Another Torpedo Essay

I wanted to start a thread discussing torpedos. So I created a rambling word salad of disjointed thoughts typical of my style. Strap in Mr. Campos, what follows is a grammatical Mandalay Bay to the English language.

As I was saying... torpedo-torpado.

I had been thinking I'd do it once I had an ingenious modification to the rules to test out, but as time passed, I never found a formula that I felt had enough merit to present as an apt substitute. I scoured Full-Thrust, articles on TMP, and many other rulesets looking to nick ideas in order to cobble together "One Ordinance Rule to Rule Them All". My game design Sauron being rather weak in this case.

I've got a confession: I've had a love/hate relationship with torpedos in Silent Death for a long time. It started before I even cracked the 1st edition Silent Death Rulebook with "drone races" in Starfleet Battles.

On the one hand, the tactical game of cat and mouse movement and countermeasures played out on the board can only be done justice with the system as designed. On the other, it can bog down at times, get confusing tracking fiddly counters belonging to several players, stacks of cardboard chits that can at times accomplish very little, and at others give the impression that the hidden subtext to the game could read- "Silent Death: Torp Tactics".

There's more variation in SD: The Next Millennium ruleset for how to run torpedos than any other weapon system -to its benefit I suppose, as there is probably a broad spectrum of preferences as to how to play them.  Several pages (5) of the Fighter's Tactics Manual (1997)  discuss most things torp, though I'm not sure if that entire section is what the table of contents is referring to as the "Torpedo Essay" credited to Bob Mohney or not.

For my table these days, which is more or less just a pair of novice players having a scrap very occasionally, I've thought I could "fix" or homebrew a considerably more abstract variant that will lend itself better for our goals for a snappy and quick game by bringing a touch of modernity to this phase of the game.  The goal being maybe to get them off the table entirely (!) -sacrificing the above mentioned granular tactical area deterrent metagame torpedos bring to the table in exchange for streamlined simplicity, a.k.a. dumbing down, modernizing, etc. but that's a whole other topic/can of worms.

After a long time of tinkering and late-night epiphanies of replacement system ideas to test, to borrow the concept from the guru-kid at the Oracle's pad in the Matrix: "There is no spoon" (the spoon being any sort of de facto torp rule problem) I've learned to try and bend the spoon (change the rules) in a different light - "then you will see it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself". So all this time I've been kind of oblivious to the obvious-- In trying to make a skirmish game into a fleet game by putting too many ships on the table, I've forgotten for far too long what the essence of Silent Death really is: a dogfighting skirmish game.


It's an easy trap to fall into, and I've seen tabletop grognards like myself slog games down with too many pretty painted models from Napoleonics to you name it for the sake of epicness. Or maybe since I've been playing more video games than tabletop games for decades, I've lost touch with what feels right for a game, spoiled from computer-assisted math crunching. But if our game is a catholic school teacher with a penchant for the KISS principle, then the torpedo phase is the ruler in her hands ready to crack our knuckles the moment we get eyes for too many BPV. 


The fast flow present in a round of Astro/House Smash is what the system does best. The lore (and my die-hard habits) are why I chose to get back into it over newer games. I just lost sight somewhere along the way in approaching it in too much of a  Babylon 5: A Call to Arms/Starfleet Battles mindset a bit too much, which is funny, because I intrinsically knew it was the antithesis to those rulesets for years-- at conventions back in the day you could walk by a fleet game and again an hour later and see only a mild progression of the board position, whereas a Silent Death session has wildly progressed (if not into a second go-around by hour two even). I've been a zealot to this model of space action over the sometimes molasses-crawl pace of most other large class vessel systems since. (Disclaimer: I've not played modern takes like Armada, so maybe it's improved?) And just to add this point in fairness to StarFleet- It CAN be played at a reasonable pace with an appropriate set-up, but for some reason in my area at least, it's always too many players and too many ships. I have fun playing it still, but it doesn't scratch my itch for a good cinematic space clash.

Not to be entirely mistaken though, I still want to homebrew a separate Silent Death variant where the torpedo rules scale with larger points values without taking 5-6 hours to play (1-3 Warhounds + fighter escorts taking 1-3 hours, nothing too crazy). That should be something that might not cause a grub flare-up as long as it's sporadic and in an area of space that has been cleared of the Brood menace fairly adequately (though it's always a risk that makes captains uneasy). I've just figured out most of the "problem" I was seeing was of my design. I am also trying out some homebrew rules I've made out of personal preference that I'll post soon. I wanted to split this torp thing into a separate thread.
 
I've been playing variable speed out of habit forever but starting to want to mix things up with other types, or likely just the integrated list more and more lately. What about you? What is your favorite method for representing boom-sticks of the homing variety? Does the thought of a Lillith's entire Mk.50 magazine dumping all at once make you do the Alpha Strike Jig?

  +

First rule of torpedoes if you fire them don't follow them. The enemy will have fired torpedoes too.

Second rule: Use them to soften up the enemy.

Third rule: If you haven't used them against fast targets, then wait to use them to finish off the enemy.

Fourth rule: Cross torpedo fire, do not fire them at the closest target but paired with other friend target the one close to them and vice versa. This means the enemy may run into your torpedoes rather than running away from them.

Fifth rule: Gunboats can pack a ton of torps, Unloading them at a threat but targeting something else may cause the threat to run away.

Sixth rule: Always fire enough torpedoes to get through PD.

Seventh rule: MK50s are scary but they are slow, always approach a ship with MK50s from behind.

Eighth rule: MK10s can bounce off of armour, remember to back them up with MK20s or 30s.

Ninth rule: Use attrition fighters and secondary weapons to shoot down torps that did not connect but are still tracking.

Tenth rule: If a Gunboat cannot avoid a salvo then turn to face the threat with the heaviest armour and least damaged side (never the rear)