Why is the balance in that scenario as bad as you suggest? It follows the 2/3 attacker/defender bpv and neatly requires a mostly freigther convoy by the 300 cargo and max 1 armed/qship rules.

By David Kass (Dkass) on Monday, September 15, 2003 - 07:11 pm: Edit

In my opinion, the attacker in this type of scenario should have a BPV advantage (with the defender having about 2/3 of the attacker's BPV), before accounting for the freighters. With the freighters, the two BPV will be about equal (although probably still favoring the attacker by a slight margin).

I feel it needs to be this way to avoid having the convoy go hunting the raider. At equal BPV (including the freighters), the raider can outgun the warships and thus is likely to win any straight up fight.

The scenarios you are considering have the defender with a higher BPV, when including the freighters. You seem to want the attacker to have 2/3 of the defender's BPV. While this may work for the scenarios you are looking at, it does not for the one you're planning for the game. Remember that in the CL24 scenario, the only way for the freighters to disengage is by distance. This gives the DNL a chance to "hang" out and wear them away (requiring the convoy have enough firepower to have a chance of forcing it away). Also read some of the suggested tactics. Most involve very agressive convoy operations (see also the ones on the BBS).

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 11:58 pm: Edit

Could someone explain to me the size class 4 rule?
1/2-1 of all fleets mustbe sc4.

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 03:23 am: Edit

Not in force for the current playtest Les, so don't worry about it.

If it were, you would be required to field X size clas 4 warships in a fleet, where X = half the total ships present -1. ie: 9 ship fleet, 4 must be size 4's.

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 04:47 pm: Edit

Any other rules in that ruleset you sent me not in force?

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Thursday, October 09, 2003 - 03:17 am: Edit

Y175, pre-construction build %, max 1 sz2/CVA is in effect. That's about it iirc.

By Daniel Knudtson Thompson (Brezgonne) on Sunday, November 02, 2003 - 09:33 am: Edit

I'm a bit unclear how combat is supposed to work here....

By David Kass (Dkass) on Tuesday, November 04, 2003 - 04:16 am: Edit

Daniel, you might go investigate the SFBOL topic where this campaign is being played out. From my understanding, its a series of scenarios where players "force" each other into specific types of scenarios by challenges. The individual scenarios are regular SFB battles.

By David Kass (Dkass) on Tuesday, January 13, 2004 - 01:50 pm: Edit

How about adding a border duel scenario (basically a duel scenario but with a BPV of 45+3d6, designed to allow for small FF and police ships. I believe every race has a ship that will fit in at 48 BPV).

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, January 14, 2004 - 11:34 am: Edit

David Kass:

Cheapest Tholian true warship (i.e., not counting armed freighters) is standard PC at 59 points. Note that PC in this galaxy does double duty as powerful police ship/weak frigate. Tholian SC4 warships are clumped into a very narrow BPV range of 59-86 (excluding X-ships and Neo-Tholian SC4 ships).

By David Kass (Dkass) on Wednesday, January 14, 2004 - 01:39 pm: Edit

Alan, note that Tholians are not on the list of races allowed for this campaign (intentionally I believe since they break many campaigns).

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Wednesday, January 14, 2004 - 01:41 pm: Edit

David Kass:

I regret I hadn't noticed that. You're right that the Tholians are extremely difficult to balance at the campaign level.

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Wednesday, January 14, 2004 - 04:28 pm: Edit

Well since no base assaults were played last campaign, I think none will be played next. Drop all the base assaults and play for points and the tholians could play.

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Tuesday, April 20, 2004 - 10:46 am: Edit

Ok based on Less request here is my proposed overhaul to the Convoy Raid;

Convoy Raid

Attacker	Defender	Maps
150+12D6	*225+12D6
300+D6x10	*450+D6x10	2x2

*Convoy force must bring cargo boxes at least equal to half their allowed bpv, bpv for these units comes from your non-warship pool and therefore must be freighters and the like, max 1 qship and 1 armed freighter (units from the generic MSC and not your racial MSC).

Convoy setup within 5 hexes of 2215 heading A, spd 10 WS 0.
Raider setup in the 01xx or 42xx row, spd max WSIII.

Map is fixed, but there are 2 more maps in dir A.
Convoy can disengage by seperation or leaving map 3 in dir A.


Convoy player scores VPs for crippling/destroying/capturing raider units. Also scores VP=10%EPV for disengaged cargo units.
Raider player scores VPs for crippling/destroying convoy units. Captured convoy units are treated as destroyed for scoring.
(this is pulled in part from SL208, CL24)

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Tuesday, April 20, 2004 - 01:35 pm: Edit

"max 1 qship and 1 armed freighter"

I'd suggest 1 for the 1st bracket, 2 each for the second bracket.

