Brodie,

The Fed I used/tested could match the B10s heavy weapons, but do remember...it's a Fed, and Big Crunch™ is just one of those things. For what it's worth, it could only match the heavy weapons...it could not exceed it, and could only match it with full overloads on one turn. Over multiple turns, it could not do that kind of damage what with two-turn arming. And it had nothing of that kind of phaser power or drone capability, either. It weighed in around 230 or so.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 07:04 pm: Edit

I'm for Full X-Aegis for a number of reasons.
1) It's the future so some technologies will be cheaper and easier.
2) No one knows what technological development will come to fruition so the ships can be eclectic. Also the Admirals purchasig ship designs will not know what threat the future holds.
3) Full X-Aegis isn't that much better than regular X-Aegis.
4) With the reduction is phasers coupled with the higher BPV brought on by things that are not good at drone defense ( as oppossed to equal BPV of GW ships which will very probably have a proportionately bigger drone chuck rate ) so the choices for drone defence is reduced and Full X-Aeis ( particularly with Drone IDs ) helps the X2 ships defend itself in an area where it will be weaker than X1 ships ( drone defense ).
With Full X-Aegis, atleast the X2 ship will know what the drone about to kill her is.


On Firepower.
10 O/L Disruptors doesn't break even with Four 20 point Photons. 5/6 x 6 x 10 = 50 but 4 x 3/6 x 20 = 40. Admittedly the rear disruptors taken out will be equal but still Photons fire every second turn and require warp to arm.
The B10 gets to fire every turn and has UIM!

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 07:42 pm: Edit

And that is not a bad thing. No cruiser, no matter what generation it is, should be able to consistently dish out the damage a battleship does.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 07:47 pm: Edit

I always forget something.
5) As a nonweapon it won't be restricted by the treaty.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 08:11 pm: Edit

I'm not so sure on that.
One of the reasons the US decommissioned it's battleships was that FFGs could deliver more "boom" on command at longer range.
Sure missiles are an entirely new weapon system but even with the same systems Cruisers can beat "larger ships"...consider the Graf Spree Vs HMS Dreadnought.
Admittedly the cruiser weighed more than the pre WWI dreadnought but it makes the point; a Battleship of poor tech might not be able to support more BOOM than cruisers forever.

By R. Brodie Nyboer (Radiocyborg) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 08:20 pm: Edit

Mike, whew!

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 08:38 pm: Edit

---

Quote:

I'm not so sure on that.

---

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 09:00 pm: Edit

Well to be fair, we shouldn't be compairing Fed XCAs to Klingon B10s, we should compair Fed BBs to Fed XCAs.
Or atleast Klingon XCAs to B10s.

By R. Brodie Nyboer (Radiocyborg) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 09:07 pm: Edit

And this has what to do with ASIF?

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 09:22 pm: Edit

And how does that matter? I reiterate; a cruiser should not have the same firepower of a battleship of any race.

Brodie, not a thing. Just pointing out the obvious to MJC.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 10:13 pm: Edit

Actually, Firepower and ASIF are tied in an intractible bond.
An ASIF that's too good and battles will never be resolved, too weak and we fall into the same eggshells-with-sledgehammers problem.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Monday, December 19, 2005 - 10:18 pm: Edit

I will admitt though, that without compairing phaser firepower as well, the point is pretty useless.

Also since a Gorn CCX can already hurl 2 PT-M and 2PT-S all evenloped, 280 points of damage is already concivible.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 08:58 am: Edit

The B10K has 15Ph-1s and 6Ph-3s and 8 B-racks and 10 Disruptors and 2 ADD-12s. Plus the SFGs pad out the Phasers.
At R8 (assuming every weapon got the chance to fire) you're looking at 32.5 + 2 + 50 in direct fire damage for a total of 84.5 points.

My poor old Fed XCA with 8Ph-5s, four 24 point Photons and 2 GX-racks is looking at 28 + 48 points of direct fire damage or firing alternate Phot-tube on each turn the damage is 28 + 24. I'ld call it an expected total of 52 points of direct fire damage at R8.
Admittedly with the refit to 12Ph-5s it'll be 42 + 24 or 42 + 48 and that'll be pretty powerful.

A Fed CX currently hurls with 12Ph-1 and 2 GX-racks and Four fastloaded 12 point photons, some 26 + 24 points of damage every turn with direct fire weapons ( 50 points ) at R8. Using 16 pointers every other turn, the turn of attack will have 26 + 32 for 58 points of damage.

R0 damage are a little different.
B10K 97.5 + 23 + 100 for 220.5 points of direct fire damage.
Fed CX yeild 48 + 78 for 126 points of direct fire damage using overloaded and 142 points of direct fire damage with two turn overloads on the turn of attack.
My Fed XCA generate some 66.66 + 96 points of damage on the turn of attack for 162.66 points of damage.


I don't really see it as much of a problem considering the BPV of these ships and the CX is pretty good.
Plus the B10K has the wood on the XCA ( and indeed all X ships ) at point blank range.

