Terry - I actually believe it was the inability to record on the betamax machines and not the size of the tapes that killed betamax.

By Symon Cook (Symon) on Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 04:17 pm: Edit

We must have had a really weird Betamax then because we recorded on it!!
Honestly, there is a load of disinformation about Betamax. Tapes you bought were usually 90-120 minutes long, just like VHS and the same price in the UK at least. You recorded and rerecorded on them. Video rental shops in the UK used to rent in both formats, one tape per film. It IS a case of the inferior format winning out!

By Ken Kazinski (Kjkazinski) on Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 09:01 pm: Edit

Symon, the initial betamax machines were only able to play tapes. By the time betamax machines could record most people had already purchased VHS machines.

By Terry O'Carroll (Terryoc) on Sunday, May 29, 2011 - 10:12 pm: Edit

Symon, initally the tapes were too small. By the time longer tapes came out, VHS had a larger user base and beta could not compete. (Source is articles on this subject on various websites about economics).

For a technology to be "disruptive" and knock out an established technology, it not only has to be better, it has to be significantly better, enough so that the cost of changeover is justified. VHS got ahead, and in the view of most users betamax just wasn't superior enough to justify the cost of abandoning VHS.

You see the same thing with Microsoft products. Sure, systems like Ubuntu are very good, and many would argue superior to Windows in its various incarnations. But it's really easy to hire people who know how to use Windows and Office... saving training costs... and so the technically inferior system stays in use.

By Symon Cook (Symon) on Monday, May 30, 2011 - 08:12 am: Edit

Guys, that's what Wikipedia says. As I was in my 'teens at the time, the reality was somewhat different. By the time video recorders became one of the things that everyone was buying, the capabilities of affordable, production models were what was important. One of the things often overlooked is that buying the very longest VHS tapes at that time was a bad idea. They were excessively priced and prone to stretching/snapping.

For a technology to be disruptive and knock out an established technology, it either has to be better, preferable significantly better, OR have superior advertising. (grin)

By Stewart W Frazier (Frazikar2) on Monday, May 30, 2011 - 08:42 am: Edit

A couple of other things about the light/medium photon, at that time, researchers may have found the 'sweet spot' for tuning the mediums before the lights (meaning the power needed for the lights was heavier [25-50%] than shown with the FRA) or that politics may have pushed those researchers into delivering the one weapons system they had better developed leaving the other to languish (or a combination) ...

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Monday, May 30, 2011 - 09:59 am: Edit

A thought, the same sort of politics that limited them to medium photons, (powerful senators district for production, contractor kick backs etc.) were at play on the Pl-Fs (throw in State Department meddling) Star Fleet may have been VERY unhappy with both decisions.

By Troy Latta (Saaur) on Monday, June 06, 2011 - 11:01 am: Edit

Played the first turn of the Andro vs RYN scenario "To Make a Stand" yesterday. Many mistakes were made, but much fun was had, and we learned that our group isn't familiar enough with either race to play a scenario that big.
It was well worth it, though, if for no other reason than to get to the part right after EA when you announce unpowered shields, and everyone at the table raised his hand.

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Saturday, June 18, 2011 - 11:05 am: Edit

i like the Ryn, the main thing with them is they have TEMs for combat and the TCBs on the ship are mainly for if someone gets to close, the andros are really fun too.

By james lee boyce II (Postalpanzer) on Friday, July 01, 2011 - 02:10 pm: Edit

someone wrote "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."

I think the alunda play more like hydrans that only need to get to range 2. If one ends its turn at that range to you and you have not done significant damage to it you are toasties. Even if it fires late in the turn at you at range 2 doing alot of damage it can take the whallop you give it before the weapons recycle up since any BB hit can be taken on one out of arc and it doesnt lose capacitor energy to arm any of the other BB's it has and can use the ARF to keep you in kill range when they do cycle up pump 4 into every BB in arc and crush you

By Andy Vancil (Andy) on Friday, July 01, 2011 - 02:45 pm: Edit

Ideally, the Alunda get close and deliver their wallop. But like the Hydrans, they can function OK if their opponent is trying hard to stay away from them. And most importantly, they don't have to base their EA on a guess as to whether their opponent will close or keep the range open; either way they are ready.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, July 01, 2011 - 02:54 pm: Edit

They are actually reasonably effective at R7--the 4 point BBs hit on 7's (i.e. about 60% of the time) for 10 damage. Which is pretty good at that range, if you want to avoid getting close (say, against someone who is launching plasma at you that you can't just eat and mangle them). At R4, Bio Bolts become downright scary. Getting to R2 is nice and all if you can get there without getting beat up too much, but that is generally unnecessary. Get to R4 (or R7 if you can't get R4 due to seeking weapons or whatever) and shoot as many guns as you can afford. You'll do a lot of damage very consistently. Then run away to cool off, using the ARF to keep your opponent from getting too close.

Another thing that the Alunda has going for it is that in one of those situations where it wants to move speed 31 all turn to chase someone down (possibly pulling them in with an ARF if needed), it can leave the capacitor completely empty (assuming it used all the power on the previous turn). If you can catch someone at R2 as they are running, 5 battery power through the .5 power Bio Bolts at R2 translates into 30 damage (if you have 10xBB to use. If you only have 8, it tops out at 26 damage, which still takes down most flank shields). Which is a down flank shield most of the time, which you can follow up with Plasma Whips through the hole. Without actually arming any weapons during EA.

