BFG FAQ 2010 Ordnance Questions

[lastspartacus]

Im just against the idea of being able to have a sure fire method of your fighter squadron being able to 100 percent shoot the same amount of torpedos, be they 2 or 12.  Torps were already nerfed slightly in the 2010 errata, as far as hitting ability by spread size.

Also, I dont see, as powerful as ordnance is, why, either by balance or by logic, there is any reason you have to choose between torps and bombers coming at you.  Anymore than two waves of bombers.

[Sigoroth]

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.

I disagree.

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.

Why would anyone send a wave of 16 AC into an Oberon under the current rules? I would send in a wave of 1b/5f and 2 waves of 1b/4f, giving 13.24 attacks on average.

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.

The optimum number of fighters to send against a 5 turret target with a wave of 16 AC is 8. It is actually fairly easy to calculate what the average number of attacks are that would result. First, look at the odds for each possible result of turret fire. The chance of missing with all 5 turrets is 1 in 32. Missing with 4 turrets is 5/32. Missing with 3 is 10/32. Two misses = 10/32, one = 5/32 and no misses = 1/32. Now look at the consequences to an 8 fighter wave. If you hit with 0, 1, 2 or 3 turrets all turrets will be suppressed and result in a straight 8d6 attack runs (28 on average). If they hit with 4 turrets it is 8d6-8 attack runs (20 average). If they hit with all 5 turrets it's 8d6-16 attack runs (13.33 average).

So the total average = P(0-3)x28 + P(4)x20 + P(5)x13.33 = (1/32+5/32+10/32+10/32)x28 + 5/32 x 20 + 1/32 x 13.33 = 26.29 attacks on average. Against 5+ armour this translates to 8.76 hits, or 4.38 after BFI.

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.

As you can see, your maths is quite a ways off. Even according to your own calculations it goes from 7 to 16, not 5 to 16. Regardless, the proposal nearly doubles the effectiveness of a wave of sixteen AC against high turret targets.

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.

To be honest this seems more like a contrivance to me. It's also unclear. Does each surviving fighter allow each bomber to re-roll their attack runs? So 2 surviving fighters gives 2 re-rolls for each bomber?

[Vaaish]

Why would anyone send a wave of 16 AC into an Oberon under the current rules? I would send in a wave of 1b/5f and 2 waves of 1b/4f, giving 13.24 attacks on average.

we aren't talking about the current rules. We were talking about RCGothic proposed rules.

So the total average = P(0-3)x28 + P(4)x20 + P(5)x13.33 = (1/32+5/32+10/32+10/32)x28 + 5/32 x 20 + 1/32 x 13.33 = 26.29 attacks on average.

See, this is why I didn't want to calculate the average runs

As you can see, your maths is quite a ways off. Even according to your own calculations it goes from 7 to 16, not 5 to 16. Regardless, the proposal nearly doubles the effectiveness of a wave of sixteen AC against high turret targets.

Well... I didn't do any math on that, I picked the numbers based on there being an approximately 50/50 chance to roll at least a 4. In any event, the point stays the same, RCGothic's proposal give AC a pretty sizable boost.

To be honest this seems more like a contrivance to me. It's also unclear. Does each surviving fighter allow each bomber to re-roll their attack runs? So 2 surviving fighters gives 2 re-rolls for each bomber?

I find it pretty clear I thought about making it each surviving fighter allows one bomber that didn't score any attack runs after turret value was subtracted to reroll but it seemed like there wasn't enough point in doing that and it seems to create a good bit of book keeping to calculate who got to reroll. I also felt it needed to be only surviving fighters allowed the re-roll or every bomber wave would have a token single fighter to grant the whole wave rerolls. Hence, any fighters surviving the turret fire allow all bombers who failed to score higher than the targets turret value for attack runs to reroll their dice.

I am, however, quite puzzled at how you got that out of what I wrote. It's really quite simple. If the wave has any surviving fighters after being fired on by the turrets, all bombers who got zero attack runs get to reroll their dice.

