I think you meant 'respective', rather than 'receptive'.

Offmap areas, being far from combat with enemy empires, would (in my opinion) not have lots of BATS and such.

I think the limits above should be much less, and perhaps would be base stations instead of BATS (not having to deal with the possibility of invasion from hostile empires). I would suggest a flat cost of 2 per such base. It would be necessary to include a note that a base station is two repair for usage in a basic game and how many PFs it can hold.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Monday, September 12, 2016 - 12:33 pm: Edit

Stupid auto-correct. Yes, 'respective'.

The idea is to increase repair facilities and the ability to build off-map Starbases faster/cheaper than starting from scratch.

The Lyran only have 9 on-map BATS, but probably won't lose that many. The Hydran also start with 9 and Kzinti with 10, but will lose half of them during the opening turns of the game.

PF can't be moved from one base to another, can they? Even if they can, you still need to buy them at some point. So why does it matter how many PFs they would have? I'm not seeing the point of that last part.


Garth L. Getgen

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Monday, September 12, 2016 - 12:37 pm: Edit

Why would anyone want to spend 30+ EP on an offmap SB, versus doing something else with that money?

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Monday, September 12, 2016 - 06:03 pm: Edit

If the intent is to increase repair capacity, then PRDs can be easily built for 3 or 5 EPs ( or free with engineers) at off-map planets.

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Monday, September 12, 2016 - 06:56 pm: Edit

Well, yeah, true. It also increases construction capability, too, something the Kzinti / Hydran could use.


Garth L. Getgen

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Wednesday, March 22, 2017 - 10:24 am: Edit

Here are some proposed Balance Options for the ISC. Feel Free to comment and suggest different cost options. I did try to match the cost options with those of other empires where the option is similar in effect.

(653.13) ISC Options

A. Extra Gunline Ships (+6) Add 1 DD and 1 FF per turn to the construction schedule for Y168 and Y169.

B. Early Carriers (+15) The ISC developed fighters in the early Y160s and can begin construction of carriers in Y168. All PDUs, BATS, and Star Bases have their normal fighter compliment in Y168.

C. Smaller Concordium Defense Reserves (-6) Eliminate the CDR Echelon Two.

D. Larger Concordium Defense Reserves (+6) Add CDR Echelon Three with the same units as Echelon Two.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Wednesday, March 22, 2017 - 11:03 am: Edit

(653.1) General Options

Colony Construction (+2) Add One Colony on map subject to placement restrictions under (446.11) with the additional restriction that it cannot be in the same hex as a base. This option may be chosen a maximum of 3 times.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Wednesday, March 22, 2017 - 11:03 am: Edit

Deleted by Author. Duplicate post.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Wednesday, August 02, 2017 - 04:09 pm: Edit

(653.16) Vudar Options

A. CW Production (+12): A bright Vudar engineer designs the CW. The Vudar produce one CW in place of the Spring Turn's CL and one CW is added to each Fall turn's production starting with Turn #1.

Author's Note: The balance option on this one may be a little high as I copied from the Tholians Option but the CW replaces the CL each year instead of adding a CW each turn. Also (635.16) should be (635.17) as (R16.0) is for the Jindarians and (R17.0) is for the Vudar.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Wednesday, August 02, 2017 - 04:30 pm: Edit

(653.13) ISC Options

E1. Smaller Seventh Fleet (Y168) (-20): The ISC Distant Zone is much more active; remove units equal to 36 total attack and/or fighter factors.

E2. Smaller Seventh and Eighth Fleet (Y186) (-20): The ISC Distant Zone is much more active; remove units equal to 18 total attack and/or fighter factors from each of the Seventh and Eighth Fleets respectively.

By Thomas Mathews (Turtle) on Sunday, November 05, 2017 - 09:11 am: Edit

(653.16) Vudar Options

B. DW Production (+8): A bright Vudar engineer designs the DW. The Vudar produce DWs in place of each turn's DDs production starting with Turn #1.

Author's Note: (635.16) should be (635.17) as (R16.0) is for the Jindarians and (R17.0) is for the Vudar.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 07:48 pm: Edit

(653.2) Federation options:

Caution(+3) -- the Feds become suspicious of Klingon intentions. The 5th fleet detachment (602.2) is released on turn 6. It may move by strategic movement that turn. If the Klingons do not attack the Federation, it may be used in the Limited War to support the Kzinti.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 07:52 pm: Edit

(653.5) Kzinti Options:

The Third Dimension (+6) -- The Kzinti discover a route to the Hydran Old Colonies that avoids the Klingons by passing above the Galactic Plane. Kzinti ships may move by strategic movement between the Old Colonies and either Kzintai or the Barony by this route. The Hydrans can use it after war breaks out between the Federation and the Klingons. Other powers can never use it.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:00 pm: Edit

(653.4) Romulan Options:

Bribery (+8): By paying 10EP to the Gorn on each of turns 10, 11, and 12, the Romulans are able to delay Gorn entry until turn 13. The money is deducted from the Romulan treasury. Gorn PWC on turn 12 is DN, HD, 2xBD, BDS. The Gorns may attach this to any fleet. On turn 13, the Gorns start with 15EP in their treasury; the other 15 were taken by corrupt officials.