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Tuesday, April 20, 2004 - 05:50 pm: Edit

Possible, but the 1/1 limitation is straight from SL208 so its a good baseline to start discussion at least.

I just realized that I left the old 2x2 maps in the table when in fact I went with the 3x1 configuration. FYI.

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Wednesday, April 21, 2004 - 03:06 pm: Edit

Ok what worked or didnt work?

1)mapsize. 3x1 too big? However at the quoted speeds of 9-10 for the convoy, they should've made it in about 10 turns.

2)Weapons status. This is the one that most concerned me. Perhaps WS 1 for the convoy? Or standard rolled/agreement for both sides? Or a WS 1 lower than the raider for the convoy?

3)Reinforcments. Really don't want to go there! It would also encourage the convoy player to just circle the wagons as well, which i'd rather avoid as we already have a 'base assault' scenario. I really want to encourage the moving convoy battle. If necesary, a simple turn limit could be put in but I think that would be the same as a reinforcments table/rule.

4)bpv. Too much? Too little? About right? Currently set to have the raider at 2/3 the convoy as per SL208.

By Bret O'Neal (Fiverdown) on Wednesday, April 21, 2004 - 10:19 pm: Edit

First off I didn't maximize the combat ability I had available with my fleet.

I could of gone with somthing like this WE, LQ, L-Armed. Fits all restrictions and has no freighters, didn't seem right to me, where is the convoy? Would of been a much more balanced fight. Maybe even in my favor.

Instead I went with, 2xL-F, 4xS-F, L-AF, SQ, SNP
This looks like a convoy.

I like Escort(s) (max 65-75 point ships, depend on year), armed & Q are 60%, Freighters are 40%.
Attackers are 75%
ex 150
90 for combat ships, 60 in small & large freighters.
Attacked by 100 in combat ships.

Keep WS-0 to 3. Keep cargo escaping victory stff.
freighter kills are x2 (combat BPV), freighter captures are x3 (combat BPV).

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Wednesday, April 21, 2004 - 11:09 pm: Edit

I just realized something.. you bought the Q ships and armed freighters from your combat ship bpv didn't you?

U10.14 Each player has a generic pool of 600 bpv to draw on for non-warship expenses (freighters, ground bases, base pods/modules, minefields, police/Q ships, auxiliaries etc.)

I took that to mean you had 127.5 for warships and 127.5 for freighters and q ships.
Let's see

F-AL 75
F-L 18
F-S 12
S-Q 40
=199 non warship

snp 55 warship

Ok ignore all our opinions on the scenario because we are both literally challenged I think.

By Paul Scott (The_Rock) on Friday, April 23, 2004 - 01:45 pm: Edit

The SNP is a non-warship too (or can be).

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Saturday, April 24, 2004 - 04:37 am: Edit

SNP is a warship.

I could of gone with somthing like this WE, LQ, L-Armed. Fits all restrictions and has no freighters,

That would bring cargo spaces = half your total bpv though? If so perhaps a ratio limit on q/armed freighters is needed.

Keep WS-0 to 3.

Really? My impression is that WSO really hampered you.

freighter kills are x2 (combat BPV), freighter captures are x3 (combat BPV).

Why? EPV is supposed to be used as per VP rules and seems to take into account their increased values. Also, freighter captures are typically destroyed as the raider cannot afford the crew to man a prize nor the time to escort it anywhere.

Les,
took that to mean you had 127.5 for warships and 127.5 for freighters and q ships.

Not quite, the old rules had a minimum non-warship half bpv requirement, not exactly half bpv. Current convoy rules have a cargo space minimum requirement rather than non-warship bpv.

By Bret O'Neal (Fiverdown) on Saturday, April 24, 2004 - 08:52 am: Edit

Ok, looks like neither less or I understood the rules of engagement.
I think we should probably play this again.

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Saturday, April 24, 2004 - 03:52 pm: Edit

So what the hell is the value of a cargo box? Or are you talking about the # of cargo boxes?

By Geoff Conn (Talonz) on Sunday, April 25, 2004 - 04:04 am: Edit

# of cargo boxes. ie: if the convoy player has 400 bpv, he must bring at least 200 cargo boxes in the convoy.

By Les LeBlanc (Lessss) on Tuesday, April 27, 2004 - 11:15 pm: Edit

I think 6 ftrs should come with the convoy from the freighter bpv pool or half and half. The Ftrs maintain ws-3.

This give some needed firepower that gets used once and then is gone. Hydran would not be allowed to rearm these ftrs.