27 replies to this topic

[TheEmpire]

Do we really need this ship? That is the first question. Second is that Were they that important? Third is that if you look at the stats the Medical frigates they only had I think 4 Turbolasers. They would be weak under armed and very useless. Until ground at least then only if PR made it like the UEAW medical frigate and I doubt that. And the shielding was the same as a nebulon B. Also they mostly stayed out of fights. They were only used for the battle of endor because the rebels needed every gun they had. I say no.

[Tropical Bob]

I wondered about Mon Mothma's transport being a Dreadnaught-class Heavy Cruiser as well.

This is an interesting idea. I can't decide whether I support it or not though.

[Ghostrider]

They would be weak under armed and very useless. Also they mostly stayed out of fights. They were only used for the battle of endor because the rebels needed every gun they had. I say no.

My point is they are clearly not combat ships. With the Space tug compliment and light healing ability, they are a cheap Hajen, with basic defenses. If they were really useless, the Rebels would not have bothered with them. They had to have SOME uses, even if it's just rescuing EV pilots (hence the space Tugs).

Besides, Arent' you forgetting the Redemption.

That is a canonical example of a medical frigate in battle. So do we get one as well???

Edited by Ghostrider, 26 August 2008 - 08:56 AM.

[Kitkun]

Question. How do you propose the medical frigate be implemented into PR? What would it's role be?

It's main use as a mobile hospital would have no bearing in a space battle where a regular Nebulon-B would be more useful, and units auto heal after battle already. A squad of CT tugs for healing ability? You might as well just buy the tugs.

[Ghostrider]

Question. How do you propose the medical frigate be implemented into PR? What would it's role be?

It's main use as a mobile hospital would have no bearing in a space battle where a regular Nebulon-B would be more useful, and units auto heal after battle already. A squad of CT tugs for healing ability? You might as well just buy the tugs.

I see it as a poor-man's Hajen.
Give it the Hajen healing ability as well at 1/2 range and 1/2 strength.
Whereas the regular Nebulon B has 12 Turbos and 12 Lasers, I suggest remove 4 Turbos and 4 lasers, and up the shielding.
You now have a ship with 2/3 the firepower of a regular Nebulon B, slightly better shields, and a light healing ability.
Although it's not a front line ship, it would be an excellent reserve class, particularly if you place it near the space colony.
I know you can buy space tugs, but they get wiped out pretty quickly. At least this way you get 3 freebies.

It's a bit of everything. I know it's not a front line ship, but it's interesting.

I thought of it simply because the Rebels actually had them, and it's an obvious forerunner of the Hajen.
Bear in mind that the Empire has to research the Nebulon B before it can get the Lancer, and I see that as a research downgrade, becuase overall, I think the Carrack is a better ship.

I think it's place is an between the Nebulon B and the Hajen. If you want the Hajen, you have to research the Medical Frigate (Incidentally, as it's mostly a re-fit, rather than major overhaul, make the Medical Frigate research fairly cheap and quick - say 1/2 that of the Nebulon B itself.)

I suggest it for interest mostly - the rebels did make use of them. So perhaps we shold too?

[Ghostrider]

Question. How do you propose the medical frigate be implemented into PR? What would it's role be?

It's main use as a mobile hospital would have no bearing in a space battle where a regular Nebulon-B would be more useful, and units auto heal after battle already. A squad of CT tugs for healing ability? You might as well just buy the tugs.

I see it as a poor-man's Hajen.
Give it the Hajen healing ability as well at 1/2 range and 1/2 strength.
Whereas the regular Nebulon B has 12 Turbos and 12 Lasers, I suggest remove 4 Turbos and 4 lasers, and up the shielding.
You now have a ship with 2/3 the firepower of a regular Nebulon B, slightly better shields, and a light healing ability.
Although it's not a front line ship, it would be an excellent reserve class, particularly if you place it near the space colony.
I know you can buy space tugs, but they get wiped out pretty quickly. At least this way you get 3 freebies.

It's a bit of everything. I know it's not a front line ship, but it's interesting, especially if you have to research it (cheap research at that) before you can get the Hajen.

Besides, I also thought it would be a far more interesting craft for Mon Mothma

[keraunos]

They would be weak under armed and very useless. Also they mostly stayed out of fights. They were only used for the battle of endor because the rebels needed every gun they had. I say no.

My point is they are clearly not combat ships. With the Space tug compliment and light healing ability, they are a cheap Hajen, with basic defenses. If they were really useless, the Rebels would not have bothered with them.

I'd support Medical Frigate, but I'd limit its healing abilities to fighters only. And I wouldn't give it Tugs...

