SH53 Border Incident

by on December 29, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: SFB

Crossposted from the SFU blog on BGG

After our last big game, Patch suggested we do an SFB game next. After rooting around in the scenarios for our current year (Y160) a little, we decided upon “Border Incident”, a scenario originally meant to showcase a miniatures boxed set, and featuring the new Romulan KR ships.

The Romulans created an incident designed to test their new ships in battle—a battle balanced well in their favor. An old “Warbird” ship attacked a Federation outpost and then fled into the Neutral Zone, drawing a Federation CA after it. The new Romulan ships Proconsul and Tribune were waiting in ambush, and the first test of these ships seemed well under control. Unfortunately for the Romulans, it did not go according to plan.

The scenario starts with the CA closing in on the WB+, with a KR and K5R showing up on turn 3. A Gorn CL shows up to help the CA on turn 4. Patch volunteered to take the ‘allies’ in the scenario, so he wouldn’t have to worry about reading the cloaking rules in detail (only the WB+ cloaks, the KRs don’t have them for this scenario), but ran into trouble. A 50-point plasma torpedo requires a lot of respect, but I don’t think he really comprehended just how limited a sublight ship is even with cloaking reducing damage. The WB has three choices, move one hex on impulse 32, do one impulse tactical move (turn) anytime from Impulse 2 on, or spend no energy, and get one free turn in place on impulse 32. This means where it is is a given, and only facing could be variable. With the WB+ facing away from the CA at start, staying out of arc of the Pl-R on approach is easy.

Studying the situation again now, I’d go speed 21 (the WB+ is 20 hexes away) to get into its hex on impulse 31. Assuming the WB+ goes, and stays, cloaked for this, 6xPh-1 at effective range 5 should do 12 points of damage (after reduction from cloaking effects). The Photons should be half full overload, and half standard (all allowed as prior arming for WS-III; no further overloading is done for flexibility and lack of energy), and then reserve power dumped into the photons to overload them for the point-blank shot. And that’s where this plan is iffy, since there’s a decent chance that all four will miss (1:16), but with full reserve power put in, there should be 2×16 and 2×12 point shots, and lucky rolls will easily kill the WB+ (average looks to be ~16, for a total of 28, or not enough to get through the armor, more’s the pity). No matter what happens (well, other than the WB+ blowing up), on impulse 32 watch the WB+ move first (if it didn’t Tac), and move into a hex it’s not in. On turn 2, go speed 4 and launch a Wild Weasel while reinforcing the shield facing the WB+. The WB+ probably started decloaking on Impulse 32, and fires (after Tacing to face the CA) on Impulse 5, and the WW moves on 6 before it impacts, so the only damage done will be from the phasers. If the WB+ doesn’t launch the R, there’s a problem, as you’ll still be ~5 hexes away at the end of the turn, and limited to speed 14, with the KRs coming on.

And it’s the KRs on turn 3 that keep this from being a walkover. With one more turn, the CA can counter anything the WB+ did to counter all of that, and two-three would allow another pass that can probably punch through whatever’s left on the rear shield and do damage that it can’t recover from. As it is, it should be noted that with 9 total power, shield damage is probably permanent, as there’s not enough to regenerate them with (I’ll note here we used the original Basic Set WB+, not the Y1 version with two more impulse power as the scenario was published ages before that came out).

As it was, I went speed 1 to get a little closer to where the KRs would show up, and Patch went speed 20, cautiously approaching from one side and behind. Not liking how things looked, Patch aborted the attack run on Turn 2, boosting speed to 22 and ejecting all four torpedoes to re-arm them as standard/proxes. He held to speed 22 on Turn 3, and I entered at the bottom right with the KR doing 21 and the K5R at 23. Patch basically went straight for the Gorn entry point, while I tried to close the distance. Towards the end of the turn, the CA started turning around, and hit the K5R with one out of two prox photons.
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Brothers in Valor

by on December 26, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

The final volume of the Man of War series starts, as usual, in medias res with the USS Cumberland stuck in an impossible situation. Unlike the previous volume, this one flows naturally from the situation at the end, but there’s also a decided tendency to make the opening action bigger and badder than the previous.

