J. Dean sez -

<HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT><P>To be honest, if you are looking to try to balance drone-less Federation ships. . . <!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0>

<HR SIZE=0><!-Quote-!><FONT SIZE=1>Quote:</FONT><P>Jessica, then Plasma Sabots and ECM plasma should not be considered either as plasma works just fine without those improvements<!-/Quote-!><HR SIZE=0>

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 03:20 pm: Edit

Johnathan Perry,

I think you make good points, except for one. IMHO, there is NO need for a speed 40 plasma. Sorry, but there isn't. No ship in the game ever goes faster than 32; they may have more power, but no more speed. An increase of 25% speed in a plasma is huge; get too close to a plasma armed ship to use your disruptors or photons, and you'll get the crap knocked out of you. I tried playing with the plasma sabots, and found it too much. The plasma is already pretty versatile; enveloping, shotgun, downfiring and pseudos are all options the plasma already has. For DF, you can bolt it with a reasonable chance of success. The sabot is just too much.

By Nick Samaras (Koogie) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 03:58 pm: Edit

Mike, that increase in power allows them to move faster and avoid plasmas until they have feeble warhead strength.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 04:02 pm: Edit

You still can't move any faster than 31, though...I don't care how much power you have. The extra can be used for reinforcement, EW, weapons, etc...but you still have the same speed limit.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 04:36 pm: Edit

Mike: what your missing is that, while no ship can exceed speed 31, pre- and early-war ships have combat speed that are between eight and ten points lower than mid- and late-war ships. Launching plasma against an enemy whose effective battle speed (after arming weapons and such) is 20 is a world of difference from launching plasma against an enemy whose effective battle speed is 28 or 30; the former is going to get tagged by a much stronger warhead than the latter. Thus, the late-war speed upgrade; a somewhat-effective counter to the 8-to-10 point battle speed increase in the late war years.

The photon, however, is a hit-or-miss weapon that is pretty much as effective in Y185 as it is in Y169. Yes, the plasmas that the Fed face are moving faster after Y181...but so are the Fed ships, so it's a wash. On the Western Front, the only change is that those miserable ECM drones have gone from speed 20 to speed 32...but in Y185, the Fed has those available, too, and in far greater numbers than he did in Y169.

By Andrew Harding (Warlock) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 04:57 pm: Edit

Hugh,

Let's test the 'photon is weak, plasma is fine' theory. I'll take a bunch of NCL hulls; you can build whatever S8 legal Rom fleet you like to the same points value. Floating map. How do you beat my retrograde/saberdance?

By Kirk Spencer (Kspencer) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 05:11 pm: Edit

heh - Andrew, I cloak and wait for you to come to me. If it's not important enough for you to stick around, it's not important enough for me to get pounded upon. Oh - if I'm the one that needs to push you, I do it slowly and under cloak - again either you come close or I get to my objective eventually but unscratched.

By John de Michele (Johnd) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 05:21 pm: Edit

For a bit of extra mayhem, add commander's options on both sides. As the Fed, I would fill up on T-bombs and use them to flash bulb Roms one at a time, until dead. Add dogfight drones to the G-racks for that extra bit of oomph.

John.

By Kevin M. McCollum (Sfbl5r) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 06:10 pm: Edit

Kirk, if you stay under cloak, under the stalemate rules, after ten turns, you are deemed to have disengaged.

By Alan De Salvio (Alandwork) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 06:37 pm: Edit

And plasma faces a somewhat unique open map versus closed map problem, which is mitigated for drones by their rate-of-fire. (so I agree with improved plasma and don't see the need for improved direct-fire photon/disruptor)

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 09:42 pm: Edit

Jessica,

I'm aware of the speed advantage of late war ships; I just don't think it's worth adding another 8 points of speed to a plasma, and I have several reasons why.

First, the power increase you're speaking of is fairly universal...in other words, the plasma armed ships benefit from it, too. This allows them some flexibility to chase/close with enemy ships, so the speed increase is in many cases a wash.

Secondly, there are already several plasma ship refits available. The romulans have the B refit, which changes the fixed G torpedo to a swivel S torpedo...a pretty significant improvement in the KR ship classes main armament. The plus refit for the sparrowhawk classes accomplishes the same thing, as does the Gorn plus refit of Y170. The Gorn also got the F refit, adding in a pair of plasma F's...again, a significant increase.

