Rules Questions and Comments

[Cannonshop]

Some thoughts on addressing Hex Improvement Ratrace. What are your thoughts?

New Hex Improvements Concept
OR
The End of Hex Improvement Rat-Race
OR
Dave's Crazy Idea #5313301753086580315


Introduction
One of the systemic problems in the FGC 3062 rules set – including the current 2nd Edition Revised rules were are using, it a phenomenon I like to call "Hex Improvement Rat-Race." It boils down to three inter-related game mechanical issues:
   Hex Improvements directly create income and are one of the few ways for a faction to increase its per-turn income without actually conquering more territory.
   Hex Improvements directly determine the upper production limit of a faction, with no other mediating factors (other than availability of cash). This is compounded by the abstract construction system that allows all production to be funneled to any one Hex Improvement of the right type.
   Hex Improvements are permanent and have the same effect regardless of their location on the map, making it a viable strategy to "hide" Hex Improvements deep inside a large faction without any downside.
Collectively, these create a situation where everyone is building hex improvements, and if they ever stop they will permanently fall behind factions who don't – unless war or sabotage damages or changes control of a hex element. In a perfect world, this might actually be OK, but there are two other issues that make it a major problem.
   The prices on Hex Improvements are balanced with the largest factions in mind, making it very difficult for small factions to build Hex Improvements and thus raise their income (to, presumably build more UIs)
   The largest factions (who can best afford HIs) have the greatest strategic depth (and thus the best ability to safely hide them). Until recently, they also had the cheapest intel ops, making it easier to guard their factories against sabotage – though that issue has been fixed.
So, how do we fix this? The short answer is "totally change the Hex Improvement system." The slightly longer answer is "speciate the hex improvements a bit to more clearly define their uses and add a system to reign in large faction super-spending without making the paperwork too nutty."

Hex Improvement Types
Broadly speaking, the existing classes of hex improvements (MF, SY, IC, PF, RS) all still exist; however, several of them are broken out into multiple categories.

MF & SY form the Military Production and now represent three distinct types of units:
   Repair Facilities: These are easy to build and inexpensive. They do not build new units but can repair existing units of the appropriate type.

   Military Factory: Factories create FP, which can be combined into units. Only Transported and Static units can be assembled by a Factory however – Shipyards are needed to assemble higher-class units.

   Shipyards: Shipyards build JumpShips and WarShips; they can combine their FP production with FP from factories, but any products must be assembled at the SY.
MFs and Sys may be "built into" the appropriate WarShip hulls as YardShips (MF for Faslane, SY for Newgrange). RFs may be build into ground units as Mobile Field Bases.
MFs and SYs do not produce RP, though their products can be sold.

ICs will be revised as part of the communications rules, and are not touched on here.
PFs will be revised as part of the R&D rules and likewise are not touched on here.
Recharge Stations will be revised as part of the Trade rules.

Hex Improvement Costs
A faction's first few hex improvements are fairly inexpensive to produce, but their price escalates are more are built.
Each corporation (see Corporation rules below) that wishes to build a hex improvement must pay the following cost:
Base Cost: RF – 4 RP*, MF – 8 RP, SY – 12 RP
*RFs always belong to the Faction Army pseudo-corporation
Cost modifiers:
   Multiple Improvement Modifier: T^2/10 where T equals the number of pre-existing Hex Improvements of the Military Production type belonging to the building corporation
   Strategic Depth Modifier: 〖(H-1)〗^2/10 Where H is the shortest route (in hexes) to another faction
   Stacked Improvement Modifier: P^2/10 where P equals the number of pre-existing hex improvement in the target Hex, regardless of ownership
Add the total of the modifier above to 1 for the cost multiplier.
Example: Eric wants to build another MF. The corporation that will build it already has four military production type hex improvements and his target site is four hexes from the nearest border and already has an SY . The MIM is 1.6, the SDM is 0.9, and the SIM is 0.1, for a total of 1+2.6 or 3.6. Eric's MF will cost 28.75 RP to build (after rounding).
RFs take 1 turn to build, MFs take 2, SYs take 3. Building them as part of a unit (RFs for ground units – i.e. Mobile Field Bases) or MF/SY as part of a mobile unit impact the production as if their adjusted production cost was part of that unit's FP but do not automatically take extra time. Note that movement class modifiers apply to this 'virtual' FP so YardShips will be quite expensive.