Once out of this bit of formula, we’re back to our usual mix of well-done military SF, with plenty of action. The character side is less evident here; I assume it got crowded out by other concerns (or deadlines). The bulk of the book is involved in a daring and dangerous mission (or two missions, really) behind enemy lines. Some early parts of this got done a bit episodically, and I wondered if I’d accidentally missed something, but no, there’s just less bridging between sections than I expected.

Man of War is billed as a trilogy, but Brothers in Valor does not bring the action to a close. How this is considered ‘the end’ is way off in spoiler territory, but needless to say, I’m eager to see what happens next, and am disappointed that the next two (shorter) books are prequels, as opposed to the promised next series.

Despite some minor problems, overall the writing is holding up, and I do recommend the entire series as good military SF.

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Gaming Technology

by on December 22, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Gaming

Technology is such a ubiquitous fact of our lives today that how to represent it comes up in a lot of games, from tactical differences to the strategic march of progress. The best-known example of the latter would be the ‘tech-tree’ in Sid Meyer’s Civilization, which has been copied many times since then. The general idea is that there’s a large list of possible advancements out there, but only a few are available at a time, and each one not only provides a benefit, but leads to other advancements, like an episode of Connections. But while that’s possibly the most common way of representing technological advancement (and a staple of most computer strategic SF games), it’s not the only way.

The biggest problem with the usual methods of depicting technology, is that the player is generally given a laundry list of choices, and whatever he chooses is inevitably the next one gotten. To a certain extent this isn’t bad for handling engineering, as improvements in equipment are often goal-driven, but much scientific progress is accidental, and even happens while looking for something completely different. This would imply a more random ‘research’ mechanic, which could easily go wrong, and take interesting choices out of the game. But there’s room for games where technology is less important, and you just manage how much ‘funding from above’ you’re doing.

Civilization (the Francis Tresham board game) may be the earliest attempt to show technological progress in a game. While it has a large list possible advances to obtain (like in the ‘tech-tree’ model), they are not dependent on each other. Instead, each belongs to one or two of five different general fields, and each advance acquired in a field provides a discount to all the others. This is often equated to a tech-tree, but nothing requires having gotten another advance first.

Hearts of Iron III had a very interesting take on the question however. It divides fields into practical and theoretical knowledge, and keeps a score in both that slowly degrades over time. Whenever you get any kind of advancement in a field, your theoretical score goes up, while building units or engaging in combat generates points for the relevant practical score. High scores in either, or both, makes research in that field go faster, representing familiarity with the field, or a knowledge of just what types of things need improving. The game still has you picking what you’re going to get next, but activities outside of the tech window also influence things. It’s an ingenious idea, and I’d like to see some form of it show up elsewhere.

While I can’t really complain about the usual tech-tree approach, especially in a fairly abstract game such as SidCiv, I do think hiding away the theoretical end of science could be a useful approach. A space 4X game could do this, and maybe have a number of alternate sets of discoveries that are set when the game begins. In each game, the player doesn’t know what version of ‘physics’ is true in advance, and only finds out as particular discoveries come in, which he then starts basing practical advances off of. It’d be a lot of extra work on the development end, but it could make for a very rich game.

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There Will Be War, Part 1

by on December 18, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

I can remember coming across this anthology in the library when it first came out. I had completely forgotten that I had actually checked it out and read it until a few scenes in the stories started resonating with me, and I started remembering having read them before. I’m pretty sure I never got around to reading the later ones though.

Overall, it’s a good anthology, and a great idea for one, though unlike many such, many of the stories here had been published before. There’s also a few non-fiction essays, which are naturally quite dated now. Actually, the stories are too; you can see a lot of their time in them. Overall, it’s a pretty good collection; here’s some particular notes:

“Reflex” – Basically an outtake from The Mote in God’s Eye, it’s just as well that it was left out of the novel, as it wouldn’t add anything to it. As a separate short story, it’s pretty good, though not anything special. Having some idea of the peculiarities of Langston Field ahead of time might help, as it’s not really described here, though the effects are.

“Spanish Man’s Grave” – A 1947 western seems an odd choice for a military SF collection, though Pournelle’s reasons are good, and it’s probably the best-written story in the collection.

