Subtopic	Posts		Updated
	Archive through May 13, 2002	25		05/13 09:42pm

I think the confusion may lay in the term "range of detonation". Most commonly we view this as being the entire hex. However, this is not accurate as all units in a hex are NOT damaged by the same seeker (outside of WW collateral). The detonation range is actually quite short, say just under 5km (just close enough for the warhead to actually HURT). This also covers the "proximity of detonation" roll for EW effects against seeking weapons. A bad roll represents a weapon that didn't get close enough for full warhead effectiveness.

Now then, when a ship launches a seeker from a rack/tube at another ship in the same hex, it takes a short period of time for the weapon to begin tracking the target. This is also why there is no "sudden impact" for seekers. However, if the target is still in the hex the next impulse, this is PLENTY of time for the weapon to aquire, seek out and impact the target.

Here's the however: If the target leaves the hex before then, the weapon needs time to re-orient itself to re-acquire and pursue the target. The target can make this movement while the seeker is still tracking in and actuall out-maneuver it briefly due to the radically changing pursuit vector at such a close range. It is actually changing it's bearing to the seeker faster than the seeker can turn, due to the short range. The target does not actually ENTER the detonation range of seeker, and is in fact probably doing everything possible to AVOID said range while still angling to get BEHIND the seeker.

That's my tecnho-babble explanation and I'm sticking to it. *s*

As a tactical matter, there are ways to avoid such aggravations. For one, don't launch in your target's hex when he can move next impulse. Launch the impulse before. Or tractor him so that you can launch on an impulse when he doesn't. Or launch from one hex out when the seeker will move the next impulse and he doesn't. Or any of a dozen variations of the same.

And if he DID manage to outmaneuver it, then maybe HIS tactics are just better than yours. Could be he just forced you into mis-timing your launch.

By Derek Myers (Solario) on Wednesday, May 15, 2002 - 10:29 am: Edit

I would just count myself lucky that there ISN'T a 1-2 impulse delay for the amring of drones. Because then the question is moot and you'd just have to worry about firing and hitting after the drones have armed.

But my own personal theory is the seeking weapons must overcome the inertia of launch and switching to it's own propulsion, just like missiles on our own aircraft. An F-15 drops a missile, then it activates it's own rocket system. The missile just doesn't fire up on the luanch rail...what if it got stuck or caused heat damage from luanch?

Then again, those are two more cans of worms we can thankfully avoid.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 08:38 am: Edit

I'ld like to make a quick list of reasons why people ruin/harm the game by moving to R0 ( and invoking a whole bunch of rules than plainly seeing where the ships are. I have an idea for an R0 resolution system but it seems to me that I might miss some point.
I'll start the list with:-
• Maximum Damage. ( for phasers and some heavy weapons.
• Kzinti Anchor without risk of ADD fire destroying drones (or SS).
• Getting SS and slow armored drones to hit whilst tractoring a still fast moving vessel.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 01:13 pm: Edit

Most of these things are facets of the way the rules work.

Changing those rules would result in a fundamentally different game.

R0 happens.

So fire at R1.

Otherwise simply deal with it or don't play.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 07:31 pm: Edit

If you don't like R0 combat then don't let your enemy get that close. There is a reason for the old saying "Speed is Life" in SFB'dom.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 08:31 pm: Edit

There's a bunch of things that could be availible on a sub scale map ( even non facing weapons' fire if the rules are written for it ) that do occour at R0 that wouldn't automatically have to occour with the counters being in the same hex and confusion therein.

By Loren Knight (Loren) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 09:00 pm: Edit

Except that a sub-scale map would be pointless since the engineering won't support it. It's easy to forget that everything in SFB take place at faster than the speed of light so refining activity to a finer scale is refining it beyond a pratical messurement.

The activities need to be basic and besides you can't turn or slip or anything like that since a single slip in twice that scale and a turn is twice to six times or more that scale.

The rules as is seem to account for pre-determining of possition and timed actions because there is no way to make a flash decision in the amount of time that two opposing ships share a hex (in most battle curcomstances). It's really just an instant.

So some generalization needs to be in place (the rules as is) to take into account a thousand instantainious actions mostly handled by software.


That's my interpretation anyway.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 09:48 pm: Edit

The last couple of pages of CL1 would be of interest to you I'm sure.

If two ships both end the turn in the same hex and choose to use their manouver thrusters ( the zero energy turn ) to manouver, they'll spend an entire turn ( about a minute ) in the same hex.


Side slips are actually quite easy on a minihex grid. If you have a scale of 10:1 such that 10 minihexes are travelled trough to represent the movement from one hex to another, and your ship is moving at speed 16 and you side slip on impulse 12 and fulfill your sideslip mode on impulse 14, that would normal.
But you could have minihexes of 10:1, be moving at a speed of 160, move 5 hexes ( three sideslips and two fulfills ) on impulse 11, five hexes on impulse 12 ( two sideslips and three fulfills ), five hexes on impulse 13 ( three sideslips and two fulfills ) and five minihexes on impulse 14 ( two sideslips and three fulfills ); and thus be in axactly the same place, having moved 20 minihexes of which 10 were sideslips and then were fulfills.