I'ld argue that the final damage output is not really the problem even if ahead of a BB...these ships are TWO tech levels ahead and just look at the tech level difference between Fed YCAs and CAs. The devil is in the question; "Will it play nice?"

By Jeff Tonglet (Blackbeard) on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 03:15 pm: Edit

The "Padded DAC" version of the ASIF will give a cruiser roughly 20-30 free internals.

That'll give an XCA the toughness of a DN.

The weapons improvements will give it the firepower of a DN, too.

That's where we want it to be, isn't it?

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 09:03 pm: Edit

I think we want to have the firepower of a CX but better defenses and better general capability.

In a lot of ways this means a ship that it so good it'll phase-out BBs in the same way that CX began to phase-out DNs.

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 11:11 pm: Edit

Better defenses then a CX? Please clarify: More, or just better?

By Jeff Tonglet (Blackbeard) on Tuesday, December 20, 2005 - 11:47 pm: Edit

Wet-navy battleships were the king in their day, but new technology rendered them obselete. I think it would be interesting if the SFU history had X-tech do the same thing to DNs and BBs. We already have the start of that story in the decree that no DNXs were ever built.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 01:07 am: Edit

Absolutly, the cruiser shall be king. While the frigate and destroyer of today are tough cookies (the carrier is the real king of today) in space those just can't be as effective. The cruiser is the perfect size to fill the needs of the space navies. So the BCH will become the new Flag ship. Although limited in production it is the ultimate expression of a starship in the SFU.


IMHO.

By R. Brodie Nyboer (Radiocyborg) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 01:11 am: Edit

Thank you Jeff for bringing us around.

So then do we want the XCA (generic) to have the protection of a DN? Would BCH be sufficient, or CB? Or for that matter BB?

I'm not talking firepower, let's table that for now (please). This thread is about protectiveness.

Here are some questions regarding protection/anti-eggshell:

1. What are the threats an XCA is likely to encounter, common and worst-case? (I consider the Andros to be possible but unlikely.)

2. What does it need to survive initial contact (assuming it was caught relatively alone)?

3. Generic-wise (i.e. racial-flavor notwithstanding), what's the right "feel?"

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 11:19 am: Edit

BTW: I didn't mean to be saying the XCA will be the equal of a Battleship. I was only trying to address the point that there will be a higher damage output and BPV level to internals than ever before (i.e. eggshells). The ASIF, in whatever version, seems to solve the problem nicely and in an interesting way.

Earlier I said that the ASIF and Ph-5 should define X2. I might be a better analogy to say the ASIF and Ph-5 are key new spices that help define the flavor of X2; an entirely new flavor on the SFU menu.

I think we really need something that plays differently and not re-portioned versions of old dishes.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Thereplicant) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 12:55 pm: Edit

Well, the problem with ASIF is that it present a way to make the new play like the old.
Judging by how my X2 shapes up the new ships* will be one size bigger than previous, and get one lvl of fire power above that. (Ie the new CAs are based on the BCH pattern, and have the fire power of DNLs.)
The result would be faster battles, were mistakes are more costly. (Myself I like 'living on da edge')With X engines the chanses to build up to disengagement speed would also be better however.

*CLs and up. DDs are a bit harder to make bigger without making them into CLs.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 01:25 pm: Edit

A couple of thoughts about this whole "eggshells with hammers" business:

1) It may be more interesting if everyone has improved survivability, but not everyone implements it the same way. One race might use ASIF, another might use "regenerating shields", a third might use... something else - perhaps nanotechnology-based damage control that allows the ship to repair damaged systems far faster and more efficiently than any other race.

In the GW, most races are distinguished by their weapons. The Romulans, Tholians (but usually only in a defensive situation prior to arrival of the Neos), Orions, and Andromedans have significant non-weapon-based differences. But ultimately, the real difference between the Federation, Gorns, Klingons, Lyrans, etc. is that they carry different weapon systems. If all X2 races had improved survivability, but achieved through different means, it would further differentiate the races.

The downside of this is that it will make balancing between the races more difficult. But I think it would make for a more interesting game if a successful solution could be found.

2) The Tholians are a bit different than other Alpha races in terms of survivability, especially the Archeo-Tholian SC3 and SC4 ships. (So are the Orions and Andros, but for different reasons.) SC3 and SC4 Archeo-Tholian ships tend to have noticably better shielding than their counterparts, but fall apart more quickly once the shields are penetrated. They are "hard, but brittle". Also, ships with only one web caster are vulnerable to a single unlucky DAC hit (drone) more than other ships of comparable size/power. (The War Eagle is similarly vulnerable to a torp hit, but by the time the Tholians have web casters in this galaxy, most of those Eagle are King Eagles and have padding for the R-torp.) Look at the CCX and CPX. Besides having better shields than almost any other X-cruiser they suffer from this vulnerability. A CCX or CPX that takes a even a single internal could lose the web caster to a drone hit. There is no other X-ship that can suffer so great a reduction of its combat power to one unlucky internal.

