Random Questions

[narf poit chez BOOM]

How do you shoot a pink elephant?

How do you shoot a gray elephant?

How do you shoot a blue elephant?

[Sardia]

I'm at version 1.66 right now, but I don't want to patch up to 1.71. Will there be any problems with the balance mod if I do not patch up?

[Randallw]

I have a 1.66 game with BM 1.13. I don't see any problems, apart from for some reason if a carrier is destroyed it drops all its fighters in the sector.

[Suicide Junkie]

Randallw said:
I have a 1.66 game with BM 1.13. I don't see any problems, apart from for some reason if a carrier is destroyed it drops all its fighters in the sector.

If the fighters had been launched in combat, and the carrier died... then the fighters are still in space with nowhere else to go.

If a carrier is just blown up unexpectedly (intel op, random event, or whatnot), the unlaunched fighters should go up in the blast.

How did your carrier die?

[Randallw]

It works like this.

My enemy sent a colony ship through a WP. I destroyed it. The colony ship had a fighter bay and 16 fighters onboard. in the brief battle one was launched (1 bay). in the next turn the other 15 fighters, which never launched, were dumped on the wp and fought by my fighters.

I noticed this strange event and tested it in the simulator. a freighter with 1 bay and 50 fighters will die, launching maybe 1 or 2 fighters. The other 48 fighters are niow listed as existing when the simulation ends, and if you restart it, will be massed in the area the freighter died.

So now I, and I wouldn't put it past my enemy to do likewise, build freighters with lots of cargo space, and one bay (you need at least 1 bay for it to work). The ship will die, but then it drops 50-60 fighters on the wp.

This is 1.66 with BM 1.13. It seems a bit buggy, but nevermind we can both use it equally. It just adds an interesting change to war plans.

Edit: I just remembered he used it too. He dropped 41 fighters on my side of the wp that then flew off across the system, avoiding my 60 fighters.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Emergency launch!

[Randallw]

Personally it reminds me of the Star Wars novel where the Empire uses a cloaking device on freighters, not to hide the freighter, just its cargo. It scans as an empty freighter, until it breaks up and squadrons of TIE fighters float out and attack.

I think of them as Tenders. They don't hold the fighters inside, they are on external hardpoints and just detach.

The delightfully ironic thing is we stuck with 1.66/BM 1.13 to avoid the new 1.71 rule that fighters can only leave their carrier once a turn

[Sardia]

Is the distribution of ice, rock and gas planets equal in a bm +FQM game? I've noticed a lot more gas planets than rock and very few ice planets.

[Captain Kwok]

Yes, all 3 types are more or less equal.

[Randallw]

In one of my favourite series of books a ground crew is loading anti-matter missiles while the pilot looks on. They're being careful but no-one is overly tense or worried, after all if by some chance the containment fields go off no one on the entire ship is ever going to realise. A nearby ship is certain to notice the explosion, but no one on the carrier will have a chance to feel anything.