============ OGRE/GEV list, Nov 22nd (Last: Nov 19th) ============= ===== SHVY From: Steve Jackson ===== GEV/MSL Defense Rebuttal Rebuttal Rebuttal From: "Andrew Walters" ===== Mixed ratios. From: str@qdot.qld.gov.au (Shaun Travers) ===== Experienced Nuke Catchers From: "Said, Stephen" ------------------------------ From: Steve Jackson Subject: SHVY Played a good game at Horrorcon last weekend, on a BIG table. Used the latest "draft" if the superheavy rule change. Wasn't completely satisfied. What if: A D result has no effect on a Superheavy that is already disabled. What if in addition to that: An "X" result has a 50% chance of leaving a Superheavy disabled with one gun lost, and a 50% chance of a real X. It would be interesting to see the results of one of those "12 HVY, 6 SHVY" analyses on the first change, and on the first and second together. Of course, a SHVY is always going to draw fire, just because it's scary, and some players will just dedicate as much fire to it as it takes, until it's dead. But if that is the wrong decision, leading to a waste of effort, SHVY are worthwhile BECAUSE they draw fire. Steve Jackson - yes, of SJ Games - yes, we won the Secret Service case Learn Web or die - http://www.sjgames.com/ - dinosaurs, Lego, Kahlua! The heck with PGP keys; finger for Geek Code. Fnord. ----- [I would hope that you mean that only the most recent D result effects a SuperHeavy. If additional Ds don't even "reset the clock" they become very tough. (How about Ds in overruns?) -HJC the mathmanic] ------------------------------ From: "Andrew Walters" Subject: GEV/MSL Defense Rebuttal Rebuttal Rebuttal I guess I'm thinking the Ogre doesn't have to worry about the GEVs drawing first blood. There is no defense against multiple GEVs in open ground, anyway, but if you reduce their numbers somewhat (without getting sidetracked) they won't be able to take a big enough bite out of you to matter. Say you charge straight in, make no attacks first turn, GEVs come in with big grins and merrily open up. Four GEVs per MB means a 50% chance of taking out a MB, the GEVs do two of these attacks and the other two go after treads. That takes out 1 MB and 1.2 treads. You charge and get one or two within secondary range (ignore the remaining MB), that takes out those one or two, missles take out five more, and there's only three or four GEVs left. Call it four, and forget that some are now disabled. These gang up and take out the other MB . By now they ought to be able to retreat where you can't get them without getting sidetracked, so you now have to put up with the four of them taking out 2.6 tread units/turn, and they do if for three turns, totaly loss of treads 11.6 by the time you hit the secondary armor line. I would call that a worst case scenario, You never catch a GEV with the mains, never get a 2B shot at a GEV after turn one, and never destroy a disabled GEV. And you still hit the secondary line with M3 and all your secondary batteries. There's still a lot of armor in front of you, but they don't have very much time to take out those 48.4 tread units. The GEV wolf-pack is great, its nice to deny the Ogre counter attacks early on, but you need the punch of HVYs. The first half of an Ogre game is a fast moving Ogre in an open field and you can only get part of your armor there; you want GEVs, and maybe HVYs, try to defang and slow down (MBs and treads). You expect and take losses, particularly if you have only one or two HVYs taking all the Ogre's fire. If you have a bunch of them... The second part is broken field, slow moving Ogre, and you have all your (remaining) armor, and all your infantry; you need to bring maximum firepower to bear because the Ogre is still only four or five turns from the CP. If the GEV battle went well the Ogre is minus missles and MBs, so he has a max of six 1-1 attacks against armor per turn, which is actually plenty, but it means he's only destroying three per turn (2xD=3DX). Since this part of the battle only lasts three to five turns that's okay, in the "we're all going to die stopping this thing" context. I think the hardest part of Ogre is deciding when to stop taking out weapons and focus on the treads. More early shots at weapons is good because more of your armor will survive, which means you'll be more effective at reducing treads. More weapons reduction is bad be The idea of the GEVs backing up from a creeping Ogre to maintain their first shot is interesting, but that's actually a very dangerous game. On the plus side it means that the Ogre will hit the secondary armor sooner, since its running forward to meet the GEVs while the Ogre advances a M2 instead of M3, but from the Ogre perspective the defense can only do so much damage per turn, and the later they start and the less distance I have to cover under fire, the better my chance of having one tread unit left when I hit the back row. Defensively, it always feels to me like that map is way too short, and the last thing I want to do is wait to engage the Ogre. If the Ogre blows away six of my unblooded GEVs with missles at the outset that's fine, that way I don't have to scrape up three attack points to fire at those missles *eighteen* times to take out those missles (or six attack points twelve times) before he gets to whatever row is six away from the back. That means he gets in weapons range at least one turn later, maybe three or six turns later. The missles have to go, and if they take out armor, that's probably just as well, since those eighteen 3 point 1-1's would otherwise take out eighteen tread units, almost a whole movement point! I guess that's the other defensive dilema, where on the map do you start targeting unfired missles? I'd love to try forty LTs agains a Mark V; never mind the annoying 3-2 1-1 round-down, when you present more targets than the Ogre has guns some of your armor units enjoy an infinite defense