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	Archive through April 17, 2002	25		04/17 01:30pm

Ok I will be posting the revised enhanced photon rules this evening. However there are a few things that I would like opinions on.
WSIII status: I am inclined to write that a tube can contain no more than 8 energy in any configuration. That way a standard or proxed heavy can be loaded but a fully overloaded heavy could not.
penalties for not venting: The way I have it now a ship recieves 1 sep for ea non-vented tube when it is fired in any configuration. However 1 point of feedback may fit as well,(antimatter flash).
Type decision: I think that once 4 energy has been allocated to a particular tube, the decision must be made as to what type it will be. Exception, lights must be decided on the first turn.
Historical limits: Although there is no reason why size class 4 ships shouldn't be able to refit all of their tubes, the Federation repair yards may have a fit if they recieve more than 2. This being that the amount of repairs on these types would be prohibitive if they were to fire their 4 photons in heavy mode.
Shock: Since normal photons can retain 8 energy, shock should only be allocated if a ship fires more than 4 in the case of the Bc or if the torp has more than 8 energy in the tube. This last is just a thought as I already have a shock chart.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, April 17, 2002 - 02:51 pm: Edit

I agree with the shock line in this post, above. I never liked Photons creating shock anyway because they are more released the fired, IMHO. I've been reviewing the photon rules and I have to say that they are the cleanest rules in the game. Note how few rule ref.s there are. I have a problem with changes to the first turn arming particularly with the lights. I see the first turns arming as the power for the drive system. If only one point is applied then I can't see the the torp having good range. One point arming on the second turn would free up much power for the turn that counts. How about this: You can arm it with one point first turn but the range will be limited to range 12. If you arm it 2+1 you get a light that can fire to full range(also can prox. for 2 points of damage.) Also light can fire at R1. Yes?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, April 17, 2002 - 03:02 pm: Edit

Just to lighten things up :

The Photon torpeedo moves so fast it is resolved as DF. But it is a unit that moves(at high warp). Drones and plasmas do too, and thay can HET. I give you the PHET (photon HET) It arms with 1 extra point of warp (reserve OK)on turn 2 and is fired to the hex beyond the target, HETs, and strikes the target from behind. Calculate range as true +2. Hahahahahahahaha uhhhk caugh*caugh* whew.

Almost fell out of my chair picturing that.

Kaptain Kirg says "Ah Ha! They missed!....... Yeeeouch!"

By Jim Davies (Mudfoot) on Wednesday, April 17, 2002 - 06:00 pm: Edit

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Quote:

phasers go from charging each one to having capacitors

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By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, April 17, 2002 - 08:11 pm: Edit

The original rules had each phaser with its own capacitor. That was later changed to a ship wide capacitor. I.E. the energy from unfired phasers could fire others that did fire the next turn. Thats a fairly big tactical change. Any way, the upgrading of the phaser is not a good compairason. All races recieved these upgrades(Andros excluded.) and everybody has phasers. Mega Overloads I guess are not the answer. I'll except that. I would like a new tactical dynamic for photon use.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Wednesday, April 17, 2002 - 08:49 pm: Edit

I played with a group that gave the photon a general refit. It was called the IP Photon Refit (IP for improved), and was available starting with the Andro Invasion. Any ship could purchase it as a refit, similar to the UIM refit for Klingon ships, but for a steep price...the BPV cost was 12 points. No special devices or compications...just a new table to use. Arming costs, damage, feedback, and power sources stayed the same. The chart for overloads stayed the same as well. The only thing that changed was to allow range 0-1 firing for the standard photon, and making the proximity more effective at longer range, but even less accurate at shorter ones...in fact, it couldn't fire at range two or less at all.

I'm not suggesting it as a really valid fix, but it might spark some other ideas. I can email the chart if anyone would like to see it, though I know it won't ever be accepted, nor even submitted (at least not by me!) I can tell you that the change in numbers is similar to the effects of UIM, giving a bonus for ranges 3-8...the range bands the photon has the most trouble with.

By Jonathan Perry (Jonathan_Perry) on Thursday, April 18, 2002 - 11:45 am: Edit

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Quote:

That addresses the power issue for the feds, but isn't much help with the overall problem of photon performance upgrades. Neither is the plus refit, which adds defensive phasers and some extra shielding. So for the purposes of improving the photon, no refit the feds recieved is material.

