Well the dice giveth and taketh away.

By Norman Dizon (Ichaborn) on Sunday, February 21, 2021 - 01:41 pm: Edit

Sir, the possibility of navigating an asteroid field is approximately 3,720 to 1!

NEVER TELL ME THE ODDS!!

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Sunday, February 21, 2021 - 02:48 pm: Edit

Yahtzee!

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Sunday, February 21, 2021 - 03:12 pm: Edit

Glenn

Actually there are a number of things people are not really seeing here. But by far the main one appears to be just how changing when a torp hits you by a hex or two can totally change the nature of the game. Everyone knows a torp having a range change is bad. My F went from 20 damage to 15. Or from 15 to 10. So...by gaining a combination of factors. A speed change from the tractor that allows you to turn quicker which changes the amount of time a required for the torp to hit you since you are moving away vs side slipping and staying moving toward it. Add in when you slowed down you actually increased speed so moved one hex more than you legally could based on your speed. So things like this will cause torps to lose impact power as they have to move further. And while everyone knows this, it is obvious. What seems to elude the people saying it is no big deal is that this can happen every time you launch a torp and every time you can lose 5 damage to all damage. Depending on how it is used.

Now the other side of the coin, is that the Gorns, could use it to catch lone ships that cannot use it. (assuming you have 2 Gorn ships) You can use the reverse technique of using a tractor to turn toward an enemy while facing away before you can legally turn at your speed and again at the same time gain a hex of movement not based on a speed change. So now on top of gaining a hex of movement. You can do an actual speed change and gain several more. So in a way catapulting your ships across the map into his lap so you can tractor him and use the wonderful Gorn Anchor. Understand the speed increase would not have worked this way if only it was used because you could not have turned now. And would have probably not have been able to turn for at least an extra hex of movement because of the speed increase. (Probably being the point obviously it might not matter depending on how much you increased speed.)

This is not a purely defensive weapon to be used against just Plasma Users. It also could be used to maintain distance on someone trying to get into overload range. Or someone like a Hydran with Phaser 2s and 3s needing to be at range 3 or less. The defender, has Phaser 1s and wants a range 5 or 4 shot.

So defender comes in, takes shot at range 4, uses tractor, turns and moves when he could not at his speed. Now moves away for two hexes, one caused by tractor and one for delay. Then drops tractor and moves another. Pretty much just walking up slapping you and walking away as you watch.

Can you do a speed increase to counter? Maybe.

Same thing in reverse of course, as the Gorn anchor reverse showed. The number of tactics from this are as varied as the styles of play we develop.

But the one race that really can be hurt are plasma races. How often as a plasma race do you really want to close to tractor range on a Fed with overloaded Photons while not launching your plasmas. (and yes I know you could launch Pseudoes and so forth and so on.)

All I am saying is this is a lot bigger than people think if players start taking the time wo work out fairly simple tricks to make them more effective. But it uses movement rules that were never the intent of the game. Which I see as a form of exploitation or cheat.

Do I like the potential? Can I use these to my advantage? Oh hell yeah. The number of things I have figured out so far will up my game be at least several levels. But even so. The other side of me that looks at rules and how they should interact sees a lot of issues.

So...I have made my points as to why we should make the rules consistent. Are we going to? Not my call. Either way I am happy. I have pointed out a number of things that can be done. I have shown why they bypass a number of rules that say movement power has to be spent for movement. So...we adjust the rules or not. I am good either way.

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Sunday, February 21, 2021 - 03:25 pm: Edit

I don't see a need to change the rules, despite the walls of text.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Sunday, February 21, 2021 - 03:57 pm: Edit

"All I am saying is this is a lot bigger than people think if players start taking the time wo work out fairly simple tricks to make them more effective."

We know that's what you are saying. You have yet to make a convincing case that is what's going to happen.

"I have shown why they bypass a number of rules that say movement power has to be spent for movement."

No you haven't. You say it does, but you haven't cited all those rules, even when asked by the Executive Developer.

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 12:59 pm: Edit

Actually I did Alex you seem to have missed me putting the actual rules in. But that surprises me not at all.