Spies (+8): The Romulans discover that the Gorns plan to attack them on turn 12. They decide to preempt this by attacking the Gorns on Romulan turn 12. The Romulan Fleet of the North is released on turn 12, and all Gorn fleets are released immediately if any Romulan Fleet of the North ship leaves its deployment area, or if any Romulan unit enters Gorn territory.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:11 pm: Edit

I would recommend not numbering the rules in an official seeming way.

I think your Fed option is worth more than three points as it will significantly strengthen Federation defenses (just a few ships at 7th Fleet SB will probably save it from a turn seven attack or at least cost the Klingons a lot more to take it) and will be a LARGE help for the Kzinti if the Klingons do not attack. Perhaps 10 points?

I think your third dimension thing breaks the game. There's no reasonable reason that the Hydrans wouldn't go help the Kzinti on turn two if it exists. You could disallow its use for early activation of the Federation (as it doesn't prove Hydran power if you don't actually break through the Klingons or Lyrans to get to the Federation).

This is probably worth 20 points, as _THE_ big disadvantage the Hydrans are inflicted with in F&E is their isolation. With other powers able to SEND THEM MONEY, or ship (or for them to move ships elsewhere) it greatly complicates the situation for the Coalition.

Hydran RNs (and RGRs) are simply the best cruiser cost hulls the alliance has, and being able to have the money to build them regularly is a large advanatage. Being able to send some to defend Kzintai or other alliance capitals is going to be harsh for the Coalition. This is the case for many other hulls the Hydrans can build.

Consider what happens when Hydrax falls. Normally the Coalition can just pile enough ships in Hydran space that the Hydrans just can't get there, rendering their powerful ships mostly impotent. But what if you can move a half dozen Hydran heavy hulls to a besieged Kzintai.

OUCH.

***

Also, this would require a chain of supply points to traverse this distance as clearly the Kzinti and Hydran offmaps are far more than six hexes apart.

***

Anyway, all this aside, my memory tells me that ADB has always disallowed suggestions that you CAN do this sort of thing and I would be surprised if that did not happen here.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:28 pm: Edit

653.9 Hydran Options:

Deadly gas(+8): Because Methane is poisonous to all Coalition races, conquered Hydran planets do not provide any EPs to the Coalition.

Home field advantage(+8): Hydran ships in or adjacent to Hydrax are never pinned.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:35 pm: Edit

General option:

(+7) Precognitive allies.

Your empire has managed to obtain the assistance of an elder race of previous unknown origin. While mostly unconcerned with material matters, their vast psionic powers allow them to peer into the possible futures to aid your empire in selecting outcomes.

Once per year, your empire may do one of the folloowing:

1. Select a battle force's BIR after observing the opponents BIR and the variable die roll.

2. Reroll any *one* six sided die rolled by any player. In the case of multiple dice rolled simultaneously, any can be changed this way, but only one.

3. Upon provoking enemy reaction, the empire may take back the last hex of movement and move to a different hex or stop. If a stack stopping provoked the reaction, then the reaction can be cancelled but the stack must then move another hex.
In any case, the reaction is undone before the alternate action proceeds. Reaction then can be performed as normal normal.

Use by opposing empires.
For option one, the phasing player gets first choice to know the enemy BIR. If the non-phasing player also chooses to know the enemy's BIR, then the phasing player may cancel their precognition (and use one of their options later) or may cancel the effect completely resulting in normal BIR determination and revalation.
For option two, the phasing player gets first option to reroll a die. If the non phasing player chooses to reroll the same die, the phasing player may cancel their own use of this balance option (and use one of the listed options later) or may cancel the use of the enemy's die roll rerolling ability (costing both empire's balance option abilitiy).
For option three, opposing empires cannot cancel this ability by using their own.

(*15) Reality alteration.
Works as option #2 above, except that the empire instead of rerolling a die, can choose the actual roll (ie make the roll be a '1', or whatever number is desired). The other options of Precognitive allies are not available.

If two opposing empires both use this ability on the same die (phasing player chooses to use this ability before the non-phasing player), then the effect is cancelled.

***

Only one of the two balance options above may be selected by any alliance of empires or powers, and no more than one empire of an alliance may select one of these options. To use these abilities in a battle, the flagship of the battle force must belong to the empire which purchased the balance option.

