Pre-SysNES2: Beta-testing and Submission

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

Praxzen Fleet Concept RED DAWN

Mixed Laser/Particle Defense Fleet, T3, CON4, MTR4, Advancer, Poor Safety:

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Coccinellidae class Command Frigate

1 Twist Drive
12 Metal Capacitors (Refined)
3 Pulse Drive
1 Command Deck
1 Command Staff
1 Fire Control Teams
1 Computer Module
1 Scanners
1 Commlinks
1 Scanners
6 Jammers
6 EW Broadcasters
12 Coilgun (Refined) [TRI-COUPLED]
1 Lubricants (Refined)
1 Barrel Casings (Refined)
1 Plasma Shield
7 Carbon Armor (Refined)
2 Tungsten Armor
1 Heavy Cladding

292e (131e) / 85m / 15v / 0a / 0t / 98s
Size: 77 / Mass: 77 / IS: 5 / IP: 1
Range: 0 / Power: 42 / Heat: -5
Init: 4 (12) / Dodge: -19 / Avoid: 12 / Armor: 34 / Shield: 16
Refine: 488e / 122s

Projectile Gun Total Damage: 24 (4x5D through A18/S1)
Fires Controlled p/t: 1
Init Bonus to Fleet: 8
EW Attacks: YES
EW Score: 24
EW Vulnerability: 38
Jammer Init Debuff: 5

Notes: Immune to same tech-level Particle Weapons. 0% Hit Chance by FMs at Long Range through enemy 15 Init. 1% Hit Chance through enemy 16 Init.

---

Reduviidae class Attack Frigate

1 Twist Drive
17 Metal Capacitors (Refined)
3 Pulse Drive
1 Scanners
6 Coilguns (Refined) [TRI-COUPLED]
1 Lubricants (Refined)
1 Barrel Casings (Refined)
3 Microwave Beamer (Refined)
1 Plasma Shield
2 Carbon Armor (Refined)
1 Tungsten Armor
1 Heavy Cladding

152e (68e) / 79m / 14v / 0a / 0t / 56s
Size: 77 / Mass: 76 / IS: 14 / IP: 1
Range: 0 / Power: 108 / Heat: -5
Init: 2 (10) / Dodge: -17 / Avoid: 7 / Armor: 19 / Shield: 34
Refine: 229e / 57s

EM Total Damage: 1035L (3x24D through A50/S#)
Projectile Gun Total Damage: 12 (2x5D through A18/S1)

Notes: Immune to same tech-level Particle weapons. 0% Hit Chance by FMs at Long Range through enemy 5 Init. 6% Hit Chance through enemy 6 Init.

---

Code:

[b][u]REFINEMENT COSTS[/b][/u]

[b][u]NAME			IND	SCI[/b][/u]
Metal Capacitors	300e	100s
Coilguns		300e	100s
Lubricants		400e	300s
Barrel Casings		400e	200s
Microwave Beamer	300e	100s
Carbon Armor		300e	150s
[i]Reduviidae[/i] class	229e	57s

[b]TOTAL:			1929e	1007s[/b]

Code:

[b][u]PFC RED DAWN[/b][/u]

[b][u]NAME			NUM	IND		SCI	MET		VOL[/b][/u]
[i]Coccinellidae[/i] class 	1x	292e		98s	85m		15v
[i]Reduviidae[/i] class (Ref.)	4x	272e (68e)	56s	316m (79m)	56v (14v)	

[b]TOTAL:				564e		154s	401m		71v[/b]

Code:

[b][u]TOTAL RESOURCE INVESTMENT[/b][/u]

s: 1164
e: 2488
m: 401
v: 71

Agg. Prod./Res.: 2960

t: 4
a: 0

These can rapidly be moved to patrol friendly/home systems with local power sources. Uncoupled Reduviidae beams let them strike multiple targets while still focusing firepower; between the four of them, they will melt any possible command ship near their own tech level, dropping Fleet Init and allowing them to survive ranged missile strikes. The Coccinellidae is basically immune to anything but the same strategy at long range and strong in EW, allowing it to suppress enemy C&C and help the Reduviidae to lock down the battlefield. Once any command ship is dealt with, Reduviidae can one-shot 12 small ships per turn or carve up somewhat fewer large ships. Coilguns also provide close-in defense should fast platforms get through.

