Archive through February 13, 2004
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Star Fleet Battles: SFB Proposals Board: The "X" Files: OLD X2 FOLDER: X2 photons: Archive through February 13, 2004
By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Tuesday, February 10, 2004 - 09:38 pm: Edit

Quote:

No kidding. Finally catching on, I see. It isn't fair because the BPV of the Fed is understated. Which is why having all these systems is enough to be getting on with without 20 point photons.


No it's unfair because of several reasons all of which I pointed out.

Let's take the big one...force Dynamics!

An 8Ph-5, Four 24 point Photon torpedo, 48 Warp ( 6 scaucer/AWR ), 48/40/40/40 shield, 4 cargo, 4 extra R-Hull, Full Aegis, 2 X1 G-rack, ASIF that doubles HUll and other boxes for 6+15 power, S-bridge capable but otherwise a Fed CX ( including the 8 EW and ability to fight with a negative shift ) Fed XCA fights a single vessel.

I nominate a Fed DNa+ with an Outstanding Crew.
We could argue that by the time X2 comes around we won't have a restriction that DNs can't have poor or outstanding crews.

At 330 BPV for the Fed XCA and (211 x 1.5) 316.5 with her 1 G-rack loaded up as an ADD-8 or possibly an ADD-4 and type IVF-ECM drone launcher.


In such a situation, the DNa+ would be able to generate 10 ECCM on the turn of attack ( and 10 ECM on the turn of defense if it did have the ECM drone) .
Would the XCA look to using an ECM drone to defend itself or would both ships just take the -1 shift?
Would both ships fire at R8 or R4?
Would they centreline or oblique?

Would they both go on the offensive EW wise, since we are afraid of GUTTING the target ship, I would say yes.
At R8 and a negative shift for both parties with 7 bearing Ph-1s {2.83x7 points of damage) against 6 Bearing Ph-5 (4x6 points of damage) and Four 24 Point Photons ( 1-4 x 4 x 24 ) generating 64 points of damage and the six 16 point Photons hitting on 1-4 also generating 64 points of damage.
A hit of 83.833 point of damage against the Fed XCA's 40 box #2 sheild is a big hurt on the XCA.
A hit of 88 against the 38 box shield is a bad hurt.
But all in all both ships are about as bad off as eachother so I would say the BPV is about right.


Quote:

I feel that we need to evaluate what the photon should be able to generate in regards to crunch power. During the early GW era two full overlaods or four standards would just about drop a cruiser's foreward shield (30 point shield + 3-5 battery reinforcement). A full overload jackpot against a cruiser would crush a foreward shield plus battery reinforcement and damage 25% to 30% of the target's internals. The question then becomes, should the X2 photon be able to generate a proportional amount of single impulse crunch power.


I've alwys gelt the XCA should beable to pull down the #1 shield of an enemy X2 Cruiser with average results at R8. The MY CA throws out four 16 point Photons and hits the D7's #1 which has 30 boxes and brings it down ( save BTTY Re, EW etc ). So too a Fed XCA throwns out four 24 point Photon at R8 and hits the #1 sheild of a Klingon XCA which has 48 boxes for 48 points of damage.


Quote:

The problem I have with your analysis is that you often seem to assume a particular tactic for one side with no acknowledgement that there are plenty of other tactics that might be used instead. For example, in your post on this thread arguing that 20-point photons would not be unbalancing, you assume:


I had a bunch of people post that they didn't read some of the posts I've made simply because they were too long. Writing down every availibe option makes for very long posts.

I write a story of a battle pass that seems reasonable to me giving either both sides a dumb move or neither and if it comes out to me that both sides come out fairly well or both sides come out very badly then I would say that the situation is probably very balanced.

If we write down every possible permutation and combination of actions one could take with a ship and make them all counterbalanced exactly by everybody elses abilities to counted said same action during the design of the game then we leave no room for tactics to be developed.

