GCWIII -- New Combat Model? Let's Mock!

[Ramano]

Ahh, I was unaware that was decided on. However, I dont see how X-Wing would apply as its based on single fighter combat. Im hoping we are going a bit bigger in scale then that lol. As far as Armada, this is the first ive ever heard of it so I dont know what you mean with that.

[SWSF Hale]

Some Old & New Ideas From This Thread, Revisited & Summarized

1. Phase-driven combat (Deploy/Damage, Maneuver, Battle, Repeat) on a hexgrid.

2. Using dice rolls to randomly initiate pre-scripted events for a particular campaign (i.e. event: "small gang war" at location: "compton")

3. Master Character + NPC Team. Characters will have RPG-flavored classes and attributes. The bigger/better and more badass an NPC is, the more Influence it requires your MC to wield (i.e. how Tarkin was able "to hold Vader's leash" as Leia put it).

4. Small scale space combat (ISD & Friends at the very most, ISD being a rare event).

5. Seswenna Sector overall (not only for story purposes, but so players can have their own little base somewhere), but action will mainly consist between individual systems for a length of time. The game will revolve around either the Rebel Alliance or Galactic Empire accruing a cumulative amount of Influence before the Sector is handed over.

6. Influence Points. Command Points. Emplacement Points. Experience Points.

 

[SWSF Eidolon]

  Mostly all sound good.

   I think combat would be drastically simplified however if we aren't using every specific weapon emplacement.  Not sure if that was the intent, but looking at the CRV mods that was what I assumed from the listings.

  I think more of a comprehensive presentation of the abilities of a unit would better serve us.  Even to the point that Attacking may not even happen every Round, depending on what a ship/player wants to do.  Though Attacking may need to be separate from Actions even for Order of Battle/Phases.

  My thought (probably same as usual) is we give units an Action Potential (AP) rating.   Then for specs we simply list the actions it is capable of with descriptions.  So when it comes to unique abilities for a unit, it would be written as an ability directly in the spec.  Then all occurences in a battle are easily regulated with the same flow dynamic. . how much AP do they cost to execute and how much AP do you have to use?  This also helps with rule digging.  Rules tend to be written directly in to specs with what an Action Constitutes and How it's used directly in the spec for the ship.


   I have a drywall repair going on at house today but this evening will try to deliver a little quick example system of it with a couple exchanges between two ships.



   Addressing an order of battle/phases.  I totally think it's the way to go and a great shake up.  Rather than the old system of a player moves attacks and actions all in same post/turn, we make it phases for both players.  Basic order idea. . .


Beginning of Battle

    Deployment
  Player 1 deploys a unit
  Player 2 deploys a unit
  They cylce back and forth until all units for a battle are deployed


Round 1

    Movement
   Player 1 chooses a unit to move, moves it and commits to actions (presuming attacking is not part of AP in this case)
   Player 2 chooses a unit to move, movies it and commits to actions
   They cycle back and forth until all units have been moved

     Attack
   Player 1 chooses a unit to attack with, a target, executes attack.
   Player 2 chooses a unit to attack with, a target, executes attack.

     Resolution
    Player 1 resolves all actions, and takes damage.
    Player 2 resolves all actions and takes damage.
    End Round 1


Round 2

     Movement
   Player 2 begins movement in this phase to rotate.  Battle proceeds in same format until withdrawal/defeat/conclusion.

[Ramano]

Oh my. Thats some hiroglyphics there man. With all due respect as it is a good idea, I just think that may be a bit more complicated then what we are shooting for. Youre talking 3 or more posts for a single round of action, and I see people, very much myself, having problems keeping track of what is all going on and who is on what phase of actions. Is there any way to simplify that at all?

[SWSF Hale]

Well when you think about it, most tabletop games are VERY SLOW, even if it's just a 1 X-Wing vs 2 TIE Fighters.
If you guys have played (old school) BattleTech before, it uses a hexgrid as well. Combat is phase-driven. Even a 1v1 battle takes forever.
But that's okay I think. In this day and age, we can't handle 24/7 round-the-clock combat. We need phases to maximize participation.
If that's SLOW, so be it!

Something I always liked about BattleTech was that targeting an enemy unit was dependent on a few things:
1. Gunnery. The piloting skill of your character or if your Mech has amazing targeting computers.
2. Ranges. Depending on which weapon you use, distance from you to the target negatively impacted your dice roll.
3. Movement. The number of grids the target moved bumped up the "to hit" number you needed to reach.

It was a very dynamic game, and even though combat was phase-driven, both Movement & Shooting were considered to happen simultaneously. So, both players would reconcile damage at the end, regardless of what happened.

What we're talking about doing is recreating a tabletop-style combat game. We can't do that with traditional simming mechanics where we just take turns posting. We need to think "outside the battle post" if gaming on this forum is to survive.

[SWSF Eidolon]

Oh my. Thats some hiroglyphics there man. With all due respect as it is a good idea, I just think that may be a bit more complicated then what we are shooting for. Youre talking 3 or more posts for a single round of action, and I see people, very much myself, having problems keeping track of what is all going on and who is on what phase of actions. Is there any way to simplify that at all?

   Well the idea is we scale things so that a battle is likely to last only 3-5 Rounds anyways.  But yes it would break up the usual style of posting and result in much more posting.  What it hinges on basically is that we are keeping our own grids and updating them with each movement to keep track of what is where.  Of course, officially, we could post a new grid with locations clearly simply marked at end of each round.

