Any race that enters economic exhaustion while its home world is controlled by enemy forces does not suffer from the effects of economic exhaustion until the turn after it has reconquered the capital hex.

Note this would not help a race that was already in exhaustion.

This would primarily help the Hydrans and possibly the Kzinti, obviously.

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 12:10 pm: Edit

Um........Why?

By John Colacito (Sandro) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 12:41 pm: Edit

Why?
Game reasons: to help the pathetic off-map Hydrans or Kzinti get more than some lousy 20-25EP per turn during exhaustion.

Tecnobabble excuse: a race makes more sacrifices in order to get the capital back and the civilian population is willing (or forced) to contribute more resources than otherwise. This effort collapses and/or is no longer needed once the capital is regained.

Having said all the above I must say that while I like this proposal I can't see why a Coalition player would go for this.

Maybe this would be a good balance for all those silly proposals that allow conquered planets to produce more income?

By Eric Stork (Merchant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 12:54 pm: Edit

Allowing this is like allowing any race in such a situation to voluntarily go to Limited War or Peace to push back Exhaustion, which is not allowed. Only this is better.

By Ryan Opel (Ryan) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 01:00 pm: Edit

I see this as akin to the Poland, France, Norway and the other Allied countries in WWII who fought on throught he end of the war.

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 01:26 pm: Edit

It just makes no sense that a race that has lost most of their income to not go into exhaustion with the other races.

Besides, the Hydran should be exacting quite a high price for being driven off map. Same for the Kzin.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 03:25 pm: Edit

however history does state that the hydrans were able to fight their way back on map and re-capture their capitol.

even with all the late-war enhancements I don't think this can reasonably happen with the current rules, the hydrans just don't have the income to build a fleet able to do this (it's to easy for the klingons/lyrans to divert enough resources to hydran space to out-spend the hydrans virtually every turn except immediatly after their shipyard comes online) and even with all the fighters the hydrans have they still need to be able to asswault the fixed defenses the coalition puts up and that isn't easy

the hydrans are paying a large price for being pushed offmap, their economy is cut to a very small amount, they have to pay 90 EP to build a new shipyard, they can only do 1 conversion/turn (unless they build an additional SB) they skip almost 6 turns of construction

the hydrans start with 17 EP/turn of income offmap, this will be expanded a bit by surveys, but after exhaustion hits I doubt if this will be more then 10-15EP/turn and from this they have to replace destoyed ships (and with coalition maulers there will be destroyed ships) do any repairs, buy PF's and try to expand their fleet.

once (if) they get a toehold back on the map this may grow to 15-20EP/turn, but even that's not enough to build a fleet that can survivne tackleing a SB + PDU's and still having a fleet that can keep from being pushed back off.

one big mystery has been how in the world do the hydrans manage to do this, over in the fighter operations topic, I suggested that the megafighter stinger-2 could be the answer (take a stinger-2 add 2 damage points to it, give it 3 charges for it's fusions so it can fire one at R-10 and once at R-3, and upgrade it's speed to 30 without it taking double damage) but SVC is opposed to giving the hydrans any advantage from this other then a couple compot. doubling their economy during this time would make it MUCH harder for the coalition to hang onto hydran space

also when long-term capture is added to the game the eastern half of hydran space will be in this condition before the hydrans are able to mount an offensive so the coalition will be getting even more money during this time compared to the hydrans

this definantly is worth playtesting

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 04:03 pm: Edit

It is a give and take thing.

By the time the Hydrans come back, the Coalition will be hip deep in its own mess with the Feds/Gorn/Kzinti.

If they keep enough ships in the South to fight off a 150 SE Hydran Fleet, then they will be losing elsewhere.

I mean really, a late war Hydran Fleet can get around 200 COMPOT easy, add in an FSP and POOF. Dead starbase.

And trust me, 150 ships is easy for the Hydrans, who will have about 110 SE or so before being knocked off the capital.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 04:15 pm: Edit

Christopher, what sort of losses do the hyrans take in loosing their capitol and attempting the expedition to retain 110 SE at that point?

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 04:40 pm: Edit

Well, the first thing is that you don't attempt the expedition with many ships. You can cause trouble with only 5-10 ships or so.

Also, the Hydrans should not lose too many ships over the capital if they play it right. Sure, they will take cripples, but those can all get off map.

Remember, the Hydran Capital fight is a game of chicken. But the trick for the Hydran is not to wait till the Coalition flinches, but rather to know the right moment to flinch.

Sure, you can fight the Coalition down to your last ship, but that does not help the Alliance at all. You need to keep your fleet viable, while exacting as much damage as possible.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 05:04 pm: Edit

historicly the hydrans did loose a bunch of ships over the capitol.

one nice thing about this proposal is that in many ways it's self correcting. if the hydrans are weak they get the extra income for longer, if the hydrans are strong then the coalition will be driven from the capitol sooner and the hydrans will drop down to the normal income (and if the hydrans attempt to manipulate the game by not going after their capitol to keep the extra income the coalition can always abandon it to eliminate this abuse, just like the hydrans can do early in the war if the coaltion decides not to attack the capitol, but instead to just surround the capitol)

By Eric Stork (Merchant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 05:47 pm: Edit

David L., the only problem is that it goes one step past what I'd see as the initial step.

The initial step would be to allow any race pushed into its off-map area to go to Limited War, maybe Peacetime. Under existing rules, being at a state of Limited War/Peace delays Exhaustion. This proposal is one step better in allowing more income to be gained. It changes the existing rules without trying the first step to see the consequences.