Corporations
Any faction may create up to 10 game mechanical corporations, two of which are pre-set. Corporations "own" Military Production unit improvements; multiple corporations can be used to keep the Multiple Improvement Modifier from getting out of control. However, corporations cannot easily combine their production output.
General rules:
   A Corporation may produce or repair no more FP per turn in a single location than the total of its MFs x 2 and SYs x3.

   Exceptions: Corporations may undertake joint ventures; however, for each additional corporation that participates in a venture beyond the first, there a 'cooperation surcharge' of (5(C^2 ))% of the total production cost.

For example: If two corporations cooperate on a project, they can combine their manufacturing capacity, but must pay a 10% surcharge. If three corporations combine, the surcharge is 45%, and if four do so it is 80%. While such massive ventures can quickly complete an expensive project such as a WarShip, the inefficiency is hard to afford.


   The first two "corporations" a faction has is its Army and its Navy. The primary purpose of these groups is to account for mobile units such as YardShips and military owned Hex Improvements like Repair Facilities. In general, a faction will want to have its MFs and SYs owned by other corporations to reduce MIM on Repair Facilities.

   [tie-ins with R&D and Trade Rules go here]

Hmmmm the board seems to have digested my numbered lists. I hope this is readable :/

I don't get it...then again, I don't really see the problem with the existing infrastructure rules where industrial production boosts a faction's income.  Then again, I've got a surplus of capacity in my current faction, relative to their rather small income proportionally, this really doesn't change anything except that it's even more expensive and more difficult to do...well, ANYTHING that requires money, since the resource generation basically vanishes, leaving about (oh at this point) around 6 to 9 RP/turn income assuming all territories gained in the last two turns remain.

I don't see the advantage here, except for megafactions that have scads upon scads of hexes, most running in every direction. It's pretty much structured here to punish factions that don't have density-like TAurians, whose worlds are (for the most part) exposed on at least two empty sides, or the Marians, whose holding is pretty small in any given direction, or for that matter the UIW, which doesn't have three hexes from SOMEONE ELSE in any direction.

I've got a simpler way to cure your infrastructure rat-race, that requires less studying and less math (and man-hours) to accomplish:

Change "Commerce Disruption" from an "Invasion" order, to a "Raid" or "Battle" order, so that commerce-raiders can actually hit deep into enemy territory, where those concentrated nests of MF and SY infrastructure ARE, and cut the cost of "Destroy Infrastructure Element" SF missions.

These are ONLY preliminary comments, taken in the vacuum of not knowing what you have in mind for Trade Rules that might make up for the godhammering of a faction's ability to pay for...well, anything unless they're the Dominion or something, so keep in mind this is just htat immediate first-look reaction, and not a biting nastiness telling you to STFU, nor is there intent to cause you to quit work, just concerns.

[Dave Baughman]

Cannon, I know you mentioned you wanted to see the developmental Trade rules... please let me know what your thoughts are (everyone else too).

I know its mentioned below but let me emphasize again here: the resource point amounts in this draft are subject to change based on a more detailed statistical analysis of faction expenses vs. desired spending ability.


Editor's note 1: Planetary Development score roughly correlates to the current planet ranks as:
Rank   Type         Base Revenue      New Title
-2   (no equivalent)      N/A (penalty)      Toxic World
-1   Member World      0         Under-developed
0   Space Station      0.25         Developing
+1   Control World      0.50         Developed
+2   Regional Capital      1.00         Highly Developed
+3   National Capital      2.00         National Capital
Editor's note 2: all RP numbers are subject to change closer examination of target income levels and are here for reference purposes only.
Trade
With the elimination of hex improvement direct income, two changes in the game mechanics will replace this revenue source.

