I used to like the idea of published ship modification rules, until I saw the "Tholian Army Knife" - a hellish mix of Gatlings, Plasma-F, and Photon Torps, able to slip in and out of webs and mangle your cruiser repeatedly. (The moral here is for players to be careful what tech-slosh their campaigns allow.)

No thank you - besides, if I dream up a 'cute' idea, I can always submit it to SVC/SPP for mature consideration.

(I still enjoy messing around with units for Battletech, though. Mostly 3026 and 3055 technology vehicles, these days - beware of Arrow-equipped VTOLs and Artillery Hovertanks.)

By Nathaniel Barnes (Ninetails) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 07:19 am: Edit

One of the things I _really_ like about SFB is that a lot of the ships are the way they are for a _reason_. One of the reasons that the Feds picked up drones is that they had trouble stuffing more than four photons into their DN, then found out that drones are kinda nifty. Lyrans have a crappy secondary heavy weapon, but, for their era, generally really nifty overall ship designs. Early hydrans have lousy arcs. Etc, etc, etc. It has _character_.

A ship modification manual will inevitably lead to the smoothing of these little quirks that create the character that is so much of SFB's value to me. I'm against it. Gimme Omega 5 and more Magellanics instead.

By David A Slatter (Davidas) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 08:01 am: Edit

I have designed a "construction manuel", and it's more or less impossible to create an unbalanced ships with it. However, it had to be very complex in order to cover all the potential gliches that players would try to capitalise on.

Basically, it was driven by "technology points", which you could allocate into a number of options. To give you an idea how much complexity was required, here are a few of the categories.

"space" - the more you had of this, the bigger you could build a ship for a movement cost of X. It got progressively more expensive (in tech) for each extra "space tech" pip. Some systems only took up half a box, others more than one.

"phaser arc" - the more you had of this, the more points you could spend on improved arcs. Again, it got progressively more expensive for each pip.

"phaser upgrade" - allowed you to gradually increase your Ph2/1 ratios towards all Phas-1.

"Warp","impulse","APR", "battery". Depending on your tech level in each of these these, a certain number of each power system was allowed on a ship of a certain size. Exceeding that was allowed (Exceeding almost anything was allowed), but you paid progressively more for each box that exceeded the limit.

"Weapon". All weapons had thier own individual tech costs. Often, they came with attached advantages. Plasma gave you better battery tech, Hellbores gave you better APR tech, Photons allowed you to buy AWR tech. The weapon upgrades had attached tech costs, which got pretty complex for drones.

"Shield". Each pip gave a small shield improvement to all your ship classes. The pips got progressively more expensive. There were several general modifiers that applied for different sorts of shielding (e.g. stronger front shields).

Turn modes, breakdown ratings, hull distribution (front/centre/rear), were also controlled along with a number of other factors. Shuttle development was particularly complex, and skewed such that you could only have a limited number of shuttles that used your best technology. (Fed CVAs had much better fighters than Fed FFVs).

I also had overall cost multipliers depending on the size of the ship and the number so far built in its class (prototypes were more expensive). Various rules were added on for class varients, and calculating the cost of refits, and tech costs for developing the war classes.

And then there was (at least) two randomisers. To stop ppl designing cookie-cutter ships all the time, a certain number of tech points was pre-alloacted randomly into certain areas, to reflect the fact that some races may find the photon (or whatever) easier to invent. The second randomiser applied racial traits, such as increased marines, horrible turn mode ships, weak production ethics. Often, there were tech bonuses or penalties attached to the second randomiser.

I'd only got as far as the main races and their equipment. Integrating Andro, seltorian, or Neo-tholian technology would have taken a much longer.

The possible problem with all this was, once you had put the necessary stoppers in the system to prevent ppl trying to abuse it, the ships did come out rather similar to SFB ships - i.e nothing really whacky and different. Still, it was *your* ship and design, and you could try out the weird weapon combos. And I guess that differences would be more pronounced if more then 1 person (me) tested it properly - others would have different priorities.

The bottom line is that ALOT of tables and whatnot is required to make a workable design system. I'm not sure how sellable that will be. You are talking a design system almost an order of magnitude more complex than the battletech one.

By David A Slatter (Davidas) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 08:18 am: Edit

PS I could post one or two ships that came out of that system, with me trying to abuse things as much as possible....

By Alex Chobot (Alendrel) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 09:02 am: Edit

And don't forget that you need to build ANdros...and all the Omegan tech...and the LMC when it comes out....

I'm sorry Scot, but I do see this as being a very intensive project if it's going to be both 1) comprehensive enough to be widely useful and 2) airtight enough to plug all the loopholes. If it isn't doing both, there sin't much use to it, and point 1 makes point 2 amazingly difficult to pull off.