And while it also seems to escape you. Proving what is happening at this moment...by being able to show it "will" happen in the fouture...is not something anyone can do so that entire concept is BS.

What I have stated is pretty simple for almost anyone to understand. Months ago. No one did this. Then some started. Then others started to be able to counter them. Then more ideas surfaced as the ways to cheat, or exploit this or as some would say simply develop tactics started happening. And now....not 1 person doing it. But 10....and it is ever growing as people realize they too need to do this.

Now maybe Alex you never play anything but solo ship games. A lot of people live and play tourny games and little else.

Those of us who almost never play single ship games in the specific groups I play in...which is Star Fleet Battles Online are seeing this a lot. So unless you come there and play in our group you cannot get the proof you claim you want but even then you might not be convinced that this is a rapidly growing issue.

Is it really going to be an issue? I am sure we will work it out as everything has been. New tactics, learning to counter things. So forth and so on.

The fact that some rules are being misused. That movement costs are never paid for. That speed increases are being done without using speed changes. That ships can move a lot further than they have movement energy. Not a single ship but both ships do not have the energy to get there but they do. Things like that are violating the rules. But is that a reason to change this rule about tractors? That is the question.

I have presented real, and you might try it, easily verified examples of what happens. So...do we find some way to modify the rules to stop this or not? I think we should because of the effect it will have on plasma. Most seem to feel it is not really a problem. One day when they play plasma against someone using these tactics maybe they will see why I did this.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 01:12 pm: Edit

You cited one or two rules about a week ago(which I responded to, pointing out what they actually say, and you never rebutted). You certainly have not provided any kind of comprehensive list of the "many" rules this violates, and doubly so in response to SPP's request for exactly that.

"by being able to show it "will" happen in the fouture...is not something anyone can do so that entire concept is BS"

Yet you spend the rest of your post talking about exactly that.

By Mike Dowd (Mike_Dowd) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 05:02 pm: Edit

You know that meme from The Simpsons, "Old man yells at cloud"? We have this happening here too.

Alex, I too apparently have missed his laundry list of rules that are being broken because of what our group refers to as "stupid tractor tricks", probably because it was never sent (if it exists at all).

A hint for Charles: If you want to see something changed, and the game designer ASKS for a list of the rules that are being broken by something that has been in the game and massaged for the last 40 years, give them EXACTLY what they have asked for instead of repeating the same drivel. They WANT clarification -- else NOTHING will be considered for change, let alone BE changed.

To continue down this path without doing as the game designer has asked will quickly get you labeled in the minds of the readers as irrelevant, or worse, with persistence, a troll. The Gods know that you have reached the first stage with me, and are rapidly approaching the second.

By wayne douglas power (Wayne) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 09:03 pm: Edit

I am playing in the some of the Campaigns that Charles is in.
I think in some of the Campaign battles the players on both sides have forgotten about the EW when doing the tractor (two ships on the same side with 6 ECM one goes to tractor the other a die roll will be needed to be successful due to EW shift). Players will have to adjust the EW or roll dice.

In the campaigns I have found it better in some scenarios to disengage. Knowing that your opponent may try using timed tractor move gains, means I have to change my tactics against them.
I am only an average experienced Captain, I am happy when I can get a draw or a win against the great Captains in our Campaigns.

all good

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 09:58 pm: Edit

Question that continues to pop into my mind:

Why does a plasma user, continually fire torpedoes into the RA of ships already going away from them.....

By Richard Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 10:49 pm: Edit

To encourage them to keep going. :p

By Dennis Surdu (Aegis) on Monday, February 22, 2021 - 11:10 pm: Edit

I suspect the players Charles is encountering may be violating the tractor (or other) rules in some way and so it appears to be more of an abuse than it really is. It may help if the players, by whom these tricks are being employed, came on and explained EXACTLY what they are doing with their energy plot. Charles, perhaps you do not realize that they are actually playing wrongly. Otherwise, it would be helpful to answer SPP's request directly as to what rules the tractor tricks violate. It is highly unlikely that you have stumbled across a tactic that breaks the game.....one that the best and most experienced players have not seen in 40 years.

