>One or two questions regarding the PBeM. This may be premature but, if
>we are taking part in EA exercises how will the TO@E be organised? Is
>this a free for all until we can sort sides, or will the smaller ships be
>under the 'command' of the capitol ships (for example my destroyer and
>frigate escorting an omega) ?

Once the set-up and Turn 0 detections are sent out, certain things will become clear, but not everything. Normally I make the sides very clear, but in this particular scenario, half the fun (and purpose of scenario) is to determine...who is on which side. I anticipate this happening within a couple of turns, really. This should not be a free-for-all, per se. I think the first couple of turns people will try to work out who is on which side, and as soon as things become clear (and weapons charged)...*wham*.

But then again there are always surprises...no? ;-)

>Who's in charge of the manouveres ?
>(ie which officer on which ship)

Captain Scott Field aboard the EAS DIONYSUS is the Fleet Commander with respect to the fleet manuevers exercises. I hear tell he has put together an Admiral's Speech to the troops. ;-)

Once the scenario starts, however, this little chain of command might crumble - who knows? ;-)

>Can I pair up a PDAF and a C-Bat to give one level of interecptor
>shielding? for example, the WEBER has 2 fire-cons, 2PDAFs and 3
>C-Bats (1*SFP, 2*SAP). could I use these as follows
>
> firecon1 : Free
> firecon2 : Controling C-Bats in Interceptor mode
> PDAF 1 : Anti-Fighter / Anti-Missile Mode
> PDAF 2 : Interceptor mode (with the C-Bat 1)
> C1 (SFP) : Interceptor mode (with PDAF 2)
> C2 (SAP) : Interceptor mode (with C-Bat 3)
> C3 (SAP) : Interceptor mode (with C-Bat 2)
>
>Giving 1 level of shielding from attacks from fore/aft arcs, and 2 levels
>from port/stbd ?

No. The PDAF systems operate independently of the C-battery systems. The C-batteries require a dedicated FireCon in order to go into 'intercept' mode. This requirement prevents the PDAFs (which have their own built-in FireCons) from coordinating *that* closely with C-batts (yes, I know you can come up with reasons and methods of using advanced tech to circumvent this - I can! - but since I *am* trying to keep this relatively simple...).

And for those newer to the rules, remember: Anti-Fighter mode and Anti-Missile Mode are two *different* modes! Thus you have 3 modes to chose from for your PDAFs/ADAFs: Anti-Fighter, Anti-Missile, and 'intercept'. Ditto for your C-batteries, except your C-batts have an Anti-Ship mode, too.

More to come later. :-)

>A couple more nit-picky questions re: scrambling fighters. In MT, you can
>only scramble when your carrier is being attacked by enemy fighters; can
>we scramble on turn 2 if we don't have any "enemy" fighters
>within 6"?

Yes, you can. Due to the circumstances of this scenario, the restrictions on when you can and cannot scramble fighters is more liberal.

The 'scrambling fighters' early in the game ruling basically means you're doing your goddamndest to get your fighters out asap - fighters which are not currently manned because you did not expect to head into any real battles right away; you were just doing ship maneuvers. Once you reach Turn 6 you can launch them normally, without restrictions (there is a remote chance that someone may be trying to scramble fighters and get bad rolls every turn; at some point the pilots really do get to the fighters and get them out).

>Also, are we calling the Omegas carriers for purposes of launching 2
>fighter groups per turn?

Yes, Omegas are essentially carriers. Beefed-up carriers, but carriers nonetheless.

>For the HBW capaciters, if I understand you right, the fastest we can do
>things is:
>turn 1: warm up capaciter
>turn 2: begin charging
>turn 3: shunt power from the Jump Engine capaciter
>
>...or can I transfer the jump-juice over on turn 2?

You can transfer jump-juice once the capacitor is warmed up - ie, in this case, Turn 2. I'd prefer the former method you list, but it's slightly more complicated and I'm *trying* to keep things simple. Trying...only partially succeeding.

Systems in intercept mode will work as normal.

*Good* question, and one I really hadn't thought of (duh; hello!). I gave it a lot of thought overnight (ie, slept little), and am of two minds on the subject.

On one side I'm tempted to say 'no, cannot be intercepted'. It'd make things easier, deadlier, and simpler (wait, that's the same as easier).

On the other hand I'm tempted to say 'yes they can be interecepted' because I'm seeing the pulse torps as being really beefed up batteries (REALLY beefed up batteries; more or less akin to the main gun/weapon on B5 that we've seen in 'The Fall Of Night', 'Dust To Dust', and 'Severed Dreams'). Saying yes makes things somewhat more complicated in the intercept rules. I would say that for each level of 'shielding' one has with one's *DAF/C-batt pairs, apply a -1 to the die roll of the pulse torp. To retain the pulse torps inherent nastiness, no more than 2 levels of 'intercept shielding' can work against any given pulse torp (so no more than -2 can be applied to the die roll).

So, since I'm the one who has to actually deal with the complications right now, I'm going to say, at least for this game, that up to two levels of 'intercept mode shielding' will work against pulse torps (so only up to a -2 can be applied to the die roll for pulse torp damage).

Unless someone can come up with *good* arguements otherwise. ;-)