For example, attacking an oberon with five fighters and 5 bombers. Turrets fire on the wave killing 3 fighters leaving two fighters and 5 bombers. The bombers roll for attack runs and the numbers come up 1,1,3,5,6 leaving you with one attack run. Since there was at least one fighter remaining, you reroll the four dice that failed to roll high enough to attack.

The rationale being that the surviving fighters distract the turrets or cover the bombers allowing the bombers another shot at their attack runs. It gives fighters a purpose in a wave of bombers without the arbitrary extra attack dice per turret eliminating the weird 1 bomber and 5 fighter waves we have now. It also has the effect of making high turret value ships less susceptible to bombers making them more inviting targets for AB or torpedoes.

[RCgothic]

Ok, so bombers get a fairly sizeable boost when you have a wave of 16 against one unescorted target. The end result is a crippled, braced cruiser or a braced battleship.

Now try sending 16 assault boats instead. Even if the ship braces, that's 1 point of damage and 5 critical hits on average. The end result is a weaponless, rudderless, braced battleship.

Assault boats are already that strong.

Now mass some turrets (you can get 8 escorts into base contact without even overlapping - this isn't hard.), add in some CAP, and suddenly your wave of 16 attack craft is up against 13 turrets and 4 fighters, for a grand total of 0 attacks ever. Worse than FAQ2010! In fact, if you can mass 14 turrets (Oberon and 9 escorts), then 16 attack craft will on average never roll a single attack against you,  even without a CAP. With a CAP of 4 fighters, you only need to have 6 escorts in contact to be completely impervious.
Massing 9 turrets brings the average damage down to current levels, without a CAP, and with a 4 fighter CAP, 7 turrets brings damage down to current levels.

OK, so the cost is that your escorts now become vulnerable to direct weapons fire. At least they're doing some actual escorting. And, can even escort multiple ships at once! The point is that there are defences against these uber waves. The proposed rule is simple, sorts out all the problems with the FAQ2010 version, and with a little extra strategy, isn't even any more powerful than FAQ2010.

To review:
Turret Suppression: each surviving fighter negates one turret for the purposes of rolling a bomber's attack runs.
Massed Turrets: If a group of ships are in base contact, their turret strength is increased by the number of other ships in the group.
CAP patrol: A wave containing fighters may move into contact with a friendly ship and form a Combat Air Patrol. If the ship is in base contact with other friendly vessels, the entire group is protected. When the group splits, decide which ship/group the CAP remains with.

In fact, there's room for making massed turrets even more effective by allowing the group to total all the turrets in the group together! Lack of shields is a pretty big drawback, so there's room for a pretty big benefit.

[horizon]

Assault Boat.
Not every race has them. Plus one can repair damage.
(16 aboats is only possible from 2 squadroned Emperors/Despoilers in b2b or 3 Devestations/Mars/Dictator/or added in Styx in b2b).

16 assault boats vs 4 turrets
is 14 assault boats remain
14 times a D6 (unmodified depending on race).
Brace dice before crits are rolled:
4+ = 50%
7 assault boats remain.

1 = nothing = 0,16 = 1,12 assault boats miss
6 = 1 hit = 0,16 = 1,12 assault boats do a hit
2-5 = critical = 4,62 assault boats do this.

Repair Dice,
full health BB = 12 dice = 1,92 repairs
with bm = 6 dice = 0,96 repairs

Thus in the end: 1 hit, 3-4 criticals remain.
Remember from a weapon not available to every race.

Top Assault boats use:
Chaos, Tyranids, Orks

Medium use
Space Marines (as they have less available but do have a +1.
Dark Eldar, due cruiser restrictions less available.

Lesser use
Craftworld Eldar (as upgrade on restricted ship plus option buy the +1 as well)
Imperial Navy (only 2 ships have access).

None
Necrons, Tau, Corsair Eldar, Adeptus Mechanicus

Your to reviews:
Turret Supp: as said high ends. Overpowers ordnance loving fleets.
Massed turrets: this it too much, not fan of it.
CAP: I'd say single base only.

