I think I will be getting sfbol soon and will be playing omega TC s. But would like someone to teach me how to use the program. I have a couple of play balance suggestions especially about the kolighar. VS plasma maybe a lowering of the ability to phases down plasma that doesn't involve complex math is 1/2 rounded up plus one vs alpha only plasma omega plasma regular rules. And for the kzinti a rather different take is a new drone type that takes 5 to kill with say an 8 point or 10 point warhead. Note this technology is develiped only for use against pm phaser races

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Wednesday, August 17, 2011 - 08:42 pm: Edit

James wrote:
>>I think I will be getting sfbol soon and will be playing omega TC s. But would like someone to teach me how to use the program.>>

It is really pretty intuitive these days. Just log on, ask for someone to walk you through the interface for a few minutes, and you'll be ok.

>> I have a couple of play balance suggestions especially about the kolighar. VS plasma maybe a lowering of the ability to phases down plasma that doesn't involve complex math is 1/2 rounded up plus one vs alpha only plasma omega plasma regular rules.>>

The designers have made it very clear that they aren't willing to change rules for the Omega TCs, so to make the Koligahr work, we have been going through a lot of bending over backwards weapon layout shenanagins. Some of which kind of work ok.

>>And for the kzinti a rather different take is a new drone type that takes 5 to kill with say an 8 point or 10 point warhead. Note this technology is develiped only for use against pm phaser races>>

Yeah, things like that will sadly never actually fly. So the Koligahr has a lot of weird weapon configurations to try and make it balance out.

By james lee boyce II (Postalpanzer) on Thursday, August 18, 2011 - 07:45 am: Edit

So if no rules can be changed the best way I see is to make half of its phasers a different omega type like the loriyill

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Thursday, August 18, 2011 - 08:20 am: Edit

I think the current Koligahr TC has, like, 4xMP1 and 4xMP3 in weird arcs, and 5xACs. I think it works ok.

By David Zimdars (Zimdarsdavid) on Thursday, August 18, 2011 - 04:03 pm: Edit

I smooshed Barry Kirk's Gorn in a playtest Koligahr at Origins. It is murder to plasma.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Thursday, August 18, 2011 - 06:06 pm: Edit

Assuming it is the last one I saw (5xAC, 4xMP1, 4xMP3), I think the only good option for big plasma is to just anchor it and hit it with 100 points at once. Yeah, it can shoot the plasma a lot, but every phaser hitting the plasma is not hitting you, and it is still going to take 60-70 points of damage or so, followed by phasers.

By David Zimdars (Zimdarsdavid) on Thursday, August 18, 2011 - 11:52 pm: Edit

The Gorn was slowly eaten away by the antimatter clouds. He didnt close enough for an anchor. Once he had paper shields, he was eaten out by caseless.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Friday, August 19, 2011 - 09:29 am: Edit

Yeah, that is not a good way for a Gorn to play that game. I mean, to be fair, the Gorn is already kinda fighting an uphill battle due to the MPs, but the ship is kinda slow (relative to an armed Gorn) and has a heavy alpha, like the Fed, and really, the best plan is just anchor it, I'd imagine.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Sunday, August 21, 2011 - 02:59 pm: Edit

That probably would have been a better way to play it. Go for the anchor.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, August 21, 2011 - 03:07 pm: Edit

Yeah, I think launching torps piecemeal at the Koligahr is totally playing to whatever strengths it has--more ACG shots (which add up in the long run), easier to shoot down 1 torp at a time with the super effective MPs.

The Koligahr (even the kooky 5xAC, 4xMP1, 4xMP3 version) is very akin to the Fed in that it has a powerful close range alpha strike with reasonably power hungry weapons. Either, like, launching an enveloper to make it turn off (would it even turn off from an enveloper?) and chasing it for an anchor or just running it down, torpedoes be •••••• and trying to anchor it is likely the only thing a plasma ship can do against it.

By David Zimdars (Zimdarsdavid) on Monday, August 22, 2011 - 12:34 pm: Edit

BTW, Barry spanked me pretty hard later on in a his KLI to my FED.

By Gary Carney (Nerroth) on Saturday, August 27, 2011 - 01:40 pm: Edit

To go back (way back...) over to the FRA for a second; if there were to be a tournament version of the BC, should it have access to any shuttle bombs, or should it make do with regular shuttles?

(The historical BC has two small bays on the sides, specifically to allow for the use of more shuttle bombs. I was thinking that the aft bay could be left for regular shuttles; and if the ship were to be given shuttle bombs, have them be carried in the port and starboard bays instead.)

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Saturday, August 27, 2011 - 02:19 pm: Edit

Gary Carney:

Unanswerable question.

You are requiring decisions to be made NOW on something that is in the future and would in part be determined by playtesting.

There is zero need for a commitment one way or the other at this time.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 01:31 pm: Edit

Bill and I had a playtest game with the Peladine Republic Tournament cruiser yesterday. I took the Peladine TC and Bill took the Wyn Aux Box with the options Hellbore, Hellbore, Disruptor, Disruptor.

