ACS and ISaW: Game Play Review

[The Purist]

Abstract Combat System Rules Review

To say that ACS is a blood sport might be something of an understatement. ACS can be used for stand alone scenarios or as the combat system for ISaW. In the other thread discussing the ISaW game turn we are about to begin reviewing the "orders" that commands can receive and these will often refer back to ACS. Therefore a review and understanding of ACS might be helpful to those unfamiliar with the system.

Quite a lot of the rules in ACS refer players back to SBF and Adv SBF where most of the core rules reside. For those not familiar with the rules found in I/O, ACS builds ‘Formations’ (regiments) consisting of ‘Combat Units’ (battalions), which engage each other in combat in much the same way BT, (Adv) BF, (Adv) SBF games do, with CUs having armour, movement, TMM, short, medium and long range damage values.

The abstract aerospace rules in SO are expanded upon in (Adv) SBF and scaled up in ACS with the use of the Star System Radar Map (SSRM) for moving formations in space from the periphery zones to the space above the planet’s atmosphere. The rules also provide a ‘Planetary Combat Map’ that reduces a world to a giant mega-hex, with oceans and other large bodies of water removed so that just the usable land mass is available (750km per hex). Planetary maps provided in other products can also be used (Galtor III, Mallory’s World, etc.).

Game Scale

The game scale is 1 turn equals 3.5 days with 8 turns to an ISaW month. Setting a default scale for movement on the SSRM is important as the published time to travel from the Zenith or Nadir points to planets on the SSRM could take longer than the allowed game turns in a month or would leave very few turns for actual combat. The group I am with use a standard of one (1) week, or two ACS turns, for a straight line run from Periphery Zones to planet. This means adjusting the movement rate calculations of aerospace formations but otherwise works well. See rules on page 319.

Force Structure

Formation and Combat Unit health need to be tracked and very good forms are provided in the game, a good spreadsheet also works. These formation sheets track movement, tactics values, morale and skill of the ‘regiment’ while the CU sheet tracks the individual stats of the battalions in the formation/regiment. A ground Formation may hold 2 – 8 CUs while AS Formations hold 1-4 CUs (wings). CUs are limited to 48 Elements for ground battalions and 40 ASF for Aerospace wings. Note that the Assault Aerospace Wings (dropships) appear to be limited to 12 Elelments to a CU/Wing. Artillery Formations are supposed to hold only one CU but this can potentially lead to extra paperwork and slow play a bit. To avoid this we allow players to group their artillery battalions in larger formations if they wish the fewer formations can have tactical implications during the movement phase and the interplay with initiative.

Another criticism of the 'one artillery battalion formation' centers around ground support missions in ACS. Bombing missions,  for example,  attack the entire formation,  not the hex, this exposes artillery to extreme danger.  Ground-to-air attacks do only 1/4 damage (FRD)  so an artillery battalion could hit every wing in the attacking formation and never do a single point of damage. By allowing more than one battalion to be in a formation or allowing artillery and non-artillery to be in the same formation this issue is avoided.

There is a contradiction in this rule section on page 306 as the paragraph describing Formations states 2 – 8 CUs are allowed per formation but the very next sentence under Combat Units then stats the limit is 2 – 6 CUs. We have gone with the 8 CU limit as later rules often refer to “Full Formations” being of 8 CUs.

Clan forces in ACS are based of the Trinary for building CUs into Formations. Clan CUs may be from 1 – 4 Stars with a maximum of 30 Elements. The rules do not change the number of CUs in a formation.


<<to be continued... >>

[The Purist]

Set Up and Sequence of Play

Force Commander (COM), Combat Unit leaders (LEAD) and Leadership Rating – ACS has two special abilities at the CU level that can be important factors in a game. The most important of these if the Force Commander or COM special ability that translates into a Leadership Rating or LR. The COM special is assigned to the CU that holds the Force Commander while the LEAD special is assigned to one CU in each Formation. These abilities can effect damage and morale but the most important is the LR. The COM is granted an LR value based on the highest morale Command in the force. See page 367 for the table. The LR effects Initiative dr, Engagement Control, Morale and ‘Combat Drop’ modifiers. The loss of LEAD or COM can have a serious impact on other units in their formations or the entire force (especially where morale TNs need to be met).

Master Modifier Table

On pages 308-311 are the tables that will give you most of the needed modifiers to play ACS. The table is missing any sort of guide and some of the modifiers seem strange but a bit of thought as to what is intended can resolve any questions. If a negative modifier seems to be more a penalty where it should obviously be a bonus then you should probably draw the appropriate conclusion.

Take for example the RCN or DRN bonus and Manoeuvre DRs. One would think that having the scouts or a drone carrier would aid in manoeuvre but the table modifiers, which normally modify the TN, seem to impose a penalty by increasing the TN. The ‘logical’ solution would be to use the +1 as DR modifier, rather than a TN modifier.

If anyone else has an idea if there is some other reasoning behind such entries on the tables it would be welcome information.

There are a couple of other issues with the table that do affect final TNs or DRs but they can be worked through via logic and ‘sportsmanship’. If not,… the GM is king and has executive powers,…so,….

Sequence of Play

The rules here are pretty straightforward. Depending on the phase the actions will either alternate or be carried out by one side and then the other.  We found it curious that reconnaissance is carried out before movement and that it is not something that is done during movement. This means reconnaissance is carried out by ‘stop and start’ motions. You recon a hex or hexes, move, wait until the next turn, recon a hex(s), move, wait until next turn, and so on.

I’ll admit that we simply changed the recon phase where Recon Formation move and scan/recon. Scanning can be done by Recon formations without costs but a “Recon” DR will use up movement. Ground Formations use MPs to both scan and Recon. It just flows better. Otherwise, we have found both sides are effectively blind (see rules further down). The scan/recon rules on pages 265-267 work very well and are a good tool to remove the 'omnipotent player syndrome'.

[The Purist]

Deployment Phase

As per the text on Page 310 the only time this phase is required is at the scenario start or when new troops are due to enter the SSRM or PCM.  There are three types of Formations, Aerospace, Recon and Combat. The rules often refer to Ground Formations but care must be taken with context as ‘Ground’ can mean either Recon or Combat Formations. The beauty of the Recon Formation is that it can spread out to cover 3 hexes albeit at a pretty hefty cost to combat capabilities. To be honest, this makes sense and should not surprise to anyone.

Formations are drawn from the Combat Commands on the battlefield and players assign the role at this time. Note that the Formation’s role can change from Recon to Combat and vis-versa. The rule on page 311 repeats an early contradiction and states that Ground Formations are 2 – 6 Combat Units where earlier rules allow 2 – 8 CUs (8 CUs is again stated later on). Aerospace Formations remain consistent at a max of 4 CUs (wings).

Once organized the formations become a nifty (and clever) blip counter for use on the PCM and SSRM, usually numbered or lettered for ease of identification. Note that mercenary CUs count as two CUs if placed in a formation with regular army CUs. This is a clear nod to doctrinal or other ‘cooperation’ or ‘efficiency’ issues. So, if you absolutely must have the elite Wolf’s Dragoon’s Zeta Battalion supporting your Kurita Genyosha mediums the maximum size of the Formation will be reduced.

Adjusting Formations

Formations can also be adjusted during play and, as we will see later on as casualties mount, this is a wise thing to do. Formations might also be adjusted to meet the operational challenges once you start feeling out the enemy’s force. A player may find he needs to bulk up his formations or, alternatively, he may feel the need to thin them out. There is a limit to how many CUs can switch from one formation to another and this is based on the above mentioned Leadership Rating (LR) multiplied by 2. Transferring units between formations is done in the same (PCM) hex or (SSRM) zone and can also slow down the receiving Formation if more than one CU is received.

The number of CUs that can be transferred can be increased by risking a DR versus the LR but this has some risks as a failure slows both units by 1 MP and the adjustment is cancelled. It may not seem like much until you actually need those MPs. Finally, you can adjust Formation while inbound on your transports but the LR costs are doubled. All in all, this is not a major concern as adjustments normally come about due to combat but this rule does cover the possibilities.

Switching Formation Roles

Combat and Recon formations can change roles at the start of a movement phase. This happens more often than you might think as battles develop. Combat Formations changing to Recon Formations lose an MP for that turn while Recon Formations changing to Combat Formations lose 2 MP and ¼ of their damage values. We have found that Recon Formations make frequent changes but there is nothing wrong with Assault Mechs and armour trying their hand at Recon. They do not have any of the Recon bonus advantages and are slower but if forced to fight they carry bigger sticks than hover tanks.

Deploy Forces

The initiative winner decides who places Formations first on the PCM or SSRM and the attacker may not deploy in a hex with the defender’s Capital, a Fortification, Industrial or Ground Formation.

Aerospace Deployment

A well thought out rule with ample explanation of what can and cannot be done (mostly). The aerospace rules on page 312 outline where Formations can be deployed and, unlike the Ground Formation deployment, AS deployment is simultaneous. The attacker must deploy in the Peripheral Zone or at a Pirate Point. If the formations are not initially placed in P1 (Zenith) or P4 (Nadir) zones they remain off map until detected. The defender may deploy 25% of his in system forces in P1 or P4 as well as O1, O2, O12, O13, O14, O24. A Formation belonging to a Patrol must deploy their blip counters in P1 or P4 and do not count against the 25% limit. Jump capable Formations can start in any Middle zone or the Outer and Peripheral zones noted above. Aerospace Formations that consist of ‘Garrison’ CUs may not deploy (or move) beyond the Inner zone on the SSRM. Otherwise everyone sets up in the Central, Inner or Middle zones of the SSRM.   

This next part is a bit of a problem. All ASF Formations must have a base, nothing out of the ordinary there but this base must be a warship, dropship CU or a ground hex on the PCM (or moon). The problem here is that Combat Commands do not come with dropship CUs for the attacker so, technically, an attacker without Assault Aerospace Wings in a CC could never bring along its ASF wings and, therefore, could never attack as CCs cannot be split. You could not decide to leave the fighters behind (not that you would want to). That being said, it is *assumed* that CCs come with generic transport units which would fulfill this requirement but the rule actually states otherwise.

Picking nits? Probably. Common sense is the obvious solution in this case. The way this rule was written was one of the reasons we developed the rules for our ‘naval commands’ with a minimum of 3 Aslt DS Wings.

Ground Deployment

Combat and Recon Formation blip counters are placed on the PCM within the limits mentioned above unless granted hidden status (previous ISaW game turn? GM discretion?). As Combat Drops are handled during the movement phase those formations are not deployed at this time. 

Recon Formations can spread themselves over a maximum of three (3) contiguous hexes to better scan and scout the map ahead. Any suitable method to note the deployment area is fine (we use chits). The more spread out the Formation is the less effective at detection (Scanning) they are. This is clearly defined on the Master Modifier Table. Recon and combat DRs do not suffer any further penalties due to the spread of the Formation.

Attack of Opportunity

The Deployment Phase is where the Attack of Opportunity mentioned in the ISaW thread comes in. If a CC arrives on a target planet having used “Transport Move” orders *and* the defending CC has the Defend order the attacker may suffer an AoO. The defending AoO Formation is deployed last and may deploy in the hex with the attacking ‘Tranport’(ed) CC Formations. The Formations then engage in a round of combat before the regular turn continues with certain bonuses to the defender's Formations.

This option is definitely a double-edged sword as the defending Formations are now locked in combat with all the handicaps involved with “Engagement Control”, “Manoeuvre” and “Tactics”.  This includes the restriction on Tactics (page 316). Unfortunately for the defender, he must decide whether he will exercise this option before any deployment takes place so he has no idea what the contents of the enemy Formations are or how many enemy Formations are coming his way.

When it works it works well but with all the possible drawbacks AoO and Defend orders are tricky things to implement.

