Crossbow and Stat Conversions

capi3101

Admiral
Good morning, y'all.

On Tuesday, September 13th, I posted a guess over on the Alpha Test Game 4 thread of the TacOps stats for the A-18 Crossbow, mainly to see if I understood the conversion process from the statistics used in the original games. This morning, Ironduke posted a request that I post this information in a separate thread for further discussion, which I'm now doing.

So, to reiterate what I posted on the 13th:

Real stats, from three sources:
A-18 Crossbow - 24m Length; 40 metric tonnes mass; max speed: 370 kps; No Afterburner; Acceleration Average; 8 dps YPR; Shield: 25 cm fore/aft; Armor: 20 cm fore/25 cm port/25 cm starboard/20 cm aft; Guns: Mass Drivers 3x1, Neutron Guns 2x1, Turret (Aft Neutron Guns 2x1); Missiles: Torpedoes 4x1, FF 3x1; Special: Tractor, Jump Drive

And now here's my guesstimate:
To Hit: 6 (The Crossbow is smaller than the Sabre but just as maneuverable, though larger than the Rapier - estimated bounding box volume ~3,313 m^3)
Shield: 50/+5 (the recharge is a guess based on the recharge rates of other bombers already in the game.)
Hull: 85
Cost: 8 (based on a higher maneuverability rate and slightly stronger firepower than the Broadsword)
Max Speed: 4
Acceleration: 1 (same as Jalkehi, also rated as Average Acceleration)
Turn Rate: 3 (8 dps, same listed as Sabre, Ferret)
Afterburner: None
Jump Drive: x2
Fighter Complement: none
Decoys: none
Missiles: 4 Torpedoes, 3 Pilum FF
Guns: 3 Mass driver Cannons, 2 Neutron Guns, 1 Turret (Aft)

I suppose the Tractor Beam would be a new feature, which is why it isn't in the game already. Then again, the Broadsword should have one too, so that may not be an issue.

So how'd I do? Even remotely close?
 
Hm, I'm still missing my "official" ship list with the current stats, but what I did find is one of the first generation ship cards (from the physical version of the game). And yes, you're quite close with your guestimates... :) Here's what I found:

Max Speed: 4
Acceleration: 2 (seemed to be less sluggish than a Jalkehi)
Afterburner: none
Turn Rate: 2 (depending on in-game performance, I guess)
Jump Drive: x3 (?)
Shields: 50 (no recharge given)
Hull: 90
Decoys: none
Guns: 2 Neutron Guns, 3 Mass Driver Cannons, 1 Turret (aft)
Missiles: 4 Torpedoes, 3 Pilum FF

And no, the Tractor Beam wasn't the reason why it's not in the game yet - it's the simple fact that Marc hasn't touched the Crossbow (yet?). I'd also love to get the Gothri in game, or the Strakha... :p
 
I suppose we might've been drawing some of our data from different sources; that would explain the differences. I can see today that I should've got the hull of 90...simple error in addition.

I had kind of figured there was an observational aspect to determining some of the stats, if for nothing else than the shield recharge rate. The number I put down was a complete guess. Acceleration and turning are the same way, then?

What did you have down for its Cost and To Hit, out of curiosity? I'd love to talk about how those are determined in particular...the numbers I put down for the Crossbow were nothing more than educated guesses.

Do you have stats for the Gothri and the Strakha? I might take a crack at these too, just for the hell of it...
 
During my "research," I fired up WC2 and Academy and let the enemy take down my shields, then afterburn away and wait until they were fully recharged. It took lots of excel charts to determine the best recharge rates for each craft, and then I went from there and "guestimated" the rest, using the info we sometimes get in the games, books or other official reference material. Speaking of which, the CIC's ship database was of course of invaluable worth, too! :)

Cost is really nothing more than a shot in the dark, and it desperately needs to be reworked. Again, I tried evaluating the "worth" of each ship considering offensive and defensive capabilities and putting them in relation to each other. I'm not really satisfied with the way it is right now, and I've not even broadened the scope of the game from WC2 era to WC1 (let alone 3, 4 or Prophecy). Also, it's completely off when balancing fighters against capships...

Target Roll is something that I made up "from scratch." There are really no rules to this stat, other than it should be balanced.

I found my old ship list, and yes, the Gothri and Strakha are in there. However, these are "alpha" stats - meaning they're coming from a different version of the game, where I didn't use shield recharge and had an "Evade" stat in there. (Which I later renamed to "Handling" and finally left out completely while introducing the Target Roll mechanic.)
 
Cost is really nothing more than a shot in the dark, and it desperately needs to be reworked. Again, I tried evaluating the "worth" of each ship considering offensive and defensive capabilities and putting them in relation to each other. I'm not really satisfied with the way it is right now, and I've not even broadened the scope of the game from WC2 era to WC1 (let alone 3, 4 or Prophecy). Also, it's completely off when balancing fighters against capships...

I've encountered this same problem myself in a couple of my games...the tricky part of using offense/defense as a means of judging a craft's worth is, in my experience anyway, figuring out the limits of its offensive capabilities. I'm trying to make a game similar to TacOps at the moment and torpedoes (and Mace missiles) are giving me fits; some of the fighters that I've got carrying the things are pricier than some capital ships at the moment.

I suppose I could try plugging the ships into SFRPG's system and see what comes up as a cost that way, though Starflight/Wing Commander are not wholly compatible with one another. I don't know...I really haven't got any other suggestions as a workaround.

You say you tried to evaluate the worth of each craft. How did you do that exactly? Might be a good place to start a discussion on the topic (unless I've asked this question too many times already and the answer has always been "nothing more than a shot in the dark").
 
Sorry I've not come around to answer your question yet... At the moment I'm really busy with RL stuff and have to catch up with a lot of work. I'll get back to you once things have settled a bit! I used lots and lots and lots (did I mention lots?) of different charts to compare ship stats and calculations to find out a way to balance ship worth. In the end, though, I think I might just be better off estimating this, depending on beta-tests of the game.
Usually, wargames use fighter squadrons instead of single fighters to work around this issue, but I really want the focus of TacOps to stay on fighters. I may have to rework the way capships work in the game...
 
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