To be fair, Bill has not played a game of SFB in about 16 years, so he was a bit rusty. Also his dice rolls were not the greatest.

This is from memory, so I may have gotten stuff wrong

Turn 1

I plotted speed 17 for the turn. Can't remember Bill's exact speed. I EPTd both plasma Gs and headed direction A. Bill turned right and headed direction E, although he quickly turned to D.

About impulse 4 or so, I launched the scatter pack with 1 Type IF, 3 Type IM, and one 1 Type IVM in it.

Any case at some point I batteried up my speed to 30 and Bill also accelerated up to speed 30.

At some point Bill launched 4 drones all targeted on the medium speed drones of my scatter pack. He also launched both suicide shuttles which I ignored, since I was going fast enough to simply evade them.

Also, Bill continued to turn to C and than to B and than to A.

I Turned at some point to F and than back to A.

Bill managed to fire both disruptors at me, one hit, and an overload and standard hellbore in direct fire mode, both hit. He did manage to do some minor damage to my #1 shield and about 15 points total to my #2 shield.

I passed within one hex of Bill's drones, and labbed them all succesfully. After labbing the drones, I fired one P3 at each. One each of the RX P2 fired as a P3 and one of the P1 360 as a P3.

This killed 3 of the 4 drones.

At this point I dropped tracking my SP drone that still had one of Bill's drones still targeted on it. This freed up a control channel, only four in use at that point, so that on impulse 32, I could launch both plasma G EPT at Bill.

Turn 2,

I started the turn with 9 points left in my phaser cap, about 2 points still in my batteries and
I plotted speed 25 with a slow down to speed 17 later in the turn. Bill plotted speed 30 the whole turn.

Early in the turn, Bill launched four drones at me. Do to mistiming those drones, I ended up having to tractor two of them and phaser down the other two. I fired 4 P2 downfired as P3s at the drones to guarantee killing them. Bill headed in direction A and than direction F towards the north wall with me and the plasmas in hot pursuit.

At about impulse 8 or so, Bill phasered down my fast drone from the scatter pack. He also got some phaser shots and a disruptor on my weakened #2 shield reducing it to two boxes. I managed to close to range 3 and launched with him dead ahead and not far from the North West corner, so I launched both of the plasma Fs at him. At some point, my plasma Gs finally caught him, doing a total of 40 points.

I than proceded to fire 2 P2 and 2 P1 at him taking down his #4 shield and a couple of internals. I also launched two drones at him. A type IF and a type IVF.

After looking at the range at this point, range 5. I noticed that all he had left were a pair of P3 and he had a down shield facing me. So, I dropped my #5 shield and sent over 4 boarding parties. My dice were super hot, and I took out both of his tractor beams with hit and run raids.

At some point, I came close enough to the North wall that I pushed his two tractored drones into the wall killing them.

Late in the turn, Bill launched his two remaining shuttles.

Late in the turn, my plasma Fs caught him up against the West wall and did 30 total damage. It took down his #5 shield and did about 13 points in. One of those points was a drone rack.

My fast drones had almost caught up to Bill and on impulse 32 he fired both his remaining P3 at the drones. The Type IV drone survived.

Turn 3, Bill was screwed, he started the turn with a Type IVF drone one hex away from a down shield.

Any case, my phaser caps were all but empty. My batteries were all but empty. And I was about 9 hexes in direction A from him facing E. Bill was facing direction D.

I plotted speed 14, charging up my phasers, batteries, plasmas, and put two points into tractors. Bill started by TACing with a speed change to four.

Impulse one my type IVF hit Bill and did some substantial damage including it hit another drone rack.

Bill launched two drones at my three remaining scatter pack drones which were closing in at that point.

As I passed his first shuttle, it fired at me doing 4 points to my #1 shield. I returned the favor by grabbing it in a tractor and death dragging it. I also did the same to his other manned shuttle as I passed it.

At some point I took care of his two drones, don't remember how.

Bill TACd first to C and than to B. At some point he accelerated to speed four and moved one hex in direction B which took him off the West wall. I managed to slip right up against the west wall and was now out of arc for his hellbores.

I used batteries at one point to accelerate a little bit, and Bill conceded at this point since I could reach range 2 off his down shield and at that point, I had a 11 phasers to hit him with, plus the two drones, plus any fast charge plasmas. And I could hit with the phasers at least before he could hit me with his hellbores. Asssuming I didn't continue to slip around and prevent him from getting the hellbore shot entirely.

At the point Bill conceded, I had not yet taken a single internal and Bill was pretty badly beaten up. He was also about to take 9 P2 and 2 P1 into a down shield at range 2.

Bill admitted that he was a bit rusty and had not played an optimal game. But, my feeling is that the Peladine TC is a bit on the powerful side.

To recap, it's armament is.