By Dwight Lillibridge (Nostromo) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 09:04 am: Edit

I personally trust that if this product comes in to being that it will have munchkin prevention in mind. SFB is a game with a rather heavy to carry set of rules that was written to close loop holes someone might try to exploit off handedly. there is value in the product for those who wish to have a set of guides to design ships for races that they wish to propose to ADB. other reasons would be for the GURPS prime directive and campaigning in it. Battletech was exploited for it's dollar sales value and not meant as a tactical game in a pure sense, I might note that this is only my opinion. there are those who want this kind of product, myself I have wanted it since way back when it was announced by TFG. the construction manual would be very welcome to allow some sense of what is correct and as a guide line to keep in line with the play balance that is in SFB when making ships to operate in the SFB universe while playing Prime Directive games rather well. the last is something I would never be able to stress enough. think of the game and new adversarys for the players to deal with that they won't know about and playing out the confrontation on the SFB map against a true unknown, something you can not do today as everyone knows or can by that rule book. with GM designed raceial ships that are close to balance with SFB players don't get slammed by advantage unless it is meant to be and the GM would have to do so on purpose. there would not be a guessed frigate with 4 photons and enough warp power to power a starbase. why you ask? I trust that such information needed to make new weapons and or systems that would function in the SFB universe for PD games and such would have loop holes closed and receive the same scrutiny as the rest of the products made for SFB. like a fine wine I doubt it would be released before it would be done right or before it is time to do so. the many websites with homebrew rules will never come close as they have the handicap of the desire to do something and hope someone else likes your idea so you can get away with that munchkin cruiser or some such.

don't under estimate the construction manual I trust SVC believes it is time.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 09:39 am: Edit

As I see it, there are three products here....

SHIP CONSTRUCTION MANUAL: discussed above, probably not ever going to happen.

SPARE PARTS GALAXY: An amusing idea worth considering at a different time.

SHIP MODIFICATION RULES: Rules to allow minor ship mods, replacing this with that and so forth. That wouldn't seem like an impossible thing (although it would basically be a campaign rule). I think where S3.3 and S7 failed was in the "you can add four boxes" to the ship since that created no end of monte haul tweeking. Maybe if we just allowed you to swap a couple of boxes, trade a lab for an APR or a phaser-2 for a phaser-G, it wouldn't be impossible.

By David A Slatter (Davidas) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 09:41 am: Edit

Alex.

My system was airtight (as far as I knew, and I spent at least 100 hours on it). And I think there would be a market for a system (not necessarily mine at all) that just encompassed the main galactic races, *if* people were prepared to hack alot of tables. Besides, I could probably expand it to cover most Omegan races as well, if I had the time and the SFB modules (which I currently do not). Problem is - that would make it more complex still...

Oh - and if you had poor technology, even your best attempts resulted in some seriously naff ships unless you wanted to spend an idiotically large amount of money (i.e. you could have had 2 SN-quality ships for the price of your slighty better SNB).

By Kerry Drake (Kedrake) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 10:09 am: Edit

I would think a game using ship construction would work as long as you totally removed it from the SFB Universe. The SSD/DAC game engine is a beautiful thing in and of itself and perhaps could be licensed to someone to make a NEW game altogether (that included building your own ships, and perhaps some sort of technology tree - ala the Campaign Designers Handbook).

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 11:12 am: Edit

SPECIAL ALERT: I am going to leave this topic to discuss the "SHIP CONSTRUCTION RULES" (the ones that will never be done) and will start a new topic for the "SHIP MODIFICATION RULES".

By mike mendick (Mikey2) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 11:18 am: Edit

svc:
I think another cheese prevention is to add a a mandatory "hull cracking" cost. Say 1/3 the fully refitted ship cost, before allowing any mods.

(so a hydran NCA with 8 gats would be possible, but it would cost like 160pts + the cost of the 4 added gats)

mikey- frequent former cheese victim.

By scott doty (Kurst) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 11:32 am: Edit

SVC
I have a "ship construction manual" type thing that is already done, my group has used it for a while. Could I post a link to it to allow people to view it, or is that an infringement on ADB's copyright laws?

By John Trauger (Vorlon) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 12:46 pm: Edit

The only kind of ship construction manual that could be acceptable is one whose creations can't compete with traditional "stock" designs.

I think Bruce Graw's CDS system in SFT #1 is a step in the right direction. That system had problems in the sense that it created munchinized ships BIG TIME.

Graw's system used a different point scale than BPV, which completely removed it from the world of "stock" ships. This significantly reduces its threat to Module R sales.

