So Hawks difficult
second album is here and as with any table-top game there are
inconsistencies and typos. Now I, personally, am a big fan of
Dropfleet. I love the models and the cinematic style of the system.
It’s clever use of signature and scan mechanic makes for a very
interesting way of looking at the concept of ‘Ranges’.
Now we have a lovely
bunch of clarifications and a few little errata to help out. SO I’ll
go through them and pick out the major ones (In my humble opinion at
least) and mull over what they mean for the game as a whole.
Errata:
Most of the Errata is
actually just correcting Typos and also clearing up little loop holes
that if followed would be a programming error.
The meat of the Errata
is actually in the Shaltari section. Which makes sense, the Shaltari
as the wildcard ‘rulebook-meet-window’ faction are always going
to be the faction that will be needing clarification.
- Voidgates can now only kill bulk landers on a 5+ which is a very, very good change. Voidgates are numerous and in atmo, tricky to kill. So the Shaltari player is usually gonna have a couple around a cluster. So the battery effect needed to be downgraded as the previous 4+ was far too good a force multiplier.
- Voidgates are now Hull 2, again this needed to happen. As before they were harder to kill than PHR Strike cruisers due to not being high enough hull to create the need for a crippling roll, which made zero sense.
- A drop in the PD of Shaltari Fighters to +4, which is fair enough considering the monstrously good PD on non-Shielded Shaltari ships. (Although considering a later clarification on Close Action attacks this extra PD would be very handy!)
- Glass Cloudfliers are now 18 points, which seems harsh at first but I think could balance out, as they are only 1 Hull point and need to be taken in quite large groups anyway.
[EDIT: THESE ARE NOW HORRENDOUSLY BROKED! XD] - They’ve also added the ability for Voidgates to be used to gate onto Space stations as they couldn’t before…. Ooops!
Missing?
I’d like to see the
Scan characteristics of frigates get another pass, Frigates having
the same scan characteristic as Cruisers is very difficult to
swallow. I can see thematically why this is the case (I also see a
good Theme case the other way), but mechanics wise the Scan should
force the Frigates to close with the enemy. At the moment they can
stay a good distance from the capital ships of an opponent’s fleet
and fire with impunity knowing that it’s difficult for an opponent
to manoeuvre to engage. It also allows them to almost guarantee a
good alpha strike before the opponent has a chance to pick them off.
Scan and Sig on
Frigates I (and Mike) feel should be closer to each other. The
mechanic of Spikes already more than makes up for any lost distance
and would force the Frigates to actually get stuck in and take the
beating they rightly deserve.
Core FAQ:
Some good
clarifications in this section, for instance the Voidgates can’t
use their charged atmosphere while in range of stations, so
interestingly Shaltari may struggle to hold stations. Some of the
clarifications I personally thought wouldn’t need clarifying but I
guess different people read the same words differently!
An interesting
clarification on damage effects, which can be used for any effects
across the board. For a ship to be effected by a specific effect that
takes place after armour rolls it needs to be damaged. For
example the Crippling damage, impel, and corruptor weapon qualities
must actually damage in order to cause their effects. So if a Passive
is passed any weapon effects can be safely ignored. Which is good to
know.
Scald works against
Passive saves which is very cool, hands Scourge a nice element to use
against Shaltari, especially as otherwise Shaltari could Turtle up as
soon as Scourge get near.
Torpedoes are also clarified as being absolutely horrendous! Much like the terminator they just keep coming at you. Until the ship is gone, enters atmosphere, shakes it off, or scrapes it off with Debris Fields the torpedo just keeps rolling till it hits. Naughty! I’ve heard the logic behind this is because Torpedoes are very limited in army’s to have them miss on a 1 and disappear would be incredibly annoying.
Torpedoes are also clarified as being absolutely horrendous! Much like the terminator they just keep coming at you. Until the ship is gone, enters atmosphere, shakes it off, or scrapes it off with Debris Fields the torpedo just keeps rolling till it hits. Naughty! I’ve heard the logic behind this is because Torpedoes are very limited in army’s to have them miss on a 1 and disappear would be incredibly annoying.
Plus it amuses me that torpedoes follow ships like a Mario
Cart red shell!
Now for a rather
unfortunate Bug-bear in this FAQ…..
