Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[serrate]

So, I was trying to prepare myself for this next battle, and generally trying to learn some naval tactics since I have no experience with them.  I thought I'd share things that I'd "learned", create a place for others to do the same, as well as allow you to correct the things that I learned incorrectly.  It is a given that most, if not all, of you may already have a fantastic understanding of naval actions due to other games such as CTA, Leviathans, etc.  So don't hesitate to share your knowledge and tell me where I'm wrong.  I'm hoping to be just competent enough by the time our game rolls around, so as to not cause you to want to throw heavy miniature spaceships at my face.

Here's a helpful site, although not all of it is necessarily relevant at Capital Scale: http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,2107.0/nowap.html

You might recall that some people suggested the Battlespace scenario, 1 Black Lion versus 2 Congress.  Rob said this was no fight at all, but rather a slaughter.  However, since they are the only minis (warships) I own, I decided to get to know them.  Set up a game in Megamek where I played both sides:

Scenario 1:  1 Black Lion, vs 2 Congress, 2x2 space map, no cover (I couldn't figure out how to add asteroids to my map).  Wow, that was quick and brutal.  The difference in damage between what these classes can do is similar to putting a Firestarter up against 2 platoons of infantry armed with forks and knives.  The only thing I learned in this iteration was that if two Congress frigates are ever caught out in the open like this, they need to either jump or surrender.

Scenario 2: 
1 Black Lion + 3 squadrons of ASF's (Corsairs, Eagles, Thunderbirds)
VS
2 Congress (2 Union DS, 2 Leopard CV DS) + full ASF complement (2 sq. Sparrowhawks, 1 sq. Thrush, 1 sq. Stingray, 2 flights Zeros)

Still a bloody mess.  Of course, I didn't exactly use assault dropships for the Congress group, and the ASF's were lighter as well.  This group lasted much longer though.  The Black Lion just has the ability to reach out and utterly crush another warship (at least a frigate).  The dropships and ASF's of the Congress group pushed through the fighter screen and starting putting damage into the Black Lion, and when the Black Lion lost init for 4 turns in a row I was starting to wonder if the dropships and ASF's couldn't finish it off.  But no, the BL just opened up on anything in every arc.  A single hit from that beast will pop a dropship instantly, and if you've got dropships in more than one arc... goodbye dropships.  The Congress group was able to damage the AFT weapons of the BL, and then took their remaining fighters and sat there, and even ate through into the IS of the BL, but it would've taken forever and the remaining BL ASF's were chewing them to shreds.

Things I think I learned:
1)  Battlecruisers will eat your face.
2)  Splitting forces up, in order to "surround" an opponent is a bad bad idea.  This just allows the enemy to use his full firepower on multiple arcs.  Seems like you'd want to keep all your forces limited to a single arc of the most powerful unit if at all possible to minimize how much firepower can be brought to bear.
3)  Using 1 thrust to "roll" is crucial in order to present fresh armor
4)  I need to remember to use "evade" movement.  I'm not sure if it would've helped against some of the capital fire (can capital ships even Evade or is that limited to ASF's, small craft?)
5)  While I wasn't ever able to use cover, I think it would be a huge tactical element in a game.  The ability for outmatched units to possibly hide until it's a knife-fight where they can put their greater maneuverability to use, would really add something to a game.  In the case of two Congress vs a BL, it might not be enough, but it sure beats trying to engage in the open.
6)  ASF's with no aft-facing weapons are at a severe disadvantage.
7)  Based on my experience with how easily a DS is destroyed by a Warship, it would be foolhardy for us to part with Babcock until our fleet has defeated the OpFor fleet.  Babcock is seriously the only thing keeping us alive!

Things I need to learn more about:
1)  Firing arcs, I was confused about what weapons were able to fire where...
2)  What happens with "out of control" units at Capital scale?  In my game, they just continued straight ahead at their current velocity until they either left the board or regained control.  But they didn't have the random movement that I've seen before, and I'm not sure why not.


Questions for our upcoming game:
  Will we be allowed to split off fighters that are out-of-control from the rest of the sqaudron? 
  Why are the Gunnery skills better than the piloting skills (aren't they usually the opposite for aerospace units)?
 

[Darrian Wolffe]

 Why are the Gunnery skills better than the piloting skills (aren't they usually the opposite for aerospace units)?

Because my copy of HMA, on the RARE occasions it actually works at all, crashes and burns when I try to print sheets with a lower Piloting Skill than a gunnery skill.  Ergot, screw it.  There they are.  

