Well Scott's point is that if they choose shortest path they would not be able to circle their province along the ring they would instead 'punch through' the ring in the direction of the supply grid.

I agree with this concept.

I do disagree with his viewpoint on whether or not blocking ships should have the chance to evade (essentailly letting the retreating force go).

First of all, the precedent is in the game already in other forms...choosing to pursue or not, fight approach battles or not, options to retreat defender, attacker, defender, withdrawl before combat, etc. All of these are examples of engagement decisions. I do suppose that if you compared it to withdrawl before combat you find that one ship cannot just up and leave unless unopposed. This option could be given to the RF but don't they want to escape? Doesn't chasing the blocking ships off achieve their goal of not being trapped?

Second, the retreating force is as much responsible to be in the position they are in as the blocking ship or ships. If the RF is in over its head it is because they moved to be in that position. Sure the blocking force is trying to cut them off and may have intended to do so. Not having a choice when it comes to letting the RF out of 'the trap' seems odd. Maybe Scott can look at it again with the notion of what die roll chance the blocking ships should have to successfully evade. (Maybe it should be a lower chance like on a 6 or a 5 or 6...maybe two dice?) Either way IMO the option should be available.

Garth: That's what I said in problem two...same issue.

By Kevin Howard (Jarawara) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 09:38 am: Edit

I wanted to contribute an idea I used before, but I have to admit to not understanding the full issue, nor do I suspect my idea solves the major issues. But with that being said, perhaps this might help anyway:

I had used in my games a variantion of the retreat priorities to allow for the retreating party the option of retreating towards their capital. If that's the normal direction they'd retreat due to the normal retreat priorities, then all is fine, but if the retreat priorities direct them elsewhere, they can ignore it, and retreat towards their capital, and only towards their capital, using the fighting retreat rules.

Obviously, they can't go galloping all around Orion killing individual ships that way, but there still might be major abuses I haven't yet seen. And sometimes they can jog 'slightly to the left, instead of slightly to the right' on their way back to their capital, thus smushing an enemy frigate along the way. Perhaps that part still needs to be fixed.

Most of the abuses seemed to be fixed when I playtested this, but as I said, I never really saw the rule stretched to the extreme, so I don't know the full extent of the problem, or how this idea would interact with other rules (read: Hydran Expedition?). If this idea helps with any new proposals you're playtesting, feel free to steal part or all of it and add to your own.

Oh, and if you've lost your capital, then you retreat to the newly designated one, probably off map. That can lead to a bit more abuse, as the border to the off map is wider, allowing you more options. Your option is specifically to retreat to the nearest off-map hex.

By Scott Hofner (Sshofner) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 09:51 am: Edit

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Quote:

First of all, the precedent is in the game already in other forms...choosing to pursue or not, fight approach battles or not, options to retreat defender, attacker, defender, withdrawal before combat, etc. All of these are examples of engagement decisions.

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By Joe Stevenson (Alligator) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 10:23 am: Edit

"This option could be given to the RF but don't they want to escape? "

I think you are on to somethign here. Give them the option to oppose, but that STOPS THEIR RETREAT. They then have to reevaluate supply and they still have the penalties of FR.


"That is not present anywhere else in the game. And as I said previously, if you make an exception for this one instance then you will keep having "valid" instances until all combat can be avoided except at fixed defenses. "

I don't see it that way, Scott. As I said before, these are escaping units. We've defined FR basically that way. They don't really have time to stop... although as I say, if they stop, put further restrictions on them. We gave them a special out so they could escape back to their supply, not to give them license to run around starting fights.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 11:19 am: Edit

Choosing to pursue - happens indeed after a battle, the decision is whether or not to make the 'attempt' have another round. If the pursuit is not chosen or if the die roll fails there is no combat.

Fighting approach battle - there 'may' be a battle although if the defender dclines approach the attacker can simply leave avoiding combat.

Exercising retreat options - this is obviously during combat and may lead to the end of combat in that hex...unless there is pursuit...or fighting retreat. The only way to avoid combat here is ship specific (holding back units) or excusing them from combat using the Command options.

Withdrawl before combat - if unopposed there is no combat.

