8/29/22, 10:02 PM Romulan Mauler Rule | BoardGameGeek

Federation Space Forums Variants

Romulan Mauler Rule(↦ /thread/2334535/romulan-mauler-rule)

Byron Henderson @pugbuddy Dec 21, 2019 (edited)

One thing in the original game rules that never worked well for me is the Mauler rules. Like everything else in the game, they are very simple but
using them essentially makes the Mauler a one-shot, throw-away ship for most players.

The original rules for the Mauler allow the ship to do the following:

1. Fire at its normal attack strength every turn.

2. Fire at twice its attack strength every other turn (requiring it to not fire while it "recharges" every other turn).
3. Fire at triple its attack strength once in a "suicide" attack. This automatically damages the ship AND requires it to "recharge" for a turn.

While generally interesting, using this ship within the rules-as-written is suicidal. The ship has such a weak attack strength (roughly that of a frigate),
that firing at its normal attack strength has only a 2-in-6 chance of damaging a Federation DD or CL.

So you double the attack strength? That gives it a 3-in-6 chance of damaging a Federation CA and 4-in-6 chance of damaging the aforementioned
DD or CL. However, the other ships will have two shots at the Mauler to do damage (one in the firing round and one more in the "recharging" round).

So cloak while you are recharging (to deny that second shot)? Then the Federation ship is no longer engaged and can double up on another
Romulan ship, virtually guaranteeing your comrades-in-arms are greatly annoyed at you, if they manage to survive (which is not terribly likely).

So Triple your attack strength for one round? Against the stardard Federation (or Gorn) CA, you get a 5-in-6 chance to damage the ship, but NO
chance to destroy it! There's a 2-in-6 chance to destroy a Federation DD or CL. Unfortunately, the Romulan automatically damages his own ship and
might be reduced to space dust in a single round if his opponent manages to hit him in the same combat round.

Overall, the options are just not good.

I went back and watched the Star Trek episode the ship is based upon and found no mention of doubling or tripling the ship's attack factor. In Star
Fleet Battles, the ship carried a single Plasma R torpedo, which could be overloaded, I suppose, but that would not damage the ship itself. I could be
mis-remembering that part but even so, in light of everything, the Federation Space rule makes very little sense.

I actually like having options in how the ship fires. It makes for a fun little counter. But I would recommend getting rid of the "suicide" possibility to
make the ship actually useful (and worth rebuilding, if lost).

I propose the following rule be used in place of the original game rule. I restricted the rule itself to the general outline/ideas in place in the original
rule but removed the auto-damage to the ship (not the attack strength) created by tripling the attack factor.

OPTIONAL MAULER RULE

The Mauler may fire at its normal combat strength every combat round. Alternatively, it may elect to fire at twice its combat strength every other
combat round, but must spend a combat round “recharging” as per the original rule.

As a third alternative, it may elect to fire once at triple its combat strength but, after doing so, suffers -2 to its attack strength for the remainder of the
battle in addition to having to spend a combat round recharging (this reflects damage done to its attack capability by overloading its weapon so
heavily. Note that this damage does not affect the ship’s defense or movement capability).

• Place a “-2 AS” counter (-2 attack strength) in the box with the Mauler as a reminder of its decreased attack capacity. The counter is removed after
the combat phase is completed (the ship’s engineers are able to repair the damaged batteries once combat is complete).

• During combat, the Mauler may still fire every other round at twice its (reduced) combat strength. It may not fire again at triple its combat strength
until/unless its attack capability is repaired.

• (If using the Lyran Space cards: ) A “Historic Engineer” card may be played at any time during combat to immediately repair the ship’s attack
capability and allow it to fully function once again.

* (If using the Lyran Space cards: ) Maulers may not use "Overloaded Plasma Torpedo" cards.

This makes Maulers more dangerous weapons and worth the investment in building or converting War Eagle cruisers to them. Thoughts?
Comments? Critique?

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