Encounter One Combat Example

Following queries received after putting the new edition of Encounter One online, I have included a combat example in the rules. This uses two of the example ships from the rules and runs through the Firing procedure for Beams and Missiles.
I have expanded the Example below and added graphics from the Fire Chart.

Combat Example. 

Empire Cruiser Miami encounters the Federation Cruiser Leviathon during a deep raid. Both ships approach to 92M range with the enemy in their forward arc before opening fire. Both ships have aligned all their shields to their forward arc.

Miami is Mass 18 with three St 5 Beam, two Dart and one Bolt capable of engaging their forward arc plus two St 4 Shields. Miami also has a flight of five fighters.

Leviathon is Mass 20 with two St 5 Beam, two Bolt and one Dart plus two ST 4 Shields and one St 3 Shields covering their forward arc. Leviathan also has two turreted St 5 Beam covering their side and rear arcs.

Miami fires first with three Beam St 5 totalling 15 St.

Referring to the Fire Chart. Fire Factor (FF) 15 at less than 100M range, the FF is reduced to 12.

FF 12 is then cross referenced against the target’s mass of 20 to further reduce the FF to 7.

Leviathon had decelerated by 6 (Tactical Factor 5) and made two turns (TF+2); Miami made one turn (TF+1). This gives a Tactical Factor of 8.

Cross referencing FF 7 against the TF of 8 gives a final Fire Factor of 6.

FF 6 against a ST 3 shield gives H90* one hit with a 90% chance of an extra hit. 

Rolling percentage dice gives 52% for two hits and stay on the same row. FF6 vs Shield St 4 gives H32 (One Hit and 32% chance of one extra). Rolling against the first shield gives 78%. Failure to beat the shield moves up the column to the next starred entry 84* at FF4. Rolling against this give 08% for one hit.

Rolling on the Damage Allocation Table gives Red 2 and Black 9. This would be a Probe but none carried so down the table and one Hull box is damaged.

Leviathon returns fire with two Bolt and one Dart missile. They fire Beam as well but without effect. Federation Bolt at range 100 have FF10. This is cross referenced against the Target Mass (18) reducing it to FF6.

Miami had accelerated by 4 (Tactical Factor 4) and made one turn (TF+1), Leviathon made two turns (TF+1) and Firing Bolt (TF+3) totalling TF9.

FF6 against TF 9 gives a final Fire Factor of 5. Referencing FF5 on the Missile % column gives 38% chance of hitting the target for each Bolt. Rolling twice for two Bolt gives 27% and 63%. One missile locked on the target. 

Miami has two Point Defence, each has a 60% chance of intercepting a Bolt at 100M. Miami elects to roll both PD against the Bolt and hope the incoming Dart misses. Rolls of 95% and 02% result in one interception and the incoming Bolt being destroyed before impact.

Now for the Dart missile. Federation Dart at 100M has FF7. Miami’s mass of 18 reduced this to FF4. Tactical factors as for the Bolts except Dart are TF+1 not +3 so a TF7. FF4 against TF7 gives a final FF3 and 22% on the Missile% column. A lucky roll of 03% means the Dart drills into Miami with no interception from Point Defence as they were already used. If any PD had remained they would have a 15% chance of intercepting the Dart at 100M.

Rolling on the Damage Allocation Table gives Red 3 and Black 4, knocking out one of Miami’s forward Dart Launchers.

Further Thoughts

If you've read through all that, you might be thinking it's a lot of effort for two hits! 

And you would be right. However, I can say that the Combat procedure gets much easier with familiarity and the range for opening fire in the example was not optimal. It could be seen as 'reconnaissance by fire' intended to see what the enemy has. 

Beam can fire out to 200M (or 200cm on the table) but it's effective fire improves significantly at close range. Bolt is a close range missile, Dart is a long range missile. At a closer range the Beam and Bolt would be more effective, at a longer range Dart would be more effective. Point Defence also improves with range, so there are various tactical choices to be made.

One point that did occur to me while writing up the Combat Example was how much the process slowed down when I came to work out the Tactical Factors. If you are playing a one or two ship game then that may not be too much of an issue. But if you have a couple of fleets with dozens of ships, plus fighters buzzing around, then calculating Tactical Factors could become a real problem. 

The optional rules for Tactical Computers are one way to address this issue. However, Tactical Computers give a significant advantage to larger ships. As the quality of their computer is directly linked to the mass of the ship. They also add a considerable points cost to the ships design.

I have an alternative proposal...

Ships Tactical Factors

As written, the rules calculate each ships Tactical Factor for each turn. It did occur to me that you could use a ships maximum Acc/dec and Turns capability as an agility modifier. 

Assume that while moving from point to point, a ship in combat is also making best use of its drives to zig-zag, evade or make itself a less predictable target. Each ship could then have it's own Tactical Factor recorded on its record sheet and save having to recall how far you just moved each turn! 

Players calculate their Ships Tactical Factor (STF) at the design stage and refer to that during the game. If a ship takes damage to its drives, then you may need to recalculate the STF.

Under this system the example ships would have initial Ships Tactical Factors as follows:

Miami:     Acc/Dcc  = 12, Turns = 3 (8+3)     STF = 11

Leviathon:     Acc/Dcc = 9, Turns = 3 (7+3)    STF = 10

Vadastra:     Acc/Dcc = 10, Turns = 5 (7+5)    STF = 12

This would make the Tactical Factor calculation dependent on the target ship rather than the shooter like Tactical Computers. This would also give an advantage back to smaller, faster more agile ships like your mass 5 torpedo boats and Escorts rather than the hulking Dreadnoughts. Those already have an advantage in their sheer firepower and mass. 

Situational Tactical Factors for Inertialess Drive, Tractors and Hyper-Space would still apply with out unnecessary complication. 

The Tactical Factors for Firing Missiles seem counter intuitive to me. They could easily be dropped without making all that much difference to the final result. 

There could be other systems that would fit in here like ECM, chaff, stealth or decoys. These may well be costed on the mass of the ship as bigger ships are harder to hide. Probe and Mirage projectors may also tie in to this system with a bit more thought.

Chris Nicole

15th April 2021