By wayne douglas power (Wayne) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 04:23 am: Edit

SFB is a great game, and SFB has a lot of rules. One other thing with the tractor that has been forgotten at times is a given tractor beam cannot be used again on the same turn or within 8 impulses on two consecutive turns of its link being released or broken.
In the Campaign sometimes players forget a rule (and are corrected in game most of the time). This can happen with learning new rules, I do not see any violation of the rules deliberately done in the campaigns, most of the time the tractor things have been done correctly.

all good

By Peter Bakija (Bakija) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 08:34 am: Edit

Dennis wrote:
>>I suspect the players Charles is encountering may be violating the tractor (or other) rules in some way and so it appears to be more of an abuse than it really is.>>

Eh, I'm willing to assume that everyone is playing correctly. You can completely plot speed 20 on one ship of a group, and if you bend over backwards and do a ton of pre-turn calculations to get everything right, and then have your ships in a tight group where everyone is moving the exact right speeds and all your ships allocate tractor power and turn tractors on and off in the exact right sequence, that ship that plotted speed 20 can certainly move like it was moving speed 30 for much of the turn.

This is a completely possible, and achievable thing without breaking the rules.

It is just, as mentioned elsewhere:

-Complicated and time consuming to figure out.

-Requires ships of different sizes all next to each other in correct formation, moving the exact right speeds.

-Requires using a point of tractor power each time you gain a hex of movement, which is less efficient than just moving faster assuming any ship smaller than a CA, and there need to be ships smaller than CAs to make this work.

-Requires being in a tractor beam which comes with penalties, even if only for an impulse at a time.

-Requires using your tractor beams, which often have better things to do.

-Results in ships moving more hexes while at a lower speed, which gives up movement precedence.

-Is generally less effective than just, ya know, moving faster.

When Charles is talking about "violating rules", I suspect he means "If you pay for 20 hexes of movement, you should only move 20 hexes of movement, and moving more than 20 hexes when paying for 20 hexes is violating the established movement rules" and "when you are moving speed 20, you should turn as if you were moving speed 20, and not turn as if you were speed 12, which is violating the turn mode rules".

This is 100% a thing that can happen. And can be very useful at times. But I also think that Charles is kind of just ignoring/handwaving away the penalties and costs associated with doing this, based on situationally specific factors.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 01:58 pm: Edit

One of the things I think Charles means by "violating rules" (my apologies to him if I am incorrectly stating his position) is that you can use "tractor" tricks, powered by APRs, to gain hexes of "movement". I presume this "seems wrong" to him. Ordinarily APRs can't be used for movement functions.

But SFB has always had rules that may "seem wrong" but are necessary for the system to work. One that has always bugged me is that you can't target small ground bases on planets from more than five hexes away. Why? With the sort of sensors available to starships, you should be able to hit them from much further away. Even if they are "camouflaged", once the ground bases have revealed their positions by firing, they ought to be targetable from a distance. It's not like they are going to reposition themselves to avoid incoming fire. But no, you've got to get within five hexes.

Or there's the issue with tractoring drones I mentioned a week ago. Tractor an enemy drone, it keeps tracking you anyway. Tractor a friendly drone and it loses tracking and is removed from play,

And don't get me started on DefSats!

But I'm not suggesting these rules should be changed. They were written that way for a reason and trying to fix things that I think "seem wrong" but that presumably don't bother some people, is likely to be a cure worse than the disease.

So Charles, I think, needs to demonstrate that the effect of "tractor tricks" is sufficiently harmful from a play balance standpoint that the rule needs to be changed. And I don't think he has met that bar yet. Yes, it can make things difficult for plasma-users in some circumstances. But you know what else makes things difficult for plasma? ANY ship with the power avilability to generate significant firepower while moving at high speeds; X-ships, PFs, Fast Cruisers, Light Dreadnoughts, and even a number of "standard" late-war ships (especially some of the Hydran hellbore ships, though that would be a non-historical battle except perhaps against the ISC). The Tholians are my favorite empire but the Romulans are my second favorite, And when I play the latter I generally take it for granted that my opponent is likely to use speed to negate, or a least degrade, my torpedoes. So I plan accordingly.

