Guidance Linked Missiles & Hesh Missiles Rules for RTGs Mekton Zeta.

Working on someones idea of implimenting HESH missiles, those that are able to tear a great deal of armor from a target. I came up with a perfectly legal way of doing it by crosslinking a few missiles together.. It was also much too expensive, so I brainstormed a way to do it cheaper. I hate using the stupid mecha trick Special effect, so I didn't even consider it. Instead I came up with a balanced way of implimenting it.

To create a hesh missile requires you to take a number of missiles and link them... But not the ordinary way. This link costs no points and the benifits and penalties of the system cancil each other out rather nicely, if not in favor of the defender. The missiles tend to be a few low warhead types and four is about the optimal number to place in such a grouping. The reason is this- You divide the number of missiles that is grouped by two and this is your negative modifier to your strike roll. If the roll misses then they all miss. If the roll is a strike the entire 'package' hits a single spot, with each warhead doing seperate damage to the same target servo. Counter-measures tend to have great effect on this type, since a single success wipes out the entier pack.

Guidance linked missiles work in much the same fashion. The negitive modifier is the same, and if the roll to strike is a hit, they all hit. But they hit they do damage like a regular volly afterwards. Countermeasures still have good effect but acts like normal counter measures in the number of missiles it knocks out. Linked guidance has an additional benfit to smart missiles. Evasion doesn't work nearly as well because of the linked guidance. If any single smart missile retains lock after an evasion attempt, they all will relock on to the target.

Constructing Hesh packs- Hesh missile types may be built of various missile types on each warhead. Exceptions are if one is hypervelocity, long range or smart, they all must be bought that way. But they might be bought with differant missile sizes and ranges. The differant warheads each affect the target normally. The ranges are averaged to get a single range. All weapon accuracies must be the same as well.

Example of a simple Hesh Missile-

Four 2 kill missiles with a +2 Weapon Accuracy are bought as a single Hesh missile. Being that is is four missiles linked as a single hesh, the modifier to the WA is -2 (Four divided by two is 2) The bought WA and the modifier cancil out to be a WA of zero. (if eight were bought as a single Hesh in this way the total WA would be a -6.) The cost for the Hesh missile would be 1.28cp (4 missiles x .2 kills each x 1.6 for WA) and the space would be .96 or round as 1 space (1.28 divided by 1.33 for weapon mateing.) The range averages as a 2k missile.

Example of a complex Hesh Missile-

One 9k missile loaded with 5 two kill warheads (each zero range) They are all bought at +0 WA. (In this case you must buy 0 range missiles with the same modifier as the ranged ones.) The total WA modifier would be -3 (6 missiles divided by 2 +0WA) The range would be (11+0+0+0+0+0)/6 = 2 hexes combat range. The price would come out to (.9+.2 x 5)= 1.9cp and the spaces are rounded to 1.4 due to weapon mating. The designer also add that this is a penitrating hesh, so the warheads will hit screen reactive shields starting with the smaller ones.

Special rule regarding hesh effects. The entier hesh missile impacts againsed the armor at the same time. The stopping power will effect all of the warheads with its full stopping power. After any damage is resolved by any penitration of the attack then degrade the armor by the number of warheads match or exceed the damage coefficient of the armor. Knock back is determined by the total kills of the hesh as a single attack. Reactive shields will protect at full effect vs each warhead of a heash individually before detemining if they are blown. In the case of screen reactive shields. The hesh builder detemines if the round was built for penitration or ablation. Penitration causes the smaller warheads to effect the screens before the larger ones so that the biggest warhead attacks the shielded character last. This penitrates the armor deaper at the loss of ablating the extra armor. Ablation works the opposite way the most powerful warheads do damage to the screen before the smaller ones do. This gives the warhead more ablation power while trading off penitration. The effect must be noted when the Hesh is built.

If a guided linked packs, like Hesh packs, may be bought as mulitiple types of warheads and ranges. Like hesh, if one buys long range, smart and/or hyper velocty, they all must buy it. They also must be the same WA warheads even if some are bought at 0 range. If differant ranges are bought it is assumed that the pack all has the same range by averaging the ranges the designers built it that way for best effect. Since the pack is not a single missile you do /not/ use the weapon mating option to determine space.

Example build of a Guadance Linked pack-

Four warheads are bought at WA+1 as 1k, 2k, 3k, and 4k warheads The one kill missile bought at 300% range and the others at standard ranges. The cost of the pack would be 1.1cp as would the space. The Range comes out to be (12+5+6+7)/4 =7.5 or 8 hex combat range. The packs total WA is ( 4 missiles divided by 2) -2WA +1(purchased)WA= -1Weapon Accuracy.

Guidance linked missiles specail rules. If a missile counter measure is effective againsed only part of a Guidance Linked pack, roll 1d10. On a result of 1-5 the pack looses missiles from the least expensive missiles to the more expensive warheads. On the result of 6-10, the pack loses missiles from most expensive to least expensive. This is rerolled for each effective counter-measure. Besides as noted above, packs work the same way as standard vollys.