There are of course probably counters, but this feels pretty robust.

---

To demonstrate I'm not just making things up with regard to this kind of fleet modeling, here's an analysis of Steel Reign using the same model. As can be seen, the APR of Red Dawn and Steel Reign is roughly similar (2960 vs. 2998), although Red Dawn's science investment is 2.67 times higher. This seems roughly in line for what one would expect for a high-s, high-e, low-m/v society fighting a low-s, mid-e, high-m/v society. Making e, m, and v all equal on a one-to-one basis has its problems, but is far more reflective of things than a flat-cap, in my opinion. 1250s or 1500s is probably a more realistic science cap, considering we were previously allowing 1000s for refinement on top of whatever ships cost.

Spoiler :

Disenfrancised · Feb 19, 2012

Symphony D. said:
I think it should be some sort of average of Size and Mass, possibly factoring in Armorheavier and dumber material can survive more hits than fragile, smart stuff. Size alone also gives Carbon Armor a lot of advantages over the other two since it primarily buffs Size rather than Mass, giving you more HP along with good armor (if refined) for cheap. Using only Size also lets flimsy things like Solar Arrays, Thermal Rockets, Burst Drives, and Internal Hangars boost your HP, which makes not much sense. You pay for it in Dodge, but still.

Q: Would a Command Deck / Command Staff based orbital or defence installation be considered close enough to buff all other orbital or defense installations? Light lag on and around a planet would be sufficiently limited that logically you'd think it would. This would make building a NORAD-type defense installation unit on a planet with tremendous armor values a real boon to coordinating defenses.

Q: Depending on the answer to the above, wouldn't data on Scanners also be capable of being shared? That way a few intel defence stations can back up numerous weapons platforms, rather than every single weapon platform needing Scanners. This gives ground and orbital defenses some cost advantages that seem reasonable considering they're static.

Hmm I'll think about the HP thing.

Yes, the 'long range' battlespace is currently envisioned as a light second across or so, and includes a planets entire orbital space and the planets surface.

Every defence platform doesn't need scanners? Scanners are for detection, they're needed to engage an enemy fleet that doesn't want to be engaged, during the battle itself they have no function beyond the int bonus. Since a stationary defence formation will be waiting for the enemy to engage them (so they can do their objectives of dropping troops/bombing/raiding), they can do without scanners all together.

Q: Has the Plasma Shield totally replaced the Magnetic Shield, or will the latter be making a reappearance? (If so, as a cheaper or costlier version of former? It used to be cheaper.)

*Twirls mustache*

The RED DAWN fleet is one hell of a rattlesnake - very discouraging of attacks. The counters I see are BIG LAZOR and serious EW+Missiles. A shielded boarding ship with crazy speed/dodge might work vs the Command ship.

I'm probably going to adjust the EW probabilities, difficulties and change some of the actions.

Thlayli · Feb 19, 2012

Thlayli said:
Waaaait a second, can someone explain to me scientifically why the long range to-hit chances of Kinetic Lances are better than the short range ones? I was under the impression that KL's were a dumb projectile.

This.

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

Disenfrancised said:
@Thlayli: At longer ranges a kinetic lance has both more time to accelerate, and also can go 'dark' for periods to let busy ships lose their targeting locks. It has a dumb warhead, not delivery system.

This.

Thlayli · Feb 19, 2012

Oh, cool.

Better question: Why doesn't IP Speed have an effect on dodge calculations? I feel like it should.

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

See here for an answer.

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Numeric Analysis of Red Dawn vs. Kal's Missile-Laser Fleet (No BattleCalc Simulation!)

