It took people a while to adjust to the present DR system, too. Referring back to the description pages and such. There's always adjustments.
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Fred's musing on Damage Ratings
- Thread starter Fred
- Start date
Sigma
Inactive Member
Why not do a few trial role-plays? A couple done by you (Fred) to show us (the players) how you envision it running. Then a couple by other GMs to see if they run it. After that, we collect people's opinions and see what they think of the system. With actual data, we can answer objections and concerns.
These don't have to be full-blown plotships. Since it's the damage rating system that's the main focus, you could do a small skirmish scenario that starts before, say, an ambush. A team of power armoured soldiers going up against an ambush force of... a large mecha and some power armour troops. Another scenario in which our brave heroes are just surrounded by a lot more enemy power armour than them so the only disparity is in numbers rather than equipment.
These don't have to be full-blown plotships. Since it's the damage rating system that's the main focus, you could do a small skirmish scenario that starts before, say, an ambush. A team of power armoured soldiers going up against an ambush force of... a large mecha and some power armour troops. Another scenario in which our brave heroes are just surrounded by a lot more enemy power armour than them so the only disparity is in numbers rather than equipment.
Toshiro
Inactive Member
From what I've been told, Fred's been doing something similar for a while. Also, for those who might not be aware, we already have an optional more concrete system which Fred's system is meant to simplify. We pretty much have ships with HP flying around, it's just often disregarded. This would still be optional, but reduce that "DnD" element.
SSharp said:
A while back I had a conversation with Fred about his shield concept, which he helped me figure out a solution to. I going to quote the issue in my next post.
An short aside for Fred, Nashoba, Wes, and ShotJon:
However before I get to my main point, I do want to point out that to help my own way with making Fred's idea more concrete. In fact, some of you I am at least trying to help impliment the conceptual side of the point the Engineering Guide; however, their are a lot of typos already so I don't want to post any links to the guide until it ready.
I am not trying to stop Nashoba, Wes, or Fred from making a wikipage explaining how the new DR System and Shields work. In fact I would suggest that they do so if they are not already. What I am trying to do is tac on something to help the new DR system.
Confused so far? Good 
I honestly had to get that aside out about what I am doing right now, so Fred has an update. I also wanted to make clear that I had a problem not have a problem with Fred DR System.
________________________
The Problem
To quote Fred:
My main concern was an issue of how we demarcate, or reorganize, shields and other defense systems into these new concepts of shield, barrier, and energy armor.
What I had problems with I felt that that people in SARP may disagree whether something is a shield, barrier, or energy armor as we apply Fred's new DR System. This was because I feel that shield, barrier, and energy armor are being used as "new terms" and people may not agree on there new meanings.
However, demarcation itself is an ok thing. In fact its what science does every day and is a fundamental aspect of the scientific method that makes things simple. By evolution we literally could not survive as a species unless we took this scientific approach of demarcating and unification. Philosophically speaking, unification is a fundamental human instinct not something logical. (And I have philosophy paper by Thomas Samuel Kuhn for all you fear mongrels out there)
So what Fred is suggesting is something ok and continually necessary for survival. We just need to solve this minor problem.
_________________________
Solution:
The solution to the problem was actually simpler than describing the problem itself. The solution is to do two things:
1) First we universally define these three terms as concrete laws. Fred helped define these in a chat a had with him in IRC.
*Definitions*
A Shield:
A Barrier:
A Energized Armor:
This ones pretty self explanatory.
2) The second things is was my idea that we could then ask the faction managers or article creators to go to the wikipages of the shields their factions use and add this tiny little line:
Where the inster text option the FM puts either: "Shield", "Barrier", or "Energized Armor".
This way the faction managers have made clear what each shield technology in SARP does since ultimately they have the final say. Thus any disagreement has been avoided.
I honestly had to get that aside out about what I am doing right now, so Fred has an update. I also wanted to make clear that I had a problem not have a problem with Fred DR System.
________________________
The Problem
To quote Fred:
Fred said:
My main concern was an issue of how we demarcate, or reorganize, shields and other defense systems into these new concepts of shield, barrier, and energy armor.
What I had problems with I felt that that people in SARP may disagree whether something is a shield, barrier, or energy armor as we apply Fred's new DR System. This was because I feel that shield, barrier, and energy armor are being used as "new terms" and people may not agree on there new meanings.
However, demarcation itself is an ok thing. In fact its what science does every day and is a fundamental aspect of the scientific method that makes things simple. By evolution we literally could not survive as a species unless we took this scientific approach of demarcating and unification. Philosophically speaking, unification is a fundamental human instinct not something logical. (And I have philosophy paper by Thomas Samuel Kuhn for all you fear mongrels out there)
So what Fred is suggesting is something ok and continually necessary for survival. We just need to solve this minor problem.
