Encounter Resolution

Blue? Green? Red? Refuse? It's time to talk about rules for a new community edition of the VBAM rules!
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Tyrel Lohr
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Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

The recent discussion regarding 1E encounter resolution has made me wonder if there isn't a better way to handle this particular facet of the game. Specifically, is there a more straightforward method for determining the type of space combat scenario that is going to be resolved and how these decisions are made at the start of an encounter?

The discussion on the forums up to this point has focused on 1E, but I feel some of the same issues could apply to 2E. I made efforts to add more guidance on what happens on refusing certain scenarios in 2E (such as what happens when a defender refuses a Defensive scenario), but there could still be room for improvement to make this clearer and have fewer exceptions.

One way to simplify this is to handle encounter resolution like I historically have in my own VBAM campaigns. In this case, you work through each space combat scenario type in order and ask "does anyone want to generate a scenario of this type?" starting with the fleet with the highest AS (I would be tempted to change this to ships to make it easier to calculate, but that is splitting hairs).

For 1E, this would mean asking "does anyone want to fight an Interception scenario?" If someone does, then you would fight that battle then see if anyone else wants to fight an Interception. Once everyone has passed, then you would move on to Breakout scenarios and so on until you get to the end with Pursuit scenarios.

Handling it this way makes it much easier to figure out the order in which scenarios are demanded and fought. Refusal then always "fails" towards a later scenario in the chain.

Another important element that has to be made clearer is that two opponents can only fight one scenario of each type per encounter. If the Brindaki and Kili already fought a Deep Space scenario in the Tauron system this turn, then they can't generate another Deep Space scenario against each other in this encounter. They can still fight a Defensive or Pursuit scenario, but that's it.

Of course, that is another question that could be put forward: do players think that players should even be allowed to fight multiple scenarios per encounter? In 1E it's assumed that you can have multiple scenarios, and 2E followed suit, but I could see an argument for saying that they couldn't. The outlier is defender fleeing from a system with defenses, where you more or less have to be able to do both a Defensive and Pursuit scenario to both hit the planetary defenses and still chase down the fleeing fleet units. This *could* be patched by having a special Defensive retreat battle, but that just adds another decision point, something that I don't think really adds much to the game.

Yet another approach would be eliminate the scenario resolution order completely as it exists in the rules and base it entirely on an "initiative order" based on total AS or number of ships and then have each side take turns demanding and then immediately resolving battles. For example, if the Lorans had the initiative they could demand a Deep Space scenario against the Senorians, who could either accept or refuse it. This still leaves us with the decision tree issue of what happens when you refuse the scenario and one empire has fixed defenses present. If the Senorians have bases in the system, does refusing that Deep Space scenario let them refuse and counter with a Defensive scenario? Or would it become a Pursuit?

As I believe the rules are written in 2E, the Senorians could refuse the Deep Space scenario and fall back to the fixed defenses. Either the Lorans or Senorians could then demand a Defensive scenario to be fought there. If the Lorans refuse that Defensive scenario, then they could either leave the system or else stay and attempt to blockade the system. Otherwise, if the Lorans demanded the Defensive scenario, the battle would be fought (as there are bases to attack), but the Senorians could have their fleet retreat, setting up a potential Pursuit scenario at the end of the encounter.

This really illustrates just how convoluted the encounter resolution can get, and I'd love to hear people's thoughts on ways that it could be improved.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

It's been quiet here this week, but I am going to start trying to roll notes and comments into a public GoogleDoc so that we can hopefully achieve some momentum:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1s_D ... sp=sharing

Users can only view and comment, but that should be a good starting point. I'm going to be using this document to track some of the things I'm playtesting, both including possible encounter and space combat resolution changes. Basically, I am going to be looking through the existing 1E/2E rules and see what might need to be changed to make this work, plus highlight some other elements that could make the game run faster or be generally easier to remember when playing the game.

I've cavalierly given this doc the title "VBAM: Galaxies" -- let's see what kind of distant galaxies we can visit together!
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by BroAdso »

I put together a flowchart to see if that can help clarify encounter resolution and which Scenarios to generate when. It doesn't have bombardment or invasion actions on it, but those could be added, and the production values are less smooth than I'd like. It's a start, though - tell me if it's on the right track.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

I think the Raider interaction can be moved to the Supply Phase and out of the mix, which will eliminate one decision node.

I'm not sure that highest number of Scouts is the best for deciding who chooses first, but it's a step in the right direction. The reason I worry is because it makes having lots of Scouts the absolute best answer, and I want to mitigate that. My gut instinct is to say most ships, likely with the same assumption you have here that they are out scouting ahead of the fleet and can get a better feel for the situation.