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Monday, July 04, 2011 - 09:58 pm: Edit

im looking through the Biolectric Bolts rule (you guys got me thinking about the alunda) not sure if SPP knows this/cares but there is a typo on OE10.14. it says "Bbiolectric bolts

By Troy Latta (Saaur) on Tuesday, July 05, 2011 - 10:12 am: Edit

Alex: What version of the rules are you looking at?

By David Young (Semperatis) on Wednesday, July 06, 2011 - 06:58 pm: Edit

Is there a list of ship names for the FRA anywhere?

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Wednesday, July 06, 2011 - 07:35 pm: Edit

There are a number of Auroran ships named in the three scenarios looking at the Trobrin trouble in Y149 (Encounter at Aurora, Defying Destiny, First Battle of Aurora):

CLA: Berlin
CVS: Typhoon
CL: Honor, Virtue, Andoria, Mars, (Leinster*)
FF: Guardian, Vindicator, Bremen, Lübeck
FFE: Hessen
FFS: Thompson
CR: Throne of Ozymondas


*The Leinster left Aurora to try and go back to the Federation; it may or may not have been turned into an Auroran CL (as opposed to a Star Fleet CL) before it set off in Y132.

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Thursday, July 07, 2011 - 06:38 pm: Edit

troy im looking at the copywright 2007

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Saturday, July 16, 2011 - 01:37 am: Edit

Hiver Mental Nodes:
the mental nodes can be used to generate ECCM to the node group, does the node ship generate this as well... IE DNH (node carrier) is commanding a CA and a CLJ along with all thier fighters (3 node spaces)if it puts 6 ECCM into the hive mind does the DNH benefit?

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Wednesday, July 20, 2011 - 01:53 pm: Edit

Loriyill Fire Balls
(OE9.352)says that overloaded fireball internals are resolved "simultaneously" as its own volley, does this mean each facing is the same volley?

By A. David Merritt (Adm) on Wednesday, July 20, 2011 - 02:12 pm: Edit

Alex, both of your last two posts should have been in Omega Q&A. You might repost them there.

http://www.starfleetgames.com/discus/messages/12031/132.html?1310304527

By james lee boyce II (Postalpanzer) on Thursday, July 21, 2011 - 02:01 pm: Edit

since the upgrade to have new ships that can go speed 30 has not happened yet, I am suggesting a completely different way to go. Instead of adding warp say a new type of impulse engine technology is developed that produces 2 energy instead of one (high output impulse). This will bring the power levels up but still keep the flavor that a frigate or DD can go faster than a CA. Obviously some races will not get this technology the Clorophons and the Sigviron since they have a huge amount of impulse, and the Alunda since their impulse really isnt impulse. With this idea new SSDs for new ships dont need to be made a refit with a bpv cost could upgrade impulse to high output impulse.

By Alex Lyons (Afwholf) on Thursday, July 21, 2011 - 05:22 pm: Edit

Looking over the Warp refitted Alpha ships, it appears that each warp box costs 2 BPV so a new erratta could just be added that you can buy new warp 2BPV each up to speed 30 (or to balance engines)

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 01:30 am: Edit

Bear in mind there is a look at a couple of speed-30 Vari ships in Captain's Log #23; the Command Cruiser and Wing Cruiser.

One thing that is interesting to note is that the background for these ships (which is also noted in the Vari R-section of the Omega Master Rulebook) implies that the Vari, at least, were not in a position to simply upgrade the warp engines in their older cruisers; that they had to build brand new ships from the keel up to handle combat at higher tactical warp speeds (and more importantly, could do so without completely sacrificing the power they needed to actually fight).


Kind of like a less drastic version of what happened in the LMC with the Middle Years Eneen. Their CL was a refit of an Early Years design, but is not able to have its warp engine upgraded to modern standards. (In contrast, their Baduvai rivals could simply remove the warp pylons on their older ships and replace them with more powerful ones). They had to go back to the drawing board entirely when eventually fielding the speed-30 NCL; though they were able to convert their surviving CLs into monitors (where speed was less of an issue in any event).


When it comes to the Omega Octant, I like the idea of dividing the various fleets into those which were able to upgrade the engines on pre-esisting cruisers to let them go speed-30, and those which had engineering constraints that forced them to build brand new hulls.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 08:55 am: Edit

I'm sure that speed 30 Omega ships will show up eventually. I mean, sure, a late war Omega expansion probably wouldn't be *that* exciting, whole product wise, but with a handful of late war, speed 30 ships (for the empires that still exist at that point...) and maybe some new minor technology for everyone, and you got a reasonably low effort product that wouldn't be too difficult to put together.

They could bundle it together with Omega X ships, but as that would require a lot more stuff (i.e. having both X ship SSDs and speed 30 ship SSDs would be an awful lot of stuff in one book), probably best to just work with late war ships, maybe some upgraded/improved late war technology for various empires (although I can't imagine what that might be--maybe some slightly better versions of phasers for a bunch of the empires that could use that; things like that), and call it even. I'd buy that.

By james lee boyce II (Postalpanzer) on Friday, July 22, 2011 - 12:15 pm: Edit

On another note dont the Probyr need a secondary weapon. Every race seems to have its phasers, a torp, and another goody, but it seems that the Probyr are just a torp and phasers the TA is just an extended function of their torps. Maybe some kind of new wings that add something to make playing them a little more exciting.