Federation Commander

Hello All,
Why does an active cloak reduce a Baseline Speed of 24 to a Baseline Speed of 16? Why does it prevent a speed greater than 16 even if the ship is uncloaked (as per 5P3 f )?
Sebastian

Any speed over 16 voids a cloak.

When you cloak it reduces the baseline speed down to 16,
even if you uncloak, the game doesn't allow for changing the baseline speed.
Though you are capable of Accelerating in subsequent impulses.
All actions are calculated on your Baseline Speed.

Your speed won't be 24, but with acceleration you can have impulses at 16+1.

To answer 'why' for 'why does the speed drop', it's because the cloak would not work if the ship was going faster than speed 16.

Likely a game balancing decision. It was probably exhaustively play tested and determined that speed 16 or less was the best.

Thank you gentlemen. All of those are good points. I was, however, hoping for the techno-babble answer. It helps me remember the rule.

It's probably similar to a submarine. You're underwater and hard to detect, but if you go too fast the destroyers can hear you and fire at you.

The cloak is probably the same thing, if you go too fast, the cloak can't hide the warp signature and the enemy can locate you.

Go back to SFB where higher speeds give a die roll shift in favor of the guy trying to find you.

I see. Thank you.
I should spend more time reading the SFB rules.