*WARNING
THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS MATHS*
*AND TABLES!*
*AND TABLES!*
*CONTINUE
ONLY IN THE INTERESTS OF FULL* *NERDERY!*
*
*
One particularly
important clarification is the one I’ve been dreading, the Close
Action (CA) grouping mechanic. Ships in a group now pool all of their CA
attacks into one bunch and the defending ship gets their Point Defence (PD) against
the hits from that pool. This is assuming all the attacking ships are
in range of the defender. Now with this ruling in place the CA
orientated groups are very, very dangerous. Now it’s very easy for
a group to overwhelm PD through sheer weight of fire, add into that
the PD result needed is 5+. If you look at the table below you’ll
see what I mean.
*
Ship Name
|
To Hit/To Crit
|
Random Amount/Highest to Lowest CA result per
unit
|
Group Availability per BG Min to max.*
|
Group CA Min to Max Ship number/min to max CA
|
Special
|
Taipei (UCM)
|
4+/6+
|
D6+4/ 5-10
|
2-10
|
2 (10-20) 10 (50-100)
|
|
Amethyst (Shaltari)
|
3+/5+
|
D3+2/ 3-5
|
2-6
|
2(6-10) 6 (18-30)
|
Ignores PD
|
Turquoise (Shaltari)
|
3+/5+
|
D6+3/4-9
|
1-3
|
1 (4-9) 3 (12-27)
|
Ignores PD
|
Jet (Shaltari)
|
3+/5+
|
D6+3/4-9
|
1-2
|
1 (4-9) 2 (8-12)
|
Ignores PD
|
Wyvern (Scourge)
|
3+/5+
|
2D6+4/ 6-16
|
1-3
|
1 (6-16) 3 (18-48)
|
|
Djinn (Scourge)
|
3+/5+
|
D6+2/ 3-8
|
2-9
|
2(6-16) 9 (27-72)
|
(*= per battlegroup max
is based on what is considered standard tourney size list of 1250pts)
*
So what we can say here
is that CA is a HUGE part of combat in this system with
this change. Now considering the major culprits of this are Frigates,
combine the low signature with the sheer weight of firepower and you
have a recipe for a 1-turn battleship killing scale of an alpha
strike, at the extreme end of the potential list build. CA are all
Front/Side/Rear fire arcs, so there’s very little you can do to
manoeuvre your way out of it, which is a shame. I’d like to see
some major restructuring in the amount of available CA and the to
hit values in each fleet. Currently it’s too big a part of the
game, considering the following:
- You can’t get away from it with clever manoeuvring, the Arcs are too wide and movement rarely takes you outside a Scan/Sig Bubble.
- PD against a fair amount of the larger CA dedicated groups like pissing into a strong headwind. Whether through sheer weight of fire, or if against Shaltari it’s completely ignored, the average PD value of most ships is no real defence.
- The average to hit roll of a CA weapon is 3+ that means half the hits that happen are twice as hard to get rid of, and ignore an armour save straight away. Something here really needs to change.
Crunching some numbers
(with Maths Mike help, cheers Buddy!) I’ve compared the major Close
Action boats in the game getting an Alpha strike vs the
Heracles/Minos Battleship in the PHR, for the following reasons;
- It’s the toughest ship in the game (Like your Mum).
- It’s the most expensive ship in the game (Like your Mum).
- It’s slower than a Reliant Robin going uphill, so will likely get hit first (Like your…no….Wait. I don’t condone that).
So using the hardest
thing to kill in the game I would think is a good benchmark in order
to give an idea of whether or not Close Action stats need another
pass.
*Things
to bear in mind though; is that attacking ships involved here are
alpha striking (i.e. striking first), against no external modifiers.
(ECM etc)*
* I’m only using bald
median averages for the shots randomisation and I haven’t included
any other Primary armaments, the Taipei, Wyvern and Djinn all have
other pop guns to add damage potential.
