Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board

Archive through April 27, 2003

Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: SFB Proposals Board: The "X" Files: OLD X2 FOLDER: X2 drones: Archive through April 27, 2003

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Wednesday, April 23, 2003 - 10:10 pm: Edit

...one reason why there's nobody calling for speed-40 drones.

And a reason why the answer should be "no" if someone does.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 04:58 am: Edit

I'ld like to see playtesting on that.

Speed 40 drones aren't much of a problem, because speed 40 plasma already exists.

Speed 40 drones are easy enough to kill with Ph-6 rapid pulses and they'll be so few and far between that GW ships will be able to destroy them with Ph-1 pairs without too much trouble.
It's the X1s that'll really suffer finding Rapid Pulsed Ph-3 shot less effective at R2 than one would hope.

And I think that's a good thing.

By Mike Dowd (Mike_Dowd) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 08:52 am: Edit

Well does anyone remember the "Boost Phase" proposal that wuld make a drone Spd 64 or 48 for the first 4 or so impulses, but introduce a myopic zone or no HETs because of it?

Whatever became of it, or was it relegated to the trash heap?

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 09:00 am: Edit

It was relegated to the trash heap most because rapid Pulses Ph-6 shots would allow the X2 ships to deal with the higher speed drones just before impact.

The GWs and X1s deal with the higher speed drones by the fact that they have a higher phaser to incomming drone ration than the X2 ships.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 12:11 pm: Edit

MJC: Wrong, it was not relegated to the trash heap at all. It's pretty presumptuous of you to say that of any proposal that is not yours. I'm the one who presented that idea and many people liked it but as with many other proposals it was talked about and then new ideas were raised. Almost none of the ideas presented have been trashed. They are one the record and don't need to be discussed to no end.

I have generally decided not to bander about with you and offered an olive branch to you a bit ago but speaking for others propsals is not acceptable to me at all. If you want to bring up the merrits or lack of merrits of a past proposal thats great. Go ahead. But, please do not presume to tell others my ideas have been relegated to the trash when they haven't. You may have done so with it but others and I haven't.
=================================
Mike Dowd: The Drone Booster Pack proposal is in the archives of either this thread or in the original X2 thread "MAJOR "X2 CHANGES..."

A sumation is that fighter booster packs (originally taked from old supplies) were modified and fitted to drones and boosted the speed of the drone for a number of impulses (4 or 8 depending on playtesting results). It is harder to hit but takes double damage while boosted. You are right that the drone cannot HET while boosted.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 12:30 pm: Edit

I think a drone booster module would be usefull, and may even be something we can apply to the various tech levels. For example, speed 64 for x-impulses for 2X. Then, speed 48 for x-impulses for 1 or 0X, to keep the 2X crowd from getting a total advantage. Make it a one-space module, maybe?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 01:26 pm: Edit

The original proposal was that it was a drive module upgrade (payloads were unchanged). It literally graphed onto the outside of the drone. One pack gave you 4 impulses and two packs gave you eight. When they burn out they jettison and the drone continues normally.

I was going to add a rule that said the boosted speed = drone speed x 1.5 because X-drones are variable speed. The problem is figuring when movement happens with all of the possible speed choices. It is easier to say that the Booster overdrives the drone motor to the max and only opperates at 48. That way you move one hex then two then one. To simulate a moment of speed increase I would say the first movement after launch is one hex. A drone that is boosted is known to all at the moment of launch. After the booster jettisons the drone slows to what ever speed the player set at launch.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 01:38 pm: Edit

Alternately, you could say it adds a flat +16 to speed and if the drone's drive goes slower, who cares?

That opens the system up to speed-change tricks and we may not want that.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, April 24, 2003 - 01:38 pm: Edit

An upgrade to speed 64 might be good but I would wait and see how things turn out. The drone booster could certainly be fitted to X1 drones. In fact, I've proposed that X2 not improve on the X1 drone but invent new modules and racks (such as chambering).

Here is a radical new module type. It is an explosive module that can generate a shield. It uses the energy from the warhead to generate the shield. For each point of damage it stops with the shield the warhead is reduced by one. It is a 6 point, half space module that must be in the forward position.

If a possible six point shield is too much (likely) the make it 2:1. Every point of damage it stops reduces the warhead by two. That would add three points to a drone. The shield takes the first damage points that hit the drone.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 02:12 am: Edit

L.K.:

Check the drone poll in the poll thread.

You'll find very few people wanted any kind of drone booster.

