I've sent an e-mail to SVC and SPP asking them to delete the offending rule (OE1.225) and all it's subsections completely.

Hopefully that happens prior to micro phasers ending up in FC.

By George Duffy (Sentinal) on Sunday, March 06, 2011 - 04:45 pm: Edit

Baryy

I don't understand why you think that micro phasers are "evil" and need to be removed from Koligahr weaponry. All of the other empires that could use micro phasers are ones that take them as option choices (Bolasco and Zosaman).

Primarily, the Koligar's main two opposing empires are the Trobrin and the Probr. Both of whom use plasma technology as their main heavy weapon (Implosion torpedoes and HEATs). It would stand to reason that the Koligahr would build a weapon with the means to defeat such a threat. Considering the number of plasma that can be thrown at a ship by an equivalent-sized opponent I think it is a balancing factor in itself. Otherwise the Koligahr would have been overrun by either one of these empires long ago.

By Terry O'Carroll (Terryoc) on Sunday, March 06, 2011 - 06:21 pm: Edit

FC already has the concept of "settings", such as the Main Era, the Middle Era setting (Briefing #2) and the Early Era setting (created by Mike West and so far only seen in Captain's Log). It's made clear that mixing ships from different settings can have balance issues, so I think it would be a good idea to declare Omega as it's own "setting" and with the explicit caveat to players that these rules may not play well with Alpha Octant ships.

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Sunday, March 06, 2011 - 06:28 pm: Edit

Which is how it stands in SFB.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Sunday, March 06, 2011 - 07:05 pm: Edit

I'm not saying micro phasers are "evil" per say.
What I'm saying is that they are unbalanced versus plasma and the 1:1 damage ratio versus plasma needs to go.
They are already far more powerful at short range, which is where you shoot at plasma anyway, but the 1:1 ratio against plasma is huge.
Also, don't forget that Loriyill have micro phasers.

If the Koligahr would build a phaser type specifically to damage plasmas, it would have been copied by the Maesron too. Since the Maesron would be facing the Probr and the Trobrin. It's just too good.

Actually, there is another way to look at this. If the Koligahr needed a kick ass micro phaser that does insane amounts of damage to plasma, than they need a split BPV on their ships.
The one BPV would be for use against plasma ships like Trobrin and Probr, and the other BPV would be for use against all other ships.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 11:12 am: Edit

Barry Kirk:

The Trobrin microphaser has been in the game since the introduction of Omega (it appeared in Omega #1). It has been in use not less than a decade now. Before anyone considers a sudden need for a dynamic change there is going to have to be something more than a single voice "crying in the wilderness" so to speak.

By Troy Latta (Saaur) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 11:24 am: Edit

As a plasma player in SFB, I don't think microphasers are really a problem. SFB plasma has options to allow it to deal with point-defense-heavy opponents.
That said, however, plasma is already pretty weak in FC, both because of those advanced options being missing and the ability of ships to accelerate instantly to (effectively) speed 32 over a turn-break. In FC it might be too much but in SFB they're fine.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 11:47 am: Edit

Troy Latta:

And that is pretty much the point I suspect.

There are a lot of options and limitations in Star Fleet Battles (PPTs, EPTs, Acceleration Limits, Wild Weasels, Sabot) that do not apply to Federation Commander.

I am not sure any change is needed in Star Fleet Battles precisely for those reasons. But as noted, those things are not available in Federation Commander, and there are translation adjustments between the two game engines. So Barry may be right that an adjustment is needed for microphasers in Federation Commander. He is acting as the proverbial "canary in the coal mine" (an honorable act) and his concern warrants attention.

Does not mean that a change is indeed warranted simply because he is championing one, but it does mean that he situation should be carefully reviewed.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 06:44 pm: Edit

Steve:

The microphaser is used primarily by the Koligahr, but it is also used by the Loriyill, Bolosco, and others. It is not used by the Trobrin. The Koligahr would use it against the Trobrin though.

I've been using the microphaser a lot lately and have been logging a lot of play test time on it. Alhtough, this has been solely for tournament play using the Koligahr Tournament Cruiser.

