Ack, my posts are gone. Due to the whole board upgrade attempt? I've been pretty busy, so I haven't looked here in quite a while.

SVC, do you have any record of our proposals for Hydran and ISC weapons?

hm, maybe used in CL24?

By Ben Moldovan (Shadow1) on Monday, April 29, 2002 - 01:24 pm: Edit

SVC, how do you look for posts addressed to you? Do you just look at the beginning of posts on the Last Day screen, or do you do a keyword search on your initials and name?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 29, 2002 - 01:27 pm: Edit

I have all of the previous posts; I just haven't cleaned them up to repost yet. Been busy.

Ben, I just do a "search for new messages since the last time you checked". I read a topic if:

1. It's one I'm following closely.
2. A message starts with SVC.
3. Something intrigues me.

About 2/3 of topics on this board are not read by me with any kind of regularity.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 29, 2002 - 01:33 pm: Edit

Ben, I checked, and I have all of your posts. Two points....

1. The way you proposed it, it can (obviously) only be done in Deck 2, not as a CL24 variant to the existing deck.

2. When we do deck 2, I'll write the rules and then look at the proposals to see if I missed anything.

You could in theory come up with a way to do ISC ships using existing plasma cards with, perhaps, the photon "standing in" for the PPD. Similarly, you might do hydran ships with the photon standing in for hellbores and disruptors standing in for fusions.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, April 29, 2002 - 01:42 pm: Edit

And by the way, I do have ISC and Hydran rules like that already.

By Ben Moldovan (Shadow1) on Tuesday, April 30, 2002 - 12:53 pm: Edit

Deck 2, yeah that makes sense now that I think about it.

As for the weapon rules, I did think you might have your own ideas for them, I was just throwing out possibilities to consider. It was fun thinking out how the weapons should work. I do have a creative streak which surfaces now and then.

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Thursday, July 11, 2002 - 06:57 am: Edit

SFBF RACIAL DUEL
by Andy Palmer and Dale Davis
USS Maryland

Each player has their own deck. Cards are selected for the deck with the following restrictions:
Exactly 60 cards
No more of any Action card than exist is a single deck
No Reinforcements
No PF Flottilla

Each player selects ships, from a single race, of not greater than 60 points (most races will need ships from 2 decks in order to max out the points - just borrow from your opponent's deck if you only have one deck yourself).

A die roll determines who goes first. Players draw from and discard "to" their own deck only.

Notes: This allows players to remove all the non-racial weapons cards so that no "non-usable" cards are in the deck. This has been playtested for 2-player only.

By David Kass (Dkass) on Thursday, July 11, 2002 - 09:09 pm: Edit

I understand everything but the No reinforcements and No PF flotillas. They don't make any sense. I find them to be very good cards to have in the game (whether I get them or not). They allow for large swings in play so that even a player on the loosing end of a drawn out duel has the hope of "pulling it out of his ass." In particular, I find the PF flotilla a critical card to avoid stalemate type situations that cause the game to drag. In a game where everyone is drawing from their own deck, even the "unfair" problems disappear (everyone will get each card--if they decide to include it). Hiding the cards in reserve is no longer useful (its actually counter productive).

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Thursday, July 11, 2002 - 11:33 pm: Edit

David. The PF Flotilla was removed because it is unbalancing in racial duels. It basically kills a ship every time it is used and races with fewer ships (due to higher average points/ship) such as the Romulans and Tholians end up losing because of it. As far as stalemates go, our playtesting found the game more fast paced because you could use every card you drew (I've found that most stalemates in the regular game result from having only one type of ship and are unable to draw usable cards).
The Reinforcements was removed because there is no pool of ships to draw from. Each player starts with 60 points worth of ships and the first to lose his last ship loses. Reinforcements would just drag this out and give victory to the one who got the better ship with their Reinforcement card.

By David Kass (Dkass) on Friday, July 12, 2002 - 12:11 am: Edit

If you're not ready for it, a PF flotilla will kill a ship (I have stopped it before in a duel). But that is the entire point of it. Since there is no limit to the number of ships (and they can come from multiple decks), all the races can take smaller ships (well, perhaps not the Tholians or Orions, but they're not really complete races at this point). Consider it one of the disadvantages of those races.

