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When getting ships for ship to ship combat (RPG not miniature) do you prefer:

A)  Basic designs with power points that can be spent in areas (shields, hull, etc) as you wish

b)  Structured ships with all points already set for each ship


c)  doesn't matter as long as the rules are done well

Ex.  Say I have a tank size attack vehicle.  Should the game tell me how much Shielding, weapons, and such / let me spread out a pool of point to my systems

FOR ME, I always return to the ship-to-ship combat in Classic Traveller as my model that I have bastardized for many other RPG games.

The big issue is that you want to engage all the PCs in the vehicle, which can be difficult sometimes. Sometimes, half the crew just has to strap in and hold on. However, if possible, dream up ways for the PCs to be useful and certainly engage the players' ideas on what their PCs could be doing.

As inspiration, watch action scenes in movies where the whole team is involved.

Here's my first suggestion...freeway chase from Matrix Reloaded:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8OZpmIWcxg

What images/videos do you crazy kids imagine for vehicular combat that engages all the PCs?

Quote from: rway218;834080When getting ships for ship to ship combat (RPG not miniature) do you prefer:

A)  Basic designs with power points that can be spent in areas (shields, hull, etc) as you wish

b)  Structured ships with all points already set for each ship


c)  doesn't matter as long as the rules are done well

Ex.  Say I have a tank size attack vehicle.  Should the game tell me how much Shielding, weapons, and such / let me spread out a pool of point to my systems

I prefer B, mainly because it helps with immersion in role-playing outside of combat. However, B also can encompass A with ships that have power allocation and management during combat within set parameters for the particular class of ship.

EDIT: For example, in FASA's Star Trek Starship Combat Simulator, which was part of their Star Trek RPG, you could allocate power to engines or shields or weapons from a basic pool. Some ships were better than others at certain missions, a Saladin-class Destroyer could pump more power into weapons and shields than a Nelson-class Scout, even though they both had the same power plant IIRC.

I moved away from power points altogether for my latest setting, and went with the assumption that starships have more than enough power for their needs. Instead, the risk/reward for the starship crew is based on how hard they're willing to push everything.

Weapons will do extra damage with more power running into them, but they'll burn out if pushed too hard.

And there are no inertial compensators in this setting, so pushing the engines too hard is really tough on the crew. And the engines.

The thing is, my players find these kind of decisions more fun. They'd rather take a gamble on pushing their ship/crew a little harder to win the battle than spend the first part of every turn haggling over who gets more power points.

I want both a consistent set of rules / explanations for how things work and interact, and examples of a full range of ship classes using those rules, as well as to be able to create new and modified ship designs without having holes in my understanding. I want to be able to use the ship's stat's, status, and crew abilities, to game out maneuvers, combat, a variety of ship damage and emergencies, operations (supplies used/needed, and maintenance) and boarding combat.

Something solid and physics based like GURPS Vehicles or Fire Fusion and Steel.

Putting in sufficient power is just another design choice.

Ship rules need to fit in well with the rest of an RPG's rules. Not just bolted on.

I prefer something as absolutely simple as possible.

I've been leaning to a basic design per class of ship that has a defined power structure.  

I would list upgrades for ships (and a cost for each) that add to the standard.

Then use battery (or other power source) to reinforce power systems, and a damage control to rebuild systems.  These would be expendables not renewable items purchased or restocked (depending on the world government setting) at port.

The weapon systems would work off the expendable system (unless it is power based, then it would be recharged off the power system)

Just spit balling here, but how SIMPLE is too simple?

Also how COMPLEX would be too complex?

Quote from: jeff37923;834083I prefer B, mainly because it helps with immersion in role-playing outside of combat. However, B also can encompass A with ships that have power allocation and management during combat within set parameters for the particular class of ship.

EDIT: For example, in FASA's Star Trek Starship Combat Simulator, which was part of their Star Trek RPG, you could allocate power to engines or shields or weapons from a basic pool. Some ships were better than others at certain missions, a Saladin-class Destroyer could pump more power into weapons and shields than a Nelson-class Scout, even though they both had the same power plant IIRC.

No Saladin class in FASA Trek, I presume you mean the Larson class destroyer which Mk VI and Mk VII had the same FWC-2 warp engine as the Nelson class scout Mk V and Mk VII. Both had 20 power units. The Larson could put more power into weapons because it had more weapons to put power into.

On that topic, FASA Trek had a really good ship combat system if you wanted tactical-level decision-making as well as something for all the PCs to do.

If ships are going to have set stats, a good variety of types and Mks is nice for variety and is also cool because sometimes you'll see a ship of a certain type but not be sure as to which Mk it is and what weapons/engines/shields it has. For instance, a Mk I Larson compared to a Mark V is quite a change in fighting ability.