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By Kevin M. McCollum (Sfbl5r) on Thursday, April 18, 2002 - 11:59 am: Edit

Jonathan, you might as well save your breath. This crowd has ignored the general superiority of Fed ships until fairly late in the war. They ignore the fact that the D7 didn't have phaser-1 till 175 (if playing a point game) and then only three of them. They ignore the fact that the drones were speed 20 (easily dealt with by the single G rack on the Fed cruiser) and that the disruptor hasn't received an improvement for just as long as the photon torpedo. They also ignore the fact that the Fed cruiser has more phasers than the D7 and can recover quicker from damage and can actually take more internal hits to cripple. they are so convinced they are getting the short end of the stick, they ignore the facts.

By Hugh Bishop (Wildman) on Thursday, April 18, 2002 - 04:07 pm: Edit

Ok here is the abbreviated Enhanced photon rules to date.

The Federation developed the E-photon refit cir 182. This was in response to Plasma improvements and a gradual loss of parity with Coalition ships and Pf's. The Federation also anticipated a prodution slow down as the war ground on and their econonmy reached exhaustion. It was anticipated that the improved firepower options would offset the overall reduction in ships due to attrition and reduced production. The refit was originally set to encompass the entire fleet by 186 but was slowed as X-tech came online. As a result it was not completed until the last days of the ISC pacification.

The Enhanced photon refit represents a combination of improved arming software and reinforced standard photon tubes. This combination allowed the loading of light(mini) and Heavy photons in addition to standard loads, thus increasing the tactical options of a ship equipped with them. The refit was available to all size class 2, 3 and 4 ships and bases. Size class 5 and lower were not structurally sound enough to use the E-photons. After initial trials of the enhancements it was deemed to costly to equip size class 4 ships with more than 2 e-photons as the shock damage proved to be prohibitive on these smaller ships.

Enhaced photons may be loaded as a light photon instead of a standard. In this case that option must be chosen at the 1st turn of arming. It then follows the rules for Mini-photons. Which includes overloads and prox.
Enhanced photons may be loaded as heavies. These follow the rules for Mega- photons in P-6 except as follows.
1) The heavy requires 3 turns to load, the standard cost for this is 2/2/2.
2)The torpedo must be designated as a heavy load on the 2nd turn of arming or when the total amount of energy allocated surpasses 8.
3)Firing photons in the heavy mode causes shock damage to the firing ship.(see chart)
4) wsIII situations allow a ship to have a max of 8 pts of energy per tube. Therefore an e-photon can have a light torp loaded in any configuration, a standard loaded in any configuration, a regular heavy, a proxed heavy or a partially overloaded heavy ready.
5) Anti-matter venting: A ship that has fired a photon in the heavy mode(any of them) must vent antimatter for 12 impulses before it can begin to reload that tube. If it does not it recieves +1 shock equivelance points for each tube fired without venting.
6)Anti-matter flash: In addition to the sep penalty a ship that fires an unvented tube also recieves 1 feedbace damage per unvented tube due to antimatter flash.

Shock chart.

Size class 2 > BB 25 sep, All others 20 sep
Size class 3> Normal hull 13 sep
"war hull" 11 sep
Size class 4> normal hull 9 sep
War hull 7 sep

notes: shock on size class 2 ships applies if more than 8 points of overloads are used per tube.One roll is made for each tube thus firing.
2)Shock on size class 3 ships occurs on any heavy overload fire and if more than 2 tubes are used in any heavy mode. 1 die for ea overload and 1 die for each 2 heavy standard non overload.
3)size class 4 ships roll for shock for ea tube used in heavy mode.

The reason for rolling for shock when using less than 8 pwr per tube for size class 3 and lower ships, is that heavy standards have a greater range and therefore is a recoil effect.

Well this is the rule in a nutshell, analysis?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, April 19, 2002 - 03:22 am: Edit

I think you have what should be two seperate rules. I can't see how firing lights should be tied to heavys. That is, size 5 can't fire lights because its part of the E package. Shock and other limits should not effect lights, since that is an added fuction to a normal photon.