I've felt that the drone boost should just be you boost up to double but no greater than 40 and at a particular range, drop the booster pack, or else suffer the G13.37 ( or something like it table ) to inflict the damage near the target rather than on the target on account of the fact that the the drone was going faster than it's guidance computer could handle.

Oh and suffer double damage to the drone until it drops the pack.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 02:33 am: Edit

I'm going to post an interesting question before I start calling Loren names...because we may be looking at crossed purposses.
Everyone's free to put in their two cents.

What is the purposes of the drone boost?

You see there are really two ways one can veiw it (Or maybe three)
.
1) ( And this is how I see it ) You have the drone boost so that you can travel these longer ranges against the faster moving ships, but in the final few impulses the drone drops down to speed 32 so that the defensive phasers and ADDs of the enemy ship can have a pretty good shot at getting those R1 and R3 shots ( respectively ) that are going to do the most good to stop the drones.

2) The drones jump up when they get toward the target and thus force the enemy vessel to have a smaller selection of ranges that he can actually fire at, finding the drone jumping range sometimes two hexes per impulse.

3) Simply to be some kind of middle ground between the Speed 40 drones of the late X2 period and the speed 32 drones of the Early X2 period.
I.e. Type VIII and XI drones have an in between value....the Type VIIIB
Probably counted by some kind of poundal drone version of it'self just before the advent of the real X2 drones.
24/8/32 End 5
24/8(4)/32 End 5 (40 for 12 impulses)
24/8/40 End 3
32/10/40 End 7.

The answer to that question will shine a lot of light on whether we need boosted drones at all.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 02:38 am: Edit

Quote:
Here is a radical new module type. It is an explosive module that can generate a shield. It uses the energy from the warhead to generate the shield. For each point of damage it stops with the shield the warhead is reduced by one. It is a 6 point, half space module that must be in the forward position.

If a possible six point shield is too much (likely) the make it 2:1. Every point of damage it stops reduces the warhead by two. That would add three points to a drone. The shield takes the first damage points that hit the drone.

I hate to just sound spiteful but I'm going to have to make a negative comment, the thing to remember about drones is that they are not plasma.
There are a lot more drones flying about than plasma in any one typical battle and thus the record keeping for the drone should be kept to a minimum.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 10:33 am: Edit

Quote:
Check the drone poll in the poll thread.

You'll find very few people wanted any kind of drone booster.

Near as I can tell, a whopping four people responded, and I see no specific question in regards to a boosted drone. The only question of speed is to what general speed 2X drones should have, and the two options were 32 and 40. No mention of a short-term speed increase was made at all.

Boosted drone speed offers a variety of tactical options, none of which will hurt the game. You've mentioned some yourself. It can increase your drones range, limit the target's defensive options, or overwhelm the target if combined with slower drones. And, if used as a surprise (that is, the drone hasn't been labbed), it could really be useful in breaking up a formation or just giving someone a hard time. The target won't know it's a boosted drone until it's too late, especially if the boost comes as they get within a certain range. Imagine yourself as the Fed XCA, with a few drones coming at you. You don't know what they are, so you may be encouraged to fire at them from farther away than you'd like, meaning your P6 won't be an autokill. That's pretty usefull, IMHO. Certainly worth discussion. Besides, if you really want to give the plasma chuckers a speed 48 plasma with a better "glory zone", having boosted drones is just a way to level the playing field.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 01:22 pm: Edit

MJC: You know, if you had just left out the comment about calling me names that would have been a clean post with a thoughtful analysis so I'll skip that bit. Let's be civil.

The drone suffers from the same problems as the plasma except that there a many more of them. To solve the speed problem plasmas got a speed increase. They burn out and reduce the warhead with range. Drones with a general speed increase get the benefit with no downside along with being numerous. That's why I think trans-32 drones are too much. How can I survive a 12+ drones wave comming at me for up to 3+ turns at speed 40 or 48. OK, I might survive one but not two or three waves. Put me on a closed map and forget it.

A boost on the other hand gives just the right amount of speed increase. You can gain tactical advantages IF you plan it right. A plasma looses warhead with range. A boosted drone takes double damage while boosted.

The up side is that you drone range is increase a bit. Surprise launches are possible (say after a Alpha exchange) and might get the drone through a down shield before the opponant can turn away. A boosted drone will get out twelve hexes in eight impulses. Any drone user can use this because it currently is the only way to have a drone do a mid-turn speed change. Launch a wave of drones. The next turn launch a second as boosted. Times correctly the boosted drones will catch up with the first wave and slow to match. This allows the ship to not have to keep up with the first wave as much to set up the same thing.