_________________________
Solution:
The solution to the problem was actually simpler than describing the problem itself. The solution is to do two things:
1) First we universally define these three terms as concrete laws. Fred helped define these in a chat a had with him in IRC.
*Definitions*
A Shield:
Please note for this new term shields we have reduced it to distortion shielding or deflection shielding. Its a particular confusing term. However, I remember someone mentioning Wes is very particular about distortion shielding so I want to get this ok first before we give this definition a better name.
A Barrier:
Under the old System you might still call these "hit point" shields. However, as concept of hit points is not necessary and can be easily replaced with a concept of three values like Fred has suggested for other things.
A Energized Armor:
This ones pretty self explanatory.
2) The second things is was my idea that we could then ask the faction managers or article creators to go to the wikipages of the shields their factions use and add this tiny little line:
Code:
===== <Article Header Text> =====
| Shield Type: || <insert text>|Where the inster text option the FM puts either: "Shield", "Barrier", or "Energized Armor".
This way the faction managers have made clear what each shield technology in SARP does since ultimately they have the final say. Thus any disagreement has been avoided.
I don't see how Zack's argument is solved.
Nor do I really understand what you're getting at, phacon.
We have opposing tech for different factions. Yamatai uses distortion shields with maybe some scalar shielding, and the hardened "barrier" technology it got from the NDI; Nepleslia uses three different types of shields, with maybe one of those being of "barrier" type; Abwehrans don't even use shields; Gartagens use defense screens that possibly act like barriers and can be projected for dozens of kilometers; and the NMX use alien technology we do not define.
This doesn't even touch armor, which we define with SP.
Right now, all those differences are irrelevant under the DR system. If the whole point of this is to make PvP possible, or to maintain a defined set of rules that cross factions, we should keep the DR system. By doing so, we avoid plunging ourselves into an enormous pissing contest over whose protective measures defeat what weapons and how.
The Priss Scale could give protective measures unique properties that matter, and help players gain a true sense of a faction's technology beyond the fluff. However, it would require trusting each other not to use those properties to gain an upper hand on another faction.
It depends on why we are doing this. Fred said that he wants to make things easier for players. Zack, I imagine, is more concerned with PvP opportunities. Techheads want defined rules; roleplayers want fewer restrictions.
Nor do I really understand what you're getting at, phacon.
We have opposing tech for different factions. Yamatai uses distortion shields with maybe some scalar shielding, and the hardened "barrier" technology it got from the NDI; Nepleslia uses three different types of shields, with maybe one of those being of "barrier" type; Abwehrans don't even use shields; Gartagens use defense screens that possibly act like barriers and can be projected for dozens of kilometers; and the NMX use alien technology we do not define.
This doesn't even touch armor, which we define with SP.
Right now, all those differences are irrelevant under the DR system. If the whole point of this is to make PvP possible, or to maintain a defined set of rules that cross factions, we should keep the DR system. By doing so, we avoid plunging ourselves into an enormous pissing contest over whose protective measures defeat what weapons and how.
The Priss Scale could give protective measures unique properties that matter, and help players gain a true sense of a faction's technology beyond the fluff. However, it would require trusting each other not to use those properties to gain an upper hand on another faction.
It depends on why we are doing this. Fred said that he wants to make things easier for players. Zack, I imagine, is more concerned with PvP opportunities. Techheads want defined rules; roleplayers want fewer restrictions.
Honestly, I came mostly at the tail end of this discussion, so I am not as familiar with Zack's problem as I should be. I thought though the issue was shields having hit points and that not being realistic. To solve that, the idea was I guess to have three separate categories. ""distortion""(*) shielding and energy armor shielding--Two of those are definitely things that don't use hit points, but instead they would be based on Fred's idea of a three point system.
The last type of shielding, "barriers", might have hit points (at least that how we treat them right now), but under Fred's system they wouldn't.
Nitpicking aside (see ** for Nitpicking), I do realize that there are a lot of differences between how factions use shielding and as you pointed out separating shielding into three categories may highlight those differences.
Honestly, I really just want to simplify things and avoid a pissing contest as you put it and I think Fred would too. I feel like maybe people would see differences between the three categories as so arbitrary that they did not matter. As you put when you mentioned a "Priss scale", a lot of that would be based on trust. If there is a way to ensure that trust or direct avoidance of pissing contest, I am open to suggestions. The point this though we can no longer hide behind numbers of DR System we currently use. Well actually, we could, but I think people already pointed out other problems with the current DR System.