I could see modifying the reinforcement card to bring on a specific ship (selected per races--say an 8 point cruiser or maybe a carrier). Sure it slightly lengthens the game, but it introduces signficant uncertainty and tactical dimensions. Or perhaps the reinforcements should give an Orion (CR the first time, LR the second) for something interesting (available since each player has a full deck).

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Friday, July 12, 2002 - 06:59 am: Edit

David. The game is already far more deadly simply because there are no "wasted" cards. What balances the PF Flottilla in the standard game is the fact that you get no points/credit for the kill; this is immaterial in this game.
If you add Reinforcements to the game, you add no uncertainty. All you add is the cheesy tactic of trying to go through you deck as fast as possibly just so you can reshuffle the reinforcements cards and get more ships.

By Andy Siviter (Andys) on Friday, July 26, 2002 - 06:21 am: Edit

CL24 - The Space Dragon.
The rules read as though you turn attack cards until you find a single phaser or plasma card.
If in this search you turn over an Enveloper card, can you set this aside for possible use with a Plasma-S or Plasma-R later.
--------------------------
Suggestion for alternative rule for the Dragons attack: turn over cards until you have a card for each weapon slot left after the defensive fire against the dragon. Although potentially making the attack much more vicious, it also makes every point of damage more than 4 you can do valuable.
(As it stands you might as well not bother firing if you can not do the full 8 damage, for example doing 7 points and leaving just the Plasma seems a poor decision since you are taking away your chance to get off lightly with a Phaser-3 * I do realise you might actually want to do this if you were holding a WW in your hand * )

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, July 26, 2002 - 10:09 am: Edit

Yes, you keep the enveloper card. But if the next usable card is a phaser, it does you no good.

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Friday, August 16, 2002 - 01:01 am: Edit

A friend and me came up with an idea to make carriers a bit more defendable against other carriers. If a carrier sent out its fighters against another carrier (or the [planetbased fighters card(s) is played), the defending carrier could use it's fighters in defence. The attacker would roll for his fighters, the defencer rolls for his fighters and subtract the defender rolls from the attacker rolls and apply that to the ship. If either side rolls higher than six, the opposing side losses a squadron. On average, both sides will lose a squadron, but taht is usually how carrier battles work in the SFB universe. The basic idea is to have dogfights, but simplified to SFBF levels.

We were thinking of having them be able to defend against drones and plasma's as well, but that might be stretching it a bit too much.

By Ben Moldovan (Shadow1) on Friday, August 16, 2002 - 01:05 pm: Edit

I like it.

By Joshua J. Brumley (The_Specialist) on Thursday, August 22, 2002 - 01:20 pm: Edit

What do y'all think of this:
Orion carriers
Orion ships(and bases) can use two OPT mounts for ONE ship-based squadron of fighters. Two OPT mounts must be used, this reflects the size of one squadron. Use the fighter rules as normal but destroying the squadron will destroy both OPT boxes. If an OPT box is destoyed, the squadron be comes unavailable on ships until repaired.
My group has experimented with two versions of this rule, the first is as described above. The second version is as above but the Orion ship or base must be designated as having the squadron upon bringing it into play, the OPT mounts are lost forever in favor of the squadron.
We found that the first ver. makes Orion Ruolette more interesting but sometimes unbalancing. The second is a little more balanced but makes the Orions more like the races.
Opinions?

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Thursday, August 22, 2002 - 01:40 pm: Edit

Not a bad idea. But given that Orion ships can already use just about every weapon, overlooking the idea of having to switch the weapons out, why limit them to the one squadron? At best, they could launch one fighter attack, which won't do hardly diddly to a ship, provided the defender has any sort of defense. I wouldn't be cared of an Orion taht came out and anounced that it has a fighter squadron. I'm a bit more scared of an Orion in the screen (read: overloaded photon, overloaded disruptor, phaser 1, phaser 3, bye-bye Condor) Seems too limiting for too little a gain. Just let them use the fighter squadron when they want to and be able to fire weapons other times.
As for bases, you have to declare the option mounts at the begining anyways, as per the rules in CL23(?) and are set for the rest of the game.

