Complex and unnecessary

[SteveZilla]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

I once saw a suggestion posted to the forums (I'm sorry, I can't recall who came up with it ) that sounded like it would work well for large vehicles versus smaller attackers, and might be adaptable to even larger targets. Divide the hexes of area of the target by the number of BODY the target has. The result is the number of hexes you have to destroy (exceed the DEF of) in order to do one overall BODY damage to the target.

 

Perhaps one could use volume instead of area. Surely one of the math-heads around here could calculate the volume of the Earth in cubic hexes.

 

Area of a 2 meter (across) regular hexagon = 	                         3.464101615 mm
Volume of a 2 meter tall 2 meter regular hexagon =                     6.928203230 mmm

Average Diameter of the Earth = 7910.825 mi = 12,738.85 Km =            12,738,848 m
Circumference of the Earth (using Average Diameter) =                    4,054,901.25 m
Surface Area of a Sphere: A = 4*Pi*R^2
Earth Surface Area (using Average Diameter) =                 509,812,152,907,514 mm
                                                              147,170,091,864,500 hexes
Volume of a Sphere: V = (4*Pi*R^3)/3
Earth Volume (using Average Diameter) =             1,082,403,254,073,596,031,587 mmm
                                                      156,231,452,533,992,140,353 hexes

 

If my math is right.

[schir1964]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

Sean,

 

I thought I would let you revisit this thread that kind of relates to what you are trying to do here.

 

[thread=51286]Alternative System: Death, Destruction, and Function[/thread]

 

I don't know if it will help you or not, but it does address the final result you are looking for.

 

- Christopher Mullins

[Markdoc]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

The simplest approach - and the one I use - is that "an object" is the smallest unit that can function independantly.

 

For living organisms, that's the organism itself. Exceed the BOD score and it ceases to function properly. Double its BOD and it ceases to function at all. That's true whether it's a mouse or a 50 ft woman. All that's different is DEF and BOD scores.

 

For small vehicles like a car or even a tank, that's also a unit. Blow up the engine or even a bit of the inside, and it's pretty much done.

 

However for larger objects - a building or a battleship, for example - that's not the case. Blow up a main turret on a battleship and the ship continues to function. Blow up the bridge, and you may have degraded command but the ship will continue to function. If you blow up the powerplant, most of the ship will stop functioning but it won't sink and much of the lighter armament will still function. To make it sink, you need to make a biggish hole through numerous bulkheads - each of which is an independant entity (flooding one compartment won't necessarily have any effect on adjacent ones). Same applies for a building.

 

So as for the earth, each hex of dirt/stone is an independant entity (since destroying one hex has no real effect on the hex next door), with 13 BOD and 3-7 DEF). Call it 5 on average, and to destroy the earth would require 156,231,452,533,992,140,353 attacks doing an average of 31 BOD (based on the numberof hexes referred to above). You could get by with a somewhat larger number of attacks doing 6 BOD, but I suspect the LTE or old age is going to catch up with you before then: assuming SPD 6 (and nobody doing any repair, like shovelling dirt back into the holes), you'd be finished in only 9,908,133,722,349 years: call it ten trillion years, to be fair.

 

I think I can live with that.

 

cheers, Mark

[archermoo]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

Been there as far back as 3rd edition Champions. I can't say with any certainly how much further than that.

 

Getting +1 Body for a level of Growth or Density Increase doesn't necessarily mean that doubling mass always and only adds 1 Body. It just means that adding 1 Body seemed appropriate for that level of that power.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

Getting +1 Body for a level of Growth or Density Increase doesn't necessarily mean that doubling mass always and only adds 1 Body. It just means that adding 1 Body seemed appropriate for that level of that power.

 

I also remember that doubling the thickness of wood adds maybe +1 DEF, but doubling the thickness of steel adds +2 DEF. So, it's possible that objects deliberately constructed to be more vigorous or "tougher" might have up to 2-3 times the calculated body for their mass. The capital ships in Terran Empire, for example, are monstrously tough and can survive multiple antimatter missile hits.

[archermoo]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

I also remember that doubling the thickness of wood adds maybe +1 DEF' date=' but doubling the thickness of steel adds +2 DEF. So, it's possible that objects deliberately constructed to be more vigorous or "tougher" might have up to 2-3 times the calculated body for their mass. The capital ships in Terran Empire, for example, are monstrously tough and can survive multiple antimatter missile hits.[/quote']

 

Yup, which is why I pointed out earlier that as far as how it is mentioned in 5ER it sounds more like a general rule of thumb that give a decent starting place. Rather than a hard and fast law of "physics".

[megaplayboy]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

All I remember are:

1. that Star Hero writeup for the Sun that had it doing something like 975d6 KA, with about 24 total levels of armor-piercing and penetrating at the core(as compared with the apparently puny antimatter missile doing 25d6 KA, no AP/Pen, and the also-pathetic hypothetical earth-killer weapon doing 50-52 d6 KA).

