Archive through February 03, 2003
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: SFB Proposals Board:
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X2 Shields:
Archive through February 03, 2003
I remember a lot of talk about beefing up starship shielding on the old X-threads, and the topic's been touched on here and there in the new X-threads, but not fully flushed out to the best of my knowledge.
I have created this thread the possible discussion of different types of shielding and operative modes for shields to accentuate the difference in defensive technology for the newer starships.
Crud, what I meant to say is; "I have created this thread FOR the possible discussion of different types of shielding and/or operative modes for shields to accentuuate the difference in defensive technology for newer starships.
Sorry about that 
So, does onyone remember my "metal" shields proposal? In simple terms it's Car Wars "metal armor" from over a decade ago. In short there's an inner and outer layer of shielding. The outer layer cannot be destroyed unless certain criteria is met, and essentially filters out so many points of damage before hits are scored on a starship's normal ablative shielding.
My proposal is for such a shield system which I guess I'll designate as "hard" shielding (denoting a type of hard shell around the ship). An outer layer of so many boxes (perhaps 10 for DNs, 7 for cruisers, and so on? I don't really know) that is generated by a powerplant inside the starship. Upon receiving a volley of damage, the first X-number of damage points are absobed/filtered-out by the outer hard shield before being applied to the inner shielding.
The outer shield is destroyed only when the powerplant inside is destroyed (destroyed on drone hits? Again, I'm not sure).
Too fancy? Too corny? Not big enough? Thoughts? Different concepts, anyone?
Off to do yard work....
Potentially unbalancing relative to X1 and GW tech.
How so?
Back to pulling weeds.
A system that absorbs 10 points per volley would make saber-dancing almost impossible, and would render the X0 drone totally obselete.
Would the hard shield regenerate even if the normal shield is down?
Listening to the NASA briefing here ... then I'll head back out to the backyard.
Jeff; that's a good point, assuming the weapons' tables stay the same. If they evolve, or alter in some other form, then it might not be that drastic. How about a different permutation of the technology?
In any event what's the alternative?
Maybe shields could be "tuned" to specific weapons?
(NASA briefing isn't holding my attention...best wait for the full story....heading back outside)
Even if we adjust the X2 ship's offenses for this new gizmo, that leaves the X2 vs. X1 mismatch.
What if different races got different variations?
Klingons need to defend against big Kzinti drone strikes and big Fed photons. So they would be interested in something that could stop say 7-10 points per volley.
Hydrans need to defend against Klingon disruptors and Lyran ESGs, but already have close range covered. So they might be interested in something that stops 1-2 points per weapon.
Not that I like the idea of armored shields, since it eliminates a captain's problems for him and acts a lot like regenerative shields, but just a thought.
Good points. I hadn't really thought of that.
I may have told this story before, but heck I'll tell it again anyway. Years back (high school?) I went to Pacificon in what was then the Dunfy Hotel off 101 in San Mateo. That's when gaming was at an all time high. SFB was huge. There weren't enough rooms so people were playing games out in the halls.
Anyway, one SFB game had homemade ships. One of the ships had a huge rotating shield instead of six smaller shields. I'm not exactly clear on how it worked, but I think the shield would face the ship's vulnerable side as the owner flew his vessel around the map.
From that concept I thought about different types of shields, and thought about something that was "reflective" in nature (not unlike Omega Fae fire shields). From that idea I thought about something that would always be on, but would only stop a certain amount of damage before letting the rest pass through to the "inner" shields. And before I could submit the idea Car Wars Tanks hit the market with "metal armor" 
Ah well. I figured this was my big chance to tell my disgruntled SFB-invention from years gone by, and mayhap reintroduce it.
But to the point. How about if these things can only stop certain types of weapons, and not transporters? That is a hard/armored shield tuned to say "phasers" stops X-number of damage points from phasers, but all other weapons pass through it like it wasn't there at all.
Neat? Dumb? Too cool? Just brainstorming here.
Maybe if it covered one arc, and had to be pointed like a turret?
Have shields that distribute damage that they are being hit with to ajoining shields. 60% damage to the shield being hit. An 20% to each of the ajoining shields. If the damage taken on the ajoing shield is greater than it is, the damage is applied to the shield being hit after the ajoining shield has been reduced to zero.
2 to 1 direct reinforcemet.
1 to 1 general reinforcement.
The subspace field generated by 2X ships has a disruptive effect on disrupters,plasma bolts,phasers,and TR beams,and any other weapon using subspace or phased energy ect. These weapons would have their damage effect shift one column to the right when appling damage. If shifted of the chart a -1 would be applied to the damage roll.
Shannon,
That is too unbalancing vs Non-X ships who cannot generate the EW to counter the -1.
The trouble with following the Andro lead.
5 point BTTYs, and damage shunting, is that we get ships that like the Andros have powerful defensive capasities such that they can not be defeated by GW ships.
Let's stay away from the damage shunting.
Which begs the question of how balanced do things need to be against non-X ships?
"huge rotating shield"
It was a Juggernaught, Captain's Log #1.
Ahhh, yes the 359° sheild with 0.1 points of power per point of damage it'ld stop each turn.
Tos, I don't know that it was the Juggernaut, but I know it was a homebrew vessel drawn on graph paper. I wish I could remember more.