And I don't know, on the 1st question.  It adds a lot of complexity to record-keeping

[agustaaquila]

Things I think I learned:
1)  Battlecruisers will eat your face.
2)  Splitting forces up, in order to "surround" an opponent is a bad bad idea.  This just allows the enemy to use his full firepower on multiple arcs.  Seems like you'd want to keep all your forces limited to a single arc of the most powerful unit if at all possible to minimize how much firepower can be brought to bear.
3)  Using 1 thrust to "roll" is crucial in order to present fresh armor
4)  I need to remember to use "evade" movement.  I'm not sure if it would've helped against some of the capital fire (can capital ships even Evade or is that limited to ASF's, small craft?)
5)  While I wasn't ever able to use cover, I think it would be a huge tactical element in a game.  The ability for outmatched units to possibly hide until it's a knife-fight where they can put their greater maneuverability to use, would really add something to a game.  In the case of two Congress vs a BL, it might not be enough, but it sure beats trying to engage in the open.
6)  ASF's with no aft-facing weapons are at a severe disadvantage.
7)  Based on my experience with how easily a DS is destroyed by a Warship, it would be foolhardy for us to part with Babcock until our fleet has defeated the OpFor fleet.  Babcock is seriously the only thing keeping us alive!

Things I need to learn more about:
1)  Firing arcs, I was confused about what weapons were able to fire where...
2)  What happens with "out of control" units at Capital scale?  In my game, they just continued straight ahead at their current velocity until they either left the board or regained control.  But they didn't have the random movement that I've seen before, and I'm not sure why not.

Ok, to respond to some of these.

1)  Yes, large heavily armed warships will destroy each other in very short order.  The Black Lion is one of the better ships available in this time period.

2)  Not necessarily, heat sinks limit the number of arcs that can be fired, and so while concentrating in a single arc might limit exposure, spreading out can do so as well.  Warships, all of them, are glass cannons, and so a good line of thought would be clan mech warfare.  Long range, and unlike clan warfare combine fire all the time.

3)  Its the most important maneuver in the entire game.

4)  Evading is a choice, and one that might improve defense.  I do not use it a lot, unless its my only option to get a unit into attacking position the next turn.

5)  Knife fighting against battlecruisers still ends very poorly.  I like to focus on combining fire in one area until the ship breaks.

6)  If they let things get in behind them, or they have no one on their side covering their rear. 

7)  If you think that you can.  There will be death, and if the enemy wants to focus on destroying dropships then they can.  I plan to be on board the Robinson and focus on destroying the big guns first.

I think the important thing to remember is to focus fire even more than a mech game.  Because a fleet can destroy a warship a turn.  I like ling range, but the fight is likely to devolve into short range death passes.  god(s) hep us all then.

[Darrian Wolffe]

As a reference, I had rather assumed the PCs were taking their DropShip and docking with the Robinson (since Admiral Rue is your primary contact and you had stuff aboard the DropShip you wanted to keep), which would then stay WELL away from the battle line.  The NPCs have absolutely no way to know the Robinson is important at all in this fight.  Are ya'll doing something else?

And Bryan, #1 is not necessarily true.  Camerons are battlecruisers as well as Black Lions are, and they aren't even as remotely dangerous.  Really, the ship designations are bad, because they're usually based on tonnage, not the role of the ship.  The only thing that makes a Destroyer in BattleTech is being between 350 and about 550 k-tons. 

And I DID say that the Black Lion/x2 Congress fight was a slaughter, didn't I? 

As for some other issues:
1)  Firing arcs, I was confused about what weapons were able to fire where.   Check out page 235 of TW.  it shows the firing arcs for ships.  Essentially, each arc goes forward 1 hex out of one of the 6 hexsides, then splits off 60 degrees to either side.  Like the forward and aft firing arcs for leviathans.

2)  What happens with "out of control" units at Capital scale?  In my game, they just continued straight ahead at their current velocity until they either left the board or regained control.  But they didn't have the random movement that I've seen before, and I'm not sure why not.  Remember that for Random Movement to occur, you must fail the Control Roll by 5+.  Check your logs - it may be possible that all of your Control Roll failures had a margin of failure of 4 or less.  Additionally, Control Rolls taken by WarShips are fairly rare; most of the things that cause control rolls don't or can't apply to WarShips in a large portion of the game (such as spending more thrust in a hex than you have SI or sustaining damage in an atmosphere).  Finally, Megamek may not be coded for random movement, or it may be an on/off switch in a menu somewhere; such things happen. 

Another good lesson in areospace combat is that, unlike in BattleTech, speed is not a defense!.  Speed is instead an enabler of offense.  For WarShips, once you've reached a certain Velocity, the ability to spend Thrust is really about being able to maneuver your ship to get into a position you want to be in and staying there.  A 4/6 ship vs a 2/3 ship doesn't have any advantage at all until the range is very close and it can maneuver into a particular firing arc, while the other ship can't turn fast enough to catch up.  But until you're into that range (which is about 5 hexes), it's not a huge advantage.


Your best real defense in this game is deploying layers of smaller WarShips and DropShips ahead of your serious capital vessels to screen them from enemy fire as you close.  Once you're to the range you want to be in, let those smaller ships (which will generally be heavily damaged or destroyed by that point) head for the proverbial hills.  Remember, ECM and ECCM are the "terrain" of space combat, and you get to put that terrain where you want it.