Asides:
______
*Still using quotes because I still am waiting for Wes's opinion on whether or not, he is ok with calling this shielding type as a whole distortion shielding, since they are all similar to distortion shielding in the or wishes it to be called something else
**Well to nitpick, I think the I think the NMX would be more barrier or "distortion" shielding. Gartagens defensive screens would definitely fall into either the energy armor category or barrier category depending on how big the shield is. Also, the Abwehrans do have their own type of shielding that was approved. Please see Harb Bubble Shielding and Hazard Shielding. Whether they use it or not, of course is something I do not know.
The last type of shielding, "barriers", might have hit points (at least that how we treat them right now), but under Fred's system they wouldn't.
Doshii Jun said:
Nitpicking aside (see ** for Nitpicking), I do realize that there are a lot of differences between how factions use shielding and as you pointed out separating shielding into three categories may highlight those differences.
Honestly, I really just want to simplify things and avoid a pissing contest as you put it and I think Fred would too. I feel like maybe people would see differences between the three categories as so arbitrary that they did not matter. As you put when you mentioned a "Priss scale", a lot of that would be based on trust. If there is a way to ensure that trust or direct avoidance of pissing contest, I am open to suggestions. The point this though we can no longer hide behind numbers of DR System we currently use. Well actually, we could, but I think people already pointed out other problems with the current DR System.
Asides:
______
*Still using quotes because I still am waiting for Wes's opinion on whether or not, he is ok with calling this shielding type as a whole distortion shielding, since they are all similar to distortion shielding in the or wishes it to be called something else
**Well to nitpick, I think the I think the NMX would be more barrier or "distortion" shielding. Gartagens defensive screens would definitely fall into either the energy armor category or barrier category depending on how big the shield is. Also, the Abwehrans do have their own type of shielding that was approved. Please see Harb Bubble Shielding and Hazard Shielding. Whether they use it or not, of course is something I do not know.
Fred
Retired Staff
You're making mountains out of molehills, Phacon. Take it easy.
The protective layers I presented are more or less a varying degree of plotshielding afforded to units. I use distorsion shields, gravimetric barriers and energized armor as a starting basis because they are what I know Yamatai (and the UOC) could use, with Mishhu and Nepleslian having technology that comes very close.
For Star Army of Yamatai ships, the very nature of their Combined Field System is to, well, combine different kind of protections together to give their vessels maximum protective coverage. Distorsion and gravimetric shields are pretty well established, while energized armor is somewhat newer.
Put at the very basics, the function for each layer of protections runs as follow: distorsion shields bend away attacks before they can hit the target, gravimetric barriers cause incoming attacks to suffer premature impacts, while the energized armor increases the amount of punishment a ship's hull armor can sustain without being compromised.
For some more evocative picture of those:
I offered to establish these protections in a manner that would be much easier to keep track of. Keeping in mind more individual shield types affords their intended use more credence and purpose and places a bit more meaning in weapon choices too.
I wanted to settle for three damage conditions for each protection types: active, drained, depleted. With three states, it's much easier to keep track of for GMs. Arguably for Star Army GMs, keeping track of 3 protection types could in turn heighten that complexity, but I don't see it as any worse than keeping mentally track of zesuaium's strengths against heat, electricity and kinetic attacks.
It also kind of supports situational needs of plotships better. It's very hard for players to picture enemy attacks coming in from '45-degrees above you, astern of the ship'. However, they have much more ease keeping track of other narrative elements such as 'a torpedo is coming in'. This way, 'transfer fore shield power to the aft quadrant' is just as laudable as 'transfer power from distorsion shields to gravimetric barrier'.
The premise of that is that instead of relying on keeping shields constantly at maximum strength, ships have limited energy reserves and instead what they do is 'raise shields' to passive stand-by mode. Whenever an attack is expected to come in, the ships computer has the shields 'brace for impact', thus expending the necessary amount of reserve power to counter the attack.
Deployed energy shielding shouldn't 'lose' hit points to attacks - it either is active or not. Keeping this on trigger and making each span of activation something that's costly however fulfills the need of making them go down via attrition.
As for the actual endurance of those protections, I'd typically scale them by unit type by default to keep things simple (at least for the moment). So...
The above would make shields kind of more like they were in the first DR system, though they'd be much easier to bring down while still allowing the larger units the greater endurance they are entitled to. The vulnerability is there to provide much more interactivity with engineering crews trying to manage/shore up ship protections in mid-combat - something that they can do in the middle of a fight (since actually fixing real ship damage in a fight takes too long to be appreciably done beyond quick juryrigging).
