Streamlining BFG

[Thinking Stone]

Note: SO = Special Order. AC = attack craft. BFI = Brace For Impact special orders. BFG = Battlefleet Gothic.  Sorry about length, bold bits are most important.
@Phthisis:
Here are my ideas. I like your efforts to make BFG more 'elegant' but I think that there may be better ways to do it than some of yours—your stimulation of discussion is good! I've just read the whole thread, so I'm going to neglect quoting because it will take too long.... I understand if you think that's unacceptably lazy, please tell me.

Realsim versus Gameplay: I believe that wargame gameplay should be derived from realism! This is a model of a real-life system, afterall: would it make sense to remove key elements of realism and leave an abstract game behind? Sometimes, yes. But many of the BFG rules are already abstracted a great deal and many of the elements of realism are key to represent (admittedly not-so-life-like) space opera battles in space. So, if it is likely that a lucky event can change the winner of a battle in real life, doesn't that add to your tactical acumen if you can overcome it? Or did you perhaps 'waste' your ships early on and not leave enough reserves for that critical roll? In my experience with Warhammer based games, it is rare that a single roll changes an obvious win into an obvious loss; it is usually a series of poor decisions or rolls. I do agree, however, that it should be possible for the player's tactical acumen to overcome bad luck in all but the most fargone situations. In my opinion, the War of the Ring is a game system where this is far more possible than in Warhammer Fantasy or 40K. A key example in BFG seems to be the 'first-turn-shot' problem, where the turn order is the main factor in who gets off a devastating first salvo. This 'honour' should go to the fleet with the longest range, so perhaps some modification to the resolution of shooting should be done.

The problem with just having manouevring and no luck is that every game would end up the same. E.g. Eldar versus Chaos. Eldar (for sake of the example) move around the back and shoot. Chaos keep together and shoot their batteries at the Eldar at range. Eldar can change which way they move around the back: excitement ensures! While I'm sure your group do not want to make it this ridiculous, I hope to have illustrated the dangers of removing the luck. Chess works very well in its limited environment, but BFG offers much more in the way of allowing different results to influence the game, so that the game is not the same every time.

I like the store of SOs idea, but the command chain is one of those characteristics that makes BFG special. Perhaps some modifications? Interesting BFI idea, also (although I think they are better now. If critical damage and hit damage were swapped, yours would be better. I started a thread on this). Are SOs really so necessary, though? Should the game depend on them, so that you need them to play: it seems from your experiences that we need SOs to 'snatch victory regardless of the situation'. If so, then perhaps every ship should have SOs but with different restrictions and limitations, following the Epic model. This solves the problem of modern crews being able to do special orders (a question I've pondered also). But, in light of this, why should they be limited? Overall, I think SOs are a test of the crew in the heat of battle that this represents. What if, after suffering damage, a crewman causes a torpedo to be dropped and explode?

Is there a way to combine the store of SOs with the current Ld. based system? Perhaps there are some that are automatic and some that are not? I think this is a really nice way to represent command ability.

Turret Suppression: The World War tactics theme does come up quite often, but in BFG the situation is quite different: firstly, we are in space; secondly, the distances are much greater; and thirdly, the weapons are much more deadly. These points already make a close comparison with aircraft battles tenuous except when used as inspiration; I think it is better that we stick with the abstract version that exists today, where fighters can confuse and overwhelm the widespread turrets on a larger ship. If you take a look at the Escorts in BFG topic, you'll see my thoughts on escorts being changed to a more anti-AC role, in addition to their current role; turret suppression reinforces the vulnerability of large ships to small vehicles without ridiculously large numbers of point defence turrets, but my suggestion for escorts allows them to counteract this weakness. horizon, to save us here, what are your (concise) feelings about AC? I've forgotten... Uni....

Boarding: if a ship is so supremely better at boarding that it has an excess of dice from boarding values, why should they fight as if they are the same strength as the ship they are fighting against? E.g Emperor battleship against Cobra destroyer: Emperor rolls a 1 and Cobra rolls a 6. 5 hits damage to Emperor. If you had 2 Cobras, you could cause 10 damage! Do I misunderstand the system? Discarding the excess dice would only work if the modifiers were changed to allow ships to show their superior boarding modifiers. Victors can suffer criticals. I think we should redo the whole system, perhaps differently to your idea though.