Fighting Retreat - Also happens as an effect of the combat before it and the retreat priorities used to resolve that battle hex. Avoiding combat is present in some form in many parts of the game why not here as well?

The fact is that the FR must be resolved before you can move on to resolve another hex. This lumps it togther as part of the whole combat sequence (normal combat/retreat/pursuit/slow-unit/fighting retreat) of the current hex you are working on. IIRC prior to FR you could retreat to a hex that had units present forming a new BH. That BH was resolvable at a future time (attackers choice on resolution order) where the defending player could then attempt withdraw before combat. My whole view on this was that with FR the defenders option has mostly gone away. When you take away options and force combat that is bad for the game.

Don't get me wrong Scott I do think some of what you say about this change is valid. This is why we need to iron out the wrinkles in developing this fix.

Phil: Option 11 of leaving it as written is not really an option as it has been determined something is amiss.

By Scott Burleson (Burl) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 11:19 am: Edit

>> I think you are on to somethign here. Give them the option to oppose, but that STOPS THEIR RETREAT. They then have to reevaluate supply and they still have the penalties of FR.

I like this compromise as well. One point that I was going to bring up is that if it was decided that the blocking ship could evade the FR, then the FR does still need to have to be able to continue the retreat. This basically takes care of that. They can either retreat or go beat up a single frigate.

I just want to echo a little on some of the other things discussed. If there is an arbitrary limit on the number of hexes, it probably needs to be the retrograde limit (effectively 6+1 hexes). I would be against any sort of auto-destruct at that point, just a stop. This (EDIT: a retrograde limit with a stop) probably does make sense, though.

Obviously, I like Hofner and I's cornerstone that we originally produced which the FR has to be a shortest path towards a declared unchangeable supply point => That is basically what Kevin did, although his supply point had to be the capital.

Russell is correct in that his situation is probably an abuse of the rules. Unfortunately, if the Klingon's had captured 1506 in a previous turn, they can set that situation up under the old rules without using a fighting retreat as long as retreat priority #2 does not stop that.

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 11:22 am: Edit

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Quote:

"This option could be given to the RF but don't they want to escape? "

I think you are on to somethign here. Give them the option to oppose, but that STOPS THEIR RETREAT. They then have to reevaluate supply and they still have the penalties of FR.

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By Philippe le bas (Phil) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 11:24 am: Edit

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Quote:

Actually, the Cloudburst scenario requires the Fed to do it.

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By Michael Lui (Michaellui) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 11:33 am: Edit

The scenario just demonstrates what COULD happen if you're not careful.

By Tim Losberg (Krager) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 12:12 pm: Edit

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Quote:

My whole view on this was that with FR the defenders option has mostly gone away. When you take away options and force combat that is bad for the game.

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By Russell J. Manning (Rjmanning) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 12:16 pm: Edit

Phillippe,

I didn't have the choice as to the hexes I was in to get the one-two punch as described above. I was restricted by retreat rules.

I think I also like the modifications proposed. Let me see is I understand it. First, we are limited FR's to the shortest path to get in supply. Second, an FR essentially skips over any forces in a hex doing no damage to either unless the FR force choses to fight. If they do that, the FR stops in that hex and proceeds no further whether they are in supply or not. In addition the fight is still done at BIR0/10.

Ok, I think one question needs to be answered. Does the FR force get a pursuit option. Take the example of what happened to me. The Coalition decides to stop and fight the previously retreated force in 1503. The Kzinti fight the one required round (because you know any witdraw will be opposed) does the FR force get a chance to pursue. I would say no.

By Douglas E. Lampert (Dlampert) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 01:24 pm: Edit

I DON'T LIKE this option. This is NOT supposed to be a second OpS move where you get to go attack someone again. It's supposed to be an option to avoid having 3 frigates herd 100 ships to an untenable position.

Potentially anything where you can do it repeatedly and create NEW battle hexes each time IS vastly more powerful than a normal Ops move, especially since this happens AFTER all reaction movement and all reserves are used.

I put that frigate out with a reserve fleet to cover it and 3 other frigates in a position to react onto it even if your fleet made a deliberate attempt to smash those frigates with every force available to it! You're allowing someone to kill them without ANY of that applying because he's "retreating" rather than attacking them. Bah humbug!