[The Purist]

Detection and Reconnaissance Phase

I find it useful to keep flipping back to the Adv SBF rules regarding detection and reconnaissance beginning on page 265. The tables on 267 are well defined as are descriptions of the results obtained from first scanning and then conducting reconnaissance in enemy hexes. Ground Formations on the PCM default to blip counters until they obtain hidden status or are destroyed. Exceptions are if being transported inside Aerospace Formations. If a GM is available Aerospace Formation on the SSRM are not deployed on the map except for Formations in the P1 or P4 Zones as mentioned earlier. Note the paragraph on page 313 does not state this but to do otherwise would place the rule in conflict with the deployment rules on page 312.   

Detection

As the hexes in ACS are 750km across (or 100km if using Scaled SBF) visual/scanning detection and reconnaissance takes place in the same hex as the friendly Ground Formation, or the same hex and the six surrounding  hexes if an Aerospace Formation is conducting a reconnaissance mission. This  renders most of the modifiers on the tables on page 267 moot and we are left with the modifiers from page 308 and the Master Modifier Table. This is where Recon Formations RCN specialties come into their own as the Formation can spread out across numerous hexes to cover more ground.  Aerial Formations gain a +2 to Detection (exception: not allowed against hidden Formations).

Aerospace Formation on the SSRM are limited in detection ranged based on the zone they are in:
Periphery and Outer Zone – detect only Formations in the same sector.
Middle Zone – same or adjacent  Middle and Inner Zone sector
Inner Zone – may detect a Formation in any Inner  Zone sector or an adjacent Middle Zone sector.

Once a Formation is detected it is placed on the map as a blip counter and the information defaults to a “Solid Lock”. On the PCM this is already the case except for hidden units, on the SSRM the blip counter is placed in the appropriate sector but nothing else is known of the Formation’s make up. At this point a “Detection” roll can be made to try and obtain better information but as the table on page 267 notes, with so few modifiers available the chances are not great.  A Combat Formation can make detection rolls for the cost of 1 MP while Recon Formations can scan for free.

Reconnaissance

If your scan results come up empty you can still try a Reconnaissance DR to gain more information before trying to “Engage” the blip counter. A Combat Formations pays 2 MP for Recon attempt while Recon Formations get two free attempts and then pay 1 MP for each attempt after that. Here the table on page 267 is more forgiving as even a “Mixed Signals” or a “Partial Scan” will normally tell you everything you need to know. However, if you entered the hex to conduct this reconnaissance it may be too late to get away if the enemy is looking for a fight.

Once in the hex an engagement control DR must be made as per the reference to the rules on page 246 (typo: text on pg 314 states 346). This is another example of where Recon Formations can help as they are harder to hit (even more so if high TMM CUs are present) and harder to damage. That said, once engaged a Recon Formation will find it difficult to disengage due to the +2 to their Engagement DR as found on page 308. You may have to give the enemy something better to shoot at in order to help them slip away.


Reconnaissance is certainly something a player needs to pay attention to, even if you lack CUs with the  RCN special. Light/Medium Mechs and armoured battalions are best at the role due to high MP and Formation 'Tactics Values'.

[The Purist]

Movement

Movement is relatively simple with additional costs per hex determined by how many friendly or enemy formations are already present. The player who lost initiative move first and players alternate as per the usual BT movement rules. On the PCM or planetary maps each hex cost 1 MP per hex with a +1 for each friendly Formation already present. In order to move *through* a hex with enemy Formations it will cost either +1 for one Formation or +2 for two or more enemy Formations. As noted above, moving through or exiting a hex with enemy Formations will require an Engagement Control Roll if the enemy wants to prevent you from leaving.

Recon Formations, being spread out over larger areas, do not cost extra to move through their hexes. Furthermore, Recon Formations may only attempt to engage other Recon Formations but may be engaged by other ground Formations.

Wrap Around Movement - If using the PCM, representing just the available land mass, the hexagon shape maps wraps around and the unit would enter the opposite side of the map. See page 314 for examples.

Recon Formations - movement is based on the hex the blip counter is located in and it may be spread over three contiguous hexes with various modifiers to its effectiveness as found on the Master Modifier Table on page 308. Here again we run into a strange structure of the rule. As stated on page 314 the actual hexes occupied by the Recon Formation is only determined “after movement”. This begs the question as to how the recon unit is actually supposed to scan and recon multiple hexes if the actual hexes are determined after the Formation has completed all movement.

To resolve this conundrum we have the Recon Formation, with the ‘sweep size’ already determined from previous turns,  move while conducting scan/recon activities, expending MP as required. At the end of its movement it ‘resets’ its size (1-3 hexes) as desired, for the next turn.

Facing -  facing is only important for how it effects movement. A Formation may make two hex side changes without cost. Additional hex side changes will cost 1 MP.

Stacking Limits  - up to 16 CUs (battalions) may stack in a hex while CUs in Recon Formations count as ¼ normal size (4 Recon CUs count as 1 CU). Care must be taken when changing from Recon to Ground Formations to avoid violating stacking limits.

Drop Zones can hold 48 CUs while an “attacker” can stack 24 CUs in the DZ hex (??). This rule could be clearer as it does not state whether the hex can retain that stacking limit indefinitely or whether the expanded limit applies only to the turn of the actual drop. The sentence could also be more clear in defining who an attacker is. It is assumed the attacker (limit of 24 CUs) is actually the defender of the planet. However, it should be noted that it is not all that uncommon to have both sides dropping troops on a planet and thus the attacker/defender role could flip as each DZ hex is engaged. To date, no one in our game has bothered to attack a DZ.

Fortification hexes may also change stacking limits depending on their size and whether a factory or urban centre is present. See pages 322 and 324.

Terrain – while not used on the PCM, using planetary maps can effect movement. Industrial and fortification hexes also slow movement (+2 MP each).

Transporting Infantry  - Infantry mounted in CVs within a Formation are considered loaded and do not count against the Formation’s movement modifier. This is important as movement rates effects “Tactics Values” and thus the “Manoeuvre Roll”. The infantry is considered deployed for combat. If the Formation moves again the infantry is once again considered loaded.

Ad Hoc Transports – probably an obsolete rule now that we have the tables in Campaign Operations where infantry CUs have their own inherent combat transports.

Engagement Control – As noted elsewhere ACS uses the same rules for Engagement Control as those found in SBF Strategic Aerospace rules found on page 246 (typo on page 315 states 346). This means that if “opposing forces occupy the same zone at any time during the movement, Engagement Control must be determined in order to see if combat occurs”. Here “zone” should probably have been replaced by “hex” but that is a small matter. However, this is a change to rules found earlier in the movement section where Engagement Control is checked if enemy units attempt to “leave or move through a hostile occupied hex…” The change makes sense so it has not been an issue in our game.

The Engagement Rules also repeat the fact that Ground and Recon Formations do not use the +2 modifier for operating in an atmosphere but then again the Master Modifier Table applies this modifier to Aerospace Manoeuvre Rolls and not Engagement Rolls, which also makes sense. Movement penalties for moving through enemy occupied hexes is also restated.

It is also noted that Recon Formations may not engage enemy Formations but if they are engaged they may return fire. Recon Formations may also attack using a “Recon Strike” as found on page 316.

Multiple Engagements - The rule here states that a unit that has been engaged cannot declare an attack against any other Formation but it does not clarify which Formation should be the primary attack if it is engaged by more than one enemy Formation. We have assumed the first engaged is the primary target and any other Formations that join the battle can be attacked with the noted penalty until the first Formation is eliminated/retreats.

Rear Guard -  Rear Guard is a tactic that allows a Formation to spread itself over two hexes to screen a retreat. The rule works quite well when you can get a Formation in place but the nature of the ACS combat makes this a bit of problem. Other Formations may actually be destroyed before they can retreat behind a rear guard.

Losing Contact – If a Formation manages to end a turn with no enemy Formation in the same or adjacent hex it may flip back to a blip counter. A rare occasion but it does happen. If a battle is going against you, and you have the opportunity to move this unit first, and the unit has a high movement value, and the enemy does not have aerial reconnaissance, this Formation may be able to reach your dropships and escape,... if the rest of the Command isn't pinned in combat, of course. However (cup half full moment), chances are that you have regained ‘blip’ status because you are wining, in which case you can use your speed to run down a fleeing enemy Formation, or pile on to another battle to help crush the flagging enemy.

Hidden Formations – Unfortunately this is another rule that could have been written more clearly. As written its states the “During Ground Combat, players can conceal Formations from their opponent at the start of play or at the start of each turn”.

Sorry, what?

Is concealment done at the start of the turn or in the Combat Phase? It would seem to make sense that the attempt to hide units is done at the start of the game turn provided the conditions found on page 315 are met. If so the rest of the rule regarding Ground Formations work well.

The last paragraph of the section regarding Aerospace Formations seems unnecessary. It begins by stating Aerospace Formations may not hide on the SSRM and then references you to page 313 detection rules where it clearly states that Aerospace Formations on the SSRM *are* hidden until detected (with the noted exceptions).

Hidden units can move (slowly) with the intent to stay hidden, escape or perhaps set up an ambush. The chances of successfully moving more than one hex and retaining hidden status are remote. If a hidden unit pulls off an ambush they gain to hit modifiers as well as inflicting a bonus +20% damage. Combined with other tactics and a successful manoeuvre DR and the ambusher can come close to doubling its damage while the defender’s damage is reduced by 50%.

Good work if you can find it.

[Alexander Knight]

Actually, ad hoc transports are still a thing because the infantry in tables is "mechanized".  I.E. 2 companies of foot infantry and 1 company of APCs per battalion.  A purely infantry formation would be cheaper, and benefit from the ad hoc rule.

[The Purist]

Actually, ad hoc transports are still a thing because the infantry in tables is "mechanized".  I.E. 2 companies of foot infantry and 1 company of APCs per battalion.  A purely infantry formation would be cheaper, and benefit from the ad hoc rule.

We did find the infantry regiments in CO curious affairs. We use 3 battalion infantry regiments with inherent transport as a standard in our game (move 6w, TMM 2). A similar version is used for jump infantry as well (drive/fly to the battle then jump into combat) although we are still experimenting.

However, the motor/mech regiment we use is based on the 4th SW Atlases and the "Typical" BF2 regiment found therein. The big change is that we mixed the armour and mounted infantry coys in the battalions (2 APC mounted inf coys and one tank coy) rather than having 2 infantry and one tank battalion. The regiment deploys with 3 CUs instead of one large regiment sized CU. It costs more in RP than a light tank regiment and costs 1 RP/4RP to supply.

It only adds a touch more paperwork and CCs are more expensive to purchase and supply. Players thus far tend to only include one or two of these regiments except in special or *notable* commands.

[epic]

Curious what your experience has been with larger battles in ACS.  or how large your biggest battle has been? 

We had a substantial dip in productivity for getting turns done due to having to resolve our biggest battle to date...
involving 5 Lyran Combat Commands and 3 FWL and a merc unit. 

With so many forces on world, it was difficult for the FWL forces to easily maneuver, though they often managed engagement control.  Unfortunately for the FWL, the Lyran player continued to have excellent luck with rolls even in the face of Inferior Doctrine (and it didn't help that their fortress was destroyed and communications sabotaged by Lyran commandoes). 

I am finding that in smaller sized engagements of 1 or 2 Combat Commands, light/medium units can very much win battles.    But in larger scale operations, it's heavy/assault commands that win the day. 

Side note: I often am finding that air battles and achieving air dominance often doesn't occur until at least turn 4 or 5 of ACS.  By the time that the ground ops are often achieving victory for one side, the flyboys can finally start continuing ground ops.  Is this the same for you?

[The Purist]

Our biggest battle occurred on Kessel where there were 12 LC and 11 DC Commands on the planet when the LC final gave up the attrition battle. Not all of the commands were engaged at once as the build up occurred over a number of months. The final battle in Dec 3019 had parts of 13 Commands engaged with a number of Formations on both sides hidden and trying to repair.