Just my .02 quatloos worth.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 02:40 pm: Edit

Couple things left out of Charles report....

He says he plays Plasma empire (not which one),
though not who he was fighting at the time....
Doesn't say if his opponent had fired and turned away (normal procedure against plasma)....
Not what range he launched at (which seems to be what forced the action his opponent took)...
He stated, he couldn't find a tactic to counter the action (also fails to describe his tactics)....

Hard to cross the fence to his side, with what little information he gave....

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 02:50 pm: Edit

Mark, he did go into a bit more detail at one point, as I recall he was fighting Hydrans - I’ll dig back when I have a moment.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 03:49 pm: Edit

Here, a bit more than half way down: http://www.starfleetgames.com/discus/messages/12031/41490.html?1613143619

Charles with an ISC CS and DDL versus a Hydran Knight, Lancer, and Horseman.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 04:15 pm: Edit

He started the discussion talking about ships out running his plasma, that example was about getting pinned in a corner....

Not sure where to go on that front...
Since that incident didn't involve plasma when the event took place....

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 04:21 pm: Edit

Thanks Alex

And Mark...in that example...which by the way Peter is why I am not concerned about the bad effects of using a tractor, because as that example showed, there were none nor could there be.

Now what I mean by that to be as clear as I can. Yes...it cost a single point of power for 2 ships to each gain one hex of movement. Now, that actually was more power than it would cost either of them. Since one was 2/3 and the other 1/2 move cost.

So the power consumption was bad from a normal movement point of view and I am sure we can all agree to that. But...in order to do, what he needed to do. He had to do it using tractor tricks. The reason why, was his ships had damage. As such, they could not run the speeds he needed to run at all. He needed to get at the least 30 movement hexes from each of his ships in order to keep me semi pinned near the wall of death. (Touch wall you die).

So...top speed of both of his 2 ships is 27. Period. No allocation. No speed change. Nothing can possible make them go faster. Except misusing a tractor rule, which says you tractor someone, slow down and gain a faster turn rate. But by timing this carefully and ignoring intent of the rule you can take advantage of an exploit and if you only do this for a single impulse or two at the most, you can gain a hex of movement for both ships at the amazing cost of 1 point of power which you cannot in any possible way pay for from movement power so it is against all the rules of the game dealing with movement and should be illegal.

Now...multiply that by the 3 total tractors they have between them. And they each ran speed 30 the entire turn. Meaning they moved 30 hexes during the turn. Now at no time did they ever "Officially" reach speed 30 not because they did not actually reach speed 30. But because the tractor rules when used this way, "Falsely" say and show that instead of speeding up, you slowed down.

So as but one example of tractor tricks doing illegal things. I think this stands out pretty clearly.

Max possible speed you can allocate. 27 because of lack of warp/impulse power.

Impossible to change speed because again. Lack of Movement power.

But increasing not 1 not 2 but 3 hexes of movement using none movement power and never ever showing that your speed increased. So appearing to be within the rules but having gone over the movement rule by a speed of 3.

Now you can call this a game mechanic or a legal rule because the rules allow it. Ok...I accept that you can call it that. I see it as a cheat and misuse of the tractor rules and the intention stated specifically in the rules that using a tractor "slows" you down. Which is why it does not calculate you using it to do a speed change that makes you go faster but only calculates that you went slower.

This is long but as clear as I can make my reasoning in this one...of many examples I can give you.

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 04:26 pm: Edit

Charles: citing the many specific rules, as mentioned, will make you case far better. As opposed to continuing to ignore that request from one of the two people that can actually make the change you are suggesting,

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 04:51 pm: Edit

Now Mark

You also mention why would I launch torpedoes at the rapidly retreating rear of a ship. Well normally unless as some people mentioned...I would not...unless I wanted them to keep running.

So why am I saying this is a problem? Because without a HET and a large speed change, The ship I just launched at will get hit with 10 movements of my F torpedo doing 20 to 15 points of damage adjusted by EW possibly and by any phasers he decides to fire.

