Tholian Tactics
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: General Tactics Discussion: Tholian Tactics
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By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Tuesday, September 30, 2025 - 09:35 pm: Edit

John,

I'm afraid I disagree. You (quite reasonably) want a web tender for your buzzsaw. I don't want a web tender (except - maybe - in some special circumstance) for my wedding cake. It's a waste of money because the tactical requirements are different. You want a good minefield for your buzz saw. I can get by with no mines, but might buy a smaller field. "Exact same forces" is the wrong approach. What we need is "exact same commitment of Tholian resources".

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Tuesday, September 30, 2025 - 10:26 pm: Edit

Alan, I disagree with your approach. We're having a discussion about the merits of two different web patterns. "Exact same forces" is the only approach if you want to focus on the web pattern merits alone.

We agree that a buzzsaw without mines is vulnerable. We should agree that a wedding cake without ships is also vulnerable as there's only a single layer of web above strength zero. You may try to argue that you still have that inner web layer, but that's insufficiently significant if the enemy can just waltz up to that web ring and attack the base in force from range one with all direct fire weapons available to pound the base. Also, that web at strength 35 should protect the fleet against the explosion of your base.

I would remind you that "exact same forces" qualifies as "exact same commitment of Tholian resources." You may not "want" one thing or another, but I would remind you that when the enemy has arrived, you fight with what you have, not what you want.


You made one good point, even if it is not exactly relevant to our discussion. Economic cost is a more relevant measure from a strategic perspective. That point frequently shows itself in my thinking.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Tuesday, September 30, 2025 - 10:29 pm: Edit

Greg, we're having a long running discussion about the merits of a wedding cake and a buzzsaw. Your suggestion isn't bad, just not helpful to our discussion.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Tuesday, September 30, 2025 - 11:44 pm: Edit

John,

OK, here's a Tholian defense.

Y175. Battle station with PAM and two hanger modules. Six Spider-IIP fighters and six Spider-III fighters. One CA and four PCs. No mines

This is a very formidable defense IF the base has a wedding cake web setup. But use these "exact same forces" with a buzzsaw and the base will fall much more easily with (comparatively) low Klingon losses. But that tells us nothing about the viability of buzzsaws generally because there's a mismatch between the force structure and the web configuration.

Or how about this?

Y175. Battle station with PAM and standard WT. Six mine packages but NO proper warships.

This is a formidable defense IF the base has a buzzsaw web setup. But use these "exact same forces" with a wedding cake and the base will fall much more easily with (comparatively) low Klingon losses. But that tells us nothing about the viability of wedding cakes generally because there's a mismatch between the force structure and the web configuration.

In each case one web configuration does a lot better than the other because the forces are much more appropriate to that configuration. Neither is really a fair test.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Wednesday, October 01, 2025 - 11:19 am: Edit

Thank you for proving my point. Now let's try something new, a combination of the two, like I was suggesting:

Y175. Battle station with one HPM and two hanger modules. Six Spider-IIP fighters and six Spider-III fighters. One CA and four PCs. 2 Mine packages with command controllers for the captor mines and the NSMs. This mix is formidable either way.

This gives you everything you asked for and some extras you can use. It gives me a satisfactory core without a WT. How does this work for you?

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, October 01, 2025 - 12:47 pm: Edit

John;

A minor point, but in Y175 the power module would be a PAM rather than HPM. The HPM isn't available until Y178.

More comments later...

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Wednesday, October 01, 2025 - 06:30 pm: Edit

Y178 then.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Wednesday, October 01, 2025 - 07:03 pm: Edit

Alan, here's a heads-up for something I'll be mentioning sometime in the future: Seltorians.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Saturday, October 04, 2025 - 04:48 am: Edit

Alan, I'm going to switch back to the year being Y175+ and using a WT and 2 mine packages. I'll begin this with a one-word refutation that the WT is a waste of money. NONSENSE!

From Y175+, the outer two web rings require 24 units of energy to maintain their strength. A WT, at 70 Economic BPV, can do this all on its own. A single PC, at 59 BPV, can't.

Two PCs, at 118 BPV, can maintain the outer two webs, but they have only 28 units of energy combined. Subtract the 3 points of energy combined for life support and shields and the PCs are sitting ducks without power for much movement or any fighting.

Three PCs at 177 BPV combined, could power those rings, but with an average of eight points of power from each PC required to do so, and with a housekeeping cost of 4.5 energy points total to keep the heat on and shields up, we're still looking at the sitting duck farm.

Let's look at 4 PCs. That's 236 BPV. They could also power those rings for an average of 6 energy points per PC. Add the 6 points total for life support and shields and we're looking at 54% of their power spent just for web maintenance and housekeeping without fire control or weapons being charged.

A single WT can keep all of the Tholians' ships at 100% combat effectiveness while being able to keep its lights on and move at speed 20. It shouldn't as its turn mode will take it away from the middle ring. A WT is a high-priority target that could be used as bait drawing in enemy ships to get stuck in the web.

So, in short, I'm keeping the WT and the mine packages. I'll also take 50 BPV for command triggers.

If you have a problem, you may adjust your choices accordingly. Your complaints about my choices prejudice my defense. Both the WT and the two mine packages make your defense stronger, so having them won't hurt your defense.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Sunday, October 05, 2025 - 01:36 am: Edit

OK, some responses:

Quote:

A single WT can keep all of the Tholians' ships at 100% combat effectiveness while being able to keep its lights on and move at speed 20.

