Archive through January 15, 2003
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: SFB Proposals Board:
The "X" Files:
OLD X2 FOLDER:
X2 plasma:
Archive through January 15, 2003
I'm not a fan of rules that target older tech to make it less effective.
why not? Just curious......I see no particular reason that bigger guns/shields/engines means better tech.....often better technology means simply being unaffected by older technology. A World War I tank will never pierce the armor of an Abrams.
Your example does very will to illustrate my point.
The first tanks were mobile, armored machine gun nests. Naturally something like that would just be a target for a M1A1 Abrams.
On the other hand, if such a tank came upon a modern group of soldiers (and they didn't have anti-tank weaponry handy), they might have just as big a problem on their hands as their WWI great-gransfathers.
My point is that a WWI tank's machine guns still work and would still do very well at machine gun sorts of jobs. The capability of the WWI tank hasn't changed, but a M1A1 has much better armor, much better weapons and is faster. The M1A1 does not destroy the ability of the WWI tank to function.
X2 should be the same. Your suggestions amount to X2 destroying the ability of GW tech to function.
John T. Well said.
To use your analogy, a modern infantry platoon would also have little trouble taking out a WWI tank........They would not be affected the same way a WWI infantry unit would be affected......the old technology just isn't anywhere near as affective against modern units as it was against old units.
As for the "if they didn't have any anti-tank weapons" that's like saying,
"well if your X2 ship didn't have any of it's X2 defences then it would be affected just like a GW ship"........well yeah.......
Actually, you're both right. The advances made in military technology have always been done so with an eye toward making the other guys equipment obsolete. Take the tank argument. The US used the M60 series tanks for years as a defensive tank. It had a decent gun and good fire control, but it couldn't take a hit from a Soviet tank...it didn't have the armor for it. So, along comes the M1 series. This tank CAN take a hit from a Soviet tank, and is also faster and can fire on the move. We made those changes specifically to counter the Soviet tank design and doctrine. In short, we did make changes to make someone elses technology and tactics obsolete, somewhat as Darin suggests.
However, I don't think that in SFB making GW era weapons less effective against a 2X ship is the right answer. A 2X ship, if properly designed, will be resistant to GW weapons by its nature. It'll likely be faster, tougher, and have better reach and accuracy than a GW ship will. So, while a GW ship can still hurt a 2X ship, it will have to work harder for it.
Exactly. We make stuff obsolete by creating effective combat-based counter-meastures.
Darin,
Your idea for plasmas to lose tracking on X2 ships is the equivalent to having a device that can make a tank's gun jam on command or burn out a shell's fuse while in flight.
Not the sme thing at all as developing a bazooka.
Besides, what's the point in X2 making X0 obsolete? If you want a completely separate game, go and play Full Thrust or Delta V.
X2 will by its very nature wipe the floor with X0 on ground of its own choosing, but it'll be able do that with just the evolutionary changes you'd expect. For example, the XCA could be immune to the GW CA by blowing its doors off at R10 and turning away before the CA gets to overload range, and then doing it again. There's no need for any artificial impositions making something obsolete.
We have a number of times developed active defences or devices to make enemy weapons less effective.
Chaff and flares for planes.
Aegis systems for naval vessels.
Smoke to mask tanks.
All three of these advances retard the effectiveness of enemy weapons.
I knew my ideas would be a hard sell. Everyone wants new rules, new weapons with bigger numbers and more of everything......but I believe that way leads to madness.
Back on topic...
X1 plasma is already better at bolting than non-X plasma, simply due to the larger warheads. (2M+2S has a warhead of 140 at 10 hexes, compared to just 90 for the 2S+2F of the non-X plasma CA's). If it can get a positive EW shift, 70 points that hits on 1-4 at ten hexes is a pretty decent alpha.