Hit and run: I think that you should roll 2D6 and choose the one you want all of the time. This does add some nice tactical decision to the game.

It seems that many of your group's ideas are interesting but do not necessarily make the game any better than the current rules: they are more of an alternative, rather than an improvement. Of course, if your group prefers it, then it's an improvement for you! I agree that simpler rules are better but I have this concept of 'elegance': where a rule can be optimally simple but still convey the perhaps complex situation trying to be emulated.

Engine Explosion: Admittedly, for me and my bunch there are few situations where a great number of ships are in range of the explosion, and few more where ordnance are in range, so I don't think changing this would make a great difference. If not rolling a 4+, you need 1 die per strength otherwise this would be too complex. I understand your sentiments on using the armour value, though. This is sensible, unless we assume that spaceship engines are so massive that armour does not protect them.

I think we should keep the rubber stamp out of it. If Pthisis is lucky enough to have friends that support his revolutionary ideas, I think that is approval enough. Not everyone is so lucky.... Let's keep it civil, please. I like this forum because of its niceties and manners and we're not around to make people feel bad, especially about a game. Besides, it makes you look better if you're nice and use good grammar.

@horizon
I think that elegance will win people over. Good (= simple, = nice or whichever applies) rule, realistic effect. I have been pondering this, but I think that this is the essence of 'elegance'. Though not stated elegantly... I like the roll a die for SOs idea, he he he. But I think that some officers might notice that going on BFI when 90 cm (however far that is in real life) away is a little, er, silly. There would be disciplining....

[horizon]

I prefer gunnery over ac a lot. And I think AC is too strong/dominant already in a lot of fleets.

I'll add some ideas later regarding AC. (new thread)

good call on boarding there TS. 2 Cobra's could damage an Emperor in this case.

[Phthisis]

@TS
Thanks for such a thoughtful and polite post. 
I still think these rules give everyone what they want, so I will continue to defend them.

I failed to mention this earlier, but in our boarding rules escorts make boarding attacks vs cap ships in the form of H&R attacks equal to their boarding value.  A cobra boarding an Emperor would do 3 H&R attacks. However they defend against boarding normally and board other escorts normally.
It is possible for a cobra to damage an emperor but not to the degree you say or in the manner you describe.
Lets say an Emperor is boarding a Cobra.  First they need to total their boarding values.  The Cobra has 1 hit and 2 turrets, so it rolls 3 dice.  Assuming the Emperor is undamaged it has 12 hits and 5 turrets, so 17 dice.   Both players roll all their dice.
Lets say the Cobra player rolls 6,4,2.  For demonstration, lets say the Emperor rolls all 4s. 
Now we pair up dice from highest to lowest.
Cobra 6 - Emperor 4  = Emperor loses 1 damage
Cobra 4 - Emperor 4 = Tie, no damage to either ship
Cobra 2 - Emperor 4 =  Cobra loses 1 damage.
The Emperor has 14 dice remaining, which are ignored.  Only the 3 highest are used in this situation.
The Emperor takes a hit, the Cobra is destroyed.  The Cobra player rolls for crit against the Emperor just like gunnery (ie, a crit on a roll of 6).
As you can see, the Emperor has a massive statistical advantage.  More dice = more chance for higher rolls.  The most a cobra could do damagewise is 3 hits ever, but vs an Emperor your odds  of winning the lottery are better.

We have been playtesting for a while and even wuth the same fleets, no two games have been alike.  Think of chess:  no chance anywhere in the game, same rules, same board, same setup, same pieces, same side goes first.  Every game has an identical setup and there is no chance involved to force players to account for.  So by your reasoning, every game of chess played would be identical.  There's no variation for players to account for, so each player will make the same moves every game?
Of course that doesn't happen.  It doesn't even happen when people play against computers.
BFG has quite a bit of variation.  Different fleets, different ships to choose, different battle sizes, different setups, different victory conditions and different terrain all mean that even if there was no chance in the game, every game would be different. 
Mind you, our goal is to strip the game of chance where we see it being unnecessarily powerful to the point of overriding a player's strategic decisions.  Ld tests for SO is one of these instances.  In fact, the ONLY purpose of Ld tests for SO is to allow chance to override a player's strategy.  Im surprised that a group of players who play strategic wargames are defending a system that does this.

