Federation Commander

Kang · Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 10:01 pm Post subject:

Don't have my SFB rulebook to hand - don't have a big enough hoist - but don't atmospheres break tractor beams?

If you needed an excuse for being able to stay still in order to lift stuff from a planetary surface, apart from using transporters and shuttles, you could do worse than to use a Space Elevator as per Arthur C. Clarke's idea, also featured in ST-Voyager (I think the episode was called 'Rise' or something). This would mean that the orbiting ship would need to be stationary for sure and the transfer would take more than a scenario's length. It would therefore definitely need to be 'between scenarios'.
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Wolverin61 · Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 10:29 pm Post subject:

Don't know about the rule either, but the big E tractored an F-104 in the atmosphere.
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mjwest · Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 10:41 pm Post subject:

No, atmospheres do not break tractor beams. In fact, you can lower an object down into the atmosphere of a gas giant until the object is destroyed by the lower atmosphere.

Like I said earlier, the main options are to either give a simple procedure that ships can use while Stopped (not 0 or 0+1, but Stopped), or to just ban it in-scenario. It has to be allowed in some way; it doesn't have to be allowed within a scenario.

As for space elevators/beanstalks/whatever, they just don't work in settings with ubiquitous reactionless thrusters. (Much less teleportation machines!) To make beanstalks viable, you need to have pure reaction thrusters and no teleportation. Put in different terms, beanstalks are more efficient and cost effective than, say, the space shuttle and rockets. They are way, way, way less efficient than impulse engines, warp engines, and transporters. So, unless you find a totally isolated planet that is really, really backwards, you aren't going to see any such thing in a "Star Trek" universe.
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Dan Ibekwe · Posted: Tue Feb 15, 2011 11:46 pm Post subject:

Playing devil's advocate, how about a planet with a space elevator in a nebula, where shuttles and transporters won't work?

OK, it might be quicker to land the ship...
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Kang · Posted: Wed Feb 16, 2011 7:14 am Post subject:

Steve Cole · Site Admin Joined: 11 Oct 2006 Posts: 3812

Current theory....

Raising and lowering happens outside of scenarios.

tractoring two docked units means towing both.

tractoring a unit docked to a planet or base just isn't possible.

That may change by this time tomorrow, but for FC, simpler is better.
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Hod K'el · Posted: Fri Feb 25, 2011 9:57 pm Post subject:

Back to the topic...Scenario 8CM50!

When we read over the Scenario, we had a problem with 8CM50D2 due to the Federation not being allowed to fire on the transport using direct-fire weapons, but being able to launch suicide shuttles and missiles at it. These weapons are indiscriminate any will kill randomly, whereas the direct-fire weapons can be targeted by directed fire to take out power systems and stop the freighter before it can accomplish its mission. Would not the Organians have a problem with such random killing?

We also had a problem with 8CM50C Victory conditions. Just landing the colonists and their cargo on the planet is not sufficient since they can be transported off planet via transporters and arrested by Federation personnel. Thus the Klingon cargo, beamed into space, is useless and with the Klingon ’civilians’ incarcerated, how can there be a victory? So how does one claim victory when there is no evidence of a victory; when there is nothing to show for such efforts?

I will admit that it took me three trys as the Federation before I figured out how to beat the scenario as it is written.

Looking at the scenario in a more constructive manner, we firmly believe that the 8CM50C Objective needs more detail and the 8CM50D Special Rules needs better allocution. The 8CM50E Force Dynamics is very good.

We both believe that this scenario would be very interesting if played by Orion verses Klingon as both ships have very sharp turning radii.
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Mike · Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 5:22 am Post subject:

Personnel cannot be beamed without their permission, so Klingon colonists could not be beamed off the planet by Federation ships.

It would seem logical that Klingon cargo on the planet could not beamed off the planet by Federation ships.

If I understand the situation correctly, the goal of the Fed ships is to prevent the Klingon transport from transporting personnel and cargo to the planet. This should take place in space.

My original series of questions and observations that started this thread had to do with the possible Klingon tactic of landing the transport on the planet and transferring personnel and cargo while on the planet. The transport would be fair game for Fed suicide shuttles, but that's where the two Klingon warships come in. They have to survive to protect the transport.

The Fed ships have no drones, so the only weapon they have against the transport are the suicide shuttles. These Fed ships in the Middle Years era of this scenario do not have drones.

The way I see it, both Fed ships should gang up on whichever Klingon warship they can on Turn 1 and mission-kill it. The other Klingon ship will not be strong enough to take on the Feds after that. Then the Feds can concentrate on launching suicide shuttles at the transport. If they can get to a 1-hex range of the transport before it lands on the planet, they can tractor it, pull it away from the planet, and virtually guarantee its mission failure with suicide shuttles at close range. Hit & run raids can also knock out transporters once a suicide shuttle takes a shield down.

If the Klingon transport remains in space and tries to fly within transporter range of the planet to beam cargo and colonists once each Turn, I'm not sure there will be enough time for them to gain enough victory points to win. The Feds start the scenario with +17 victory points because of the point differential.

The Klingons have two very fast warships with thin shields handcuffed to a slower ship with a definite destination. Though the Fed ships are not as maneuverable, they do not need to be.

We're still waiting for some final rulings on those questions before testing out this scenario. They don't want to waste their time trying different tactics if what they try is ruled out.
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Hod K'el · Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 6:28 pm Post subject:

The way I see it, both Fed ships should gang up on whichever Klingon warship they can on Turn 1 and mission-kill it. The other Klingon ship will not be strong enough to take on the Feds after that. Then the Feds can concentrate on launching suicide shuttles at the transport. If they can get to a 1-hex range of the transport before it lands on the planet, they can tractor it, pull it away from the planet, and virtually guarantee its mission failure with suicide shuttles at close range. Hit & run raids can also knock out transporters once a suicide shuttle takes a shield down.

This is exactly the way I finally won the scenario.
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Mike · Posted: Sat Feb 26, 2011 10:39 pm Post subject:

Interesting.

The transport is not able to put up much of a fight. With only one Ph-3 it cannot even destroy a suicide shuttle. My original submission for the scenario used a large armed freighter instead of the troop transport, but I understand that they were switched to showcase the troop transport.

Of course the Klingons aren't going to be sitting around whistling Dixie as those two Fed ships pour gang-fire into one of their ships. They should be doing exactly the same thing back on one of the Fed ships. The difficulty they will have that the Feds won't have is that overloaded disruptors only hit with about half as much damage as overloaded photons. On the following Turn when the Klingon can overload disruptors again, there will probably only be two to fire. The power situation for the E-4 is pretty dicey, too. It has to sacrifice a lot in order to fire both disruptors overloaded.
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terryoc · Captain Joined: 07 Oct 2006 Posts: 1384

The transport is able to move at fleet speeds (24+1) and so should be able to dodge any SS until it is tractored. It can also launch SS of its own, it has 7 shuttles and while it doesn't have much power, even a 1-energy SS will make the phaser-3 shot a guaranteed kill.
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Mike · Posted: Mon Feb 28, 2011 3:20 am Post subject:

The problem for the Klingon is the time factor. Only 10 turns to get enough colonists and cargo to the planet.
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Steve Cole · Site Admin Joined: 11 Oct 2006 Posts: 3812

Rather than repeat the last episode, if one or two of you guys who found so many problems with the Comm 62 scenario wants to email me, I'll send you the Comm 63 scenario and maybe you'll find the missing parts before we publish it?

Just a crazy thought.
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