At the absolute minimum, if a Fighting Retreat can be converted to a normal battle-hex then let the things the other side can do to reinforce that battle hex apply. Ships within extended reaction range of the new battle hex can react in to it. And treat the hex the original retreat was from as having an infinite range reaction marker on a fleet of the ships you are running from so some of them can join the party. If you can "run away" to a new fight you could have avoided then I can have some of my friends use the same sort of magical extra "movement to combat" ability to come join the party.

By Matthew G. Smith (Mattsmith) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 01:38 pm: Edit

Yeah, I like that. If the blocking force decides to engage, BIR 10 vs. 0 as currently written. If the FR force decides to engage, it's BIR 10 vs. 0 (as currently written) BUT the force that the FR force is retreating from has the option to reinforce. (Creating a "running battle.")

One round at BIR 10 vs. 0, then the next round the FR force is "reorganized" and further rounds proceed as normal.

Yeah, picket duty is inherently dangerous, but so is stopping to engage said picket when you have 50+ warships on your tail.

By Joe Stevenson (Alligator) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 02:04 pm: Edit

"I DON'T LIKE this option. This is NOT supposed to be a second OpS move where you get to go attack someone again.I DON'T LIKE this option. This is NOT supposed to be a second OpS move where you get to go attack someone again."

Which is already happening now, which is why we need to close this loophole.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 03:15 pm: Edit

In Russell's situation, without knowing the rest of the map, it appears that his opponent used FR as a cheesy tactic to get some extra kills.

By fighting 1504 forst, it forced Russell to retreat to 1503, which was the closest empty hex in line for his supply point of 1502. When the enemy retreated from the second battle hex in 1502, Rule (302.734) should have forced them to retreat to 1602 (or 1402). However, they invoked FR, claiming that the stack of cripples in 1503 was "blocking the path to supply" and thus "trapping" them.

This ignores the fact that 1602 (and/or 1402) was a valid retreat hex, after which they could use Retrograde Movement to get back to 1504 (or 1506 or even 1407).

This is obviously a cheesy tactic and obviously not what the rule was intended for when it was written -- "In some cases a force is blocked from its deisred retreat path and may wish to try to fight its way out of the trap." Where was the "trap"????

This looks, to me, like a bigger problem than the 21-hex Orion Spiral Of Death retreat. I'm just not sure how to close such a loophole. Not without causing other problems.


Garth L. Getgen

{edit -- sorry for the cross-post ... I typed that up hours ago but didn't hit the "post" button until just now. GLG}

By Russell J. Manning (Rjmanning) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 03:36 pm: Edit

Doug,

I have to agree with Joe here. What you are claiming would happen, i.e. the creation of a battle hex w/o option to react/reserve, already happens under the FR rules as they exist. How is the proposed fix any different?

By Dale Lloyd Fields (Dylkha) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 04:03 pm: Edit

I don't know if this has been suggested, but hey:

Allow the non-retreating forces from the original hex to build a pursuit force to continue to pursue the fighting retreating forces each hex that they go through a fighting retreat. Make the force doing the fighting retreat build a pursued line for the battle. So if the Klingons fighting retreat away from a Kzinti strongpoint, the Kzinti get a chance to send in a good pursuit force to whack them with a BIR=10. Let the pursuing forces retro afterwards.

Example: The Klingons have two hexes between them and their nearest supply point. One range-two retreat hex is empty and the other range-two retreat hex has a Z-FF. The hex nearest the Klingon supply point also has a Z-FF. After fighting the original pursuit battle, the Klingons fighting retreat over the first frigate. The plucky FF257 slows down the Coalition fleet long enough for a guaranteed CVS+MEC+EFF, DN, BC, CD to catch them and fight them with 55 total ComPot with the existing FF in the hex (so about 22 damage). The Klingons have to build their line as a pursuit force (so all their cripples and no free scout) and have to roll on BIR=0. The Klingons do 8 damage and fighting retreat again. The Kzinti cripple the BC, and take the FF that started in the hex along with them. Now the Kzinti have CVS+MEC+EFF, DN, CD, 2xFF total in the second hex of fighting retreat. This Kzinti force punishes the Klingons again with another 20 damage while the Klingon's damage gets washed against the CVS's fighters. The Klingons are now back at their supply point having taken another 40ish damage on likely crippled ships, and the Kzinti have a few more cripples which they retro back to repair facilities. If the Klingons had retreated to the empty range-two hex they wouldn't be sitting on the supply point at the end of the turn, but they would have avoided the two extra pursuit battles at BIR=10/0.

