BFG FAQ 2010 Ordnance Questions

[RCgothic]

A couple of other things I wouldn't mind seeing changed, but by no means as essential as the turret suppression:

Massed Turrets:
If a ship is in base contact with other ships, it counts as having +1 turret for each ship in contact for all purposes.

Assault boats:
Turret fire can make attacking certain parts of the ship too risky. Each turret gives a -1 modifier on the critical hit roll. These modifiers can be negated by suppressing fire from escorting fighters as usual.

Critical hits:
Port/Starboard weapons offline: It's crazy that one side should be more likely to be taken offline than the other (3/36 vs 4/36). On a critical hit roll of 4/5 randomise to see which side is taken offline. 1-3: Port, 4-6 Starboard.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

There's nothing wrong with the way bombers work. The problem is with the turret suppression rule, which has the following things wrong with it:

#1. Easily misinterpreted and unintuitive.
#2. Written so the fighters do damage, rather than clear space for the bombers.
#3. Makes high turret targets nearly invulnerable against bombers without a similar handicap to assault boats.
#4. Makes sending more than a token bomber against T3+ pointless, as fighters do more damage than bombers, even when shot down.
#5. Removes any point in shooting turrets, because fighters get the extra attacks anyway.
#6. Completely gimps fighter bombers, because they only roll a D3, which is easily negated by turrets.

The proposed rule is:
When bombers roll for number of attacks against a ship, surviving Fighters in a wave negate one -1 modifier from turrets each, allowing bombers to proceed with their attack runs more easily.

This eliminates all 6 of the above points, at the cost of a slight increase in power of bombers. (which would put them more on a par with assault boats). This isn't complicated, it doesn't mess with the fundamental way bombers work, and is the way many people play it anyway due to misinterpretation of the current rule.

While I do think the rules are fiddly, wouldn't doing it the way you propose actually increase the number of attacks available? Consider:

2 fighters and 2 bombers vs 1 cruiser.

Normally, (D6-turrets)+(D6-turrets)+2.

Under your proposal, assuming the fighters both manage to suppress the turrets it becomes:

D6+D6 which is actually in effect adding an additional 2 attacks for a total of 4 (because the turrets have been removed from the equation).

Kinda makes bombers really overpowering.

I think if that is the way we want things to go then it's time to start marking how many fighters, bombers and AB are being taken in a fleet. I don't mind bombers effectivity being increased but their availability on the table should now be affected by attrition.

[Vaaish]

RC: it does negate your points, but the problem is it makes fleets with high launch bays much more effective. For instance, GW Tau and their 28 LB. send in 10 bombers and 5 fighters against a high turret target like the empy and you are rolling d6 attacks for every surviving bomber rather than d6-5. that's a huge improvement to ordnance since nothing has been done to increase the effectiveness of turrets and you are likely to drop only two enemy markers with your shooting.

on number 3. I don't think this is necessarily a problem as AB are doing different things. bombers are attempting to make multiple passes at the target which is why the turrets are reducing their effectiveness while the AB are driving right into the ship and stopping. What it does do gameplay wise is give you different tactical options for dealing with high turret targets. I don't think we need to have bombers be effective against every target.

[horizon]

Hi Admiral & Vaaish,
thanks for backing me up.

If ordnance increase it is time to restart Nate's pooling idea from Yahoo (some years back).

Or that a ship has:
2x supplement on board.
Thus a Devestation has:
8 fighters
8 bomber
8 assault boats

When a turret succesfully hits that marker is gone for good.
Fighters roll a D6 in the end phase it they have been removed due intercepting torpedoes or markers. On a 4+ they can be launched again. Otherwise disabled.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

Too much. I was thinking more total strength X2 so for a total of 8 markers you can use. You have to list down how many of what type of ordnance one has on a given carrier.

Example.

Dictator. 4 Bays. Max of 8 squadrons. Player chooses what type and how many. Say 4 fighters and 4 bombers. Or 6 fighters and 2 bombers.

Of course, there will have to be some repricing, with carriers generally getting a reduction in points since sooner or later they will run out of ordnance to use. Also since Chaos can use all 3 types of ordnance but are more constricted in the variety, there must also be some realignment there as well as fleets with resilient AC.

[horizon]

Found it:
http://www.sg.tacticalwargames.net/forum/index.php?topic=1849.0

[Vaaish]

Of course, there will have to be some repricing, with carriers generally getting a reduction in points since sooner or later they will run out of ordnance to use. Also since Chaos can use all 3 types of ordnance but are more constricted in the variety, there must also be some realignment there as well as fleets with resilient AC.

would re-costing really be necessary? Weren't the ships originally costed based on running out of ordnance on a double?

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

Yes because running out of ordnance then was as a result of chance. This time it's a certainty.

[RCgothic]

While I do think the rules are fiddly, wouldn't doing it the way you propose actually increase the number of attacks available? Consider:

2 fighters and 2 bombers vs 1 cruiser.

Normally, (D6-turrets)+(D6-turrets)+2.

Under your proposal, assuming the fighters both manage to suppress the turrets it becomes:

D6+D6 which is actually in effect adding an additional 2 attacks for a total of 4 (because the turrets have been removed from the equation).

Kinda makes bombers really overpowering.

I think if that is the way we want things to go then it's time to start marking how many fighters, bombers and AB are being taken in a fleet. I don't mind bombers effectivity being increased but their availability on the table should now be affected by attrition.

