Rules Questions and Comments

[GreyJaeger]

If that's the battle I think it was, your talking about when the TH took the Levi and ran. In that battle, the TH had ground forces on Sudeten, we fixed our ships by the 30% and took the rest of the salvage to Rasalhague where we trialed the Horses for use of the Shipyards, won and got the White Terror and White Cloud repaired so they'd be ready for Sudeten 3.

I don't remember it that way, but I could be wrong. It has been known to happen.

[Fatebringer]

It was actually Holt that explained the rule to me back then. One of the few times his explaining the rules to me actually helped me. Normally it's a "You can't do that, you can't do that either..."

[Dave Baughman]

Caveat: DR6 is the GM and anything he says overrules my opinion.

Assuming my interpretation is correct, you are both right.

1) Contested status prevents a hex from "spawning" RP so to speak.
2) Salvage RP is created by converting FP in the salvage pool back into useable RP. This normally happens at the end of combat operations.
3) However, contested status prevents RP from being generated, and thus prevents the conversion of the salvage pool.
4) As soon as the contestation is cleared - either by securing the hex or by making a sharing agreement - and assuming that no renewed combat operations are occuring in the hex at the start of the turn, step #2 would kick in and whoever had control of the field would extract salvage.

The only real exception here is special raid salvage, which is 'stolen' by the raider when they withdraw and thus undergoes the conversion to RP in the raiding party's final destination - which is almost always a different hex, unless the raid was executed as part of an invasion scenario or it was a case of raiders on one control world raiding another CW in the same hex...

I hope that made sense, if not I blame being sick for any ambiguity in what I said... my brain is a little scrambled right now lol

[Dave Baughman]

tl;dr version:

Contestation prevents the salvage process from generating RP. However, since the salvage "reaction" never happens, the salvage pool (the "fuel" for the RP-creating reaction) is still there and can be collected once the contestation is cleared.

[GI Journalist]

Right. The effect of Contested hexes (or something very much like it) is described in the salvage rules.

However, it's unclear what effect Terrorized hexes have on salvage. The way it is written gives me reason to believe that it should have an effect on all RP generated in the hex including salvage RP, much like the effect of a Contested hex.


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[Deathrider6]

Salvage will be granted to the victor once the Hex loses it's contested status. That should occur at the end of combat this next cycle. Until then Salvage unclaimed. That is my take on the subject. A formal ruling will be posted tomorrow. I have an Airshow and then a birthday party to attend today.

[Marlin]

Thanks. Please include the extra surrounded FP in the ruling.

[Holt]

It was actually Holt that explained the rule to me back then. One of the few times his explaining the rules to me actually helped me. Normally it's a "You can't do that, you can't do that either..."

Yes its big.

[Deathrider6]

Damn Holt that image is huge!

[Cannonshop]

I guess this is our thread for posting weird ideas...

so here's a weird idea for a possible rules-change:

Hex Element: Magazines

Cost: 12 RP+
Income Generated: 0
Type: Military/Objective
Capacity: Special

What it does: A Magazine may be used, instead of a Factory site, to repair damaged ground units up to the capacity invested in the Magazine, or the maximum (pre-damage) capacity of the unit being repaired.  Once used, the Magazine must be re-filled with RP=1/2 the FP it can restore.

In the event that the magazine is captured, the attacking player rolls 2d6, on a roll of 8 or 9, 1/2 the FP the magazine can re-fill is added to the salvage pool for the attacker.  On a roll of 10 or 11, 75% of the magazine's FP capacity, and on a roll of 12, 100% of the magazine's capacity can be used by the victor.  On a roll of 2, 0% of the Magazine's contents may be used by the victor, representing incompatibility or accidental damage to the facility.

Tech bases apply-a Clantech magazine may only repair Clantech forces, an IS magazine may only repair IS forces.

Magazines may be destroyed in a "Destroy Supplies" Special Forces mission, if the capacity of the magazine exceeds the result of a 2D6 die roll, the mission, while successful, only destroys the stockpile in the Magazine, leaving the defender's forces untouched.

