pward
Member
Ok, this post got lost in the melee at the end of the other thread, but I'm still curious how people see this interpretation of the IFT:
Ok, so the premise is that the 4 column equates to the 1:1 column in other games that use ratios for their combat results table.
At zero DRM, the effectiveness drops off quickly at 2:1 (2 FP), which loses 6 chances in 36 compared to the 1:1 (4 FP) column. Going from 21:36 to 15:36 is a loss of about 28% of it's effectiveness. And then a bit more at 4:1, the 1 FP column, losing an additional 5 chances in 36. Going from 15:36 to 10:36 is losing a third of it's effectiveness over the 2 FP column. In total, 1 FP is about half as effective as 4 FP.
Working your way up, the 6 column (or 3:2) is significantly better, gaining 5:35 chances for an effect (21:36 -> 26:36). That's about a 23% improvement for having an extra half-squad worth of FP. Fairly close to the opposite of the 28% loss for half of the squads firepower. (An attribute of the 2d6 "pyramid", with a base squad FP of 4 "centered" on DR=7).
The 2:1 (8 FP) gains another 4 chances bringing the total up to 30:36, about a 42% improvement for double the firepower. Again, because of the 2d6 pyramid, this resembles the 1/4 FP loss ~ 2x FP's gain.
After that, the return on investment of an additional squads worth of FP is not so great, diminishing returns are in effect up to the 20 chart (5:1 odds), where any fire (still talking about 0 DRM) will result in at least a PTC. The next additional squads worth (now 6:1 odds) gets "all MC", which is clearly better than a plain old PTC at the top. Just looking at the MC end of things, forcing the possibility of ELR and broken units rather than NE or PTC (pass or fail) results is a "good thing".
After that point, you need to add a squad and a half of FP for some reason to get the next level of effect (the 30 and 36 columns, or 7.5:1 and 9:1 odds.) I still haven't come up with a good reason why its not the 28-36-36 columns at the end of the chart...
If the game mechanics were written that all units had a "defense rating" of 4, then a base 4 FP squad vs a 4 defense squad would be a 1:1 ratio. Since each defending unit gets it's own "save" DR to shrug off the effect (EXC: the low results K/# and #KIA), perhaps it's not so odd to look at each unit having a "defense" of 4.Something hit me the other day looking at the charts. I want to put forth the idea that the IFT is really just an odds column written against the base 4FP "standard squad". The topmost result for that column is the pinnacle of the 2d6 pyramid at DR=7.
If you look at it that way, things start to make a little bit more sense. The one and two columns are for instances where a standard squad has area fire penalties, allowing for two such instances while still resolving something. After that, you're looking at multiples of 4 up to the 24 column, with a single instance of "half a standard squad" having columns in between the multiples of 4 (i.e. the 6 column). Or perhaps the 6 column was included with the 6FP US 1st line squads in mind.
Once you get to six squads (half a company!), another single squad won't make an appreciable difference. But other than that wild ass guess, I really can't say why the 30 and 36 columns aren't the 28, 32 and 36 columns instead.
I can understand stopping at 36FP. At that point, no matter how bad the +DRM are, you will always get a result.
Food for thought, don't look at it as a "base 1 FP" chart, look at it as a "base 4 FP" chart.
Ok, so the premise is that the 4 column equates to the 1:1 column in other games that use ratios for their combat results table.
At zero DRM, the effectiveness drops off quickly at 2:1 (2 FP), which loses 6 chances in 36 compared to the 1:1 (4 FP) column. Going from 21:36 to 15:36 is a loss of about 28% of it's effectiveness. And then a bit more at 4:1, the 1 FP column, losing an additional 5 chances in 36. Going from 15:36 to 10:36 is losing a third of it's effectiveness over the 2 FP column. In total, 1 FP is about half as effective as 4 FP.
Working your way up, the 6 column (or 3:2) is significantly better, gaining 5:35 chances for an effect (21:36 -> 26:36). That's about a 23% improvement for having an extra half-squad worth of FP. Fairly close to the opposite of the 28% loss for half of the squads firepower. (An attribute of the 2d6 "pyramid", with a base squad FP of 4 "centered" on DR=7).
The 2:1 (8 FP) gains another 4 chances bringing the total up to 30:36, about a 42% improvement for double the firepower. Again, because of the 2d6 pyramid, this resembles the 1/4 FP loss ~ 2x FP's gain.
After that, the return on investment of an additional squads worth of FP is not so great, diminishing returns are in effect up to the 20 chart (5:1 odds), where any fire (still talking about 0 DRM) will result in at least a PTC. The next additional squads worth (now 6:1 odds) gets "all MC", which is clearly better than a plain old PTC at the top. Just looking at the MC end of things, forcing the possibility of ELR and broken units rather than NE or PTC (pass or fail) results is a "good thing".
After that point, you need to add a squad and a half of FP for some reason to get the next level of effect (the 30 and 36 columns, or 7.5:1 and 9:1 odds.) I still haven't come up with a good reason why its not the 28-36-36 columns at the end of the chart...