***

This rule could probably be written more tightly, but this should suffice as a proposal.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:39 pm: Edit

(653.3) Klingon Options:

Use for Parts(+5): If the Klingons have two or three identical crippled ships in the same location, they may sacrifice one of them during the field repair step to repair the other one or two. This does not cost any EPs and can be repeated. For example, if there are six identical crippled ships, the Klingons could sacrifice two of them to immediately repair the other four. There is no salvage for the sacrificed ships.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:50 pm: Edit

(653.4) Romulan Options:

Bribery (+8)

There are problems with this proposal, as written I think the cost is much too low.

I suggest instead that the payment does delay Gorn _entry_ into the war, but on turn 12 the Gorns still go to a wartime economy but do not join the war. Specifically, they can produce their normal production schedule, do survey, activate offmap ships, accumulate unspent EPs and do anything a power can normally do at wartime, but do not join the Alliance until Alliance turn 13 begins.

Deadly gas(+8):
Honestly, the Coalition do not get EPs from the Hydrans by occupying their planets. They make them give tribute on pain of being blasted from orbit (presumably). I don't think a hostile atmosphere is sufficient reason to disallow this,

Home field advantage(+8):
This will cause a large increase in the number of ships the Coalition needs to defend against Hydran attacks as phrased, as it means that Hydrans just ignore pinning all the way to 1013, for example, if they start within one hex of Hydrax. I don't know how many points this would be worth, but surely a lot more than 8.

***

If the intention is that the ships are unpinnable only while within one hex of Hydrax, it's still worth more than 8 as you can put your reserves on Hydrax and they cannot be pinned. This makes attacking Hydran hard points a LOT harder.

Again, I think this is worth more than 8 points.

***

Also, I think that this doesn't work at all. The Romulans have CLOAKING DEVICES and cannot do this.

By Richard B. Eitzen (Rbeitzen) on Thursday, June 06, 2019 - 08:54 pm: Edit

Use for Parts(+5):

*Suggest you add that this requires a field repair ship(s) (expending capacity equal to the repair cost of the ship(s) repaired plus the repair cost of the ship consumed).

*This should probably be a general option rather than just a Klingon one?

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Friday, June 07, 2019 - 08:17 am: Edit

A big part of my intention is to get people to look at things in different ways with some creative thinking.

Yeah, the parts could be anyone. I was just thinking the Klingons were the most likely to use it.

Per the proposal, the Hydrans can't use the third dimension until Fed entry.

I just numbered them because I saw that was how other people were doing it. Didn't realize that made it "impostor official". Whoops, and lol.

The Hydran one, yes it means they can't be pinned while within 1 hex of Hydrax. 2 hexes away and they can. So it won't help them on the expedition for example.

If the costs are off, they can be adjusted. The main question is whether or not people find the ideas interesting.

Speaking of which . . .

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Friday, June 07, 2019 - 08:43 am: Edit

Federation options

Relocation (+8)

The Federation develops the ability to move critical infrastructure. By using two tugs, they can move production from one undevastated Federation minor planet to another. The "source" planet has its economic value reduced to 1(not devastated) or 0(conquered or devastated). The "destination" planet thereafter has its economic value increased to 5(not devastated) or 2(conquered or devastated). On the turn of the move, the source planet collects EPs at the reduced level. The destination planet gains the extra production the following turn. Neither planet can ever be involved in a production move again.

Resilience (+6)
Due to a market economy and popular support for the war effort, Federation-controlled Federation planets recover quickly. After a Federation-controlled Federation planet produces at the devastated level for one turn, its production increases by 1EP per turn until full production is reached, at which point it is considered to be recovered. This applies regardless of whether the planet was previously conquered or only devastated. Redevastation would reset the production back to the devastated level.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Friday, June 07, 2019 - 08:56 am: Edit

Gorn option

Specialization(+6)
Because the Gorns have very few carriers, they improve their ability to perform repairs. All Gorn bases and FRDs can perform repairs during the field repair step in addition to their usual repairs during the repair step. Such repairs are paid for at the usual "base" repair rate.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat2) on Friday, June 07, 2019 - 01:27 pm: Edit

General Alliance option:

The best laid plans (+4):

Battles develop their own rhythm and logic. Controlling the BIR is impossible. For every battle round, each player rolls a die and subtracts 1 from the result. That number, from 0 to 5, is that player's "chosen" BIR. There is no VBIR roll. If a "VBIR roll" is needed for purposes of any rule, then take the actual BIR, add 2, then divide by 2 and round down.

I think this option, while apparently neutral, is actually pro-Alliance. For one thing, it will mess with maulers. That's why I'm calling it a "general Alliance option." It has the added benefit of speeding play as players don't have to choose a BIR.

By Ted Fay (Catwhoeatsphoto) on Friday, June 07, 2019 - 01:54 pm: Edit

Uncontrollable BIR also makes it difficult to control SFGs or do ground combat - both of which require a player to select "4". You will need to specify under what circumstances a player is qualified to make an SFG or G attack. note these are NOT VBIR requirements, but selected BIR requirements, which your proposed option does not cover.