This discounts the various other refits the plasma races recieved (Gorn D, Romulan "old" plus and phaser refits), since they are functionally similar to refits the other races recieved as well (Fed plus, Klingon K or B refits).

The point is, these refits I mentioned upgrade the major heavy weapon of these ships in two ways...more damage, greater range, and better firing arcs. Personally, I think that's enough. Could be wrong; it wouldn't be the first time.
The other races do not recieve such upgrades to their weapons. Drones are certainly upgraded, that's quite true, but drones are more easily dispatched than a plasma.

I could live with a slight increase to plasma speed; perhaps up to 36. But 40 just seems to high to me, IMHO.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 10:04 pm: Edit

Okay, I spent some time tonight doing something I should have thought of a long time ago, and came up with some interesting results. I took a CA of each major DF race (Klingon, Fed, Hydran, Kzinti, Lyran, Orion) and moved it, one step at a time, from range 30 to range zero, speed 5. This gave me 6 rounds to fire and calculate results using real dice, and real numbers. Each ship fired normal weapons (no overloads) as much as they were able, and I totalled damage for each against an imaginary target for the entire six rounds.

After doing this, I am forced to admit I am wrong. Yep, that's right; probably don't see much of that here, but I'm not ashamed to admit it.

The winner insofar as total damage scored was the hellbore, followed closely by the photon. The disruptor was a close third, and would have possibly surpassed the photon but for suffering UIM burnout on the second turn. Fusions, it should be no surprise, were dead last.

What makes the photon a good weapon is what others have said...it has a fixed damage rate. So even though it hits pretty poorly, it does decent damage over time. This is probably somewhat harder to see when looking at a single ship battle, but in a fleet or even squadron battle, it shows up nicely. Further, if you add a legendary weapons officer, the photon is almost disturbing to see. (I kept seperate track of this for each ship...the fixed damage of the photon means alot when paired up with a LWO.)

So, I'm forced to conclude that, even though they have some limitations, they do work out pretty well in the end. I'll still grit my teeth when I fire that volley at range 3 and miss with 3 of 4, but that's okay.

Now, all that being said: I still believe that anyone who wants to discuss improvements to the photon (or any other weapon) should be allowed to do so in peace, and not be ridiculed, pestered, or in any other way verbally abused. They should not be accused of stupidity, a poor grasp of the rules, or of having poor playing skills. They have the right to discuss it all the live long day, and if anyone disagrees with them, say your peice and then leave it alone.

There...I'm off my box for awhile. SVC, feel free to zap this thread at your leisure...it isn't needed anymore.

By Andrew Harding (Warlock) on Thursday, April 25, 2002 - 11:53 pm: Edit

While I think plasma has trouble against the western races, there are enough people who consider it to be even or even advantaged in large open space games that I'm interested in playing it out a few times against a 'plasma is already too strong' player to see if there are strategies that I've missed.

Now that SFBOL support for multiple ships is better (though we'll still need paper SSDs for now), does anyone want to take on my direct fire fleet with equivalent points of plasma ships? You run 1000-1500 points including commander's options of Rom or Gorn, I'll run the same number of points of Klingon, Kzinti, Fed, Lyran, Hydran or Tholian (your choice, depending on how many bragging rights you want). Setup on a shield boundary 35-50 hexes apart moving speed 31 forward on a floating map with equal Weapon status of your choice, your choice of advanced or commander's level rules, no optional or playtest rules, date of your choice provided my race's CW is available, both fleets must be S8 legal.

Any takers?

By Jonathan Perry (Jonathan_Perry) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 08:47 am: Edit

I don't remember ANYONE saying that plasma was advantaged in open space games.