By Joshua J. Brumley (The_Specialist) on Thursday, August 22, 2002 - 01:44 pm: Edit

Well, if nothing else, it'd be one last HURRAH! before the Orion got shot to pieces

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Thursday, August 22, 2002 - 01:46 pm: Edit

That's pretty much how Orions get treated in my group anyways! They are target number one, followed by anything with plasma-R's or photons. Carriers are a close second.

By Joshua J. Brumley (The_Specialist) on Friday, August 23, 2002 - 11:14 am: Edit

Hehe...

By Steve M Still (Buckeye43026) on Thursday, September 05, 2002 - 04:19 pm: Edit

***********************************************
Preface: This is all based upon the assumption that SVC is not releasing a myriad of new rules changes for fighters to accommidate the addition of the Hydrans and the B-10V ;) in the new card set.
***********************************************

I like the idea of using a carriers' fighters for defense. Our group adds our own twist;

Robert Snook wrote:

-----
...the defending carrier could use it's fighters in defence. The attacker would roll for his fighters, the defencer rolls for his fighters and subtract the defender rolls from the attacker rolls and apply that to the ship. If either side rolls higher than six, the opposing side losses a squadron...
-----

This is cool but essentially makes the carrier even more powerful than it allready is and probably under-BPV'd.

Our group allows a player at the END OF THEIR TURN to desiginate each individule fighter box as either "defending", or "prepped for attack". (This can be denoted with any small trinket or counter of one's choosing.)

If the fighter is "defending" it is allowed to act in much the same way as Robert described above.

The CATCH is that on the following turn the player may only attack with fighters that were "prepped for attack" at the END of the previous turn. This adds a little more strategy to the game, something we are always for.

This idea can be morphed and transformed to perhaps provide screen protection, anti-seeking weopan protection, etc. I open the floor to suggestyions!


-Steve

By Robert Snook (Verdick) on Monday, December 09, 2002 - 03:03 pm: Edit

We've tried a different way to use ECM cards. Instead of having them be one-time uses, you can leave the ECM or EM card on the ship, but you cannot change formation with that ship, the idea being that it is paying for the ECM/EM and so does not have the energy to move elsewhere. If you are keeping the EM card on, you must overcome the EM yourself to do damage (subtract four from your attack) and you cannot launch drones, fighters, or plasma while you are still using the EM.

Limit the number of permanent ECM/EM cards to one. You may play more on a ship during an attack, you just have to choose which ones to drop when the attack is over.

ECCM cards remove the ECM of the target ship, making them much more useful, instead of being throw away cards if not used on the turn they are drawn.

You can get rid of the ECM/EM card during your formation stage, but it does not cost anything, meaning you can still make a formation change with any eligible ship that turn.

Other cards that can get rid of the ECM/EM are the Prime Team(taking off one ECM/EM card) and the Organian Ceasefire(taking off all ECM/EM cards).

By John Kasper (Jvontr) on Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 01:08 am: Edit

Hydran variants:

Ph-G uses 1 to 4 PH-3 cards.

If a Hellbore is used w/ other weapons or on a ship w/ damage, at least on point of damage from the hellbore must be scored on a non-free space.

By Andy Palmer (Andypalmer) on Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 07:33 am: Edit

John. Why would you ever hold on to that many Ph-3 cards? That would, IMO, make the PH-G worse than a Ph-3 because at least with the latter, you have no illusions of wanting to hold onto and keep those 1 and 2 point damage cards, not to mention REQUIRING that many cards to be effective. IMO, the Ph-G is only valuable if it applies a multiple to the damage of a Phaser card (i.e. doubles the damage, etc.).

NOTE: The original PH-4 was a similar rule and was changed for similar reasons.

By John Kasper (Jvontr) on Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 08:19 am: Edit

The intent was to give you a place to dump PH-3 cards whne you've got too many. Perhaps 1 or 2 PH-3 cards, damage doubled?