Archive through October 03, 2004
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Federation & Empire: F&E PRODUCTS:
F&E Future Products (Far Term):
F&E Nebulous Operations:
Off Map Raids:
Archive through October 03, 2004
Cool. I like this concept.
A couple of questions:
Is the assignment of immovable assets to subareas secret or open? I wonder if simplicity could let it be open, since the die roll determines which subarea I find... The only issue is immovable assets added after the game begins. Will the opponent know to which subarea I have added a FDU? (My options will be limited, since I have to put it in the `emptiest' subarea available...) Does whether the opponent has `found' an area in a previous raid impact that?
Are all movable units considered simply to be near or far until a raid occurs, or are they also (secretly) assigned to subareas at all times?
Another question: Will raids (in the 314/320 sense) ever be able to strike an off-map area, or is this rule the only way enemy units can ever enter one?
Does any of this concept have an effect on movement between on and off map areas?
Does the movement between the off map zones use up movement points? (I assume it does, but at what rate?) Is it 1:1 like normal hex-hex movement or is it something else?
Do we need to consider/reconsider how moving between off-map zones is dealt with currently (moving from Kzinti to Fed to Gorn, etc.) or will that concept remain intact as it stands?
For a name maybe one of these:
"Off-Map Missions"
"Off-map Operations"
Are there any plans for large scale raids on map? If not then 'Raid' still works with Large Scale Raids.
If so the Large Scale Raids can be written up also and become part of this rule as "LS On-Map" separate from "LS Off-Map".
SVC: On thought about that new concept (which I like).
You said: If I don't want to fight the starbase I can re-roll anything that comes up 4.
It seems to me that if there is a bunch of stuff off map then finding something is easier but as you find more stuff the remaining stuff is harder to find.
As such I say that only one roll is allowed per raid. If you rolled a province you've already found then you can fight there or accept you found nothing. If there is nothing in a slot then there is nothing to attack.
What would result game wise is many small scouting raids to establish the wereabouts of the off map systems. Some raids will fail. Survey ships and scouts (including DP with Scout Sensors) might be allowed one re-roll if a result is an established zone on the first roll. (If second role is also an established zone then it can pick either raid). This benefit is given to the entire raiding group.
the thing I find scary about this is the fact that the defender is prohibited from co-locating things and making a strongpoint, but the attacker only attacks one area.
this means that the defender needs 6 times as many defenses as the attacker needs forces to have an even chance in a fight.
if the defender is after one specific unit that could be reasonable, but if the attacker is just interested in doing as much damage as possible and doesn't care what they get (they just want to get something) the defender needs to have a LARGE edge in forces to defend against it.
a single raiding fleet (11 ships) will effectivly tie up 66 ships or so to defend against it. actually in practice it probably takes more as the 11 ships are going to be the best ships available while the defending ships will be a mix of everything
Maybe 5 and 6 represent areas you don't have to guard and which never have anything in them, but you must always roll so 5 or 6 always mean "nothing there"?
That would mean there are only four areas, and that if I roll a 2 I find out what is in two and can return to 2 whenever I want, but if I roll to see if I can find one of the others and get a 5 or 6 then I wasted the trip. Meaning 1/3 of the time nothing happens.
There was some hue and cry IIRC about the original form of the proposal requiring three times as many ships to defend as to attack... Four times (with 5 and 6 being wasted trips) brings that down from six, but will that be enough?
As I understand it, 44 ships will `raid-proof' the off-map area now. The question, I guess, is: (a) should the defender be able to `raid-proof' the OMA, and if so, (b) is 44 ships too much to expect? If the answer to (a) is NO, then (b) is irrelevant, right?
We could call these Deep Raids, maybe?
As for the rolling, I know good design says to keep steps to a minimum, but perhaps one way to get around some of the concerns about ease of finding areas would be to roll to see if the off-map raid finds anything, and then roll to see what area it finds?
Possibly give an off-map raid a 1-in-6 or 2-in-6 chance of success, but, like the original rules, have the likelihood of finding a target be modified by the size of the raiding fleet, perhaps, and/or the number of previously successful raids while still leaving a fairly good chance of a raid turning up negative (say a maximum chance of success at 4-in-6)? Then, once we know if the raid has found anything, that's when we roll to see what area?
I don't think that the "four times as many" issue is valid.
First, if you're in the off map, you have your whole darn fleet there with you.
Second, if you don't want something hit, move it farther away (into the survey zone).
If there is a concern about the number of ships requried to protect Off Map Zones, just allow a Reserve made up of X/Fast Ships to respond to an Off Map Raid. This will allow a slightly smaller defense force at each zone.
