Reading Weapon Data Line

[Avi]

Hello All,

I am trying to fill out a ship form for USS America LHA-6 and under the Phalanx Blk IA it has "F/SA(R)2" listed. I know this means there are 2 of them, 1 Forward and 1 Starboard Aft but what does the "(R)" mean?

-Mike

[TonyE]

(R) think Rotary as in spinning barrels.  I'm not certain of the rules implications outside of the concept of firing bursts rather than rounds.  Perhaps someone else has more information there?

[kmart494]

As Tony said, it just denotes the barrel type (rotary).  Normally, where the 'R' is would be a numeral to show the number of barrels in a given mount.  Some modern gun systems have 1 or 2 barrels, but older post-WW2 ships may have as many as 3 barrels per mount.

[Avi]

Thank you Tony and Kmart. So if I remember correctly that would give it 2 shots when it fires either both at 1 target or split between 1 different ones?

There seems to be a lot of bits in the rules that aren't actually rules so finding which bits of information are impactful to gameplay and which are fluff is tricky!

[TonyE]

31 minutes ago, Avi said:

Thank you Tony and Kmart. So if I remember correctly that would give it 2 shots when it fires either both at 1 target or split between 1 different ones?

You got it!

[kmart494]

It gets 2 shots for being Autonomous.  You can shoot at different targets, too.  On the weapons line the AA rating would read something like "5.0A".  The "A" is Autonomous.

I agree that some information impacts gameplay even if it's not a rule.  I think Larry and Chris were greatly affected by the recent revelation (declassification) of how good or bad certain systems were in reality.  Much of Harpoon to date was based on the theoretical.  I attended several of Chris' seminars that were quite an eye opener for me, too.  They wanted to include that kind of stuff in H-V but it's hard to make a special rule for evey little thing that could make a difference.

[Avi]

Do the authors go to many conventions/is Harpoon played at a lot of conventions? Once things are safer and schedules return closer to normal I'd love to attend one.

[kmart494]

They typically attend the HMGS’s Cold Wars (March) and Historicon (July) events.  Both used to be in Lancaster, PA but CW will be in Ocean City, MD next year.  They play a mixture of all their games.