 March 11, 2009 - 7:44pm | Before I begin my question I have already come up with some answers, but I am interested in what other people think. My question is, How do assault carriers recover their fighters? I have discussed this at length with my wife who has a degree in nuclear engineering and is my science go-to girl and we have tossed around a few ideas. The main one is that if one is to stay true to the canon Knight Hawks rules, the recovery of fighters is a difficult concept, especially with the way ships are designed in regards to providing gravity. I don't think there is a right or wrong answer to this because it is science FICTION, but I am greatly interested in what others think. Take care C.J. |
 March 22, 2009 - 5:05am | Bugger, and all this time I've allowed fighters and scouts to evade any projectile weaponry (and thus my whole debate falls apart from there). Okay, then...that's a new house rule of mine LOL |
 March 22, 2009 - 2:07pm | And it's a great house rule. Personally I think you should be able to evade the other rocket powered weapons (RB, AR, SM) as well as torpedos, it's just not in the canon rules. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
 March 22, 2009 - 3:22pm | No too sure about that, Terlo... That would power up the fighters and Assault Scouts rather dramatically. In the context of SW2, this would help the UPF, big time, since they have over 30 Assault Scouts (including militia). If you limited the ballistic evasion to strictly fighters, then the boost goes slightly to the Sathar (25 vs 16 UPF fighters). I would be willing to playtest it... |
March 22, 2009 - 6:58pm | True, from a game balance perspective it may not work with the current mix. However, I was speaking more from a pure physics point of view. The other rocket weapons (with the possible exception of the SM) are all moving at about the same speed. They all cover 3 or 4 hexes in a turn, so from the point of view of speed of weapon vs maneuverability of target the mechanics are about the same. From a campaign perspective, the Assault Scout was supposed to be this great new ship that the Sathar had no match for, hence the grand larceny attempt in the Warriors of White Light module. The ability to dodge the torpedos and rocket batteries of the destroyers that are the workhorse of the Sathar fleet would be something they'd be worried about. I agree from the point of view of balance in the SWII board game it may not work (needs to be tested), but from the campaign perspective it fuels the "awesomeness" of the Assault Scout that give the Sathar nightmares and helps explain why there are so many of them around. (I've got to get my game working so I can try out all these rule variations. so much to do, so little times. /me goes off to do some more coding...  )Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 23, 2009 - 4:50am | There's a lot about the SW2 that needs to be maintained for balance, but outside that game any house rule should be right as rain. The SW2 progression even suggests which percentages should be used for hit determination depending on the scale of the battle...smaller skirmishes are suggested to use skill modifiers and the damage table while larger battles suggest simply using the unshaded percentages and hull damage only...thus on the larger scale battles a LVL:1 fighter pilot blasting away with assault rockets has the same base chance to hit as a battleship's LVL:6 pilot with a disruptor cannon LOL |
 March 23, 2009 - 12:17pm | Who would waste a torpedo on a fighter or assault scout? In every age, in every place, the deeds of men remain the same. |
March 23, 2009 - 12:17pm | There's a lot about the SW2 that needs to be maintained for balance, but outside that game any house rule should be right as rain. The SW2 progression even suggests which percentages should be used for hit determination depending on the scale of the battle...smaller skirmishes are suggested to use skill modifiers and the damage table while larger battles suggest simply using the unshaded percentages and hull damage only...thus on the larger scale battles a LVL:1 fighter pilot blasting away with assault rockets has the same base chance to hit as a battleship's LVL:6 pilot with a disruptor cannon LOL Yeah, I have never liked that rule, and never used it. With the two campaigns of SWII that I have played, including the current one, we play with no ship skills, and full damage table (the "middle" option) regardless of the number of ships involved. This gives the best amount of realism and game balance. The whole idea of reverting to the basic rules, or tediously calculating gunnery bonuses, gives me a headache. Plus, the skill level thing gives a boost to the UPF, which is a serious game balance issue. Rolling on the Damage Table is not a big deal - in fact it is fun. Lighting ships on fire, or blasting all of their MR so that they cruise in a straight line is quite enjoyable, especially when it is your enemy's ships that are suffering! There is an additional record keeping factor, granted, but that's ok. |
