Re: Galaxy idea - maping (was capturing planets)

From: rwallace@unix1.tcd.ie (russell wallace)

Date: Thu, 16 Jul 1992 21:27:05 +0000

In <8087@orbit.cts.com> jduffin@pnet51.orb.mn.org (Joshua Duffin) writes:

>This is something of a thorn in my side: The magic number for shields.  I
>don't like the magic number.  Before the existence of the magic number (which
>is the cube root of 30, of course), a nice hyperbolic graph could be drawn
>showing the relationship of shield and weapon strength (probability of
>destruction given a certain weapon strength versus shield strength).  With the
>magic number, it's very difficult to get anything more than a very general
>idea of how likely you are to "hit;" fifty-fifty when your weapon equals their
>shield strength, better if higher, worse if lower.  I'd like to have more
>information available there.

Well, the exact formula (now published in the manual v3.0) is:

p[kill] = log[4] ((Weapons * Weapons Tech) /

(Shields * Shields Tech / size^(1/3) *
30^(1/3))) + 1

_____________________________________________________________

(sorry if that comes out a bit garbled, ASCII uploads are slightly
problematic on this system.)

>Also regarding combat, I think it might be nice if larger ships could take
>more than one hit before dying, or perhaps if a certain strength of gun had to
>hit in order to kill them, or, to combine those, if it has some number of
>"damage points" (perhaps equal to mass?) and a weapon does its strength in
>damage points to the ship each time it hits.  Or, perhaps you're just assuming
>that every gun is deadly enough that if it penetrates the shields, it'll kill
>everyone instantly.

Well, in real life, a weapon which can penetrate the armor of a tank,
say, will usually either totally destroy the tank or at least render it
inoperative ... I'm assuming that this will carry through to space
combat, particularly considering the weapons which are likely to be used
at Galaxy tech levels. This is why I didn't use anything like damage
points. On the other hand, remember that a large battleship is totally
immune to weapons below a reasonable size, and mostly immune to weapons
slightly above that (especially if you invest in Shields technology).

--
"To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem"
Russell Wallace, Trinity College, Dublin
rwallace@unix1.tcd.ie

References

Re: Galaxy idea - maping (was capturing planets)
jduffin@pnet51.orb.mn.org (Joshua Duffin)
Wed, 15 Jul 1992 20:14:43 +0000