I used to do a good bit more complex, and went from there to the abstract system put out in 3rd edition GURPS, which runs from the basic principle that parties care a good bit less about how complex the ship stats are than how the PCs interact with and are affected by combat.

The RPG/boardgame hybrid BATTLESTATIONS (http://www.battlestations.info/) is a good product to consider if you want to a good team tactics aboard a spaceship.

I've never found any ship-to-ship combat rules that I thought were really quite right for me.  Most of the time I'll largely just wing it.

I never understood why systems like starfleet battles never let you move power from one shield to another (as I remember the game from 1993).

One of the ways I am thinking of doing this in Red Death is having the shields weaken all over, as if compensating for every side at once.  Even allowing the batteries to be used to strengthen them during combat

Also, to allow targeted system attacks with live damage control point pools.

Quote from: rway218;836133I never understood why systems like starfleet battles never let you move power from one shield to another (as I remember the game from 1993).

One of the ways I am thinking of doing this in Red Death is having the shields weaken all over, as if compensating for every side at once.  Even allowing the batteries to be used to strengthen them during combat

Also, to allow targeted system attacks with live damage control point pools.

It depends on the Desilu Star Trek episode maybe.

I don't recall about diverting power in the original series, but I definitely remember it in Next Generation.

Quote from: rway218;836133I never understood why systems like starfleet battles never let you move power from one shield to another (as I remember the game from 1993).

I think it's because it's based on the ship combat scenes in TOS, and because the designers liked the tactics involved when damage to a particular shields persist, which is what happens in some TOS combats. If shield could be quickly moved around, it would reduce the significance of the ship maneuvers - many SFB combat results are determined by maneuvering to get to the enemy's downed shields, while keeping your intact shields between you and the enemy, so if you could change where the good shields are easily, it would undercut that emphasis on maneuver. It would also reduce the dilemma of whether to divert power to reinforce shields, versus power to engines, ECM or weapons...

You could of course decide you prefer shields to work differently and use house rules. There are all sorts of places you could set the balance, one end of the spectrum being SFB, and the other where there's just a pool of shield energy that applies everywhere, and all sorts of possible places in between, such as being able to shift X points from one shield to another per turn or impulse.

Quote from: RPGPundit;836283I don't recall about diverting power in the original series, but I definitely remember it in Next Generation.

In TOS they did divert power to shields sometimes, but it was a different thing from shield integrity, as it is in SFB. In SFB, each ship has six shields, one per hexside, which each have a strength, and then each turn, you can allocate points either to reinforce a specific shield for one turn, or to general reinforcement (which protects in all directions, but only at 1/2 strength). Shield integrity only recovers very slowly (mainly between battles).

Perhaps because the shield generators are dedicated to fore, aft, etc. and can't be rerouted, or perhaps when damage gets through that shield it means the generator is damaged or overloaded and thus can't be used? Are you seeking a rational explanation of make-believe technology? I don't have any others to offer. Maybe a Trek nerd who owns some of the make-believe manuals can tell us.

Quote from: Matt;837092Are you seeking a rational explanation of make-believe technology? I don't have any others to offer. Maybe a Trek nerd who owns some of the make-believe manuals can tell us.

You can't reroute the the crystal matter stream without inverting the vortex capacitors. If that happens your Jefferies tubes get all backed up until you recalibrate the plasma polarity. Nobody wants that.

Exactly.

Quote from: Spinachcat;835644The RPG/boardgame hybrid BATTLESTATIONS (http://www.battlestations.info/) is a good product to consider if you want to a good team tactics aboard a spaceship.

I was always curious about that game. It does seem to focus on the sort of activity I'd want to see in some RPG spaceship battles... each PC operating a certain facet of the attack/defense/maneuver.
How complex is it? Would it make a decent template to meld into a wider scifi RPG or does it already cover most anything you'd want to do outside of combat as well (I know there are a bunch of expansions for it)?

A & B. I like to have standard examples readily available, with the option to customize.

If I read the OP right I go for number 2 or 3. My first experience with ship to ship was 1st ed. Traveller which didn't have the power point sub-game. There was the thing where you had to allocate what programs were in the multi-ton computer memory but that's a different sub-game from what is proposed. High Guard got into the power point allocation and that seemed to inform MegaTraveller's development as well. At the time we tried to go along with that, but eventually (and certainty at this point in my life) I feel that path lead to madness for roleplaying (unless your concept is based on Scotty, in which case it leads to Romulan Ale).

Someone mentioned GURPS Space (3rd ed?) which I liked because it abstracted power, tonnage and space in what I felt was a callback to Traveller. When GURPS Vehicles came along my group adopted that model and it worked for a while but then became another MegaTraveller style trap.