 March 24, 2009 - 12:09pm | Who would waste a torpedo on a fighter or assault scout? Is it truly a waste if it takes out a weapon platform? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 24, 2009 - 6:31pm | Who would waste a torpedo on a fighter or assault scout? Is it truly a waste if it takes out a weapon platform? Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 24, 2009 - 6:40pm | Every situation has its circumstances. A lone sathar destroyer being attacked by a militia assault scout and frigate would probably want to reserve it's pair of torpedoes for the frigate, but say for instance said destroyer lost the laser or electron battery and the scout is harrassing it from behind at 4 hexes out...if the destroyer is in its offensive phase and can only bring the remaining energy gun to bear (as the laser cannon is facing the wrong way and the rocket battery is out of range), obviously that one gun won't be capable of destroying it so "Fire in the hole" certainly applies, or suffer the wrath of another inbound assault rocket later. |
March 25, 2009 - 1:06pm | Every situation has its circumstances. A lone sathar destroyer being attacked by a militia assault scout and frigate would probably want to reserve it's pair of torpedoes for the frigate, but say for instance said destroyer lost the laser or electron battery and the scout is harrassing it from behind at 4 hexes out...if the destroyer is in its offensive phase and can only bring the remaining energy gun to bear (as the laser cannon is facing the wrong way and the rocket battery is out of range), obviously that one gun won't be capable of destroying it so "Fire in the hole" certainly applies, or suffer the wrath of another inbound assault rocket later. You're talking a last ditch plan. It such a situation the destroyer would turn to face the militia frigate to bring it's laser cannon and torpedos to bear on the frigate first. The laser battery and as a destroyer the electron battery would begin counter fire against the assault scout. If those weapon systems were down, then the destroyer has already seen battle and is damaged. Good chance the torpedos have already been expended on a juicy target of some kind. In every age, in every place, the deeds of men remain the same. |
 March 25, 2009 - 6:07pm | Back to the original question, though this has been an enjoyable hijacking, I agree with the automation. The fighter lands on the Carrier, which can only be moving in a straight line, and gets into a channel like at an automated car wash. It is pulled through and automatically armed, then dropped off at the launch platform. As far as fighters evading rockets I kind of disagree. I haven't played in ages, and I don't remember the MR of a fighter or scout vs that of an assault rocket, but in modern air combat the only way to avoid a missile is to turn inside of it. Therefore you are limited by the G load that a person can absorb. A missile has no such limitation and should easily be able to out maneuver a manned fighter. I agree that drones should be the way to go. They wouldn't have the G limitation, they would be cheaper and smaller too. Then you would have a whole bank of operators remotely piloting them from inside the assault carrier. |
 March 25, 2009 - 9:53pm | Oghma: You're presuming atmospheric movement. You're also wrong. You don't have to turn tighter than it, you can also make your signature disappear into something else. In genuine 3D, it's amazingly hard to vector a missile in; that's why a CPU on board does so... most misses occur in closing engagements; if you veer at the right moment, a close miss can be made... but if the missile hits... Without friction, missiles and ships react identically to each other if the thrust is the same # of G's. Again, closing will be the big issue, but unlike air-to-air, there is no friction to grab. Missiles thus have a much harder time rotating, since most of their thust is forward-only. Their radial turn rates are likely much lower, and thus their ability to course correct is lower, and hits are secured by the ability to course correct. In Air to Air, 80-95% of the missile's turning is the vanes, not the engine. In space, it's 100% engine, but that engine has to both turn and thrust, and any thrust in wrong directions reduces chances of hit. It's also about 3 orders of magnitude harder to code the guidance package. |
March 26, 2009 - 1:16am | You're talking a last ditch plan. Well, yeah...the question posed was "who would waste a torpedo on a fighter or assault scout?" There's one such situation. Note how I started the scenario by saying the destroyer would "probably want to reserve it's pair of torpedoes for the frigate", yet in the course of unpredictable combat it finds itself only in range of a harassing assault scout and with a choice of firing the sole funcitoning weapon that won't destroy it even if it hits (d10 damage versus 15 hull points) or firing said one weapon in conjunction with another that will destroy it. Save that torpedo for the other ship later, and that assault scout survives to attack you again. Change the scenario to a sathar frigate with no damage, the same thing goes: it only has one LB and one RB...if the RB is out of range and the cannon