As for canon-vs-non-canon, they are definitely in. But I'm sure they shouldn't get too much attention: there are simply too few ships we know about, so we stick to couple of definitely canon units we have some info about. Surely we've seen it in movies, but we can also imagine they didn't have many uses. I doubt survival ratio in space battle would be anything but very low (contrary to what novels make us to believe).

Don't know why, but I can compar Medical Frigate with M.A.S.H. Only because we know that such units existed in Korea, we shouldn't demand them in every game, nor should we make it significantly important. 1 per 200 units? Maybe

[anakinskysolo]

I don't like it. Its a MEDICAL frigate. They heal people in there, not other ships.

[Kaleb Graff]

I don't like it. Its a MEDICAL frigate. They heal people in there, not other ships.

Definitely. I think the rebels need an earlier healer unit, but not this.

[TheEmpire]

That sums it up. The Medical frigate had people in it not starfighters. And if you say they were healing the piolt there would still be major damage to the starfighters. They did not heal starfighters. Not canon.

[Ghostrider]

I don't like it. Its a MEDICAL frigate. They heal people in there, not other ships.

It may be a medical frigate, but think of the effect that MASH units had on the US army. Anyway. How do you think ships heal themselves.... IT's with people!
Heal more people, the people heal the ships faster.

I'm trying to simulate the overall effect that a hospital ship will have on making a fleet more capable of making war - by having more crew available. Also imagine unarmed shuttles racing rescue crews to ships in the heat of battle - in the same way that rescue crews do today. That's gotta have a fairly good effect.

Think of it as increasing crew compliments and maintaining veterancy (which no game could possibly hope to simulate). EAW assumes after a battle that ships magically mend to full strength and automatically have full crew compliments. As the game can't simulate 'skeleton crews', give ships increased healing for better than expected crew compliments, courtesy of the hospital ship.

Besides. How many times have we read of heros being saved from certain death by medical frigates. Such as Luke and Wedge at the beginning of 'Truce at Bakura'.

Anyway, part of being a rebel is knowing the commanders take care over your welfare. Medical ships are a vital part of that. As an imp grunt, you gotta know that if you get hurt - You die - you are expendable.

[Kitkun]

How do you think ships heal themselves.... IT's with people!

Trained mechanics and engineers were likely in short supply on a medical frigate.

And generally, people who needed a MASH were likely out of action for a long time, if not for good.

[Phoenix Rising]

I've looked into this, but I can't think of any way for it to realistically work. I don't think having it repair other ships exactly does it justice; it should be repairing organics. I mean, just look at the MTC, it has distinct modules for hospital and repair duty, so using the same game ability to represent both doesn't seem right.

Ideally, the medical frigate should have some kind of impact in land battles, but I'm not sure how fluidly that would work. Thyferra's auto-heal advantage, for example, requires a dummy object placed in its land map for it to work in tactical. You could possibly call the frigate itself into a land battle and just not have it show up as a real unit to get an appropriate ability in-battle, perhaps some combination of a health bonus and infantry healing, but I'm not certain it would work. And, in my opinion, it's not really worth the trouble of adding a whole new unit for it to hinge on something unconventional like that.

As for Mothma's Dreadnaught, that's pretty much the closest thing canonically to a command ship for her, so not much you can do about that.

[skie9173]

Would it be possible to make it that the frigate grants minor combat bonuses to the fleet it is part of, like fleet commanders but on a smaller scale? It might not be a perfect solution and it may even be rather repetative to have another bonus granting unit, but it could be passed off with the explination that it "conserves experiance" by getting personal healed and back into combat faster. Also soldiers would tend to fight harder and with greater moral if they know that there is a dedicated and skilled crew near the front lines willing to help patch them up. Personally I'd say it makes more repair bonuses, and shouldn't be that hard.

P.S. sorry for any bad typing/spelling errors. late and been a long day heh

[Phoenix Rising]

I could make it give ships more hull, shields, and the like, yes. More repair? No. Still too much of a compromise to justify adding an entire new unit.

[SpardaSon21]

Is it possible to confer bonuses to ground troops if certain ships are in orbit? So the medical frigate may be useless in a space battle, however it could confer a slow passive regeneration to infantry b/c of combat medics or a constant supply of first-aid kits or you get the idea.

[Phoenix Rising]

I don't think so. Like I said, you would probably have to actually bring it into the land battle somehow.

[SpardaSon21]

Yeah. Sucks.

[Kaleb Graff]

We could make a mobile hospital, represented in space by the medical frigate.