Anti-missile fire. Where is it?

[Hotfoot Jackson]

Been looking through my nice new (secondhand) Traveller Book and Adventure, comparing them to the FFE The Books volume. I was looking through the starship combat rules, and while I know about the Pulse Laser/Beam Laser less accurate/more damage omission (thanks CT Errata guy DonM), nowhere can I see any actual mechanics for anti-missile fire. Plenty of mentions, computer prgrammes, specific phases for it, but no actual rules. Did they, like the Pulse/Beam laser thing, exist in Basic Traveller but were not copied to later editions? Or were they never worked out at all?

I know High Guard gives a different system where it's all worked out, but the lack in the starter ruleset is annoying.

Other references to combat seem to state that missiles are also affected by sand, as indeed are starships, where sand is capable of causing minor damage. Easy enough to work out, a missile passing through sand is destroyed on a roll of 8+ on 2D6, a ship passing through a cloud of sand takes a single hull hit on a similar roll. But official rules would be nice to see.

 

[McPerth]

Been looking through my nice new (secondhand) Traveller Book and Adventure, comparing them to the FFE The Books volume. I was looking through the starship combat rules, and while I know about the Pulse Laser/Beam Laser less accurate/more damage omission (thanks CT Errata guy DonM), nowhere can I see any actual mechanics for anti-missile fire. Plenty of mentions, computer prgrammes, specific phases for it, but no actual rules. Did they, like the Pulse/Beam laser thing, exist in Basic Traveller but were not copied to later editions? Or were they never worked out at all?

I know High Guard gives a different system where it's all worked out, but the lack in the starter ruleset is annoying.

Other references to combat seem to state that missiles are also affected by sand, as indeed are starships, where sand is capable of causing minor damage. Easy enough to work out, a missile passing through sand is destroyed on a roll of 8+ on 2D6, a ship passing through a cloud of sand takes a single hull hit on a similar roll. But official rules would be nice to see.

I cannot tell you for sure, but as my player group always understood (IIRC, there's many years since we played CT), lasers used as ahti missile role just shoot at the missiles instead an enemy ship. Any missile hit was destroyed, so was no more a danger for your ship.

About the effect of sand when a ship passes though the cloud, a hull hit seems not a good answer to me. In CT, the first hull hit produced explosive decompression , and further hits had no efect (book 2 page 32, TTB page 77)*, so it seems too much if that's the first hit and too few if already decompressed.

I think it could be better to have the pilot roll 8+ to avoid damage, and treat it as a hit if not avoided, or something like this.

(*)As an aside, this effect of hull hits (which are 16 in 36, so nearly 50%) having no effect above the first one it's one of the flaws (IMO) of the game, as you can have your starship holed until it is a starcheese (emmental class) and still fully operational.

 

[aramis]

Anti-missile fire: Page 76, right col... Works just like normal fire.
It can be presumed a hit kills a missile.

As for the prototype game, that's Mayday.

 

[Hotfoot Jackson]

Thanks. Will check now.

 

[Hotfoot Jackson]

Hmmm. That doesn't actually tell me much, I'd seen that and all it says is when anti-missile fire takes place. Do we have to allocate turrets to anti-missile fire or return fire? I'd guess yes. 8+ for a hit to destroy a missile, fine. What about modifiers? How fast actually does a missile go? We're told launched ordnance shares the launching ship's vectors, but after that? I'd say 6G going on later sources, but is that added to the modifiers or is it a base 8+ per turret per missile?

I'm going with a turret being used for EITHER return fire OR anti-missile fire in the Return Fire Phase, 8+ destroys the missile, no modifiers apply. If there is more than one turret, they can target the same missile or a different missile.

 

[aramis]

The modifier to hit a target isn't by its acceleration. It's by it's difference of vector.

Note that the target program isn't used for anti-missile fire, and that weapons can only fie once per player turn, so yes, you DO need to divide some for anti-missile and return fire... but note also that return fire and anti-missile fire are during the other player's player turn.

 

[infojunky]

The modifier to hit a target isn't by its acceleration. It's by it's difference of vector.

Note that the target program isn't used for anti-missile fire, and that weapons can only fie once per player turn, so yes, you DO need to divide some for anti-missile and return fire... but note also that return fire and anti-missile fire are during the other player's player turn.

Read it again, once per phase…

 

[BlackBat242]

You just replied to a 10-year-old post.

Just sayin'.

 

[Spinward Flow]

Better late than ... um ... something something?

 

[aramis]

Read it again, once per phase

Bk 2 '81 actually says "In the laser fire phase of a player turn, the phasing player..." - p29
There is one laser fire phase for each side in each player turn. (space combat sequence, p31
That thus renders to once per player turn, noting that there are two player turns per game turn.
Once per player turn is accurate.

The page numbers are different in '77, but the content is the same.

 

[whartung]

Bk 2 '81 actually says "In the laser fire phase of a player turn, the phasing player..." - p29
There is one laser fire phase for each side in each player turn. (space combat sequence, p31
That thus renders to once per player turn, noting that there are two player turns per game turn.
Once per player turn is accurate.

The phasing player gets to fire once, but the non-phasing player can fire twice. They can "fire back" with the "Return Fire" program at any ships that attacked them, and they can fire at any missiles that have contacted the ship using the "Anti-missile" program. Neither of these stipulate that they override the other, that if you return fire you can't anti-missile or vice-a-versa.

 

[infojunky]

The phasing player gets to fire once, but the non-phasing player can fire twice. They can "fire back" with the "Return Fire" program at any ships that attacked them, and they can fire at any missiles that have contacted the ship using the "Anti-missile" program. Neither of these stipulate that they override the other, that if you return fire you can't anti-missile or vice-a-versa.

What he said.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Not stated explicitly, but shifting targets during a turn imposes a -6DM. One might apply that to lasers used to target missiles then used against other ships in the same turn.

 

[infojunky]

Not stated explicitly, but shifting targets during a turn imposes a -6DM. One might apply that to lasers used to target missiles then used against other ships in the same turn.

Now that is a good question, in Book2 downing in flight missiles isn’t a thing, but in Mayday it is.

Right now I am in the missiles are fired one turn and hit the next frame of mind. Just for reduction of clutter on the game board.

 

[whartung]

Not stated explicitly, but shifting targets during a turn imposes a -6DM. One might apply that to lasers used to target missiles then used against other ships in the same turn.

Correct. Not explicitly stated. So..."No". Nothing says to apply that. The role is different. The -6 can be affording the shifting of the fire across the vast distances of space vs the very close, ALREADY IMPACTING, missiles.

 

[kilemall]

The way it's worded, always seemed to me that the lasers had their attack phase (with potential double fire) then their defense phase with both return fire and antimissile fire. It's not explicitly stated, but you could make a case for the return fire/antimissile to be a choice of use between since they are happening in the same phase. Not so the completely different attack and defense phases.

Interesting question about whether the return fire can incur the -6 DM- my ruling would be no since IMO the Return Fire program is using the incoming fire as targeting reference point.

Also interesting about the LBB5 differences in anti-missile work. Sand is much more effective then even the Missile Supplement rules, Repulsors and ND loom large, ECM if anything is abstracted in the to-hit roll (with a computer advantage baked in), and there is no ambiguity about the PD laser choice, it IS a choice-

C. For each battery that achieved a hit, dice are rolled to determine if it penetrated
the defensive fire of the target. Each battery fired by the target ship as
defense may not be fired again in the turn.

I would further argue that the to-hit number also bakes in the possibility in CT of entirely outmaneuvering the missiles so they can't get within intercept range. The larger the battery shot, the more the missiles can be spread out and some WILL get to intercept.