doesn't line up, once again you either fire the LB and let the scout live to attack or fire the LB in conjunction with a torpedo. Even if the torpedo misses, the scout wastes its entire MR by evading in the next movement phase and most likely will not be able to acquire the sathar ship, permitting said sathar ship a better chance at acquiring the capital ship. In the end, that sathar ship is far from home and optimally would want to fire those torpedoes at the capital ship. But they'll be even farther from home if they lose their ship. Wasting is a matter of interpretation, but the last ship moving under its own power wins... As far as evading torpedoes and rockets goes --- a torpedo is a homing projectile, the rockets are free flight and depend on their velocity to hit their targets. If a vessel can evade a homing projectile, as the rules clearly state that they can, it should definitely be capable of evading a free flight rocket. |
March 27, 2009 - 4:05pm | I don't remember your background, I know you have some solid technical knowledge, but I'm a military pilot and I have a clue. Yes, you can fool a missile's guidance system with flares, or hiding your signature in some other way. But if that was mentioned in the conversation before then I missed it. If we are going to introduce new tech into the argument, then we need to consider proximity fuses, something used commonly today, where all the missile has to do is get close, then it explodes causing damage with shrapnel and explosive force. This would be accounted for by the low end of the damage roll. This tech would make last second veers significantly less effective. A missile in space would obviously have to be turned with vectored thrust. It probably wouldn't have vanes because they's be useless extra mass. And, as you point out, a ship would have to be vectored the same way. Turning radiuses for each one would probably be significantly tighter because they don't have to consider atmospheric resistance, only monemtum. Your own argument seems to work against you. A missile with significantly less mass than a manned fighter would be able to turn tighter because it has less mass and therefore less momentum to change. It would still be more maneuverable than the fighter. Now we can argue advancements that make pilots more G resistant. Or that Dralisites are not G susceptible because they can put their brains in their butts if they want. The limitation is still how many G's the human can pull vs how many G's the machine can pull. The human loses every time. In the absence of a means to spoof the guidance, or hide your signature, (which weren't part of the discussion before which is the reason I didn't mention them) you either have to out run it, turn inside of it, or be smarter than it's guidance system. When you consider the level of robotics advancement in the frontier, a missile with AI would be orders of magintude more advanced than anything we know today, not to mention able to react significantly faster than a human. There would certainly be tactics for defeating it, but ultimately you still have to outmaneuver it or out run it. Even A last second veer is still out maneuvering it and subject to the G limitation of the pilot. |
March 27, 2009 - 5:37pm | Putting it that way Oghma we don't know what the turn of a torpedo is, as unlike a seeker missile they don't have an ADF or MR factor to bring up. A torpedo just moves slower than assault rockets and a limited ranges of 4 hexes. And the rules do allow for fighters and assault scouts to try and evade torpedos, the MR of the evading ship is multiplied by 5% and the result is subtracted from the torpedo's percent chance. So a torpedo already has a 70% chance, and assault scout's MR 4 x 5% = 20% so 50% for assault scouts and 55% for fighters. Looking back through the rules is says nothing about assault rockets or rocket batteries after all. But I think most people here thinks it should. In every age, in every place, the deeds of men remain the same. |
March 27, 2009 - 7:05pm | In real life, space movement is vastly different from the way it is represented in the KH board game (see the vector movement article in the new Star Frontiersman magazine). The KH rules treat the ships like planes or boats, not like spacecraft
in that there is some sort of medium that allows them to translated
their velocity in one direction into motion in another direction. In reality, the MR rating is meaningless and turning is a function of the thrust to mass ratio of the object only since to turn you have to stop your motion in one direction and apply it in another. As Oghma said, the missile will almost always win this one in a real life as you have to deal with only mechanical stresses and not biological ones. It's actually a bit of a conundrum. If the rockets are free flying (i.e. boost quick and then fly straight), unless they have a massive warhead they'll never hit you. Once they end their boost phase, you just calculate their trajectory and thrust perpendicular to that vector to get out of the way. The question then becomes how big of an change can you make in your own vector (depends on your