My goal with the Drone Booster was to ive the drones so catch up speed with out going too far. It is true that ship speeds are high and drones will need some help. If it turns out they need more help we can increase the time the boost lasts.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 01:37 pm: Edit

Quote:
I hate to just sound spiteful but I'm going to have to make a negative comment, the thing to remember about drones is that they are not plasma.
There are a lot more drones flying about than plasma in any one typical battle and thus the record keeping for the drone should be kept to a minimum.

That doesn't sound spiteful to me. You make a good point, it adds to the record keeping. personally, I'm not convinced its too much but it might be and I didn't think of that aspect.

Earlier I had mentioned that the X1 drone migh should not be improved in and of its self but that a drone booster and new modules might do the job of filling the X2 needs. That was we don't need a new drone type or chart and the drones will be compatable with X1 ships. I would think that the drone booster could fit on any size 1 or larger drone. Maybe fit three on Type-H drones.

Anyway, the module I proposed was an optional module and an example of the thinking I was after. It sort of invites fire even if the enemy can't kill it it reduces the damage he will take. In turn, it reduces the weapons he can fire at your ship. But then, is it a shielded drone or not? Labs will tell. Hmmm, the choice is: fire my last ph-6 at the enemy and take full damage from that drone of fire at the drone to take less damage and not the enemy ship?

It's the sort of tactical decision I think SFB is all about. Same thing with the Drone Booster, tactical planning.

By Mike Dowd (Mike_Dowd) on Friday, April 25, 2003 - 10:13 pm: Edit

Loren, MJC, my goal with the boost phase was to allow for a drone wave to be built up in front of a ship travelling at speed 31. As it sits, with so much available warp power on X2 designs, you will see them almost *always* travelling at Speed 31. If drones are limited to Speed 32, you can never build up a credible enough threat when a drone wave impact is iminent *and* you are in the glory zone for your DF weapons and the opponent is forced to make a decision between phasering down the drones or laying waste to your ship.

If drones are given a max speed of 48 or 64, it skews the play balance too badly that when your ship is facing X0 or X1 technology it is a total and complete massacre, even between even BPV ships.

The idea of a boost that engages the impulse after launch to speed 48 or even 64 for a limited duration, like 8 or 6 impulses was meant as a compromise between the two schools of thought. Of course with any new goodie, there are drawbacks -- no HET during the boost phase, increased vulnerability to damage during the boost phase, a reduction of the warhead, a chance of missing the target if during the boost phase, or any other host of ideas we can come up with.

Unfortunately, some on the boards have a "my way or the highway" attitude that frankly rankles me, and have no room for compromise.

I will continue to review this discussion until Sunday morning when I start another cross-continent move. I'll likely be back and looking at things in about 2 weeks.

-Mike Dowd

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Saturday, April 26, 2003 - 12:07 am: Edit

Mike D: What you are proposing is near exactly what I proposed back in the beginning of the X2 discussion. The proposal is in "Major X2 changes..." way back last year...December? (I'll double check.)
There is a back story and all.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Saturday, April 26, 2003 - 02:06 am: Edit

Quote:
Near as I can tell, a whopping four people responded, and I see no specific question in regards to a boosted drone.

It was option B and only options A and C got votes.

Quote:
Boosted drone speed offers a variety of tactical options, none of which will hurt the game. You've mentioned some yourself. It can increase your drones range, limit the target's defensive options, or overwhelm the target if combined with slower drones. And, if used as a surprise (that is, the drone hasn't been labbed), it could really be useful in breaking up a formation or just giving someone a hard time. The target won't know it's a boosted drone until it's too late, especially if the boost comes as they get within a certain range. Imagine yourself as the Fed XCA, with a few drones coming at you. You don't know what they are, so you may be encouraged to fire at them from farther away than you'd like, meaning your P6 won't be an autokill. That's pretty usefull, IMHO.

Wait I have 8 labs ( But proabbly actually 12 because we want X2 ships to have a longer ranging sceitific mission ).
I have Full Aegis letting me ID six incomming drones automatically at R3.
I have Bridge as a special sensor letting me use one of my labs to ID 4 drones out to R15 with a 2 in 3 chance?
How is it I don't have an ID of the drones!?!