Two Plasma G FP
One Plasma F LP
One Plasma F RP
Two Drone-B racks
Two Phaser Is 360
Six Phaser IIs FA
Three Phaser IIs RX

It also has two points to spend on improved drones and a scatter pack.

One possible suggestion was the following. The phaser IIs are divided into 3 banks of 3 each. Two banks with FA arc, and one bank with an RX arc.

How about reducing one of the PIIs in each bank, total of three to P IIIs.

After which the armament would be...

Two Plasma G FP
One Plasma F LP
One Plasma F RP
Two Drone-B racks
Two Phaser Is 360
Four Phaser IIs FA
Two Phaser IIs RX
Two Phaser IIIs FA
One Phaser III RX

It also has two points to spend on improved drones and a scatter pack.


Any case... Questions? Comments?

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 01:40 pm: Edit

Well, having not actually seen the SSD yet, let alone seen it in play, looking at the armament, it does look a tad overgunned.

11x phasers is a lot of phasers. An 11 point capacitor is a lot of capacitor.

Having 2xG torps, 2xF torps, 2x drone racks and all those phasers is a lot already.

My initial suggestion would be remove the SP and the drone points (if the Shark doesn't get a SP and drone points, why would a Pelladine?) and see how it goes from there before messing with the guns on the ship.

By Ken Kazinski (Kjkazinski) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 06:06 pm: Edit

Peter,

The tournament cruiser is in E4.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 06:24 pm: Edit

Well, not having E4, that doesn't help much :-)

I'm sure I can download it off SFBOL.

By William T Wilson (Sheap) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 06:43 pm: Edit

It's not a Peladine if it isn't massively overpowered...

I agree with Peter, the ship shouldn't have a scatterpack or drone points. It is probably still too strong even without them. If you wanted to try to balance it by changing phasers, you would probably have to reduce the entire rear bank to P3 with RA arc.

Remember how strong the 10-phaser Seltorian was, and the Seltorian has/had lousy non-phaser weapons. The Peladine has 11 phasers, and great non-phaser weapons, plus the usual assortment of Peladine munchkinry. P2s are simply not that much worse than P1s, and a ship with that much seeking weapon firepower doesn't really need phasers anyway (see the Romulans).

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 07:17 pm: Edit

I would agree ditching the SP and the 2 drone points would help a lot.

The RX phasers are common to a lot of Peladine ships. So, I wouldn't make them RA.

That was one of the items I discussed with Bill was reducing the RX phasers to P3.

However, I was thinking more that spreading out the P3s would make more sense.

I would suggest either ( getting rid of the SP and the extra drone points ) or ( reducing some of the P2s to P3s )... however, I wouldn't like to do both at the same time.

As for the ship being on SFBOL... I don't think the TC is online yet... I haven't done a .def file for it. Although I'll go look for it.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 07:19 pm: Edit

Huh, yeah, now that I have seen that SSD, that ship is kind of nuts.

38 power is very standard, so that's reasonable.

14xC Hull and 8x Lab is pretty serious, internals wise.

It can fire all 11 phasers down the #2 and #6 shield hex rows. Which is also kind of crazy. Even with 9 of those 11 phasers being P2s, that is still kind of insane.

The Scatter Pack and 2 drone points are wildly excessive. Get rid of those. It might still be a bit overgunned even then. But I'd like to see how it works without the SP and the 2 drone points before pulling off phasers.

By William Stec (Billstec2) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 07:34 pm: Edit

Well it's good to know that my loss was not entirely due to sub-optimal play. The Pelandine seemed overly powerful, and it's good to see you guys agree.

By Barry Kirk (Barrykirk) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 08:07 pm: Edit

Sorry about that Bill... You don't play for 16 years and in your first game back... My playtest ship was way overpowered.

By William Stec (Billstec2) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 08:21 pm: Edit

That's the nature of playtesting. But it didn't scare me away at least.

By William T Wilson (Sheap) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 08:29 pm: Edit

Apparently the E4 version of the ship and the SFBOL version of the ship are the same.

The funny thing is the ship is actually toned down from what it is in the regular game (where it also has S-torps, 40 power and six shuttles with a balcony).

Although the SFBOL SSD actually has 38 power, it says 40 in the summary table, so either it was supposed to have or once had 40, or maybe it's just a mistake. In any case, 40 power is totally unnecessary on a ship with no direct-fire heavy weapons.

I agree that making the rear phasers RA only violates the traditional Peladine ship layout, but you've got to do something. You'd probably have to at minimum delete 2 of the wing phasers to get the firepower into the ballpark.

By Peter D Bakija (Bakija) on Sunday, September 11, 2011 - 09:09 pm: Edit

Yeah, my second thought (after immediately vaporizing the SP and drone points--how did that even make it onto the SSD?) is to make the wing phasers in groups of 2 instead of 3, so it has 4xP2 FA, 3xP2 RX, 2xP1 360. That is still 9 phasers, all of which can fire down the #2 and #6 hex rows. Which is very strong. But more reasonable.