thrust i.e. ADF) and how big the warhead is. A direct hit is impossible in this case unless you don't maneuver. (I can work out how far off track you can get in a turn and post if there is interest). If the rockets can maneuver the entire time up to impact, and have any sort of a decent guidance system, they practically can't miss. They will always be able to out manuever you and can compensate for any vector change you make (The rocket's/missile's ADF is guaranteed to be higher than yours). You might be able to throw off a direct hit but it will be close enough that it really doesn't matter. If it has a high ADF but limited fuel (like the torpedos and SM in Art's KH Vector rules), you have to try to out run it. But again it's amost guaranteed to get close enough to detonate unless you have a speed advantage when it is launched at you. Of course in all of the above, you may have methods to decoy/blind/destroy the missile before it hits you. Just as food for thought, think about this. An Assault Rocket, according to the rules, takes up 10 cubic meters. If you talk about a cylinder 1 m (3 ft 3inches) in diameter, that cylinder is 12.7m (41.5 feet) long. That's about the same length but half the diameter of the V-2 rocket. That's a big rocket. The Torpedo and seeker missiles are even bigger. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
 March 27, 2009 - 10:12pm | Ohgama, is it possible for a fighter to shoot down a rocket, or was that just BS Bellisario made up for JAG? "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
March 28, 2009 - 3:58am | I haven't seen that episode of JAG, but I would say that the odds are pretty low in a modern situation. Air to air missile range in speed from Mach 2.5 to Mach 4.5 plus the speed of the fighter that launched it. Then you haved to take into account the small size of the weapon as well. So I would think that in order to shoot one down, you would have to start with a vector similar to that of the weapon just to have a chance of seeing it long enough to shoot. Coming from the side you could attempt to put a barrage in front of it and wait for it to fly into it I suppose. From the front, the cross section is so small, and the time window so short, that extreme luck would have to be on your side. Now for a capital ship that is a different story. Carriers have radar guided guns that spit out something like 3000 rounds a minute basically spewing such a dense line of projectiles that the spray them in front of an incoming missile, such as an Exocet, and wait for the missile to fly into the spray. For Star Frontiers, I would think than a low yield laser battery would be really good for missile defense if such a thing were to be created. For a fighter in Star Frontiers, small rail gun aimed by a computer would be a neat idea. The projectile wouldn't have to be very large to knock down a missile. |
March 28, 2009 - 5:55am | extreme luck would have to be on your side. I say no to the example but sometimes people get lucky- I have an uncle who caught a fish by hooking the eye of a hook caught in the fish's mounth-wouldn't think its possible but it happened. When something is so unusual and unlikely I think its best to only include it in a game by GM choice (when a phenominally lucky roll comes up) and never by actuall mechanic that the players can invoke anytime they want. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 28, 2009 - 8:57am | I haven't seen that episode of JAG, but I would say that the odds are pretty low in a modern situation. Air to air missile range in speed from Mach 2.5 to Mach 4.5 plus the speed of the fighter that launched it. Then you haved to take into account the small size of the weapon as well. So I would think that in order to shoot one down, you would have to start with a vector similar to that of the weapon just to have a chance of seeing it long enough to shoot. Coming from the side you could attempt to put a barrage in front of it and wait for it to fly into it I suppose. From the front, the cross section is so small, and the time window so short, that extreme luck would have to be on your side. It was the last episode of one of the final seasons(the one where Bud's leg got blown off). In that season's story arc, the third in command of al-Qaeda bought an old Russian boomer, complete with its old Russian crew, and somehow acquired an SS-N 12(?) I think. In the course of being pursued by the LA-class sub Watertown, the terrorist and the Russian crew got radiation poisoning and started dropping like flies, just as torps from the Watertown hit the sub. The terrorist, in a last "dying" act, launches the bird, aimed dead at the carrier Seahawk, giving Harm an excuse to strap on an F-14 shaped dildo and chase the missile down, shooting it down with a Phoenix missile(or was it a Sidewinder?) just short of the carrier, to the cheers of everyone watching on the Seahawk's bridge. That said, I kinda figured that would be impossible to pull off in RL, since even old Soviet missiles fly faster than an F-14 at max burn, but it would be easy meat for a Phalanx or Goalkeeper system on board an SuW platform—easier still since the SS-Ns 12-14 aren't seaskimming missiles—meaning there won't be one-missile kills of an Eliat or a Sheffield unless lots of vampires are launched to roll back the CIWS. That being said, this brings us back to another debate: Given the existence of guided missiles, and drones which can carry guided missiles(and cannon), has the carrier simply outlived its usefulness, or will there yet be room for manned fighters? Me, I can see both schools of thought. "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