The major point is that the Fed needn't allocate anything at all to EW during energy allocation. One of the advantages of an X-ship is the reserve power.
By the same token the XCA would have less power for SSReo if it when that way.
If the Klingon D7K follows at high speed, the XCA maintains speed and has more than enough power to recharge batteries gradually over several turns, even while reinforcing the rear shield and annoying the undamaged D7K with rear facing (and 360) Phaser-5s. In the meantime, the damaged D7K falls further and further behind.
Good, but letting the D7bk follow you also lets the D7bk build SPs and if the damaged D7bk has one Shuttle Boxes with her two remaining drone racks she can probably build an SP awsell. Plus the damaged D7bk can control 5 or 6 drones to aid the un damaged one control the drones it launched from it's SPs. Plus it's own drone racks could launch Type IVF-X-Ph-2 drones to do a little damage when the XCA makes her attack run next ( is it really more than 6 turns away!? ) or any other kind of drones with speed 32 and extended range...I would look to extended range if I had GW drone chuckers and was on a floating map.
That the Feds will make their attack at moderate speed. But if I were playing the Feds in this scenario I would rather have the control of the range that a very fast attack run gives me. If that means loading the photons to something below 20 points, well just because you can load to 20 doesn't mean you have to. If that means not charging ASIF, well I'ld rather rely on ECM, shield reinforcement and control of the range, at least in this scenario.
Oddly enough in the PLaytesting I did between an XCA+ and a CX and DDX that was exactly what happened...the ship had the ability to load 24 pointers and didn't because the battle speeds were so high as to make the power unavailible.

The thing to remember is that one big ship has always been better than it's weight in BPV of a number of smaller ships...it works it'self out in fleet battles ( to some extent ) but since the situation is a FORCE DYNAMICS situation, the BPV may well be 300 and sitll only find a equal battle of 350 BPV worth of Extreme combat GW cruisers.
Find a DNH to duel with the XCA and you'll have a better idea of what the BPV of the XCA is.

Can you see how telling a reasonable story is less convoluted than analysising every option.

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 12:12 am: Edit

You continue to misuse the term Force Dynamics mjc.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 01:26 am: Edit

Sending a small task group of GW ships against one X2 cruiser is the wrong way to calculate BPVs.

Individual ship battles like a DNH or BB against an XCA is the way to get the BPV right.

We can also send XDDs against DNs and BCHs and XFFs against CAs and CCHs and then scale up.

Or we could have a full fleet battle Vs an X2 squadron.


A straight up fight between two GW cruisers and one of these X2 super cruiser with the GW cruisers having a slightly lower BPV than would be fair, is going to be descidedly unfair to the GW cruisers.


Do 2 Klingon F5s in Y148 beat a Fed CC?
If BPV was the ultimate Guide then they should waltz it in...and yet they don't!

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 10:42 am: Edit

MJC: I disagree.

To calculate the BPV of X2 I would take the most common units of the GW and pit them against X2.

2CW loses to XCA, 3CW beats XCA. The BPV is between 2CW and 3CW.

Lets try 2CW+DW. That beats the XCA. The BPV is between 2CW and 2CW+DW.

Lets try 2CW+FW. That beats the XCA 50% of the time. We have our BPV.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 12:37 pm: Edit

I think it requires, short of and probably in addition "The Formula", a mixture of opponants. IF the target is around B-10 levels then battles with a B-10 and battle s with a two ship team and then battle with a small ship squadron are required to acheive maximum balance.

By R. Brodie Nyboer (Radiocyborg) on Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - 08:11 pm: Edit

No offense guys, but do we really need to continue the BPV discussion in the photon torpedo thread? We already had part of this conversation in the BPV thread.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 12:19 pm: Edit

Well, if you want to start a new photon discussion, how about this idea...

Since the integrated X2 proposal included Mike R's SSD and general idea, why not go in the photon improvement direction?

For example, his design had 4 photons and improved phaser arc's.

What if we revise the photon torpedo design with some of the ideas that we started to discuss before the integrated proposal tangent took us away?

for example, we were talking about double shotted and pulsed photons...to me, that makes a X2 photon, twice as effective as earlier photons by the virtue of being able to fire twice as many shots in the same time period.

Why not, propose that photons do just that? that way the "general" designs that mike proposed could have 2 photons instead of 4, but able to fire as many torpedos as the original 4 tubes could fire?

then when time came to field a "war version" of the X2 cruiser, increase the number of tubes to 4 which fire 8 torpedos instead of the 4 the original photons could launch?

compare this to the X2disrupter threads where note was made that Klingons, instead of (this is a paraphrase of many posts) improving the x2 disrupters, they increase the number of disrupters from 4 to 6.

this would mean that on average, the fed ships would have 2 more SSD boxes of something other than a heavy weapon, which (presumable) will contribute more BPV without having to inflate the number of photon torpedo tubes the ship is equipped with.

just a thought...