This allows fighting retreat to happen, but puts the retreating force in a bad position (due to having to build a pursued forces for each fighting retreat they do). It would self-limit the number of fighting retreats that happen. This also allows fighting retreats to have teeth even if just a few ships remain in the hex that the original fighting retreat was conducted from. But, since the pursuing force is limited to 6 ships, they won't obliterate the fighting retreating forces (just really rough them up). However, if the fighting retreaters go through a hex with any decent number of existing forces (4-6 SE), they will be really messed up (as the pursuing forces will likely have a full battle line).

Ideas? Denounciations?

By Douglas E. Lampert (Dlampert) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 04:14 pm: Edit

Russel: Umm, I'm CRITICISING a fix proposal that continues to allow this. Surely the words "I don't like this" about a fix proposal indicates that I don't LIKE THE FIX PROPOSAL! It doesn't indicate that I'm enamored of the current rules or that I don't think they have that problem, it especially doesn't when I've already offered a (different) fix for the problem with the current rules which avoids the problem!

But the proposals being discussed most recently prior to mine was that the retreating force be given the option to stop and fight. You responded to that proposal so surely you are aware of it.

I mean it's not like Scott Burleson's and Lawrence Bergen's and your own posts more or less immediately prior to mine didn't have the proposal to let someone stop and fight a real battle. Oh wait, they did, as did other posts going back in the archive.

This is a bad idea. I give reasons why it is a bad idea. Assuming that because I'm critisizing a "fix" which leaves the key problem ENTIRELY INTACT I must not see the original problem is silly at best. I'm well aware of the problem, that's why I mention it in my post.

By Tim Losberg (Krager) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 04:43 pm: Edit

Douglas,
To be honest, I wasn't sure what you were referring to either, there are aprox 11 different proposals out there right now.. saying "I don't like this option" without clearly stating what the option is can cause some confusion.

here are my thoughts on the current proposals
general comments...
I am opposed to any suggestion that-
1. Destoys an entire fleet after x retreat attempts
2. allows an attacker to pre-position ships along the only retreat route the retreating force will have to take.
3. Forces a fleet to fighting retreat multipl hexes once the decision to perform a fighting retreat has been made, the decision to perform a fighting retreat should be decided on a hex by hex basis... FR should ALWAYS be voluntary.
4. That removes all the damage the retreating force causes, this is a FIGHTING retreat, not a route.

I like the idea of having a direcction you indend to go... if the fleet is out of supply it should be any where, but the fleet must keep moving a particular direction, not just bouncing around...
As far as maximum numbers are concerend, I say a fleet can perform a maximum of 2 fighting retreats, after that they have to select a non fighting retreat hex for their 3rd (final) retreat. (if they don't have a non fighting retreat hex to choose from, then it is not a fighting retreat is it?)
I think a combination of these 2 requirements should reduce the ability of a retreating force to abuse the system.

By MikeMascitti (Lokiwormtongue) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 05:24 pm: Edit

For the little weight my opinion carries I really like Dales' idea. If the FR force stops to pound on a picket ship or ships then those ships that the FR were retreating from should be able to catch up to the retreating force and give them a little kick in the ass.

By Scott Hofner (Sshofner) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 05:52 pm: Edit

Dale- Not bad.... it gives options to the non-retreating force for a continued pursuit due to the FR force continueing to fight as opposed to retreating into an unoccupied hex. I like this in conjunction with an announced line of retreat. It eliminates the need for any kind of arbitrary hex limit on the retreat due to the opponet punishing the FR force, not the arbitrary rule. Simply put, there is the potential for multiple FR pursuit battles because there is potential for multiple FR battle hexes. Now obviously, it won't stop all abuse, but it coupled with a set path would deter most abuse with rules that are simple and fair.