+++++++++++++++++++++

I, for one, made no attempt to redicule anyone. I simply stated (and will continue to do so), that if the Fed ships consistently lose, then they need an upgrade of some sort. If they don't, then no upgrade is needed. No statistical analysis of the heavy weapons, ceteris paribus, means a darned thing unless you put them on a ship and actually play them against each other.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 09:10 am: Edit

Jonathan,

I know you didn't ridicule anyone, and I'm sure it's appreciated by more than me. You are absolutely right in your statement that you have to play the weapons to see if they work right. Doing the little exercise I did last night proves that nicely. I think the photon is fine for now, though with 2X it will probably need some sort of upgrade. Frankly, firing every turn is a big boost already; making it more accurate or damaging may be a problem, but we'll just have to wait and see.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 09:44 am: Edit

Mike,

Re: photons -- Thanks for the analysis, and the honest assessment at the end. It makes a huge difference.

Re: late-war plasma -- This is still something of a problem. Yes, the plasma ship is just as fast as the target ship, with a similar speed upgrade. However, the problem is the speed of the torp relative to the target ship.

Think of it sort of like the infamous YF-12 machine gun test. The YF-12 (later developed into the SR-71) has a problem with machine guns: it flew fast enough to run into its own bullets. A similar problem with missiles happened, and indeed one managed to shoot itself down (fired and promptly outran the missile, slowed to find out where the missile went, missile aquired the YF-12 as a target and blew it out of the sky). In short, the YF-12 was too fast to effectively use weapons that aren't instant-impact (and as beam weapons are still a bit impractical, it never developed into the intended F-12 interceptor).

Yes, the ships are very fast, able to hit battle speeds of 30 or so. This means that, from the time the plasma torp leaves the tube, it is only going to close a very, very few hexes with the target (unless the target is so unfortunate as to be closing dead-on, rather than oblique), which means that plasma can only be effectively launched from rather close range. The old plasma-ballet tactic of launching from just outside overload range becomes useless, as plasma launched from that range doesn't stand a snowball's chance of actually hitting a late-war warship. Meanwhile, the direct-fire weapons are just as effective at range-X as ever...which means that the plasma ship is going to get plastered trying to get into a firing position to use its plasma with any effectiveness at all.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 10:33 am: Edit

Jessica,

I agree that the plasma should get some speed upgrade...it's the amount that worries me. 8 more points of speed is a 25% increase...that's alot, IMHO. As a ship takes damage and looses power, that increase will become deadly difficult to deal with. Just my two cents worth; it doesn't really matter, as the rule will go/no go without my say. I'm just hesitant to see anything like this. Plasmas are a fearsome weapon anyway; a super plasma makes me frankly nevous, especially in the hands of a fast-loading x-ship.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 10:59 am: Edit

It will probably come down to playtesting in the end. From the reports I've seen posted here so far, the speed-40 plasma seems to be working out OK...but that's likely only a small fraction of the reports that have gone to ADB.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:11 am: Edit

Yeah. Plus (not to sound suspicious) most of the reports are from the pro-plasma crowd. If it goes, I'll use it. I just have to drastically re-evaluate how to handle a plasma ship; especially the big boys.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:26 am: Edit

Only after Y181, though...and by that point, there's a lot of ways to handle a plasma barge.

Eight points scared me at first, too, but I've given it a couple of runs in little pick-up games, and it seems to work OK. I'm not exactly what you would call a fan of big plasma, either; the only plasma race that I'm all that fond of taking is the ISC, which come in a distant third after Klingons and Hydrans.

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:31 am: Edit

I'm a simple, DF kind of guy; I don't particularly like drones or plasmas, though I recognize the value of each. I love disruptors, and Hellbores, and strangely, Fusions. Don't know why, but I do. Then again, anyone that's ever been set upon by a pack of fusion-toting Stinger II's can tell you fusions are pretty good...

By Stephen W. Fairfield (Sfairfield) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:33 am: Edit

I agree that seeking weapons are disadvantaged on open maps vs. high speed opponents, though I suspect that they don't have that same problem on fixed maps. This could be viewed as a natural tradeoff/downside for seeking weapons and explain why 'historically' the Gorn, Romulans, and Kzinti (ok, the Kzinti have disruptors and later on aren't that different from Klingons, but I think are still more drone-dependant) aren't as big/powerful/whatever as the three main (mostly) direct fire fleets, the Federation, Klingons, and ISC. Namely that seeking weapons are very good at attacking a fixed objective, good at defending one, but are pretty poor in fleet engagements where the objective is simply to destroy the enemy fleet. Direct fire fleets tend not to excel in one area or the other (though the three mentioned do have good standoff weapons to pound a base from outside meaningful Ph-4 range).