To me, this "hard, but brittle" characteristic is part of the intrinsic feel to the smaller (not Dreadnoughts) Archeo-ships (the DD being the extreme example) and I would like to see it continued in X2, if possible.

The problem is balance. Tos has already stated that he doesn't want to see X2 Tholians. I suspect part of his reason may actually be concerns about balance. Though I very much disagree with him about having X2 Tholians at all, I understand his concerns (if I'm not misreading him) about balance problems. After the Andros, the Tholians are already the Alpha race hardest to balance across different scales and scenarios. As with the Andros, the Tholians in some situations cause real trouble for the BPV system. So, assuming that there will be X2 Tholians, I would like to see them continue that "hard, but brittle" characteristic. But I recognize it may not be possible to get it to work.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Thereplicant) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 01:56 pm: Edit

Yes, Tholians and Andros are a pain. And then we have entire generations of A-quadrant boats that play under other RULES than previous ones;
The X-1 ships doesn't only have more power and weapons, they also play using rules that are different to the standard SFB rules!

So, IMO, the idea of getting X2 to play nice with
GW era tech is tricky to say the least. And IMO it is in the way for the development of X2.
I think we must accept we can't avoid some balance issues.Of course, we don't have to make it more difficult by introduce really arcane and bissare rules.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 07:41 pm: Edit

Tos:

Things the X1s don't have and things that arn't weapons and thus won't be restricted by the treaty.
• S-Bridge drone knock-downs.
• Full X-Aegis.
• A.S.I.F.


1. What are the threats an XCA is likely to encounter, common and worst-case? (I consider the Andros to be possible but unlikely.)
Well I don't think many XCAs get built with XDDs doing the real work, bult maybe we'll pretent you said XCM.
• Cleaning up Andro.
• Fighting off the ISCs remainant, so one needs to be able to fight the ISC CCX.
• Clearing areas of pirates so being able to go toe to toe with an Orion CX would be needed.
• There is also the prepairation that XCAs will be figthing other XCAs if the treay breaks down and thus need to be awfully good at fighting.
• Moreso the XDDs and XFFs will be reclaiming planets that were lost but now have bought CW and DW units to protect themselves and their shipping.

2. What does it need to survive initial contact (assuming it was caught relatively alone)?
A high strategic speed.
Failing that enough firepower to give it the extra turn the ASIF buys it, to destroy or at least cripple the enemy vessel. The big problem with this question is you didn't outline the enemy. A Xork vessel will need a different resolution (get out of jamming range and tell everyone what you say) to a contact with a gravity wave or even a sun snake.

3. Generic-wise (i.e. racial-flavor notwithstanding), what's the right "feel?"
The oddities of X1 taken further.
CXs need X1 BTTYs to offset the fact that they don't have a DN shields (although close).
CXs need 8 EW to offset the fact that they don't have a DFN's internals.
This is how X2 should be. Cruisers doing DN and BB jobs with a reliance on high tech rather just bulk.

L.K.:
Earlier I said that the ASIF and Ph-5 should define X2. I might be a better analogy to say the ASIF and Ph-5 are key new spices that help define the flavor of X2; an entirely new flavor on the SFU menu.
Don't be so humble, let's not forget the S-Bridge.


A.T.:

Different defenses would be very hard to put together because the different races would have a different requirment based on their own systems and those of their enemy.
That is to say, regenerative shields work better when you opponant is Klingon than a Fed.
This creates nightmares in balance.
Better to give everybody a little dose of ASIF and a little dose of regenerative ships than to ration them out in equal but all-or-nothing bundles.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, December 21, 2005 - 08:22 pm: Edit

S-Bridge... I think that might be an herb...


====================
In regards to my own ASIF proposal, I had wanted the ASIF to be a very generic benefit to the force field system that strengthens the hull. I didn't want it to be specifically a damage blocking system. Although by strengthening the hull you do block some damage to the hull. By blocking some damage to the hull you protect SOME other systems. What I did NOT want to see is the ASIF blocking the underlined one hit DAC items. The ASIF should NOT block power surges and those are the things weapons and power systems are most vulnerable to.

The very name Advanced STUCTURAL integrity field implies to me that only things such as hull and cargo (a type of hull) would resist damage. This is extremely simple to track and to consider but must be considered in tactics against ships so equipped. Shuttle bays have some electronics but are mainly open space so I handled the small difference by allowing for a shuttle to be crippled (one point remains)instead of being destroyed (the shuttle box is still destroyed and the shuttle recoverable once the shuttle box is repaired).

Flatly blocking damage points to any system just doesn't fit the ASIF title, IMO.

To me the reason for ASIF is to support X2 technology. The reason for the extra benefits is to better safe guard the crews who are the MOST valuable system on the ship (in RL more than in game mechanics).

The ASIF I proposed requires that players manage their ships a bit more carefully. You need to still use repair systems to stay in the fight. You will lose weapons at a greater rate compared to hull losses since hull disappears more slowly.

Hull arrangement also affects the dynamics but not the process.