About firing arcs - putting yourself in multiple firing arc of the other guy means you're generally spreading out damage, so it'll take longer to kill him, and he can still shoot back at you.  However, if his ship is heat-limited (can only fire 3-ish arcs, which isn't uncommon), then you start presenting difficult choices about what he can shoot at.  There's times and places to both load up one arc and to surround - if you load up one side arc, what happens when he rolls his ship?  Doing damage to both sides of the ship means that rolling doesn't do a lot of good...but it'll take you longer to severely damage him in the first place.  Decisions, decisions...

[serrate]

2)  Not necessarily, heat sinks limit the number of arcs that can be fired, and so while concentrating in a single arc might limit exposure, spreading out can do so as well. 

I guess I never really saw much limitation due to heat on the ships I was using, but then there was a very limited amount of stuff on the board.

7)  If you think that you can.  There will be death, and if the enemy wants to focus on destroying dropships then they can.  I plan to be on board the Robinson and focus on destroying the big guns first.

As a reference, I had rather assumed the PCs were taking their DropShip and docking with the Robinson (since Admiral Rue is your primary contact and you had stuff aboard the DropShip you wanted to keep), which would then stay WELL away from the battle line.  The NPCs have absolutely no way to know the Robinson is important at all in this fight.  Are ya'll doing something else?

That's something I missed in the timeline, that we'd be docking with the Robinson first, and then the battle would be engaged later.

Any possibility of getting our stuff off the dropship, and then using the dropship as a fighter screening unit?  Or should we even worry about our stuff?  I'm pretty sure I didn't have ECM/ECCM turned on in my megamek game, so that would certainly add some survivability to all forces. 

1)  Firing arcs, I was confused about what weapons were able to fire where.   Check out page 235 of TW.  it shows the firing arcs for ships.  Essentially, each arc goes forward 1 hex out of one of the 6 hexsides, then splits off 60 degrees to either side.  Like the forward and aft firing arcs for leviathans.

The Warship Firing Arcs diagram on page 95 of SO is helpful as well, as a good bit of my confusion was regarding the different side arcs.

2)  What happens with "out of control" units at Capital scale?  In my game, they just continued straight ahead at their current velocity until they either left the board or regained control.  But they didn't have the random movement that I've seen before, and I'm not sure why not.  Remember that for Random Movement to occur, you must fail the Control Roll by 5+.  Check your logs - it may be possible that all of your Control Roll failures had a margin of failure of 4 or less.  Additionally, Control Rolls taken by WarShips are fairly rare; most of the things that cause control rolls don't or can't apply to WarShips in a large portion of the game (such as spending more thrust in a hex than you have SI or sustaining damage in an atmosphere).  Finally, Megamek may not be coded for random movement, or it may be an on/off switch in a menu somewhere; such things happen. 

Megamek does have random movement, I've seen it before when practicing ASF combat.  I had forgotten about the MoF on those control rolls, I'm sure that was the issue.  One of the Congress frigates failed a Control Roll and it went off-board in the next turn, which likely saved it's life.

Your best real defense in this game is deploying layers of smaller WarShips and DropShips ahead of your serious capital vessels to screen them from enemy fire as you close.  Once you're to the range you want to be in, let those smaller ships (which will generally be heavily damaged or destroyed by that point) head for the proverbial hills.  Remember, ECM and ECCM are the "terrain" of space combat, and you get to put that terrain where you want it.

Yes, I need to turn on ECM/ECCM in Megamek and get some experience using it to screen units.  That will add a lot to the game-play.

About firing arcs - putting yourself in multiple firing arc of the other guy means you're generally spreading out damage, so it'll take longer to kill him, and he can still shoot back at you.  However, if his ship is heat-limited (can only fire 3-ish arcs, which isn't uncommon), then you start presenting difficult choices about what he can shoot at.  There's times and places to both load up one arc and to surround - if you load up one side arc, what happens when he rolls his ship?  Doing damage to both sides of the ship means that rolling doesn't do a lot of good...but it'll take you longer to severely damage him in the first place.  Decisions, decisions...

I see your point, and maybe I need to work with a more heat-restrictive ship than the Black Lion in Megamek, because heat definitely wasn't an issue for it.  Of course, another point in favor of the limited arc(s) approach is all the aforementioned ECM.  Seems like you'd want to maximize that extra protection as much as possible.

Thanks for all the comments!

[serrate]

Tele-operated missiles:

These are unique weapons, and not a "firing mode" (such as indirect), correct?

Is damage resolved immediately when the missile enters a targets hex?  Or does the "attack" only occur during the combat phase?  Page 251 of TW isn't clear on this, but I'm assuming that the potential damage occurs during the combat phase.

If the missile 'attack' is resolved simultaneously with all other fire, does this mean that a -T crew must decide to either trust that the weapon will hit (if the missile ends the movement phase in the hex of the target) and go ahead and put another missile in space, OR they would need to wait until the turn following a successful hit before dropping another missile?

Do T-O weapons exist in the Star League era?  Tech Manual indicates that they were developed by ComStar and the Combine, so I'm thinking "no".

[Darrian Wolffe]

Tele-operated weapons don't exist yet (outside of possibly VERY experiemental platforms), so don't worry about them as they pertain to the scenario.