I recently had a string of battles, where I was flying against plasma ships, and was able to simply phaser the plasmas down and run in. Or conversely, not have to run them out too far before phasering them down and turning in.
What it means is that plasma ships can't push the Koligahr far enough away to make the plasma ballet work.

As for my being the single voice "crying in the wilderness", I know of some other SFB players who have complained about the same issue with microphasers to me.

Troy:

There is a difference between a point-defense heavy opponent and a micro phaser equipped opponent. A pair of PM-3 will almost always outperform a phaser gatling against plasma. A pair of PM-3 will reduce a plasma by 8 points every time. A phaser Gatling will only reduce a plasma by 8 points if it rolls perfectly. Usually, it will reduce a plasma by 7 points or even 6 points.

A PM-1 will reduce a plasma by 6 points every time. Problem is that very few ships have more than two phaser gatlings, but it is very common to have a micro phaser ship with 8 PM-1 and 2 PM-3.

Example, in Tournament play, the LDR Tournament cruiser has the best phaser point defense for any alpha ship. With 6 phaser 1s and 2 phaser Gs.

Each phaser 1 will reduce a plasma on average about 3 points, and the phaser Gs will reduce it by 7 each on average.
So, the LDR can count on having a plasma reduction of 34 points. The Koligahr, has a plasma reduction of 56 points. That's a huge difference!!!

If you fire an EPT plasma S at an LDR, and he hits it at range one front centerline with every phaser he has, he will still take 26 points of plasma damage. Under the same conditions the Koligahr would only take 4 points of plasma damage.

The Koligahr can afford to run through an EPT plasma S. The LDR can't.

The options to deal with point-defense heavy opponents can only adjust so far. The Koligahr goes way beyond those limits.

By Mike Kenyon (Mikek) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 07:03 pm: Edit

If I'm understanding the case properly, you're saying that because the plasma ballet doesn't (necessarily) work against the Kolighar, they're bad.

I'd suggest that needing different tactics against different opponents is part of the joy of the game.

From the sounds of it (and I haven't played the Kolighar more than a couple times personally and never against heavy plasma), it forces the plasma player into playing the Kzinti game -- "stop me, stop my plasma: you can't hit both". Granted, you're average plasma boat isn't going have as much non-plasma armory as a 'Zin is going to have non-drone armory, but I don't see it as disasterous.

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 07:08 pm: Edit

Are there non-Alpha tourney ships available now?

By Scott Tenhoff (Scottt) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 10:10 pm: Edit

I would like to point out, reading all this, that the Omega Plasmas aren't all your standard spd 32 torps.

The Trobrin Implosion Torpedos detonate at range-1, not on impact. So to shoot them down, you have to shoot at range-2.

The Probr HEAT can go upto speed-64 when Accentuated. THus can they make the range-2->range-0 jump if timed properly.

The Alunda Plasma Whip torpedoes aren't that special. But the Plasma Whips themselves do double damage against unshielded targets and are only hit on FLAG, IIRC, and take 0 energy to charge.

The Sigvirion Kinetic Waves do the most damage in the mid-range (12-15 or more) battles, not in the close and archor battles.

So the entire gambit of Omega plasma torps are different compared to the Alpha octant. Which the races should be balanced against, not the Alpha torps of the ISC/Gorn/Roms.

By Andy Vancil (Andy) on Monday, March 07, 2011 - 11:17 pm: Edit

The microphaser is unbalanced against plasma. I could see giving it 2:3 damage instead of 1:2 (and 1:2 versus HEATs), but 1:1 is not workable.

Note that microphasers do just fine at range 2, where p1s autohit for 5 and p3s autohit for 3. Not much difference. A Koligahr CA can still do 46 plasma reduction, guaranteed, compared with an average of 26.5 for the LDR TCWL.

Yes, Omega torps are different than Alpha. In general, they are weaker. No pseudos. No EPTs. Fewer torps. Implosion torps are short-ranged, and HEATs are small. KWs are too easy to avoid optimum range, and once you get myopic on the Sig, he's done for.