[Vaaish]

This:

Assault boats are already that strong.

is a very bad reason for this:

Ok, so bombers get a fairly sizeable boost when you have a wave of 16 against one unescorted target. The end result is a crippled, braced cruiser or a braced battleship.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

Yup. BFG is not about ordnance. It's mainly about gun battles with AC and torps in support.

[lastspartacus]

You mean thats the goal, right admiral?

[commander]

Just a thought, instead of making carriers a costly affair, just limit their number you can take in a fleet. You can even change that parameter for each fleet (to stay fluffy). Result: less AC.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

You mean thats the goal, right admiral?

Nope, that was the main idea of BFG. It never was supposed to be AC heavy.

[horizon]

In hindsight Andy Chambers said he would've never added attack craft.

To be honest: I think a large margin of players would've added house rules in such a case because of Star Wars, Wing Commander, etc.

[Sigoroth]

NOTE: Really long post, but please read it all before telling me how powerful AC become with the proposed turret suppression rule. I alternated my colours so you don't get hit by a wall of teal.

I hardly see the problem with surviving fighters fully suppressing turrets. So the proposed rule gives a big bonus to massive waves of AC. So what? Ok, I get it that a lot of people don't want to see AC get stronger. Well the strength of smaller waves actually goes down, so it's large waves that are the problem right?

Well, let's see now, if there's a wave of 16 AC coming at you then you could shoot some torps at it to knock out the fighter screen (Falchions are great for this). You could send in some fighters to bring the wave down to a more manageable size or you could simply run an escort into the entire wave. You can even blow the entire wave up with direct fire!. 

If you have put yourself into a position whereby your opponent's reloaded and unbraced carriers could send out a wave of 16 AC and hit you in the one turn, and you have no massed turrets or escort screen or fighters on CAP, then you sir, are a bonehead. You deserve the pain that's coming your way. Since 1 AC is worth roughly 3WB in terms of hardpoints (and pays above this due to the ability to focus both sides) then you're looking at 48WBs at close range. Against an abeam cap ship with 5+ armour those weapon batts would get 24 dice, which is very close to the average shown by the wave of 16 AC against a 5 turret target. Sure, they'd have to deal with shields, but then again, that sort of firepower is far more likely to be on LO rather than RO. In which case we're looking 4.67 hits past shields on a braced battleship! More than the 16AC with 26.29 attacks! Hell, it's possible that the firing ships could be firing into the sun in one of the first 4 battlezones. In which case that firepower goes up to 34 dice at 5+ armour, which translates as 7.44 hits past shields against a braced battleship, not including crits! 

Note: a braced, closing, battleship with 6+ armour at close range against 48 locked on WBs gives up 43 attack dice, which equates to 4.57 hits past shields, not including crits. If you allow left shifts to go to the actual firepower column (meaning the double range-shift would give 48 attack dice) it translates as 5.33 hits past shields on a braced battleship.

Further, the direct fire method drops the BBs shields, enabling follow up lances to be effective. The AC does not combine so well at all. Also, putting a BM in contact will slow the ship, which may also be slowed due to crippling, and will also halve repair dice for any crits inflicted. If you try to do this before attacking with your AC you run the risk of losing your entire wave. These 1 in 6 rolls do happen ... just ask any Eldar player. So, you either don't get the benefit of slowing down the target and halving their repair dice, or you put a BM in contact and your 26.29 average attack runs drops down to 21.91 attack runs on average (3.65 hits after brace on average).

I think that it would be far harder to get a full wave of 16 AC into base contact with a battleship unmolested than it would be to get 48 WBs into close range on LO. So when you manage to do it you should get rewarded just as much, particularly as you pay a premium price for those AC (compared to direct gunnery). Also the direct gunnery combines well with further lance fire from the fleet. The AC does not combine.

Lastly, let's have a look at just what sort of squadron we're talking about putting out 16+ AC in a single wave.