Nowadays we go for the even more abstracted Stars Without Number model for RPGs. If I get the the power allocation minutia urge I play compy games like Space Engineers or Star Hammer.

Quote from: nezach;837126You can't reroute the the crystal matter stream without inverting the vortex capacitors. If that happens your Jefferies tubes get all backed up until you recalibrate the plasma polarity. Nobody wants that.

Maybe I'm being anachronistic, but you don't run into these issues with armor! :rant:

Quote from: Xavier Onassiss;837334Maybe I'm being anachronistic, but you don't run into these issues with armor! :rant:

Yeah, that's true, but hull plating offers a lot fewer interesting choices than power allocation. Or technobabble opportunities. Although Traveller made a spirited effort in that area.

Quote from: nezach;837602Yeah, that's true, but hull plating offers a lot fewer interesting choices than power allocation. Or technobabble opportunities. Although Traveller made a spirited effort in that area.

Providing more options can be a good thing, for a table top wargame. Allocating energy to shields, weapons, engines, etc. requires good decision-making and system mastery. For a wargame, that's a feature, not a bug, but it can take a fair bit of time out of each turn sequence.

On the other hand, if you're designing a space combat subsystem for an RPG, I've found that many players want to move things along quickly rather than bogged down with too many fiddly decisions. They just want to fly their damned ship and blow some shit up, thanks very much.

That's assuming they have any interest in space combat at all. Sometimes you'll just "lose" half the table during a space battle if your space combat rules look too much like a wargame -- they came here for an RPG, not a tactical simulation, so you'd better give them one.

So I've moved in the "RPG" direction and created a fast-paced system (for Savage Worlds) that gives everyone on the crew a number of basic combat options they can choose from without slowing things down. Every round, each crewmember chooses an action, and goes with it. Some actions have risks if they fail (engines and weapons shut down if pushed too hard), and some give bonuses to others (sensor locks aid weapons fire, etc.) The whole crew functions as a team in combat, so nobody is left out of the action.

Xavier, that's true, some players aren't into tactical simulations in RPGs, and many have never ever seen or never learned one, or never enjoyed one, and being a passenger during ship combat can mean nothing to do but hope you don't die. There are many players and groups who naturally don't want that.

However, some players (like me) want tactical simulations in their RPGs. I started gaming with The Fantasy Trip (which has hex-based tactical combat) and wargames including Star Fleet Battles. In general, I'd rather be a helpless passenger helplessly watching a detailed tactical spaceship simulation, than be in a game without a tactical combat system (though I'd play a space marine game if there was an interesting tactical system for personal combat. (I even have a hard time being interested in GURPS games where the GM doesn't use maps for combat.)

So as always, different players are interested in different things. But I think (and in my experience) detailed space combat IS generally much less likely to be interesting to a group of players than detailed personal combat, because players and their characters are naturally less involved in the outcome, since the situations, details and outcomes are mainly about the ships. It could involve the characters more if the situations weren't about maneuvering and destroying entire ships, but more about boarding and moving about the ship and maybe working with ship layouts and systems that effect the people aboard (doors, lights, air, artificial gravity). Or if the players are all captains or pilots or tactical officers.

I like a good wargame, but not necessarily in my RPGs.

Quote from: Xavier Onassiss;837634So I've moved in the "RPG" direction and created a fast-paced system (for Savage Worlds) that gives everyone on the crew a number of basic combat options they can choose from without slowing things down. Every round, each crewmember chooses an action, and goes with it. Some actions have risks if they fail (engines and weapons shut down if pushed too hard), and some give bonuses to others (sensor locks aid weapons fire, etc.) The whole crew functions as a team in combat, so nobody is left out of the action.

I mentioned previously that I am generally a more "fast paced system" type of guy nowadays. I'm all for the abstraction of the fiddly power allocation game that can take place in tabletop or computer games myself.

Having the option for shields doesn't mean that you have to incorporate all that noise into a RPG. It can just be another abstracted choice for the players to choose from. Do they choose direct power to get a +1 to agility and hope the pilot makes his dodge roll or do they boost the shields and withstand the next pirate salvo?

Quote from: nezach;838535I mentioned previously that I am generally a more "fast paced system" type of guy nowadays. I'm all for the abstraction of the fiddly power allocation game that can take place in tabletop or computer games myself.

Having the option for shields doesn't mean that you have to incorporate all that noise into a RPG. It can just be another abstracted choice for the players to choose from. Do they choose direct power to get a +1 to agility and hope the pilot makes his dodge roll or do they boost the shields and withstand the next pirate salvo?

+1 :cool: