Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board

Archive through July 29, 2003

Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: SFB Proposals Board: The "X" Files: OLD X2 FOLDER: X2 SSD's: Archive through July 29, 2003

By Mark James Hugh Norman (Mnorman) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 08:35 am: Edit

Mike:
What is the advantage in an integrated UIM and DERFACS?
The only damage increase I have seen is a 1 point damage at all ranges. I have seen nothing that would make me prefer 4 of the new disruptors to 6 of the X1 disruptors (especially considering the power reserve I have seen for X2 ships)

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 08:42 am: Edit

With the integrated UIM and DERFACS, they can't be destroyed by H&R, and the UIM can't burn out. The capacitors hold enough power to overload each disruptor one time, so you can run around for one or two turns at full speed without re-arming them. That adds alot of flexibility, IMHO, though playtesting will verify if it's "good enough" to pass muster as a 2X toy.

By Mark James Hugh Norman (Mnorman) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 08:46 am: Edit

From my previous message. I meant to say that the capacitor is not much of an improvement over holdable disruptors, considering that number of times I have armed disruptors without firing them almost immediately (almost none). also the enormous amount of reserve power available make it seem to me that the capacitor isn't that much of an advantage. Considering that X1 makes 6 DISRs an alternative to four 12/16 photons (at least on cruisers.), any increase at all in the capability of photons would balance the disruptor improvements that have been suggested on this board.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 12:01 pm: Edit

Quote:
Chris, how can you say that? It bears no more resemblance to a photon now that the old one did. It still has the same decrease in damage over range, the same one-turn arming system, and still has a lighter damage base. It bears virtually NO reseblance to a photon at all.

Seven words.
Twelve damage at R zero every turn...that's a heck of a lot like a Fastloaded X1 Photon to me.

Quote:
MJC,

Re the waist phasers. I kept them P-1's for a variety of reasons.

The Klingons traditionally keep a lighter phaser in those positions...the D7 did it, as did almost every other ship they fielded. I'll grant that the DX did have all P-1's, but the P-1 was old tech by that time.
As a defensive phaser, the 2X P-1 has a three-point capacitor, just like the P-5. That means those waist phasers can fire three times as P-1's without recharging the capacitor, or six times each as P-3's. Coupled with the aegis control the ship has, that's a very good defensive phaser suite.

I'm not sure with the top speed of the ships and the drones being the same, that you won't need an extended phaser arc for the waist, but I will admit that I find them very much like the Ph-3s on a D5...i.e. padding.

Quote:
What is the advantage in an integrated UIM and DERFACS?
The only damage increase I have seen is a 1 point damage at all ranges. I have seen nothing that would make me prefer 4 of the new disruptors to 6 of the X1 disruptors (especially considering the power reserve I have seen for X2 ships)

•Caps will greatly increase your ability to blast at R8 over two turns.
• Hitting 1-5 at R8 means EW affects you less.
• Hitting 1-5 for 9, times four, is 20 points of damage...over two turns that's 40...which comes very close to the 48 of the four 24 point Overloaded Photons of the equivalent Fed.
• With a refit to Six of the things you jump up to 30 on one and therefore 60 over two which knocks the sock off the 48 at R8 that the Fed is likely to do.

Quote:
With the integrated UIM and DERFACS, they can't be destroyed by H&R, and the UIM can't burn out. The capacitors hold enough power to overload each disruptor one time, so you can run around for one or two turns at full speed without re-arming them. That adds alot of flexibility, IMHO, though playtesting will verify if it's "good enough" to pass muster as a 2X toy.

Some people are talking about a 2 point Cap and that might be creating confussion.

Quote:
From my previous message. I meant to say that the capacitor is not much of an improvement over holdable disruptors, considering that number of times I have armed disruptors without firing them almost immediately (almost none). also the enormous amount of reserve power available make it seem to me that the capacitor isn't that much of an advantage. Considering that X1 makes 6 DISRs an alternative to four 12/16 photons (at least on cruisers.), any increase at all in the capability of photons would balance the disruptor improvements that have been suggested on this board.