Of course Plasma ships are not bereft of direct fire weapons, namely plasma bolts. By the time the General War is well underway, the typical plasma armed cruiser has something like 2 S-torps and 2 F-torps. The S-torps can be bolted, and while not having a great chance to hit at ranges over 10, very few other weapons can do 15 damage at range 20 in a single shot. At ranges 9-10, it hits as well as normal or overloaded photon torpedoes, while still being outside overload range of any answering fire. Yes, it takes 3 turns to charge instead of 2 for photons, but it does much higher damage, leading to an analysis similar to the photon vs. disruptor debate. And by firing it's S-torps as bolts, it doesn't even leave itself open to an overrun if the bolts miss, since it still has it's 2 F-torps, held at zero cost, to punish anyone that tries take advantage of this.

Repeating Mike's analysis for our theoretical plasma ship, assuming that the torpedoes start uncharged, that it can only use bolts, and will hold off firing for a turn, if it could get a better shot on the next turn without losing an overall opportunity to shoot. Essentially the following pattern: turn 1, move/charge (r=25), turn 2, move/charge (r=20), turn 3, move/charge (r=15, hold until next turn), turn 4, move/fire S-torps (r=10), move/fast charge S's/Fire F-torps (r=5), move/Fire S-torps as F's (r=0).

Trial	Total Damage
1	50
2	120
3	100
4	90
5	80
Average	88

So, how does this compare? Let's repeat for the photon, assuming a ship with 4 torpedoes, firing as proximity/standard/overload, whichever is best (and possible at the time). Again, starting with weapons uncharged, we have the following pattern: turn 1, move/charge proxies (r=25), turn 2, move/fire proxies (r=20), turn 3, move/charge proxies (r=15), turn 4, mover/fire proxies (r=10), turn 5, move/charge overloads (r=5), turn 6, move/fire overloads (range 1, avoiding feeedback, or range 0 and taking it).

Trial	Damage (r=1 Overloads)	Damage (r=0 Overloads)
1	72	72
2	36	84
3	52	84
4	48	90
5	82	82
Average	58	82

Admittedly, these are very small samples in a somewhat contrived situation, but it seems the Photon is a poorer direct fire weapon than the Plasma Bolt, unless the firing ship is willing to self-inflict 16 points of damage in order to ensure that the overloads hit.. So at least, it seems that Plasma ships have their answer to the fast target problem: just bolt them (if they can get within r=10).

By Tony Barnes (Tonyb) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:34 am: Edit

Mike,

---

Quote:

especially in the hands of a fast-loading x-ship

---

By Mike Raper (Raperm) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:39 am: Edit

Stephen,

Intersting. I only have two comments that I think should be considered.

: It would depend greatly on what kind of plasma you're bolting. A fed NCL, for example, can ladel out up to 64 points of photon damage. What kind of bolt damage could a comparable Gorn or Rom CL do?

: The photon gets one big advantage over the bolts; it gets to fire first. Following the rule of "firstus mostus", you may smack the crap out of someone with your photons before they can shoot that bolt at you.

Just some thoughts. Looks like a nice analysis all in all. I'm on your side in that I don't like the idea of a speed 40 plasma, but I think every angle has to be considered to come up with a fair evaluation.

By Stephen W. Fairfield (Sfairfield) on Friday, April 26, 2002 - 11:47 am: Edit

Mike, It's bolting S-torps twice, then its 2 F-torps, then its S-torps fast loaded as F's. I'm not sure what the Gorn or Rom CL's are armed with when the Fed NCL is around (I'm assuming a ship with 2 S-torps, 2 F-torps vs. one with 4 Photon torps).

One thing to note, is that the average damage from proxies (i.e before the photon gets within overload range) is 16 for the 5 trials, assuming no reinforcement etc. which is annoying, but not lethal. By contrast, the r=10 S-bolts did an average of 36 points of damage before entering the r=8 overload threat range. Essentially two S-bolts act a lot like 4 overload Photons, except that they get to fire 2 hexes further out (prempting the photon and giving the bolting ship a chance to fire and begin to turn away, leaving 2 seeking F-torps in its wake to dissuade the photon ship from trying to follow it).