Rule Modifications for Starfire

Mass-ive!  And they should act that way on the table!

https://oldschoolfrp.tumblr.com/post/186521407401/maneuvering-ships-in-starfire-william-h-keith

A good concise intro to Starfire, albeit a tad out of date:
https://www.starfiredesign.com/starfire/introduction/

fun little post at the piazza:
http://www.thepiazza.org.uk/bb/viewtopic.php?f=88&t=23045
Just shows how easy it is to use and adapt these rules.

So, having fun getting back into these rules and definitely have more experience with naval games. This has helped developed some of my thoughts on space ship wargames in general, and what I'm looking for in a game.

1) History v. Fiction. As a big fan of the WWII Solomon Islands campaign, I think that you can in fact have different navies, different ships, different tech and different strategic / tactical issues, and have a great naval wargame. 

I think a lot of sci fi wargames give good tools for gaming, but they get into trouble when it comes to differentiating between [fictitious] cultures and their gear. History delivers the issues right into the game designer's hands. The last big space game I know well enough to comment on was Battlefleet Gothic, but some people insisted that the Eldar fleet was broken - it was probably just not easy to handle...most warhammer and GW gamers wouldn't know tactics if it erupted thru the lining of their stomach wall at breakfast.

2) Newton's Laws. I'm realizing that they matter to me, especially the First Law. They make it space instead of wet navy. Doesn't have to be "Ad Astra" level in detail, just give a good feel for inertia, acceleration / deceleration, thrust, etc. So I said that once you were moving in a specific direction at a specific velocity, you just continued at that speed/velocity until Thrust changed it [accelerate, decelerate, or turn].

There are a few things that I don’t like about the movement system; I appreciate the impulse mechanic being an attempt to allow players to move simultaneously without writing orders, but it is cumbersome. I sometimes forget which impulse I’m on!  You can also screw up your ship movements by forgetting which are moving in which impulse – this is more a product of ship differentiation as if you make them in identical batches a lot of this goes away.

Don’t like that it ignores Newton’s First Law. I have been tinkering with a very simple NFL inertia system and it works well. It also adjudicates power – the Ion Engine Units – to various systems to enhance performance. With the smaller scenarios, this gives the players an opportunity to do things that make sense but also achieve a bit of tactical surprise with EW / ECM affecting the to hit number.

3) Ship design. Dying to do this. Mostly in the area of making for interesting game play between different fleets with different gear. I think tactics revolve around the gear, and the hard part is making viable different fleets with different tactics.

4) Dicing. Switching to d12 with a natural ‘1’ being a critical Hit that damages like a particle beam. This significantly speeds up play as each firing system can be a colored dice, and you can roll for all your shooting at once.

5) Turn Modes. Movement in a previous turn doesn't count for Turns. 

I also really dislike tracking anything - ANYTHING - in any game across two turns, unless it is super easy like flipping a counter over to "disrupted side". So all turn mode movement must be spent each player turn and doesn't carry over. Think of the turn as less about time and more about decision points for captains and admirals, and you'll see it makes sense.

6) Energy Allocation. It has to power Shields, Weapons and acceleration/deceleration and each 60° Turn; any excess may be allocated to EW / ECM [Electronic Warfare / Electronic Counter Measures] to modify your Initiative die roll. So for example: if you have 6 Ion Engines, you might allocate 2 to S/weapons, 1 to a Turn and 3 to ECM [giving +3 to the Initiative roll]. I also tinkered with the ECM package as giving a bonus / penalty to your Hit ability; this time I gave 1:1, so 3 ECM made you harder to hit by 3 on the dice.

So, how did it play out?
I kept the 2d6 rolling and the constant IN to the Khanate ship for this playtest.

Using my handy 99cent marble notebook, I've made a high tech record sheet, *ahem, seen below. In the first couple of turns, the Terrans research vessel Discovery moved on spending Thrust to close quickly - scientific curiosity, no doubt!  The Alkzar would like to keep distant but also protect the planetary outpost from the intruding vessel, ergo it fires a missile [with 2d6 still, didn't switch to d12 yet] and hits, knocking down Discovery's shield.