Balancing X2 plasma races against things other than X2 ships is going to be hard - as a seeking weapon, it's effectiveness varies far more dramatically with enemy abilities than direct fire does. Do people want X2 to be a fleet wide upgrade (like going from W era to Y era ships) or a few elite units (like X1)?
Darin,
Sure, and SFB has chaff for fighters, ADDs and cloaks, which are rough equivalents to your RW examples.
But they're usually an active countermeasure that has a cost of some sort associated with it, rather than a passive, no-cost counter-measure that arbitrarily says, "plasmas can't maintian a lockon to X2 ships."
Andrew: My vote is fleetwide
Fleet wide.
I all depends on the history. The old Supplement 2 history had the GW era big ships held up in a stasis field orbiting Organia and the few that were allowed were to be "Gems". This could change and X1 ships might well be still flying about. It could be that the Organians feeling poorly for not seeing the Andromedan Invasion did see something terrible comming so they widened the neutral zones and let the Empires have substantial fleets. Patrols could only be groups of three or less and only so many ships could be on patrol at one time. The Trade Wars are basically the same but over less systems (neutral zones would be six or seven wide instead of the majority of Alpha).
The History has much to do with how things will fit but this one is more open than before while still keeping the flavor of before AND preparing for the Xorks. When they arive the Organians just leave altogether, never to be heard from again. 
For those worried that GW plasma is overly dangerous to X ships, I can assure you that it's not the case. I'm not sure if the topic is still on this site, but some time back I posted a few battle reports between a Fed X1 squadron and a non-X Rom force with Sabot torps of around 50% more BPV, fought with EW on a floating map. The Feds won easily, it was like shooting fish in a barrel.
I vote we dump Supplement 2 history and create something rational that fits our design. If they overlap that's fine, but I don't want to be tied to the history of a failed product.
X1 ships are generally limited to 10% of a fleet for various reasons. X2 ships are, IMO, the fleet replacement of the old X0 ships.
X2 replaces X0, it need not immediately replace X1. In my world these X2 ships complement the X1 ships, they do not replace them. X1 was designed as command ships during the GW and in the X2 era I would like them to stay that way, at least until all the X0 ships are replaced or a war starts.
I vote we dump Supplement 2 also.
The SFU history has changed significantly since it came out.
While I basically agree with your post Tos and John there are a few things that are from supplement two that have carried over. The will be (as per SVC) something called the Trade Wars at time mentioned in the published history. He did say, however, what that will be is not known at this time. Also, there is a lot of stuff being argued that is already in Module X. I've been working on a review and list of repeats but I've both been sick and busy. I half done. I'm trying to be accurate.
Sure,
but let's base our X2 on the current SFU first. If some of the SFU is drawn from Old X2, fine. We're in no position to edit the SFU.
But let's use the stuff in its SFU contenxt, not its Old X2 context.
Of course. And the Xorks must be considered in that there must be a powerful fighting force to survive a powerful foe. X2 can not be designed to battle the Xorks but the final design must be capable of fighting them. The task is more dificult because we have no idea what they will be like except they will be a powerful major threat.
We must design for the logical progression of the established SFU wile keeping the Xork invasion in mind.
If fact, it is the Xork invasion that is the center piece for the change in the history I presented. That the Organians attitude was different for not foreseeing the Andros and seeing the Xorks comming. They don't lock up the old fleets and know the Alpha sector must be prepared with out actually telling them about the Xorks. If they did the races might make war for a final grab before preparing for the comming invasion. They set wide neutral zones and the Trade Wars (but not as wide as Supp. 2) and X2 happens. Access is limited by number of ships and tonnage so kilogram for kilogram the new ships are built faster and much more powerful.
The new technologies just become standard when the Xorks arive and the Organians leave, never to be heard from again!
Just as the first reports start to appear about a powerful new threat the last Oranian appears to the Leaders of each of the races: "They are the Xorkellians. They come from a vast Empire. Their resources are not limited like the Dark Ones were. They are many. They are comming. Prepare your selves, together you may stand...without us."
