Thoughts on 'averaging' Volley Fire for massive battles

[Lanrak]

Hi.
The terminology in not important to me. Call it what you prefer.
But the type of weapon effect is important .

If an element has an armour/resistance  value.
This could be subtracted from the 'area weapon effect.'

EG
Orks have a AR value of 2.
A mob of orks are fired upon by an IG squad armed with 7 las guns , and a heavy bolter.
This generates 7+5 area weapons  effect.
13.
Subtract Orks AR value of 2 leaves 11.

The frontage of the unit .(How many models across,)
is 8 Orks .
These 8 models have 11 points of area weapon dammage alocated to them by the owning player.

I am advocating area effect weapons are described as'amount of  hazzard per meter square',   
Then we can model units 'concentrating fire' to get maximum effect.

[Philip S]

I think I see what you are driving at.

I prefer not assigning damage in a variation of 'Hit Points'  (assuming I am following your thoughts correctly - which I am not sure that I am)

I write this to see if I am on the same wavelength: If the Orks where standing in a 'level 11 zone', and this is enough to drop an Ork then all the Orks are drop, then I think it's a possibility -  if the Orks have 'hit points' and 11 points are deducted from the group and this results in some being dropped and some with 'damage' then I am resistant.

Philip

[Lanrak]

Hi Philip.
Basicaly its gruoping all the 'area effect 'of a firing unit and applying it to the area the enemy unit is in.

So if an Ork unit suffers a particular effect at a set value , eg 7.
Then all Orks in the targeted unit suffer this effect if the 'area fire value' is equal or exeeds 7.

Rather than roll one dice for each firing model , we assign an average value for the 'area fire value' for the unit as a whole.

How do you feel about  using a units 'dammage capacity' to determine its 'size' in relation to ' area fire?'
(I am using 'dammage capacity' to mean wounds/structure points or what ever you use to measure the units physical effectivness loss.)

We could use a simple 'area fire value' VS 'dammage capacity' to determine effect on target unit perhaps?

 

[Philip S]

So if an Ork unit suffers a particular effect at a set value , eg 7.
Then all Orks in the targeted unit suffer this effect if the 'area fire value' is equal or exeeds 7.

Seems good.

Rather than roll one dice for each firing model , we assign an average value for the 'area fire value' for the unit as a whole.

Average value?

What we have at the moment; Lasgun they have a 'set effect' and that is killing a regular sized human, a group of 100 with Lasgun with Marksmanship 8 will drop 80 targets per increment, or 800 per turn. There is no need to roll - is that quick enough?

(note: as it's per increment an enemy advancing on this 100 IG line would loose 80 Troops per incremental advance. After ten 'steps' they would be 800 Troops down).

How do you feel about  using a units 'dammage capacity' to determine its 'size' in relation to ' area fire?'
(I am using 'dammage capacity' to mean wounds/structure points or what ever you use to measure the units physical effectivness loss.)

There is no 'damage capacity' as such it's more 'toughness' and 'catastrophic failure' (or not). All or nothing - no nibbles. No hip point or wounds. The injury either stuns (and recover next turn) or drops (incapacitated (and possible death)).

In the core rules this 'drop' is basically death, but in a later Augment this may not be the case, however most will close and finish the target to make sure.

The stat for this resistance (toughness) is Stature. overcoming that is what puts the person down.

Philip

[Lanrak]

Hi again.

I belive we are  on the same page. , but pehaps on differnet paraghraps ?

As the area fire value of a unit is expressed as 'per area'.
Then we have to find some way of determining the 'area'  the target covers.

I used the expreession of 'damage capacity' to represent how many 'critical hits/ casualties ' a unit can take.

'Stature' decide at what point (level of dammage taken) causes the unit to loose damage capacity /take a critical hits/wounds .

Eg a unit of 10 soldiers with I 'wound' each will have a DC of 10.(10x1.)
A unit of 5 large monsters with 3 'wounds' each will have a DC of 15.(5 x 3)

Vehicles could have DC assigned to movment and armament perhaps?
(Bigger vehichles have more systems  therfore more DC.).

We compare the amount of hazzard per area to the area taken up by the target .This gives us the result on the unit.

As area fire can cause units to become supressed , wether they take physical dammage or not .
A dammage table could list moral and physical dammage perhaps?


EG
A unit of light Infantry.
The heavy Machine gun has a range of 36 " and causes an area effect value of 5
They have 7 laser rifles with a range of 24" and cause an area effect  value of  7.
The flame thrower has a range of 8 " and causes an area effect value of 4
The unit is equiped with fragmentation grenades these have a range of 4" and a area effect value of 3.

 The units area effect values are ;-
Range /Area effect value.
36"  /05.
24"  /13
8"   /17
4"   /20.

