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[Rules] Weapon Limitations

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FrostJaeger

Banned Member
For Reviewers:
  • Contains Unapproved Sub-Articles? No.
  • Contains Links to Unapproved Articles? No.
  • Contains New Art? No.
  • Previously Submitted? Yes; was rejected by Wes.
  • Changelog: N/A
  • Checklist Requested? Yes.

Inspired by the post Wes made in this thread and by the results Fred compiled here.

Note: This thread is not for discussing potential issues with DRv3 - such as missiles and rate-of-fire - nor is it for discussing potential issues with the NTSE. If you want to discuss either of the above, make a separate thread. Inflammatory/off-topic/toxic/troll posts can and will be reported to staff members.

EDIT: Post updated to reflect overhaul.
 
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NOT an NTSE. However, I'd probably do something to note that a 10 TEW ship has to incorporate higher tech then is typically and is likely made as a cutting-edge ship by a Yamatai level power. Or something along those lines.
 
What about weapons that are below the tier of the ship itself? I like to include point defense in my designs, but I don't think that should impact the weapons the ship carries that are the equivalent tier and above. Under these rules, even the older the Plumeria couldn't keep any of its array of Tier 9 turrets. My refit would be similarly impacted. I'm also unsure of how this should apply to missile launchers, since it's the missiles themselves which convey the DR and don't take up much relative space. This could break my Plumeria refit further, even though every single weapon has its needed space mapped out on the deck plan, including missile storage.
 
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I think one solution would be to make point defense weapons cost half of what they would normally cost. To prevent players from abusing this, we could classify point defense weapons as any weapon at least 3 tiers below the ship's tier.
 
That still wouldn't help the Plumeria given that its turrets are two below, and that it would leave no "slots" for the point defense weapons anyway at this reduced value, but at least people are thinking. I'd prefer that point defense didn't impact the offensive weapons at all and vice-versa, provided those weapons could reasonably fit. Please consider them independently of each other.

I also see this ruining the ability of Starfighters to carry Ke-Z1 missiles under their wings simply because of math, and missile launchers in general. This, if forced back into relevancy, is too vague as it is due to being better suited to offensive energy weapons than other options. It doesn't seem to consider the other aspects of starship weapon design.

Edit: Struckthrough an error.
 
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The majority of the ships on the site don’t follow the 8 tier rule anyways.

Missiles / Rate of Fire / carrying fighters all break DRv3 as well.

You’re kinda going to have to accept DRv3 doesn’t work for ship designers / GMs / etc. but the solution to that is to rework DRv3 completely later. But for the time being: how much DR does your Refit have under the current system and how high would we need to adjust his to fit?

I’m guessing it’s closer to 12 on tier weapons or about 20-24 if you include fighters. That seems to be about where other ships tend to fall.
 
@Tosh, the article states you can trade a TEW for 2 Teir-1 weapons. So say that you have 4 teir-2 weapons, you would still have 7 TEW to play with.
 
First, I don't see any reference for how it handles weapons below tier in the submission beyond a vaguely stated "and vice versa" which may or may not apply to this. All conversions were Tier+0 or above, though some went back and forth. That's part of my problem.

Also, my apologies, some corrections. The ship has two kinds of turrets, most of which are Tier-4 and four of which are 2 below Tier -2. Here's a reference.

2D (Current Standard):
2E (Refit):
Plumeria 2D has 1 main gun at Tier+2, 2 canons at Tier+0, 2 missiles at ~Tier+0 (has used up 8 slots at this point if the missiles count), 4 turrets at Tier -2, and 11 cannons at Tier -4. This might just barely squeeze in as 10 slots depending purely on interpretation of how the Lower Tier weapons and the missiles are computed. Also, are individual missiles mounted to the ship counted in the total as I've done here? If so, starfighters might not be able to carry them anymore.

2E Refit has 1 Tier+2 main gun, 4 Tier+0 launchers, 8 ~Tier+0 missile tubes (only two face any given direction, rather than having 2 multi-axis launchers. Are these calculated as two weapons for this?), 4 Tier-2 turrets, and 15 Tier-4 turrets. This uses up 10 slots (depending purely on interpretation of the missile tubes), and then there are the turrets.