strength! Until the thing runs over you, then you have D0. Not sure what "Ano" means. ----- [Ano is Japanese. Wouldn't it be cool to have an OGRE Manga/Anime? And my GEVs always do 1-2s against MBs until they are all quite dead. (One side or another, possibly both) I'm considering a modification with 12 GEVs front and 8 Missile Tanks behind. The GEVs give up a first turn strike and form the wedge with three at range 8 and nine at range nine. If the OGRE rushes this line, nine GEVs survive the first missile strike and have a 19% chance of no MB hits and a 35% chance of one MB hit for a 46% chance of at least taking out both Mains. (If both mains are lost then five are lost to SBs and Missiles and the OGRE has a rather hard time getting the last four) If the OGRE takes the two move then the three forward guys strike and scatter and one of them survives, if no missiles are used. Would you rather take fourty Lt Tanks or fourty LGEVs? I would never fire on single-use missiles. Treads are ALWAYS a better target. -HJC] ------------------------------ From: str@qdot.qld.gov.au (Shaun Travers) Subject: Mixed ratios. > From: Chris Camfield > > Missile tanks are a little short-changed as well as secondaries. A 3 > attack strength isn't really worth 1.5x a 2, because so many units have > even-numbered defence values. > > One ugly idea would be to double the resolution of the CRT to d12, and add > a 3:2 column halfway between 1:1 and 2:1. One could also add a 2:3 or 3:4 > column. > > Or on 3:2 odds, give an additional attack at 1:2 (if the 1:1 misses, or in > any case). Actually, I've been toying with an idea for the last few months but haven't put it into practice due to lack of time: Create a 2:3 and a 3:2 column. The 2:3 has one more D than the 1:2 and the 3:2 has one more D than the 1:1. I don't know how much this unbalances the normal game but the reason I was thinking of this is to disallow combining attacks. Therefore each unit fires separately at another unit. If you do this, then the Missile tank is at a disadvantage, hence adding in the 2:3 and 3:2. In the disallowing combined attacks, I would not apply this to infantry combined unit markers, e.g. a 3-1 infantry would not fire as 3 1's but as a 3.ttack strength. If I ever try this out, I'll tell you how it goes. -shaun ----- [There already is such a rule, see Ogre Minis, Section 8, Optional Rules, Page 49, Command Control. -HJC] ------------------------------ From: "Said, Stephen" Subject: Experienced Nuke Catchers Has anyone given any thought to the effect of unit experience in a campaign game of OGRE? I have just about completed my campaign rules (Thanks to all the input...) but one thing that has been dogging me is that if you pit a taskforce that has been holding a sector for the last month against one that is straight out of the factory, surly there should be some difference between the units. Here are some of my thoughts. Could I have your feedback: (i) Assign a commander character to command a taskforce. The characters with the highest 'Tactical' rating choose whether they want to set up first or after their opponent. If the difference is significant, the character with the higher rating can set up part of his force first, then the opponent needs to set up their force in it's entirety, then the character can position the remainder of his forces, reflecting his tactical experience. (ii) Add some kind of morale aspect into the battle, restricting units from performing certain actions etc. (iii) Actually allowing veteran units a modifier. With this idea, I have thought about either adding modifiers to the players dice rolls or actually using a 'Veteran' Combat Results table. Anyway, I hope these thoughts are enough to foster some discussion. Regards, Stephen Said --//:Origin Australia - Systems Engineer://-- office : +613 9574-8080 fax : +613 9574-9090 mobile : +613 417-265-025 email : ssaid@earthling.net stephen.said@au.origin-it.com "Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity." ----- [I'm still working on a rule for "Self Aware" Ogres. How about this? SPLIT FIRE: Self-aware OGREs can declare split fire at any point during their movement phase, after resolving the current overrun. The OGRE takes any of the attacks it would be normally eligible to make in it's upcoming fire phase and resolves them now, with the following procedure. The OGRE declares all of the attacks (and odds, including exact targets, down to exact OGRE components targeted) to be made during this split-fire phase and the next hex (or two inches of movement factor used) of movement to follow this phase. Each of these attacks is resolved, in the order declared, and none of them can be aborted or shifted (even if the target was destroyed by a previous attack during this phase) and rolled and then the OGRE is moved as declared and any new overruns are resolved. Example: Self-Aware OGRE Mark III in GEV hex 2011 moves into hex 1911 and overruns two squads of enemy infantry, which blow away it's main battery before getting toasted in 20-1s from SBs and AP. The Mark III declares a Split-fire phase of two SBs on a Heavy Tank in 1710 (firing as two seperate 1-1s) and two SBs combined against a Missile Tank in 1711 (for a single 3-1) and one missile against a MHWTZ in 1408 (for a 1-1). The movement part of this phase is back into the water in hex 2010. (Ending it's move for this turn.) The first 1-1 against the Heavy tank toasts it and the second one against it is wasted. The 3-1 against the Missile Tank causes a D result and the Missile misses the MHWTZ. The OGRE would have liked to have stuck around and fired it's last missile against the MHWTZ, but it's declared move puts it back under the waves. If you use this, I suggest a 50% increase in price tag for Self-Aware OGREs. -HJC] Henry J. Cobb hcobb@io.com http://www.io.com/~hcobb All OGRE-related items Copyright (c) 1997, by Steve Jackson Games.