The largest AS battle had nearly 70 wings (including naval commands) on the maps (PCM and SSRM) while the engagements actually took place over nearly a dozen zones. 43 wings were destroyed with their commands with 24 more scrapped due to damage. The battle became spread out due to the fact that wings do escape engagements and need to be chased down. Both sides also had air-to-air strikes take on combat air patrols on the PCM as well. For all the wings engaged relatively few bombs were dropped due to the need to jettison ordnance in order to preserve tactics values. Ground fire also deterred air strikes,.... having 5-8 CUs each capable of doing 1-4 points of damage to attacking wings was the cause of death for more than one unlucky group of pilots.

Of the 23 Ground and 10 Naval Commands engaged during the campaign, 11 Ground plus 1 Naval Command were destroyed outright (or so badly shot up that it didn't matter) another 7 were so badly crippled they were scrapped to rebuild other commands, or provide armour for commands rebuilt from scratch a send in again. For example, the current 3rd Dieron Regulars are on their third iteration.

If you want a more detailed view of our campaign see the "1st Mechanised Brigade" thread down in "Non-Canon Units" My personal merc regiment exists in that 3rd SW alt-uni.

[The Purist]

Combat Phase

The Combat Phase is where ACS has some of its greatest strengths and, so far as a campaign game engine is concern, one glaring weakness. We’ll get to that weakness when the dice actually start rolling.

Types of Attacks – as noted on page 316 each formation is allowed one attack per Comabt Unit (CU or battalion). Needless to say this is easy to arrange as a Formation of 6 CUs would make six attacks against the Formation it has engaged, or was engaged by. Note that Formations do not need to be stuffed fully to their maximum capacity of 8 CUs. In fact, players often avoid full Formations except when defending or assaulting a fixed position such as a capital, industrial hex or fortress. This makes sense as a smaller Formation can pin a larger Formation in an engagement just as easily a full Formation can, it may simply be destroyed sooner. By having more Formations than the opponent one side or the other gains an advantage as well as tactical flexibility, especially when units start to break and (try to) run.

Artillery Attacks do not make use of range to hit numbers but instead receive a +2 to hit modifier to all attacks. This is not as bad as it sounds as artillery Formation rarely can win an Engagement roll unless the other guy want to fight the gunners. At the same time, charging the guns like some 31st Century version of Balaclava is not really such a good idea, Artillery CUs have fairly good armour and if they hit they inflict 12 points of damage. Lastly, you do not need to be engaged to fight in the combat phase but you and your opponent must exchange fire at long range.

Recon Formations that are caught by Ground Formations in the movement phase and engaged are treated as a regular Formation at this point. They suffer a +1 To-Hit penalty and only do 50% of their normal damage.

On the other hand, Recon Formations that were not engaged but are in position to attack can execute a “Recon Strike”. The to-hit modifiers are found on pages 308-311 but the “LEAD” CU does 25% of it medium range damage, fraction round normally (FRN) is assumed as the rule is silent otherwise, with the attacker choosing his target. The defending CU that was targeted may return fire with a number of to-hit modifiers and does 50% of its long range damage, again RFN is assumed. This is a nifty little rule that adds some panache to the combat phase.

Attack Declaration

As with movement, attack declarations are made, initiative loser going first, and the declarations alternate until all engaged units and units not engaged but in the same hex have declared attacks.

<<The next section (Tactics) is a bit complicated so I’ll post that section separately.>>

[The Purist]

Combat Tactics

Some fairly clever rules as written and together with other modifiers found elsewhere the tactics rules can change the amount of damage received or inflicted substantially. However, as we will see further down “Tactics” have a significant flaw that makes applying the rule very difficult. More later.

Following attack declarations players now declare which of the three Tactics choices they will wish to use to hopefully increase the damage they inflict or decrease the damage they receive.

And this is where the rule seems to have problems. The Tactics must be chosen before the Manoeuvre Roll has been made to determine range.

There are three Tactics – Standard, Aggressive and Defensive.

Standard Tactics – do not grant any additional damage for a hit so players just use the final modified to hit number and if the hit is successive the attack does full damage. If the attack fails (you miss) the attacking unit will still do 80% of full damage. <blink> <blink>

Yes, you read that correctly. A miss is still a hit, every time, regardless of conditions. Even a final DR of 2 will hit for a base 80% damage. This means that your CU with a long range damage of 1 that never lands a successful attack will still do 1 point of damage. This can be reduced by the interplay of other factors but more on the effect this can have in a campaign game later on.

Aggressive Tactics – a player may add a number +1 to-hit modifiers (up to a maximum of +5) to increase the damage his attack does. For each +1 DRM applied, a successful hit increases the damage by 10%. This means damage could potentially be increased by as much as 50% with this tactic. However, if the attack fails (major typo in the rules here, btw) then the attacker does only 80% damage but any return attack that hits is increased by the same modifier (see the example on page 316). Here again we assume FRN as the rule is silent on fractions.

So if the return attack would do 6 damage it is increase by 50% and then adjusted further by any modifiers the CU shooting back may have. For example, a Capellan medium Mech CU chooses Aggressive Tactics with a +5 and fails at close range, it will only inflict 5.6 damage, FRN to 6 damage. A Davion CU (ie: light tank CU) returns fire at short range with its own Aggressive Tactic with a +2 modifier and hits the Cappelan CU for 6 damage. The 6 points is increased by 50% for the failed Capellan tactics, +20% for the Davion Aggressive tactics and a further 10% for Superior Doctrine for a total +80%. Those 6 damage points now equal 10.8 point (FRN) or 11 damage points to the Capellan medium Mechs.

Defensive Tactics – this tactic aims to reduce the damage received by 10% for every +1 to-hit modifier to a maximum of +5 (or -50%). If your attack hits you reduce the incoming damage by x %. If your attack fails you take full damage and your attack is reduced by the usual 20% and then reduced a further 10% for each +1 modifier from your failed attack. Without other modifiers a failed attack with +5 modifier would reduce the damage you inflict by 70% but you would still do 30% damage (which can be adjusted further up or down by other modifiers).

For example, a FWL medium Mech CU is set upon by an LC assault Mech CU and the FWL attempts to use Defensive Tactics to try survive the blast. The FWL CU has chosen a +4 to-hit modifier and this attack succeeds. The LC assault Mech’s damage at medium range (for example) would normally do 15 points of damage. However, the LC CU’s attack failed so his base damage is reduced by 20%, the damage is reduced a further 10% for Inferior Doctrine and the savvy FWL commander’s Tactics reduce the damage by a further 40%. The base 15 damage is reduced by 70% to a final value of 4.5 (FRN) or 5 damage.
 
That, in a nutshell, is Tactics. The beauty of this rule is that Tactics can play off each other and the choices made can see a number of plus and minus modifiers come into effect so keep your scratch pad (or calculator) handy.

Tactics Interplay Example

A DC green (fanatic) heavy Mech CU from the X Sun Zsu Academy is fighting on Waldorf to drive off the FS invader. The FS CU is a veteran (reliable) medium tank CU from Y Deneb Cav. The DC player lost the initiative and declares he will use Aggressive Tactics for a +3 (30% damage inflicted). The FS player declares he will use Defensive Tactics for a +4 (-40% damage received). The manoeuvre DRs are made and the range ends up being medium.

The DC player checks the Master Modifier Table on pages 308-309 and has the following modifiers:

Base To-Hit: 4; Attacker Fanatic; -1; Green: 0; Target TMM: +3; Medium Range: +2; Aggressive Tactics: +3 = Final TH # required of 11. The young cadets blaze away and, not surprisingly, their attack fails. 

The FS players checks the Master Modifier Table on pages 308-309 and has the following modifiers:

Base To-Hit: 4; Defender Fanatic: -1; Superior Doctrine: -1; Veteran: -2; Target TMM: +2; Medium Range: +2; Defensive Tactics: +4 = Final TH # required of 8. The FS tankers (just) score a hit.

The damage is applied as follows:

DC heavy Mech CU has a base damage at medium range of 9; Attacker Fanatic Defence: +10%; Missed target: -20%;  Aggressive Tactics failed: -20%; target successful Defensive Tactics (+4): -40% = ((9 x 1.1) x .2) = 1.98 FRN to 2. The FS medium tank CU takes 2 damage.

FS medium tank CU has a base damage at medium range of 9; Superior Doctrine: +10%; target Fanatic Defence: +10%; Veteran: +10%; target failed Aggressive Tactics (+3): +30% = 9 x 1.6 = 14.4 FRN to 14. The DC medium Mech CU takes 14 damage.

Note that had the FS also missed the damage to the DC CU would have been as follows:

Superior Doctrine: +10%; target Fanatic Defence: +10%; Veteran: +10%; DC failed Aggressive Tactics (+3): +30%; failed attack: -20%; failed Defensive Tactics (+4): -40% = ((9 x 1.6) x .4) = 5.76 FRN to 6 damage.

Needless to say the outcomes can vary substantially. Had both sides hit the numbers change. Had both attacks failed, they change again.

As mentioned above there is the big issue with the rule and the sequence of play, Tactics are chosen before the Manoeuvre Roll determines the range so the use of Aggressive and Defensive Tactics is not as easily applied as the examples above suggest. This means that Standard tactics are almost always chosen and this means that a failed attack will do the base 80% damage.

But more on that and it's impact on a campaign game in the next chapter

[The Purist]

Wrong Thread,..... moved to the ISaW thread   :thumbsup:

[Welshman]

Hey, Purist.

Thanks for the player perspective. I’m the author of SBF, ACS and the core of ISW (it was edited after I wrote the base rules).

I haven’t had a chance to read through all of this. From what I’ve seen, looks like some editing errors as well as some confusion in wording.

Best help would be to post your specific issues, as questions, in the Rules Question forums.

Cheers,
Joel BC “Welshman”

[The Purist]

Hey, Purist.

Thanks for the player perspective. I’m the author of SBF, ACS and the core of ISW (it was edited after I wrote the base rules).

I haven’t had a chance to read through all of this. From what I’ve seen, looks like some editing errors as well as some confusion in wording.

Best help would be to post your specific issues, as questions, in the Rules Question forums.

Cheers,
Joel BC “Welshman”

Good evening, Joel,

My next post will deal with the largest 'complaint' we've found with ACS and its link to the campaign engine, ISaW.

Don't take offense. What ACS/ISaW did was create a totally new game. Unlike BT/AS/(adv) BF/(adv) SBF, which are all tactical or lower operational levels of the system, whose progression can be quite easily be followed, ACS/ISaW (and Scaled Adv SBF) is a different animal.

It is Grand Strategy. The following two posts will hopefully show where, in my view, the two systems meet and do not mesh as perhaps they should. As mentioned before and elsewhere. This is all intended to be constructive.

Cheers.

[The Purist]

Resolving Attacks

The rules for resolving the ACS attacks are those used in (Adv) SBF and are conducted in the following sequence:

1) Determine Range (Manoeuvre Rolls)
2) Determine to-hit number
3) To-hit DR
4) Determine and Apply Damage
5)Check for any Critical Hits

Determine Range

The rules for determining range involve a manoeuvre roll where Formations compare their Tactics Values, which is determined by their formation movement and quality values, roll 2D6  adding or subtracting the modifiers found on the Master Modifier Table on page 308. An additional -1 to the TN can be achieved by a Formation that does not use all available  MP. Note that the +2 DR for an aerospace Formation operating in an Atmosphere mentioned previously under Engagement Control is actually found under Manoeuvre on the MMT. Since the atmosphere affecting ‘manoeuvre’ seems more logical we have gone with the table on pages 308-309.

The Formation with the highest MoS determines the range for combat. If the DR is a tie then the Formation with the highest MP determines the range. If still tied the die are re-rolled.