Battletech allows/allowed players to create mechs that directly competed with those designs created by FASA (and they were terrible examples of mech design, but that's off-topic)

By Jonathan Perry (Jonathan_Perry) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 01:17 pm: Edit

John - I don't think it was a flaw. I think it was purpose built to allow you to build cheezy ships, if you wanted to spend the points. At least it seemed that way to me.

MY problem with it is that the ships started to all look the same . . .

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 01:41 pm: Edit

Dwight:
While I would have agreed with you at one time about how all the loopholes in SFb were closed and covered, we've got a player who routinely finds other loopholes and manages to use them. He's a friend of ours and wouldn't think about banning him from playing, but he can get frustrating at times. If the ship construction manual came out, no matter how foolproof it looked, it would have more than enough loopholes to exploit to make any game a heart attack or seizure just waiting to happen. Also, if it ever did come out, it would give an air of officiality to every ship posted on the internet and stored in peoples hard drives and disks lying around, diluting the meaning of the official ships. I'm against it, based on principle and reasoning.
On the side, the kitbashing galaxy sounds like a good playground for all the munchkin players to get it out of their systems, provided it has serious limitations.

By scott doty (Kurst) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 04:03 pm: Edit

Here are my starship construction rules that we have used for years. The main point is that as long as you stay within the shock ratings then the units built seem to be reasonable.

http://www.angelfire.com/falcon/sdoty/

By Chad Calder (Hades_Minion) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 05:16 pm: Edit

Scot,

You want an example of how hard it is to balance systems.

I looked at your web site for less than 2 minites and I have already found a way to create a supership. Create a CA with 30 transporters with 10 ph-1s or so. The ship will carry 40-50 BP. Everything else is standard.

close to range 5 and fire destorying a shield. then capture the enemy ship. (you could use shield crackers also if you want to futher make this ship super.)

Note I haven't even tried to optimise this ship an already it could defeat any ship in the game except for Andros.

By scott doty (Kurst) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 05:26 pm: Edit

I have two words for you, open map.
Why would you let anything get to range 5 if you did not want it to? Did you look at how many items a hull of a given size can hold? Are you assuming the enemy does not have weapons that will cause you damage before you get anywhere near range five? Try the above with a standard Frax unit on an open map and see how well you do.
There are many existing units that could cause yours problems, even with its "munckinized" systems.

I was not trying to advocate my system as perfect, just playable if you use common sense. I am sure people will find ways to "beat" the system, but for most units it should provide a reasonable basis for a BPV. And do not also forget that your opponent must O.K. your ship before the game, I am sure that one would be nixed, at least on a closed map.

I am not saying a starship construction system would be easy or perfect, but it would be nice to have a central system for all to use if they want to.

By Pierre Adams (Pja) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 07:27 pm: Edit

My group enjoyed using the rules from SFT 1 & 3. It was a welcome diversion from standard fleet battles & tourney battles. We had no problem with the CPV being on a different scale than BPV. What we enjoyed was having two sides given a set amount of CPV, and having two fleets built secretly. Then at the next gaming session, it was not only a battle of ships, but also design philosophy.

I wished people would have posted their designs on the net, its interesting just to compare design philosophy. But I never saw any CPV ships from Bruce Graw, the creator of this system, let alone anyone else.

By Loyd Romick (Kurgan) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 08:29 pm: Edit

Ship construction may be an art, but its nice to have a tool to work with.

Also, it could have uses in an ongoing game were enemy ships have been captured, and you want to convert them to your races technology.

1 vote yes for the construction manual.

By Dwight Lillibridge (Nostromo) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 09:14 pm: Edit

scott I took a look at your ship construction stuff, good enough veiwing that I decided to reveiw it further.
would you like to collaborate and develope it further?

By scott doty (Kurst) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 10:02 pm: Edit

Dwight: Sure, always good to collaborate.

By Chad Calder (Hades_Minion) on Wednesday, April 03, 2002 - 10:03 pm: Edit

Scot,

Yes the ship a proposed fits within your rules. According to your web site a stock BCH has 32 spare spaces. The ship would be a BCH with +19 trans, -2 flag, -2 emerg,-2 tractor, -4 Hull, +10 Ph-1 Fa, +4 360 Ph-g, +4 Shield Crackers, +4 APR(so it can have 6 ECM speed while going speed 31 on passive fire control.) This ship will only cost 180 or so BPV. For extra giggles add some more Impulse and it can go speed 31 under EM with 6ECM and only cost 195 or so.

Such a ship can beat any ship (Including Battleships except andros) in the game on a closed map EVERY single time. (you would need to do 60-70 INTERNALS ie 100+ damage from range 6+ to have ANY chance of wining.)