“Marius” – This was the story that confirmed I’d read the anthology before, as the description of ruined Strasbourg (and Europe) rang a bell. This time, I had a lot more knowledge of reference of the title. A 1957 story, it has a survivable nuclear war in its past, and is really about pragmatism vs idealism. It’s the only story Pournelle saw fit to do an afterword to, and while what he has to say is true enough, I think he misses some of Anderson’s point.

“Ender’s Game” – Unlike most of the other stories, all my memories of reading this are gone, and I just remember reading the full novel a few years later. I actually like this 1977 short story better, as it’s much better focused, and I don’t care for a lot of the early added material in the novel (which I’ve always regarded as quite good, but not up to the accolades a lot of people have given it).

“A Death in Realtime” – One of the few new stories here, it definitely is a product of it’s time and 1981 computer technology. However, McEnroe has a real feel for the early computer/arcade generation that really helps give the story some extra punch. At least if you’re of an age to remember those times.

“Overdose” – Written in 1975. Vietnam merged with extradimensional invasion. For me, probably one of the poorest stories here, not counting the poems or non-fiction.

“Diasporah: A Prologue” – Nuclear war from the defender’s point of view. Israel is attacked by the surrounding Arab nations in a scenario that feels like it hasn’t aged much in the last 35 years. The “prologue” in the title isn’t explained, but seems to be a reference to the author’s later novel Diasporah.

“His Truth Goes Marching On” – I’m not sure of the propriety of an editor picking one of his own stories for inclusion in an anthology (especially after leading with he co-authored), but it’s good enough that I’m not going to actually complain. It’s the Spanish Civil War with the serial numbers filed off—but he didn’t actually do a lot of filing, since the background just transplants the entire general situation to another planet, complete with Spanish names. Still, well done, and another reprint of a 1975 story.

“The Defenders” – This feels like a Twilight Zone episode, and with an original publication in 1953, it’s about the right time for it.

“Unlimited Warfare” – Another 1975 story, this one featuring the law of unintended consequences as Britain and France have another spat.

“The Battle” – A 1954 story featuring a look at what happens when technology fights the biblical Last Battle.

“Ranks of Bronze” – A 1975 David Drake story (later turned into a novel I haven’t read) with a Roman legion fighting battles for aliens. No, really, it’s good. I often don’t care for Drake, but I might look up the full novel of this.

“I am Nothing” – A 1952 Eric Frank Russell story that shows its age. It’s not poor, but does have a terminal case of black-and-white psychology in order to make a point.

“Call Him Lord” – 1966 Gordon R. Dickson; Earth is a museum piece (or at least it looks that way to the rest of the galaxy), but considers itself to have a separate mission. I’d kind of like to see some more of the world.

“Quiet Village” – 1970, a bit late to be presenting the aftermath of a survivable (presumably) nuclear war, but it works well off the traditional Seven Samurai setup.

Whew, that was a longer list than I expected! There’s a lot of stories in here, and most of them are good, but not great. There are some real winners in here, though I have to imagine that someone who’d been keeping up with short SF in 1981 might feel a bit cheated by the fact that there’s only about three new things in here. As it is now, I don’t know how many of these have appeared elsewhere, but the age of many of the stories bears keeping in mind.

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The Reformation

by on December 14, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Books

MacCulloch’s book on the Protestant Reformation is a huge work on a huge subject. Everything you might expect is in here, and much, much, more.

He starts with a fairly good overview of western Christianity at the end of the Middle Ages, and moves on to the expected history of the reformation. This covers the Reformation in terms of both thought and politics, and I’m not entirely sure that I really understand much more than I did before. Some of it is just me (I find philosophical/theological arguments tough going at the best of times), but MacCulloch’s writing is dense, and not the easiest reading. The book is extensively crossreferenced with itself (and these are all links in the Kindle version), which also points up how many balls he’s trying to keep in the air. For all the scenery that goes by, I don’t feel like I know the period any better, or have a good sense of what any of the principles were like.

The last major section of the book is more of a social history of the period, and I have to think the main text might have benefited from this being right there. On the other hand, it has a focus that the earlier sections lack, so maybe the book would have been better if it had all been more split up than it is. This section goes into the witch hysteria, the status of marriage, sex and the ‘Reformation of Manners’, and a number of similar subjects.

I can’t really recommend this this book except as being thorough, and the only book I’ve read on the subject. It certainly should make a good general reference when dealing with something more specific.

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