Quote:
Certainly worth discussion. Besides, if you really want to give the plasma chuckers a speed 48 plasma with a better "glory zone", having boosted drones is just a way to level the playing field.

Speed 40 drones may also do that without creating a massive (okay a whole page) set of rules to cover such things as.
Double damage to drones which haven't dropped their WBPs!?!
Counting every 16 impulses ( or part thereof ) as a full turn of full consumption for Endurance purposses!?!
Mixing Boosted drones with Poundal drones!?!

It'ld be nice to say...this is what was done between the time when Type VII & VIII were found to be unworkable and the time Type X & XII came into production.
It'ld be nice to say, since fighters got WBP in the GW by X2 Drones should have them too.
But I think it'ld be a lot of rules for a historical footnote unless Boosted drones exist because the Type X & XI never came to be....but that's juts what I'm thinking.

As to varriable speed drones...I try to see what I can resurect out of the seahorse drone and we'll see where that takes us.

Quote:
MJC: You know, if you had just left out the comment about calling me names that would have been a clean post with a thoughtful analysis so I'll skip that bit. Let's be civil.

Yeah...I made a mistake by using someone elses language...because I thought I'ld be cooling in doing so despite that fact that very fewe things have been dropped from contemplation, even if the conversations have wained.
I don't think we should try to be civil...but rather to recognise that we are going to butt heads from time to time and that neither of us really aims to offend nearly as much as we aim to 1) build a better X2 and 2) give as good as we get.

Quote:
The drone suffers from the same problems as the plasma except that there a many more of them. To solve the speed problem plasmas got a speed increase. They burn out and reduce the warhead with range. Drones with a general speed increase get the benefit with no downside along with being numerous. That's why I think trans-32 drones are too much. How can I survive a 12+ drones wave comming at me for up to 3+ turns at speed 40 or 48. OK, I might survive one but not two or three waves. Put me on a closed map and forget it.

Okay...I don't follow.
12 drones???
• Is that from a Klingon With her 2X2B-racks and her 1X2E-rack ( which can launch Type Xs but not Type XIs ) and an X2Admin scatter-pack? Putting 11 drones ( possibly 13 "spaces" of drones ) on the board.
How does the Klingon Launch a Scatter Pack on the third turn?
• Is that from a Kzinti X2 cruiser which her 2X2C-racks, 2X2B-racks and 2X2G-racks?
It'll put up 2 Type X drones per turn from the 6 space C-racks and 4 Type XI drones from the other four racks, but that's 8 drones with 12 spaces of drones.
• Or are the 12 drones from a D7D, D7bk and D6D task force sent to destroy your ship.
Yes 12 drones can bve launched every turn but they are easy to destroy and only able to go at speed 32.

Okay...the G-racks on the Kzinti are probably a latter refit for the Xorks so we will say that Fed has the full Phaser suite and is fighting the 12 drones of the Kzinti X2 cruiser.
Assuming R1 Ph-6 rapid pulse fire from my 9Ph-5s bearing in aoblique, we can destroy ( and yes that will require careful timing to deal with the drones but because your are fighting a Kzinti that is a big priority ), all four Type X drones (24/8/40) with four Ph-5s and follow that up with 8Ph-6 shots from my 4Ph-5s to kill all but one ninth of the incomming type XIs. In the seond Aegis phase I fir on the remaining drone ( which there is only a 44% chance of it existing ).
Note that enither of my 2 G-racks were employ meaning that Type VII-MW and Worse still Type XI double space MW, drone swarm killed weren't emploed.

The Kzinti Cruiser in this situation is basically taking all the offensive capasity of the Federaion Phasers out of the offensive equation but the Fed can keep it up every turn.
The Fed just needs to find 8 (with a 1/9 chance of 8.5) points of power every turn and has 36 points in his Caps.
Good thing Caps to SSReo might drain his caps if he lets them.

Quote:
A boost on the other hand gives just the right amount of speed increase. You can gain tactical advantages IF you plan it right. A plasma looses warhead with range. A boosted drone takes double damage while boosted.

I think seahorse drones are a better solution to the varriable-speed/Drone-Tsunami idea.
On acount of the fact that requiring a second drone control channell on the seahorse drone will cause the drone Tsunami to simply not exist in the obscene levels feared.

Quote:
My goal with the Drone Booster was to ive the drones so catch up speed with out going too far. It is true that ship speeds are high and drones will need some help. If it turns out they need more help we can increase the time the boost lasts.

