Brikspace -- TBD edition

[Theblackdog]

So I've finally decided to publish my Brikspace rules for public ridicule/C&C.  The intent behind these rules is to provide a more in-depth ruleset to use with small fleets of 3-10 microscale spacecraft (not counting fighter squadrons), as opposed to the hundreds-of-ships LDD fleets Epik Space was designed to handle.  The ruleset features frictionless movement and customizable ships with a wide range of weapons and special abilities.  I've put the Google doc here.  Example games with earlier versions of the rules can be found here, here, here, here and here.  

Thoughts on the rules as they stand:
The biggest problem, and one that's hard to resolve, is that battles typically become jousts with both teams flying towards each other, trying to reach the optimal range. This results in an interesting opening as both sides jockey for position, and a not-very-interesting endgame as one side or the other reaches its optimal range and is content to stay there, or both sides reach optimal range and have no reason to move.

[stubby]

A lot of games in this genre solve the problem by making ships hard to target from the front, easy to target on the broadside, leading players to try and trick each other into exposing their flanks.

[Theblackdog]

Hmm.  It could work, but in this game ships can rotate by up to 180 degrees each turn, so it would be hard to sneak up on an enemy's flanks.  What might work better is an accuracy bonus to attacks made against ships traveling directly towards or away from you -- this would encourage the different sides to 'spiral in' instead of charging directly towards one another.  Battlefleet Gothic has something like this IIRC.

[stubby]

Hmm.  It could work, but in this game ships can rotate by up to 180 degrees each turn, so it would be hard to sneak up on an enemy's flanks.

Not at all. This is where coordination and positional advantage come into play - if you can cover a target from more than one angle, there's no direction it can turn that doesn't leave a flank exposed.

[Theblackdog]

When I get home I'll playtest it both ways, see what works best.

[Theblackdog]

Updated the rules in preparation for Dominion's Call: Vanderheim.

CHANGES:
You can now fire all weapons while using special abilities.  Special abilities are limited by cooldown times.  
Ammo restrictions for missile and torpedo launchers have been removed.  Torpedoes now have thrust for only one turn, after which they coast.  
Guns have been tweaked, usually to increase range.
A new weapon category, 'superweapons' has been added for large, fixed-forward guns.  Superweapons generally do very high damage and have special effects.
Some new special abilities have been added.
The 'target painter' ability has been tweaked.  It now allows you to re-roll accuracy for gun attacks and gives missiles a chance to hit even if their targets have moved outside their cone of fire.

Not everything that will be in Vanderheim appears here - AT fields, for instance, aren't there because I don't envision them being a part of 'normal' gameplay just yet.

[Falk]

So is O:DC getting spit up between different forum members?

[Colette]

So is O:DC getting spit up between different forum members?

Yep.

[Battlegrinder]

This looks awesome for the most part (especially the section on maneuvering in space), but I do have a few comments.

6. It isn't clear in the rulebook if the WS limit is for how many weapons a ship can have, or how many it can fire on a given turn.

7. This is more of a nitpick, but the I think the Armor stat could stand to be renamed as the Defense stat, since many factions use shields rather than actual armor to protect their ships.

8. There's no Destroyer or Scout class, which seems like a fairly major oversight.

9. Likewise, It'd be nice to have some separate stats for super-capitals, maybe by splitting the current "mothership" class into two classes. One would be more in line with the Dreadnought style super-capital many players use, and the other might be more of a super-carrier (ideally, with the launch bay special ability tossed in for free).


I also have a few quesstions about the custom weapons I'll be using for the Frangerian Navy.

6. My plan for the Rift Cannon (think of it as a weaponized Gate spell) is to give it a chance to bypass it's target's armor/shielding. The current plan is to have an extra roll after it scores a successful hit. On a 6, the target's armor is bypasses, and on a 1 (or a 1 and 2), something goes wrong and the cannon deals no damage. Does this sounds balanced/fair?

7. The superweapon would work on a similar principle, but with 2 firing modes. Mode 1 would operate like the Spinal Mass Driver, and mode 2 would take the summoning aspect of the Gate spell and reverse it, effectively banishing the target into another dimension. My current ideas for balancing mode 2 is to have it take longer to charge up and to give the target a chance to resist (like rolling an opposed roll on a heroic feat). If anyone else has suggestions for this, I'd appreciate it.

[Theblackdog]

6. It isn't clear in the rulebook if the WS limit is for how many weapons a ship can have, or how many it can fire on a given turn.