If one Formation makes its TN and the other fails then the Formation that succeeded is considered to have out-maneuvered its opponent. The Formation that was outmaneuvered reduces the number of attacks it can make by 50% (FRD) and, in ACS, takes an additional 20% damage.

This means 50% FRD of 1 is zero and your sole CU doesn't get to shoot back. The above is why the general rule is to ensure that Formations have CUs appointed in pairs. With the exception of very fast A/S wings this especially applies to A/S Formations.

If both Formations fail their Manoeuvre Roll then combat takes place at Long range.

If two Formations are in the same hex but not engaged there is no Manoeuvre Roll but any combat takes place at Long range. This is very important when artillery and long range A/S formations (see Lyran heavy A/S wings) comes into play.  Since artillery does not use range and instead applies a +2 base to its attacks (plus other MMT effects),  Long range can actually be artillery’s best friend. Veteran artillery can be deadly. Elite battalions? Depends. Once spotted they draw airstrikes like flies to honey but also tend have very heavy aerospace CAP. Charging the guns with heavy tanks or Mechs is an option but painful.

Ok,… back to Manoeuvre.

The Manoeuvre Roll coming after Attack Declaration and choosing Tactics is what makes applying Tactics so difficult in the majority of cases. If you choose Aggressive Tactics and your opponent wins the Manoeuvre Roll your changes of hitting, even at Medium range drop significantly.

Take for example a Regular/Reliable FWL hvy tank Combat Unit at Medium Range, with a TMM 2 that has chosen Aggressive Tactics with a +2 modifier for an added 20% damage.  The target is a CC hvy Mech CU also with a TMM of 2 that has chosen Standard Tactics.

As per the MMT the base to hit number is a 4, in our case we will assume that none of the modifiers for Force Abilities or Formation Modifiers apply. Modifiers under Combat Units grant a -1 for Regular quality and +2 for the TMM. Under Combat Modifiers on page 309 Medium Range add another +2 and Aggressive Tactics add a final +2. The final TH TN is a 9 or roughly 27.7% chance to hit. Not the best odds. We will assume a miss. The attacking FWL tank CU will still do 80% of its 12 damage or 9.6 damage FRN to 10.

The CC hvy Mechs are also Regular/Reliable and has a base to-hit of 4, a -1 is applied for Regular quality, +2 for TMM and +2 for Medium range for a final TH TN of 7 or 58.3% of a hit. Pretty good odds. Even the 41.6% odds for a TH TN of 8 (assume a medium tank CU w/ +3 TMM) are fairly good. A hit converts the CC hvy Mech CU damage from a base of 10, +20% for the failed FWL tactics to 12 damage. Even had the CC CU missed its target it would have still inflicted 10 damage points: base 10, -20% for failed attack, +20% for LC failed tactics attack.

Herein Lies the Problem

All of this is fine, you take your chance with Aggressive of Defensive tactics. However, after some experience with the combat system what happens is players ‘default’ to standard tactics for the vast majority of engagements and this results in what comes close to “Mutually Assured Destruction”. Hits inflict normal damage and a ‘miss’ inflicts 80% of base damage. This is not offset that often by such factors as -50% for a “Forced Engagement”, or -50%/-75% for Overruns, or other negative modifiers for Recon Formations. Most Engagement Control Rolls are fairly generic with the only modifiers found on the MMT (yes, there are exceptions).

As can be imagined the amount of damage points that can be inflicted in a single turn when two or three full commands plus a mercenary command and garrison CUs are on each side can be extremely high. Our record in 1257 armour points in one ACS turn. The result is that entire Commands can evaporate in just a few ACS turns. The damage can come so fast and heavy that CUs may not even have the opportunity to route away before being eliminated. An attacker who “wins” will often suffer 60% - 85% damage while the defender who loses may suffer 85%-100% of committed forces depending on if the opposition allows the remnants to leave or simply takes them as salvage.

All this is absolutely fine in a quick set up game where ‘stompiness’ is the goal and players are fine with the loss of two Commands and a third gutted, in the process destroying three Commands of the opposition. However, in a Campaign Game where a House might see 5, 6 or more major battles involving 10-18 commands you have effectively destroyed the Commands taking place in the battles with no means to replace those losses.

A ‘generic’ Command of 1 medium Mech, 3 medium Armoured, 5 Infantry, 1 Artillery and 2 Aerospace Wings (med and hvy), Reliable loyalty and Regular quality will cost 366 RP, 183 if Reliable/Green. If you won the battle you may have just lost 6-8 full Commands with another 8-10 reduced by as much as 60% - 80%, give or take a few hundred armour points. If you lost and the enemy has not permitted retreat you have likely lost every command involved (ie: 12-15+). The losses are so high that Going-to-Ground or Scattering is rarely an option and would only prolong the end of a command if it lived long enough to try.

With the economies of 3025 a House (even the Lyran Commonwealth) can replace maybe three or four of these commands if Regular/Reliable, six to eight Commands if Green. Note that Green troops die very quickly or become the source of “human wave” tactics by attacker/defender in order to keep or halt the momentum of an offensive.

These massive losses will free up RPs from the supply requirements after a couple of turns of heavy losses but only temporarily. Properly planned, the massive holes torn in the frontier defences mean that wide swaths of planets are occupied by smaller follow up Commands, who can exchange themselves against the unsupported garrisons. The defenders RP base begins to erode and then begins to collapse. A defending House will then find itself short on future income just as it manages to push a new wave of commands forward. The attacker is gaining in RP very quickly and can keep pouring in the cannon fodder.

On our first attempt at switching our game over in April 3019 we found the Federated Suns on the receiving end of a combined assault from the Draconis Combine and Capellan Confederation. We saw the issue with the FS economy and thought we would test the theory that if pushed the FS could collapse even from a CC attack. Even with harassment on other fronts the two attackers were waltzing through Federated Suns space in less than three turns and the writing was clearly on the wall. The DC and CC, each using about 50-60% of the economies respectively, kept pushing waves of Questionable or Reliable Green, or (sometimes) Very Green troops into the gaps each turn which made any sort of FS recovery impossible. With a “failed” attack still inflicting 80% of base damage players don’t even both trying to use sophisticated strategies, it’s just a case of human wave attacks after human waves by low(er) quality troops. Veteran and Elite Commands such as the Davion Guards lasted a while longer but eventual went under.

By the end of June 3019 (just four turns), every House with an active front (they all had one) has burned the bulk of their 3025 at start commands. I stopped counting after over 125 commands were totally destroyed in those four months. More were scrapped by a hasty combining of remnants. With the full concurrence of the other players, we reversed course and reset to Apr 3019. What followed was an additional few weeks of back and forth on how keep the best parts of ACS combat rules, including tactics, without seeing BT-uni ‘lore’ completely upended.

We think we came up with a viable solution.


b]<< to be continued...>>[/b]

[epic]

As a note in regards to the loss of Combat Commands and how quick it occurs, a point; investing in jumpships for commands is almost never worth the expenditure because of how expendable combat commands are.  Doubling the cost of a unit only to see it get killed 2 turns after being built is not worth the investment... unless the unit built for raiding.  That's the only reason I can see it possibly paying off. 

[The Purist]

I agree,... we haven't had a single Jumpship equipped command build in (now) 19 game turns. The exception here being the Naval Commands, where Jumpships are mandatory. That said, however, jumpships are not needed for raids as the Command does not actually move. The Command uses one (1) orders point for the raid but only the two CTs and their supporting a/s sqns actually move to the target (within the limits of 3 orders points remaining).

[The Purist]

The Trouble with Misses being Hits

When a Miss is a Miss

What we eventually agreed on was that the majority of the rules were quite well done, if a bit thin on clarity in places. What made the campaign system all but unplayable was the MAD nature of the damage system flowing from every miss actually being a hit.

After some trial and error we came up with a change where a failed attack would actually be a clean miss. The new definition of a “failed” attack became an MoS of 0 (we first tried a MoS of -1 or 0). So, a to-hit TN of 7 that succeeded with a final modified DR of 7 was considered a hit but just barely and netted the base -20% damage. While an MoS of 1 or more inflicted full damage.

On the battlefields this change still made applying Aggressive or Defensive tactics very tricky, which is what we believe the original rule intended. Along with a lower rate of casualties, victors still suffered 30% - 50% damage while the defeated lost 40% - 65%. Lopsided odds still result in crushed commands, unless the defeated were granted their Ransom/Parole.

One unexpected result of the new combat effects was that “Honours of War” were granted more often, though not for the reasons one may think. Defeated commands were allowed to retreat for a number of tactical and strategic reasons that were not required in the rush to kill under the MAD scenario.

Tactically, a defeated command would require additional ACS turns to finish off, often into the next ISaW turn. This imposed additional Fatigue on the victor’s commands involved in the turns required for the final kill. In the case of an extended campaign, continued fighting also led to more losses that otherwise could have been avoided, especially where a full battalion ends up destroyed. Extended fighting could also prevent the engaged commands from being withdrawn for repairs the following ISaW turn and would impose much higher supply costs for multiple turns consecutively “in combat”.

Strategically, allowing commands to retreat prevented them from being able to Go-To-Ground and perhaps causing trouble as guerillas (arguably a rare choice but still). More importantly, allowing a retreat forced the defeated House to supply the battered command in the next turn, at combat supply rates, and forced them to move the command from the site of the battle to a new system. In both cases this involved often heavy RP expenditures for commands which might only be good for providing free armour replacement points. The return of “Honours of War” also allowed players to negotiate “Ransom” and “Parole” for commands that they might wish to retain rather than rebuild from scratch.

As it has turned out, negotiated Ransom generally nets 50-150 RP be paid to the victor to let a command withdraw with its kit. The victor might also insist on a period of Parole where a Command may not return within 60 light years of the the present front for a defined period of time. Once agreed, these terms were generally turned over to ComStar (GM) for enforcement. Violation of said terms might result in ComStar’s increasing that House’s ‘Interdiction Level Trigger’,… or not,… depending on the offending House’s level of contribution to ComStar “operations”. The offended House has on one occasion, tracked down a parole violator and destroyed the Command entirely.

This rule change has restored a balance to the campaign game. Commands are still destroyed on occasion but most that retreat are rebuilt via repair or combining remnants. The worst off battered and mangled commands are moved to a place where they can provide mobile armour replacements depots. The front moves but not nearly at the rate it did in the first attempt at ACS/ISaW.  Attrition has set in with more and more armies finding they can support combat operation for only so long before offensives simply need to halt, at least for a few months while losses are replaced and commands are reshuffled to balance the front.

Determine and Apply Damage

As noted damage values are modified by tactics, quality, manoeuvre and the MMT.  The rule section on page 317 notes rules for Secondary Targets and the reduction of damage by 25%. However, under the engagement rules its states that once a Formation is engaged it only receives one attack per CU and it must engage that Formation as its primary target.  There is nothing that states a Formation may attack a second Formation that has engaged with it but we figured this might be "implied".

The only thing we think this might apply to is when CUs in a Formation no longer have a legal target in the primary Formation they may choose targets in another Formation as a secondary attack.

Applying damage also follows the rules in (Adv) SBF. Here we have a “Tactics Check” dr to be made before damage is applied. A single dr is made for the hits made by a Formation. The player with the lower Tactics Value may add the difference between tactics values to the dr. The winner of the dr gets to choose how to apply the damage to the target Formation. They could apply all the damage to one CU, spread it around all the CUs or, in the case of the defender winning the dr, apply to the CU best able to take the damage.

And herein lies a new problem with a new “Tactics” rule. Formations may often contain numerous units with similar movement values in order to have the best “Tactics Value” for Engagement and Manoeuvre DR. However, these same Formations may have CUs with different TMMs. In combat, attacking CUs could focus their attacks on the lower TMM CUs to obtain hits but when applying the damage choose high TMM CUs. Units that may have been impossible to hit short of a DR 12 can now be shredded by what amounts to “luck of die”.

