Subtopic	Posts		Updated
	Archive through September 12, 2002	25		09/12 10:10pm

How about . . .
Using the web strength method.

The Widget race has a CA that produces a 100 point warp shield. The captain orders the #6, #1 and #2 protected, lowering the warp shield strength to 33 in those facings. The RH of the ship is unprotected. In other words, divide the raw strength of the shield by the number of facings it is protected.
On turn two, the situation is chaotic and the captain generates a 110 pts shield to protect all facings. Now he has an 18 pt shield.
Turn 3, he is facing a plasma R at range 1 (WH=50) on his nose. He allocates for only a 90 point shield on #1 and #2 (he took damage last turn because his 18 pt shield collapsed under heavy disruptor fire) creating a 45 point shield, phasers it down to 40 points, and gets hit leaving only 10 points for protection for the rest of the turn.
This could be the Y100 era Widget race ships.
The Y125 refit would allow (at no additional cost) minimum shields (5% of the raw strength) to protect the facings that are NOT allocated.
The Y150 refit increase that to 10%
The Y180 refit would have some other refit.

THIS promotes:
Auto-regenative shields
Shield strength that is based on concentration of its use.
Decision making on shield allocation
Tactics to protect poor judgements.

Naturally, this may even be too weak for a race but this was just off the top of my head.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, September 12, 2002 - 11:08 pm: Edit

Glen: That is a different idea. Not what I was thinking technicly.

However, it is a good one, useful in it's own right. Thought provoking and tacticly rich.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 01:03 am: Edit

A different idea is to track the damage to the shields and say that this represents "dead area" that give no pretection until the damage is exceeded.

Let's say a CA has an F-torp launched at it and it raises a 20-pt shield. Until the damage to that shield is repaired, 20 is suptracted from any shield points raised for that shield.

By Jim Cummins (Jimcummins) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 09:42 am: Edit

You could have the warp shield tied to Shield generators

The shield generator could be attached to the warp nacelles, and are destroyed on Warp hits reducing the number of generators and the maximum strength of the shield. On a CA, maybe 25 shield generators in total, each generating 5 shield “boxes” per point of warp power. For a maximum unified shield of 125 points.

Or on the hull on each shield facing, this would allow a maximum shield that can be produced in any direction. The maximum shield strength would be reduced as the shield generators get destroyed. Make them hit on hull damage, with a directional damage restrictions, and that all shield generators must be damaged before other hull.
On a CA maybe 8-10 generators per facing with each allowed to create 5 point of shielding, if powered by 1 point of warp energy
This would add tactical consequences for under-powering shield arcs, as well as giving an opponent a reason for forcing down a shield, as damage would reduce the amount of shielding regenerated.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 12:50 pm: Edit

I wanted the shield generation to be built into the entire engine and controled in the control stations (bridges). No shields if you become uncontrolled and as you take warp damage your ability to raise the shield is diminished.

An other thought I had was to split the shield. On a CA you would have a right and left shield tied to the power available in each engine. From the front and rear, damage would be apllied equally to each shield, but from the side applied to only one. This would add some need for maneuver. The mauler arch would be used for damage comming in, perhaps, so that there would be some coverage for targets slightly off the center line. Use this because it would be to hard to always center line a target given the map is a hex grid.

For a third warp engine the c-warp could be devided equally between the two shields(with odd points going to the shield of choice. One shield could not be more than one point stronger than the other.). Single warp ships would have one unified shield or that race could have no single warp designs (that's the one I prefer).

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 12:56 pm: Edit

Their shuttles could sacrafice two points of speed for one point of warp shield 360'.

By Glenn Hoepfner (Ikabar) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 09:24 pm: Edit

As for my idea, a friend proved it is too powerful against a static position (ie, a base or planet). Or even fleet engagements at long ranges.
I'll rethink.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 10:57 pm: Edit

Glen: Perhaps then a short to mid-range weapon would be in order for a so equiped race. Try it on a Hydran Ranger, see what happens.

In fact, if some one wants to, some experiments on verious races might shed some light as to the type of weapon style that would fit such a race while not being too powerful. I was thinking that a warp weapon might work. Something to compete for the same power.

Warp Plasma Beam Weapon.

This weapon is an example of the heavy weapon that a Warp Shield using race might employ.