It's how many weapons a ship can have.  

7. This is more of a nitpick, but the I think the Armor stat could stand to be renamed as the Defense stat, since many factions use shields rather than actual armor to protect their ships.

I actually want to do that, but I felt like it would cause confusion for the Vanderheim players if I did it right before the battle.  

8. There's no Destroyer or Scout class, which seems like a fairly major oversight.

Not really.  The classes are supposed to be general 'sizes' of ship; from there you can use the perks and flaws to create more specific designs.  For instance a Destroyer could be a frigate with more weapons but a reduction in speed, while a Scout would be a frigate with fewer HP and weapons but more acceleration and an extra special ability.  

9. Likewise, It'd be nice to have some separate stats for super-capitals, maybe by splitting the current "mothership" class into two classes. One would be more in line with the Dreadnought style super-capital many players use, and the other might be more of a super-carrier (ideally, with the launch bay special ability tossed in for free).

I'm not sure about this.  This is a skirmish-level game, intended to be much smaller scale than something like Dilanski's Epik Space.  If a supercapital showed up in a Brikspace game, it would likely be the focus of an entire battle -- and in that case, it would be best to just make up rules for it on the fly.  Angels, space stations, and AT fields aren't covered in these rules, but I use them anyway.  

6. My plan for the Rift Cannon (think of it as a weaponized Gate spell) is to give it a chance to bypass it's target's armor/shielding. The current plan is to have an extra roll after it scores a successful hit. On a 6, the target's armor is bypasses, and on a 1 (or a 1 and 2), something goes wrong and the cannon deals no damage. Does this sounds balanced/fair?

This sounds a little like a superweapon to me, since it's a special effect rather than straight damage.  Also, what does "the target's armor is bypassed" mean?  Does it mean the target takes one point of damage automatically?  What about overkill?  What happens if you roll something that is neither a six or a 1?  
The 'superweapons' are a very new feature and are being playtested in Vanderheim, basically, so I'll probably tweak them after it's finished.

7. The superweapon would work on a similar principle, but with 2 firing modes. Mode 1 would operate like the Spinal Mass Driver, and mode 2 would take the summoning aspect of the Gate spell and reverse it, effectively banishing the target into another dimension. My current ideas for balancing mode 2 is to have it take longer to charge up and to give the target a chance to resist (like rolling an opposed roll on a heroic feat). If anyone else has suggestions for this, I'd appreciate it.

This sounds like the sort of thing you'd design as a special effect rather than incorporating it into the rules.  Also, regarding heroic feats: I tried heroic feats in brikspace in a chat battle and it didn't really work.  It works in Bragspace because Brag builds individual bridges for all the ships and has the captains act out the feats, which can be entertaining even if the feats themselves are pretty basic.

[Theblackdog]

I don't have time to work on the full ruleset right now, but thanks to Vanderheim and some very productive discussion on chat, I'm planning on making several changes to the rules:

Light weapons will be buffed to have a 1/2 chance of damaging baseline frigates.

Component damage will only put the affected weapons out of action for 1 turn; the player will not have to sacrifice shots with other weapons to repair them.

Ship construction will be changed to give ships a free perk without taking an accompanying flaw; a flaw will only be required if you take a second perk.

All special abilities will have a cooldown of 1 turn at most.

Ramming damage will be calculated based on ship size rather than remaining HP.

Ships will gain a "crew" stat - "crew" are equivalent to supernatural dice in Brikwars proper, acting as a dice pool that can be added to various rolls and stats.

Movement will change from a vector system to something based on the Brikwars creation movement rules.  However, inertia will still play a role; instead of having a fixed maximum speed, ships will start with the same speed they moved at last round and have 'thrust' that can be spent to either pivot or increase/decrease speed.  They will also be able to assign Crew dice to a Stunt Driving roll in order to turn more quickly.  

Although details aren't fixed, fighter squadrons will operate more like they do in Battlefleet Gothic.  They will have a 1" attack range, and fighter vs. fighter combat will work something like combat in Risk, but with the attackers getting the advantage.  Warships will be able to attack fighter squadrons in the same manner as they attack other ships, removing 1 fighter for each point of damage they inflict.  I'm not sure how fighters attacking capital ships will work - at present I don't want vanilla fighters to be a major threat to capital ships - although there may be "bomber" and "boarding pod" variants that can - and the proposals I heard on chat all seem too powerful.