By Dale Lloyd Fields (Dylkha) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 06:13 pm: Edit

Statement of Intent for my idea

Fighting Retreat should be an extension of retreat rules. If all the enemy are behind you, then they can pursue you to a limited extent until you get to point away from them and hit the "High Warp" button. A fighting retreat means you have to move a little slower because you don't want to let the E4 in front of you sink your DN with a P3. The ships behind you then get a chance to catch up and cause more harassment. If you are constantly moving slowly because of enemy forces in front of you, the enemy forces behind you should have the chance to constantly engage you until you get a path clear.

Feature: Extension of existing pursuit rules.
Feature: Pursuit rules means cripples keep showing up each hex as cripples are slowest and easiest to catch.
Feature: No rule-based limit on number of fighting retreat is defined, but the retreater may find an effective limit on the number of retreats based upon how many times he wants to take 20-25 damage.
Feature: Does not automatically destroy retreating force but could reach that after 6 pursuit battles at 20-25 damage each [see effective limit].
Feature: Pursuer still takes damage during the fighting retreat but has more options on which to resolve it.
Feature: Only non-standard movement required is an optional retrograde movement for the pursuing forces. This allows the pursuer to get back to safety/repair points. Should require retrograde to a non-battle hex.

Now, noted problems with my proposal:
Problem: Does not fix a healthy fleet fighting retreating from a battle it won. This proposal reverts to the standard fighting retreat rules in the absense of pursuing forces from the original battle hex (though I suppose you could pick up healthy pursuers along multiple fighting retreats).
Problem: Does not technically stop a 23-hex fighting retreat, so unusual situations could result in unusual outcomes.

By Dale Lloyd Fields (Dylkha) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 06:43 pm: Edit

Thanks Mike and Scott

I was present for the Orion Death Spiral (or as Nick put it, "The Great Cleave of F&E") and this would have prevented it. If the Orions went through 23 hexes of fighting retreats they would leave a mother-load of crippled/dead F-FFs in their wake, but their fleet would be gone.

In the case of Russell's situation, you might get around it slightly by the following:

Tweak 1: The pursuing force in a fighting retreat automatically succeeds in catching the retreating force even if the retreating force has no crippled units.

Then Russell would have been able to bring in 6 healthy ships from 1502 to take damage on (instead of losing ships) and would have been able to do a decent amount of damage to his opponent.

Tweak 2: As a way to tweak this proposal against arbitrarly long fighting retreats you could add: The fleet conducting the fighting retreat is considered to run out of supplies after it has fought a number of fighting retreats equal to its movement value (so worded for F/X-ships and Early Beginnings). Such a force now fights as if unsupplied and is not considered to be in supply for retrograde regardless of its location at the beginning of the retrograde phase. The pursuing force is always in supply, regardless of the number of fighting retreats.

Since retrograde is designed to reposition units, this would prevent the retreater from moving a large distance while fighting retreating and then retrograding. You would get one or the other. If you wanted to be more severe you could have the supply cut-off happen at move/2 or move/3 or just disallow any fighting retreating unit from retrograding period.

By Daniel G. Knipfer (Dgknipfer) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 07:36 pm: Edit

I like Dale's idea of allowing a pursuit force to join the picket ship. It seems realistic to let the pursuit force catch up.

Here's another possible idea. Limit FR to a max of once per battle hex unless all possible retreat hexes after the initial retreat have enemy ships present. A retreating force would not continuously plow through enemy ships unless they had no choice.

By Joe Stevenson (Alligator) on Monday, July 16, 2007 - 08:02 pm: Edit

"2. allows an attacker to pre-position ships along the only retreat route the retreating force will have to take. "

Tim,

That would only be true in the case of normal retreat.


"3. Forces a fleet to fighting retreat multipl hexes once the decision to perform a fighting retreat has been made, the decision to perform a fighting retreat should be decided on a hex by hex basis... FR should ALWAYS be voluntary. "

The way FR is written now, you MUST FR until you get to a hex with no enemies; but note: IT IS VOLUNTARY. The retreating force choses to FR; once he does, he has to live with it.