Without trying to represent some level of realism, a wargame isn't a wargame any longer.  I agree it has to be based on realism, and were only eliminating chance where it overrides the player's ability to win through strategy or where they can be robbed of victory due to bad luck.  Making strategy dependent on chance is risky for a dame designer, especially in the name of realism.  What % of orders can realistically be expected to be obeyed?  Vaash says he averages Ld8, (better than I average).  So 3 out of 10 orders aren't going to be obeyed? I have some experience with command and that's shameful, even for people with zero training and no discipline.  And one order not being obeyed means the rest of the fleet is incapable of obeying orders as well.  They will all stand around doing nothing because their commander didn't tell them what to do good enough.

Doing SO our way is a very good representation of how skilled a fleet commander is at coordinating his fleet and doesn't detract from a player's strategic abilities.  Most SO only cover actions that require a few buttons to be pushed by a few people anyway, whereas the things we've left for Ld are tests of a captain's skill or leadership ability.

We get hit by lots of explosions here.  Ships seem to be blowing up constantly.  We get maybe 2-4 Plasma Drive overloads each game and a Warp Implosion every other game.  The Plasmas aren't so bad to cruisers but it reaps havoc on escorts.  Warp Implosions tear chunks out of fleets.  Ive lost 2 games that I had in the bag in the past 6 months due to a WDI.  Same has happened to an IN player in our group.  An untouched squadron of escorts dissapears along with a crippled ship and a healthy ship gets crippled.. Thats a lot of VPs.  Or one ship gets hit hard out of a squadron, has a,WDI and wipes out the 2 crippled ships in its squadron and cripples the healthy one.  4 Lunars down the drain at 1500 pts.   Nothing due to strategy.  Just bad luck.  But you lose just the same.
What I neant with Plasma drive is a cruiser blowing up would do 4 attacks flat but the rolls are against armor.

Our AC rules nerf bombers without need for the strange turret suppression mechanic.  With escorts, they can protect vs AC now by running b2b with a cap ship.  What I'm interested in is a way for escorts to become valuable defending cap ships vs gunnery & torpedos.  Our rules have gone some of the way in doing that already, but I have some ideas.  Better shooting vs ordy would be one option.

[horizon]

Jeez, what dice! All those plasma's!

9 out of 10 destroyed ships end up as a drifting hulk at our place.

Weird.

I lost once due a warp drive on an Ork vessel, killed a Defiant in one go (hit down), destroyed some escorts, crippled a Lunar. But I see that as the following: to greedy to get close. If I stayed further away I would not have been hit.
So it is tactics. You get close you get the chance to be in the blast. That's cool. And it is still two sixes. So a risk worth taking but if it happens: it can be so much fun! Hey, I had a big laugh after that game.

[Phthisis]

That is really freaking weird. 
At 1500 pts we have 12-14 ships on the table.  A 9 or higher on 2d6 result in a dead ship exploding in some way.  Thats 10/36, or just under 30% blowing up on the first roll, excluding burning hulks that blow up later or hulks blown up do to shooting.  Depending on how long our game goes, 2-4 ships blowing up per game is statistically average.  9/10 is very low!

What's wrong with people's dice on this forum?  In Horizon's games ships blow up 66% less than normal.  Vaash rolls above average Ld consistently and passes SO tests with apparent consistency.  Sigiroth hammers 6+ armor at long range with WBs like a champ for the win.  No wonder you guys think Ld isn't a problem.  Your dice completely ignore probability in your favor!   