Also, how many of the NG ships will be assigned to each planet? Remember these ships are assigned to specific planets and will provide additional defenses.
I think there is some concern of the Coalition, attacking the Hydran/Kzinti Off-Map areas with a small fleet, while the main fleet focuses on the Capital. In that situation, the Hydran/Kzinti, can't afford approximately 40 ships required to guard their Off Map assets.
Of course, those Assets may have a bit more defenses under the new rules, between NG ships and EBs adding defenses to the existing planets.
I don't think there should be any way to raid-proof the Off Map Areas if this rule is introduced, but we might wish to look at making things slightly easier for the defender. Of course, how that is accomplished (and note I say 'slightly') will depend greatly on whether or not we now have to move from zone to zone within an OMA.
In order to simulate the scarcity of infrastructure, and to take into account the fact that the OMA zones could represent territory 2 hexes away or 20, perhaps it would use up the total operational move allowance to go from zone to zone for ships with Op move of 4+? They could transit the entire Near Zone Area (crossing as many zones as they wished) using strategic movement. Ships with Op move of 3 or less could move between zones using strat move only and would be limited to one zone per turn.
To move from the Near Zone to the Survey Zone could either be done with strat move only, or op move only (representing the lack of SMNs). If Op move, it might take one turn to go from Near to Survey, with each point of Op Move allowance less than 6 resulting in a turn's delay.
We might also wish to consider prohibiting certain units (FRDs) to move from Near to Survey unless towed operationally.
Along with this, we could say that ships of Op move 4+ are able to react to incursions up to one zone away, the rationale being that the defender knows the area much better than the attacker and would have ample warning. It would still force the defender to allocate a minimum of two groups of ships (one each in zones 2 and 5) in order to provide full Near Zone coverage.
Moving from one race's OMA to another would still take a full turn but could only be done by strat move (two turns if the ship/unit in question was op move 3 or less).
It's complicated, I know. Just some semi-random thoughts 
NG ships probably won't be a factor in off map areas. If there are any, it might be one or two, perhaps three Hydran GRVs.
The off map has two zones, near and far, both of them one movement area each, and I already said it takes a full turn of operational movement to go from one to the other. Stop inventing what I've already invented.
Actually, SVC, you said there were 7 zones (or 2 zones with 7 areas total). Okay, so the areas in the Near Zone don't affect movement at all.
What's needed is some sort of quick reation force in the OMA so that the defender isn't grossly over-penalized by being required to split foces between 6 areas (or 4, whichever). Maybe the defender could form a de facto reserve in the OMA that could only be used there and wouldn't need a marker (the player could simply designate the force and be done with it)?
SVC: Ya exactly. Much cleaner than my proposal. It nicely relates the situation of trying to find a needle in a haystack...a REALLY big haystack with lots of needle look-alikes.
Actually, the original rule basically said the ships at the other places showed up one batch per round.
SO what you are saying is (kind of) its similar to the rolling done for activating the Gorn off-map fleet (in difficulty level)?
The attacker chooses A or B.
A: Attack a known location.
- or -
B: Search for a new location.
Once the die roll is made the attacker cannot then go back and choose to fight the known location.
If B is selected and the die roll is an area already found then the attacker can attack that location?
Or is this result: No new information discovered: mission failed.
If the die roll is a successful discovery of a new target the attacker may continue on and attack this new location.
Do I have this correct?
How about changing the cost of the raid force from 3 EP/raid to 3 EP/ship and remove the limits on number of ships?
SVC: YOU ARE CRAZY. PAY 3O EPS FOR A RAID? NO!
if a race is trying to fight it's way back on-map, but must keep 44+ ships off-map to protect things there from attack this will make it very hard to have many ships available to fight the on-map battles and occupy the on-map space
and note that 44 ships doesn't raid-proof anything. it just means that there will be a real fight there, which either side could win
Here is when my lack of full understanding hinders me. It seems to me that all areas can be found in one turn this way. I would think that with one ship (or one raiding group) it might take a few turns to find them all. It a lot of space out there. Shouldn't each raid group only have one chance to find an area per game turn?
Since the defender knows where everything is then the defender should be able to react to a raid with ships in other areas.
I would think.