Quote:Which begs the question of how balanced do things need to be against non-X ships?
That goes back to the BPV arguement.
At 300 BPV, I should be able to take 2 Y180 CAs and fight with even chances against 1 Y205 X2 CA. Which means a crippled X2, and either (one dead D7 and one D7 with shield damage), or (2 crippled D7s), is a draw.
Quote:The trouble with following the Andro lead.
5 point BTTYs, and damage shunting, is that we get ships that like the Andros have powerful defensive capasities such that they can not be defeated by GW ships.
Let's stay away from the damage shunting.
I agree. Look how much the Krait had to be weakened to prevent it from overpowering the rest of the field. Let's avoid anything that looks like a PA panel.
Geroge,
Balance isn't the issue so much as equality of BPV. As long as 500 BPV of General War-era ships have a 50-50 shot of beating 500 BPV of X2, we're good.
You are distribting damage,not storing it like the Andros. Also the Andros could clear their panels and convert the damage to power, shields have to be rebuilt. An the were the only ones that could do that This makes a shield more resistant to large Alpha strikes, but not pounding matchs. More like combat with early and mid years ships. Part of the idea of 2x ships was to give the game a different flavor of play. Have play have to develope different types of tactics to counter the changes their enemies have made. Not just slap a neew a improved label on a face lift product, that was the old X2.
As for balancing ship that going to be a tough one. The ablities of the different generations of ship will make that near impossible. How many predreadnoughts does it take to have a fair fight with WWII Iowa class battleship. Thats 0X to 2X. Now a Iron Duke class with a couple of its bubbies might just might do the job. Thats non- full up graded X1 compared to 2X.
And giving every race the ability to shunt 20% ( 8, 10 or 12 points of damage depending on who's X2 we use ) of your obliqued #2 shield damage to the #3 shield where it'll very likely never be meaningful...will do what to racial flavour?
If you want to have ships that can smuggle damage to other shields, then fly an X2 Andro! I'm sure at least a conjectual one will apear in a CL sometime.
Welp, my take is I think an X2 ship aught to be able to manhandle a non-X ship of the same class with relative ease.
Damage distribution is interesting, and I think adds a much different dimension to the game, so to speak. I think it's different from the Andro because the damage to the shields is still there, and can't really be converted into useful energy.
I think the same goes for my hard shield proposal, but I won't defend it beyond giving it my personal thumbs up
John; 500-X verse 500-non-X, I totally agree. Which is why I suggested a low number for the hard shield. 10 points of damage is hard to muster for some ships to deliver to a target, while it's a pittance for others. Perhaps the only way to evaluate it is to test it.
It could be that an XCA is a 600 BPV thing, where a regular CA is still in the 150 range. Same hull spaces, perhaps a few more weapons here and there, but its inherent abilities allow it to carve circles around a regular CA, and blast it to smithereens. This could be partially reflected in the defensive technology. I don't really know, I'm just tossing out ideas.
MJC it makes smaller ships harder to be over run by large ships in a single turn. For example take a destroyer with 6 26pt shields. Change the shield arrangement to 30-27-24-24. With spreading the damage it would take 50pts of damage to take down the shield. You would have a ship with 0-15-24-24 instead of crippled 0-27-24-24. Also these are shields not panels. You have to rebuild them like any other shield.
Has anyone considered combining shield and PA panel technology?
Perhaps X2 ships could have both PA panels and shields. Damage that leaks through shields could then get absorbed by panels, or vice versa. Alternatively, the X2 ship captain could have the option of taking damage on panels or shields, up to their capacities.
I'm not suggesting full-strength, Andro-style PA panels. The X2 panels would have to be pretty limited to keep the X2 ships from having a ridiculous advantage over older ships; maybe 5 or 10 points per shield facing. The X2 ships might have a lower rate of energy transfer/dissapation than the Andro panels.
There is a certain logic for the X2 ships having this technology. The Galactic races would undoubtedly learn SOMETHING from the Andromedan ships they fought during the Invasion. Certainly, with data on hundreds of battles against Andro ships (and it's hard to imagine that there wouldn't be at least one captured sample of Andro PA panels), the Galatics should be able to make some sense of it after 15 or 20 years of study. They might not fully understand it, but figure out just enough to use some Andro technology in a limited fashion.
This would give X2 ships a decidedly different flavor in combat, and would require reconsideration of many tactics used against older ships.
Quote:MJC it makes smaller ships harder to be over run by large ships in a single turn. For example take a destroyer with 6 26pt shields. Change the shield arrangement to 30-27-24-24. With spreading the damage it would take 50pts of damage to take down the shield. You would have a ship with 0-15-24-24 instead of crippled 0-27-24-24. Also these are shields not panels. You have to rebuild them like any other shield.
There are three ways a Andro can deal with Damage to the PA pannels.
• Shunt the damage to the BTTYs.
• Drop the PA pannel and clear it.
• Shunt the damage to a different ( read rear ) PA pannel.
Taking 1 of the three still makes the ship too much like an Andro.
Quote:Has anyone considered combining shield and PA panel technology?
It's been put forward before...
Let's just make the only Andro tech to get used by other races to be 5 Point BTTYs and leave it at that.