The base cost to establish a Magazine is 12, plus whatever FP/2 in resources used to stock it.  The stocking must occur in the turn before the turn in which the Magazine is actually used.  (if established in turn 3, the magazine may not be used until the combat phase of turn 4.)

New units may not be built at Magazine sites, only existing units may be replenished/repaired from them.

Upon an agreement between the players (by PM, with CC sent to the GM staff), allies may make use of each other's magazines under whatever terms they happen to find agreeable, however only the owning player may re-stock one.


Cost/Benefit analysis:

Magazines are cheaper than Factories, but have strict limits on how they may be used, and have unique vulnerabilities.  A magazine stocked with 50FP worth of materiel (at a cost of 25 RP+the establishment cost of 12) MAY be used to repair up to 50 FP of the owner's forces-this would be true even if the owner only has a normal production capacity of 2 or 4 FP-so there is an advantage to them that could counter the disadvantages if the owning player has sufficient foresight in setting one up.

[Daemonknight]

supply depots.


however, its not nearly as worthwhile sending 50 RP to that mag, as it would be to spend it on building new MFs, and getting income plus production capacity from them.

[Fatebringer]

And us Clanners can call them Caches.

[Daemonknight]

actually, caches are storage areas, not designed to be funtional for anything but holding stuff in a secure place. He's talking about something thats actually a useful facility, like a foreward repair/refit base. Not really the same thing, a cache is unlikely to be a fully functional mech repair facility.

[Cannonshop]

supply depots.


however, its not nearly as worthwhile sending 50 RP to that mag, as it would be to spend it on building new MFs, and getting income plus production capacity from them.

Maybe.  Then again, a factory can't regenerate 50FP you lost getting pushed out of systems X, Y, and Z in a single turn if your production capacity is only 20FP/turn in terms of "Capacity" as opposed to "Cost", which is the basic idea: banking around 5FP worth at a given cache each turn for, say, five turns, and you've got the ability to rebuild a unit FAST without straining the rest of your production-which can be handy if you REALLY need to counter attack after a big push, but don't have the factory-floor-space to do it even if you had the money.

I tried to model it as granting a better result to smaller factions that may need to re-build units rather than just churning out brand new ones.

I may have screwed up the balancing though...

[Daemonknight]

the issue is that first, you need to build the depot. So thats money that you've flatout lost, because the Depot doesn't give you anything in return on it's own. Then, you need to throw away factory space to build up the capacity for those supply depots, instead of using it to increase your current military strength. Then, when your current units take damage, you move them back, they spend a turn refitting(and maybe training aswell), and then go out again.


Which sounds fine in theory, but in my opinion, you're better option is to forgo the Supply Depot, use the starter cash to invest in a new MF/SY, and then instead of dropping capacity into a Depot, use it to increase your total effective strength right off the cuff. don't forget, if you're winning battles, salvage is likely repairing a significant portion of your forces. And with the way this game works, rarely do you lose a battle, but escape with significant portions of your command, unless it's a Clan trial, in which case you likely didn't lose very much FP in the first place.


I can see something like Supply Depots, as you've explained them, being extremely useful in a rule set that requires logistics/supply train AND a less lethal combat system. Unless a force is totally encircled, you almost NEVER see a unit killed to the last man, in history or fiction. It just doesn't happen. Either people retreat, or surrender. Or like I said, they're backed into a corner, and either they won't give up(fanatics defending an important position, or a 'hold the line' type order- even then, its usually to buy time for others to escape), or the attacker decides to make an example and slaughters them all.

If the game had logistics requirements, I'd say your idea would be almost required. However, we don't have them, and I'll bet anything nobody wants them, because that inserts a whole new level of paperwork and complexity. Not that it's complex, it just means more stuff to track, and most people seem to balk anytime an idea is put forward that would increase the 'workload', whether its a good idea or not.

I personally see a wargame that disregards logistics as half-assed, log is more important than the fighting itself. After all, can't have a battle if the troops dont have their mechs, or if the troops don't get to their objective in time.