What if the attacker had to make some sort of die roll that would indicate that a certain portion of the off-map attack ends up being used (and thus unavailable in the attack) to guard the fleet's retreat and supply lines?
what I think this rule needs (but I can't think of the 'right' way to do it so I'm not doing this as a formal proposal)
1. ships raiding out into unexplored territory aren't going to be moving fast (they ahve to spend a lot of time checking that there isn't an ambush fleet behind each moon). scouts or survey ships should help significantly with this
2. ships raiding out into unexplored territory aren't getting supplied by normal means, so they need to take supplies with them or run the risk of being 'out of supply' when they have to fight/run. tugs and survey ships should help with this (tugs carry supplies, survey ships carry some supplies, but have the knowledge to make use of things they find to suplement the supplies that are carried)
3. ships raiding out into unexplored territory are trying to keep a low profile until they find something, they don't want the entire off-map fleet to gather and jump them (this causes them to be a bit slower)
4. the defender should have a chance of spotting the raiding ships as they are exploring
5. once the raiding ships are spotted ships will converge on the spot so even if there are only a few ships there initially the raiding ships need to fight and run or they will be overwelmed by the converging ships (one random ship/carrier group/etc arrives each combat round)
6. with so little knowledge of the area the raiding sips can't use 'dash warp' without the very real risk of running over something that will vaporize them. thus no stratmove, retrograde movement, and probably no retreat by the normal rules (instead of disengagement by acceleration and re-appearing 1 hex away they need to fight a running battle until they either kill off the pursueing ships (crippling should slow them down enough for disengagement by distance) or reach familiar territory)
the cost of making the raid should just be in the supplies carried (cost as per the homeless ship rule??) and the risk of loosing the raiding ships.
the difficulty of finding something should be based on how much time is spent looking, if you have a specific target or just are looking for 'something to kill, and how good the sensors are.
if a raid fleet just ducks into the offmap area and returns every turn it should have very little chance of finding anything. if it spends the entire turn offmap (haveing entered the offmap area the previous turn) it should have a much higher chance of finding something (but this requires more supplies)
the deeper into the offmap area the raiding fleet goes before they find something the longer it should take to get back to the on-map area (and therefor the less likly the raid is to make it back through the gauntlet of converging ships)
if the converging ships choose not to fight for a round to let more ships gather the raiding fleet should have a chance of getting away
something like each round of the retreat the running force rolls 2d6
on a 1-2 they get away no matter what and can choose to get back on the map or stay offmap to search more
on a 3 they would get away if the only ships left in the offmap battle force are crippled, but there are uncrippled ships with them.
on a 4 they would get away if there are no ships in the offmap battle force (all killed or none comitted) and there are uncrippled ships with them
on a 5+ they only get away if there are no uncrippled ships in or with the offmap battle force
So we have six zones in the "near map" and one zone in the survey area. Then the invader rolls to see what zone he discovers, and can attack.
Why is it that he is guarenteed to find something his first time out?
Why can't the defender sortie an "approach battle" to prevent the attacker from even getting a chance to roll that die and explore?
Why aren't we using the simultaneous multiple location combat rules (capitol defence procedure) that already exist?
Why doesn't the defender get all salvage for battles in off-map areas? It's not like the attacker is getting freighters and tugs in there.
I'd reccomend the following as an algorithm:
1) Attacker moves fleet into Off-map.
2) Defender declares whether or not ships are moving to pin attacking ships before they can begin their exploration. If so, which ships are doing such reactions.
3) Attacker elects to move unpinned ships into the off-map area to explore/attack known targets, pull them back into the hex they left, to abort the attempt, or leave them there to fight the pinning battle.
4) Defender reserves any reserve fleets.
5) Attacker begins resolving "hexes".
5a) When the "pinning hex" is resolved, combat is as normal, but retreat for the attacker is onto the board, from the hex they entered by.
5b) When the "explore/attack hex" is resolved, the defender uses the capitol defence procedure, using only those areas the attacker has explored. This may (it will at first) mean there is no static force. The attacker then creates his assault fleets against known zones, and any ships not put into any assault fleet is considered to be exploring. The mobile fleet may elect to reinforce the static defences as normal, or engage the exploration fleet. At the end of any round in which the attacker does not retreat, roll 2d6 (adding one per uncrippled ship, one if a prime team is present, and three if at least one scout diamond is present). On a 12+, the attacker has discovered a zone, and rolls 1d6 to see which zone. If an already discovered zone is rolled, the exploration revealed nothing new. If a new zone has been discovered, the defender must re-allocate his vessels using the capitol defence procedure, taking into account the new zone. When/if the attacker finally retreats, retreat is to the "pinning hex", if there is a combat there, or onto the board, from the hex they entered by, if there is not.
Special consequences: all salvage the attacker would normally claim goes instead to the defender [if you don't like that, then such salvage is unclaimed, as per pursuit battles], and if the attacker fails to retreat even a single ship (crippled or uncrippled), all exploration information gleaned this turn is lost.
6) Attacker retrogrades as normal. Defender's vessels are all considered to be all within the same "hex" as all off-board facilities, and thus there is no need for the defender to CEDS retrograde.
7) Life goes on ...