Once More Unto The Breach

[murtalianconfederacy]

A new VBAM:SX campaign.

EDIT: Read below for reason for deletion of diary.

[murtalianconfederacy]

I was looking at some of my files and realised I've made a major error, which I can only put down to my having not played VBAM:SX for two-three years and getting too familiar with designing ships for SNE--I added the 50% SUs for stations, but not the x1.8 modifier. So that means the NAL and TIC are a bit out, cost-wise. For that reason, I'm taking the diary down and seeing if I can fix the issue--if not, I'll just have to re-start the campaign...

[murtalianconfederacy]

After going through all the bases, there's only three bases which are affected (Shieldwall, Edington and Torhanu-Zekla). I can't retro-actively fix the issue, but I'm going to do a bit of fluff to address the issue. Luckily there's been no Defensive scenarios...

[murtalianconfederacy]

And finally the diary has been updated. It's not current (the date is now 3001.11) but I hope to update it over the next couple of days (after the current events have concluded).

[mwaschak]

And finally the diary has been updated. It's not current (the date is now 3001.11) but I hope to update it over the next couple of days (after the current events have concluded).

Thanks for the update!

[Tyrel Lohr]

It's great to see these campaign diaries again, Murtalian! I can't wait to see what happens when them stumble onto something they doesn't want to be found.

[murtalianconfederacy]

Well...they did. In 3002.03/4.

Sad to say but this campaign is finished, mainly due to one of my old problems--DBNA (Death By NPE Activation). However, seeing as this was meant to be a warm-up campaign to get me back in the mindset, it's not gone too bad (apart from the base's cost mix-up and other minor problems)...

I think I'm going to start a new exploration campaign, probably with the NAL or maybe with one of the SNE races. OTOH, I've been laying the rough groundwork for a VBAM version of the Warring Triumvirate/Veiled Serpent. Some changes have to be made (my vision of the Jakrah scouts, for example, don't really work in VBAM), but it's something I've wanted to do for a while...

[mwaschak]

Sad to say but this campaign is finished, mainly due to one of my old problems--DBNA (Death By NPE Activation). However, seeing as this was meant to be a warm-up campaign to get me back in the mindset, it's not gone too bad (apart from the base's cost mix-up and other minor problems)...

Ouch. It does remind me of a few games where I just starting running the NPE and let my old empire exist as a vassal state.

-Jay

[Tyrel Lohr]

Sad to say but this campaign is finished, mainly due to one of my old problems--DBNA (Death By NPE Activation). However, seeing as this was meant to be a warm-up campaign to get me back in the mindset, it's not gone too bad (apart from the base's cost mix-up and other minor problems)...

You might consider reducing the chances for NPE activation to help ease that up a bit. I know that wild swings in luck can end up introducing a lot of them. You might also want to take a quick page from the new Second Edition rules and have most of those activations result in one-system "non-aligned worlds" which just sit there and do their own thing and have the equivalent of non-aggression/trade treaties with everyone they meet until someone declares war on them. Then you can trade with them and pass through their territories (you get military access) without issue, or declare war and integrate them if you'd rather go that route.

NPE that have 25 EP per turn income should still probably end up being NPE, but you could still just leave them as one system empires.

Part of what I'm doing in 2E is to change the new empire activation rules so that you get fewer large empires so that you don't have as much problem with this kind of activation fatigue.

[murtalianconfederacy]

Hmmm...

Maybe an initial roll on the relationship roll for a large power towards a smaller power. If its bad enough for a declaration of hostilities, then carry out the activation as normal. If not, then they sign up to NAP/TT and I can leave them alone for a while. It would save on relationship rolls (I was doing about 20 rolls each for relationship and treaty offering at one point...). I'd state that splinter colonies would receive this treatment apart from ones that are big enough to be minor powers (if there are two splinter colony rolls, for example)

My main problem does tend to be smaller powers that don't do anything but still need to be recorded...

[Tyrel Lohr]

My main problem does tend to be smaller powers that don't do anything but still need to be recorded...

In the context of Second Edition, you could always just have the powers sit in stasis or assume that they are throwing all of their extra points into tech investment. Then you'd only have to worry about checking their status once every 12 turns instead of every turn.

Actually, you could probably do that anyway in situations where you don't have to worry about them going to war. Just have them run through and make purchases once per turn and have them apply retroactively. It would give them a bit of a bonus since they wouldn't be paying maintenance on the units for part of the year, but these one-system powers usually have a poor enough economy that every little bit will help them remain competitive.

[murtalianconfederacy]

Here's the final diary. Seeing as it was a warm-up, it lasted longer than some of my standard campaigns...

[Tyrel Lohr]

Thanks for posting this final report, Murtalian! Very interesting to see how everything came together. I am especially interested in comparing the Starmada/VBAM stat conversions here against what I have in Second Edition. So far it looks like they are pretty close when it comes to cost and tech level combos. It also makes me think I might need to go ahead and tweak my Command Costs down slightly, as I can see a convincing argument for that based on those conversions.

Oh, and depending on if you start another campaign in the next month, you might want to try mapping the stars on a hex map and see how that works for you. I have had a lot of luck with that since 2E started, and it's going to be the default option in those rules. It makes it so much easier to keep track of where everything is! You lose a bit of randomness, but in return you don't have to deal with those annoying rat's nests of jump lanes that sometimes appear once the map gets too big

[murtalianconfederacy]

Well, if you're talking about some of the Holoki designs, the largest one was a SX Hull 40 (well, the Holoki in 'A Three-Edged Sword' had SNE Hull 75 ships, so I actually reduced the size of their largest vessel...) so that CR of 26 is the maximum value possible (except if you added a Command Centre)

As for hex maps, the main problem is that I don't have any way to create hex maps (except for printing some hex graph paper out, which will cost me in both money and flexibility (if I want to start a new campaign, I'd have to go to the library to print it out), but I can do normal maps on squared paper (remember, I'm one of those 'pen-and-paper' gamers). Of course, translating that map to the computer is the biggest problem...

I have started a campaign, as it turns out--well, two. One I didn't get too far on--and their tech level felt a bit too high (they were running around with Scout (2) vessels. The second of the two campaigns I've started has made it to turn one, but they have already activated an INT-1 NPE which I'm in the process of generating...

[murtalianconfederacy]

In the process of generating the NPE, I had a few inspirations of things to do, some in VBAM, some in SNE. One of them, a non-exploration, Commodore-level campaign with the race I started generating and a human power, is what I'm going to do (as soon as I actually start working on it...)