• 2 Emperors - expensive ships, requires 6 cruiser hulls and very slow and cumbersome. Has availability to get the alternative 16 a-boat squad against which the bombers should be competitive.
• 2 Explorers - cheap and easy to get, but extremely susceptible to direct fire, particularly NC. Slow and cumbersome.
• 2 Despoilers (or 1D/1TE) - very expensive ships, requires 6 cruiser hulls and cumbersome. Has access to the alternative 16 a-boat squad.
• 4 cruiser carriers - For CE, DE, CWE & IN this is a very expensive prospect. For Chaos this is less so, but still an expensive squadron. Chaos also has the option of taking 3 or 4 Styx fleet carriers for an 18 or even 24(!) AC wave, but they are very expensive ships and would require 6-8 cruisers to do.
  

In the above list we have two basic types capable of launching this sort of wave. The first are BBs which are slow and cumbersome and expensive (except Explorer) who hang back because of a combination of 5+ prow armour and either long range weaponry or too few shields to survive up close.

The second type are more capable of getting up close and personal but given just how many points they cost and how susceptible they are to direct fire (only 2 shields instead of 4) it is far more likely that they're going to have to brace, rendering the squadron useless in terms of RO if they're empty or even their offensive power if not (braced they could release only a wave of eight).

Of course, Eldar are not so hampered, but without getting into the foibles of MSM we can see that the very cheapest an Eldar player can field such a squadron would be 1000 points with 4 Eclipse (blech!) and even with Eldar rules we would only see an increase to about 6.67 hits against a braced 5 turret target. If I had a 1000 pts worth of Nightshades I'd get 12.5 hits past brace. Hardly overpowering, particularly as people don't stock up on Eclipses (CWE has a much higher cost for forming a squadron capable of doing this) and Eldar are almost always forced to launch fighters because of how effective single waves of enemy bombers are against them and the amount they're normally outnumbered.

So, in summation, the proposed ruleset removes a hell of a lot of confusion, is more intuitive, more richly rewards tactics, forces your opponent to actually think, works elegantly with fighter-bombers, makes it possible to actually overwhelm high turret defences (meaning 6 really doesn't need to be the absolute hard cap) and is not, in the final wash, overpowered. Do it.

[horizon]

Well Sigoroth,
thank you for showing why that rules just means no good to the game.

Because AC increases, the gunnery player needs more cap, thus adds a carrier.
Because there is more defensive AC the ordnance player adds another carrier, "just to make sure.".

The Downward Spiral.
(Or Upward if you like to see an ordnance dominated game ).

[Vaaish]

more richly rewards tactics, forces your opponent to actually think,

I think we have differing ideas of what richly rewards tactics. For the high LB player, you reward him simply for having more AC to throw at the problem (read spamming) which I don't see as any great tactical depth that warrants a reward. For the other end, you penalize the lack of AC by forcing the player to counter his opponents AC by squeezing in another carrier, sacrificing ships as ablative wounds, redirecting firepower, or placing himself in a tactically weak position simply because his fleet can't bring as much AC or because his fleet is more gunnery focused. None of those things makes you THINK any more that you would already in a given situation.

High turret ships create situations where the attacking player has to put more thought into their actions as there isn't a one size fits all solution. Bombers should be less effective against high defense ships. This makes you think about launching AB at it instead, or perhaps using torpedoes on the ship rather than always launching X bombers to Y fighters and hoping for the best. By making bombers better at attacking than any other ordnance option, you remove tactical options and thought as the game devolves into who can get the most bombers out.

I'm going to make another plug for my idea here You want fighters to boost a bombers capabilities and get away from adding extra attacks themselves, just look at what survives the turret fire and see if there are any fighters left. If there are, reroll any dice that failed to get any attack runs.

That gives a small boost against high turret ships, helps make fighters useful and is extremely simple to use while requiring no additional math which is far more intuitive IMO. Finally, why are y'all holding to the 16 LB idea? I arbitrarily picked 16 LB for my example since it was an even number of LB and broke nicely into 10 bombers and 6 fighters.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

Both sides are making excellent points but am now kinda starting to get lost with which is what proposed AC rules. Can someone summarize the proposals again along with their authors?