Here where I live, our dice aren't so kind!  Here, where the laws of averages still apply, we can expect over the long run that our dice will even out to their statistical average.  Ships blow up, we fail our SO tests all of the time and roll shit for Ld every couple of games.  This is our inspiration for limiting the amount of chance over our ability to control our own fleets.  Its been great playtesting this system.  Nobody has been able to say that the dice screwed them.  No more fleet wrecking explosions turn 3 that end the game.   No more Dark Eldar fleets failing to reload ordnance for 4 straight turns despite Ld 10.    We have been winning or losing on the merits of our strategy, not luck.

[horizon]

lol, Yes I can fail SO tests as well. But you need to live up to it.

In one battle with my Tau vs Orks I could reload one ship and that was it. So I started losing the ordnance war vs the Ork at turn 3. Couple this with an Ork fleet which made the turn to head my way.
But due the right gunnery approach and staying out of boarding problems I won that game. My Wardens and Castellans having a key role at the moment gunnery started.

With BFG only rolling high (shooting) isn't good, you need to roll low as well (Ld).

A lot of times ships at the brink of destruction are disengaged.
And 30% is less then 70%. So there is a lot more chance on no explosion.

And usually I do no waste guns on enemy hulks, unless they are really close to the core of the opponents fleet.

[RCgothic]

As burning hulk is just a postponement of drifting or blowing up, you need to exclude it from the calculation. Then you get 40% of ships exploding, not accounting for people shooting them repeatedly until they explode.

[Sigoroth]

Complexity & Chance vs Simplicity & Reliability

Complexity is often necessary in order to approach realism. While we want simplicity we want realism too. Best results are found when a rule is simple in itself but complex due to interaction with other rules, situations, races, etc. Some things are too complex, such as modelling a full set of movement rules that account for 3 dimensions and inertia. On the other hand, over simplifying in some areas is unwanted, such as only allowing a set number of special orders and then guaranteeing their success (why would a captain brace or not depending on how good his admiral is?).

Similarly chance is also used to simulate reality. When in a pitched battle things do not always go according to plan. What would normally be a matter of routine might become a much more difficult task when under fire (such as reloading). Also, variant leadership is meant to reflect that some ships will simply have a better crew than others, due to idiosyncrasies of the officers, their training methods and aptitudes and of the crew themselves.

Eliminating chance and complexity from the game may give a better indication of who 'deserved' the victory but still will result in reduced satisfaction due to poor realism. Complexity should really border on the intolerable. That is, the highest level of tolerable complexity should be used, assuming that it directly contributes to realism.

[Vaaish]

Its the 'tracking torpedo' situation where a player throws bombers at a ship, turrets fire, and magically all the torpedos launched happen to be targeting that ship as well.  This can be done through rules lawyering or slight of hand.  It's cheating, to be sure, but it's a weak spot I've seen exploited by known cheaters repeatedly.

A person sends bombers in first and gets turrets to fire and then uses the single turn allowed by the rules for tracking torpedoes to target the same ship? That sounds like effectively using your fleet rather than cheating. You are allowed to move your ordnance in any order you wish and all ordnance attacks have to be resolved on contact. How is this even remotely cheating or rules lawyering?

This is fairly insulting. Obvious troll is obvious. I purchased the BFG starter set the week it was released and have been playing it whenever I've had a gaming group that was willing ever since.  I still have a copy of the original rule book.  You don't know anything about me.  Perhaps I have more games under my belt than you and so I have seen the things that I'm concerned about quite a bit more.  If you care about what I'm doing, stop flaming. If you don't, go away.  So far the only argument that you've got left standing is that you like having your strategy dominated by luck because you believe it's more realistic. As I've said, you have other options.  Play BFG:R instead when it comes out. 

It was not a trolling comment. I've seen new players go on about aspects they didn't like after only a couple of game to later find out they had completely misread rules or hadn't played their fleet well because they didn't yet understand how it worked together. Your desire to gut so much of the game based on your concept that lucky rolls were a game breaking problem (a premise that you have yet to support) and your presentation of solutions that aren't well founded or contradictory to you position smacks of being a new player who is upset he lost and is trying to "fix" the game. Furthermore, you post one of the most overused memes as an attempt to discredit me while at the same time saying the same thing about me you found insulting about yourself? Nice.