The protective layers I presented are more or less a varying degree of plotshielding afforded to units. I use distorsion shields, gravimetric barriers and energized armor as a starting basis because they are what I know Yamatai (and the UOC) could use, with Mishhu and Nepleslian having technology that comes very close.
For Star Army of Yamatai ships, the very nature of their Combined Field System is to, well, combine different kind of protections together to give their vessels maximum protective coverage. Distorsion and gravimetric shields are pretty well established, while energized armor is somewhat newer.
Put at the very basics, the function for each layer of protections runs as follow: distorsion shields bend away attacks before they can hit the target, gravimetric barriers cause incoming attacks to suffer premature impacts, while the energized armor increases the amount of punishment a ship's hull armor can sustain without being compromised.
For some more evocative picture of those:
- Distorsion shields are pretty much shields as presented in the Nadesico anime - we haven't seen much of them the way things are presently implemented, but I recall Wes telling me that was the original inspiration.
- Gravimetric shields are no doubt very similar to Star Trek TNG's deflector shields and that's likely the energized bubble Wes presents in his plots.
- Finally, energized armor is something that's shown up mostly in the Asamoya and Miharu plots, and the tech also leaked out to UOC ships. The function would be visually the same as the Enterprise-A's shields in Star Trek 6, where the Enterprise gets pummeled by a continuous torpedo barrage but suffers them with blackened spots on its hull. When her protections gave out, the klingon torpedoes just went and tore through the hull rather than exploding on the surface.
I offered to establish these protections in a manner that would be much easier to keep track of. Keeping in mind more individual shield types affords their intended use more credence and purpose and places a bit more meaning in weapon choices too.
I wanted to settle for three damage conditions for each protection types: active, drained, depleted. With three states, it's much easier to keep track of for GMs. Arguably for Star Army GMs, keeping track of 3 protection types could in turn heighten that complexity, but I don't see it as any worse than keeping mentally track of zesuaium's strengths against heat, electricity and kinetic attacks.
It also kind of supports situational needs of plotships better. It's very hard for players to picture enemy attacks coming in from '45-degrees above you, astern of the ship'. However, they have much more ease keeping track of other narrative elements such as 'a torpedo is coming in'. This way, 'transfer fore shield power to the aft quadrant' is just as laudable as 'transfer power from distorsion shields to gravimetric barrier'.
The premise of that is that instead of relying on keeping shields constantly at maximum strength, ships have limited energy reserves and instead what they do is 'raise shields' to passive stand-by mode. Whenever an attack is expected to come in, the ships computer has the shields 'brace for impact', thus expending the necessary amount of reserve power to counter the attack.
Deployed energy shielding shouldn't 'lose' hit points to attacks - it either is active or not. Keeping this on trigger and making each span of activation something that's costly however fulfills the need of making them go down via attrition.
As for the actual endurance of those protections, I'd typically scale them by unit type by default to keep things simple (at least for the moment). So...
- Significantly lower rank attack will see the protection hold indefinitely barring certain circumstances
- Lower rank attack will have the protection hold 'for the moment' without appreciable reduction unless such damage is sustained (that's mostly GM's whim/common sense dictated).
- Same rank attack (medium starship target hit by a medium anti-starship weapon) would see the according protection drained.
- Same rank attack on drained protection would deplete it.
- Higher rank attack would deplete the protection type on the first hit.
- Higher rank attack on drained protection would deplete it and damage the unit or drain the other layer of protection also in the way.
The above would make shields kind of more like they were in the first DR system, though they'd be much easier to bring down while still allowing the larger units the greater endurance they are entitled to. The vulnerability is there to provide much more interactivity with engineering crews trying to manage/shore up ship protections in mid-combat - something that they can do in the middle of a fight (since actually fixing real ship damage in a fight takes too long to be appreciably done beyond quick juryrigging).
Fred
Retired Staff
Not... really.
I mean, the people that approve of the direction made their comments. The detractors have made theirs as well. Wes mentioned he was open to variants being in use, as it allowed others to possibly get what they wanted while leaving him with the status quo he enjoyed as far as running his own plot went.
So... from the way things stand - along with the comments that this should see further testing - I figure my next ship submission and my next plot might serve as a proof-of-concept for this.
It seems to be pretty much all I can do from this point on.
I mean, the people that approve of the direction made their comments. The detractors have made theirs as well. Wes mentioned he was open to variants being in use, as it allowed others to possibly get what they wanted while leaving him with the status quo he enjoyed as far as running his own plot went.
So... from the way things stand - along with the comments that this should see further testing - I figure my next ship submission and my next plot might serve as a proof-of-concept for this.
It seems to be pretty much all I can do from this point on.