That being said, I like that there is a definite order for who picks, and then you just resolve that scenario.

We do need a decision option in the flow chart for if the hostile fleets want to generate a scenario or not. Passing would be an option, along with Retreat, Deep Space, or Defensive.

I could see us nailing down Attacker/Defender and color coding the flowchart arrows to indicate who is making that decision.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by BroAdso »

I did some revisions. It still doesn't have Blockade Runner or Raider scenarios. However, I have color coded decisions and added Defender/Attacker designations to match (purple = defender, orange = attacker, blue = no player decision). One of the main limits is trying to keep it to 8.5x11 - I might just go to a bigger page, but ease of printing is so useful!

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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

I think we can safely ignore blockade Breakout and Commerce Raid scenarios in the encounter resolution for two reasons:

A) I think it makes more sense for the blockade to be an entirely strategic economic action undertaken against a system when the defender doesn't have any ships or bases left to protect it. That makes it much easier to adjudicate, and removes the ability for a galactic siege against a system, which while attractive also makes bases much less useful, and I'd like to see bases and Defensive actions in general be more compelling.

B) Having commerce raids happen in the Supply Phase when raiders are activated reinforces that players can't attack raiders directly (they have to catch them when they make an attack), and that the battles are against the beleaguered military forces that survived the rest of combat this turn.

Similarly, looking at your updated flowchart, I don't think we'd want to add Interception back into the mix because it would create even more chaos with the decision tree. I think this would be a good basis for future playtesting and to work out the kinks and see where we need to alter conditions. I'll add it to the doc and see if it will play nice spanning the page.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

Throwing out another random thought:

Would it be easier if each side rolled randomly for initiative at the start of the encounter, and then the player that wins defines the scenario?

It gets rid of the flowcharting and opens the door more clearly for situations where a fleet might not want to be fighting this battle, but they are forced into it anyway. Like a sneak attack on a naval base: the defender doesn't want to be there, and would prefer to run, but they have no choice because the enemy won the initiative.

I would make the initiative roll a d10+Scout in the system, high roller goes first. They then choose a scenario to generate against an opponent, or they could choose to pass (no action) or retreat. The only scenario that could be generated against a retreating player would be a Pursuit.

Encounter continues until all sides consecutively pass.

Example: The Jain fleet (12 ships, 2 Scout) has just moved in to Hyrak and found a Tirelon armada waiting for them (20 ships, 4 Scout). The players roll for initiative, and the Jains get (d10) 3 + 2 = 5 and the Tirelons get (d10) 6 + 4 = 10. The Tirelons have clearly won the initiative in this fight and get first choice of scenarios.

The Tirelons don't like the Jains, but they might not necessarily want to engage them. The Tirelons could just pass the initiative without retreating or attacking. Let's say they do that.

Initiative now passes to the Jains. The Tirelons already passed, so if they pass, too, then the encounter is over and it ends peacefully. However, if they try to retreat, that will give the Tirelons the chance to generate a Pursuit scenario against them just because they are mean jerks.

Now, if the Tirelons had decided to generate a Deep Space scenario against the Jains, there would have been nothing they could have done to stop them. There would be no refusing like in 1E/2E VBAM, the battle would have just happened. The Tirelons would have maneuvered in and engaged them before they could retreat. It would be like the Tirelons were there waiting for them and attacked as soon as the Jain fleet exited hyperspace.


This doesn't fix everything, and it creates some other strange interactions, but I think it would band aid the worst atrocities. It also makes a Pearl Harbor style attack more likely outside of the defender rolling a Disastrous surprise. If I come in with enough Scout and roll good enough on my initiative die, then I can control the tempo of the battle. Larger fleets with more Scouts would likewise be in a better position to push their opponent against the wall, encircle them, or otherwise prevent them from retreating.

The one situation that is still vexing is that you could have multiple battles per encounter in this system, if only to prevent a player from using his 1 Corvette in the system that won initiative to block the 50 ship fleet from a Defensive battle against his shipyards. For that reason alone you'd have to allow the attacker to generate another scenario after the corvette suicided itself against his fleet.

But what if the defender wins initiative and wants to flee? The attacker in this case could generate a Pursuit scenario against them and then circle back for a Defensive scenario to finish off the bases. Thematically, I don't have a major problem with that, but I could see where some players might cry foul. And it does extend the length of the odd encounter just from the back-and-forth fighting.