Maximum 120' firing arch.
ARMING: Two warp standard. Four warp to OV(=Dx2) Must be from warp engines. Use of this weapon constitutes active warp engine use. AWR may NOT be used to arm this weapon.
MAX RANGE:30 (OV=8)
TARGETING:Attracts to active warp. A +2 penalty for targeting non-warp targets. i.e. Sub-light units, planets, asteroids, and bases. Warp capable ships not generating warp power or who have dropped their warp engines qualify.

----0--1--2--3/4--5/8--9/12--12/25--26/30
1) 12..12..12..10.....8.....4........3........2
2) 12..12..10...8......7.....4........2........1
3) 10..10..10...7......5.....3........1........0
4) 10...8....8...5......3.....2........0........0
5) 10...8....7...4......2.....1........0........0
6) 8.....6....5...2......1.....0........0........0

This is just off the top of my head. I hope my intent is clear. Against a reasonably fast target you would be hard pressed to hold up a big shield AND fire your main weapons. Balance of tactics would be required.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 13, 2002 - 11:09 pm: Edit

A typical CA should have 32 warp, four impulse, four APR, six battery (Can use reserve warp for both technologys). Weapons should include 3 or 4 Warp Plasma Beam Weapons(WPB), 6 PH-1s, 4 PH-3s. The Ship should be a Mono hull design (diamond shaped?) with mid-side warp engines. The rest of the internals should be typical to most CAs with a good Control arangement (since their shields rely on the ship being controled).

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 12:44 am: Edit

Loren,

If you like, I can make this SSD for you. Would there be a chart to register warp shield energy used per turn? Something like the Andro PAP charts?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 01:04 am: Edit

Thanks Mike. I would like to think about it a bit. I'll make a schetch and e-mail you like before. Man, have I come up with a new race??

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 08:54 am: Edit

LOL, probably!

By Daniel G. Knipfer (Dgknipfer) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 05:54 pm: Edit

I had a simmilar idea several years back when stationed in England. We never could get it to ballance out. Ships using a 360 shield suffered to much in any engagement involving 4 or more ships. At the same time, they tended to be unbeatable in duals.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 06:12 pm: Edit

I'm curious, Daniel, was there a balancing weapon or did you try the Warp Shield on galactic ships? Please, could you give more details?

By the way, I have changed the design to two shields. A left and right shield with a fore and aft overlap. The overlap would use the mauler arch fore and aft. Anything in this arch would hit both shields. This Warp Shield equiped race would be able to use Directed Turn Mode to centerline it's shields on a enemy.

By Henry Meyer (Henry2) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 09:56 pm: Edit

Glenn (12 Sept) gets my vote - this reminds me of the Souldra of Omega; large shield capacity, needing to be spread over all threatened arcs.

Warp engines 'warp' space - perhaps some sort of 'tear' function, requiring the same power source (balancing attack/defense) and directly damaging your opponent's warp engines (thus his WS) would have been considered a weapon by the New Race?

That being the case, the actual ship-destroying heavy weapon could be dependant on the target having no shielding, or be SERIOUSLY myopic - perhaps transporter based? Looked at another way, if WS don't block transporters, you wouldn't dare close to 5 hexes, delaying your coup de grace.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, September 14, 2002 - 10:07 pm: Edit

This race has very advanced warp technology. It has found a way to reflect and refract all sorts of energy using warp engine power not used for warp. The system is intregal to the warp engine. So integral that if you damage or remove parts of one you disable the other. The process is controled in the control spaces of the ship.

That's my take on it. Glenns idea is good too. But not the same as mine. I have a diferent goal in mind. That is not to say we can't discuss other ideas here. I encurage that. And I want to discuss the original plan as well, please.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Sunday, September 15, 2002 - 01:26 pm: Edit

I tend to agree that this would be difficult to balance. A hellbore would either be murder or useless.

Everyone would want/need to either do a "banzai charge" and hope that the weapons damage overwhelms the shield or play a high speed hit and run game to try to force the ship to put it's warp power into movement and weaken its shield that way.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Sunday, September 15, 2002 - 02:07 pm: Edit

Both those tactics are valid. Mid-turn speed changes might make both those things dificult. Or easier.

Which brings up "How would mid-turn speed canges affect the shield?".