The only reason the PM isn't a bigger deal in historic Omega battles is that few races rely solely on plasma. The Sigs aren't really workable, even in Omega. The Probr have torps that are more resistant to phasers. For the Alunda, the plasma whip is just sprinkles on the icing on the cake.

But if we're ever going to have Omegan tourney cruisers that are balanced without severe RPS issues (even just against other Omega TCs), we would need to do something about microphasers.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Tuesday, March 08, 2011 - 06:45 pm: Edit

David,

Yes there are non-Alpha tourney cruisers available and posted for play in SFBOL. I've created ships for the following. Note that they are all unsanctioned play test only. However, some of those ships have been seeing a lot of play test.
I've been trying to balance these ships for use against alpha tourney cruisers and in some cases I've got some fairly good results.

1. Maesron
2. Koligahr
3. Trobrin
4. Probr
5. Chlorophon
6. Alunda
7. Drex
8. Worb
9. Hiver
10. Vari
11. Loriyill
12. Souldra
13. Ryn
14. Sigvirion
15. Maghadim
16. Eneen
17. Baduvai

I've got more planned, but I'm trying to get these ships balanced and playtested.

I wouldn't necessarily call the Trobrin a "Big Plasma" race though. They are more like the ISC in that they've got a killer kick ass long range direct fire weapon, the implosion bolt, with a couple of plasma style weapons to prevent overrun.

As for the Probr, they have a weak plasma style weapon, with a completely different set of options than standard plasma. No bolt, EPT, fakes, or shotguns, but they do have a speed 64 option, at a major cost, and the ability to re-target. The HEAT torpedo only takes phaser damage at 1:3 instead of 1:2 against normal phasers, so even the current microphasers only damage them 1:2.

The Alunda, whip crack torpedoes are a very minor weapon for the Alunda, and it has an excellent direct fire alternative.

The Sig's as Andy pointed out above aren't really workable, I've got some ideas about how to fix them, but that is for another post and/or day.

The Souldra use a plasma style weapon, but I don't have that much experience with them, other than the dark matter torpedo is fairly feeble, 10 points of damage, but hard to run out, and they have them in relatively large numbers and they recharge in 2 turns for fairly cheap.

As for the Branthadon, I've never played one, so I just don't know.

That's it for the plasma races in Omega. Hope this helps.

Scott,

You are correct, in that the idea is to balance the Omega races against each other. I forgot about that, since my focus for the last two years has been creating tournament cruisers that are balanced and play well against alpha tournament cruisers. I've been trying to iron out the worst of the RPS issues.

And that was the reason, I started on this crusade about the microphasers in the first place. It creates a major RPS issue.

Andy,

Going to 2:3 damage would certainly help a little, but I'm concerned that it doesn't go far enough. I've been having some really good success with my tournament Koligahr and it's 1:2 microphaser special rule.

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Tuesday, March 08, 2011 - 08:01 pm: Edit

Ahh, thank you, I seem to lack either the time, or the money to play SFBOL.

By Troy Latta (Saaur) on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 11:26 am: Edit

Could those SSDs (and special rules, if necessary) be made available outside of SFBOL?

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 05:49 pm: Edit

I'll ask Steve Petrick about that. The special rules are written in text on the SSDs.

But, I will have to ask Steve, how I should format them so that he can sell them... Perhaps on e23?

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 06:03 pm: Edit

After thinking about this overnight... I'm liking Andy's version with the micro phaser de-rated against plasma to only do 2:3 damage and against HEAT 1:2.

The 2:3 damage gives it only a 33% boost against plasma versus the 100% boost it currently enjoys.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 06:29 pm: Edit

I will note that I am not convinced of the need of this change.

The focus has only been on the use of micro phasers against seeking plasma. There is also this thing called "plasma bolts". The plasma empires may not like to be forced to use that option, but it is available. At five hexes range a plasma ship might score fifty points of damage with bolts against 24 points from four anti-matter cannon, 48 points if all are double shotted. At ten hexes range the plasma would average 22 points of damage against 12 points for the anti matter cannons.

There is a feeling of a "rush to judgement" in this. A "let us look at only the seeking weapon aspect and amend the situation based solely on this".