   When we are talking just the 3 of us, it shouldnt' ever get too inflated to become too complex.  It's just a simple back and forth and actually easier to know what you're doing when you're only moving one unit at a time as opposed to moving a whole bundle of them at a time. 

    Not all that much is changing from one post to another, so the progress is slower and it requires more posts.  But the way it translates with the flow in my mind represents a more "realistic" simulation of combat unfolding rapidly and subjects involved reacting without much fore thought or total knowledge of the entire scene.

   This is in general how numerous table top games unfold in order to give both players an equal chance to adjust on fly to battle field developments.  It would take a bit of practice of course, because for 20+ yrs we've always done it the other All in One way.  But after seeing the fruits of how it improves the game in tabletopping so much, I think it's a must for really produce a game any different from the old ones we've done.

[Ramano]

Point taken. However, do keep in mind, im more of a specialized gamer. I played D&D, and ive pretty much mastered that, but outside of that, Ive played X-wing. That and I played 1 part of a mission for the Stargate RPG at GaryCon, 3 years ago. Other then that ive never played any other tabletop game. Im a video gamer mostly. I played Halo professionally, I will show you god at Mass Effect or Destiny. Dragon Age, Skyrim, and Fallout 3 arnt even a challenge on their hardest modes anymore. But you guys keep dropping all these references, and I have no idea what you are talking about. The only thing I know about BattleTech was a book I read in the library in Junior High. But yeah, just so you know, you guys keep dropping all these names of stuff and im sitting here like: "Are they speaking english?" LMAO!!

[SWSF Hale]

This took about 30 minutes to build in PowerPoint, after scouring the internet for top-view pictures of SW vessels. It was easy.

My overall vision for this game...

[SWSF Hale]

Back in the glory days, we were able to keep track of multiple units and their headings in massive 20x20 square grids.
If we can't do the same thing in a 10x10 hexgrid as adults, then we got bigger problems.

[Ramano]

No no, Hale, not what I meant. You just showed me exactly what I was basically asking. You were referencing visuals to things I had no idea what they were, so I needed something to see what you were talking about cause I dont know what Armada or BattleTech is outside of a vague title name.

And I really really like what you have there, perhaps it was intentional, but limiting squadrons to groups of 3 for rebels and 4 for Imps (provided all they get are T/F, T/I, and T/Bs) is a great idea!

[Ramano]

Another thing I would like to see, which I know is about to be unpopular, but especially with that kind of grid set up is doing away with that "You can move then fire, or fire then move" BS. I mean, with all due respect, that takes everything out of tactical combat dealing with speed. Everyone just goes for the biggest gun-toting tank they can wield and takes it to hell and back. You can never fire and then get out of weapons range again, so under said system, speed and maneuver is completely irrelevant. By just saying if a ship gets 3 grid movement it can move 3 grids, regardless of what it does in between that movement, adds way more tactical combat. And yes, I know what this sets us up for, but thats kind of my point. Taking the big tank no longer becomes the best option when I can take a CRV, constantly dance around outside your weapons range, and just pick you off over time. You would actually have to think about whats in your fleet, and accessing options you normally wouldnt consider because speed is now a valuable asset. I think we should put some thought into and consider this.

[SWSF Hale]

Well that's the thing, with a dedicated Maneuver/Movement Phase, players take turns positioning their units based on initiative and speed.
This is a place where specs are going to require more work, as in, some units might have the ability to move last even if they won the initiative check.

Suppose for that posted picture, Movement initiative went like this:
1. Missiles-in-flight
2. Torpedoes-in-flight
3. TIE Fighters
4. X-Wings
5. YT-1300
6. TIE Bombers
7. CORVs
8. Y-Wings
9. ISD

Weapons initiative could be the reverse:
1. ISD
2. Y-Wings
3. CORVs
4. TIE Bombers
5. YT-1300
6. X-Wings
7. TIE Fighters
8. Launched Torpedoes
9. Launched Missiles

By flip-flopping the order of initiative for fire and movement, it gives the faster units preference for maneuvering and the slower units preference for shooting. In reality, a CORV could not move-fire-move without also getting into the weapons range of the ISD and taking some hits. The best way for the CORVs to win would be to constantly run circles around the ISD so only 1 CORV would be in a firing arc at any given time.

[Ramano]

So we are making individual posts for each unit? I dont recall anything about an initiative phase. I assumed it would just be 1 person posts, then the other so on and so forth.

[SWSF Hale]

I was only conjecturing about individual units, because that would solve the "fire-move-fire" / "move-fire-move" debate by removing turn-based combat. Individual unit movement would take more time, but I think it would be more balanced. It wouldn't matter who goes first, since everything will be decided on the initiative of each unit.

[SWSF Eidolon]

All Agreed.

Drywall project almost wrapped up ;p


"This is a place where specs are going to require more work, as in, some units might have the ability to move last even if they won the initiative check."

  Yes, exactly.  We basically give units uniqueness and varying tactical use in their ability to bend the common rules.  This is exactly how X-Wing achieves near flawless balance.  Phases, Actions and Tactical Variation by Rule Bending more or less.

  So for instance maybe an A-Wing has some ability to move after it fires, unlike most other units, purely because of it's "blistering speed"

  Maybe a TIE Bomber can more easily deliver ordinance then all other units because of it's singular role design specialization etc.

  Maybe a particular pilot is a Daredevil and any ship he's piloting gains some extra Evasion ability.

  Etc etc etc etc.  etc =)