I don't think speed 48 for a period but taking double damage is the answer.
Speed 40 drones ( particularly if ship never get faster than speed 32 which seems to be the state of play ) are fast enough to get to their targets, the trouble is being tough enough to hit their targets through the defensive fire.

Quote:
Loren, MJC, my goal with the boost phase was to allow for a drone wave to be built up in front of a ship travelling at speed 31. As it sits, with so much available warp power on X2 designs, you will see them almost *always* travelling at Speed 31. If drones are limited to Speed 32, you can never build up a credible enough threat when a drone wave impact is iminent *and* you are in the glory zone for your DF weapons and the opponent is forced to make a decision between phasering down the drones or laying waste to your ship.

True of the Klingons and other Disruptor Caps users but the Feds, unless they get BTTY that can hold Warp over a number of turns will be running around at slow speeds.
48 Warp - 32 for fastloaded 16 pointers + 1 Impulse?
48 - 24 for fastloaded 12 pointers + 1 Impulse?
48 - 24 For two turn 24 point warheads + 1 Impulses.

Kzinti's
48 Warp + About 10 other - 4 ( acutually probably -5 because of Bridge as special sensor useage ) - something ofr EW ) and you start taking our 16 points for Four DCs ( eaither fastloaded or fully overloaded per turn ) and you are looking at speeds like 31 but not 32 because it just doesn't have the extra ten points of war to do that...unless it dips into BTTY for the DCs.

So yes there will be a lot of speed 31 running around but not much speed 32 and so that becomes the trick for the drone chucker.
Find a way to launch the drones at say R2 so that that extra hex of movement every turn can eventually catch up with the enemey...speed 40 drones will make it much easy to catch X2 ships and that's one reason why I'm behind type X & XI drones.

Also the DC and Handful of Ph-5s that the Kzinti will have will allow the Kiznti to smash some pretty good holes in enemy sheilds ( about 46 points of damage from Four DC and 4Ph-4s ) and that'll really eat into the enemy Caps if they use Caps-to-SSReo which'll slow the enemy down and allow the drone chucker to actually get those drones to hurt.
Remember that Type VII & VIII drones have an endurance of 5 turns and that before extended range.

By Mike Dowd (Mike_Dowd) on Saturday, April 26, 2003 - 11:57 pm: Edit

Loren:
Yes, and it is a proposal that I wholeheartedly support. I am just trying to elabourate on the concept behind it before people conveniently let it lapse again....

MJC:
Yes, but the Feds are not a race that relies on the Drone as a Primary or even Secondary weapons system. Drones on a Fed warship, let's face it, are an afterthought, and are going to be primarily used in an ADD mode. I feel that these boost modules will primarily be in use by the Klinks and Kats...

And you will note that I never said that ships would be screaming around the map at speed 32 -- I put the cap at 31 because that is what the game limits us to. You have just, in essence, proven the point I was trying to make that with ships running around at speed 31: You cannot credibly build a sizable drone wave 4-6 hexes in front of your ship, thus forcing the opponent into a difficult decision -- protect his ship or hurt yours.

My point wasn't to use the boost phase to catch opposing ships -- the drones are too vulnerable during the boost phase, but they could certainly close the range and eliminate tactical maneuver possibilities that your opponent was considering.

In addition, let us examine each proposal *SEPERATELY*. We need to discuss the Drone Boost module and its interaction with EXISTING systems and modules, not it's combination with your 'Poundal' or 'Seahorse' proposals. If we decide that it has merit, and should be included because it isn't broken, then we can discuss another module, and that module's combination with extant systems and any proposals that have passed the general muster...

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 01:58 am: Edit

Quote:
And you will note that I never said that ships would be screaming around the map at speed 32 -- I put the cap at 31 because that is what the game limits us to. You have just, in essence, proven the point I was trying to make that with ships running around at speed 31: You cannot credibly build a sizable drone wave 4-6 hexes in front of your ship, thus forcing the opponent into a difficult decision -- protect his ship or hurt yours.

UMMMm...I still don't see where you are comming from.

Let me see if I follow this:-
You want a CREADIBLE number of hexes between the launch ship and the drones, because you're afraid that the target vessel may fire on the launch ship rather than the drones.
That's increadulous, but what the hey...are you currently too close?...too bad.
Do you have some room?...plan a speed reduction, at tripple your speed of +15 which ever is greater ( but you're bound to have better movement); you can drop down to speed 11 for say 6 impulses, and put those type VII & VIII drones, about 4 hexes infront of you.
Do you have plenty of room?...perform counter opposed sideslips to over 20 hexes and put the drones five hexes in front of you.