March 28, 2009 - 12:41pm | Maned fighters will always have a place... not necesarily that of the queen of battle, tho. The computational issues of realistic space combat make humans as direct operators less and less efficient. But fundamentally, the need for human oversight on decisions to engage will remain. A human is ulikely to guide a missile in space to any kind of combat effective use; current missile guidance regimes are "acquire target, then keep target in center of sensor field until detonation range reached". 0-G guidance is "acquire target, then identify target probable location, then move to be there hen they get there, then put warhead into firing position and fire when at detonation range". Quite literally, missile guidance for AAM can be done with analog ciruitry for RGMs and IRGMs, and air-to-air engagment is the same basic calculations. The calculations for space combat are integral calculus, and computers are the likely tactical handlers. Realisitc space engagements will likely be "program the battle computer and then sit back and hope you survive the pass." That doesn't, however, make for a good game. The role of fighters in such an environment is as a computing resource for remote defense using lots of drones; more AWACS than F-15. The combat drones then do the majority of the fighting, based upon data integrated on the "fighter"... as a coordination and engagement decision point. Hopefully, the "fighter" screen ID's threat's, and is able to engage before the carrier and it's escorted valuables get targeted... It is far more fun, however, to actually let combat skills exist and matter, and in such a case, the ability to force project and to save the costs of the long-term LS needs of the crew makes fighters a viable option. See, if the fight is going badly, the carrier should leave... with or without fighter recovery... to save as much of the crew and hardware as practical. Direct combattant ships, however, put all the techs and all the quarters into the fight. |
March 28, 2009 - 2:36pm | An Assault Rocket, according to the rules, takes up 10 cubic meters. If you talk about a cylinder 1 m (3 ft 3inches) in diameter, that cylinder is 12.7m (41.5 feet) long. That's about the same length but half the diameter of the V-2 rocket. That's a big rocket. It's also bigger than the 10x2 fighter that mounts three of them LOL |
March 29, 2009 - 6:49am | I think Aramis is pretty much correct. Manned fighter combat is probably going the way of the armored knight. But that doesn't make for a very fun game. There isn't much romance in a bunch of robots slugging it out. I also think he's right about needing a sentient mind to make the firing decisions, whether that's by programming them ahead of time, or pressing the red button. The ethical dilemnas involved in allowing a machine to make the kill decisions are pretty deep. One concept that's being worked on right now is having a manned fighter serve as the controller for a flock of drones. That still holds some pretty intersting gaming possibilities. |
March 29, 2009 - 7:59am | I think Aramis is pretty much correct. Manned fighter combat is probably going the way of the armored knight. But that doesn't make for a very fun game. There isn't much romance in a bunch of robots slugging it out. I also think he's right about needing a sentient mind to make the firing decisions, whether that's by programming them ahead of time, or pressing the red button. The ethical dilemnas involved in allowing a machine to make the kill decisions are pretty deep. One concept that's being worked on right now is having a manned fighter serve as the controller for a flock of drones. That still holds some pretty intersting gaming possibilities. Another option is the basic robotic drone and tele presence where an operator is safe in a command center and they upload their mind into the drone to take control- drone gets killed no prob upload to another. EDit: Robotic drones could also come with nukes and once their ordinance is spent they just keep boring in and...... sound satharish I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 29, 2009 - 8:49am | Another option is the basic robotic drone and tele presence where an operator is safe in a command center and they upload their mind into the drone to take control- drone gets killed no prob upload to another. EDit: Robotic drones could also come with nukes and once their ordinance is spent they just keep boring in and...... sound satharish This was touched upon in an episode of Sliders. The only problem, especially if the drones are one-shot devices, would be the psychic feedback resulting from being