Let loose the dogs of war...

Well, after getting the sensor and counter sensor thing figured out. I have been beating my brain out to figure missiles vs craft and craft vs craft. First may be a little defining of what a craft it.

Craft in Star Blazer are small fighter and bombers that are launched from the ships. They are not piloted, more like drones. Well not drones...golems in the form of a fighter that is at home in space. This way they can be smaller, carry more stuff, and are expendable.

Craft are launched in flights of four, and each bay you add to your ship are able to launch up to three flights before they can no longer control any more. When a flight is destroyed, it takes three rounds to get a new one out of storage or replace lost units. But it is still up for grabs if this will be limited or unlimited.

Any way, missiles can intercept craft as well as other missiles. Guns can also intercept craft and missiles using area effect (flack or burst) ammunition. But missiles can do it from farther out as only small guns can make attacks on these weapons.

this interplay of missile vs missile, missile vs craft, and craft vs craft comes into play and something I need to really consider. Things like the damage a flight can take vs that of a missile...I am pondering if I should say that a flight has a total hit point of the four ships and it is only KO'd when all the HP are gone? Or may be if the flight takes enough to kill one craft that they die. It is a little complex.

Any way I will keep beating on it in my head. At least I am still working on things that are relevant to the role playing game side since this can be applied to other later elements, table top or not.

Working out the kinks...

After a long night I think I have solved at least my first kink in my table top issues. I just had to change how I was thinking about the issue. Something that happens allot when I am writing. I was treating sensors and sensor deception as a different thing then the basic attack. Instead I had to consider they were integral to attacks. May be a little explanation.

Every gun on the ship is rolled as 1D12. Batteries are rolled together against targets. A battery is defined by the officer in charge of the battery. And the batteries roll is enhanced by that officers skill and the skill of of crew. That may sound complicated, but the chain of bonuses is very well defined and simple.

Most weapons have a range increment. Guns add a +1 to their attack rolls per increment, while guided weapons get to reroll to see if they lock on when they reach a range increment. For guns this means that there is an upper limit to how far out they can hit based on the target number they are facing.

To alter this and add extra reach, I have added in a sensor roll. The player can roll sensor dice with successes (every other) adding a circumstance bonus to gunnery rolls. this extends the range of the ship, but can also make hitting smaller targets easier.

To counter this though, as there is always a counter, player can equip Sensor Deception gear on their ships. Sensor Deception (SD) rolls versus the attackers sensor strength. Successes with SD reduce the number of successes from the sensor roll. If all sensor dice are removed, then there is no bonus possible till the next combat round.

This opens a more organized can of worms then I had at the time of the last post. And this can be applied to different areas to. Environments in space can be designed to block visual targeting making the battle closer ranges. Or sensors can be disrupted to to make accuracy at range more random. I will have to keep tweaking this a bit. but in the end it should add a good touch with battles occurring at longer ranges making maneuvering a little more important. Or that is at least the hope.

Missiles, Sensors, and Sensor Deception

It may seam easy, but creating a simple opposed role system for a table top role playing game is not all that easy. The reason is once you start you also see all the things that it can apply to. This is what I have run into with the above three topics as they are essentially linked.

In this case I started with sensors. I wanted a system that would add a bonus to long range attacks to have combat that is beyond a set thresh hold. At the same this this led to the creation of sensor deception.

Sensor deception is an opposed roll to the use of sensor systems. For every success that the SD using targets gets. They reduce the number of successes the attacker with sensors receives. the culmination be that if the sensor tests successes are dropped to zero, the target can not accurately fire on the target.

But the applications of SD became very obvious against missiles also. So this has snow balled into multiple roles of missiles and SD. Because as a volley of missiles travels over rounds, they have a chance to reacquire a target. Thus making this entire thing VERY messy.

But in the end I will get it cleaned up some. I may just nuke the entire thought process...I am not sure yet though. In any case, that is what I am thinking at this moment. Interesting huh?

Whipping out the Mojo, School of Water

The second primal element, water is every where. It is in the air, in the ground, and can be found in even the most desolate places. Water is the destroyer and the life bringer, and while a crushing torrent can destroy and move even the largest of stones. It's power to heal and refresh the body and mind are undeniable.

When my brain cells fail...

Not being able to focus is a pain most days. More so for me when my ADD flares up and I just can not retain a strait line of thought. But I am still thinking and I have notebooks for those odd thoughts. So here is one: how can I make MD:Star Blazers stand out?

I am not really a table top player. I think the breadth of experience I have comes from my kicking my friends tail all across a hex map in BattleTech. So I really do not know what is out there. And really I have no experience with space strategy table top.

But my rules so far lend towards a fast game and I have been keeping the system simple. Plus it is all based on the same roll system as Manifest Destiny. So far people have been telling me that that is a good path. But the question is, how do I break this out from the nice realm into the main stream.

I suppose may be that is just a dream...or I may get it right and whamo, it all works out. Not to sure how it will end up though. Well what ever the case, things will happen as they happen and I can not really do a thing about it.

My son will be in day camp starting next week and so barring him being booted out. I should be able to order my thoughts so that I can start writing more in the role playing game and the table top also. Till Monday...or Sunday if I have a thought and an bored.

Now if only Thunt would update goblins... ;-D

When a wall is in the way...

With kids in the background screaming and getting into things...I have hit a wall in writing the core elements of Manifest Destiny. SO, what I am going to do is take a little side trip into the Table Top rules I have in one of my many notebooks.

I will admit, I am a fan of some games...not because they are good mind you. But because they are different and have a perspective that breaks from the usual formula. Games like Navy Field, Naval Ops: Warship Gunner, and Warship Gunner 2. The idea of being able to build your own ship is something I like. I guess that is why I played Eve Online for two years.

Manifest Destiny: Star Blazers is based in the old world before the time of colonization. Taking place in the age of war that engulfed the player empires and nearly destroyed the universe it's self.

The idea behind this game is that the player can manage a single ship or a fleet of space fairing vessels in to combat. I have looked at different sources and have been talking with people in the field of table top strategy titles and have the basis of a simple system for the game. There are of coarse things to work out because the current system is just about 12 hand written pages. Any way, I think I am going to write a little bit and put what is in my notebook into a document.

Fortunately I am not planning this game to be a two hundred page core book. Probably something allot smaller that can plug into an old world campaign setting. But I must go where my brain takes me. :-)

Resting your head...

Since my post was so small, I thought I would add some more for today. I spent a good portion of the day writing about inns with in Manifest Destiny. Many of the RPGs I have played always used inns and taverns as just a place to eat, sleep, and talk to a contact. But in this rpg, they are more. After the cataclysm, the inn has become the social hub of those towns that survived.

Inns are larger then many are used to. Able to accommodate hundreds of people at a time. They do not have separate rooms as we understand, instead they are more like a military barracks. Especially since the colonization is being done in a military manner.

The in will be the players home. They will sleep there, they will eat there, they will look for work and get to know the locals there. They may even help the inn keeper or find a good night in the arms of a bar maid there. ;-) The inn is the social center of the MD world...and as such deserves the time I put into their descriptions.