6 beams will kill the Aegis (345L against A50 = 24 damage, 121 size / 24 = 5.041)
7 beams will kill the Skirnir (345L against A53 = 22 damage, 135 size / 22 = 6.136)
5 beams will kill the Vail (345L against A49 = 24 damage, 114 size / 24 = 4.75)
9 beams will kill the Tyr (345L against A68 = 16 damage, 138 size / 16 = 8.625)
1 beam will kill the Baldric (345L against A3 = 342 damage, 26 size / 342 = 0.076)

Red Dawn Fires First: it can kill the Aegis, Vail, and Baldric on turn one, reducing Skirnir to 6 Init (6% hit chance versus Reduviidae; with 14 Busters left, est. 0.84 hits). BMs will do 5min, 13avg, 22max damage against Reduviidae. Tyr can manage 17 damage against Reduviidae and 8 against Coccinellidae. Red Dawn probably takes no casualties. Aesir Fleet can retreat or be systematically destroyed. Red Dawn achieves moderate victory.

Aesir Fleet Fires First: BMs have 78% chance to hit Reduviidae, 0% chance to hit Coccinellidae. On average damage, will take 6 BMs (77 size / 13 = 5.923) to kill each Reduviidae. Total output of 17 BMs means it's likely only two die. With Tyr, could be three. If two survive the Aegis dies and it is unlikely further hits will occur as per above, Aesir Fleet can retreat or receive greivous damage. If only one survives, Aesir Fleet likely achieves a limited victory.

Basically: whoever shoots first almost certainly wins.

The big HP counts afforded by Burst Drives here feel off, and I think that's another indictment of the nature of Size-based HP. The fact that they're boosted further still by Carbon Armor (particularly on the Skirnir) also seems fishy. (I know it was intentional, Kal.

)

-

Numeric Analysis of Red Dawn vs. Steel Reign (No BattleCalc Simulation!)

5 beams will kill the Beluga (345L against A48 = 25 damage, 104 size / 25 = 4.16)
1 beam will kill the Skipjack (345L against A2 = 343 damage, 45 size / 343 = 0.131)
1 beam will kill the Tortuga (345L against A5 = 272 damage, 25 size / 272 = 0.092)

Red Dawn Fires First: it can kill the Beluga and seven Skipjacks on turn one, reducing remaining Skipjacks to 5 Init (0% hit chance). Skipjacks and Tortuga can retreat or be systematically destroyed. Red Dawn achieves limited victory.

Steel Reign Fires First: FMs have 69% chance to hit Reduviidae, 0% chance to hit Coccinellidae. FMs will do 2min, 5avg, 8max damage against Reduviidae. On average damage will take 16 FMs (77 size / 5 = 15.4) to kill each. All Reduviidae die, Coccinellidae is forced to retreat. Steel Reign achieves moderate victory.

Once again, it comes down to who fires first.

-

In the rules we're using, which were mostly approved, it's not clear what form of Long Range weapon goes first. Considering the speed of light, I'd say LR Beamers would be it. If that's so, I put strong odds on Red Dawn smashing both the Aesir Fleet and Steel Reign.

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

Here's an analysis of Kal's Aesir Fleet using proposed economic conditions. It's about 900 APR down from Red Dawn or Steel Reign (2077/3000) due to efficient use of resources and low numbers, so it could either have several more components refined or refine designs to get more of each, among other things, within the 3000APR/1500s model.

Spoiler :

Thlayli · Feb 19, 2012

One possible proposal for making Maneuvering Jets more useful is to scale their dodge bonus up with higher IP Speed. If your speed vector is absolutely massive, gaining more maneuvering ability with that would be more useful than attaching jets to a slow-moving barge.

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

Uh, inertia, yo. An object with greater momentum has higher inertial resistance, not less. Observe the difficulty of deflecting a bullet in flight versus one standing still. If anything, Maneuvering Jets should be less effective with greater IP.

Disenfrancised · Feb 19, 2012

Symphony D. said:
In the rules we're using, which were mostly approved, it's not clear what form of Long Range weapon goes first. Considering the speed of light, I'd say LR Beamers would be it. If that's so, I put strong odds on Red Dawn smashing both the Aesir Fleet and Steel Reign.