We set this one aside and instead use a simplified version of the “Simplified Damage” rule from page 241. In this case an attacking Combat Unit must declare a target CU and that target will take the damage if hit. This change also saves many extra die rolls in a game already awash in dr/DR.

One rule for applying damage from (Adv) SBF that does work is the “Concentration of Fire” rule from page 240. Simply put a CU cannot be targeted three times unless every other CU has already been targeted twice.

Determine Critical Hits

Simple, clean and easy to apply. The table on page 241 is easy to remember and the results of crits have changed the outcome of more than one battle in our 18 game turns of carnage. The results naturally run from ‘no effect’, targeting hits, ‘weapons damage crits’, movement and the dreaded ‘Mission Kill’. There been the usual howls of anguish when a Elite heavy Mech battalion hits its first crit check and vanishes in a Mission Kill DR of 12. More than once this anguish has been replaced by tears of joy as the CU is revived during the end phase Salvage recovery (dead but not truly dead).

Note that critical hits remain on a CU until 90% of the armour has been repaired. Unsurprisingly, this can affect how soon a command is sent back into combat.

[epic]

Secondary note about the sheer scale of damage that occurs;
This is the economy of the 3rd Succession War, and the resultant low level raiding and smaller campaigns that would occur.  Rather than large operations and invasions, a couple worlds being attacked - and then having to repair the subsequent damage to units involved - seems to have been all that most powers could afford to do up til the 4th SW. 

So.. is it actually working as designed?  The greater economies seen in the 1st and 2nd SW (with higher amounts of industrial worlds, and the values of all worlds being higher, not to mention higher levels of industrial tech) would have allowed for more large scale conflicts.  Admittedly, haven't tried those eras yet.  (that's my next project)

[The Purist]

Well,... as I've mentioned in the past, exhaustion does set in as commands are burned up and need repairing or replacing. As I have also noted in the past the 'quick resolution' rules for raids are unbalanced in favour of the attacker. There are other issues with raid resolution but that is a discussion for elsewhere.

We also need to keep in mind that the 3025 Era is a 'base line' and not intended to mimic the events of 4th SW Era. Exhaustion will bring raiding but full strength armies have no need to raid when they can conquer.

Perhaps the GM in a game could reduce Commands to 30-70% in order to encourage low intensity warfare? I would rather let the players determine the tempo of the game. As GM I do not have a script other than to see who can gain the most, or lose the least, by circa 3025. Then I am keen to see what the 4th SW can do in ACS/ISaW.   ^-^

[epic]

Well,... as I've mentioned in the past, exhaustion does set in as commands are burned up and need repairing or replacing. As I have also noted in the past the 'quick resolution' rules for raids are unbalanced in favour of the attacker. There are other issues with raid resolution but that is a discussion for elsewhere.

We also need to keep in mind that the 3025 Era is a 'base line' and not intended to mimic the events of 4th SW Era. Exhaustion will bring raiding but full strength armies have no need to raid when they can conquer.

Perhaps the GM in a game could reduce Commands to 30-70% in order to encourage low intensity warfare? I would rather let the players determine the tempo of the game. As GM I do not have a script other than to see who can gain the most, or lose the least, by circa 3025. Then I am keen to see what the 4th SW can do in ACS/ISaW.   ^-^

Yup, which is exactly what we are heading towards.  See my notes, campaign is now into 3028. 
Oddly, low intensity warfare was encouraged precisely by the simplicity of raids (and appropriate usage of spec ops on sabotage/terrorism).  Most players couldnt' afford to do major offensives precisely because of this.    Raiding in our game is a viable economic warfare strategy.  I don't know if I buy that it favours the attacker, however, but we'll leave the discussion aside for now. 

[The Purist]

Hey, Purist....<snip>...Best help would be to post your specific issues, as questions, in the Rules Question forums.

Joe BC...

Happy to do so. I will sit down and walk through the rules, noting each instance where a question pops into mind.

This may take a while as it would encompass two rule sets, ISaW and ACS.

My only concern is that the 'Ask the Lead Developers" thread appears to be where "question go to die".    ;D 

Response here seems to be pretty good, all things considered.

[Daryk]

The rules forum is relatively responsive, and since you have Welshman's attention, I bet it'll be even more so for these kinds of questions.  Just be sure to use the proper template (page refs, etc.).

[The Purist]

Abstract Combat Aerospace

The rules actually have this section after the End Phase similar to the format used with the earlier(Adv) SBF rules. As we use the full suite of rules I’ll include aerospace here.

Space Combat

The Abstract Combat Aerospace rules use the Capital-Scale Strategic Aerospace Rules found earlier under the (Adv) SBF rules but do make some significant changes.

Star-System Radar Map: As noted above (and its name) the SSRM is a ‘system’ wide representation of the star system where combat is occurring. The Central Zone is usually the location of the target planet. This makes the scale different as well.

Central Zone: This is the high atmosphere-low orbit above the world and any Formation located here is subject to gravity rules back on page 255 (warships, jumpships and space stations included). Formations here may also drop down onto the PCM for Ground Support Missions, including ‘in atmosphere’ air-to-air combat. For eras where Orbit-to-Surface attacks are possible they can be done from this ‘low orbit’ location. ‘Combat Drops’ are also executed from this location on the SSRM.

Inner Zone: This is the space immediately around the planet and within its gravity well. Formations/Units with ‘a’ or ‘p’ movement codes that do not have a movement of at least 1, or have station keeping abilities, movement type ‘k’, will fall into the CZ and crash into the planet. Orbit-to-Surface attacks and Combat Drops can be made from the Inner Zone.

Middle Zone:  Near space around the planet and any moons present would be located in this zone. A ‘near orbit’ pirate jump point can be located here but the risk is higher than normal, especially if a successful “Espionage: System Reconnaissance” was not conducted beforehand.

Outer Zone: called the transit point between the planet’s near space and the jump points. Other planets in the system are located in this zone. A pirate point is located here and there is some risk to its use. If a successful “Espionage: System Reconnaissance” was conducted before the risk can be mitigated substationally.

Peripheral Zone: Home of the standard Zenith (P1) and Nadir (P4) points. The other zones in the Periphery ring can be used as non-standard jump points without risk (and perhaps surprise the defender).

Moons: if in play and combat occurs in the Middle Zone, where it is located the moon becomes the CZ for the engagement map (see Adv SBF aerospace rules on page 250).

Planets: as with moons if a secondary planet is in the OZ and combat occurs in its sector, the CZ of the engagement map will be the planet.

In-System Jump: A jump capable Formation that did not use an IMP (ISaW rules) that combat turn may attempt an in-system jump. This rule appears confusing at first but actually depends on when the jump capable unit arrived on map. Most of the time this will be on ACS Turn 1, during deployment. Some games (or perhaps ‘orders’) may have units arrive on other ACS game turns than turn 1, this would need to be considered in determining eligibility to jump again.

Long/Short Jump Point Transit: The game default for Transit from the star to planet is set at 2 ACS turns or 7 days. As a result the movement rates of A/S units needs to be adjusted so that jumpships can arrive at the planets by the end of Turn 2. This usually means doubling the rates of movement during calculation (see page 253). This can lead to very high speeds near the planet in order to keep everything equal when Formations are spread across the SSRM.

**NB: Note that the rule here requires some scrutiny as it bases movement on where a Formation begins the turn rather than the size of the zone being moved through. This means a DS wing with an MP of 4 would have a movement rate of 1 (2 for a ‘standard’ transit system) if it began the turn in the Periphery but an MP of 4 (or 8') if it begins the turn in the CZ. This means a DS wing would take three ACS turns to arrive at a planet if it starts in P1 but could move from the CZ to zone P1 in one turn if going the other way.

We resolved the paradox by adjusting movement to work the same going in both directions.

Fuel Endurance (fighters): ACS limits aerospace fighters to operation in the CZ, IZ and MZ unless they can be carried by other “Elements”, which can only mean dropships (or Warships in other eras). Zones P1 and P4 are excepted provided the fighters can be carried to the Periphery, which means defending dropships. Where Patrols (page 357) are concerned we have assumed abstract nature of the rule permits the deployment limits (page 312) to be followed as written.

Jump Point Combat: Combat in P1 and P4 sectors (and presumably P2, P3, P5 and P6 should combat drift into those zones) are now possible but it appears that only dropships and their a/s fighter passengers can take part. As all other transports are considered generic the rule does not appear to allow a/s fighters contained therein to be used.

This does raise the question about how to handle a battle where one side has a DS wing and fighters for use and the other does not. This rule is another reason we developed the “Naval Commands”, which allowed CC a/s wing to be carried by the DS access AT# capacity.

<<to be continued…>>

[The Purist]

**The following set of rules has probably generated the most questions of any rule section of its size in the game. As others have suggested, once all of this is wrapped up, I'll organise all the questions raised by the rules review for both ACS and ISaW and post them in the 'developers' forum for the "Welshman".

Abstract Combat Aerospace – Part II

Aerospace Ground Support

An aerospace Formation that ends its move in the CZ is considered to be conducting a Ground Support Mission. With the exception of the rules for air-to-air combat on the PCM/CZ the rules are modified, including the use of a separate to-hit table (page 320). Missions are conducted against specific hexes on the PCM and once a mission is declared the Formation may not change its mind even if not otherwise engaged.

Combat Air Patrol (CAP): CAP missions are designed to protect a an area from air attack. The Formation is assigned a hex for the CAP Mission and will try to protect it and the surrounding six hexes from hostile aerospace Formation. If an enemy aerospace Formation enters the CAP area the attacker must resolve the engagement with  the defending CAP before conducting other missions. A CAP Formation gains a -1 to its Engagement Control Roll.

Ground Strike: Ground Strike (GS) missions come in two forms, Bomb and Strike. However, if engaged by an enemy CAP Mission or Air-to-Air Formation the GS mission may not be made.

If the attack goes forward the attacking formation has a base to-hit of the Formations Skill value with a +3 to-hit, modified further by critical hits and other modifiers found on the Aerospace To-Hit Table found on page 320.

The use of the word “Formation” here is curious as it would seem to imply that the Formation would make one attack that covers all of the CUs found therein but this is not the case, as is noted in the following two ground attack mission rules

Strike: Each CU in the attacking Formation may make one attack. Assuming a hit (the rule does not actually state a hit is required), each attack will do 50% of the short range damage value of that CU. Odds of a hit can be increased if CUs in the Formation forego their own attack to improve the chances of other CUs to hit. The wording is again a bit muddled as the word “Formation” seems to be interchangeable with “Combat Unit”. For each attack not made the odds of a hit can be reduced by -1 (max -3) or damage can be increased by 10% (max 50%).

**NB – note that a +50% is not possible as an Aerospace Formation can have a maximum of four (4) Combat Units. The obvious correction here is that the maxium increase to damage inflicted would be +30% if three CUs gave up their attack so the fourth could pummel the target.

The target CUs now get their chance to shoot back. Each CU gets to return fire with a base to hit of the CUs skill (the word Formation is again used, likely in error) with +2 modifier. A hit will do 50% damage,… but 50 % at what range? It does not state a range bracket although it is assumed to be short range.

If the target A/S Formation is 50% or more Large Aerospace Elements a -2 to hit modifier is applied for a net +0.
 
**This is raises another question about wording. If the Formation actually attacks using individual CUs why would 50%+ of the A/S wings being large make a difference to a specific A/S target? Should the modifier not be based on the CU being attacked? This has similar implication to always being able to choose the lowest TMM targets in ground combat.

But we digress.

Bomb: Aerospace Formation with a BOMB value may attack ground Formations. If a hit is scored the damage will equal the BOMB rating and is applied in 5 point clusters to the CUs in the ground Formation. The attacked ground CUs then get to shoot back at every A/S CU with a +4 to hit modifier doing 25% of their damage.

A few questions are raised here:
1) If the entire ground Formation is attacked, and hit, would all the CU presumably take damage in 5 point clusters? What becomes of BOMB damage points that do not fit into groups of 5?
2) If the attack hits the 'Formation' rather than specific CUs, do all CUs then take the same BOMB damage? IE: if a “Formation” is hit and takes 12 BOMB damage do all the CUs take 12 damage to their armour?
3) Or, is the BOMB damage applied in clusters of 5 to specific ground CUs until less than 5 points are left and the remaining points are applied to the next CU in line. IE: 9 BOMB damage are inflicted on a ground Formation of 3 CUs. Would five points are applied to CU #1, 4 to CU #2 and no damage to CU #3?.
4) How do you determine which CU in a Formation takes the damage? Is there a “Tactics Roll” as in ground combat? Attacker’s choice (applying “Concentration of Fire” limits)? Defender’s? Random?
5) At what range is the 25% defending ground fire damage determined? Can the defender choose the range? This is important as many units have larger medium damage ranges than they do close range.
6) How is damage applied to the A/S CUs that are hit by return fire? IE: 2 Lyran hvy Mech and 4 Hvy tank CU shoot back at a Formation of 2 Combine lt , 1 med and 1 hvy A/S wing and 4 CUs score hits (2 mech, 2 tk). At close range this would inflict 42 points of damage (46 damage at med range). Is damage applied via “Tactics Roll”? Defender’s or attacker’s choice? Randomly?

Aerial Recon: An Aerospace Formation on Aerial Recon is assigned to a hex and may ‘Recon’ the assigned hex and all six hexes surrounding it. Note that no wrap around on the map edge is allowed as is done in ground movement. Two Recon attempts may be attempted per CU in the Formation within the seven hex zone.

The A/S Formatiion gains a -4 to its Recon Roll target numbers. The number increases to -3 if an enemy  A/S Formation  attempts to engage the Aerial Recon mission and becomes a +2 if the Recon mission is actually engaged. If engaged all combat DR are modified by +1 and the Recon mission does 50% damage. The only ground fire a Recon mission will suffer is if Surface-to-Orbit attacks are allowed.

Air-to-Air Strikes: Air-to-air engagement against other Air-to-Air, Recon, CAP or Ground Strike missions work the same as if they are on the SSRM (Capital Scale Aeropsace rules). We have assumed the MMT is also used in these cases.

Orbit-To-Surface and Surface-To-Orbit

Use the same rules as (Adv) SBF except damage is 25% (FRU) of normal damage +1 (min 1 damage). A Secondary Attack does 50% of primary damage (FRU). Scatter only happens in the same hex with a 5 or 6  doing damage equal to a Secondary Attack.

[The Purist]

Advanced Abstract Combat Rules

A set of optional rules that enhances the game but there are parts that need more clarity to resolve some contradictions.

Combat Drop

As the name suggests a Combat Drop entails using a Formation of up to three Combat Units to directly deploy into containing one or more enemy Formations. The combat drop must be made from aerospace Formations Dropships, Warships or Space stations in the Inner Ring or Central Zone of the SSRM.

The dropping Formation has a TN of 6 that is modified by the MMT and the final result of the DR is checked against the table on page 321. CUs with Questionable loyalty must be Elite or better in skill and Green, Really Green and Wet Behind the Ears CUs can only make a drop if Fanatic in Loyalty. Finally, while the rules are silent on the “type” of CUs that can execute a combat drop we have limited these to Mechs, Jump Infantry and leg infantry with parachute (PARA) specialty.

The success of the drop will determine if the dropped formation will receive positive or negative modifiers to the combat rolls. A bad drop can also inflict damage on the dropping formation in addition to applying negative combat roll modifiers as per the Combat Drop Results Table.

The rules are fairly simple but we have not seen a combat drop yet in the game. I suspect that it may be due to the fact that a Command has only one Mech Regiment of 3-4 CUs, the rest of the Command consisting of another 15 CUs (+/- ?). The enemy will likely have similar numbers and until you know what the enemy Formations consists of, the expensive and comparatively rare Mechs is  not lightly risked to the unknown.

Fortress Hexes

As found in the set up and production rules for ISaW there are fortress hexes in ACS. These come in three flavours – Standard (Std), Capital (Cap) and Castle Brian (CasB). One fortress hex can be assigned for each planet’s assigned fortresses, noting the type and values.

Fortress Types:

Standard – Mainly meant to defend a target or Formation from ground attack, it offers some protection against aerospace (BOMB) or Artillery attacks.  A Standard fortress provides no extra protection against biological or nuclear attacks. Relatively cheap to build and maintain with modest supply costs they do crumble away level by level if supplies are blocked. Once in combat the supply costs increase significantly. A Standard fort can enclose both CUs and urban/industrial objectives

Capital – A self-contained fortress that offers better defenses against ground, artillery and aerospace attacks a Capital Fortress will also offer some protection against biological and nuclear attacks. A Capital 5 (Cap-5) level fortress will be immune to all attacks including nuclear and orbital bombardment. Cracking a Cap-5 fortess requires a Spec Ops team to infiltrate or otherwise reduce the fortress below level 5.  A Capital fort can enclose both CUs and urban/industrial objectives. Expensive to construct and supply (especially in combat) these fortresses are tough but will be mothballed without supplies.

Castle Brian: Top of the line fortress that is fully enclosed extremely resistant to damage. The level 5 version offers immunity to chemical and nuclear attacks. A Castle Brian fort can enclose both CUs and urban/industrial objectives. They are supplied the same as Capital fortresses but may not be constructed except by the Terran Hegemony or Word of Blake. 

Fortress Capacity

Depending on its size a Fortress can shield a number of CUs against attack but the protected CUs are less effective while inside the fortress. See the Fortress Table on page 322 for specific details.

Fortress Defences

Standard Fortress: A Standard fortress received 100 armour points per level to a max of 4 levels. A Standard fort can be attacked by Ground, Artillery, Aerospace, Orbital Bombardment and Nuclear attacks.

Capital Fortress: The Capital fortress provides 125 armour per level to a maximum 600 armour at level 5. Only Artillery, Orbital Bombardment and Nuclear weapons can damage a Capital fort. As above, a Cap-5 is immune to damage.

Castle Brian: possesses 150 armour per level to a maximum of 800 armour at level 5. Only Orbital Bombardment and Nuclear weapons will damage CasB-1 to 4 and a Casb-5 is immune to all damage.

Conventional Weapons: Each fortress type has its own set of ACS damage values for short, medium and long range and may make one attack per turn. As fortresses are immobile the enemy gets to choose the range at which it will attack the fortress or units within. Fortresses are Regular in Skill and (presumably) Reliable in Loyalty.

[/u]Surface to Orbit Weapons[/u]: CAP-5 and CasB 1-5 fortresses may mount STO weapons. Each level of fortress will do 4 Capital Scale damage. A Warship that attacks a fotress will suffer 4 points of damage per level of fortress for each round of orbital fire. In case of multiple warships the fortress  can choose the target. Combat drops in the fortress or hex or one adjacent to it may be engaged in the same manner as Warships. Also, STO may be used to engage aerospace Formations in combat in the same hex.

Attacking a Fortress
This section has a number of contradictions that are a bit frustrating. It may take the intervention the Welshman to advise on which of the various methods for damage is actually correct. I will definitely be adding this section to the main Q&A to be submitted to the ‘Developers’ forum.

Here we go.

Page 323 - The initial sentences open by stating that “Combat Formations” can choose to reduce a Standard fortress instead or engaging in combat (assumed to be with the defenders in the fort, if any). All such attacks have the damage divided by 3 (assumed FRN) and then applied to the fortress armour. No issues here, we shall push on.

Second paragraph is likely an editing error as it repeats part of what is in para 3 regarding artillery and orbiting artillery. Let’s ignore (delete) this one for now.

The third paragraph notes that Ground and Artillery Formations may attack a fortress but Artillery and Orbital Bombard are only divided by 2 in the case of a Standard Fortress. It is assumed the Ground Formation will still divide the damage by 3 before applying to the fortress’s armour.  Everything is working so far but no mention of Aerospace, so we treat it similar to (but not same as) Ortillery.

Para 4 notes that when a level of a fortress is destroyed  the units inside take damage equal to the levels destroyed divided by the original level of the fortress multiplies by 10 and applied as a percentage. The example given of a level 3 dropping one level to 2 would result in 3% damage to the defending ground units (1 level dived by level 3 = .33 x 10 = 3.3% FRN to 3% of armour). If a second level is lost it is presumed the formula changes to 2/3 = .66 x 10 = 6.6% FRN to 7% of armour as the roof rafters and concrete slaps begin to fall.  Or it could also mean that only 3% of the original armour is lost for each level. If the Standard Fortress was Level 4 the each level lost would inflict 2.5% FRN to 3% for each level.

Nuclear weapons are handled next and there is a table provided on page 323 that explains how much damage is inflicted to the fortress.
The next paragraph briefly outlines what happens to a Cap-5 or CasB-5 if sabotaged. 2nd SW covers this very well so we will not dwell on this point here.

Out of the blue comes three bullet points that I believe are missing a “header” having to do with fighting the ground troops in a fortress 

Bullet one states -  Defenders get +2 to initiative as long as they have 25% or more of the attackers PV (FRU). One would ask why this is necessary as the fortress and its contents are immobile and already engaged so initiative seems moot. The defender may have Formations in other hexes on the map so exactly how the initiative modifier would be applied ‘globally’ is a good question. Perhaps it is assumed the planet has been cleared of defender except for the fortress occupants? Yes? No? Maybe?

The next bullet states that damage taken by defending units is reduced by 5% per level for troops in a Standard fortress, 10% per level in a Capital or Castle Brian Fortress, to a maximum of 30%. Unfortunately, the table on page 322 does not mention such a maximum. A clarification for using the table would seem to be in order. The table itself seems clear enough on negative % modifiers for defending and attacking Ground Formations attacking each other.
 
 The final bullet simply notes the occupants of the fortress still receive the usual benefits from artillery aerospace and orbital bombardment.

Damage

Now we enter the twilight zone   :))

It is almost as if there were two authors with two different philosophies on how fortresses should work in the game. To wit:

‘- versus Standard Fortresses Combat and Aerospace damage is now divided by 4
‘- it now take 500 (!!!) points of artillery damage (after dividing by 4) to cause a Standard or Capital fortress to lose a level.
‘-In the very next sentence it then states that a Capital Fortress can only be reduced using artillery (now divided damage by 10  :bang:   ), Nuclear WMDs or Orbital Bombardment.
‘- Finally, Castle Brians now take 1000 damage points to reduce a level but at the same time are immune to everything but orbital bombardment and nuclear weapons (except the usually impervious CasB-5).

None of this has any link to the previous rules or the values given on the tables on page 322 so we just set these last few paragraphs aside as a WTFWT moment.

We went with the following: based on the rules we could make sense of:

‘- Ground Formations attack Standard fortress armour after dividing their damage by 3 applied against the values on the table
‘- Aerospace, Artillery  and Ortillery divide their damage by 2 and apply this to the Standard or Capital Level 1-4 fortress armour value on the tables. Note there is no mention again regarding Aerospace and it seems strange that large bombs cannot do what shells can. Perhaps there was an omission here and Aerospace can attack Capital Fortresses.
‘- Castle Brians can only be attacked by Ortillery and Nuclear weapons.

I hope this made sense to you folks out there because my head hurts.    :)

[The Purist]

Capitals and Industry

This is a nifty little rule that allows one to place ‘capitals’ and industry inside the fortresses at the expense of Combat Units.  A “Minor Capital” (District) and factory will take up the same space as six (6) CUs.  “Major Capital” (National) will take up the space of 12 CUs. Unfortunately the example given on page 324 is incorrect. If Skye and two factories were placed in the same fortress hex they would take up 18 CUs worth of space.

Unfortunately, only a Castle Brian level 3 can hold so large a collection.  Player could make do with a Cap-4 (12 CU)  and Cap-1 or Std-2 for the other 6 CU required but these would require separate hexes. This leaves no room for defending units so once the walls are breached the targets are vulnerable to Infrastructure damage.

One rule was left out of this section but perhaps common sense can prevail. 

Example: A Std-2 can hold a factory and is besieged by evil ne’er-do-wells. After receiving 100 points of damage the Std-2 drops to a Std-1 and officially should no longer be able to contain the factory. In our case, when Rahne (hex 2119) was attacked and the fortress dropped a level, we considered the factory (w/ 500 armour) was now exposed to incoming fire but the remaining fortress level was still there with its 8/8/5 damage values to shoot back. As the FWL wanted the world and factory, they finished off the fortress and captured the (damaged) factory.

Abstract Combat with Planetary Maps

Love it. I have the original map of Earth from BF2 and others from Galtor, Misery and Mallory’s World. Catalyst could print more and I would be happy to hand over my coin.

Scaled Strategic Battleforce

We have used Scaled SBF a number of times for smaller battles or for favourite units. The Combat Team (company) is now used instead of the CU in building Formations (battalions).

The stacking limits are ill-defined, referring players back to Abstract Aerospace Combat rules. Where stacking is concerned these rules in turn refer one back to (Adv) SBF aerospace rules where the only stacking limits mentioned are three (3) Formations in the Central Zone. If this is indeed the intent then the stacking limit in Scaled SBF is 3 Formations or three battalions (max 12 CT if reinforced). This is how we have interpreted the rule. Regimental manoeuvers are the order of the day.

Terrain is back in play as “mixed terrain” so Formations will pay movement penalties.

The Jump values are converted to TMM so the light and medium Mechs still get their TMM of +4.

Combat is between CTs within the battalion Formations is handled the same way as in ACS. Damage is now suffered at the company (CT) level. Aerospace combat remains the same but for the use of squadrons as CTs in Formations.

There are also a number of rules from Adv SBF brought forward for use but for the most part the game works very similar to ACS but the scale is drilled down. Boarding Actions are in play for capturing dropships, modified rules for Urban Hexes and Fortifications are there.

A lot of fun but more time is needed to resolve a multi-command battle. These rules would work very well for a “theatre-style” campaign game or one based on just a few planets (Death to Mercenaries?)


All we have left is the End Phase.

[Welshman]

It is almost as if there were two authors with two different philosophies on how fortresses should work in the game. To wit:

Err, cough, cough... "There were."

Writing a massive tome, like IO, means there are a lot of people involved. It also can lead to some communication confusions. I was commissioned to write SBF, ACS and ISW and link them to be a comprehensive system. It's part of why I was listed both in Project and Writing credits.

After I had completed my work, there was a communication "Snafu". Two other writers were asked to look it over and do some clean up (Let's face it, I write wordy, it's a fault). The communication snafus were two part. One, those writers were not given the mission brief on the overall goal of the rules. Two, I wasn't told someone else had gone over the rules in time to do a proper review.

And of course, I'm going to have to take some full on blame as well. Many things you've caught are 100% me and my either making a typing error or me having a "brilliant" idea that wasn't.

End result, we've got some gaps and issues that will need to be addressed. We really appreciate what you and others are doing here. Even if I were to go over all the rules, I know what I wrote and what I meant, so often I'll just miss where there are changes that break.

I can't promise fast responses, my day job keeps me busy. I will do my best to get it all cleared up or queued for future fixes.

[The Purist]

End Phase

At the end of an ACS turn there isn't that much admin work to be done unless it is turn 8, end of the ISaW month. As players gain experience the time required to complete the End Phase declines rapidly. Note that when the End Phase is completed on ACS turn 8 it is immediately followed by the End Phase for the ISaW monthly turn.

Fatigue – Fatigue in ACS is simple, every turn a Combat Unit is in combat it picks up Fatigue. Most CUs will pick up 0.5 Fatigue Points (FP) for each turn in combat. Really Green and Wet Behind the Ears CUs pick up a full point for each turn they exchange fire with the opposition.

Fatigue begins to be felt when a CU picks up its 5th FP. The Fatigue Points Earned and Fatigue Effects tables on page 317 are easy to use and show how and when fatigue will begin to affect CUs with both combat and morale modifiers.

Converting ACS Fatigue to ISaW: as CUs do not always fight together a Command may finish an ISaW turn with CUs at different levels of Fatigue. Simply total up all FP for each CU and then divide by the number of CUs in the Command, FRU. That is the Commands new Fatigue level.

Reducing Fatigue: Fatigue in an ACS turn may be reduced by one (1) by having a CU neither move, make any attacks, or be attacked. Seems simple enough but considering CUs are in Formations it is usually only available to a side that is winning a battle or has managed to hide.

Otherwise Fatigue is only reduced by methods found in ISaW and applies to the entire Command.

Morale

Success in ACS battles will usually depend on who breaks first and the effects of the following rules can swing a battle against even heavy odds. Keep in mind that great morale doesn't stop an AC20 from taking your head off.

Morale is checked under following conditions:

Morale Check Triggers: As per the conversion rules each CU has three triggers based on the loss of each 25% (FRD) of its armour points. These checks are made at 25%, 50% and 75% damage level “Thresholds”. If more than one Threshold is reached in a single turn then a morale check is made for each one reached or exceeded.

Formation Damage: An entire Formation must take a morale check if two-thirds (2/3) of the CUs have reached their second Damage Threshold. Here the LEAD Special may be used.

**NB – note that the the rules do not actually describe what benefit a LEAD lends to a morale check due to Formation Damage but we will address this in the Q&A thread that will be developed later. A LEAD modifier is noted in “Nerve Recovery” (a later rule).

Combat Drop: A Formation that was hit by a Combat Drop by an enemy Formation must take a morale check based the TN modifier penalty equal to the drop value.

**NB – note the example given on page 318 does not seem to make sense. It seems to state that a morale check modifiers is determined after the morale check has failed (based on the MoF). Perhaps the morale check modifier for Formation attacked by the Combat Drop should be the inverse of the “Drop Value”, ie: a bad drop (MoF of 4-6) would gain a +2 to the DR while a good drop (MoS 3-5) would net a -2 DR modifier. This looks like another one for the Q&A thread.

Orbital Bombardment: Any Formation hit by an Orbital Bombardment must take a morale check. The Force Commander (COM Special) must also take a morale check with -2 modifier to the TN. If the COM fails the entire Force is effected by the results.

Force Morale: When 2/3 of a Force becomes Shaken or worse, the Force COM must make a morale check with a +2 modifier to the roll (or -2 to the TN).

That may seem to make breaking unlikely, even with heavy damage but by this point other modifiers may have pushed the TN up by +3.

Making a Morale Check

The process will be familiar to any one who has made a piloting check. A CU or Formation has a morale value based on its conversion from BT/AS. For example a regular reliable CU will have a base morale of 7. The modifiers to any morale check are found on the MMT or the “Morale Specific Modifiers” Table on page 318. When a Formation makes a morale check it uses the morale level of the LEAD or COM CU (which makes adding a higher morale CU to an otherwise homogenous Formation worthwhile). If the DR is higher than the modified TN the CU/Formation/Force fails its Morale Check and the effects are noted on the “Morale Failure Table” (page 318). Note that in the case of a Force morale check a failed morale check may have different results depending on the damage levels (from 0 to 99%) of the CU and Formations in the Force.

Morale Effects

Shaken: CUs/Formations affected apply a -1 modifier to most actions and +1 to engagement and combat to-hit DR. Refer to the MMT

Unsteady: a -2 to most actions. See MMT

Broken: a -3 to most actions but now the CUs attacks do 20% less damage. A Formation may not use Aggressive Tactics, Force or Overrun an Engagement, may not gain hidden status

Retreating: a -4 to most actions, CUs do 40% less damage, may not attempt to gain hidden status, automatically fail all Engagement Control Rolls (makes retreat extremely unlikely). A Formation may not use Aggressive Tactics, Force or Overrun an Engagement, may not gain hidden status and must move away from enemy forces towards their nearest Capital/Fortress or Drop Zone as applicable.

Routed: same as retreating (above) but must attempt to retreat to the nearest DropShips. If morale has not recovered by the time the dropships are reached the CU/Formation/Force must retreat off world (if otherwise allowed to).

Surrender: CU/Formation/Force will attempt to surrender to the nearest hostile *Ground* (our addition) Formation. Any time the enemy occupies the same hex the affected units surrender and are considered destroyed for VP (and presumably Salvage).

Recovering Nerve (Morale)

A Combat Unit may attempt to recover morale in the End Phase of any turn it is Shaken or worse. The roll is made the same as a normal morale check with all modifiers including those found on the “Nerve Recovery Modifier Table” (page 318). If the DR is successful then morale improves one level.

**NB – the rule does not state how this might affect a Formation which is, for example, “broken” but the CUs (maybe only 1 or 2 depending on circumstances) within become “Unsteady”. We have assumed that the Formation LEAD or COM must also ‘recover nerve’ in order for the effects of a failed Formation Morale Check to be reversed.

Further, we are not sure if a CU/Formation/Force can attempt to recover morale in the same End Phase that it breaks. This would literally have the effected units fail a morale check and then immediately make a recovery DR. We went with “next turn”.

Retreats and Surrenders

Combat Units that are under the effects of “Retreat”, “Rout” or “Surrender” will break off from their parent Formation and become an independent Formations similar to the rules for “Adjusting Formations” on page 311. Formations so effected retain all CUs and “retreat”, “rout” or “surrender” as a Formation.

**NB – we have assumed that CU may form a special “Formation” on its own if it is the only CU in a Formation that is required to retreat, rout or surrender. Further, if a surrender result is called for the CU will surrender to any enemy units in its hex immediately rather than break off. A Formation would also surrender rather than retreat if an enemy Formation is in the hex when the surrender result is put into effect. About the only time a ‘surrendering’ CU or Formation would retreat was if it morale failed as a result of an attack by Aerospace Formations. 

Victory Conditions

See the text on pages 318 – 319 for the various ways victory conditions or VPs would be applied using ACS.

I’ll drop in a couple of turn examples later on. I won’t bore everyone with a DR by DR AAR but will summarize a few turns to show the flow of an ACS game turn.

Whew!!! That’s that.

[The Purist]

ACS Aerospace Combat Example

With our game in the final stages of the Dec 3020 game turn this battle is far enough in the past that sharing the details will not affect the game. The nature of this battle meant it took some time to resolve, so much so that it was ACS turn 7 before the LCAF even could consider sending a wiing in to support the ground troops.

Aerospace Battle near Mizar, Sep 3020

[f] = Fanatic
[r] = Reliable
[q] = Questionable
(g) = Green
(r) = Regular
(e) = Elite
(h) = Heroic
IZ = Inner Zone
MZ = Middle Zone
OZ = Outer Zone

The aerospace battle took place on the SSRM during the first wave of the Lyran counteroffensive against the Free Worlds League invasion begun back in the summer of 3019. The battle for Mizar had swung back and forth with the FWL holding on and with both sides pulling out battered commands and feeding in fresh troops. By September 3020 available resources for both sides had been depleted but the FWL thought they had secured the planet by placing three strong commands on the planet by the end of August.

This was good example of how quality can overcome quantity, even if it comes with a price.

Mizar was defended by the Marik Guard [f], Steel Guards [r], Iron Guards [f] and the Mizar Garrison [q]. The Parliamentary Chaos trait in this case applied a +1 to all morale check and a -1 to all Initiative rolls. This effectively countered the -1 Initiative penalty faced by the Lyran's due to Inferior Doctrine. The FWL Formations were deployed in IZ 1, IZ 3 and IZ 5.