Personnally I'ld like to be able to run Disruptors from the phaser Caps.
Holding costs 1 point S and 2 points O.
Caps cost nothing.
That's 2 points of SSReo per disruptor 4 or 6 that you can use to stop the enemy from hurting you...before Caps-to-SSReo gets employed for that same task.
Yes...BTTY makes you able to fire and direct more power to movement, but more caps means the longer before you have to take a powder.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 01:16 pm: Edit

MJC,

You're looking through the wrong end of the telescope.

Sure 12 is a fasload photon, but we have a word for a Fed who plays his ship like a disruptor boat: "loser." The Fed needs those 24-point hammeblows to consistently win.

Put another way:

12 is the highest damage heavy disruptors aspire to. 12 is the lowest damage the photon can sink to.

That is not equality.

If photons get 24-point max OLs, give the Klingons 6 of these things for balance.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 01:19 pm: Edit

Quote:
Seven words.
Twelve damage at R zero every turn...that's a heck of a lot like a Fastloaded X1 Photon to me.

So what? You had that exact scenario in X1...in fact, it was worse because the klingon had six disruptors instead of four. The fact remains, that a disruptor has damage reduction over range. Saying that any damage increase to a disruptor somehow magically makes it a photon is pointless. They don't act the same way at all.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 01:34 pm: Edit

Word.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 02:44 pm: Edit

I point out a primary advantage to having the integrated DERFACS/UIM. You get one for each disruptor. That means if one is destroyed it doesn't affect any of the others.

A primary advantage of the Disruptor cap is that you can save energy during your attack run. This energy is available for other things like Specific Shield Reinforcement (directly reducing the warhead of the enemy weapons). You are increasing the effectiveness of you weapon by decreasing the effectiveness of the enemies.

On the surface the heavy disruptor appears to be a very modest improvement but it isn't. It quite substantial in the aditional advantages it gains.

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Thursday, May 01, 2003 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Post moved to correct topic by author.

By Roger Dupuy (Rogerdupuy) on Friday, May 02, 2003 - 01:34 pm: Edit

Here's a SSD outline for XCA.

No systems locations save the photons.

FED XCA

By Roger Dupuy (Rogerdupuy) on Monday, May 05, 2003 - 01:47 pm: Edit

Another SSD ship outline. For a Romulan XCA. This one has sample boxes. The shield values are not a proposal, they are there for asthethic reasons.

ROM XCA

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 07:02 am: Edit

Yea! I'm actually playing this weekend, and will start playtesting some of this stuff. We're going to test these two ships:

Fed XCA vs. Klingon XBC

We'll test the basic models first, then the refits. Hopefully we can get in several games. I'll put up detailed results in the playtest thread. Anyone interested in any particular results?

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 07:03 am: Edit

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 09:33 am: Edit

Great. But shouldn't we be more concerned with how badly X2 mauls an X0/X1 ship before trying to balance two conjectural ships?

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 09:38 am: Edit

Nope. I want to balance these two against each other first. Then, I plan to play them out against a variety of GW and 1X ships to try to balance the BPV's. Once that's done, any changes that have to be made can then be made to both ships simultaneously, so that they'll still be pretty balanced.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 11:48 am: Edit

Good idea.

By Roger Dupuy (Rogerdupuy) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 03:06 pm: Edit

Mike, for one playtest, could you have the Klingons use AT Disruptors? I have revised them.

Roger

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 03:14 pm: Edit

Yeah, I can try that. I also plan to try the 24 point torpeodos, just to see how they do. I'll be sure to post all the results.