*
Points
|
Ship
Qty
|
Median
Dice Average
|
Normal
Hits
|
Crit
Hits
|
Minos
PD Average
|
Crits
getting through
|
Hits
getting through after armour saves
|
Damage
Done Total Before Crippled Roll
|
|
Taipei
Qty
|
4+
Hits (avg)
|
||||||||
78
|
2
|
15
|
7.5
|
5
|
2.5
|
4
|
0.5
|
1.67
|
2.17
|
117
|
3
|
22.5
|
11.25
|
7.5
|
3.75
|
4
|
1.75
|
2.50
|
4.25
|
156
|
4
|
30
|
15
|
10
|
5
|
4
|
3
|
3.33
|
6.33
|
195
|
5
|
37.5
|
18.75
|
12.5
|
6.25
|
4
|
4.25
|
4.17
|
8.42
|
234
|
6
|
45
|
22.5
|
15
|
7.5
|
4
|
5.5
|
5.00
|
10.50
|
273
|
7
|
52.5
|
26.25
|
17.5
|
8.75
|
4
|
6.75
|
5.83
|
12.58
|
312
|
8
|
60
|
30
|
20
|
10
|
4
|
8
|
6.67
|
14.67
|
351
|
9
|
67.5
|
33.75
|
22.5
|
11.25
|
4
|
9.25
|
7.50
|
16.75
|
390
|
10
|
75
|
37.5
|
25
|
12.5
|
4
|
10.5
|
8.33
|
18.83
|
Amethyst
Qty
|
3+
hits (avg)
|
||||||||
48
|
1
|
4
|
2.67
|
1.33
|
1.33
|
0
|
1.33
|
0.44
|
1.78
|
96
|
2
|
8
|
5.33
|
2.67
|
2.67
|
0
|
2.67
|
0.89
|
3.56
|
144
|
3
|
12
|
8.00
|
4.00
|
4.00
|
0
|
4.00
|
1.33
|
5.33
|
192
|
4
|
16
|
10.67
|
5.33
|
5.33
|
0
|
5.33
|
1.78
|
7.11
|
240
|
5
|
20
|
13.33
|
6.67
|
6.67
|
0
|
6.67
|
2.22
|
8.89
|
288
|
6
|
24
|
16.00
|
8.00
|
8.00
|
0
|
8.00
|
2.67
|
10.67
|
Djinn Qty | 3+ Hits (Avg) | ||||||||
86 | 2 | 11 | 7.33 | 3.67 | 3.67 | 4 | 1.67 | 1.83 | 3.50 |
129 | 3 | 16.5 | 11.00 | 5.50 | 5.50 | 4 | 3.50 | 2.75 | 6.25 |
172 | 4 | 22 | 14.67 | 7.33 | 7.33 | 4 | 5.33 | 3.67 | 9.00 |
215 | 5 | 27.5 | 18.33 | 9.17 | 9.17 | 4 | 7.17 | 4.58 | 11.75 |
258 | 6 | 33 | 22.00 | 11.00 | 11.00 | 4 | 9.00 | 5.50 | 14.50 |
301 | 7 | 38.5 | 25.67 | 12.83 | 12.83 | 4 | 10.83 | 6.42 | 17.25 |
344 | 8 | 44 | 29.33 | 14.67 | 14.67 | 4 | 12.67 | 7.33 | 20.00 |
387 | 9 | 49.5 | 33.00 | 16.50 | 16.50 | 4 | 14.50 | 8.25 | 22.75 |
UPDATED DJINN TABLE WITH CORRECT FORMULA
UPDATED WYVERN TABLE WITH CORRECT FORMULA (HOPEFULLY...)
Wyvern Qty | 3+ Hits (Avg) | ||||||||
105 | 1 | 11 | 7.33 | 3.67 | 3.67 | 4 | 1.67 | 1.83 | 3.50 |
210 | 2 | 22 | 14.67 | 7.33 | 7.33 | 4 | 5.33 | 3.67 | 9.00 |
315 | 3 | 33 | 22.00 | 11.00 | 11.00 | 4 | 9.00 | 5.50 | 14.50 |
*
- The Left hand columns in Red represent the points worth of group overtaking the Minos in amount.
- The Right hand Columns in Red represent the point at which the Average Damage over takes the half way point for a Minos Hull points.
So from this we can
read that the Taipei currently represents best value Close action
ship vs a Minos (remembering the Minos/Heracles is the toughest ship
in the game bald stats wise without resorting to special
rules/Passives) seeing as its 12pts cheaper as a group for 7 Taipei
to cripple a Minos on average. Now importantly remember that this is
pure averages we are playing with here, barring whatever luck
modifier you feel you have attached to yourself.