Long range weapons fire at the same time, whilst obviously the beam weapons will reach their targets first, a missile ships missiles will already have been launched on arrival.

I should probably rename fire control to regeneration to make it more grokkable.

I'm leaning towards HP being the mean of size and mass.

Thlayli · Feb 19, 2012

Symphony D. said:
Uh, inertia, yo. An object with greater momentum has higher inertial resistance, not less. Observe the difficulty of deflecting a bullet in flight versus one standing still. If anything, Maneuvering Jets should be less effective with greater IP.

Sure, but it just stands to reason that if your Maneuvering Jets are working properly, at higher speeds they'll course adjust you further away from whatever's trying to kill you.

Compensate by having Maneuvering Jets take more power at higher IP speeds.

Symphony D. · Feb 19, 2012

Thlayli said:
Sure, but it just stands to reason that if your Maneuvering Jets are working properly, at higher speeds they'll take you further away from whatever's trying to kill you.

Uh, no! That's like saying if you activate the tiny thruster vents on a Harrier while it's cruising at Mach 1 that it'll totally alter directions significantly faster. Even if they didn't reduce the main engine's thrust that would not be true; they only work when it's hovering. The whole point of thrusters is that they are high specific-impulse, low acceleration/endurance, and are generally not oriented in the same direction as the main engines.

Compare the Shuttle's OME thrusters versus its main engines (2x 26.7 kN vs. 3x 2,279.0 kN) and note the 100 factor difference. Multiply this by another 10 or 100 for the kind of kit being talked about here, if not much more. This is why Pulse Drives are generally more efficient at improving Dodge at low Propulsion tech.

I get that you don't like how they're set up right now but there are alternatives and it's quite by design and accords well with reality, so. Not everything needs to be available or work at T3. If I wanted to harp on something that's actually kinda broken, it's that Pebble Nets and Laser Nets don't seem worth it against stacking on more Coilguns if you're at all aiming for real Avoid, either in terms of cost, mass, or energy, and on their own the benefits they give aren't really worth it. (The Computers necessary would make it maybe appropriate on a Charm Drive command ship? If you put both with Scanners and 11 Computers you can get 9 Avoid. But you need to really stack the Computers... I also think the Charm slave mass limit is slightly too restrictive, but that's a hard one to balance.)

Kal'thzar · Feb 20, 2012

I just had some fun...

Building to a 3000 resource limit

Can't stop the Signal

Spoiler :

Basic idea is that the fleet will take losses, but against any ship that has a bad vulnerability this ship can and will do something, from lockdown to overload.

Intrusion ship is just there because I could fit it in and if the entire enemy fleet is locked down, well then you have a free target to close in on and attempt to take-over.

Basic Analysis Red Dawn vs The Signal

Assuming all on the same battlefield (I note Red Dawn has 0 range, makes sense though, they require a base to be able to power up those capacitors). The Signal carriers and Supply would ideally stay out of the battle.

Long Range Round

12 Beams Kill 12 Wodens

Movement
4 Wodens Close in on 4 Reduviidaes (1,1,1,1)
3 Woden Closes in on Coccinellidae

The Red Dawn ships could do any number of things, probably remain grouped and hope for terrible EW rolls.

EW Phase

Wodens lock-down or overload Everything

Against the Reduviidaes lockdown is automatic, whilst overload has a low % of not occurring. Depending if boarding ships can board multiple opponents in a Fleet Action determines whether to lockdown permanently or Overload power and destroy.

Against the Coccinellidae things are a bit more in the air, (a low % of not doing any of the overload or Lockdowns from occurring, but with 3 ships very unlikely). The aim would be to lock it down for the entire battle, then bring in the Insulting Boarder and capture it.

Of course if the Insulting can go after all of them it will only be a matter of time before the entire enemy fleet is yours.

Basic Analysis Steel Reign vs The Signal
Dies so fast its a little bit funny!

QUESTIONS
is overload power surplus or power output?

Symphony D. · Feb 20, 2012

Kal'thzar said:
Of course if the Insulting can go after all of them it will only be a matter of time before the entire enemy fleet is yours.