This would be a scenario...He came into range 5 of me and for whatever reason, turned to start moving away as he fired or did whatever it was he did. Such as got range 5 to fire phasers since all I had was phaser 2s and he had a tremendous advantage.

So he has just turned. And is running speed 20. Do calculations. He cannot get outside of my torps range 10 move because of the impulse chart and the moves he can make. Without a Het. A speed change would just make it take him longer to turn and even then it will hit him within 7 or maybe 8 because he does not have many bats on this ship.

Seems straight forward. He is going to get nailed unless he shoots the torp up. But he just shot me. So...damage is inbound. He does not have Bats to Het. And he cannot increase speed enough to avoid the torp.

Instead he side slips. Needs to move 2 more times to turn. But his sister ship tractors him. They slow down but do not slow down. They now increase speed by a Hex. Each moving once. Once for movement. And once for delay. And...they can both turn now after having moved 2. So now they are running directly away. (Torp does not close from sideslip moves.) And they gained an extra hex of movement so the torp now will hit after the range 5...so just lost 5 damage. But finally I will close a hex and start getting there. Nope...his other ship tractors. And they move twice. Drops tractor. And move again. Now I am still at the same starting range. Even though at speed 20 I should be out 1 hex or have hit him.

Now as Wayne mentioned. Tractors have a wait period before you can use it to retractor the same ship. So he will lose at least 1 hex where I catch up before that has passed for each ship. at which point he repeats this twice more. Total cost is 2 points of power for each ship.

Which gained you 4 hexes you would not move. Changed your direction that you could not change in time. Increased your speed to 30 for most of 12 hexes. and you totally out ran all torps less than S Torps. Without taking a point of damage when they should have run all over you unless you ED and WW.

No big deal right? I am just being silly. This changes nothing? Well lol...sorry...I disagree.

Now I was reciting this from memory. I could repeat it and get exact hexes moves, where so forth so on. But the fact is you can almost always out run any F torp, most Gs and maybe even an S if you can time it right. And if you have two ships with two bats and two tractors.

Anyway this is what I have seen and had done to me. On a side note, I have seen it fail somewhat. As in forgot to drop tractor. Or misread the impulse chart so screwed up your timing and movement and I caught them. But in every instance. Even with the screw up where they did not manage the maximum reduction. It still dropped the damage to below what the damage had to be. And it did so because they sped up, they did not in any shape or form slow down. By using tractors.

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 05:01 pm: Edit

Alex that is citing the rule. I am not posting the rule because they know the rule. Steve as an example said he understood the rule I was talking about but then said but what about asteroid damage and rules having to do with other speed related things.

As I stated to him, I see no changes there. Number one I have not looked at that because that would normally not be a factor in how and when this was being used. Though since you are increasing speed, if done in an Asteroid field it should possibly cause additional damage. However, since as the tractor rule stands now, it never will show your actual increased speed so is not making any change to the asteroid effects because you ship never sped up even though it did.

The only rules I am looking at are the most basic simple rules we have. What does it cost a ship to move. And where does the power have to come from?

And if your ship goes faster what movement power was used to move it.

Tractor moved it. A second ship, supplied your slow ship with the power to move faster than you can move by supplying your ship with movement power by losing some of his paid for movement.

These are the rules in play. Posting them would not be real helpful since everyone should know them.

The issue is the tractor rule is being used in a way to bypass the most basic rule concept of you have to in some way, pay to move a ship and that requires movement energy to be paid by the ship itself or the ship moving it.

The tractor rule is being misused in that it produces movement without anyone ever paying for the movement with movement energy.

By Charles Carroll (Nosferatu) on Tuesday, February 23, 2021 - 05:05 pm: Edit

If nothing else lol.

I am producing a tactics guide right here and right now on how to screw over anyone who does not see this coming whenever you have two or more ships in a game. You can gain an advantage and teach them something they have not worked out. Or something they ignored because they did not want or care about doing it or watching out for it. Or just accept that when it gets done oh well.