Here is the question that needs answering. Is the Warp Shield strength based on available power or based on available warp field capacity which would be correlated with the current speed? I would choose available power. It is tacticly open and easier to account for. The other would have you shield growing and shrinking as your speed changes and would make the system...well, not practical.

Part of the intention here is to creat a situation where the tactics needed would be compleatly different, like when you face Andros. If you approach an Andro like you would a Alpha sector race then you are going to die. I like the new frame of thought it requires but playing Andros is complicated. I was hoping for something a little simpler but just as dynamic.

Perhaps this race should also have light hulls like the Klingons but still a mono-hull. This race would have two volnurabilitys, loss of control kills the ship and warp damage lessens the shield. An opponant needs to focus on these. With the two (L&R) shield design maneuver is critical. Score hits from the side and you have to deal with only half the full strength. Long range strikes would be ineffective but you wont be taking damage either. They would be a tough nut to crack but like a nut once cracked it falls apart pretty quickly. Like the Andros.

If they turn out to be too powerful the a leaky shield rule will balance that out just fine. Like degragation on Andros you could roll a die to determine if each point hits on the DAC or directly on Warp. Say leak every 8th point. Roll a die for each leak point(only for leak points and yes if the shield is overwhelmed you still separate leak points) a 1-3 equals a Warp hit on the facing engine,a 4-5 equals a DAC hit and a 6 is a contained hit(i.e. no damage to the shield or the ship).

By John Kasper (Jvontr) on Sunday, September 15, 2002 - 11:15 pm: Edit

The speed/shield interaction should probably be similar to that for HETs. You can't be instantaneously generating more warp than warp engines.

If I understand correctly, this race doesn't rally have shields. Instead they are warping space around them to protect themselves. For leaky shields the amount of leak would probably be determined on the amount of warp that was imposed on the surrounding space.

By Henry Meyer (Henry2) on Monday, September 16, 2002 - 01:11 am: Edit

Hmmm. Sort of like sticking a hat pin into an orange, the space inside the rind 'folded' to make contact with the rind on the other side of the orange.

Maybe that could be their main weapon? It would fit their theme of 'Warp Mastery', letting them concentrate power on their defense and shooting back, all at the same time.

By Daniel G. Knipfer (Dgknipfer) on Monday, September 16, 2002 - 08:37 am: Edit

Loren,

We devised a weapon to go with the race we where testing. The base damage was slightly less than a Photon but the to hit numbers wher closer to a Disruptor. That way the race lacked the Feds bombardment capability, but had the kind of crunch power to deal with the "Omniversal Shield" concept. Secondary weapons where Ph-1s, PH-2s and PH-Gs. We envisioned them as an insect race living in the area between the Far Stars and the Old Colonies.

Attepts to adjust both the weapons and the shields kept falling apart over the difference with single ship, squadron and fleet engagements. The weapon worked fine, but we just never could balance out the shield strength levels. However, we didn't tie the shield strength directly to the amount of power the ships put into it.

By Troy J. Latta (Saaur) on Friday, September 20, 2002 - 03:02 pm: Edit

"We"?
You mean you actually found someone to play with out there, Dan? ;)

By R. Brodie Nyboer (Radiocyborg) on Sunday, October 06, 2002 - 09:40 pm: Edit

I haven't read the entire thread yet (just the beginning mostly) so maybe someone else has already brought this up, but I'd submit that such a Warp Shield race would use low-to-no-power-requirement seeking weapons. That way, enemies would be forced to use their direct fire weapons against the drone/torpedo/whatever swarms and have less for attacking directly against the Warp Shield. In fact, the Warp Shield race might have only a few direct fire weapons for use after the seekers are gone or in case an enemy gets too close.

By Adam James Villatorio (Merlinfmct87) on Wednesday, May 05, 2004 - 04:46 am: Edit

Good ideas everybody, but I have a suggestion.

I know that SFB can't get into TNG, but I seem to remember in ST:Nemesis that the Scimitar had Primary and Secondary Shields...maybe this is the primary?

Also, since you are creating essentially a giant eggshell around an already big eggshell(standard shields) maybe you should be easier to hit(since you are making yorself a much bigger target).

Or, this could be Andro technology, used when a PA panel goes down, and *only* when a PA panel goes down. I can't imagine them not trying to get this technology. But they might not be around to get it.

Hope you like my ideas,

Adam