Turn 3, both captains pull some maneuvers, and end up on mostly opposed courses and much closer. The Khanate Khats just can't shoot and miss with their Gun. The missile knocks out the Discovery's Armor. In response, the Terrans roll very well - outraged sensibilities? "But we're SCIENTISTS!" - and knock out both Shield and Armor.

Turn 4. The Discovery is moving rapidly along, at about 8 hexes / turn, and darts around Alkzar and scans the planet with its scientific instruments for a tactical win -if it can escape. Alkzar corkscrews clockwise to keep Discovery from getting onto its tail [Khats hate that]. With only one weapon, the Khans get a hit and the Terrans miss. Still, Alkzar has only three systems left, its Gun/Missile Launcher and 2 Engines. They really need to trim a weapon from Discovery to survive much longer.

Turn 5. Some tight turning, then Alkzar has IN and hits, knocking out the Terran Laser. At three hexes, it would've hit for 2 Dam and pretty much toasted Alkzar - whew! The Terrans shoot second and still pull the last tooth off of Alkzar - the Khans really needed a miss there.

Turn 6 [ignore that die!]. The Terrans speed off with a tactical victory. With nothing but one engine left, the Khanate isn't in a position to do anything about it. As it is a first encounter, the Terran scientific vessal decline to vaporize the alien vessel, hoping that a salvageable future is still possible with this species..."After all, Captain, didn't we intrude into their system?  Surely it was a natural, if hasty reaction for most species?"

Well, that was cool!  I liked the continuous movement. You only need to fire up the engines when you want to increase/decrease speed or change direction. The power can then be used for other fun stuff. It definitely felt more like space and didn't require much effort.

Obviously, another play is needed!  This time I added in some more resource allocation and started to write orders each turn and track them.

Turn 4. The usual closing game had the Alkzar better positioned, but their obligation to protect the planet from the intruding vessel doesn't give them many choices. If they could only abandon their charge, perhaps they could snipe with a missile at long range. Still, Discovery has better weapons at long range, anyway, with the Laser way outclassing the Gun in range [almost triple effective range] and damage [double], plus it ignores Shields [not that it matters, there's only one on Alkzar]. With 50% greater engine power, Discovery also outclasses the little system ship in terms of game speed, 6 to 4.

Turn 5. Despite smart maneuvering and good luck, Alkzar is still losing the fight with 3 hits to inflicting 2 on the larger Discovery.

Turn 6. Alkzar gets pummeled for two hits and misses Discovery. Fortunately, the Terrans are not without mercy and begin to depart with an easy Tactical Victory. This could easily become a Strategic Victory as there's nothing the Khanate can do to prevent Discovery outmaneuvering it to get a 2-hex scan with its scientific instruments unless Discovery starts to completely miss every turn with both its weapons. Not likely.

Turn 7. The Terrans head for the Warp Gate. Alkzar rolls a critical hit with the natural '1'! This knocks out an additional system, but the total is one scientific instrument and one Hold.

Turn 8. Terrans are outta there!

I enjoyed the changes. Still, simple is always better so I'll be implementing the ECM changes in a bit of a simpler way, altho I am going to port over the missile method from BFG more or less. They will fly around as a counter chasing targets.

ECM bonus. If you have more ECM, even if you lose IN you get a hit bonus of -1/die roll, and are targeted at penalty of +1/die roll. It is simple and represents that you've out performed / out resourced the opposition on allocation to EW.

Missiles. Switching to a counter that moves, like BFG.

Starfire’s use of missiles also is a bit awkward – you can shoot a missile towards your aft quarter at a ship going away from you at high speed, but it still accelerates fast enough to hit in one turn. This avoids tracking missiles, of course, but I think  Battlefleet Gothic has it right when it handles fighters and ordinance [missiles] as the same thing. What is a fighter but a missile with full decision-making capabilities that can then be retrieved?  

When beam and other speed of light weapons arrive, relative speeds don't matter much, but the acceleration of a missile fired between two ships heading away from each other at speed 6 each at max range would be an acceleration in 30 seconds of around 32 hexes!