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 03:24 pm: Edit

I think we have a playtest results thread, or something close.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, May 16, 2003 - 09:28 pm: Edit

I think the X2 Klingon will only gain parity When fully refitted though getting boom phasers refitted to Ph-5s without any kind of Fed refit might just be the ticket.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Monday, July 28, 2003 - 07:17 pm: Edit

Okay, after much tweaking, toying and reviewing (and some email conversations, as well) I came up with a new Fed XCC that should be a decent start for my proposals. 'Course, it has to be balanced against the Klingon one, which I'll post later. But, here it is:

Federation XCC

Like I mentioned in the proposals discussion thread, I see the Feds getting the best money can buy due to the nature of their economy. This ship gives all that, without being too powerful.

It as 10 phaser 5's, with four of those being 360's. This will help with oblique attacks, and also provides good seeking weapon defense. It has 46 total warp, some AWR, and 18 points worth of batteries. Not a massive increase over X1, but enough to make a difference. The biggest change is in the photon.

No one really seems to like heavy phasers, and in the spirit of cooperation and consensus building, I scrapped it. So, I needed to improve the photon. To do that, I just took parts of earlier proposals. Basically, they work like this.

The X2 photon uses the standard to hit charts from X1. Damage base is increased by 25%, so that standards are 10 points and proxies are 5. Fastloads are still limited to 12; "normal" overloads are limited to 16. Anything over 16, up to a max of 20, can be achieved, and is referred to as a "hot load". Hot loads have the following penalties/restrictions:

Any tube that fires an overload over 16 points cannot fire again for a full 32 impulses. Note that it can be armed during that time, just not fired.
Hot loaded photons cannot be held; they must be fired upon the end of the arming turn, or they are ejected and all energy is lost.

Simple enough, and the 32 impulse delay should prevent a Fed from slamming someone with 20 pointers and then hitting them again over a turn break with 12 point fastloads.

There is no SIF. Still working on how to improve shields, but I'm leaning toward making an improvement in shield repair technology. Rather than giving the ship more reinforcment abilities, which are limited only by the power you put in them, I'm thinking of saying that X2 ships can repair shields at twice their current damage control rating. That would let this ship repair up to 16 total points of shields in a turn. The good part about this is that it lets them repair fairly quickly, but they can't use it to put up a super brick. Might make their shields last a little longer in a fight; have to just play it and see.

I'll post the XBC for the Klingons later, but I can tell you it has similar power, 4 P5's, 8 P1's, and six of the capacitor type disruptors with integrated UIM/DERFACS.

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Monday, July 28, 2003 - 07:39 pm: Edit

Good, but too many P5. Swap out the quad for P1 or P6. Call the result an XCA (drop the Flag). The XCC can be a future upgrade of the XCA.

My second concern is for the design. It looks too much like a CX and people are going to start asking if the CX can be converted to an XCA.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Monday, July 28, 2003 - 08:44 pm: Edit

For my particular proposals, I'm starting with the XCC, and will work up or down from there. An XCA would have two of the P-5's removed, as well as the flag (which would become NWO). As for looking like a CX, well, "just say no."

Here is the XCA, though, for comparison. I sort of see all the XCA's being upgraded to XCC's, and even being built as such. As X2 "proves" itself, XCA's will be upgraded to XCC's as fleet flagships. I do have a conjectural XBC for the Feds, too, but I'm staying away from the post Y205 stuff for the most part. Anyway, here's the XCA:

Federation XCA

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Monday, July 28, 2003 - 11:23 pm: Edit

Mike: I like your Photon proposal as it is nearly identical to mine less the new chart I came up with. Oh and I call them "Critical Overloads".

I'm not sure I have the "No fire for 32 impulses after a Hot Load" thing and will likely add a similar tone to mine. I think that it will be "No fire from the same tube that a Critical Overload has been fired on the NEXT TURN."

With your proposal I could fire a Hot Load on Impulse one and fire a fast load on impulse two of the next turn. I imagin this was something you wanted to avoid.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Tuesday, July 29, 2003 - 06:46 am: Edit

I just didn't want to be able to fire a 20 point photon on impulse 32 of turn 2, then on impulse 8 of turn 3 toss out a 12 pointer, too. So, I figured the simplest solution was to wait a turn.

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