Now I would recomend where-ever possible to get you ship cvlose enough to the enemy to get blasted at by the enemy, but there are ways to get the drones into a position ahead of you vessel without sacrificig battle speed around the impulse of fire, if that is inately within your plan.
Drones have long been used to draw enemy fire because the ease of destruction is easier than the ability of ship to to deal with their damage ( which is very hard, usually )...actually getting drones to stike through limiting defensive phaser fire is a good thing.

We don't need drones to be able to get ahead of theitr launch vessels as a reason for boost drones.
Being able to chase down the target drone may be a legitimate reason for having boost drones but puishing drones ahead of the launch ship isn't.
How did MY ships deal with that problem when all they had were speed 20 drones!?!

Also check the Poll, the sum of faster than speed 32 and speed 32 is greater than speed 31 by itself so it's pretty safe to assume that X2 ships will go at speed 32 or perhaps faster.

Quote:
You have just, in essence, proven the point I was trying to make that with ships running around at speed 31: You cannot credibly build a sizable drone wave 4-6 hexes in front of your ship, thus forcing the opponent into a difficult decision -- protect his ship or hurt yours.

On the contray.
With Bridge as special sensor opperating as a extra drone control channel provider if needed and double drone control as a natural part of the X2 vessel, you can launch your Type VII & VIII drones over a period of several turns and build up a massive drone wave chasing the enemy.
When the enemy finally makes his attack run, he will have a wall of several turns worth of launched drones between you and him.
Type VII & VIII drones have 5 turns worth of endurance!
Plus we may not need to get drones to very close range of the enemy.
If we don't get Ph-2 swordfish warheads getting General Availiblity allowing drones to only need to get to R3 to do measurable damage ( great against Ph-6 defenses ) or in massed waves ( Just imagine 2SPs of Ph-2 drones at WS-III getting to R8...annoyance city ), then we'll probably get something just as deadly that doesn't need to strike the target vessel to damage it, like a Ph-G ( taken from obsolete fighter stockpiles, and only availible in limited numbers ) swordfish warhead ( and what a mess those will make of enemy shipping and they only really need to get to R2 to do their thing ).

Quote:
In addition, let us examine each proposal *SEPERATELY*. We need to discuss the Drone Boost module and its interaction with EXISTING systems and modules, not it's combination with your 'Poundal' or 'Seahorse' proposals. If we decide that it has merit, and should be included because it isn't broken, then we can discuss another module, and that module's combination with extant systems and any proposals that have passed the general muster...

Why?
I mean to me the whole thing is interlinked and thus we should have the ability to use or not use things that may or maynot come to be.
I'm willing to look at how my proposals mix with ohter systems ( Like Full Aegis with Bridge as Special sensor, or Reduced numbers of Phasers ( 8Ph-5s on a cruiser instead of 12Ph-1s mixed in conjunction with the A.S.I.F. )...why aren't you?
I've been talking about type X & XI drones automatically having both Poundal and Seahorse capasities for some time now and nobody has yet posted that they felt that that idea didn't pass muster...just because you'ld like to have boost drones which you put work into rather than accepting my design of Type X & XI is no reason to start saying that Boosted drones must be analysed indendantly of all other systems...deal with the systems on their merits rather than what you've invested ego into.

By Mike Dowd (Mike_Dowd) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 10:01 am: Edit

Alright, now that I have waded throught another of your long-winded posts, let me address a few issues that you have brought up.

Is it, or is it not a traditional drone-user tactic to build a wall of drones in front of your ship for an attack run?

Second, unless ships are approaching each other from 120 hexes or greater, with a pretty typical closure rate approaching 60, there won't be enough time to place the drones at a sufficient distance to form a deterrant to your opponent's R4-5 oblique and breakaway.

To answer your question about being too close, do you play on a map with the starting hexes more than 120 apart? TRhe maximum I have ever played with is each ship starting 35 hexes from 2215 -- only 70 hexes. If that is the initial engagement distance, minimum end-of-turn distance between ships is 13 hexes. Any drones launched will *still* be in the ships' hexes, unless the ships are trying to delay contact.

Plan a speed reduction? Did I hear you correctly? Speed is *LIFE* in SFB. You are going to be travelling as fast as you possibly can because of the possibility of facing saboted plasma, possibly Hydran X2 fighters, and all sorts of other nastiness on the map. I will not let any ship fly circles around me just because I want to build up a drone wave, thankyou.

