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It's been awfully quiet around here.

What affect do matter weapons have on anything?

I am playing around with a tech system and looking at Matter Weapons, I decided that they are the same size as a standard energy weapon, but do 10% more AS or AF (round normally). They do not affect maintenance, but act like Ballistic weapons when out of supply.

What does you think?

Those are certainly good ideas. Matter Weapons have never been definitively defined.

I used the trait when I did my B5 conversion to indicate similir notions; specifically, it indicated a higher than normal maintenance cost (resupply of all that ammo) and ballistic trait penalties when out of supply. At that time, I didn't consider any sort of firepower bonus, since in the B5 context, most matter-based weapons were considered inferior and low-tech.

I think more than a lot of other traits, Matter Weapons is more setting-sensitive in its application.

The main thing I wanted was to have a good differentiation between the 3 weapons types (matter, energy & ballistic).

Energy - The Standard AS/AF weapon. Out Of Supply goes down at the standard rate of 1 per turn.

Matter - Same space as Energy Weapons. Then +10% to AS/AF, Round Normally. Cost is based on final value. Out of Supply like a Ballistic ship.

Ballistic - 150% of space of Energy Weapon. Cost is based on final value. Out of Supply as per VBAM rules. Includes Long Range.

Energy & Matter weapons can be converted to Long Range at +25% space & cost.

What do you think of these rules. I am still playing with them.

Are you using Starmada scale ships or VBAM scale?

I am in the early stages of creating a VBAM Ship Design system. A lot of it also calls for lots of different Technology branches.

nimrodd wrote:The main thing I wanted was to have a good differentiation between the 3 weapons types (matter, energy & ballistic).

Energy - The Standard AS/AF weapon. Out Of Supply goes down at the standard rate of 1 per turn.

Matter - Same space as Energy Weapons. Then +10% to AS/AF, Round Normally. Cost is based on final value. Out of Supply like a Ballistic ship.

Ballistic - 150% of space of Energy Weapon. Cost is based on final value. Out of Supply as per VBAM rules. Includes Long Range.

Energy & Matter weapons can be converted to Long Range at +25% space & cost.

What do you think of these rules. I am still playing with them.

Looks reasonable. I'd say you're on a good track.

For my own force lists, I have settled on giving ships the Kinetic/Energy/Ballistic designations for ships that have a preponderance of one type of weapon or another. Units with these traits then can purchase and use weapon packages/enhancements that correspond to their weapon traits. This adds another aspect of research and development to freeform games, as well as making it easier to handle some of the strange or one-off weapons that you would encounter in various settings, be it specialized missiles or weapons with special effects.