The other scenario that worries me is two players generating a Deep Space scenario and then turning around and doing it all over again because, by definition, both players haven't simultaneously passed. There are two solutions to that off the top of my head. The first is to say that two players can't attack each other again this encounter if any of their units survived the previous battle. If you completely wipe out the opponent's forces, then sure you can push forward to attack their defenses or whatever. But if you fought a Deep Space battle to a stalemate and the scenario timed out then you're just done. The other option I see is to let the survivors at the end of a scenario immediately retreat with no further chance of attack. They're done fighting, they're out of here, good riddance. They could choose to stay in the system, but they want to get out of here.

Neither of those options are all that great, and I have to come out and readily admit that I've played so fast and loose with scenarios in all of my games that I always pick a scenario that sounds like the best option or what the commanders would do and then fight that one battle and get it over with. But I do see that we need to nail these things down. And almost all of the hand wringing is going to be over edge cases that happen infrequently, or come up when players do unexpected things that we hadn't thought about (or in my case just ignored without thinking realizing it).
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by aelius »

I actually don't mind more than one battle per encounter. I tend to think of each round of a battle as a separate encounter in the ongoing battle for the system anyway. So having more than one defined battle doesn't really cause a problem.
I tend to think that each empire should be able to generate a battle. If that means two deep space battles then why not.
This isn't a big thing for me, I see the reasoning behind the one battle per encounter standard. It keeps things neat and tidy, but it does tend to create edge cases. If everybody gets one battle, and things like pursuit scenario's only lead from retreats etc..., then it shouldn't require a bunch of exceptions to make everything work.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

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aelius wrote:I actually don't mind more than one battle per encounter. I tend to think of each round of a battle as a separate encounter in the ongoing battle for the system anyway. So having more than one defined battle doesn't really cause a problem.
I'm inclined to agree, especially if an empire is given the option to disengage units after a battle. That would address the main problem of "I don't want to continue fighting here, but my opponent can keep attacking me!" by giving you an out at the end of each scenario where you just say "yeah, we're gone".

We'll just have to see how it plays out in practice, and make adjustments from there. I don't think I've had many battles where it wasn't clear that one side or the other wanted to abandon the system and fall back.

The situation becomes even clearer if we go back to retreating ships still being in the system at the end of the turn, and then not moving until the Movement Phase of the following turn. Then the units are still "in the system" but disengaged and moving somewhere else.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by aelius »

Or you could sat that units that retreat across a lane may not move the following movement phase.
This would prevent extra movement and represent the reorganization time needed after a what amounts to a defeat.
Although it would require keeping track of which units retreated and so that method creates extra stuff to keep track of. Still, how many retreating task forces will you have in a single turn? Probably not enough to make it difficult to keep track of in your head, it would usually just be a notation on the task force record sheet.
It would make scenarios where the objective was to break thru enemy lines difficult though.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

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I need to look back and see how we handled that in the past. I don't really like having to keep track of which fleets retreated or where they are retreating to, but I think in 1E the rule was that the retreating unit HAD to move back to the system they came from (or retreat to another system of their choosing) but they didn't make those moves until the Movement Phase of the following turn. Which is fair, you just have to record the movement orders for them the turn before. I just kind of liked moving them back at the end of the turn so you didn't have to worry about it, but that does effectively give units extra movement.

Not allowing the retreating ships to move the next turn would get into a vicious loop of retreat -> pursue -> retreat that I think the 2E rules were designed to avoid now that you mention it. By having units retreat on the same turn they can start the next Movement Phase in a different system to give them the chance of running away. On the other hand, it does make it harder for the attacker to pursue them.

Part of the reason I like reading through old campaign diaries is that it gives me a snapshot of what the rules were like at that time (or at least in that campaign), so I go back to them fairly regularly just to remind myself of what exactly was going on.

I think most of my future campaign diaries are going to be simpler affairs or have a RTF version available because I've found that it works pretty good loading campaign diaries onto my Kindle to read them around the house rather than having to go back to the computer. But then I'm probably an outlier there :lol:
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by aelius »

Yeah, but unfortunately the retreat / pursuit loop is all to realistic during wartime. I can see it might not be best for game fun though.
Still it recreates those desperate holding actions as you try to scrape together the forces to stop an invading fleet. After all, if you retreat when the enemy is advancing into your space then he will follow you anyway. And if you use your movement to get out of his way he will have a free pass into your empire.
The loss of movement after a retreat leaves the initiative in the hands of the winner of the battle, which is also realistic.
It just sucks to be the other guy.
While this is realistic, I am not sure its best to make the game more fun...
I think maybe it might be better as an optional rule. I like it, but I can see where many wouldn't.
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Re: Encounter Resolution

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Europa Universalis IV gets around this by having armies that are routed get a forced retreat back to a designated province. If they get caught on the other end they can then get squished and the units killed, but they get one safe retreat to keep from being boxed in and destroyed quite so easily. But that game is also built around the big scary stacks of death, which VBAM tries not to be by virtue of raiding making it economic suicide to send all of your ships out gallivanting around the galaxy.