I gave you the benefit of the doubt and pointed out why your proposal was flawed despite my belief you want a rubber stamp post. I've tried to explain aspects that I might not have communicated well and looked over your further explanations but you really don't want thoughtful input that disagrees with your proposal. If your group wants to play by those rules, fine, but don't say you are playing BFG because you are changing the core of the game and doing so in a bad way.

[Vaaish]

ugg...this is what happens when you start a post the night before and then finish it up in the morning.... anyway, some relevant points.

Vaash says he averages Ld8, (better than I average).  So 3 out of 10 orders aren't going to be obeyed? I have some experience with command and that's shameful, even for people with zero training and no discipline.  And one order not being obeyed means the rest of the fleet is incapable of obeying orders as well.  They will all stand around doing nothing because their commander didn't tell them what to do good enough.

To get ld8, you just need a 4+ that means at least 50% of my ships will end up with ld 8 or better. Now factor in my admiral is also LD8 which accounts for another ship that might have had a 6 or 7. I usually run an emperor which gives an automatic +1 as well. With 7 ships on the table, that gives me around 5 with at least LD8. I also make pretty extensive use of squadrons (2x Vengeance, 2x Lunar, 2x Dauntless) so the likelihood that I'll have low LD is slim. Factor in the +1 for enemies being on SO and you can see that most games I'll have effectively LD9 or better. Usually that means one or two re-rolls is plenty. Working from highest LD and most important SO down, there's rarely any issue getting ships to do what I want when I want it. There are times I've failed an order and it hurt, but it was never a game winning issue.

9 out of 10 destroyed ships end up as a drifting hulk at our place.

This is about what we average as well.

[afterimagedan]

Yaaish, I assume you mean 4 ships with ld8 or better. 50% of your 6 regular ships would get it (3 of them) and your Emperor which will get it; so 4 ships out of 7. Either way, squadrons will help you get the best out of your lower ld ships.

We get plasma and warp implosions on occasion and we love it. It makes the game more "cinematic," if that makes any sense.

[Phthisis]

lol, Yes I can fail SO tests as well. But you need to live up to it.

Sometimes you can live up to it, sometimes you can't.  In a fairly usual game of BFG you have to 'live up to it' constantly. But there are lots of times where the dice just completely screw you.  Like an explosion gutting half your fleet at first contact with the enemy or one gutting your fleet just as you're about to win.  Or your whole fleet falling into an obvious trap because you fail your first SO test and fail your re-roll.  
You'll still have critical hits, gunnery and all the Ld test stuff to 'live up to'.  It's just your overall strategy that won't be completely wrecked by a moderately unlucky dice roll.

@Sigiroth
Seems like you and I agree on the basic principle, but differ greatly on where to draw the line.  You and I also disagree with what 'realism' is regarding naval tactics.

Realism doesnt equal random chance.  Random chance is an abstract used to represent any combination of factors that can make an outcome unpredictable.  Random chance should be included where it's necessary to represent relatively unreliable circumstances.  I think it's reasonable to use random chance for gunnery, bomber attacks, critical hits and repairing critical hits, navigating asteroid fields or attempting to disengage.  Turning a hard left or firing retros isn't something that there is a question whether or not they will be obeyed.  If a captain on a warship of any era issued an order to CTNH, the ship comes to a new heading.  If they order the ship to Full Stop, the ship comes to a full stop.  There isn't a 30 - 40% chance that the crew will just ignore their captain!  Using Ld tests for these type of situations is not realism.  It's an element of chance where there is none in real life.

In any wargame, I draw the line on 'realism' where it becomes a larger factor in the game than the player's strategy.  SO gives a player strategic options.  The Ld tests prevents those strategic option from being used.  The only purpose Ld tests serve for SO is to prevent a player from being able to execute their strategy.

Eliminating chance and complexity from the game may give a better indication of who 'deserved' the victory but still will result in reduced satisfaction due to poor realism.  

We have been experiencing reduced satisfaction due to the fact that we win or lose games by the luck of the dice, not on our strategy.

On the other hand, over simplifying in some areas is unwanted, such as only allowing a set number of special orders and then guaranteeing their success (why would a captain brace or not depending on how good his admiral is?).