By Orman J. Hoffman II (Ojh2) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 08:16 pm: Edit

Personnally, I find the double shot idea a bit cumbersome. I do think that some kind of improvement is necessary, however I don't think that whatever is created should be much more complex than the X1 photon. I would like to see a warhead increase, but I realize that concept is not very popular right now. Perhaps we should look at giving the X2 photon a larger firing arc (or is that a DOA issue?). Also, I still like the idea of a 16 point standard like I brought up earlier.

MJC
I noticed you answered my question but, I can't help noticing that you forgot about the battery SSReo. I suspected that if I got an answer that the X2 SSReo would be ignored. A MY cruiser that gets hit by two 16 point torps will, after battery SSReo have less than 10% of its foreward shield left. A X2 cruiser hit by two 24 point warheads will have about 30% of its foreward shield remaining with battery SSReo. To account for that a X2 photon would have to have either a better chance to hit or a larger warhead.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 08:19 pm: Edit

The only problem with 16 point standards is the range. Standards have a range of 40, and even though the to hit probability isn't very good, a 1 in 6 chance of nailing someone with 64 points from across the map is too much, unless you have some range limitation built in.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 08:36 pm: Edit

Quote:

A X2 cruiser hit by two 24 point warheads will have about 30% of its foreward shield remaining with battery SSReo. To account for that a X2 photon would have to have either a better chance to hit or a larger warhead.


Yeah but the bigger warhead or increased accuracy would drive up the BPV of the ships to the point where few if any of the playtesters would want to play.


Quote:

The only problem with 16 point standards is the range. Standards have a range of 40, and even though the to hit probability isn't very good, a 1 in 6 chance of nailing someone with 64 points from across the map is too much, unless you have some range limitation built in.


Heck even at R12 with a narrow salvo, a 33% chance of doing 64 points of damage is just too good, if the enemy is forced to fire standards...unless you move the BPV up.

Remember that most people agreed.
ASIF+S-Bridge+Full-X-Aegis would be a more fun buy for your BPV than R10 Overloads...although they would be about the same BPV.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 08:41 pm: Edit

A 16 point standard would have an 8 point prox. and I was freaking about the idea of a 6 point prox!

Such a thing would waste bases and fixed instalations or anything slow.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 08:54 pm: Edit

Just say "no" to an 6 point prox.

So just say "hell no" to an 8-point prox.

By Mark Norman (Mnorman) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 09:15 pm: Edit

I think that doubling the effectiveness of the photon is too much. However, a small improvement to the general damage (10 standards, 20 overloads) would be an improvement. The problem is that what is really needed is a way to make 2-turn arming better than 1-turn arming, which from my limited experience, it is not in X1.
How about, for increased flexibility, having variable photons, which can be armed for 1 or more energy on each of 2 or more turns, and produce 1 point of damage for every 1/2 point of power. there would need to be other considerations, such as how holding would combine with this, but it would improve the flexibility of the photon, rather than just the damage output.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 10:30 pm: Edit

We have been down this road before (actually more than once!)

as was pointed out to me by others, we need to avoid some of the more obvious problems with Supplement 1.

if you look in the archives, the choices come down to improving accuracy, or improving the damage generation ability.

there are people on record that think doing both would be too much.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 10:39 pm: Edit

And one other consideration:

there are people that think 24 point 2 turn arming cycle for photons is too much damage being generated for a fed cruiser armed with 4 photon tubes...but if you have 12 point single turn photon torpedos, you actualy get a slightly better damage rating over time as you effectively get 2 shots during 2 turns instead of 1 shot for 24 points every other turn.

its like trying to get the 24 point warheads in through the back door when you couldnt get approval up front.

if all you want is to make 2 turn arming more attractive than 1 turn fast loads, then just limit fast loads to no more power than a standard 8 point photon.

that means in two turns of fast loads, you could potentially generate 8+8 =16 points of damage over 64 impusles while a 2 turn overload can churn out 20 points damage...a base 25% improvement.

and you don't need any convoluted on complex rules to account for it!

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 11:22 pm: Edit

2x 12 does not equal 1x 24.