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Wednesday, March 09, 2011 - 08:56 pm: Edit

Steve,

The only races in the Omega octant that have a bolt option for their plasma style weapon are the Alunda and the Branthadon. The Alunda only use plasma as a tertiary weapon though.

Probr is not affected too much by this change, since HEAT under the published rules are damaged by micro phasers 1:2 compared to regular phasers which damage HEAT 1:3.

Trobrin, Sigvirion, Souldra, and Vari ( particle splitter torpedoes ) are the only other plasma races in the Omega octant. None of them have a bolt option for their plasma.

None of the Omega octant plasma style weapons have fakes or enveloping options either with the possible exception that Souldra can load a fake instead of real torp and Branthadon can envelope their dragon fire.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Thursday, March 10, 2011 - 02:41 pm: Edit

Barry Kirk:

Sorry, but the start point of this discussion was that the microphaser needed to toned down specifically versus plasmas, not general plasma weapons. In Omega, even Andy Vancil said: "The only reason the PM isn't a bigger deal in historic Omega battles is that few races rely solely on plasma."

I noted you might have an argument in Fed Com because of all the other issues involved, to include "me too" firing (which makes holding them for a direct fire alpha strike and thereby keeping your opponent from firing his microphasers at your ship is an issue).

But I am NOT going to sanction a change to a baseline rule in Star Fleet Battles that has been in the game since day one of the appearance of Omega. You can take the issue up in Federation Commander (and SVC will probably kill me on that one if Gary Carney does not).

For now, there does not really seem to be a problem that is not dealt with by player tactics with the technologies as they stand.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Thursday, March 31, 2011 - 12:01 pm: Edit

Heh. So after, like, 10+ years of Omega existing, I'm finally playing with the Omega stuff (thanks to Barry's tireless work on Omega TCs), and just caught up on this 10 years of discussion.

I've only ever used the tournament stuff (well, I played a few playtesty games 15+ years ago), so my view on these ships are very painted by that. But some impressions based on the ships I've seen and used:

-Alunda: These are the guys I play most often, 'cause I like the idea of giant space squids (yeah, ok, whales, but I like to envision them as squids...) They seem reasonably solid. The Bio Bolts are strong weapons. I'm not as convinced that the Whipcrack torps are particularly problematic, as other folks seem to be--the Alunda seem exceptionally anemic outside of R7. At R8-12, 2 point Bio Bolts are just worse than Disruptors and 1 point Bio Bolts are just worse than P1s. At ranges 13+, Bio Bolts are significantly inferior to Disruptors and P1s (and, well, any other weapons that can shoot out past that point). The Whipcrack torps make up for this somewhat, and Plasma Whips aren't real impressive as guns in and of themselves. Yeah, free and all, and they do double damage vs unshielded targets, but their damage is low (even when doubled) and the 32 impulse delay is very significant for what is essentially a point defense weapon (I suspect that they ended up being originally kind of underbalanced due to being free to fire). I mean, yeah, having WTs is certainly better than not, but I don't think that they are pushing the Alunda into "way too good", even as a free upgrade. Everything that has been said about their other systems (ARF and PCG) are pretty dead on--the ARF is good if you can afford to hold it; the PCG will see use in, like, an open map squadron/fleet engagement, but otherwise, not so much.

-Maesron: These guys seem pretty good, although most of their advantage is lost on a closed map. They can do a considerable amount of damage at, like, R16 with TGs and PWs, but if they can't keep the range open, they will inevitably get cornered and killed after taking such a shot. Also, the TMs, which certainly interesting on paper, are, as previously noted, just too fiddly and complicated for something that doesn't actually do that much. I suspect if there were just, say, 3 or 4 TMs to choose from instead of an infinite supply of ways to build and modify them, everything would work better.

-Probr: Much like the Maesron, they need to have an open map to work on. On a closed map, they are too easily cornered and killed, and PQs really blow at close range.

-Kholigar: Like the Fed, but with much, much better seeking weapon defense. Such that the above discussion about trying to change their phasers vs plasmas. But as long as they aren't fighting Alpha ships, it isn't that likely to be that big of an issue. They seem reasonably strong in general.