The Poll? That joke? Let me tell you, 4 respondants is *nowhere* near a valid statistical sample for you to suddenly start to decide what direction all of us need to go in. You are not the line developer for SFB responsible for X2. Please stop acting like you are.

Launching over several turns? What the heck is the size of the map you are playing on? Starfire?!? engagement happens on the 2nd turn unless one side is fleeing. You simply do not have time to launch and build, *especially* if the battle speed is going to be 31. Back in the GW, when a battle speed was 25-27, it was easy to build a wave because there was a 5-7 point speed difference between what a ship travelled and the speeds of the Drones.

Finally, to your comments about examining modules as a combined whole:

Have you ever worked in the software or electronics fields? If you want to start adding features to something that works, you add components *one at a time* and judge if it all works. If it doesn't you either chuck the feature, or find out where the problem lies, fix it and then add the next feature to a stable and operating system. If the X2 ruleset is supposed to work with and be compatible the extant ruleset, then this is the approach that we need to follow.

Ego indeed! The Drone Boost is Loren's idea, and you seem to be stuck on your Poundal and Seahorse modules. It certainly looks like you've invested alot of ego in your own ideas Michael. I realize that not everyone agrees with you, but try to approach other ideas with an open mind.

I will be able to reply to this Thursday -- I have 3,500 miles to move my life...

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 01:11 pm: Edit

Mike are you in Victoria BC? Where are you moving to? Or are you moving back?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 06:14 pm: Edit

Loren:
Yes, and it is a proposal that I wholeheartedly support. I am just trying to elabourate on the concept behind it before people conveniently let it lapse again....

Ah, I see. I misunderstood. Thanks.

BTW: The original proposal isn't in the "MAJOR X2 TECH CHANGES" thread. In fact, I haven't found it yet. D'oh! I will, and I'll post it's location.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 10:54 pm: Edit

Quote:
Alright, now that I have waded throught another of your long-winded posts, let me address a few issues that you have brought up.

Well onbe of the advantages of living in the western hemisphere is that you fall close to Texas business hours.

Quote:
Is it, or is it not a traditional drone-user tactic to build a wall of drones in front of your ship for an attack run?

Which are you talking about? Two turn's worth of drones or one!?!
It's a traditional Drone user Tactic to get infront of your drones or atleast get near them to draw away enemy fire.
Getting a wall of drones infront of you is just an outworking of the fact that speed 32 drones go at speed 32 whilst GW ships max out at speed 31.
What does it matter if you're in the same hex as the drones until the next time impulse one rolls around...I would have thought that that's exactly what drone chuckers wantted.

Quote:
Second, unless ships are approaching each other from 120 hexes or greater, with a pretty typical closure rate approaching 60, there won't be enough time to place the drones at a sufficient distance to form a deterrant to your opponent's R4-5 oblique and breakaway.

I still don't get your point!?!
Are you saying Klingon X2 running at speed 31 gets to R5 of you, oblques you whilst your drones are still in the same hex as you and leaves the vacinity.
Okay, sure...pound him at R8 with 4 overloaded DC 4Ph-5s and pull away yourself ( how many Het bonuses do you have? ) and see if he won't over run your drones.
Or load up on Ph-2 swordfish and perform 2 ( 1 if he it to make your R4 Oblique ) opposed sideslip groups ( that'll take 8 impulses of pre-planning!!!...when he gets to R5 of you the drones are at R3 and he gets zapped for 3.5 damage per swordfish...which is bay chance the samage damage your Ph-5s would have been doing at R8.

Once you put Type VIII drones on the board the enemy has to either find 8 points of damage he can spare or keep his speed up at 31 or 30 depending entirely on how close he want to get to you and how long the initatial launch range was.
That alone in an advanatge that can be capitalised upon...and a good Kzinti captain will be able to use forcing the enemy to either reduce offensive fire or maintain wasteful levels of speed.

Being too close with speed 31 enemy is about range 20. You drop to speed 11 for 6 impulses and he comes in six and you close by 2 ( but probably only 1 ) and he's still at range 12, which is still gives you the speed edge ( because you're not paying nearly as much for heavies ) at the critical point R8.
And further out than that and you can do a speed reduction without endangering your monent of exchange...and you know it.