My gaming group doesn't see this as over simplifying, obvioiusly.  We see Ld tests for SO being an unnecessary overcomplication and an unrealistic representation that interferes with gameplay.  

Assuming that a captain will be obeyed on his own ship by his own helmsman or gunnery crew, the limited number of SO is a realistic representation of the fleet commander's skill.  The fleet commander is in charge of issuing orders to the fleet and coordinating battle, while a separate captain commands the vessel he comes to battle on.  I've got some command experience in wargames where I've commanded real people in simulated combat.  One of the big challenges is not becoming myopic despite the fact that there are threats to your survival in the vicinity.  If you get scared, you lose focus and start commanding only our retinue while ignoring the other elements of the battle.  A less experienced/skilled commander can't keep track of the whole force reliably, while a more experienced commander can coordinate his forces regardless of his personal situation.  The number of orders a fleet officer brings to the battle represent their ability to coordinate the fleet in the midst of battle.  

Ld in the original system was a complex of the ability of the fleet commander, the captain and the crew.  I'm changing this to a check vs the difficulty of coordinating the actions of large numbers of people or performing an action with a ship of a particular size.  I think it's a better representation.  The old one was nonsensical.  

Basically we differ in two respects.  I'm assuming that a helmsman will obey a captain's order without question while you believe that 3 in ten times the helmsman will ignore him.  Also, you have more fun if the game represents your concept of a realistic naval battle.  You want BFG to be a 40k naval warfare simulator.  Although I also disagree with your understanding of what a real naval battle is like, we would favor a game where players win on their strategy rather than chance and are willing to sacrifice some realism to allow for strategy not to be overridden by random chance.  Not that we think we are sacrificing realism.

So, realism aside, the SO system we came up with is a big departure from the original rules, but it's been functioning quite well as a game mechanic.  I think one think that people are failing to notice is that SO are now a resource to be used sparingly and that can be lost due to poor planning.  We aren't just allowing every ship to go on SO whenever they want.  You, as a player, have to make difficult strategic choice and prioritize placing squadrons on SO and reserving dice to potentially BFI.  The strategic depth of assigning SOs was increased tenfold!

How's BFG:R coming?  I haven't seen anything posted for a long time and haven't heard anything from Plaxor.  We playtested the rules changes a bit just to give them a chance, but that lead to us coming up with this rule set.   I know that you and Admiral and Horizon would never think our rule changes are good based on the fact that you guys have a very different paradigm when it comes to games design than we do, but I'm interested in knowing how you guys have found your own rules in play testing.  

@Vaaish
By 'tracking torpedo' cheat, I mean that players attack a ship with bombers and then bog standard torpedos that can't track magically turn and target that ship.  This happens as part of a torpedo shotgun.  Tracking torpedos don't get a turn when they are fired.  It's a slight of hand trick, kind of like pushing troops forward in 40k while placing them in a disembark move.  Or it's a player rules lawyering.  

It was not a trolling comment.

Well, now you know that you were wrong.  I'm not a new player and this isn't a reaction to losing games.  

I've asked for constructive criticism.  You've told me to scrap the whole project because you don't agree with my fundamental assertions.  You've refused to consider how the rules chances I've proposed will play out and you've refused to test them to see how they work.  I don't really see where you expect this to go?  You refuse to consider my changes based on the fact you don't think anything needs to be changed.  Noted.  Vaash says 'no'.

Now, if you want to talk about what these changes actually do to the game, that would be awesome.  You posted some issues with the function of the rules.  I rebutted.  You dropped the arguments.  Do you agree with me now on the game play for everything but the SO rules?

What I'm looking for is something like "you're making bombers too powerful", or "your SO rules break the game by doing this...".  Regardless of whether you agree with my fundamental assertions about the original BFG rules, this rule set may be a better game just on the sake of mechanics.  You'll never prove to me that our rule set is bad by saying you like the old rules or don't think there was a problem to begin with.  You'll only be able to prove these rules shouldn't be used by showing me how they don't work.