Ask any klingon.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 11:27 pm: Edit

I whole heartedly agree with John. There is a major difference. That's the whole point of the term "Crunch". One can only put up so much defense per turn.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 11:35 pm: Edit

Quote:

I think that doubling the effectiveness of the photon is too much. However, a small improvement to the general damage (10 standards, 20 overloads) would be an improvement. The problem is that what is really needed is a way to make 2-turn arming better than 1-turn arming, which from my limited experience, it is not in X1.


24 point two turn Photons with no front loading restrictions...heck even 20 point Photons with no front loading restrictions would be enough to encourage people to go for the two turn arming...I'm not sure if anything less would.


I'm not entirely convinced two turn arming 24 point Photons have crunch power enough to over ride the power of 12 point fastloads...the Phaser-5 kicks in at R8 making any battle of two turn arming less effective unless the Photons have something pretty special generated by two turn arming.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Thursday, February 12, 2004 - 11:46 pm: Edit

Quote:

if all you want is to make 2 turn arming more attractive than 1 turn fast loads, then just limit fast loads to no more power than a standard 8 point photon.



The Admiralty just wont go for that...the'll stick with X1 Photons because in those rare cases where the Fed captain suddenly needs to Vapourise the enemy at point blank over a turn break ( 8 impulses after firing those Photons ) he can and it'll save his butt...his crew and several billion credits worth of equipment...restricting fastloads to standards could get everyone killed and loose a lot of expensive hardware.


Quote:

That's the whole point of the term "Crunch". One can only put up so much defense per turn.


On the other hand the Fed is able to get double Phaser fire if he hangs around to fastload instead of looking for two turn arming.
Crunchpower needs therefore to actually be worth a Fed's while.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 08:03 am: Edit

I dunno. I can see arguments for 20 point photons...I can. But simply driving up the damage on everything is just soooooooo unappealing. I mean, really. If you make the photon 25% more powereful, what happens to the other weapons that have to keep pace? I'd like to find a way to increase damage capability with just increasing warhead size, if we could, otherwise X2 just becomes an exercise in "bigger is better", and having DNH's disguised as cruisers. That just doesn't feel like a good direction for X2, to me.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 08:23 am: Edit

The argument that Mike R is articulating ("...just driving up the damage..."can be rephrased as 'quantity vs quality'

most posts have been one or the other proposal to increase the quantity of damage a photon inflicts with a successful hit or improve the quality by improving the chances of a successful hit.

One area we have not discussed (much) is the quality side that would make X2 distincet from earlier designs and tech levels.

Lorens ASIF idea approaches it, and has its own thread, but does not directly address photons.

I tried to suggest quality improvements for the Photon torpedo and we got "side tracked".

Lets try one more time, IMO the question comes down to ways to improve the photon that would be new or different from the "just increasing the damage" or messing with the "to Hit tables".

already proposed is increasing the number of shots a given tube could launch in a 32 or 64 impulse window (or time segment)...

It had also been proposed (and no response) that photons get other abilities...how about a setting on the photon that does not result in a hit or direct damage to an enemy, but does some thing else?

such as create a "terrain hex" where the photon exploded that does something for a limited duration ... maybe +1 natural ECM for all ships and non ship units in that hex for 32 or 64 impulses?

By Tos Crawford (Tos) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 09:15 am: Edit

Quality improvement: 180 degree arc.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 09:38 am: Edit

Quality improvement: enhanced damage against sheilds, and reduced damage to ship, (for example, +1 per torpedo vs shields and -1 vs internal damage...so 4 standard torpedos against an intact shield would do (8+1)*4=36 points of shield damage (assuming shield strength is greater than 36 boxes, but the same (shield shreader photon (a designation a player would have to decide on during the arming process) would only do (8-1)*4=28 points of internal damage if he managed to get a shot through a down shield.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 09:45 am: Edit

Quality improvement: linked to example just given, but set for proximity photons. for every 2 successful proximity photon sheild shreaders, results in +1 shield box damaged, -1 internal box damaged for internals. results in 5 point proximity photons but less effective if hits for internals occur.

By Mark Norman (Mnorman) on Friday, February 13, 2004 - 11:33 am: Edit

Quality improvement: Full Dial-a-Photon. Arm a photon for 1 or more energy per turn for two or more turns. Damage is twice energy put in.

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