[Spaceships] Missile shield vs. ramming: two questions

[Refplace]

It requires a lot of extra power but here are examples of beams slocing through ships.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYq-XJ5XfkI

I do agree there should be a pinhole kind of rule or blowthough but there are times when its not appropriate.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Michael Thayne

Rolling damage for each hit individually, you'd need 12-13 hits on average. And with the "Multiple Hits" rule from Anthony's article, you'd need 30+ hits from one salvo.

Did I do that right?

No. The multiple hits rule is messy and could do with editing, but the basic idea is that a success by 10 on a RoF 300 weapon is probably not actually 10 hits, but we don't want to roll damage 50-100 times.

Assuming the salvo has enough RoF, a hit by 10, instead of meaning you roll damage 10 times, lets you roll damage once and shift wounding by 10 columns (from /30 to x1.5).

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Damage types other than piercing do not have hole width modifiers, and should. At the same penetration, a wider hole is certainly more destructive.

Yes. And if it had been established that the damage ratings of Spaceships' weapons reflected depth of penetration into spaceships that would mean that a width modifier ought to be applied. I don't know whether it has; if you believe so, go ahead.

[Michael Thayne]

Originally Posted by Anthony

No. The multiple hits rule is messy and could do with editing, but the basic idea is that a success by 10 on a RoF 300 weapon is probably not actually 10 hits, but we don't want to roll damage 50-100 times.

Assuming the salvo has enough RoF, a hit by 10, instead of meaning you roll damage 10 times, lets you roll damage once and shift wounding by 10 columns (from /30 to x1.5).

Err, what I originally wrote was definitely wrong, but I was wondering about this sentence: "you can resolve multiple hits in a single roll by just adding (2 + RSM for number of hits) to WM." I figured to be guaranteed destroying it (4200 points of damage), you'd want to shift the WM to x1/2, which is shifting the WM by 7 categories. Which means you want an "RSM number" of 5 (2 + 5 = 7), so 10 hits? Possibly this rule is mainly only useful for resolving big rapid-fire attacks.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Agemegos

Yes. And if it had been established that the damage ratings of Spaceships' weapons reflected depth of penetration into spaceships that would mean that a width modifier ought to be applied. I don't know whether it has; if you believe so, go ahead.

As armor is linear in thickness, and damage is linear in armor penetration, the obviously implication is that damage rating indicates depth of penetration.

Originally Posted by Michael Thayne

Possibly this rule is mainly only useful for resolving big rapid-fire attacks.

The intent is mostly for 50 guys shooting assault rifles at a freighter to be a sanely resolvable situation.