-Drex: A lot has already been said about them being under BPVed, which I tend to agree with--the super computer advantages are *huge* for these ships. I suspect, however, if they just lost access to enveloping HCs, they'd probably even out. As those enveloping HCHs are just insane.

Just throwing that all out there in the name of new, not 10 year old Omega discussion

By Andy Vancil (Andy) on Thursday, March 31, 2011 - 01:25 pm: Edit

On the Alunda, the BBs may not be great at longer ranges, but you have a lot of them compared to the heavy weapons on other ships. A 2-point BB may not be as good as a disruptor, but your CA can fire 8 of them on an oblique approach. Their flexibility is also a huge advantage here. If you armed your disruptors as standards thinking you would be saber dancing, but got much closer than expected, you are disadvantaged. With BBs, you just fire fewer of them in 4-point mode.

My objection to the WT is twofold. First, I didn't like the "let's give everyone a plasma torpedo" thing that seemed to come out following O2. One neat thing about Omega is the very limited number of seeking weapons, but suddenly the Alunda and Vari get them. Second, I have found, playing the Alunda in a campaign, that their BPV was pretty reasonable without the WT. Giving a ship with 4 PWs the WT option is a huge upgrade, I would say better than adding a plasma-G launcher, but it came along at NO COST.

I do agree the PW without the WT is a pretty wimpy weapon, though, especially since the Omega MRB cut in half their effectiveness versus plasma.

On the Maesron, the problem with trying to dance is the weapon arcs suck, and they don't have enough power. I disagree that the many TM options are the problem with them. The problem is, the options are too pricey. If you only had to pay for the most expensive missile in each rack, the BPV adjustment would be about right. It's still important to realize they are mostly a gimmick.

The Probr, even on an open map, have trouble keeping the range open, due to power issues.

The difficulty with the Koligahr is remembering where the "h" goes in their name. :-) I have found them to be OK, but the short range of their weapons, and the unreliability of their phasers at range 3-5, are both weaknesses.

I agree that the most insane thing about the Drex is the enveloping HCH. The supercomputer thing is also mainly an issue in conjunction with the HCH.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Thursday, March 31, 2011 - 02:09 pm: Edit

Andy wrote:
(Yaa! Omega discussion! :-)
>>On the Alunda, the BBs may not be great at longer ranges, but you have a lot of them compared to the heavy weapons on other ships. A 2-point BB may not be as good as a disruptor, but your CA can fire 8 of them on an oblique approach.>>

Oh, sure. But that costs a lot of power when you are trying to do stuff like move and keep the range open. Especially as if you are firing at R12 (the point at which a 2 point BB is *almost* a good weapon), your opponent is going to be getting closer anyway if you have 16 power dumped into the BBs. If you look at, say, a standard volley of:

-4xDisr, 6xP1 at R15=14 average damage for 14 power.

vs

-8x 2 point BBs at R12=slightly less than 14 average damage (i.e. probably 12 but occasionally 15) for 16 power.

You have a sub optimal comparison. Move the BBs out to R15, and it gets significantly worse.

>>Their flexibility is also a huge advantage here. If you armed your disruptors as standards thinking you would be saber dancing, but got much closer than expected, you are disadvantaged. With BBs, you just fire fewer of them in 4-point mode.>>

That is certainly a bonus. But the capacitor system is really inefficient relative to phaser capacitors+disruptors (as an easy comparison). Don't get me wrong--I think that BBs are actually pretty good as guns go, but I don't think that saying that the Alunda are significantly not good outside of R7 is a stretch.