A large close action
group roaming around the board is a very, very dangerous prospect
considering that most of the time they will be going after much
smaller targets with lower PD and Hull. Let’s imagine
conservatively that you wander the board with a large group of Taipei
say around 7-9, this power group will easily cripple/destroy a ship a
turn. Add in the usual ablative loss of a couple of frigates and this
group is extremely dangerous for a good few turns, especially early
game as they zoom around after the early appearing troopships that
are lacking the protective escort assault battlegroups.
Currently the only
thing stopping mega power CA battlegroups forming is because this
game is still early days and this ruling isn’t well known yet!
(Sorry to be a signal booster for this…Oops)
I will caveat this
statement with the fact that Frigates are fragile so if hit and going
pop they can chain react pretty strongly. This is not however
guaranteed, not all explosion radius will be large enough to really
push a chain reaction and not all explosions are strong enough to
cause one in the first place. Importantly one weapon system
can target one ship a turn, and eight-nine frigates can
saturate one chosen target and sneak pretty quickly for an
alpha strike, by a kind of reverse ‘shoaling’. For example a
group of Taipei spreads out and tries to keep 2”-3” gaps between
themselves to provide protection from chain explosions. Then in the
chosen alpha strike turn they manoeuvre into scan range and overwhelm
the chosen target with sheer weight of fire.
Alpha Strike a gogo! |
So is Close Action
broken?
I would actually say
no, not hugely, but it is bent and will skew the way the game is
played. By discouraging people from taking larger points sink ships, if only
to see them fall to marauding mondo-huge groups of Frigates.
Which
I’m sure you’ll agree just doesn’t feel right.
Now my team mates have
said a few things that will change up the way Close Action is done:
Mike:
- Limit Close Action to 6” range across the board.
- Close Action shouldn’t Critical.
Dan:
- Limit the Firing Arcs more to force manoeuvring.
- Close Action shouldn’t Critical.
Joe:
- Didn’t answer…. Just picked his nose and giggled.
- It’s alright he won’t read this article, he never reads these things.
In my case I disagree
with Mike on the pure limitation of Close Action, it’s too big a
change to the core system to me. But I see the underlying point that
Scan range on Frigates in general is rather high considering relative
Signature Ratings. I agree with Dan about Firing Arcs being more
limited, having a solo front arc on some of the CA focused ships
would force a style of play that means a ship would have to commit to
a manoeuvre. I disagree with both after some deeper thought on the
CA shouldn’t Critical roll, I think that’s a very big change
that would warrant a lot of shifting of stats in the end. But then I
prefer the softly, softly approach to changing rules, preferring
stats changes to big rules changes. But usually takes me a lot longer
to work through my suggestions, my off-the-cuff suggestions tend to
be awful.
Ed:
- Up the Taipei’s points 5-7pts a piece.
- General rebalance of the Scan characteristics of Frigates (Especially Shaltari, 12”?! Are you kidding me?)
- Limit Close Action weapons to Front Arc on most ships. (Means a ship can blast past a pack of frigates to force escape, Scourge would find this especially useful as they are speedy mofos)
OR
- Add the following line to the close action rule, “Close action Criticals on one higher than a normal rolls, I.e. +3 as opposed to +2” (Have to fit in a big a sweeping change somewhere otherwise it wouldn’t be an OB Post. ;-)
But anyway that’s all
pie in the sky. So for the moment make hay while the sun shines and
all hail Drop Frigate Commander!
Anyway that’s that
rant over onto the next knotty problem.
Command Cards:
Rather brilliantly, command cards aren’t out yet and they have hilariously the largest
set of clarifications as to the usage of them. But purely in their
usage. What I can glean from the FAQ clarifications is that there are
four main types of card target, Ship, Group, Battlegroup, and Fleet.
The clarification goes into how the cards interact with each other.
But effectively you can kind of, sort of, stack but can’t target a
ship and its group with extra cards.