ACS Formations consisted of the wings noted below:

Formation A
1st Marik Guard Aerospace Wing [f]; h41, med; Mv: 6; Arm – 20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0
2nd Marik Guard Aerospace Wing [f]; e39, hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 5; Tac: 3; Skill: 2; Mor: 5 NB - as this formation has CUs with different morale levels the average morale is used for determining Tactics Values and for Formation DR modifiers. The elite status grants this formation a -2 to Engagement and -1 to Manoeuvre DRs but Fanatic loyalty also imposes a +2 DR modifiers to Engagement DRs.

Formation B
1st Steel Guards Aerospace Wing [r]; r15; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0
2nd Iron Guards Aerospace Wing [f]; r17; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 5; Tac: 5; Skill: 4; Mor: 7 NB – as the 2nd Iron Gds is fanatic this formation will suffer the +2 modifier to engagement control and with ‘regular’ morale will add +1 to manoeuvre DRs.

Formation C
Mizar Garrison Aerospace Wing [q]; r13; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 17:20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0
1st Iron Guards Aerospace Wing [f]; r16; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 6; Tac: 4; Skill: 4; Mor: 7 NB – this formation has CUs with fanatic and questionable loyalty. As the rule is silent on how to handle this situation and the ‘+’ and ‘-‘ were equal we assumed they cancelled each other out. Morale level of ‘regular’ will apply add +1 to manoeuvre DRs. The Mizar garrison wing began the battle under strength due to losses suffered in July and only partially replaced in August.

Formation D
2nd Steel Guards Aerospace Wing [r]; g12; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2
 
ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 5; Tac: 6; Skill: 5; Mor: 7 NB – with green morale the 2nd Stl Gds suffered a +1 to Engagement Control and +2 to Manoeuvre DRs. It was these modifiers that compelled Jim to deploy this wing on its own.

*****

Approaching from Zenith Point were four Aerospace Formations containing just four wings belonging to the 4th Skye Rangers and 3rd Donegal Guards. Both are elite commands but possess questionable loyalties and the modifiers these traits imposed on the attacking wings were important in the coming battle.

Formation 1
1/4th Syke Ranger Aero Wing [q]; e40; lt; Mv: 11; Arm – 18; S: 3; M: 3; L:0
 
ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 11; Tac: 0; Skill: 2; Mor: 5 NB – with questionable loyalty and elite skill this wing received -4 to its Engagement Control and -1 to its Manoeuvre DR. There is also +1 Engagement Control for Flawed Doctrine. Lyran light fighter wings are extremely nimble but lack firepower.

Formation 2
2/4th Syke Ranger Aero Wing [q]; e40; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 24; S: 9; M: 12; L:6

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 5; Tac: 3; Skill: 2; Mor: 5 NB – as above, with questionable loyalty and elite skill this command also received negative -4 to its Engagement Control and -1 to its Manoeuvre DR. Despite 'Flawed Doctrine' (+1 Engagement) these traits made the Lyran heavy aerospace wings in this battle very dangerous opponents at any range.

Formation 3
1/3rd Donegal Guards Aero Wing [q]; e32; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 24; S: 9; M: 12; L:6

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 5; Tac: 3; Skill: 2; Mor: 5 NB – same negative and positive modifiers to Engagement and Manoeuvre Rolls. As above these heavy wing proved decisive in the coming battle

Formation 4
2/3rd Donegal Guards Aero Wing [q]; e36; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 27; S: 6; M: 6; L:0

ACS Formation Stats: Mov: 6; Tac: 2; Skill: 2; Mor: 5 NB – with the same questionable loyalty and elite skill this medium wing is more nimble than the heavies and has better firepower than the light wing.

Game Turn 1

Using the default time for transiting to the planet of one week (2 ACS turn) the Lyran fighter forces begin  arriving in MZ 1 on turn 1, detecting FWL Formation C in IZ 1. Noting the opposition, Lyran dropships divert their approach and move to OZ 22 (avoiding detection). FWL Formation A, B and D immediately charge into the battle, Formation C was unable to join as it possesses the Garrison wing and is limited to the Central Zones.

Lyran fighters, with multiple negative modifiers avoid all engagements and the battle on turn one is resolved at long range with each side’s heavy wings banging away at each other. The 2nd Iron Gds and 2nd Marik both score hits against the Lyran heavies for 2 points each. The much heavier firepower of the Lyrans hurt both Marik Gds wings (med and heavy) by scoring 5 points of damage against each (6 x .9=5.4 damage).

Game Turn 2

While the LC dropships keep out of sight (and range) by transiting through the Outer Zones the FWL Formations A and B tries and fails to engage the Lyran heavy wings. In response the light fighters of the Lyran Formation 1 charge into FWL Formation B, forcing the engagement for additional negative modifers and a reduction of damage by 50%. In the combat round the light fighters of Formation 1 use “Defensive Tactics” with a +1 (-10% damage) and manage to avoid any damage at long range.

The heavy fighters of FWL Formation D move back to Mizar to cover the planet in case the dropships try to slip in and land while the aerospace battle is in progress. The long range sniping by the heavy fighters continue with both Lyran wings again taking hits (2 damage each). Lyran return fire is concentrated on the 2nd Marik Gds heavy wing and, thanks to one Lyran wing using Aggressive Tactics for +1, scores 11 damage. The 2nd Marik Guards are staggered  by critical hits to its movement (increasing its Tactics Value to 6) but pass its morale check.

Game Turn 3

The Lyran fighter wings make their move on Mizar with the heavies from the Skye Rangers (Formation 2) engaging the green pilots of the 2nd Steel Gds. Aggressive Tactics at medium range manages to hit and the FWL wings takes a staggering 14 damage with return fire hurting the Rangers. Amazingly the Steel Gds avoid any critical hits but the Rangers take targeting damage criticals. The light fighters of Lyran Formation 1 keep the fighters of FWL Formation B pinned but take long range damage from the Iron Gds heavies. The heavies of the Donegal Gds (Formation 3) are successfully engaged by the Marik Gds but the Lyrans hold the League fighters at long range. The exchange of fire sees another 2 damage scored on the 2/3rd Don Gds but this time the Marik Gds mediums are pounded by long range fire scoring critical hits to weapons systems.

The two medium wings of FWL Formation 3 fail to engage and do not add to the defence this turn. Unnoticed in the melee the Lyran dropships slide in closer to the planet undetected, moving from OZ 20 to MZ 9.

Game Turn 4

The Marik Guards signal their intent to withdraw from the battle and are granted leave to move to their dropships. At this point the 1/3rd Donegal Gds medium fighters (Formation 4) dive into the midst of the FWL Garrison and medium wing of the Iron Gds (Formation C). With all defending wings now engaged the Lyran Dropships dash into the atmosphere and land on Mizar.

Out in space the luck of the light fighter wing of the Skye Rangers (Formation 1) final runs out and they are caught by the heavy and medium fighters 2nd Iron Gds and 1st Steel Gds (Formation B). The Ranger’s are almost destroyed in a single engagement losing all but 1 armour point, suffering target damage critics and then choosing to disengage. Their return fire annoys the medium fighters of the Steel Gds with a few points of damage.

Over Mizar the medium fighters of the Don Gds keep their counterparts in FWL Formation 3 busy at long range where neither side can score any damage. This left the two heavy wings of the Rangers and the Guards to pounce on and destroy the 2nd Steel Gds* (Formation D). Return fire does pummel the Ranger’s heavies inflicting targeting damage critical hits. 

Game Turn 5

Turn five opened with the 2/3rd Donegal Guards bouncing the Iron and Steel Gds of Formation B. Concentrating their fire on the Iron heavies the wing is savaged. With both wings now reduced below 50% and suffering critical hits FWL Formation B disengages and leaves the battle. The mediums of the Don Gds Formation 4 again hold off the mediums of the Garrison and Iron Gds as the realization hits the FWL commander that his fighters have been bested.

Game Turn 6

By Turn 6 the FWL fighter defence has been reduced to Formation C, just two medium wings. On the Lyran side Formation 3, Donegal Guards heavies, and Formation 4, Donegal Guards mediums, are still very much in the fight. While the Lyran mediums keep the league fighters engaged at range the heavies of the Donegal Guards get in behind the 1st Iron Gds and with Aggressive Tactics from medium range and inflict 16 damage, targeting damage critical hits and forcing the Iron Gds to break formation and retreat.   

Game Turn 7 and 8

With only the damaged garrison wing remaining in the fight for the FWL the two Donegal Guards wings use long range to pick the opposing wing apart. The Lyran mediums kept the League pilots pinned in an engagement while the heavy fighters moved into advantageous positions for the kill shots. The Garrison wing is destroyed with little to show for its efforts other than prevent Lyran fighters from being used for ground support.

*****

On the ground the FWL commands actually gained a slight upper hand and the Lyran commands took heavy damage. In just one turn of ‘recon’ and three of combat over 2100 armour points were ‘hit’. The number of battalions “engaged” per side fell from 74 (LC) and 88 (FWL) to 47 (LC) and 46 (FWL), with many of those still engaged on the verge of destruction if the battle had spilled over into the next month. However, the news from Menkent was not good and Haddings, Alcor, Carsphaim, Cor Corali and Vindamiatrix were also under attack. Rather than risk the loss of three high grade commands, two of them being from a supportive province, the FWL declare a retreat and abandoned the Mizar system in October. The troops were moved back to Denebola for refitting while other commands sought to hold the counteroffensive to minimal gains.

The state of the Aerospace fighter forces for both sides ended up like this:

Free Worlds League

Formation A:
1st Marik Guard Aerospace Wing [f]; h41, med; Mv: 6; Arm – 8:20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0 – Critical Hits: Movement
2nd Marik Guard Aerospace Wing [f]; e39, hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 9:25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2 - Critical Hits: Movement

Formation B:
1st Steel Guards Aerospace Wing [r]; r15; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 9:20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0 – Critical Hits: Targeting Damage
2nd Iron Guards Aerospace Wing [f]; r17; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 12:25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2 - Critical Hits: Weapons Damage

Formation C:
Mizar Garrison Aerospace Wing [q]; r13; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 0:20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0
1st Iron Guards Aerospace Wing [f]; r16; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 4:20; S: 5; M: 5; L: 0 - Critical Hits: Targeting Damage

Formation D:
*2nd Steel Guards Aerospace Wing [r]; g12; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 12:25; S: 10; M: 10; L: 2
NB – during salvage phase this wing was found to be “not truly dead”. Having survived the battle for the month its experience level changed from g12 (green) to r13 (regular).

Lyran Commonwealth

Formation 1
1/4th Syke Ranger Aero Wing [q]; e40; lt; Mv: 11; Arm – 1:18; S: 3; M: 3; L:0 - Critical Hits: Targeting Damage

Formation 2
2/4th Syke Ranger Aero Wing [q]; e40; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 5:24; S: 9; M: 12; L:6 - Critical Hits: Targeting Damage

Formation 3
1/3rd Donegal Guards Aero Wing [q]; e32; hvy; Mv: 5; Arm – 18:24; S: 9; M: 12; L:6

Formation 4
2/3rd Donegal Guards Aero Wing [q]; e36; med; Mv: 6; Arm – 27; S: 6; M: 6; L:0

In summary, aerospace battles are often the bloodiest with or without the “a miss is a hit” rule. Engagement Rolls with modifiers for Fanatic or Questionable loyalty, Superior or Inferior doctrine, Mercenary status and morale levels can set the stage for a battle before manoeuvre and Tactics come into play. Manoeuvre becomes extremely important in determining range as does the decision to fight in space or in the atmosphere with its +2 Manoeuvre DR modifier. Experience can tip the scales decisively because of its impact on Engagement and manoeuvred. With no TMM used the MMT’s base To-Hit DR of 4 is only modified by quality, loyalty and tactics so hits can be quite common. The lower to-hit numbers also open battles up to more use of Engagements types (Force, Overrun, Evade) to reduce damage or avoid getting pinned down. Use of “Tactics” is also more widespread the larger the gaps in the Tactics Values are between the two sides.