I'll take another look at the 1E retreat rules later tonight and we can compare and contrast and start to get that locked down. I did add some more notes to the GoogleDoc about the different space combat scenarios as I currently foresee them. I tossed Convoy Raid in there for now in case we want military units to be able to perform those, too, instead of just having it be a raider option. The raiders are still going to attack initially during the Supply Phase, but I could see moving them back to the Encounters Phase if we really wanted to.

On a similar note, I have Supply Phase AFTER Encounters Phase right now. 1E and 2E did the opposite, however, and with the changes to supply being discussed in other threads I'm thinking that kicking it back to before might be a good idea. Then move Construction Phase back to the end, with just a note that you have to record all of your purchases during the Income/Economic Phase. That keeps the order of operations in good order but lets us put some of the rules back where you would expect them to be (more compartmentalized for easy look up).
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Re: Encounter Resolution

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Tyrel Lohr wrote:I think most of my future campaign diaries are going to be simpler affairs or have a RTF version available because I've found that it works pretty good loading campaign diaries onto my Kindle to read them around the house rather than having to go back to the computer. But then I'm probably an outlier there :lol:
Not really--I've been doing Kindle-sized versions of my SAE and SNE settings so I can look at them away from my computer. Found that dialling the paper size to 13.5x18cm and Calibri Bold really makes it easy to read. The only issue is maps.../shrugs
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Re: Encounter Resolution

Post by Tyrel Lohr »

Okay, I'm trying to get the encounter rules a bit more firmed up, and the best way to do that is by working through a sample jump lane encounter between three different players (empires) and stepping through the process so that we can discuss if this is going to work or not. I'm starting with a jump lane encounter because it is the simplest, and then once we're in general agreement I can finish rewriting the system encounter rules.

I am going to be using BroAdso's sample empires from the other thread as a common point of reference.

The Myarissan Satrapy, New Galactic Order, and ISDY Coalition all walked into a bar (or a jump lane, in this case). They are mutually hostile factions, and they are now involved in an encounter.

Myarissan Satrapy:
2 Barrus Heavy Invader, 6 Lupus Attackers, 1 Aerie EISV Light Scout, 4 Flamen Light Fighters

New Galactic Order
1 Balmung Command Cruiser, 2 Harfunnig Light Cruisers, 2 Djir Corvettes, 9 Barb Light Fighters

ISDY Coalition
5 Jumper Destroyers

At the start of the encounter, each player rolls a d10 to determine initiative. The Myarissans choose to use their Scout to spend 1 Intel to get a +1 to their roll. The final results are Myarissans 4, New Galactic Order 10, ISDY Coalition 7. The imitative order is New Galactic Order, ISDY Coalition, Myarissans.

[As an aside, something that I just thought of: would it be more strategic if we had to assign Intel to specific Scouts, with each having a capacity up to their Scout value? Then a Scout could only spend whatever Intel it is "carrying" with it]

The New Galactic Order goes first. They see that the ISDY Coalition fleet as being extremely vulnerable, so they choose to demand a Deep Space scenario against them first. The ISDY commander isn't stupid, and they refuse the scenario and attempt to withdraw. The New Galactic Order then demands a Pursuit scenario which cannot be refused against the ISDY.

They fight their bloody battle, and a few ISDY destroyers manage to survive and withdraw from the encounter.

The New Galactic Order still has the initiative, but they have likely sustained some damage in the last fight. The prospect of fighting the Myarissans right now isn't appealing, so the player passes initiative.

The ISDY Coalition would have been up next to generate and resolve battles, but they have withdrawn from the encounter and are retreating the last system they visited before ending up in this jump lane.

The Myarissans now have the initiative. They aren't as squeamish about fighting a space battle and demand a Deep Space scenario against the New Galactic Order. Dismayed, the New Galactic Order player must now choose to stay and fight or withdraw and likely fight a Pursuit scenario. They choose to retreat, hoping it will cut the battle short. The Myarissans weren't that interested in the battle, however, and they choose not to demand the Pursuit scenario against the retreating New Galactic Order fleet.

# # #

That would end up being the flow of a jump lane encounter, which is very similar to a system encounter except that there are much fewer options for scenarios here.

Does any of this make sense? Does it seem fairly straightforward? Instead of the 1E/2E scenario resolution order, you are resolving orders by initiative order. Once the current acting player is done generating scenarios then the initiative passes to the next player.
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