[Vaaish]

By 'tracking torpedo' cheat, I mean that players attack a ship with bombers and then bog standard torpedos that can't track magically turn and target that ship.  This happens as part of a torpedo shotgun.  Tracking torpedos don't get a turn when they are fired.  It's a slight of hand trick, kind of like pushing troops forward in 40k while placing them in a disembark move.  Or it's a player rules lawyering.

If the torpedoes are already on the way and magically angle to hit a target that's not along their flight line, then yes, that is cheating and you should call the player on it. If torpedoes have just been placed on the base to note they have been launched as per the rules it's not cheating or rule lawyering to move them toward a better target so long as those torpedoes stay within their firing arc and move in a straight line in the ordnance phase. I twas ruled a while back that placing the marker on the base in the shooting phase was just a placeholder to note that the ordnance had been fired. It doesn't become active until the ordnance phase.

I've asked for constructive criticism.  You've told me to scrap the whole project because you don't agree with my fundamental assertions.  You've refused to consider how the rules chances I've proposed will play out and you've refused to test them to see how they work.p/quote]

I gave you that in my first post. Skeptical, yes, but valid critical analysis of your ideas. I told you to scrap the rules because they are ill conceived and don't enhance the tactical aspects of the game. I gave you alternatives with the H&R rolls because it was the only salvageable idea there.

You don't always have to playtest an idea to prove it's bad. Stuff like your LD table or the SO changes change the core of the game which in turn affect the balance by shifting the value of ships and keeping the current point cost. Other parts like the boarding rules are plain awkward and time consuming to play using. It will take you far longer to roll a bucket of dice to compare than to roll one dice and compare especially since you're still using the same boarding modifier table all you've done is unnecessarily increased the dice rolled. Adding more dice rolling doesn't focus the game on tactics and strategy, it focuses it on rolling dice.

[Thinking Stone]

@Phthisis
At length (originally it was going to be 'Just quickly' but I devolved into a complete response...), I suggest that most of the posters in this thread have a different view of what special orders represent. Of course it is ludicrous (to me, at least) that a ship's crew will fail to come to a new heading or fire their guns upon order of the captain (unless there is some psychology at play: perhaps an idea for BFG Advanced...). However, the standard rules represent this already. Your ship actually does change heading when you turn it (stay with me: not trying to be insulting, just illustrate clearly) in normal movement. Similarly, your ship actually does target and 'lock on' with its weapon systems when firing normally (otherwise your massively powerful weapons would be useless because they would be firing only in the general direction of an enemy. You wouldn't hit much considering the distances in BFG... .

We also must remember that BFG is not a sea naval simulation but a space naval simulation in the ridiculously advanced and different far future. We assume that it is genuinely hard for a ship to take a really hard left (i.e. Come to a New Heading SOs, two turns to the left) in BFG, so hard that it requires special 'heroism' from the crew. Similarly, 'Lock On' SOs could probably be renamed to 'All Power to Weapons' SOs without losing background credibility. I take the view that 'Lock On' isn't simple targetting but a rerouting of all power to main weapons systems at the loss of power for the rest of the ship. Especially on an ancient and poorly understood space city (as BFG ships would appear to us), this is assumed to be a difficult thing to do. Burning Retros and All Ahead Full SOs are a bit different since they involve assumptions about movement that might not be so realistic (e.g. there is no momentum in space...) but similar cases can be made for these actions being 'above and beyond the (usual) call of duty'. The random aspect represents the chance that a captain will not be fast enough or competent enough to enact the order within an appropriate timeframe (and the resulting communication chaos is assumed to make further fleet coordination of orders impossible, so the Admiral says "Don't do anything out of the ordinary, AT ALL, you incompetent wretches!").

I am curious about your dismissal of the similarities between navigational SOs and navigation through treacherous space, too. They both rely upon the leadership of the ship in question representing the manoeuvring capabilities of the crew, the only difference being that one can use a re-roll and the other can't. I suggest that they might be more similar in difficulty than not.

Despite all of this, I feel your SO system does have a certain 'elegance'. I would like to find a way to combine it with the exisiting SO rules, so that the command test and 'chain of command' (which I feel are integral to the original vision of BFG and its individual challenges when compared with other, similarly themed games) can be incorporated too. That way, two rules alternatives can be offered, allowing players to see both and choose.