Small-scale trade
Small-scale trade is abstract and automatic. Hexes that are adjacent to trade-related hex improvements (see below) or other factions gain bonus income equal to 10(H^2 )% of their normal income.

Example #1: Robert has a hex containing two control worlds. Two of the adjacent hexes belong to a different faction, one contains a Trade Hub, and another contains a Recharge Station. 10(4^2 )=160, so instead of 1.0 RP per turn, this hex generates 2.5 RP per turn (after rounding).

Example #2: Daniel's national capital shares its hex with a control world and contains a Trade Hub. It is deep inside his territory and has no adjacent foreign hexes, but one adjacent hex has a Recharge Station. Daniel's bonus is only 10%, because the Trade Hub in his hex does not count. Daniel's capital hex gains a 0.25 RP small-scale trade bonus on top of its 2.50 base income.
Small-scale trade is considered part of a hex's normal income for game purposes, so an appropriately-sized raiding force could steal this bonus income.

Commodity Trading
Commodity Trading is the movement of large amounts of valuable goods from one star system to another. Each turn, a faction generates a random commodity somewhere in its territory (see table below). <<insert projects to create additional commodity rolls as part of R&D system>>
Under normal circumstances, factions can only buy and cash in commodities when the commodity is in their own territory. See the Trade Hub hex improvement for a partial exception.

There are two broad types of commodities: negotiables (which can be turned into resource points) and practical goods (which enhance a hex improvement).
Negotiables
Negotiables are exports that can be resold at a different location for a profit. Negotiables must be moved from where they appear to their target destination <<rules to follow pending completion of movement overhaul>>.
When Negotiables reach their target destination, they are transformed into resource points. Negotiables can also be sold to other factions at a price determined by the parties to the sale.

Base value: See Trade Goods Table
Local Competition Penalty: 10(D^2 )% where D equals six minus the number of hexes distance between the start location and sale location. If D is negative, treat it as zero; if D is over 100, (i.e. closer than 3 hexes from the star location), the negotiable cannot be cashed in.
Exotic Goods Bonus: 2d6x10% if the goods originated in a different faction. This bonus is rolled at the time of cash-in, i.e. not when the goods are bought from the foreign faction.

Practical Goods
Practical Goods enhance the operation of a hex element. They never appear within five hexes of their "native" element unless no other eligible target hexes exist.
Practical Goods grant a discount on production at the cash-in location during the turn after they are cashed in. The specific discount is equal to:
Base: 25% (of the first X RP <<exact amount TBD>>), then Y% (a sliding amount based on a falloff calculation, TBD)
Exotic Goods Bonus: 1d6x10%, rolled at time of cash-in only if the goods originated in a different faction. This bonus is applied to the base bonus as a straight add-on and as a 1.X multiplier to the falloff bonus, where X is the die roll.

Example: Tim is playing Clan Wolf-in-Exile and buys a shipment of Germanium from the Lyrans. When he cashes it in at his shipyard, he rolls a 4. This means that his base discount is 65% until he hits the cutoff, and even after his falloff discount percentage will be increased by x1.4.

Trade Goods Table
Roll (2d6)   Resource      Goes To?            Base Value
2      Germanium      Shipyards            N/A
3      Luxury Goods      Highly-developed Planets (+2 or +3)   25
4      Rare Chemicals      PFs               N/A
5      Ice         Under-developed Planets (-1)      15
6      Consumer Goods   Developing Planets (0 or +1)      10
7      Food         Under-developed Planets (-1)      5
8      Ammunition      RFs               N/A
9      Colonists      Under-developed Planets (-1)      10
10      Fusion Reactors      MFs               N/A
11      Medicine      Developing Planets (0 or +1)      20
12      Precious Metals      Highly-developed Planets (+2 or +3)   50

Hex Improvement
There are three trade-related hex improvements. All of the rules for construction of hex improvements and corporate ownership described in the military production section apply here.
Local Trade Hub (LH) (base cost: 4 RP)
A Local Hub is a center of trade within a faction's borders. Goods and services change hands here and these systems often serve as a stopping-off point for international trade.
An LH has the following effects:
1. The LH may "drag" commodities within a three hex radius to the LH's hex; this represents small-scale merchants buying and selling the goods and their eventual congregation at the LH.
2. The LH increases the hex's small-scale trade bonus percentage by 10.

