Suggestion:
Reduce the crippled defense strength. For example let an GCA be a 5-7/3 unit. The less efficient repair will make these units less attractive as front line damage sponges and can represent the higher cost of replacing obsolesent parts.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 04:29 pm: Edit

Roms: 12 KD4R, 20 KF4R (total 32)

Kzintis: 4 CS, 1 drone CS, 4 old CV, 4 old escort frigate, 12 old frigates. (total 25)

Gorns: Unknown number of old CLs (say 6?), two old CLs converted into training carriers, unknown number of old DDs (10?) of which two were converted to escorts later. Total say 20 ships.

Hydrans: unknown but small number of grenadier cruisers (say six?),
15 old destroyers of which some had been lost in the four powers war or war of return (say 10 left?_,
the Grenadier-V already in the game (1),
six old frigates converted to carriers and some of them lost in the war of return, (say 3)
each frigate-V with an escort frigate (3)
Total 23 ships.

Lyrans: 21 old CAs of which maybe half were lost in 4 powers war (10?), one old CA converted into a training carrier, 21 old FFs of which a few were lost in the 4PW and one was converted into an escort. Maybe 15 left in service plus the escort. Call it 26 ships.

Feds: 49
Gorns: 20(?)
Hydrans: 23 (?)
Kzintis: 25
Total Alliance: 117

Klingon: 37
Romulans: 32
Lyrans: 26
Total Coalition: 95

In any case, call it 212 counters used for NG out of 648 or 864 in product.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 04:30 pm: Edit

Oh, yeah, no new construction of NG ships. If you want to buy a war cruiser and say to yourself "this is crewed by the walkurian national guard" then knock yourself out.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 04:31 pm: Edit

Yeah, DEL's repair idea too.

By Richard Abbott (Catwhoorg) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 04:44 pm: Edit

To further that idea (or as an alternative) :-

The Romulan-KR repair surcharge (442.8) with a limited number of turns of 'spare parts' for each race - and no Orion smuggling (as there is no place to smuggle them FROM)

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:04 pm: Edit

NG ship rule ideas...

A. No independent reaction allowed (too slow - poor long range sensors); extended reaction IS ONE HEX if stacked with a scout. IOW, the scout sees movement at range-two, NGs with scout CAN react one hex but do not get the second reaction hex. Can only react in its assigned area?

B. Cannot be part of a reserve fleet (too slow, awkward coordination).

C. Cannot be used in BGs except with same NG ships (or three ships in BG must be of same NG race).

D. Are treated as speed three (or faster) slow-units -- especially in retreat (too old to keep up).

E. Can only retrograde three (or same number as above) hexes (too slow - less range).

F. Limited Strat - same as a slow unit.

G. Cannot raid or support a raid.

H. Repairs by foreign race bases or FRD/PRDs cost 1 for 1 (old parts hard to come by). (But only a home PRD can repair at .5EP less -- they have the surplus parts).

I. Cannot pin (or it could take two NGs to pin one standard); NGs are pinned at 2:1. (should two uncrippled NG CAs be able to still pin a crippled standard ship?).

J. Must be part of a capital static defense force pile - but is not counted in the mobile/static split.

K. If 50%+ of force is NG then it's BIR is -1.

L. Cannot withdraw (like slow unit?).

M. Can only draw supply from range (x).

N. Cannot block retrograde/supply in adjacent hexes.

O. Cannot be used as ad hocs/escorts/consorts to other standard ships.

P. Can only use one hex of cloaked movement; cannot attempt to find cloaked units.

Q. Cannot use command points, ADMs, MMGs, PTs, SWACs, Decoys, MEGAs, I-GCEs (old C2 facilities cannot support).

S. Cannot pursue (too slow) but could pursue slow units.

T. Cannot use field repair (old parts not carried by repair standard ships/tugs).

U. Cannot use CEDS (if it was some how available for NGs).

V. Cannot be part of a support echelon (limited C2).

W. Can be used to counter a raid in only its hex.

By Ahmad Abdel-Hameed (Madarab) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:07 pm: Edit

Chuck, I could easily see dropping C and saying that NR ships don't have the command and control capacity to integrate with a battlegroup.

