From: ccamfiel@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca (Chris Camfield)
Description: Re: What is Starfire?
 
In article <bcarlsonCM5EDu.Kvu@netcom.com>, Brad D Carlson
<bcarlson@netcom.com> wrote:
>
> I am considering picking up Starfire + Imperial Starfire, but
> would like to know what they are like.
> I have played SFB, Intercepter, Leviathan, Warpwar, and probably
> others that dont come to mind.
>       Opinions?
 
A lot less complicated than SFB, Interceptor, or Leviathan.  More so
than Warpwar.
 
Ships are represented by a string of characters that determine the
order in which damage is done.  For example, an escort might be:
 
   (2) SSAIIIFIII (6)
 
Which indicates 2 Shields, 1 Armour, a total of 6 Ion engines, and a
Force beam.  It has a turn rate of 2, and a speed of 6.
 
Movement in Starfire is inertialess, and is played out each round with
six impulses of movement.  So the escort could turn a total of three
times during the six impulses.  I forget when fighter movement (and
combat) occur.  It's been a while.
 
In firing each player fires one ship in turn.  A ship can only target
as many different ships as it has multiplex tracking for (Usually at
very most 4).  The different weapons are guns, rocket launchers,
combination gun/missile launchers, lasers (skip shields), force beams
(do more damage the closer you get), energy beams (skip armour and
cargo holds).
 
I don't want to babble too much longer... fighters are small, fast and
agile, and move and fire in squadrons of up to 6.  Carried (usually)
only by dedicated carriers.  Escort ships start to pop in too, armed
with improved point defence (originally for shooting down missiles, but
improved to be good at targetting fighters) and other weapons that are
relatively good at targetting fighters.
 
The scenarios for pre-fighter combat take you through the
Terran-Khanate War, with escalatingly large numbers of ships and
technology (I forgot to mention that part!  Different tech levels allow
different weapons and other systems.)  The Terran/Khanate-Rigelian War
introduces fighters and is very suspiciously paralleled after WW2 in
the Pacific (right down to Starfire versions of Pearl Harbour and
Midway!).
 
Ship construction is pretty easy.  Choose a hull size, which has a
cost, maximum capacity, and determines how many engines you can put in
(and how big the engines are).  Then fill up the ship with the stuff
that you want... there are some basic guidelines.
 
You don't need Imperial Starfire unless you want to run a campaign
game.  (NB notes that follow correspond to Starfire III, as I haven't
got Imperial Starfire.) That can be a lot of fun, although
time-consuming.  Start off at low tech level, expand your empire and
build ships (and/or colonize, and/or invest in technology...).
Intersteller movement is possible through "warp points", somewhat akin
to the WarpWar links.  Except that a warp point might easily turn out
to go to a system half-way across the map, and even into a system that
an enemy has previously explored, but has not discovered that warp
point due to its "closed" nature (hard to detect from the other end).
Running into the enemy at a system only one link away from his home
system can put a pretty quick end to a game.  *grin*
 
Bottom line:  it's a lot of fun.
-- 
Chris Camfield (ccamfiel@undergrad.math.uwaterloo.ca)
"Change is like the nursery, it's the place where everything grows
 And time moves like a river, we kiss the bank and on we go
 All falling apart, you hold the key to unlock my secret heart" (Tim Finn)