From what I can tell here is my
understanding of card targeting;
Eds Key of
understanding:
(Imagine this as if all
played in one turn, order in which they appear is order in which
cards are played. If type appears between slashes it means pick one
of those using restrictions as already detailed)
- Ship + Ship = No
- Ship + Group = No
- Group + Ship = No
- Group + Group = No
- Battlegroup + Battlegroup = No
- Battlegroup + Group/Ship = Yes
- Group/Ship + Battlegroup = Yes
- Fleet + Fleet = No
- Fleet + Battlegroup/Group/Ship = Yes
- Battlegroup/Group/Ship + Fleet = Yes
- Fleet + Battlegroup + Group/Ship = Yes
- Group/Ship + Battlegroup + Fleet = Yes
Players targeting
opponent’s follows the same restriction but ignores their
opponent’s card targets plays.
- I hope that makes sense
- I really hope I’ve got that right!
Anyway I’m really
glad this FAQ/Errata came out its good to see Hawk continuing to
support its second game! I really like the potential in this game
with its clever mechanics, but it’s still early days and we’ve a
ways to go till it’s as tightly balanced a system as Dropzone.
If I’ve missed
anything out important let me know in the comments and I’ll respond
accordingly.
The math on the scourge close action ships is wrong. It looks like you copied the formula from the Taipai for doing up the scourge which resulted in halving the number of crits the djinn and wyvern get on average.
ReplyDeleteAdditiomally, Scourge Caw specialists are F/S
DeleteYou are correct sir my formula there is wrong although I didn't copy paste I stupidly targeted the wrong column in excel! Doh.
DeleteWill fix now thanks for the pointer.
Luckily it didn't undermine my point if anything I underpowered the scourge.
Nice writeup, Ed! Two posts in a row for you, eh? Well done.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to leave a message here for Joe... Erm, never mind... >.<
LOL!
Dave discussed some ways to reduce "missile frigate spam", as he put it. I guess it's a thing over there. Over here, on the western side of the Atlantic, we haven't seen it as much (at least not in Phoenix, which is way further west still). I guess we're just more sporting and less gamey in general than you Brits...
Naaaah! You're just ahead of the curve! (For once!).
Ha!
8^D
But it is _very_ early in the game's existence, and I do enjoy it, so nowhere to go but up!
I disagree with the idea of Taipei being too cheap, and I don't even play UCM. Each race has some special for them - Shaltari can fire from 12'' and avoid PD entirely, Scourge can hide in atmosphere and safely get close to their enemy or create sort of mine field. Taipei have only their firepower - they have to go close and personal without much of the protection - they should be cheaper then other frigates.
ReplyDeleteThx 4 the honest write up. CA are brutal, kind of like a bunch of DD/FG/PT109 rhino rushing into close range to dump off their torpedo spread vs the carrier or BB.
ReplyDeleteI like the post. The topic is very interesting and I agree on several points
ReplyDeleteMy personal opinion is as follows.
Shaltari scan should be decreased to 10. The shaltari sniping is bogus at this point. 22 inch threat range for turquise... 10 inch range seems much more in line with the rest.
Amethyst are not really effected by the PD thing due to beam. They are effective in smaller groups, which actually makes them more dangerous. A low SR gives you a more reliable 2 turn threat with last / first activation giving them an effective threat range of 48 (max thrust 24 + 12 thrust + 12 scan) and can reliably cripple a San Fran. With shields up in the middle of the enemy fleet they really screws up any plans they had.
The low scan of the UCM ships makes it much more in line with the idea of larger ships needing a screening of lighter ships.
So for example:
An unsupported BS gets taken out by a massed Frigate torpedo run. Cinematic as fuck.
If the BS had a smaller screen of anti frigate ships in front of it it could be protected. For the CAW frigates to get into range of their target, they must then place themselves within strike range of your counter target. Then we are in the realm of tactics and that makes it fun.
Remember that the effective strike range of a large Taipei group is just 16 since you cant reliably get 2 activations in a row.
I would say that in general you would have a really difficult time building more than 2 effective (6+) Taipei groups. Perhaps 3 if you stretch it, in a 1250pts game.
Rgarding the diminishing scan values for frigates, I would make the change somewhat smaller. Perhaps just making it a 2 inch difference between the ship types.
So you're saying Amethysts are the least effective damage to cost versus the Minos. So the other factions are actually the broken trash. Good to know ;-)
ReplyDeleteSo you're saying Amethysts are the least effective damage to cost versus the Minos. So the other factions are actually the broken trash. Good to know ;-)
ReplyDelete