Under this proposal, it becomes favorable to the Hydrans (for example) if they are pushed off-map to just turtle up for whatever number of turns then come pouring back on-map who knows how strong, possibly too much so.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 06:06 pm: Edit

Eric, that won't help much

during the time when you need to be building your ships you are reducing your income

your choices are

1. normal progress (100% income now and less later)

2. 75% income now in echange for one turn in the future that you get 100% income when you would get 75% and one turn when you would get 75% instead of 50%

3. 50% income now in exchange for two turns in the future when you would get 100% instead of 75% and two turns at 75% instead of 50%

so you do trade 1 EP now for 2 EP later, but since the 1 EP now will produce something that gets used for several turns before you would be able to buy it with the 2 EP later.

as a result this is FAR from a 2:1 gain, in many ways it's likly to be a significant loss.

By Joe Stevenson (Ikv_Sabre) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 06:19 pm: Edit

"Christopher, what sort of losses do the hyrans take in loosing their capitol and attempting the expedition to retain 110 SE at that point? "

All,

In the game posted here "An elegant mess", the Hydran fleet was virtually wiped out. By the end of the game, they had at least 110 SE. It looked likely that the capital would have been retaken, but the game ended due to Ray Schwartz' death.

So, the current game mechanic allow it to happen.

Joe

By John Colacito (Sandro) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 06:40 pm: Edit

No way dude, the Hydran player will never reconquer his capital, not if the Coalition prepares thier defenses...and there should be a Coalition SB or two facing them. Don't know why this didn't happen in EM.

By Edward Reece (Edfactor) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 06:54 pm: Edit

I believe this idea has some merit in "reality" as I believe people would make sacrifices, the race as a whole would work much harder in order to regain a lost homeworld.

Joe, elegent mess didn't use XTP's. The addition of XTP's to the late war (I fear) may upset the alliance attempts to go on the offensive by practically negating the effect of exhaustion on the coalition. Without their homeworld I would expect the Hydrans to build 1 X ship per year. However my proposal was not made with that in mind. This is not ment to be internally balanced, it is ment as a pro alliance rule that would need to be balanced out with other rules or only used with mutual agreement.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 06:59 pm: Edit

also if full income is to good it's also reasonable to consider that a race jsut suffers exhaustion 1 level less (so partial would get 100% and full woud get 75%)

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 07:48 pm: Edit

Ok guys, show of hands.........how many of you have played through the whole game at least once, or at least to turn 30??

By Joe Stevenson (Ikv_Sabre) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 08:54 pm: Edit

"No way dude, the Hydran player will never reconquer his capital, not if the Coalition prepares thier defenses...and there should be a Coalition SB or two facing them. Don't know why this didn't happen in EM. "

There were Coalition SBs there in EM. It was about to happen.

Joe

By Edward Reece (Edfactor) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:11 pm: Edit

The Hydran can only retake their homeworld if the coalition lets them OR if the Federation can get a base and a fleet within 6 hexes. Anyone doubt that for the coalition the worst thing that can happen is to let the Hydrans out of the bag? Every turn the coalition counts the Hydrans and sends down enough to beat them into the ground if they fight an open space battle. If the coalition has 2 SB's and 10 PDU's on a major planet in the capital system then maybe they can actually let the Hydrans have a small ship advantage maybe. But if the Hydrans retake their capital its because the coalition lets them. If the coalition is pushed back and defending Klinshai, well the Feds/Kzinti/Gorn outproduce them anyway so it will happen sooner or later anyway. If you let the Hydrans back into their capital they will just join the party. So I can concieve of no strategic or tactical reason to allow the Hydrans back into their capital again.

I don't want to defend this idea based on the belief that it will allow the Hydrans a chance to get their capital back, because frankly I don't believe it will. But it will make the coalition work harder to keep them out of it.

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:15 pm: Edit

Every time I have lost the Hydran capital, I have made that entire region of space a bleeding ulcer for the Coalition. THat is what it is supposed to be.

The Hydrans can take their homeworld back, but it'll be very near the end, or at least post turn 25 or so.

After exhaustion hits the Coalition is hard pressed to continue to send ships down South, repair what they need to and keep the pressure on the Feds.

Play till turn 25 and see what happens.

By Edward Reece (Edfactor) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:28 pm: Edit

I can't think of anything more important then keeping the Hydrans in the box. If the coalition produces 150 EP's on turn 26 and it takes 60 of it to keep the Hydrans in check then the Fed/Kzinti front gets 90 EPs to play with. Yes it bleeds but the wound bleeds much worse if you let the Hydrans get more production. If you say "but the Fed front needs X" well my response is that the Fed front gets whatever is left after we take care of the Hydrans.

By Joe Stevenson (Ikv_Sabre) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:39 pm: Edit

"Without their homeworld I would expect the Hydrans to build 1 X ship per year."

Actually, I calculate that the Hydrans, with purchases of additional XTP, will have ~32 XTP. That's 3-5 ships.

2 Major (1 as capital)
1 Minor
2 offmap provinces
11 surveyed provinces (using average dierolls; this could be higher if a PT is used)

Joe

By David Lang (Dlang) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:43 pm: Edit

Joe, for those 11 additional provinces does that take into account the recent changes that make provinces require more survey points the more you have found?

By Lawrence Bergen (Lar) on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 09:43 pm: Edit

"Yes it bleeds but the wound bleeds much worse if you let the Hydrans get more production."

I still dont see why this proposal is necessary at all. The Alliance (especially the Hydrans with all their new stuff) should be in great shape now since F&EK, AO & CO have come. There is no basis for needing this rule as there have been only a handful of players here that can claim to playing the game to the end and NONE here that have done it since the last three products have come out.

Play an all rules game without this proposal first and then play an all rule game with it. Then we can compare notes (probably in 2006 if you hurry). Try Cyberboard it works well with the AIM chat & die roller.