This is based on the great big ridiculous assumption that Red Dawn will prioritize killing EW platforms over the infiltration unit first, when there's no reason not to considering that's your only offensive option. Your EW ships then can't do anything at all but be annoying, and can't actually resolve combat. Plus EW actions are changing:

Disenfrancised said:
I'm probably going to adjust the EW probabilities, difficulties and change some of the actions.

Kal'thzar · Feb 20, 2012

Symphony D. said:
This is based on the great big ridiculous assumption that Red Dawn will prioritize killing EW platforms over the infiltration unit first, when there's no reason not to considering that's your only offensive option. Your EW ships then can't do anything at all but be annoying, and can't actually resolve combat. Plus EW actions are changing:

Ehhh no, Overload will destroy your ships, direct damage from your power output (or surplus, still not 100% clear which).

Initially I only stuck insulting there to be you'know, insulting. Its small cheap and given sufficient time could capture some ships, which I found amusing because the ships it would go after are huge. But I don't really consider it central to the strategy.

Not to say its not an idea worth thinking about, I suppose the correct balance of ship infiltration to EW ships is probably more infiltration ships, Trade in 2 Wodens and build a small swarm of Infiltrators...

And yes EW is changing, but I don't know how, but I doubt that it will make the fleet completely useless.

Disenfrancised · Feb 20, 2012

Overload is currently surplus power. One would assume you'd stick a kinetic lance or two on your EW ships so they can actually resolve the issue if they manage to lock down everything.

Kal'thzar · Feb 20, 2012

Yeah, but this was targeted at Red Dawn, a laser fleet with a lot of spare energy. It wouldn't be hard to stick a single KL on everything though.

Symphony D. · Feb 20, 2012

Praxzen Fleet Concept "MAD WORLD"

Modification of Red Dawn, same function. Turns out I missed counting a Refined component's costs, so technically Red Dawn couldn't have fielded more than two Attack Frigates. Factoring this in, Mad World focuses even more on quality. T3, CON4, MTR4, Advancer, Poor Safety:

Python class Command Frigate

1 Twist Drive
13 Metal Capacitors (Refined)
1 Deuterium Drive
2 Pulse Drive
1 Command Deck
1 Command Staff
3 Computer Module
1 Commlinks
1 Scanners
6 Jammers
21 EW Broadcasters (Refined)
1 Algorithmic Interlocks
1 Space Marines
12 Coilgun (Refined) [TRI-COUPLED]
1 Lubricants (Refined)
1 Barrel Casings (Refined)
1 Plasma Shield
11 Carbon Armor
2 Tungsten Armor
1 Heavy Cladding

288e (127e) / 88m / 14v / 0a / 4t / 97s
Size: 77 / Mass: 77 / IS: 4 / IP: 1
Range: 0 / Power: 38 / Heat: -5
Init: 5 (13) / Dodge: -20 / Avoid: 12 / Armor: 31 / Shield: 15
Refine: 481e / 120s

Projectile Gun Total Damage: 24 (4x5D through A18/S1)
Init Bonus to Fleet: 8
EW Attacks: YES
EW Score: 92
EW Vulnerability: 0
Jammer Init Debuff: 5
Ship-to-Ship Boarding: 0

Notes: Modified Coccinellidae. Immune to same tech-level Particle Weapons. 0% Hit Chance by FMs at Long Range through enemy 16 Init. 3% Hit Chance through enemy 17 Init.

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Cobra class Attack Frigate

1 Twist Drive
17 Metal Capacitors (Refined)
1 Deuterium Drive
2 Pulse Drive
1 Scanners
9 EW Broadcasters (Refined)
9 Coilguns (Refined) [TRI-COUPLED]
1 Lubricants (Refined)
1 Barrel Casings (Refined)
3 Microwave Beamer (Refined)
1 Plasma Shield
1 Carbon Armor
1 Heavy Cladding

191e (86e) / 82m / 14v / 0a / 0t / 67s
Size: 77 / Mass: 77 / IS: 13 / IP: 1
Range: 0 / Power: 101 / Heat: -5
Init: 2 (10) / Dodge: -18 / Avoid: 9 / Armor: 11 / Shield: 32
Refine: 292e / 73s

EM Total Damage: 960L (3x22D through A50/S#)
Projectile Gun Total Damage: 16 (3x5D through A18/S1)
EW Attacks: YES
EW Score: 43
EW Vulnerability: 0

Notes: Modified Reduviidae. Immune to same tech-level Particle weapons. 0% Hit Chance by FMs at Long Range through enemy 10 Init. 9% Hit Chance through enemy 11 Init.