(Improved) Recharge Station (RS) (base cost: 8 RP)
Many star systems have recharge stations, but only a few operate at the standard of quality seen during the days of the First Star League. A fully operational recharge station with an efficient staff can greatly increase a system's trade revenue.
An RS has the following effects:
1. The hex's small-scale trade bonus income is doubled (after all other modifiers are applied). If a hex contains more than one RS, each additional RS adds 10% to the final bonus income.

2. Defending aerospace units (being able to base from the RS instead of the planetary orbitals) gain a +1 initiative bonus during the first operational round of any combat operations in the hex.

3. When combined with an LH, each RS in the hex increases the "drag" range by one hex.

International Trade Hub (TH) (base cost: 12 RP)
A TH is a hex containing highly-developed facilities for trade as well as robust customs offices and many international consulates, fostering an environment where foreign merchants can do business with confidence.

A TH has the following effects:
1.  Foreign factions may buy and sell commodities in hexes they do not control if that hex contains a TH.

2. A TH increases the hex's small-scale trade bonus percentage by 10.

3. The increased presence of customs-related surveillance measures in a hex with a TH reduces the likelihood of successful stealth insertion. Raid Insertion rolls (with or without pirate insertion) suffer a -1 penalty.

[Dave Baughman]

No comments? That bad, eh? 

Kidding aside, I know there are still a lot of holes here. I will post more as I make more progress on the parts that are still TBD.

[Cannonshop]

No comments? That bad, eh? 

Kidding aside, I know there are still a lot of holes here. I will post more as I make more progress on the parts that are still TBD.

I might have to actually get some help working out the basics here-say, working out a sample budget for an existing faction to see what it would look like compared to the income as it currently is.

[Cannonshop]

Okay...
let's see what the UIW pulls in, based on what it has currently, under this new system...

RCW=7 (Highly Developed)
CW=16(Developed)
RS=2
SS=2(Developing)


now...real-estate numbers:

7+8+.5+2=17.5 base to start with.

One of the two RS the faction owns is located in a pretty isolated hex (five hexes from the nearest territory) so we can forget about income from THAT.

There's no reference to any impact from IC's, so we'll assume that IC's and DGIC's don't factor in here, PF's likewise aren't counted.

Now, the current UIW income:

Ownership is 57RP, mostly due to industrialization measures such as shipyards, factories, PF's, Guest IC's and Guest factories and shipyards.

17.5<57

Current borders:

Clan Star Adder, Clan Ice Hellion, some Lyran and Jade Falcon holdings, but nothing that's improved.
It's probably a vital thing, then, that I spent as much as I did on internal investment (Promoting worlds from member to control, and from control to RCW), or the UIW would be in even WORSE shape financially.

Working out the predicted small-scale trade looks to be a bit of a bear, I'm not sure what ^ is supposed to represent, whether that's division, multiplication, percentages or what.

('tis also fairly difficult to predict, when I don't rightly know how much territory I'm bordering is belonging to which faction!)


The obvious solution, is to turn around and sink any banked income after the rule's changed, into trade-related hex improvements-but those are, I would guess, of limited usage given the faction's geographical position.



(sigh) just when I thought I was finally getting to a medium size, too...oh well, back to work.

[Dave Baughman]

^ is the symbol for an exponent, so ^2 is "squared"

It shouldn't matter who owns a foreign hex, friendly, hostile, or indifferent they still count as being 'owned by another faction.'

I banged out a really basic spreadsheet to let you calculate your income and see how the SST bonus works. I've attached it here. The '1-6' for foreign hexes or trade-related hex improvements is referring to hex facings. So "1" is the hex directly 'north', 2 'northeast', etc

[Cannonshop]

^ is the symbol for an exponent, so ^2 is "squared"

It shouldn't matter who owns a foreign hex, friendly, hostile, or indifferent they still count as being 'owned by another faction.'