Quote:
The Poll? That joke? Let me tell you, 4 respondants is *nowhere* near a valid statistical sample for you to suddenly start to decide what direction all of us need to go in. You are not the line developer for SFB responsible for X2. Please stop acting like you are.

The Original Poll, the one with the question about SHIP SPEEDS ( not drone speeds ).
At some point we need to start saying things.
Things are critically pendant on other things.
If we let ships move faster than speed 32 ( like say speed 35 ) then we get a radical shift in the abilit of the ships to deal with drones and speed 32 drones become ineffectual. We suddenly NEED speed 40 drones ( or boosted drones or whatever you want to call them ) where as if the game was limited to ships moving at speed 32 then speed 32 Type VII & VIII drones will work and thus we do not need a new set of rules to cover a higher speed drone, we just need a new set of tactic to hit speed 32 ships with speed 32 drones.

Quote:
Launching over several turns? What the heck is the size of the map you are playing on? Starfire?!? engagement happens on the 2nd turn unless one side is fleeing. You simply do not have time to launch and build, *especially* if the battle speed is going to be 31. Back in the GW, when a battle speed was 25-27, it was easy to build a wave because there was a 5-7 point speed difference between what a ship travelled and the speeds of the Drones.

At WS-III you can have drone already on the board.
But with a regular map starting in the opposite corners you start some 50 hexes apart.
If you want to you go speed 11 ( `though I wouldn't) and launch two turns worth of drones ( probably on impulses 25), jumping up to speed 32 ( or 33 if that's something the ship is capable of at the turn break ) putting you at battle speed with two turns worth of drones in two waves whilst the enemy is still at ( assuming speed 31 on the first turn ) a range of 8...you could even have done counter oppossed sideslips and forced the range to be R11 but hey...now I admit that if you start on the east & west edges of the map then you start at a starting range of 40, but you set the EA for the first turn after set up and so you'll just build your EAF around a single drone wave wave.
Once the enemy turns and reloads you will be able to get several turns worth of wave on the board because he'll be spending several turns arming his weapons.

Quote:
Ego indeed! The Drone Boost is Loren's idea, and you seem to be stuck on your Poundal and Seahorse modules. It certainly looks like you've invested alot of ego in your own ideas Michael. I realize that not everyone agrees with you, but try to approach other ideas with an open mind.

No body has yet answered my question, really!
Why do we need a boosted drones?

I can see reasons for haviung it and I think they are different reasons...SO DIFFERENT that calling any one of the the reason is what is need to start process.
But I don't see putting a drone wave infront of your ship as being THE reason.
Ships with battle speeds of 23 ( MY ships ) didn't ~~need~~...err...managed okay with speed 20 drones, even though those ships were capable of travelling at speed 31!
Y ships with a max speed of 25 ( and battle speeds of about 21 ) had to contend with speed 12 drones....and they actually had to contend with them.
We can't you the "drones are broken if the ships don't fall behind" principle to say that we NEED Boosted drones as history proves that wrong.
Getting the drone to the enemy vessel...that might be a legitimate reason but getting breathing space between the drones and the launch ship isn't one of them...Hell with two HET bonuses you could just back track after launch if getting all those extra hexes is really a game winner for you.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Sunday, April 27, 2003 - 11:11 pm: Edit

On Surprise generated by Boosted drones.

With ability to ID ( 2 in 3 chance per drone) 4 incomming drones at R15 and a further 6 automatically at R3, the surprise aspect of the boostered drone is a little hard to swallow.
If you've got two groups of drones, and one of the groups can be out manouvered and it's EA, the enemy might planb to out manouver the drones he thinks he can, and then jumping up on him the drones have to be dealt with another way, but the are second generation X ship. Even with a surprise they have the reserves to counter act that by tractoring a bunch of the drones for starters.
If the combination of the two sets of drones are too great, he'll just HET away and roll a T-bomb out of his shuttle bay.

I hate to say it but the surprise factor only works on incompetant players...in the specific example, players who 1) Didn't plug 5 points of resevre warp into his BTTYs, 2) use his Bridge as Special Sensor to ID the far ( i.e. avoidable ) drone wave 3) wasn't willing to commit radical defenses ( such as dropping a facing sheild and beaming out a T-bomb or dropping the Weasel or investing some of his own heavy weapons combined with all of his tractor beams or taking a couple of the closer drones on his sheilds throwing in his Cap-To-SSReo or launching his limited availibility MW warhead drones or a whole host of other things ) to stop those drones.

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