---

Code:

[b][u]REFINEMENT COSTS[/b][/u]

[b][u]NAME			IND	SCI[/b][/u]
Metal Capacitors	300e	100s
EW Broadcasters		300e	300s
Coilguns		300e	100s
Lubricants		400e	300s
Barrel Casings		400e	200s
Microwave Beamer	300e	100s

[b]TOTAL:			2000e	1100s[/b]

Code:

[b][u]FLEET "MAD WORLD"[/b][/u]

[b][u]NAME		NUM	IND		SCI	MET		VOL[/b][/u]
[i]Python[/i] class 	1x	288e		97s	88m		14v
[i]Cobra[/i] class 	2x	382e (191e)	67s	164m (82m)	28v (14v)	

[b]TOTAL:			650e		156s	252m		42v[/b]

Code:

[b][u]TOTAL RESOURCE INVESTMENT[/b][/u]

s: 1256
e: 2670
m: 252
v: 42

Agg. Prod./Res.: 2964

t: 4
a: 0

Both designs are totally immune to Particle Weapons and Electronic Warfare other than Passives and Lockdown 1, and have even stronger missile defenses than their Red Dawn counterparts. Damage decrease on the Cobra compared to the Reduviidae is trivial, and both together should remain capable of killing a Command Ship on turn one. Their increased survivability against missiles assists in this aim.

If you ever wanted to build more than two Cobras, you'd want to refine the design, but that's beyond the scope of this level of fleet modeling. They're pretty cheap if you do, and the more you stack, the more ridiculous it gets. If you upgrade Autoloaders instead of Lubricants, you can drop a Coilgun from each Cobra but get all three ammo boosters and get up to 10 Avoid. In that case, maybe quad-couple for extra punch. Poor Safety's Size and Mass penalties are really the only thing keeping them from having 12 Avoid.

These could technically still suffer from Lockdown 1 but my guess is (without running the EW Calc) that they'll be about as good in EW if not better than the Woden due to double the Init. I think the fact Lockdown 1 is available against 0 Vulnerability is kinda weird considering everything else is a minimum of 1 (including the less-harsh Passive of Break Codes), but whatever.

Refining EW Broadcasters is in fact quite worth it.

Disenfrancised · Feb 20, 2012

One of the nice things about these high end capacitor ships is how great they are as export products - you never have to worry about them being used against your planets.

i'm going to add an EW and ship boarding section to the stats page in V10. Right now the base calc is EW+int vs EW+int, so having +7 int on the cobra won't overcome the -20 EW.

Symphony D. · Feb 20, 2012

What exactly does "Stunned" mean with regards to Lockdown anyway? It's not at all clear just from the term. Does the target suffer an Init penalty? Does it not get to attack? Presumably not the last, considering Disrupt. Depending on what it is, stunned might not be a very serious penalty at all. If Mad World can still fire every turn, and the Wodens get into close range where they're in range of Coilguns and Lasers, they lose horribly no matter how much Stun they bring.

Also, if that's the case, the Woden won't be able to do anything to the Python in turn. With the spare budget, the Cobras could also have several more EW Broadcasters loaded onto them. If you add 4 each, you'll get to 65+10 and will beat 62+6. At that point the Wodens have to go down in number to go up EW, and it just becomes a numbers game of adjusting them against one another. (And the Woden fleet as a whole will be smaller anyway due to fielding Kinetic Lances, which it will now need to actually do damage, and have fewer of them the fewer ships it has...)

Pre-SysNES2: Beta-testing and Submission

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