I banged out a really basic spreadsheet to let you calculate your income and see how the SST bonus works. I've attached it here. The '1-6' for foreign hexes or trade-related hex improvements is referring to hex facings. So "1" is the hex directly 'north', 2 'northeast', etc

hoo-boy did that change things.

25.7 RP generation just off of the map as it would exist at the end of turn 3, no additional infra.

MORE if my attacks next turn go well, based on planned infra buys for turns 4, 5, and6 (upgrading currently held real-estate.)

Tough question though-the RS currently sited at 0910 ends up being not very useful, since the station's out in the back-end of beyond (more than 1 hex off of friendly territory, and something like 3-6 hexes from any foreign sites).  I'm assuming that empty-hexes count for distance here, right? 

[Fatebringer]

I took one look at it and was like... that's too complex for my brain to comprehend right now, <<Flips to combat pages>> "Death to the Infidels!"

[Avatar Zero]

^ is the symbol for an exponent, so ^2 is "squared"

It shouldn't matter who owns a foreign hex, friendly, hostile, or indifferent they still count as being 'owned by another faction.'

I banged out a really basic spreadsheet to let you calculate your income and see how the SST bonus works. I've attached it here. The '1-6' for foreign hexes or trade-related hex improvements is referring to hex facings. So "1" is the hex directly 'north', 2 'northeast', etc

hoo-boy did that change things.

25.7 RP generation just off of the map as it would exist at the end of turn 3, no additional infra.

MORE if my attacks next turn go well, based on planned infra buys for turns 4, 5, and6 (upgrading currently held real-estate.)

Tough question though-the RS currently sited at 0910 ends up being not very useful, since the station's out in the back-end of beyond (more than 1 hex off of friendly territory, and something like 3-6 hexes from any foreign sites).  I'm assuming that empty-hexes count for distance here, right? 

I would guess that empty hexes do count.  It seems like a likely way to represent the economic bottlenecking that occurs due to transport distance (takes longer to get goods from point of production to point of consumption, which in turn effects desirability and value).

I should probably take a closer look at the proposal and weigh in with my own evaluation, but it might be a while as I'll be busy and/or away pretty much all weekend.

[Dave Baughman]

^ is the symbol for an exponent, so ^2 is "squared"

It shouldn't matter who owns a foreign hex, friendly, hostile, or indifferent they still count as being 'owned by another faction.'

I banged out a really basic spreadsheet to let you calculate your income and see how the SST bonus works. I've attached it here. The '1-6' for foreign hexes or trade-related hex improvements is referring to hex facings. So "1" is the hex directly 'north', 2 'northeast', etc

hoo-boy did that change things.

25.7 RP generation just off of the map as it would exist at the end of turn 3, no additional infra.

MORE if my attacks next turn go well, based on planned infra buys for turns 4, 5, and6 (upgrading currently held real-estate.)

Tough question though-the RS currently sited at 0910 ends up being not very useful, since the station's out in the back-end of beyond (more than 1 hex off of friendly territory, and something like 3-6 hexes from any foreign sites).  I'm assuming that empty-hexes count for distance here, right? 

Empty hexes do count, and as with any time we radically change a core rules component there will be an opportunity to rejigger your setup a bit if/when these rules go live (kind of like what we did with Intel a while back)

[Fatebringer]

The Vorzel wrap up was very thuroughly done.

[Dave Baughman]

Random question:

What are your thoughts on taking the "nuclear terror" mechanism and turning it into a general "horror of war" type mechanic that kicks in any time huge amounts of FP get destroyed to reflect collateral damage etc? I was thinking that this might be a nice 'soft' disincentive against doomstacking and it would create a rules mechanism similar to those that other people have suggested where major strongpoints won't neccessarily be "pacified and productive" the turn after they fall.

I was thinking of importing the Nuclear Terror rules with only minor modifications, and adding a +1 to the roll for every 25 FP destroyed during the turn... so cluster- and regiment-sized engagements wouldn't really trigger this - only massive doomstack battles.