Actually in that case, as one fighter would probably be destroyed, you would get (D6-1) + (D6-1) which is identical to (D6-2) + (D6-2) +2. This change would only really effect larger waves, and attacking high-turret targets.

Under optimum conditions, a Dictator would put out an average of 5 attacks from bombers vs a 2-turret target from its ordnance.
This is compared to perhaps 10 attacks with both broadsides, possibly with a re-roll, that don't ignore shields or seek out weakest armour.

The Dictator pays 40pts for the privilege of ignoring shields and fire arcs.  I don't think that's over the top.

[Vaaish]

This change would only really effect larger waves, and attacking high-turret targets.

And those larger waves are what you will be seeing more of. High LB fleets will be stronger for it and that is something I believe is unwarranted.

For example, you have 10 bombers and 6 fighters (just to have an even 16 LB) going up against an oberon. For the sake of the example, assume they don't suffer casualties before turret fire. Under the current rules, each surviving bomber rolls (d6-5) and since fighters die first, all 10 bombers roll which nets you something like two attacks. Since you have at least 5 fighters with them you add another 5 attacks to that so a total of around 7 attacks against the 5+ armor.

Under your proposal, we would still have around 4 fighters remaining which lets ALL of the bomber roll (d6-1). Now I'm not going to take the time to figure out what they would roll on average for their runs, but you've completely reversed the odds. Where the bombers originally had 16% odds of getting at least one attack run, they now have 84% odds of getting at least one run since they only need a 2+ on the d6 roll to get an attack.

In our example, that equals out of eight of the bombers getting at least one attack run which is the low end. All it takes is a couple of those rolling 4+ to significantly increase the number of attacks. Say, for the sake of example, you roll 1,1,2,2,2,2,4,4,4,4. With your rules, we get 16 attack runs while with the current system we would only get five. To me, that's far too much of a boost.


Perhaps instead of all this contrivance, just say that any surviving fighters allow bombers to reroll their dice if they failed to score higher than the targets turret value.
basically it grants the bombers another shot at an attack run without the fighters themselves granting bonus attacks. It doesn't guarantee any extra attacks, but it could net you a few.

[lastspartacus]

Ill officially put forth my suggestions that turrets need not choose between ordnance, and fighters remove d6 torps rather than the whole wave.

[RCgothic]

A wave of 16 attack craft vs an Oberon would need 8 fighters to defeat the turrets on average, giving 8D6 attack runs, or 28 attack runs on average. That's 4.6 hits on average if the Oberon braces.

But this is coming from a squadron of carriers worth at least 460pts, or nearly 800pts in the case of a squadron of Emperors. If that kind of firepower has a go at you, you're going to be in trouble regardless of whether it's ordnance or not. A brace of nova-cannon shells will render that squadron useless in moments, and 16 assault boats would be more than capable of crippling two battleships if launched in place of the bombers.

In addition, if you use the rules I proposed for massing turrets, (again, a minor change next to all the major re-writes others are proposing!) and the Oberon now has 3 Cobras in base contact, it has a turret value of 8. That then requires at least 11 fighters to reliably defeat, and down to a mere 17 attacks from the 5 remaining bombers, or 2.8 hits.

That's not even taking into account the possibility that there may be fighters on CAP, or large distances to traverse in the teeth of enemy guns. A lone cobra might fly into the squadron to save the battleship, and then you've just expended 460pts and 7 hits of overkill on a single 4+ armoured escort.

[horizon]

And I don't agree on both under current rules LS.

And I agree with Vaaish. Doh, obvious...

And I like his idea pretty much.

[Vaaish]

A wave of 16 attack craft vs an Oberon would need 8 fighters to defeat the turrets on average, giving 8D6 attack runs, or 28 attack runs on average.

The oberon only has 5 turrets but all that number needs to have happen is dial back significantly. On average the five turrets will kill 2.5 markers With six fighters, you would roll either d6-1 or d6-2 for attack runs. That's a pretty significant change from d6-5.

But this is coming from a squadron of carriers worth at least 460pts, or nearly 800pts in the case of a squadron of Emperors. If that kind of firepower has a go at you, you're going to be in trouble regardless of whether it's ordnance or not. A brace of nova-cannon shells will render that squadron useless in moments, and 16 assault boats would be more than capable of crippling two battleships if launched in place of the bombers.

You forget that the AC isn't all those ships are contributing. Say everything was launched from 4 devs. They still contribute 8 lances to the fight that don't have to target the oberon. two empys are also shooting off 32wb. You still aren't explaining WHY bombers are justified receiving the boost you want to give them. Turret massing isn't always possible or practical and again benefits high LB and ordnance fleets not to mention the shield disadvantages of doing it against gunnery fleets. Even taking into account your numbers, you ASSUME that the oberon should brace which ensures further AC dominance. You are still looking at a sizable increase in attacks which bombers should NOT be getting. A "mere" 17 attacks nets you 5.6 hits which is nearly enough to cripple the battleship outright for no cost to yourself since the AC can reload. No, all your are doing is making AC more powerful and I stand behind this being a very bad thing for BFG.

[horizon]

The High Ends are unacceptable.
I mean, this fleet:
3x Explorer, 2x Hero, 9x Hero, 3x Defender
is so ordnance strong already and high on the table as the strongest list in the game it'll gain massively under this idea.