He disappears in a blinding light and is gone.
...or the organians get off their butts and lend a hand. Maybe their influence is what keeps the Xorks managable.
If they made mistakes that cost the Alpha Sector lives, they might feel they owe us one...
New Plasma type: Cannister Plasma
The ISC found the defense of its echelon formations hampered by the slow recycle time of the plasma torpedo. ISC engineers figured out how to expand the plasma-D cannister system to larger plasma torpedoes. Unfortunately, the type-M and R torpedoes proved too large to cannister so the ISC reverted to the S-torp as the basis of its heavy plasma.
Each plasma torp carries with it 2 ammunition cannisters and may launch one cannister per turn. Unlike the D-torp that can be activated well in advance of launch, the larger plasma cannisters cannot. On a turn when an ISC ship chooses to activate a cannister, it must pay energy equal to the final turn of arming for the plasma stored in the cannister. This energy may be paid during EA or come from reserve power.
A cannister plasma launcher may still arm plasma normally. Cannister lauchers at WS2 or 3 can have "one in the chamber" as well as both cannisters charged and available for use.
If the plasma is unfired at the end of the turn, it may be held as a normal plasma of its type orsent to any open cannister attached to the launcher. Sending a plasma to a cannister which shows up on enemy sensors similar to a warhead ejection. A plasma that is sent to a cannister must wait 32 impulses before it may be activated again.
A cannister plasma may be shotgunned or enveloped by paying the appriate energy cost at cannister activation. An enveloped or shotgunned plasma may be pulled back into a cannister, but the cannister cannot handle the added energy and it is ejected. The greater energy is noticable on enemy sensors. An enveloping plasma pulled into a cannister simply recharges the cannister. The enveloping or shotgun propety is lost. When activated again, the torp would need to be shotgunned or enveloped from scratch.
Empty cannisters are recharged by arming plasma in the launch tube and then sending the warhead to a cannister.
Empty cannisters can be charged with a downgunned warhead, but the normal limits and conditions of a downgunned warhead apply to the activated cannister. A S-cannister holding a G-torp could activate it and envelop it as a G, shotgun it as a G or finish arming as a S. It could not shotgun or envelop the torp as a S. The ISC ship could complete the G as a S, return the torp to the cannister and then shotgun/envelop it as a S.
It is an open question whether ISC cannister plasma can use other X2 advantages. I consider it a playtest question, but my feel is probably not. This is a pretty powerful weapon...while the cannisters last.
New Gorn Plasma: Photon Plasma
Gorn Engineers succeeded in injecting a standard photon torpedo into the center of a plasma torpedo, lending added punch. A ship may allocate up to 4 points of warp power over the arming and holding turns of a given plasma torp to create the photon warhead. Regardless of the size, holding a photon warhead costs 1 additional point of power from any source.
The damage from the photon warhead is 2x the warp power allocated +2, making a maximum of 10.
the photon warhead automatically self-destructs when the last point of plasma warhead strength is lost, whether by phaser or dissipation.
When a photon plasma impacts a shield, the photon damage is resolved as a separate volley.
If a photon plasma is bolted, the entire photon warhead is added to the bolt damage. It is not halved as the warhead strength is.
A photon plasma may be hasty-repaired as a normal plasma of its type or smaller. It may not be repaired as any kind of photon torp. The photon feature may only be repaired if the launcher is completely repaired.
This plasma could also benefit from shroud technology.
I like all of it except the "resolved as a seperate volley". That would be way too much of a boost. Also, I would make the added damage from photon be just 2x the power. Regualr photons do not get a +2, so there's really not a reason why this should. Also, minimum G type torpedo. Adding this to an L or F would be very very much to powerful.
Remove the 2x the power and it looks good as a deault minimum damage a torp will do. Remove shrowd. I like it.
oops, x2, I thought it was Gorn Gizmos.