It should also be noted that the Plumeria is considered Tier 11, but barely fits into Tier 12 measurements...likely because its main gun consists of much of the front of the ship, and removing the gun entirely would make it a Tier 11 for more realistic armor considerations. Does that mean that the main gun doesn't count toward its 8-10 point limit since it is literally constructed outside of the Tier 11 ship's boundaries? Should the ship should be calculated as a Tier 12 for weapon purposes under this system? This is an example of the kind of questions we'll run into if this is adopted as-is.

I also know that the Chiaki is in the same boat, fitting well into Tier 11 even though it's labeled as Tier 10. I'm planning to make a Chiaki variant with Sakura-like attributes (including a main gun spike that makes it longer) in the future that this all may impact notably.
 
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That's roughly an 18 TEW ship. However, the big expense is not the lots of tier-2 and tier-4 weapons. 4 tier-2 is only 1 TEW. While 16 tier-4 is still 1 TEW. Getting rid of those would only save you 2 TEW.

I feel like an upgraded cutting edge Plumaria would have a good argument to be a 10 TEW ship. So I feel like not being able to have point defense weapons isn't something that should be holding you back.
 
Yeah, by these rules point defense comes cheap (really good for countering the mess that is missiles!) so even spamming a hundred PD lasers on really doesn't hurt you too badly. In fact a -4 tier PD laser, spammed x64 is really only 2 points. That's probably enough to deflect most missile barrages.

However there's an issue in that some people might make it so their weapons are able to focus energy together so they fire an even bigger beam. In that case point defense breaks everything since you can get 16 points (20 if you're Yamatai because you're OP) and nuke the world with a +4 weapon.
 
The article does not explicitly state that the downward conversion to lower tier works that way. Again, that's part of my problem. We're also ignoring the missile question thus far.
 
Missiles are a hard spot to deal with and I feel like this thread could be really useful for the game system theorists to debate about it.
 
I remember when DRv2 came along. It became more practical OOCly to use a bunch of smaller weapons than a few big ones. When DRv3 came along, that became dated. I keep worrying about OOC 'forced obsolescence' of designs because of the rules that come and go...and this one has literally come, gone, and is trying to come again. And okay, Frost. Sorry to clutter it, but I had thoughts.
 
The DRv2 ‘lots of turrets’ problem was easily solvable by allowing for weapons to be higher than strength 5 but no one wanted to do that until we started calling it something else.
 
I appreciate how much work and thought you put into this subject @FrostJaeger. I know this is a subject that really matters to you, but I really can't see this working to the benefit of the site. Changes like this make older designs overpowered and I believe that if you made a more loose fitting set of principles to avoid and/or follow it would be far more usable in the NTSE process.
 
Toshiro said:
That still wouldn't help the Plumeria given that its turrets are two below, and that it would leave no "slots" for the point defense weapons anyway at this reduced value, but at least people are thinking. I'd prefer that point defense didn't impact the offensive weapons at all and vice-versa, provided those weapons could reasonably fit. Please consider them independently of each other.
Click to expand...

I think in that case, I'd suggest making point defense weapons half price, maybe even quarter price points wise but with a maximum tier of 8 @Toshiro.
 
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I'm way too tired to actually go in dept with this and do more than skim. So, three remarks:

1. Not a rule, a guideline. In application, something like 10 happened when you were a ship of a size that was at the top-end of one tier but could qualify for the other... so, some flexibility in the loadout to meet the desired vision seemed reasonable.

2. I'm not at all surprised that Toshiro has a problem with this. I've always perceived as Plumeria Refit as dangerous in how above its weight I perceived its loadout to be, and he differed in opinion. So, yeah, I wasn't holding my breath on that one.