(If we want to leave the original values for small arms area effect .How about reducing the range of the small arms by X distance per casualty?)

This graduation of area effect over range means that unit choose when to open fire.

Too soon and they may not sufficiently dammage the target .And the firing unit just gives thier position away.
Too late and the enemy may over run the firning unit!

I am not very good at explaining myself, sorry.

TTFN
Lanrak.

[Philip S]

Hi Lanrak,

I'm going to have a think on this, and I would ask you how would you adapt your concept if you had to remove this bit;

Eg a unit of 10 soldiers with I 'wound' each will have a DC of 10.(10x1.)
A unit of 5 large monsters with 3 'wounds' each will have a DC of 15.(5 x 3)

Multiple wounds is not something WarSpike is going to have as it does not match any damage model that is 'realistic'. Multiple wounds are tantamount to HP (Hit Points) and I find them very misleading.

What follow is an explanation of sorts, as I don't like to reject something without giving reasons 

Although this will get into a discussion about damage (a new topic maybe?), to sum up a sword thrust to the solar plexus which results in a 2" stab wound is lethal, against an Ogre (Ogryn) or other large humanoid this may increase to 4". The point is that the wound will kill just the same, and the amount of force between 2" and 4" through flesh is not that much and well within the abilities of a regular human warrior. If a beast was so large that the full length of the sword would not kill it, then it's pretty much immune - you could stab it 10 times in the same spot and it still wouldn't reach the vitals.

Same goes for lopping off arms: if the blow can break the bone it can remove the limb, if the limb is so thick (like an Ogryn's forearm) that the bone can not be broken, multiple blows will not cut it off - and considering the setting the attacker isn't going to get that many goes!

Any warrior that wishes to kill is going for areas that are critical.

The main strength of an Ogryn is not resistance to piecing impacts but they can wear some pretty heavy armour. In bare fist fights where the critical areas can not be destroyed so easily by a regular humans an Orgyn is going to be really tough.

To my mind the only time HP could make any kind of sense is in a Boxing match (with gloves) but even then I think there are better ways and HP would be secondary and more like fatigue, blood loss or baffle. I think it is a mistake to use Boxing as a basis of sword combat or firearm combat - human are very vulnerable to weapons.

I think the idea of HP with swords in historic games only come about because people actually believe that knights tried to hack through armour with swords (which they did not - grapple at the sword or morte-strike (to stun)), and bludgeon weapons were more about stunning to allow a finish that tying to kill the man where they stand. Most knights die via daggers/ spikes or via huge two handed weapons.

Because most armed conflicts are about stun and finish or grapple and finish, it seems a better idea to be able to work out stuns, holds and death. In combat - stun/ hold = finished.

As for defence, knights wore armour in case they got hit, not to allow themselves to be hit (allowing themselves to be hit would result in a stun and that leads to death). Armour is used to ride/ deflect blows that get past the guard. The guard is the number one defence (and it's very good!) As in all things; armour is only as good as the person wearing it (a person with no guard will get hit, stunned and taken down)

This roughly covers why I will resist the idea of multiple wounds or hit points in regard to armed combat. I prefer to think of other was to represent less effective weapons which can not kill outright.

For example a .38 (double action revolvers in .38 Long Colt)  has a hard time killing in some cases because it causes a smaller trauma than a .45, and has to really hit a vital area smack to stop a target. To my mind this equate to a reduction in target area. A negative modifier to the 'hit roll' would suffice. This is not to say it makes actually hitting the target harder, but hitting a vital area harder. If a person has a pistol and a point shoot skill of 5 and armed with a .38 for -2 then the kill would be 3 or less (5-3) but a roll of 4 and 5 still hit. Such a hit may stun, but if a person was pumped up then it may not stun at all (frenzy to ignore!). This allows us to model conflicts such as Moro Rebellion. The .38 can kill easily if it hit something vital, even a .22 will kill to the back of the head.

No damage rolls, no wounds and no HP!   

Can you work around/ with that stipulation?

 

Philip

[Lanrak]

Hi Philip.
Thanks for the guide lines.

I dont intend to use dice in a deterministic way, but as random modifiers.So no 'dammage rolls.'
How /what terminology are you going to use for determining the 'survivability' of an element/unit.

It is important to have some form of measuring the resistance to fall unconciuos/ be bereft of life.

Its this measure of 'resistance to adversity' I called dammage capacity.
The measure of how much 'damage' an element or unit coulkd sustain before being rendered usless in gam,e terms.

Please advise on your prefered methid /terminology.

TTFN
Lanrak.

[Philip S]

Hi Lanrak, I split the topic to keep everything on track.
New topic:  DamageI think we can come back to this once we have a better idea of damage 

Philip