FC: War And Peace - Andromedan vs Federation play test repor

[Kang]

Remember that Steve only showed some of the rules. He can't show all of it, because he wants you to buy the module!

Speaking for myself I'll be buying it whether the rules are all here or not.

Same here. Can't wait; the time lag for them arriving here in the UK is about 1-2 weeks after release in the US. I'd consider ordering them direct but the manager of my FLGS (25 miles away in Exeter!) is a personal friend so I'm giving him the trade.

I sort of assumed we were only seeing a smattering rules.

Yeah. Like someone has mentioned using 1/2 a power point to run the PA panels, and I haven't seen that in Steve's rules here; even so, what we have seen is elegant.

Steve, if that was a marketing ploy then it hasn't worked on me <joking>; I would have bought it anyway. This is a module I have been looking forward to for a long time!

[terryoc]

All this teasing is making me drool for W&P!

Sing with me now... "Alllll we are saaaaying.... is give war and peace a chance...!"

[DirkSJ]

Boarding actions.

My bet is each ships H&Rs are fully resolved before any PA panels pop. Then PA panels pop. Then other ships H&R goes. Just like how direct fire from each ship is dealt with separately.

You have X transporter bays, they area all actually transporting over, sabotaging, and transporting back at the same time. So it makes sense to handle the PA popping damage afterward as each raid is actually simultaneous and the popping is also thus simultaneous.

I doubt you can specifically target full panels vs empty ones.

Emergency Decel

Ha! Nice catch. I like your idea they get half their move cost back (the "reinforce energy") directly into panels of their choice. Excess wasted to space. It's a minor downside to the big upside that they can waste so much energy in accel/decel.

Displacement

I would think these would follow all the same guidelines for tractors pushing people around as really it ends up being similar. Same for lock on to cloaked ships.

Yeah. Like someone has mentioned using 1/2 a power point to run the PA panels, and I haven't seen that in Steve's rules here; even so, what we have seen is elegant.

In one of the first posts it says each bank has operating costs equal to half the number of panels in the bank. It's 3-4 pages back.

[storeylf]

I doubt you can specifically target full panels vs empty ones.

No I was assuminig that you can't as it sounds like the energy is across a bank not in an individual PA (the 1 bank bit mentioned earlier), however, if the bank is full or nearly full then you need to handle the cascade effect during boarding (and any side effects like killing other marines still to resolve?). Also it potentially makes a huge difference to having 2 separate volleys or 1 bigger volley, especially once skips start factoring into damage.

[Krellex]

Wait, so can a hostile boarding party beam in when there are non destroyed PA panels (even if they are "full") between the Andro and the hostile ship?

[storeylf]

Wait, so can a hostile boarding party beam in when there are non destroyed PA panels (even if they are "full") between the Andro and the hostile ship?

From what has been said so far - No. Only if the bank is 'deactivated'.

Actually re-reading that, it also depends on what direction you are talking about, It sounds like andro boarders can beam in across the PA panels onto the hostile ship, being unaffected by there own tech.

[Krellex]

Oh, so like if I turn off the forward panels to force the power into the rear bank/batteries. Which would be pretty good incentive to the Andro to *not* do that in transporter range of an enemy ship...

[mjwest]

[NOTE: I have heavily edited the post below. Please reread!]

The questions below are very good. Thank you for asking.

Andro with a full bank of PA and the other side deactivated. I get to H&R, I aim 3 boarding parties at full PA bank.

- I assume that each panel is targetable, and the '1 bank' thing doesn't mean only 1 H&R can attack it?

I roll for first boarding party and it kills the PA.

- what now?

Each box is individually targetable, but that doesn't matter, as individual panels do not hold energy. The bank as a whole holds the energy.

Each panel will be an individual volley.

- If we resolve panel cascade before some other marines (from the same ship or other wise) and damage is done to a system that a H&R is still to resolve what happens? Does the marine die, does he escape, does he roll as normal to survive, does he get to target something else?

Actually, that is a hole in the existing (5F) rules. That will have to be addressed outside W&P. I think the best bet is to say that the second marine still has to roll, so in effect it is merely rolling for its survival at that point.