It sounds to me that heavys require a different casing. Instead of some of the limits placed on heavys, limit their number. Each ship carries a cirtain number of heavy photon casings. Give each 16 divided by their size class. Additional casings can be purchaced like drones up double the original alotment.(1 bpv each?)

Shock for size class 4 only, I think.

Venting is cool (no pun intended) but should be removed in later years. No vent resriction for X ships.

By Hugh Bishop (Wildman) on Friday, April 19, 2002 - 01:01 pm: Edit

So the size class 4 ships recive the improved arming software allowing them to use the light option? This would be called an I reftit? As far as casings go, how would the Feds fit these to their torps during a scenario? The way E-torps work now a size class 3 ship will have to start to be concerned about shock breakdown after using the heavy option on 4 of their tubes-once. If we use the casing idea and no shock they could fire a full spread of heavies +1 at no consequence and if they buy more they could concievably fire them 10 times without penalty, giving them what amounts to a magazine fed Mega photon.
Casings are interesting however, perhaps they are needed to use heavy photons in oL mode. The casings could already be installed at wsIII and take 1 turn or so to "plug in" to a tube. That way a Fed could use normal heavies for thieir added range and prox abilities (and reduced shock) but be further controlled in their use of the "Big overloads". Both of these ideas need to be tested, unfortunately with my Father in law's funeral and 2 major term papers due I have only been able to solo test them once and that was before I revised the rule.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, April 19, 2002 - 01:46 pm: Edit

By casings I ment the actual torpedo unit. It would fit through a normal tube. Its just longer. But limiting the number in a physical sense is a great way to provide a built in limit. O.k. leave the shock. Since their number is limited it wont have a major effect any way, except on ships like the BCJ. A BCJ gets a load of 8 heavy torpedos and can fire as many lights as it wants. It could buy up to 8 more for up to 8 BPV. Since accuracy is not increased (except for heavy prox.) this cost is fair, I think. Combined with the shock risk there is no need to change each ships BPV or have a fleet wide refit. If you could find a simple formula for shock damage based on size class then there would be no need for any new annexes.

All ships should be able to fire lights as this is a software upgrade and requires no special equipement. Did you notice the arming proceedure I posted April 17, 2:51 PM? I think this would work well for the light. Remember the power savings is still where it counts, the turn you attack! Also give the lights an earlier year like Y178.(Or whatever year works. But lights seems to be a simpler modification so earlier seems right)

Frankly, I could live with just the lights rule.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Monday, April 22, 2002 - 05:09 pm: Edit

Hugh? You there?

By Hugh Bishop (Wildman) on Monday, April 22, 2002 - 11:24 pm: Edit

Sorry Loren, the funeral for my father in law just ended and the family has been out of sorts. School is getting hectic too. I should be able to playtest some of this on Thur. I am also working on an accuracy proposal to contrast E-photons with, since most think that accuracy is the "real solution". I still think that E-photons are viable but they do need to be tested.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Tuesday, April 23, 2002 - 12:13 am: Edit

I'm sorry Hugh. Did not mean to pressure you. Please take your time. Actually, I should have realised that was your situation. Take care.

By Hugh Bishop (Wildman) on Wednesday, April 24, 2002 - 02:48 pm: Edit

Thanks for the patience Loren. I think that I will try the E-photons this thur on a regular CA, I will try it with and without casings. The guy I usually play against likes running Gorns and Klincs, so he will not be using the Romulans. I think it is important to test vs a Romulan and a Lyran as well. I'm going to create a new discussion about a system to improve photon accuracy, check it out.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, April 24, 2002 - 10:50 pm: Edit

Sure thing. I can't find the time to play for a while and would be interested in hearing how Lights used alone effect play. Not that I'm asking you to do my play testing for me. But if you do, I'd like to hear about it.

Peace to you and yours.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, January 29, 2004 - 11:23 pm: Edit

I would like to propose this as an X2 Firing mode but also as a Stellar Shadows Firing mode so I'll propose it here.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, January 29, 2004 - 11:50 pm: Edit

Photon Torpedo Shotgun Firing Mode

Premable:-
The Federation developed a photon torpedo casing that had multiple matter-antimatter packages inside it. These pakages would break away from the target vessel at a range of 2 to 5 kilometres and strike the vessel for a fairly random amount of damage however the chance that atleast some package would strike the target vessel was increased.

