Both A Call to Arms: Noble Armada and its Fleets of the Fading Suns expansion used point values for their respective units. (Most of the human fleets in that game system were oriented as much, if not more so, towards boarding actions as they were towards destroying enemy ships.)


It may be worth noting that while both the Babylon 5 and Noble Armada settings involved "low sublight" combat, the "modern" (GURPS Prime Directive Tech Level 12) era of SFU starship combat takes place at tactical warp speeds, and with "warp-class" weapons which themselves work faster than light.

By way of comparison, the Early Years modules for SFB show a number of "sublight" (non-tactical warp, or GPD TL 9) ships, as well as rules for things like lasers and atomic missiles. However, even those ships have a limited degree of "space warping" which allows them to fight at relativistic speeds without running into time dilation issues (a "low sublight" ship would have an effective speed of zero in SFB terms); while the "warp-targeted" lasers shown on the -S series hulls involve an upgrade to the ship's targeting systems which allows them to track ships moving at tactical warp speeds. (So in other words, before the "-S" refit, the "Q-era" ships cannot even see a tactical warp ship in real-time, let alone hope to respond to one adequately.)

There are two generations' worth of tactical warp drive which appear at TL 10 and TL 11 respectively; while those ships are slower and less powerful than "modern" TL 12 hulls, they are still streets ahead of their TL 9 forebaars.


However, there have been discussion threads elsewhere on the BBS concerning what a "sub-light battles" game system might one day look like. Such a system - in whatever game engine - would likely need to be set at a different scale to any of those used for tactical warp-powered combat, though still might stand apart from games set at "low sublight" speeds.

By Andrew E Schwenzer (Andrew_Cluetain) on Wednesday, September 14, 2016 - 07:44 pm: Edit

OK, I am aware of the "warp vs sublight = Warp win" issue. If we looked at that then there is no way non warp ships could win because the warp ship would orbit at range say 5-10 in SFB and the non warp ships would be lucky to have a range 2 weapon. The reason I'm doing the playtesting is so that players can have a fun and balanced battle between various sci-fi universes and I acknowledge that there are "compromises" made to do this.

Thanks for the info on the Noble Armada ships.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Thursday, September 15, 2016 - 11:33 am: Edit

One idea I've seen done as a "house rule" is to say all combat is done at sub-light speed, and each hex is only 100 KM, not 10,000 KM. If a ship goes to Warp, it's out of the combat zone. There is no "Picard Maneuver" using a micro-jump to warp out of the line of fire.


Garth L. Getgen

By Andrew E Schwenzer (Andrew_Cluetain) on Thursday, September 29, 2016 - 09:16 pm: Edit

OK back with more playtesting done!
Patrol: 30 Points
Skirmish: 60
Raid: 120
Battle: 200
War: 300
Armageddon: Estimated at 450, but playtesting saw a FED SC that was 20% of the apposing force get nuked BADLY before any damage was dealt to the B5 Force... by the bottom of Turn 2 the feds had lost 40% of force and done 7 points of damage to the apposing Centauri force. At the moment the feeling is that 2 DN's could not take one of these ships. Since the infamous Ancient Shadow Ship is in this level the fact that CA's are getting "1 rounded" by A ship shouldn't be a surprise. Also planning on coming back to this level when BB's are available. When that is done I'll worry about the "Ancient" Priority level.

Picked up both ACtA Noble Armada books, and have one comment after briefly looking over them; the point values don't make any sense from my point of view, and using ACtA: Star Fleet as an example. A 9 Damage ship is 100 points and the DN's are about 700 points. It might be internally consistent but seems horribly over pointed next to Star Fleet.

By John Williams (Johndw) on Wednesday, August 16, 2017 - 07:05 am: Edit

I was thinking about an alternative use for the 'command' trait as used in ACTA:SF and was wondering what people might think of it.

I have two decent ideas for how it could be alternative to the normal rules for forming squads.

#1 Each ship with the "command" trait allows a number of ships up to its lab trait to form squads (or lab/2 as an alternative to this)

#2 A ship with Command+N allows for N number of squads to be formed out of ships in the fleet.

By wayne douglas power (Wayne) on Monday, October 09, 2017 - 05:11 pm: Edit

What is the first current rule book that is the one to get to start playing, is it ACTA:SF 1.2 deluxe, or is it ACTA:SF book 2.

By Tony L. Thomas (Scoutdad) on Monday, October 09, 2017 - 05:28 pm: Edit

ACTASF Book 2 has not been released yet.
But when it is, it will be an expansion to version 1.2 deluxe.

Book 2 will add 3 new empires, over 100 new ships, and the weapons and systems required to use the new empires, ships, weapons, and systems found therein.
In addition, Book 2 WILL NOT be a complete game - you will still need 1.2 for the basic rules needed to play ACTASF.

By wayne douglas power (Wayne) on Monday, October 09, 2017 - 05:50 pm: Edit

Tony L. Thomas,

Thank you, I thought the 1.2 deluxe book was the one to get (just was not 100%).

ACTASF I have been thinking of purchasing, it would be a good game to introduce some new players to the SFU.
Also very visually appealing with lots of SFU miniatures.

