Federation Commander

I know the rules say that if a ship preloads its photons at the beginning of the game, its batteries are empty.

If a starbase with multi-turn heavy weapons is going to start with them preloaded, does it have to start the game with all batteries empty? The 12 photons on a Fed starbase would only require 24 points of power to preload, yet the base has 40 batteries.

I would think that a base has good enough sensors to detect an incoming fleet long enough in advance to preload weapons without having to resort to batteries.

I suppose I'll follow up my post with an actual question:

If a Fed Starbase preloads its photons at the start of a game, are its batteries full, empty, or partially empty?

Well...

There's no rule stating anything differently for bases, so yeah the base pre-load rules follow the same rules as for starships. It is something that might be worth making an exception for, but none exist at the moment.

I am bringing this post back from the dead because I was woundering the same thing. Costing more to charge from batterys seams odd to me and as a Base can't not manuver for more time it makes multi turn arming almost more trouble than its worth. a Starbase is supposed to be mean. Any chance some one might rethink is one, or is the idea as dead as this post

Sir Drake wrote:I am bringing this post back from the dead because I was woundering the same thing. Costing more to charge from batterys seams odd to me and as a Base can't not manuver for more time it makes multi turn arming almost more trouble than its worth. a Starbase is supposed to be mean. Any chance some one might rethink is one, or is the idea as dead as this post

Well, as the topic has been idle for quite a long time, it obviously isn't a really big problem that needs a solution. As I raised the initial question, I've considered compiling some 'house' rules to make bases a little rougher to handle. At some point, I might suggest them as part of Borders of Madness. I can send you the ideas I've had along these lines, if you like.

Long idle or not, this one might actually gain a little traction ...

It's a very good point, guys.

Might I propose a rule change to tidy this up?

Apply the preload rule as usual, subject to a maximum battery use of that required to perform the preload.

For the starbase example, then, you can preload all twelve photons for 24 power, leaving 16 points in the batteries.

We could add bits like saying that there's no overloads allowed [same as for ships] - or perhaps you could allow them, subject to available battery power, because a) it's a base and b) the sensors saw 'em coming.

If you say that it's sensors that "saw 'em coming", then people are going to ask why the garrison ships can't have the same (since the base would logically also alert the ships guarding the base at the same time).

Easier to just handwave it if that's the ultimate solution.

My thought is to just special case bases. A base can use the preload ability, but does not lose ANY battery power. Due to its superior sensors, it gets a better warning on what is coming, and can react better.

Note that this only applies to the base, not to any defending ships on the same side as the base. This is only a small difference in timing. There isn't time to both act on it, and tell everyone else about it.

For ships, you get what you get.

junior wrote:If you say that it's sensors that "saw 'em coming", then people are going to ask why the garrison ships can't have the same (since the base would logically also alert the ships guarding the base at the same time).

Good point

mjwest wrote:My thought is to just special case bases. A base can use the preload ability, but does not lose ANY battery power. Due to its superior sensors, it gets a better warning on what is coming, and can react better.

Note that this only applies to the base, not to any defending ships on the same side as the base. This is only a small difference in timing. There isn't time to both act on it, and tell everyone else about it.

For ships, you get what you get.

Sounds good to me. Now, my original question only mentioned photons, but my thoughts are that it should apply to any multi-turn weapons that use battery power to preload before turn 1. Of course, the only one that comes to mind is the hellbore, but I would think that if any others are introduced in the future, this might be a consideration.

It would apply to the photon, hellbore, PPD, and ion cannon. And any other two (or more) arming weapon that contains an analog to (4C2c).

Question: If a base is able to see a attack comming and is able to pre-load its weapons, shouldn't the attacker receive the same benifit?

Unless it was suprised by the base

The "warning" thing is a can of worms. Only way out of that is that everybody (attacker, garrison, base) in the scenario gets prearming without battery use. If you want to go there, ok by me.

I could agree to only using as much power as you need, but to not no power used.

Fair enough, then I recommend the preload just be capped to the maximum amount of energy that would be spent. So, if a ship has two photons, it would have a maximum of four batteries empty. If a ship has three hellbores, it would have a maximum of nine batteries empty.

This should then apply to any unit, not just bases.