Although I now understand your system for boarding (whew! I was worried by the Cobras of death!) I prefer the current system which simulates a similar kind of thing but doesn't require the large number of dice. I think that if a ship overwhelms the enemy by such a degree that the enemy has no chance to score damage it is not such a bad thing. Your 'Risk-esque' system has its merits though, because a heroic, lowly Cobra destroyer can still damage the mightiest ships of the enemy. It also means that the results of boarding actions between two similar ships are much less certain (a Lunar can actually challenge a Chaos cruiser now!). If only boarding actions happened more often! I did have an idea of there being a certain range where close actions happened (e.g. 10 cm) and that once performing close actions ('grappling') you could close in to a boarding action.

To clarify my earlier statements regarding the similarites of BFG to Chess, I merely wished to point out that Warhammer table-top game types fundamentally depend on various random actions and that it can be limiting if the wrong random actions are removed. I doubt you would come across problems in your games for a while (especially with large fleets so that you can get a different fleet for each game) but from my experience with 40K the games, while not identical, become very similar. My example was to suggest that (although there will be important differences from shooting) the Eldar versus Chaos game will tend towards the same general action, with the gun damage averaging out to be the same over the long run. That is, unless the players change their plans! But sometimes, certain fleets require certain strategies to be viably competetive with other fleets. This has been said of the Move-Shoot-Move Eldar rules originally presented with BFG. While not every game was the same, most games (according to the guys who invented MMS rules) ended up being the same due to the constraints of survival tactics. So, to sum up (, my concern is that your group may experience some of this 'sameness' after some time playing with the modified rules. You would then have a good reason to make new rules though, which is always fun! But tricky to do right. The right new rules are always difficult to get, so well done on your group's analysis.

About Engine Explosions: I do think that it is reasonable that such large ships have titanic explosions regarding their destruction: afterall, as hulks the ship skeleton survives pretty much intact except for criticals, allowing their 'rehabilitation'. Out of curiousity (again, not trying to be offensive) have you tried specific strategies to limit drive explosion damage (e.g. not putting ships so close together)? I would be interested in seeing what effect that has on your fleets' performances overall. I agree that it should be against armour, though (except maybe Warp Implosion, as this is a very armour-ripping type of thing and it only occurs 1 in 36 times). Also, I presume you have been playing that you are only in range of the explosion if your ship's stem is in range? Of course, this would make a great difference....

About your escort roles ideas: I would rather escorts become more valuable against AC (and perhaps torpedoes, you can see the Escorts in BFG thread for more) which, to me, is more sensible in terms of the background and theme. I envisage that capital ships are more vulnerable to AC because of their size, rather than the other way around. But I would like to discuss this! Have you seen horizon's ideas?

[Thinking Stone]

@Phthisis
Sorry, I had a mental blank about this before posting! About your fixed leadership ideas, I think that they are very sensible but I think that they would work better for a large fleets version of BFG (a bit like War of the Ring (WoTR) compared with Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game (LoTR:SBG) or WH40K compared with Epic). For me, at least with moderately to small sized games, a lot of the fun in BFG is having characterful ships and escort squadrons having a major influence in a battle themselves. For example:
'The Sareveth has a crack crew of Ld 9, having fought in numerous campaigns over the Segmentum. In their last fleet engagement, they used their experties with lances and torpedo strikes to cripple the enemy battleship, Monstrous (renowned for destroying escort squadrons with long range lances), allowing the cruisers Isto and Porsorous to hulk the battleship before it could disengage. The Sacraficial, however, with its inexperienced crew (Ld 6), was plagued by bad luck and poor commands and was crippled by a squadron of Cobras which had no torpedoes remaining. Fortunately, it was saved by the heroic actions of the Vistor Sword Frigate squadron, despite their lack of experience in large fleet engagements (Ld 6 Sword squadron).'

For me, anyway, the individual leaderships of ships adds a great deal to the playing of the game at the usual points level (1,500ish and lower, maybe higher depending) . Now that I think of it, I think it would be cool to design a BFG for very large scale battles, where squadrons of ships are the key players...