>>My objection to the WT is twofold. First, I didn't like the "let's give everyone a plasma torpedo" thing that seemed to come out following O2. One neat thing about Omega is the very limited number of seeking weapons, but suddenly the Alunda and Vari get them. Second, I have found, playing the Alunda in a campaign, that their BPV was pretty reasonable without the WT. Giving a ship with 4 PWs the WT option is a huge upgrade, I would say better than adding a plasma-G launcher, but it came along at NO COST.>>

Oh, sure. All of these things are completely reasonable, viewpoint wise. But for my money, given the very underwhelming damage output at R8+ that the Alunda have going for them (or not, as the case may be), the WTs are a reasonable balance for that. And sure, yeah, a free, not insignificant upgrade, but of a underbalanced weapon to begin with. And heck, even if they should get an extra , say, 2 BPV added (given that the PWs were probably under effective before hand, I'll give you 2 for the 3 you mentioned :-) per PW for this ability, a cruiser is under BPVed by about 8 points (i.e. about 6%) which isn't enough to really worry about. Especially compared to, say, the Drex...

>>I do agree the PW without the WT is a pretty wimpy weapon, though, especially since the Omega MRB cut in half their effectiveness versus plasma.>>

Huh. I'm not even sure I know what this means--I'm going to guess that the MRB clarified that PWs don't do double damage vs plasma? I was always kind of assuming that anyway, even though it is vague in the O1 rules?

>>On the Maesron, the problem with trying to dance is the weapon arcs suck, and they don't have enough power.>>

Well, isn't that really the case for most Omega ships, really? They can always get 3x TGs in arc, and with those 1-5 to hits, they are doing a lot of damage, even with just the 3 of them (and the PWs that are good at long range too).

>>I disagree that the many TM options are the problem with them.>>

Oh, heh, I don't think it is, like, making them bad or anything. I just think that the "let's spend 4 pages on rules to build a missile that is going to have very little impact on an actual game due to the inherent launch and control and rack mounting rules" is kind of silly. I mean, as a weapon goes, TMs are fine. But if there were just, like, 4 or 5 of them as pre-existing missiles and that was that, they'd be much more manageable.

>>The Probr, even on an open map, have trouble keeping the range open, due to power issues.>>

Reasonable. Although that they are significantly dangerous at, like, range 30 helps that a lot.

>>The difficulty with the Koligahr is remembering where the "h" goes in their name. :-) I have found them to be OK, but the short range of their weapons, and the unreliability of their phasers at range 3-5, are both weaknesses.>>

Sure. I'm kind of intrigued by the idea of mass use of ACGs just to strip shields, which seems like a powerful ability. But of everyone, they kinda seem the most straight forward.

>>I agree that the most insane thing about the Drex is the enveloping HCH. The supercomputer thing is also mainly an issue in conjunction with the HCH.>>

Yeah, those HCH enveloping shots are insane. Especially given how often they hit due to the super computers. As noted, if the enveloping rounds just magically vanished, I suspect the Drex would still be very strong. Just not insane.

By Mike Kenyon (Mikek) on Thursday, March 31, 2011 - 03:29 pm: Edit

- My problem with the Alunda is that they're very, very fragile with the Warp (Any) given that there weaponry makes you want to come in. Once they start going into power hits it all starts to whirlpool very fast.

- Flip side, the Alunda have a phenomenal 1-turn punch per size class with their smaller ships at WS3. What a Tracker can do after taking the WS3 free points, playing some speed games to get a couple more and then blowing the A-Bat is pretty impressive ... if they can get to range.

- I cannot be concur with your appraisal of the Maesron .. up to the TM comment. TMs are significantly harder to hurt and more likely to hit than an Alpha drone. I'd put them about on the par of a small plasma for the effort required to deal with which goes down the general thinking of Omega in that it generally prefers fewer, more viable seekers rather than a swarm of a 100 of which 5 will hit. Maesron are really the Fed-equivalant from a feel perspective to me and like the fed, the weapons are very FA focused.

- If you're looking for the sniper/better arcs. Look no further than the Chlorophon or the Vari. Not going to say that you're going to do a lot of 1-turn damage in either, but somewhere in turn 27 your Chlorophon will invariably win the battle and the Vari is my favorite race to bring into a massive free-for-all ... "What do you mean you hit me on my down shield that's opposite you ... twice?"

- From a tourney perspective, we ended up banning the Trobrin from our local battles off of the original tourney cruiser for them. I haven't seen the updated one on SFBOL. They are a solid race that would be awesome if they just had a little more power ... which the TC gave them.