No, actually, it can't. The WT has small freighter engines, meaning it has an absolute maximum speed of 13, even if it were spending no energy whatsoever on webs. It's that speed 13 that's the problem. It makes the WT much easier for a Klingon to catch and destroy, compared to a faster, more maneuverable ship. If I were to decide to employ a specialist web maintenance ship in a Y175 scenario, I would go with either the AWT (Armed Web Tender) or Police Web Charger Destroyer. They are a bit more expensive but their superior shields and maneuverability make them more likely to survive. There's also a Web Charger War Destroyer but it isn't available until Y185. If you look at my 10:17 PM post from 6 August in this topic, I discuss the AWT and web charger destoyers in the second to last paragraph.

Based on my 11:44 PM post from 30 September and your 11:19 AM reply on 1 October, I had thought that it was agreed that the warships available for defense would be one CA and four PC. So why are we talking about the WT versus various numbers of PCs, without considering the cruiser? The issue for this discussion seems (at least to me) to be: what does a WT add to a wedding cake defense given that I already have 4 PCs and a CA? (The answer might be different for a buzzsaw because the power considerations are different for the different web structure.) Once you add in the cruiser to assume part of the web maintenance burden, the load on the PCs is lightened substantially.

But forget about the cruiser for a moment. I think there's another problem with your analysis. You appear to be assuming that I must pay full housekeeping and fire the phasers. Active fire control is not required simply for web generators to dump power into a web. And I do not need to power shields if I can run out, power the outer web, and get back behind the middle web before a Klingon can get into firing position. (My batteries can bring the shields up if I have miscalculated somehow, perhaps by failing to account for a timely Klingon speed change.) If I have four PCs each spending 1/2 point for life support and six points for web reinforcement, they can in fact run at a speed of 22. They're not firing at the Klingons. But I still have the base's phaser-IVs, and phaser-IIs and -IIIs from the fighters, and phaser-IIs from the captor mines (if I did deploy a minefield) to remind the Klingons that I'm there.

Alternately, maybe I don't reinforce the outer web at all. Instead, I add the ship's phaser-Is to the barrage from the base, fighters, and (maybe) captor mines. And the outer web decays to... 34. The Klingons can't get through a strength 34 web, either. And I do that again next turn. They can't get through a strength 33 web, either...

After several turns of this, I will move out to reinforce the outer web before it decays to the point where the survivors can move through it. But by this time, their are fewer Klingons remaining.

Or maybe I do both arm phasers and move out to reinforce the outer ring rather than concentrate exclusively on one or the other. My choice will depend on specific forces and tactics of my enemy (especially if it's someone other than Klingons - Seltorians can bring down the outer web much more quickly), as well as factors such as whether I'm expecting reinforcements or have to hold out based solely on what I have present. But it's a mistake to assume one specific energy allocation for the Tholians and base analysis solely on that. I have options.

More comments later.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Sunday, October 05, 2025 - 01:54 pm: Edit

Alan, first of all I have to admit to a mistake about the speed of the WT. I read the SSD wrong, and I did not do a logic test of what I thought I read. Yes, I'm dyslexic. Yes, I suffer from Fat Finger Syndrome which has me punch the wrong keys on a tiny phone screen keyboard. Neither of these was to blame this time.

Secondly, I haven't replaced R8, so I don't have the AWT SSD available. It should work for my purposes, but as I don't have the SSD I can't speak to or for it as I don't know the specific differences between it and the WT.

Third, as another example of my mistake, I do have R4T, but I got it to look at the JWTs. I didn't look for the PWD or the PWW. Either would work for my purposes, so if you want to trade the WT for either (probably the PWD) I'm OK with that. I would point out that this will be a small notch in favor of the buzzsaw argument as those two WT substitutions go against your Tholian resources argument as they take combat-capable hulls of which the Tholians have few. Maybe the AWT should be the compromise. How is it different from the WT? I'm asking about BPV, weapons and their arcs, and maybe the shields.

As for my showing how the WT can do something to keep 4 PCs at full fighting efficiency, I simply chose the most ubiquitous Tholian ship there is and ran with it as an example. The possible combinations of Tholian ships that can be in the battle force are virtually unlimited. As for the tactics portion of your response, we're not there yet. I was showing that you would benefit from a web charger, too. You agreed to the premise, if not the exact selection of the ship. That's OK, just replace the WT with your charger of choice.

I backed away from the HPM module mostly to keep the module slot open for a later PF docking module. So, we now have my preferred selections of a web charger and the mine packages with some command controllers. All we need now to move forward is your choice of web charger and your selected mobile defense forces.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Sunday, October 05, 2025 - 11:31 pm: Edit

John,

AWT has two improvements* over the WT.

1. It has aux engines rather than standard freighter engines. This gives it eight warp engine boxes, for a maximum speed of 25. In my opinion, that is the most important improvement as it gives the AWT a much better capability to run out from behnd the middle ring, reinforce the outer ring, and get back safely.

2. The AWT has two phaser-Is compared to only a single phaser-III for the basic WT.

The AWT is available Y170 and costs 80/44 (economic / combat) BPV versus 70/30 for the standard WT.

*I thought it had three improvements but I was misremembering. I had believed the AWT also had better shields than the basic WT. But on checking the SSDs, I find the shields are the same.

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Monday, October 06, 2025 - 09:28 am: Edit

Alan, thanks.

The third one may be its acceleration. The WT is very limited.

Are the P-1s 360°, or LS/RS?

By John Christiansen (Roscoehatfield) on Monday, October 06, 2025 - 09:29 am: Edit

Alan, I made a suggestion for a new Tholian ship. Go take a look if you want.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Monday, October 06, 2025 - 12:59 pm: Edit

John,

One phaser-I on the AWT is 360°. The other is (if I recall correctly - I'm away from my SSDs until this evening) FA.

I saw that you proposed a new ship but only skimmed over the discussion so far. I'll look at it more closely this evening or tomorrow.

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