jacked into drone after drone when they "die." This could lead to something akin to amputation trauma at best, and, at worst, to cyberpsychosis(see the Cyberpunk RPG), where jacked-in operators spend so much time with the minds in the 'face that they lose any point of contact with humanity, especially after "dying" multiple times in the course of a mission, until they either exhibit violentlly psychopathic and/or sociopathic behavior, or they simply shut down from the increasing diassociation from the rest of the human race. In Piers' Antony's Bio Of a Space Tyrant series, space navies used carriers which employed remotely-controlled armed drones instead of manned fightercraft, Hope Hubris(the series' protagonist)actually running a drone by remote during the course of routine mopping-up ops. I think Aramis is pretty much correct. Manned fighter combat is probably going the way of the armored knight. But that doesn't make for a very fun game. There isn't much romance in a bunch of robots slugging it out. I also think he's right about needing a sentient mind to make the firing decisions, whether that's by programming them ahead of time, or pressing the red button. The ethical dilemnas involved in allowing a machine to make the kill decisions are pretty deep. One concept that's being worked on right now is having a manned fighter serve as the controller for a flock of drones. That still holds some pretty intersting gaming possibilities. Manned fighter combat will go the way of the armored knight, in that it will change form, rather than become extinct. Just as knights gave way to horse cavalry which, in turn, yielded their place on the battlefield to the tank(which now share the cavalry role with FAVs, armed HMMVs, Strykers, and, of course, helos), fighters have evolved from gentleman flyers banging away at each other with sidearms and rifles, to fast gun platforms, to faster gun and missile platforms, and will continue evolving into gun, missile and drone platforms, the drones serving as a force multiplier, allowing a single fightercraft to engage multiple ground, air and space targets. It will retain guns and missiles of its own for independent long-range strike capability, and because someone will always get the idea of incapcitating the drones by taking out the controlling ship, however effective or ineffective that might be. (And, of course, there are those hardcase who just simply want to kill something alive. So it goes) "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
March 29, 2009 - 8:01pm | The issue with tele-presence in terms of fighter drones is that, axiomatically, fighters are range extensions... And at the kinds of time, accelerations, and distances in SFKH, that means BAD comm lags. For combat, 0.1s lag is enough to make a huge difference. Hit and miss kind of difference. |
March 30, 2009 - 12:27pm | All of this discussion of physics and reality is fun for the whole family, but let's not forget play balance here... I guess one's bias stems from how they want the game to flow. If you want a wargame with lots of little dudes flitting around and blasting away at the big ships with fancy manuevers, then you might want to apply the Evasion rule to all ballistic weapons systems. If you favor a game with stacks of big ships blasting each other to bits, then you probably want to leave the rules as is. (I am somewhat in this camp, though not with any particular passion...) That said, in my experience there have been relatively few Assault Rocket or Rocket Battery shots at fighters and Assault Scouts. As I said earlier, especially in the big battles, the Assault Rockets are usually fired at big ships, hoping for that loverly double damage result (19 or less) on the damage table. That's where fighters and Assault Scouts can bring The Pain. Larry almost cut one of my Light Crusiers in half with such a lucky hit! Pure dogfights are quite rare in Knight Hawks - there are almost always lots of other ships and stations floating around. Assault Scouts and fighters tend to suffer from beams - especially Laser Batteries. I like to fire my Laser Cannons (not Disruptors - the +20 on the Damage Table is much more fun on a big ship) at the lil ones too. "Moving to Rocket Battery Range" is a whole tactical decision in and of itself. It requires brass balls, as you will INSTANTLY get hit with a fusillade of Rocket Battery Defensive Fire as soon as you close to 3 hexes of range. ICMs are pretty much useless, and you wind up with a deadly duel at 40% chance to hit - with the defender getting first licks. Myself, I have a series of criteria that must be met before I expose my ships to that amount of Defensive Fire (I'll just leave it at that.) So, with that in mind, the fighters and Assault Scouts being able to Evade rocket battery fire might not be that bad. Tough to say. |
March 30, 2009 - 3:16pm | Rocket Battery Defensive Fire? I thought RBs were an MPO weapon system.... "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
March 30, 2009 - 3:23pm | Rocket Battery Defensive Fire? I thought RBs were an MPO weapon system.... No, Assault Rockets and Torpedoes are, but RBs are not MPO... |