Obvioulsy there is no shield reinforcment to use energy on, does an Andro just ignore the the energy that you'd get for ED, or does he have to dump it in batteries/PA (which sort of appeals to me )

I will ask. I will recommend that the energy just be lost. The object is not to screw the Andro every possible way. Since this is not a situation where the Andro is trying to take advantage of something, there is no real reason to make it nastier than it needs to be. Losing the energy should be enough.

- If I displace a unit, and it ends up off the map (I have no idea how far etc these things can throw someone) is the ship considered disengaged/defeated/victorious per scenario rules or does he stop at the edge of the map?

Placed on map edge. This is covered.

- 4A4 mods don't cover cloaks, are they protected from displacement in any way?

Cloaked units are explicitly immune from displacement.

[mjwest]

Oh, so like if I turn off the forward panels to force the power into the rear bank/batteries. Which would be pretty good incentive to the Andro to *not* do that in transporter range of an enemy ship...

Correct.

Full PA panels facing the transporting ship will stop transporter attempts against it. PA panels must be completely dropped before transporters can work into the Andromedan ship.

So, yes, if an Andromedan ship wants to drop its panels, it had better have no enemies in arc, or be outside transporter range. But, don't forget that if you drop a PA bank facing enemy ships, raids may be your least worry, as you will be totally open to internal damage from enemy fire.

Honestly, while these are good questions, I figure that raids against an Andromedan ship are going to be extremely rare.

[storeylf]

I imagine the released energy that does resolve to internals will be individual volleys all around. That is probably the easiest way to do it. I will ask, though.

Personally I'd see it easier to have one big volley rather than resolve lots ( or a couple at any rate) volleys, especially if there are stil unresolved H&R attacks stacked up ready to do after, but its a minor point. However, the main reason for asking is, that once you get to having skips during damage allocation it can make a huge difference to what damage is done. 2 10 point volleys could both skip a couple of boxes and get individual rolls for the what the next DAC row is, scoring on first 2 columns twice over with skips. Whereas 1 big volley would only get 1 extra roll for the skips, just advancing further down that row to the 4 column.



[edit] I see you have already modified the bit I quoted from you.

Can you clarify the order though. Does the PA panel cascade resolve before moving on to the next marine, or do you resolve all marines and then do each panel separate (obvioulsy it affects whether a system targeted by a marine can be taken during panel cascade damage, or whether the marine gets it and the andro needs to destroy another of that system (or skip, etc). I suppose an easy way of looking at it - is the entire H&R raid from 1 ship (or even all ships?) a 'volley', or is each marine a 'volley'.

[mjwest]

I imagine the released energy that does resolve to internals will be individual volleys all around. That is probably the easiest way to do it. I will ask, though.

Personally I'd see it easier to have one big volley rather than resolve lots ( or a couple at any rate) volleys, especially if there are stil unresolved H&R attacks stacked up ready to do after, but its a minor point. However, the main reason for asking is, that once you get to having skips during damage allocation it can make a huge difference to what damage is done. 2 10 point volleys could both skip a couple of boxes and get individual rolls for the what the next DAC row is, scoring on first 2 columns twice over with skips. Whereas 1 big volley would only get 1 extra roll for the skips, just advancing further down that row to the 4 column.

The thing is that the rules are built to make it individual volleys. Leaving it that way will make things much more seamless with the PA rules.

[storeylf]

The thing is that the rules are built to make it individual volleys. Leaving it that way will make things much more seamless with the PA rules.

Aye - its minor point. I was mainly interested in which way for damage allocation purposes rather than ease. However, can you check my edit to my above post, thanks.

[Scoutdad]

We eventually did have some cascading failures in our play testing. It really isn't that difficult to roll them as separate 10 point volleys and it really doesn't take that long to go through them either.

[Scoutdad]

Actually re-reading that, it also depends on what direction you are talking about, It sounds like andro boarders can beam in across the PA panels onto the hostile ship, being unaffected by there own tech.

That is correct. Andromedans can beam out through their own PA Panels (and back into the ship as their "raiders" are recovered).

[mjwest]

I suppose an easy way of looking at it - is the entire H&R raid from 1 ship (or even all ships?) a 'volley', or is each marine a 'volley'.

Any energy released by a disabled panel becomes its own volley.

I would resolve the H&R raids first, then start working through the released volleys. However, I will have to check.