2. The Vehicle Sourcebook writeup for the Iowa-class BB, assigning it a 10 DEF.

3. A writeup for the M1 Abrams giving it 30 points of hardened DEF in its forward facing.

4. The Terran Empire warships with pathetically weak beam weapons in comparison to their four layers of armor and force fields (sometimes at levels of def totaling over 100 points--apparently the idea was that one had to "burn off" the ablative FF and armor in order to really have a shot at seriously damaging a capital ship--and this could take a dozen turns or more).

5. The M1's gun does 8d6 KA, and the Iowa's does 9d6 KA(albeit with a much bigger radius)

 

To say damage and defense scaling are inconsistent in Hero system is a dramatic understatement, imnsho.

[archermoo]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

All I remember are:

1. that Star Hero writeup for the Sun that had it doing something like 975d6 KA, with about 24 total levels of armor-piercing and penetrating at the core(as compared with the apparently puny antimatter missile doing 25d6 KA, no AP/Pen, and the also-pathetic hypothetical earth-killer weapon doing 50-52 d6 KA).

2. The Vehicle Sourcebook writeup for the Iowa-class BB, assigning it a 10 DEF.

3. A writeup for the M1 Abrams giving it 30 points of hardened DEF in its forward facing.

4. The Terran Empire warships with pathetically weak beam weapons in comparison to their four layers of armor and force fields (sometimes at levels of def totaling over 100 points--apparently the idea was that one had to "burn off" the ablative FF and armor in order to really have a shot at seriously damaging a capital ship--and this could take a dozen turns or more).

5. The M1's gun does 8d6 KA, and the Iowa's does 9d6 KA(albeit with a much bigger radius)

 

To say damage and defense scaling are inconsistent in Hero system is a dramatic understatement, imnsho.

 

Actuallly none of that has anything to do with the Hero system itself. It has to do with either specifics in some of the settings, or examples provided. An Abrams A1 having 30 rDEF on its front isn't part of the rules. It is just an example of one way to model a tank of that class. And more specifically how they are modeled in the official Hero settings that they appear in. As I don't use the official settings, I've never really been overly concerned with comparing how they do different things. I buy them both to support Hero and to mine them for ideas.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

4. The Terran Empire warships with pathetically weak beam weapons in comparison to their four layers of armor and force fields (sometimes at levels of def totaling over 100 points--apparently the idea was that one had to "burn off" the ablative FF and armor in order to really have a shot at seriously damaging a capital ship--and this could take a dozen turns or more).

 

Sighs. Again - No. They aren't that tough.

1) TE ships are ATRI11, per writeups on pp172-176

2) ATRI11 all have Armor Piercing

3) Only the Empress Class Ship has any Hardened Defenses at all.

4) TE ships actually have 5 Defensive levels.

 

Using the Wasp Fighter (TE p174) vs the Peregrin Frigate (TE p176) - given Ablative drops 5 Active Points when breached (rounded to an average of 2 DEF lost per breach):

 

A Wasp will destroy a Frigate in 10 hits on only Average Rolls (28 Body).

 

Empress Class are almost impossible to destroy because their Hull Plating (second to last Defense) is Hardened.

 

Introduce the ships in Spacer's Toolit and the list of ships a Fighter cannot take out increases to include several others.

 

Only the Dreadnoughts and Battleships are as resist to damage as people make them out to be. And given the context of the Setting - Dreadnoughts should be really rare, and Battleships only slightly less rare that that. Everything else starts to fold in a Turn or two of combat. Probably less with concentrated fire.

 

The only reason I bring this up once again is that you can't just look at the write-ups of a things Defenses, Body et al. - you have to take it in the context of the Setting it is being presented in and for. TE is designed to create a kind of dramatic space combat - not one shot kills. And it does an admirable job of that - both by my playing with numbers and through actual experience using those write-ups.

 

As Archermoo said - that 30DEF Tank is just ONE way or writing such a thing up, and is by no means the only way or even the appropriate way for your specific campaign needs. Which brings us back, once again, to "Build it to your needs."

[SteveZilla]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

I forgot to add that a 3,184,713" Radius AoE would be roughly equal to the size of the Earth...

[Sean Waters]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

I also remember that doubling the thickness of wood adds maybe +1 DEF' date=' but doubling the thickness of steel adds +2 DEF. So, it's possible that objects deliberately constructed to be more vigorous or "tougher" might have up to 2-3 times the calculated body for their mass. The capital ships in Terran Empire, for example, are monstrously tough and can survive multiple antimatter missile hits.[/quote']

 

It adds BODY not DEF: the DEF for the material does not change (although arguably it should - anyone can bend a sheet of aluminium foil in their hands, noone can bend a 2" thick sheet of aluminium in their hands). Whether a wall adds 1 or 2 Body for a doubling of thickness, the principle remains that Body is treated as an exponential value. I think it is probably unfortunate that this confusion is added: the general rule is twice mass = +1 BODY. Even when dealing with damage against walls, exceeding the BODY of the wall blows a mansize hole in it and the size of the hole doubles for each +1 BODY (irrespective of material).

[casualplayer]

Re: Complex and unnecessary

 

I forgot to add that a 3' date='184,713" Radius AoE would be roughly equal to the size of the Earth...[/quote']

 

Yeah, but you'd have to target the core! Gonna need Indirect and Increased Range for that.