Federation Commander

pinecone · Posted: Thu May 21, 2009 8:31 pm Post subject:

I wish shuttles had that Ph-3...

Starfury · Lieutenant Commander Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 302

Ken Redington · Ensign Joined: 08 Jun 2009 Posts: 12 Location: Detroit MI

I voted for al the alpha races.

I like the simpler system as SFB got bogged down to 1 day of Bragging, 1 day of photocoping SSD's, 4 hours of first turn set up, and 2 hours to play the first turn. Most games lasted fewer than 5 turns. FC is a lot quicker to set up and play. I also do not miss the tax forms from SFB.

Fighters, adjustable drones, and ecm/eccm overcomplicate the game too much. I still like PF's though just get rid of the special ones or have a squadron counter for them. That way they have to stay together in one hex but you can still check off damage for each boat as it gets hit. Give them a PT flotilla feel.

I do miss my NSM for the Roms though. It fit right in with the first gen ships.

Just had a quick thought. For the PF Squadron have 6 boats for Squadron scale and only 3 for Fleet scale. You get the proper damage/firepower ratio without trying to make 6 half sized PF's.

Dan Ibekwe · Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 1:37 am Post subject:

Ken Redington · Ensign Joined: 08 Jun 2009 Posts: 12 Location: Detroit MI

This is very true.......Hmm...being as it is a single unit maybe it should count as one ship for stacking.

Scoutdad · Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 3:33 pm Post subject:

Mike · Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 4:13 pm Post subject:

I think FC should have explosions. Not exactly like explosions in SFB, but simpler.

Each ship class could have an explosion strength (police size, frigate size, destroyer, light cruiser, heavy cruiser, dreadnought, battleship). Shuttles and fighters would have no explosion strength (puff and they're gone).

The explosion would only affect other objects in the same hex.

The strength of the explosion would be applied to the affected ship's shield facing the ship that exploded.

How complicated is that?

This would help prevent "hex clustering" and make using minis more attractive for some.

(In modern warfare, commanders do not pack their forces into small areas when the threat of artillery bombardment is possible.)

mjwest · Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 6:32 pm Post subject:

The issue with explosions are not that they are complicated. Quite frankly, ship explosions in SFB are pretty simple. The issue with explosions is that you are turning the ship itself into a "weapon of last resort". That is not desired. It is not intended for the explosion of a ship to be a part of the overall strategy.

And the issue of stacking is dealt with by rule (4A3).
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pinecone · Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 8:07 pm Post subject:

Mike · Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 2:52 am Post subject:

Yeah, I know...I know.

I see the point. Stacking is not that big of a deal. And I remember how ships could be intentionally put in positions to explode in SFB to blow up all sorts of other things that were unintended.

Still, though...

Scoutdad · Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 3:04 am Post subject:

Mike: You are correct, explosions would be a simple addition to the current rules...
but waaaay back during the initial development of Fed Comm, Steve made a conscious decision to omit explosions from FC. This was done for several reasons:
1) Simplicity
2) To prevent tactical abuses (I once saw the concentrated fire from a Lyran SB take out a Hydran Hunter and about 75 Stingers at the same time...)
3) To force you to make the most of your ship w/o intentionally blowing it up
4) To keep the rulebook as thin as possible...

With that in mind, I don't think you'll convince Steve to change his original thoughts.
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terryoc · Captain Joined: 07 Oct 2006 Posts: 1386

What should be included in FC? Easy!

Whatever the players of FC are willing to buy in sufficient quantity that it's worth ADB's while to publish it! Wink

I don't mind seeing new empires and technologies. Sure, adding things like Webs, or Cloaks, thickens the rulebook but most battles aren't going to include either and you can learn FC in bite-size pieces.

Gunboats: depends on how they're done. If I have to do energy allocation, even simplified FC allocation, for 3-6 gunboats, yuck. I'd rather take 3 frigates. Same firepower, more capability. Now if gunboats were simplified to be more similar to big fighters, say base speed 24, can decel at will, fire all weapons every turn no energy alloc, but have shields and simple damage allocation, then I could go for that.
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Mike · Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 5:07 pm Post subject:

Scoutdad:

I understand the decision not to include explosions and collateral damage in FC.

I guess there is some precedent for that. When the refitted Enterprise was destroyed in ST:III, the Klingon ship was unharmed and would've been "in the same hex." The same was true of the Romulan War Eagle in TOS's "Balance of Terror" and the Orion raider in "Journey to Babel."

I do remember, however, seeing a couple of ships vaporize when the Borg cube exploded in ST:First Contact.

So, with all those examples from TOS, I'm wondering why explosion damage was ever included in SFB in the first place?

mjwest · Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 7:24 pm Post subject:

Scoutdad · Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 7:30 pm Post subject:

Although in retrospect... Cool

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