolls for defenses. It has to get it some other way.

Just make sure it doesn't get abstracted to the point the differing flavor of each ship is lost. Someone goes to the trouble of designing the beastie, it should get it's day in the sun.

So true. The essence of the ship is worth preserving. Primarily, this is the mix of weapons and active defenses, but also the mix of mission-based payloads.

Some of this could be preserved via Remark Codes. Just as a UWP determines its Trade Codes and Remarks, so too a ship's abstract model, if representable with eight (or so) alphanumeric values, could determine a passel of Remark Codes which indicate what makes that ship different from others.

But also remember that characters, unlike UWPs, have a UPP and an unrelated skill set. The "skill" metaphor could take the burden from the ship profile.

So, eight alpha-numeric digits could provide room for a few million base ship types (spanning common ship elements), and the "skills" would round it out.

OK, I'm so done with that. Post fleet thoughts on a fleet discussion topic, please.

 

[flykiller]

Wilhelm could either have a first class navy or a first class army.

he had both.

 

[Condottiere]

If he had a first class Navy, they'd have openly challenged the RN for control of the North Sea, instead of trying a policy of attrition by trying to catch out a portion of it.

You don't have to base your naval policy on a gamble; Jeune Ecole was a very viable policy, since it was based on new tactics and technology being able to overcome or neutralize current enemy superiority, the Germans went for Sumo Wrestling instead of Judo.