I had an Idea for a giant space squid type monster. It would have counters for the arms and one for the body. Anybody interested?

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Tuesday, June 01, 2004 - 01:01 am: Edit

Can it cloak by changing color? (or at least get a big stealth bonus).

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Tuesday, June 01, 2004 - 01:19 am: Edit

Ya mean like that Giant Squid from Silver Hawks back in the 80s?

By Ken Humpherys (Pmthecat) on Tuesday, June 01, 2004 - 08:42 am: Edit

The squid sound alot like Globbo. That is a game from SJG's. A big, regenerating, ameboid robot "tends" these alien kids by shooting as many of them as possible. Problem is when kids get hit they explode. When 2-3 portions of resulting explosions get together (some move) they form a new kid. Because 6 pieces come from each explostion, exploading kids could theroreticly form 2-3 new kids. Any kids who survive are made adults. It is a blast to play.

By Jeff Williams (Jeff) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 02:14 am: Edit

While I would love to see the Juggernaut once again, it would need to be modernized for current playing styles and tactics. The thing, while powerful, had a second, often overlooked weakness: drone defense.

While Juggy packed a number of Ph-4's to wallop you with, there just weren't that many Ph-1s and Ph-3s on board. We loaded the D7C with twin scatterpacks, and borrowed control channels from the Tholian and Fed. Both packs broke open (one type-IV in each) and the Klink launched more IV's from racks. The Juggy had to turn away from the wall of drones, because it couldn't stop them all, and they WOULD have dropped even that 100-point shield. The Fed stayed on it's #4, the Klink and Tholian stayed on #3. All ships fired simultaneously, and Juggy had to cover it's rear against the Fed. 7 OL disrupters punched through that belt armor and started stripping power and phasers. Next impulse we followed up again with P-1s (plus the last disruptor on the C that had turned to bear). Again Juggy had to cover against the Fed, and the other P-1s stripped more weapons and power. We followed up the next turn on the #5 armor as Juggy was STIll dealing with the drone swarm. Not as much damage (no photons) this time, but the armor belt went down.

Even after it finally whittled down the drones, it had a helluva time dealing with wolf-pack style tactics with 2 armor belts gone. It still pasted us pretty hard with those P-4s, but we were able to take it down without sacrificing a ship.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 02:38 am: Edit

Just let the Ph-1 go Ph-G at the Juggernaughts option.

By Charles Gray (Cgray45) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 04:32 am: Edit

That might make the Juggie too powerful-- maybe make it the same as the andro's--they really aren't P-1s, but something that acts the same, and the gatling setting can only affect SC-5 and smaller.

By Charles Gray (Cgray45) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 04:34 am: Edit

I have to admit I want a monster "race" taht can be used for small campaigns-- perhaps a von nuemann style ship that if it manages to establish a base starts churning out other ships. I did something like this, and the reason they never became big threats was (borrowing from Hogan), thier ruling race was long since dead-- the ship, even if it "won" would only secure a small area and wait for instructions-- not devastating, but very annoying if it happened to be squatting in aplace where you needed to be.
the idea for smaller ships and fortifications I stole from "carrier command" if anyone remembers that wonderful game.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 10:42 am: Edit

Hmmm, I'm actually working on just such a race called the Drell. Their weapons and ships operate like nothing ever seen is SFB. They are seemingly nomadic and like the Andros, their intentions and purpose are only known to them. Also, at first they are mistaken for a long gone race.

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Tuesday, June 08, 2004 - 12:07 pm: Edit

Isn't everyone make a "new" race "nothing like anything in SFB"? I mean, Omega, the Andros. All new.

If it has weapons and some sort of defense system then its an SFB ship.

Ah well, just as long as it is not another Alpha race.

By Richard Wells (Rwwells) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 01:48 am: Edit

Most of Omega ain't that different. That shard race qualifies but most of the others are fairly conventional. Might take a few sessions to work out the preferred ranges but the Maesron's shouldn't be harder than learning the WYN fish was.

Making a race that works completely differently without breaking the game system is a intriguing challenge.

By John Erwin Hacker (Godzillaking) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 03:16 pm: Edit

To Mike Raper:
Earlier in this discussion you had a link to a "cleaned-up version" of an ancient space dragon. I clicked on it a number of times but came up empty handed. Could you please post it on your website so I can get a copy of it.
Thank you very much, John

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 03:45 pm: Edit

John,

I'll see if I still have it. Not sure that I do, but If I do I'll send it your way.

RE: New races. Tough to do. I'll admit my own, though it's come a long way after lots of work, isn't radically different. 'Bout the only really significant difference is the total and complete lack of seeking weapons and attrition units...no drones, no plasmas, no fighters, and no PF's. Heck, they don't even send over BP's...they defend only. I agree with Richard. A new and really different race would be interesting, but full of challenges...not the least of which would be balancing it against other existing material.

By Charles Gray (Cgray45) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 09:08 pm: Edit

The biggest problem with real weirdy races is well... anyone remember the original Andro's?

I think it really gets into a question of tiem and allocating effort. A real weird race, say one that uses a different move system and different shield rules probably requires 4 times the playtest time as a normal style race, and it only gets worse from there.
Maybe its time for E?? the real weirdie module --five or six races with only three of four ships apiece, so you can see what does and does not work before you put them into a full module.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 09:40 pm: Edit

My race will use shield boxes to represent the system that absorbs damage (not PA's, not shields but uses all the shield rules so game wise they are shields proper).

It's everything else that is different and yes, they could be used as a monster or similar to random appearing pirates.

They are few and totally space faring. Nightmares in the Darkness! That which goes bump in the night and in space it is always night...er...unless you're close to a star then it's always day but then that not very scary so we can just ignor that part, OK? Thanks.

By David Kass (Dkass) on Wednesday, June 09, 2004 - 11:28 pm: Edit

I actually find most "really wierd" races to not be that interesting. More standard new races can create almost as much (if not more) tactical diversity and are much more likely to be balanced. They are also much easier to become competent in fighting with/against. For me, at least, a game that turns on one player or the other missing the implication of a brand new rule is not fun (and even less fun is when the win/loss is due to misreading/misunderstanding a rule).

By John Erwin Hacker (Godzillaking) on Thursday, June 10, 2004 - 03:49 pm: Edit

To All:
I have a race called The Commonwealth Of Soviet Space Republics (A.K.A. The Commonwealth Of Independent Stars) that is ready for final playtest before I send it to Steve. I have a group of loyal SFB players here in Bloomington, Illinois that helped me playtest it against every other "Official Race" in the game over the last 3 years and I think it would be a very good addition to the game system (With Steves Approval Of Course) so If anybody wants on the final playtest, give me an e-mail. Steve, I hope that you will look at the race when I send it to you.
Thank you very much, John.

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Thursday, June 10, 2004 - 04:19 pm: Edit

Where would they go, map-wise?