Arming:-
The Photon torpedo may be armed as a shitgun mode torpedo by inserting the shotgun mode torpedo casing into the phot-tube at the start of arming...this is indicated by marking the EAF for that tube with an S next to the power being used to arm the weapon.
If a shotgun Photon is armed it must be fired as a shotgun Photon or ejected.

The Photon shotgun uses all the regular rules of a Photon torpedo unless listed here.

The Photon shotgun loads 8 pakages with warp energy and create pakages that shall inflict between 1 and 2 points of damage.
Everage package must have the ability to inflict at least 1 point of damage.

The Photon shotgun may be armed in proximity mode.
If so then all the packages shall total the damage they inflict and half the result ( rounding down ). Remember that overloads and Proximity warheads can't be mixed.

The Photon shotgun may be held under the normal rules ( and the warhead strengthed under those rules.


Firing:-
When the Photon Shotgun is fired, the eight packages have a chance to strike the target. to not record which package the strikes the target just follow the rules.
The table blow shall show the number of packages to strike.
If the die roll is 4 or more or the range is 10 or greater than the player must use the packages that shall inflict the least amount of damage.
If the roll is 3 or less and the range is 9 or less then he may use the packages that have the most damage...remember that the packages ( except for proximity fire ) shall inflict either 1 or 2 points of damage, you can not have most package of the inflict 2 and others that inflict none.

The damage shall be totalled and applied as a single weapon strike.

Range	0-1	2	3-4	5-8	9-12	13-15
1	8	7	6	4	3	2
2	7	6	5	3	2	1
3	6	5	4	2	1	0
4	5	4	3	1	1	0
5	4	3	2	1	0	0
6	3	2	1	0	0	0

Shotgun Firing Mode Photons fired in Overload mode are limited to R8.

Note that proximity fuse photons merely subtract 2 from thje die roll ( which if using optional rules to combine Proximity with overloads is how you would do it ).

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, January 29, 2004 - 11:56 pm: Edit

Example.

A 12 point warhead Shotgun Photon is armed and the attack is made at R6.

If the die roll is a 5.
1 package strikes...since there are eight packages four with 2 points and four with 1 and the player must choose from the one point packages to find the package that strikes, thus 1 point of damage is inflicted.

If the die roll is a 2.
3 Packages strike...since of the eight packed four have 2 points and four have 1 and the player may choose from the more destructive packages, three packages of 2 damage each shall strike the target for 6 points of damage.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 05:57 am: Edit

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Quote:

The Photon torpedo may be armed as a shitgun mode torpedo by inserting the shotgun mode torpedo casing into the phot-tube at the start of arming...

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By Russell J. Manning (Rjmanning) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 01:12 pm: Edit

I saw that and starting laughing. People came to my office door to find out what was so funny.

By Richard Sherman (Rich) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 01:43 pm: Edit

Well, I guess that would end the debate as to whether PHOTs are energy or...ahem..."matter."

By Jeremy Gray (Gray) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 02:00 pm: Edit

Now that is a firing mode we MUST have for the photon torpedo. Then again, when ever it misses, your likely to call it that anyway.

By Tim Longacre (Timl) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 04:46 pm: Edit

I understand that it was most likely a typo, as I and O are next to each other on the keyboard, but it is funny

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, January 30, 2004 - 07:47 pm: Edit

Of course it's a typo. But as with most of MJC's posts, a good proof reading would have been nice.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Saturday, January 31, 2004 - 02:28 am: Edit

It was probably shoitgun and I delete the wrong letter.


Actually looking at the numbers I might have the attacker choose which packages stike their target period ( of those he has rolled have hit ) as the damage output is very low compared to the regular Photon...so maybe it is a shoitgun

The weapon's only advantage is that it handles EW better and that is not really enough of an advantage to make the system worth printing.

By Robert Eddy (Tar_Zhay) on Wednesday, February 25, 2004 - 01:40 pm: Edit

Why don’t you roll for each projectile separately plus reduce the number to 4, and I think for this ability it should cost more energy, say 1.5. or double like a shotgun plasma.
Advantage: You may hit with something
Disavantage: Removes some of the "CRUNCH" power of the photon.

PS: No overload function.. To small of container.