Turning could easily have the same simple multiplication of the turn mode, so a turn mode of 3 would suddenly become 30 minihexes, but that'ld drop down to 3 when you get back to normal sized hexes.


As for what to do when ships meet a subscale map...well I think the answer to that is to have new rules for determining the shield struck at that range, specifically that a random shield is hit with every shot ( narrow volleys strike the same shield ) and thus the huge reduction of crunch power will overpower the MAX-damage/bring-my-rear-facing-phasers-to-bear justification for going into the same hex.

By Tony L Thomas (Scoutdad) on Friday, September 09, 2005 - 10:31 pm: Edit

but, why needless complicate a game that already has 400+ pages of rules? WE've never had a problem using the rules as written for range 0 barrages...

has anyone else who's ever played the game???

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Saturday, September 10, 2005 - 01:55 am: Edit

S.V.C.:

How much leeway would one have when developing a minihex based range zero resolution system?
E.g. Could one allow a speed of 1 minihex per turn from manouver thrusters (C5.13) !?!


T.L.T.:

Because determining the firing arc and shield is more instinctual in different minihexes.
And the complication would be far less than the complications of directed turn modes.

By Richard Wells (Rwwells) on Saturday, September 10, 2005 - 04:25 am: Edit

MJC: Once the two ships enter into the same minihex, the same problem recurs.

One failure with some of the minihex mechanics I have seen proposed is that they let the ship turn more fluidly on the mini map than the rules in normal SFB permit. Having players tractor an enemy shuttle into their hex to exploit the minihex rules rather soured me on the concept.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Saturday, September 10, 2005 - 05:33 am: Edit

R.W.:

My intention is that if you move to the same minihex then your fire is spilt by each shot randomly striking a shield.
It'll probably be aided by having the ability to fire non facing weapons from adjacent minihexes, which will mean you can get full fire without entering the same hexes.
This will mean the that pressure to get to the same minihex will not be as great as the same hex in regular play. I'm not sure if there are a few diehard R0 players who go there just to make the rules difficult but if an R0m range is infact counter product then it'll be sort after.

Sideslips are a different matter as the aim of the concept of sideslips is to allow ships to reach hexes they are not currently centerlining but without turning to get to them. This simulates that a real space ship has 360 one degree heading it can choose from ( or more accuratly an infinite number of infinately slim incriments of heading that it can travel in.
Since choosing to side slip or not can never change you fading by more than + or - 30 degrees, it's not as big of an influence in the game that improved turning would be.

Fighter close combat manouvering might be used to give fighter some nifty manouvers in very close range.

On launching a shuttle and then tractoring straight after launch in order to turn on a dime.
I'm not going to water down the manouver rules and allow early turns ( to raise the level of entertain is the only reason I can see anyone doing it ).

The rule would simply be, multiply the turn mode number by the minihex scaling factor and that is the new minihex turn mode cost.
Yes at a scaling factor of 10:1, that would mean you can't turn for 30 hexes of movement and that seems like a lot. But at a speed of say 16, that's 160 minihexes per turn or 5 minim hexes per impulse which would then get consumed by 6 impulse for a total of 30...whilst staying at a regular scale would mean six impulses at speed 16 to get the turn mode full filled.
Needless to say you'll probably only place ships on the minihex grid when they reach R1 ( or R2 if they are going to move together ) and recalculate the hexes of the actual map every impulse that one or both of the ships move ( which will mostly be every impulse but is needed so that third party vessels can fire ) and that the "real" counters on the actual map will thus still be used to track which ship has a point of turn counter on the map and how much the turn mode is used.

By Steve Petrick (Petrick) on Saturday, September 10, 2005 - 11:41 am: Edit

Michael John Campbell:

While it was suggested way back in Captain's Log, it was unworkable then, and is still unworkable. All it does is take the same movements on the larger map and recreate them on a smaller scale, then forcing you to move to an even smaller scale when the smaller scale you were already at did not solve the problem, then forcing you to go to an even smaller smaller scale when the movements of the two ships again result in the same situation.

It got dumped and not prosecuted further for a reason, and frankly the existing rules deal with the situation well enough and there is no need to develop anything new.

By michael john campbell (Michaelcampbell) on Sunday, September 11, 2005 - 07:53 am: Edit

I think...and this just postilation on my part, that having:- 1) the ability to get non facing weapons to fire on the target at very close mini hex ranges (say adjacent minihexes) and a penalising factor ( random sheild hits for the same minihex fire ) would cause the "infinite projection into minutia" problem to not come to pass.


You're right, the rules do cover the situation...the drawback really is that it's just not instinctual.

By John Trauger (Vorlonagent) on Sunday, September 11, 2005 - 12:51 pm: Edit

In an game as complex as SFB, adding a ninihex simply adds much complexity for little gameplay that is actually fun.

I'm happy with the current system and see no reason to add needless complexity to SFB.