I don't have R8. Were the Romulan NR ships equipped with cloaks?

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:13 pm: Edit

Madarab:

See SVC post earlier under the GCA (National Guard Cruiser) listing:

"...In wartime, these ships formed a vital part of Star Fleet, covering the Gorn borders, patrolling the off-map region, and dealing with the space monsters who hadn’t noticed a war going on. One attempt to use a squadron of three of these ships in a battle against the Klingons in September Y171 ended in disaster as the ships could not maneuver or fight with the first-line ships and became easy targets."

The problem does not appear to lie with the command rating or command channels, but rather the speed and agility of the NG ships.

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:16 pm: Edit

Other ideas...

X. Can only be scraped if captured.

Y. Cannot use depot repairs; have limited scrap value (10%?).

Z. Cannot draw supplies from convoys/supply tugs/MilConvoys/LTFs.

AA. Do not get free strat after repairs.

AB. Cannot tow FRDs or pull ships from webs.

By Scott Tenhoff (Scottt) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:22 pm: Edit

Gee Chuck, give someone else a chance....

Or just bored on Friday night? LOL

By Christopher E. Fant (Cfant) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:23 pm: Edit

Just say no to hex numbers on the counter. Any game I have played with that system is very difficuly if playing anything but the main scenario, and even then it can be frustrating.

By Jimi LaForm (Laform) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:28 pm: Edit

Just some notes on which planets have NG's that can't leave the province/planet and then a note on how many are able to operationally move about at will is sufficient.

Chuck, good stuff bud.

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:31 pm: Edit

John:

I agree with Chris -- no hex numbers on the counters; if you lose one your toast. Besides, we assign monitors without doing this, so it should not be a problem.

Simple rule would be if their planet/province is overrun then they are added to the adjacent province or must move to the capital province.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 05:55 pm: Edit

JD: You said you wanted them fully functional (they aren't, look at the SSDs) and roaming around all home territory (but no foreign territory) which means giving the alliance 100 ships without any counter balance as the Coalition ships have to stay home. That's what you said. You could have been a lot less biased or a lot more clear in your post.

If you knew what NG ships were, you'd know how they act. Since you did't know, you could have asked. Instead, you just guessed, and were wrong. What NG ships are and how they work is already published hard core background, not a clean slate on which you can write anything. You started from your idea of what the US Army NG is and didn't even think SFU might not be the US Army.

Yes, they are all on the map at start. No point (or room) to print a location and given the previously stated concept that the product would have 3 or 4 identical copies of a countersheet, there is no way to do it that way, and anybody actually thinking it through would know that.

Most (even the Klingons) would be 'chained elephants' but some would be able to move around.

But perhaps your original statement was incomplete, or a joke, or based on a false impression. If you'd like to make a new comment based on data you now have, we can proceed.

By David Lang (Dlang) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 06:14 pm: Edit

in terms of ship speeds, we have defined the following speeds (in F&E and in detail in GPD)

type	hexes/turn
freighter	2
aux/NTW	3
EY	4
GW	6
Fast/X	7

if these ships are fully refitted EY ships would they still be at the EY speed (the strategic engines can't be upgraded wihtout rebuilding the ship or something like that, but the Fed CL does get the speed upgrade?????) or should they be at GW speeds, but unable to use some of the strategic speed things (unable to reserve we have, what about retrograde and strat)

I would rather say they are the same speed as the GW ships but can't do specific things then invent a new drive type that will cascade into other things.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 06:23 pm: Edit

Bit of news. I did a rough count on the countersheets and determined that to do this the way I want, it will take two copies of two non-identical sheets. That is good since one of them could be the "ships you don't need more of" while the other could be the "ships you want more of".

By Scott Tenhoff (Scottt) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 06:51 pm: Edit

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Quote:

Would the presence of an NG ship at a planet prevent troop attack IAW the montor rules?

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By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 07:32 pm: Edit

Fed CL is speed 6. it's cast iron and was easy to convert.

the only speed-5 ships I can think of are NGs, war eagles, overloaded tugs, and those weird gorn carriers.