3. In answer to @Toshiro 's question, converting down is actually fairly easy: One Tier10 weapon is worth two Tier9 weapons, or 4 Tier8 weapons, or 8 Tier7 weapons, or 16 Tier6 weapons, or 32 Tier5 weapons, etc... I've sometimes had to use fractions to actually tally up the armament of ships with a wide-range of weapons (i.e.: these anti-armor turrets take 5/32 and those anti-mecha turrets take 9/16... so both grouped together actually take up 23/32 of a "same tier weapon").
 
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Going to keep this brief, as I have work soon - and I promise that I will make a longer post tonight after work; yesterday I had to close by myself, which resulted in me being too exhausted to post anything substantial when I finally got home.

Anyhoo, here goes.
  • I feel that giving point-defense weapons their own “slot” will only lead to less ships with missile-heavy armaments and/or ships with a ridiculously large amount of missiles.
  • I’ll be creating a thread for discussing missiles, as it seems to be a rather large concern regarding these rules.
  • In order to assuage the concerns regarding the Plumeria (and other older ships), how about this: equipment utilized exclusively by the SMDIoN and/or SAoY is exempt from these rules due to Yamatai and Nepleslia being the largest ICly/two “superpowers” of the setting/oldest OOCly/etc. - and before it gets asked, no, this exemption will not be granted to any other faction in the future.
  • Stop trying to derail this thread, @Zack; the next time it happens, I will ask the staff to revoke your posting privileges for this thread. Rate of fire and fighters do not break DRv3, nor will I accept that DRv3 doesn’t work for ship designers/GMs/etc., because that claim is completely and utterly false. Why? Simple: in Star Army, the only person I’ve seen complaining about DRv3 is, well, you - and a system that works for everyone save a single person isn’t a system that needs to be reworked.
  • In my opinion, the weapon systems in turrets should be counted individually in order to prevent powergaming abominations like “turrets” with four autocannons, eight mini-missile launchers, and eight missile launchers.
  • The question regarding the Plumeria’s main gun extending into the realm of T12 due to being constructed outside of the ship’s boundaries is - with no offense meant towards @Toshiro - one that in my opinion falls under the jurisdiction of common sense, similar to the ruling on the C5-02a.
  • You’re not cluttering it, Toshiro, you’re bringing up some very good points. *pap*
  • Your...concerns have been noted, @Rizzo, however I will not be withdrawing this submission.

Edit: Here’s the discussion thread for missiles.
 
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FrostJaeger said:
  • In my opinion, the weapon systems in turrets should be counted individually in order to prevent powergaming abominations like “turrets” with four autocannons, eight mini-missile launchers, and eight missile launchers.
Click to expand...

First off, I would like to thank you for the addition of clarifying language in the submission article. While people reasonably presumed that lower tier weapons worked in this manner, presumptions do not make rules. I prefer having it explicitly stated. The SMDION and SAOY exclusion may also need explicitly added there if it is to be adopted.

I guess part of my issue wasn't just that the math that the turrets involved, but the line between offensive and point defense weaponry didn't exist in the eyes of this submission. The turret 'clusters' you propose cease to be point defense, so those don't really seem to be a conflict that could arise provided the wording was indicative that it was for point defense. My missile concerns were completely separate, but will be discussed in the other thread since we're branching that off.

Most of my work will likely fall more or less into the bounds of this anyway, with the Plumeria 2E being a more extreme case of internal optimization freeing up stupid amounts of space, combined with the whole idea of making an optimized 'hero ship' and, let's face it, my character having a special place in his heart for the bird. Plumeria 2E was meant to be a worthy face of the RP if it was called upon to be such over the 2D.

As for the conceptual "Pocket Gunship Chiaki variant" I am considering, everything stat and purpose-wise makes me think it'll be a Tier 11 anyway. I've been grappling with that one for months, and the current Chiaki refit is only Tier 10 apparently because its original was downgraded in comparison to the Plumeria, which was in turn downgraded because including its main gun is cheating for armor considerations. I agree that common sense should rule the day, just expect questions for anything with spike weaponry that pushes it over the edge to the next Tier. "Chubbing up your phallic weapon is cheating" sounds like a good guide to live by though.
 
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