All good

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, October 10, 2017 - 01:23 pm: Edit

The "basic book" is 1.2.

Book 2 (or 2.0) is being laid out right now. It would have been much closer to finished if not finished, but the die cutter surprised us in mid-production with an offer to do 8 products instead of 4 for the same price and I dropped everything to do the other sheets, all of which were so old they had to be done from blank pages.

By Tom Talasco (Pvt64) on Thursday, December 07, 2017 - 09:37 am: Edit

Cannot wait for Book 2 to come out!

By John Williams (Johndw) on Saturday, December 09, 2017 - 10:37 am: Edit

I mean.. I CAN wait, but I would love it sooner than later, heh.

By John Williams (Johndw) on Wednesday, February 07, 2018 - 11:24 am: Edit

With book 2 basically being done as far as rules and ships, just needing layout and whatnot. Has any thought been put into starting book 3 yet? How do you think the expanding sphere generators will be handled in the ACTA system?

By Tony L. Thomas (Scoutdad) on Wednesday, February 07, 2018 - 01:57 pm: Edit

Book 3 is well under way.
Play testing of ESGs, Fusion Beams, and Hellbore Cannons are quite close to complete. Only minor tweaking is needed.

The current focus is fighters and carriers.

By Shawn Hantke (Shantke) on Thursday, March 01, 2018 - 08:41 am: Edit

What are you guys using for a gaming mat? The size is supposed to be 4' x 6'?

By Tony L. Thomas (Scoutdad) on Thursday, March 01, 2018 - 10:19 am: Edit

Typically, our group uses either a 4x4 or a 4x6 map - depending on the size of the fleets in play (see ACTASF Book 1.2, Page 31, left column, middle of the page) as most of our battles are in 1,000 to 1,500 point range - with a few smaller ones, just to try one specific rule or ship.

Although... some scenarios do specify a map size, and that will overrule the general rule.

By Mark Lurz (Markalurz) on Thursday, March 15, 2018 - 05:52 pm: Edit

with my group, we typically use a 4x6 map when we play a 1500 + point per side game, when play testing however we use a 4x4 map to get everything going quickly to test out the rule(s) then keeping the same ships we switch sides to get multiple point of few on how a rule should play

By Andrew E Schwenzer (Andrew_Cluetain) on Tuesday, January 01, 2019 - 03:48 pm: Edit

Last weeks Blog had a Lyran ship on what appears to be a ACtA base but I've not seen that base type before. Wondering if anyone knows where the base is from. Pic says the ship is Daniel Bostwick's but I don not know if he is on the BBS. If anyone knows where that base is from or can find out, Info would be welcome!

By David Bostwick (Zarquon) on Tuesday, January 01, 2019 - 05:42 pm: Edit

A friend of mine makes them for us.
If you can give me an email, I can put you in touch with him.

By Andrew Schwenzer (Andrew_Cluetain) on Wednesday, September 30, 2020 - 11:23 pm: Edit

Just noticed the article in CL54 about SFACtA regarding the state and direction of the game. Anyway to get a brief synopsis of that here?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, October 01, 2020 - 03:05 am: Edit

I guess you mean ACTASF2, ACTASFR, and ACTASF3.

The update was in the article.

ACTASF2: the PDF has been out for a while, I need Tony to send me the final glitch/gripe list so I can issue the paper copy.

ACTASFR: Tony is finished, but I haven't started the layout yet.

ACTASF3: I would guess in Feb-April 2021 but maybe Tony will finish his work in Nov 2020. I don't remember what the article said.

By Tony L. Thomas (Scoutdad) on Monday, October 05, 2020 - 10:43 am: Edit

ACTASF2: I can complete the final glitch/gripe list this week and will contact you next week about when you'd like to have it sent.
It's surprisingly small... yay!

ACTASFR: Got tow edits for Fed ship list when you do start.

ACTASF3: With COVID delays, I'd guess Feb-April is more realistic...
Unless someone reading this wants to play test... and actually play and report...

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, October 05, 2020 - 04:11 pm: Edit

Send it when you have it.

By Zac Belado (Pixelgeek) on Thursday, April 15, 2021 - 11:00 pm: Edit

A question for anyone who has played them both, which of the miniature focused games, Starmada or ACTA, gives the better SFB 'feel'.

I have both rule sets but was curious if anyone had any feedback about how each ruleset plays

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, April 16, 2021 - 01:00 am: Edit

Both have a decent SFU feel. Neither really feels much like SFB, but then, neither does SFBF.

By Tony L. Thomas (Scoutdad) on Wednesday, May 05, 2021 - 11:12 am: Edit

Zac... I have both rule sets, and have played them both. But while I am admittedly biased, I much prefer ACTASF.

Not necessarily because it's more SFB'y… (Yes. That is a word - as of 10:07 a.m. 5/5/21), but because I find it easier to teach to a larger number of new players.

While both systems will give similar results to SFB (NOTE: if played by players of relatively even experience and across multiple sessions), ACTASF is designed to be a fast and fun system where ships blow up quickly!
And while this seems counter-intuitive to the slow, methodical pace of SFB; we have worked diligently to at least make the system work much like SFB (albeit on a much compressed time scale).