[Cannonshop]

I dunno, maybe too much book-keeping involved there.

Then again, my own pet recently has been the fantasy of 'fixed values' for Regiments and Clusters to avoid the 200FP single-line-item.

see if I understand where you're going (at least, in principle) it  would be to force a 'collateral damage' check for those doomstacking battles- I'd pretty much guarantee you get multiple wwII division-size conflicts happening in an industrial area, it's going to end up being about as productive as Stalingrad was, and about as expensive to repair.  Figure that each hex-element needs to make a survival check when the FP>25 per side, with an increased difficulty for each additional FP>30 per side, run it from a base number that's very reasonable (say, 7 or higher) through 8, 9,10,11, or 12.  Cap it at 12.

Each failed survival means a salvage roll, at 8.  Failure means you want those factories, you better start building new ones, winning means 1d6x4 RP to repair and 1D6 turns of spending before it's up and running.

I really don't think expanding the "terror' effect is a good idea-there's no mechanism to un-do it if, say, the defenders actually won....

[Daemonknight]

wait, how is Dave's idea more book keeping? Especially compared to yours. Dave's idea is that instead of rolling for 'Terror' only when nukes are used, you roll for it anytime more than 25 FP is destroyed on the surface of a planet(maybe also apply it to aero/naval battles if SYs, RS, SS or trade hubs are present?)


And no CS, you've run totally off the tracks to what Dave was talking about. He said take the Nuclear Terror rules and modify them to apply to large-scale conflict, not to start trashing planets anytime you have a multi-regimental battle. You could have 30 regiments per side and never fight in an industrial aera on a single planet

[Dave Baughman]

I dunno, maybe too much book-keeping involved there.

Then again, my own pet recently has been the fantasy of 'fixed values' for Regiments and Clusters to avoid the 200FP single-line-item.

see if I understand where you're going (at least, in principle) it  would be to force a 'collateral damage' check for those doomstacking battles- I'd pretty much guarantee you get multiple wwII division-size conflicts happening in an industrial area, it's going to end up being about as productive as Stalingrad was, and about as expensive to repair.  Figure that each hex-element needs to make a survival check when the FP>25 per side, with an increased difficulty for each additional FP>30 per side, run it from a base number that's very reasonable (say, 7 or higher) through 8, 9,10,11, or 12.  Cap it at 12.

Each failed survival means a salvage roll, at 8.  Failure means you want those factories, you better start building new ones, winning means 1d6x4 RP to repair and 1D6 turns of spending before it's up and running.

I really don't think expanding the "terror' effect is a good idea-there's no mechanism to un-do it if, say, the defenders actually won....

My original idea was to port over only the 'nuclear terror' part of the rule and keep collateral damage limited to WMD, though now that you mention it, bringing over that rule as part of the whole equation might actually be a good idea for the purpose of encouraging canon-like battles rather than doomstacks. After all, if defending with 538103561365916591356815 FP would incur the possibility of losing your own hex elements even on a successful defense, maybe that will give people some pause about doing these insanely overscale battles.

I'm not sure though that either my original idea or the broader interpretation would cause a lot of paperwork though. Using this rule would involve one extra die roll at the end of any battle where more than 25 FP total (between both sides) is destroyed in a single turn. There would be an additional roll at 125 FP (the '5 token' collateral damage mark) and 250 FP  if we used collateral damage, since each 25 FP increment would be equal to a single nuke token. The 5-token roll is a single roll for the hex, not a separate roll for each hex element, just like general orbital bombardment.

Unrelated to this idea, I should note that we are thinking on similar lines with regard to the composition of regimental and cluster line-items. In the future, when the sheet is updated to support specific accounting, units that are more than 25% above strength (i.e. 12 companies or 9-10 binaries *-remind me, why are we still using binaries as the Clan force increment? Gotta change that to Stars for sanity purposes) are going to have to be broken out into their component units... 1-line brigades are part of the problem with doomstacks and are not going to exist forever... not the least because they won't work right with the transport rules I am working on.