Traveller: The New Era
Sample "sensor battle"
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Date: Mon, 30 Oct 1995 23:04:13 -0700 (MST) From: merrick@Rt66.com (Merrick Burkhardt) Subject: Sample "sensor battle" Howdy, here are some notes I jotted down a while ago regarding active vs. passive sensors. These may look like a silly thing to write down since it's just a rewrite of the players aid card in a way, but it is useful (IMHO) to see it in a different format. I assumed a sensor duel between 2 Small ships. One with a 16 hex AEMS, the other with a 8 hex PEMS (folding). The range is 64 hexes. The AEMS ship is free to evade at up to 6gs. The PEMS ship can't evade at all because it has a folding array. Both have 16 hex EMS Jammers (not that it matters for the AEMS ship). I also assume that using the jammer counts as going active (not explicit in the rules). Both ships also have EM Masking and are at the same TL. I didn't use black globes at all. I was trying to get at the range of Diff Levels the sensing ship would have to deal with. For the AEMS, for example, jamming to +2 DMs was impossible because outstanding success is not possible for the Formidable Jamming task, etc.. AEMS ship Lock-On attempt: Conditions Diff Level --------------------- ---------- No Jamming by target: Difficult Jamming successful or Cat. Evasion Failure by AEMS ship : Formidable Jamming + Cat. Evasion Failure by AEMS ship: Impossible PEMS Lock-On attempt (straight BL): Conditions Diff Level --------------------- ---------- Stern quarter* if AEMS is using gturns: Easy Evasion +1 and stern quarter: Average Evasion +2 and stern quarter: Difficult "Normal" or Evasion +3 and Stern quarter: Formidable Evasion +1 or no gs: Impossible Evasion +2+ No attempt *Stern quarter---this is the drive signature rule from BL. In my edition the rules say stern quarter arc, but the aid card says stern on... a big difference, and I don't have any way of knowing if it was made clear. Of the possibilities I think the last 3 are most likely. The Difficult result seems impossible given that an Outstanding success on the evasion task would let you choose facing. PEMS Lock-On attempt (using my sensor rules): (if the diff level above is easier, it may be used instead) Conditions Diff Level --------------------- ---------- "Base"---AEMS ship has a lock: Average Target Evasion +1: Difficult Target Evasion +2: Formidable Target Evasion +3: Impossible This case allows the PEMS to operate at twice the short range of the AEMS---so 64 hexes is Medium range. This range may only be used if the AEMS has a Lock-On, otherwise use the normal rules. The major difference is that except for cases where the PEMS happens to get a shot into the HEPlaR drive of the target, it will always be less likely to lock with than the AEMS. Also, using my passive rules the diff levels directly above would be the same for *any* passive sensor! (I require that the antenna be at least the same size as the active's though) It is interesting to note that in the latter PEMS case the ship could have a non-folding array and be able to evade---it would then be at a great advantage over the AEMS ship. We've been horsing around with these rules along with the new HEPlaR missiles and we get very passive battles. I was trying to paint a Gazelle with the 10 hex AEMS on a Rampart (until that point the Rampart had no Lock) and actually locked. Next turn the Gazelle would've taken a few missiles, but it killed the Rampart as soon as it went active with the 2 LBs... 3 hits---6 criticals **boom** (I let the Gazelle use its folding 5hex array as a 4 hex array when folded, so it could use passives and evade) Missiles are still hard as hell to lock... the sub-shortrange idea posted here works pretty well. At detonation range (0) missiles become Easy to lock with a SR10 AEMS. Otherwise missiles are impossible to lock. Anyway, that's how typical military sensors stack up. -Merrick