On a open map this ship will win against any published equal BPV ship 90%+ as it can go speed 16 with 6ecm and 15 reinforcement with +2 for passive ECM and then jump to speed 31 with 8ecm and use 1 bat to raise fire control on a surprise turn. It only needs to reach range 5 ONCE on a single impulse to win.

This means that the frax can't penitrate the shields even with narrow salvo, Normal load Photons can't hit because a shift is garuentied and no other weapon has the long range crunch without getting close to range 5.

Please note that I am not trying to pick on you. I just think your rules don't account for several problems and I know that if one person in less than 5 minites can find a problem, then over 1000 SFB player reading rules for several days will be able to find MANY different loopholes.

Please note also, that massive transportor arrays are not the only loophole in your rules. Your rules need a sliding scale for power and phasers. ie phaser boats can be very powerful in the correct BPVs, and the ability to go speed 31 with armed weapons is HUGE as it makes Seeking weapons worthless.

By scott doty (Kurst) on Thursday, April 04, 2002 - 12:00 am: Edit

Again the point is nobody could create a perfect shipcon system, just one good enough to be a framework for someone to work with that wanted to make their own units. To get "perfect" or at least better BPV's these units would then have to be playtested again and again and again to tweak, or completely revise the BPV's for the unit depending on the playtest results.

On a open map this ship will win against any published equal BPV ship 90%+ as it can go speed 16 with 6ecm and 15 reinforcement with +2 for passive ECM and then jump to speed 31 with 8ecm and use 1 bat to raise fire control on a surprise turn. It only needs to reach range 5 ONCE on a single impulse to win.

A couple of points to the above: 1) I can not imagine someone letting you play this unit, and do not forget any constructed ship should be agreed upon by both players. 2) I also think you a missing a LOT.
a) The opposing player could just purchase lots of boarding parties to defend his ship from your assault. Given equal odds (another 180 point unit), you would really hope your BP's manage to win, otherwise the opposing ship will have more firepower than you, and you will die. Most BCHS have 20 boarding parties, you can send over 23 (19 + 4 trans) at the most (unless you are assuming shuttle raming through the bays as well) and if the ship purchases just 10 extra BPs it would actually have an advantage in BP combat compared to the attacker (assuming it had 20 BPs + 10 purchased). All this time your ship will have most likely taken considerable damage in the exchange, remember boarding party combat does not occur to the END of the turn, after which your ship may not be there.
b) A frax CC with a legendary weapons officer (a 176 point ship)would have a 50/50 hit at range on your ship, while you are doing NOTHING in return. Given an infiniate amount of time, and a little maneuvering your unit could be beaten.
c) Anything that has decent plasma firepower could also be a big problem, as your unit MUST close to win, otherwise it will be picked apart.
d) Are you actually suggesting that that unit could beat a DNH let alone a battleship (I really do not care which one)? Your ship would be detonated LONG before it hit range 5.
e) Your are missing the point that it would have to penetrate the shields with its phasers to win in any case, at range 5 a p-1 does 3.5 dmg, 10 would do 35 avrg, and only 1 point left on the shield stops your whole ship, unless you fire your gats (I assume these are defensives), but then you would only get around 5 more points, 40 points is easy enough to stop, especially since you are completely commited to you attack run, if you abort, even once, you lose.
f) I am also not picking on you, I really did not think about huge transporter arrays, it is good to know and think about. The problem is your unit is VERY myopic, and could be beaten by many existing units, but would be a royal pain if it was a surprise.

By scott doty (Kurst) on Thursday, April 04, 2002 - 12:12 am: Edit

Onto your second point: Phaser boats are quite nice, but as you only have a limited amount of space you can only have so many. Going speed 31 all the time is really cool and helpful, but try arming that vast array of phasers it does slow you down. Seeking weapons do not become useless, they just reduce your firepower, which is in and off itself very helpful. If you put 16 phaser ones on a unit it would cost the same (assuming all FA) (48 BPV) as 10 phaser ones [FA](30) and 4 range 22 dirs (16) with 3 extra APR (2 free from the DISR and 1 for 2 BPV) and FH arcs on the DISR (no UIM though), on an open map I do not see the DISR ship being that overwhelmed, and it has better arcs. Increase your p-1 arcs to FH and it costs you 3.75 per p-1, a rng 22 dirs costs 4 points. Yes I know the power curve on the p-1s are better, and in close range the p-1s are better in a power/dmg situation, but not ridiculously better.
I do not see a problem with the power systems.
I will look at the points you have mentioned, maybe a sliding scale for phasers would be neccessary, I have not personally noticed a big problem, but as you mentioned if 1000+ players look this stuff over, maybe the vast majority of difficulties could be fixed.
I also realize I forgot to include crew unit/boarding party numbers, my mistake. We always just used an average amount when we used this system.