My secondary gaming group has decided they want me to run a D20Future game, specifically with spaceships and such. I said I'd run it, but I'd have to look for a better way to do space combat.
Does anyone know of a better space combat system (maybe even a Star Wars system?) that I can use with D20Future? I want this game to actually be enjoyable for the players and myself, so the ones in the book won't do. :P
I'd like to work in something from the vehicle combat system - turn numbers and speed categories. Stuff like that. Maybe the ship's size class (medium, heavy, etc) will be the deciding factor. While that'd feel a bit like the Star Wars system, it can hopefully be introduced in a rules-light manner.
Acceleration: In outer space, there is nothing universally present to stop an object from moving, or accelerating in one direction. Because of this, spaceships do not have a "speed", but an acceleration rate. Most have three modes of forward acceleration, usually three reverse, and usually one for port and starboard (and upward and downward, if you want a spherical battle) travel. Some spacecraft are equipped with Afterburners, which allow for even faster acceleration. The details on this matter are explained below.
Acceleration speeds
Maneuvering speed: The distance at which a craft can accelerate in one turn without maneuvering and attack penalties. This is the speed normal side-mounted thrusters are capable of accelerating at.
Cruising speed: A quicker form of acceleration that allows for larger speed gain than Maneuvering speed, but causes any piloting checks or attack rolls to be made at a -4. Cruising Speed acceleration is normally double Maneuvering speed. Fighters tend to have side-mounted thrusters capable of this accelerating speed.
Full Throttle: The quickest form of acceleration on most normal civilian craft, and all ships larger than Light class, Full Throttle acceleration is double Cruising speed. Piloting checks and attack rolls made for the ship while it is in full throttle are rolled at a -8. This is the highest speed a reverse thruster can accelerate (or decelerate, as the case may be) at.
Afterburning: Only ships with afterburners (which are normally only mounted on fighter craft and sometimes light combat craft) can, in short bursts, inject their engines with incredible amounts of fuel. This inefficient mode of acceleration is usually only reserved for combat, as it consumes too much fuel for ordinary travel. The heat caused by the afterburners can also cause damage to the ship if used for longer than three rounds consecutively. Once The afterburners are disengaged, they must cool for as many rounds as they were used in order to return to normal temperature and not risk damage during further use.
Afterburning ships accelerate at double their cruising speed. Attacking accuracy becomes pitiful while afterburning, and maneuvering effectively is extremely difficult. All attack rolls and piloting checks for the ship are rolled at a -16 while afterburning.
Drifting: When a ship stops accelerating, it does not slow down, it continues to drift in the direction it was going, at the same speed it was going before. Since the ship is not accelerating, targeting systems are able to function normally and attack rolls take no penalty. A ship can make a full attack action at any point while drifting, so long, of course, as it does not take any other actions (except free actions) during the round.
Now you just need some reasonable maneuvering speeds and you've got a decent movement system... Needs a large board, though.
As for effects of flat-out speed on accuracy... I'd use the GM's best friend (+/-2) for that... or the GM's best friend's big brothers (+/-4 or +/-8).
If I ever run some starship combat, which might be possible due to my ever growing Starcraft arsenal, I'll probably be using this.
Kudoes!
Stealing from the driving rules:
Kay, here are defense modifiers for acceleration (stolen straight from the driving rules):
Drifting/Maneuvering speed: +0
Cruising: +1
Full Throttle: +2
Afterburning: +4
As for relative velocity difference, how about this: if the target is moving faster than the first range increment on the weapon you're firing, then he gains a +1 to defense. Relative velocity equal to twice your range increment? +2 defense. Double that? +4 defense. And double that (8Xincrement)? +8.
If he's moving that friggin' fast, he'll probably be outside your maximum range increment before you can hit him, anyway.
... Mines probably have an inverse bonus, though.
Edit: Because I can...
Mines: For every 500ft of velocity a ship is traveling, the Piloting DC to reduce Mine damage to half increases by +1.
Missiles: Missiles have no range increment save for your system's sensors. Once locked on, a ship can only escape a missile through evasive actions or decoys. Missiles always use afterburner acceleration rate (unless they are used in atmosphere, see below), though they take no penalties for their own acceleration, and suffer no penalty to attack rolls against fast-moving targets (though acceleration speed still applies).
Standard missiles afterburn time-and-a-half as fast as average fighters of the current Progress Level.
Atmospheric Flight and Combat:
Ships cannot travel at speeds greater than their highest acceleration rate while in atmospheric flight. Acceleration beyond these speeds risks burning the ship apart.
Likewise, weapons fired in atmosphere have a greatly reduced range. Air and dust particles reduce LASER potency, and the same particles create intense friction for solid projectiles. The first range increment for a weapon designed for space becomes its final. Re-arrange all other range increments accordingly.
Projectile weapons fired in atmosphere deal half their normal damage as fire damage instead their normal damage type.
Missiles fired in atmosphere move using the same rules as ships.
Modifying Mecha Weapons for Space Combat
Preparing a Mecha for space combat requires increasing it's weapon range incredibly. Projectile weapons are enhanced this way by utilizing railgun technology (whether magnetic, or gravitic). LASERs are powered up and focused out to farther points. Plasma weapons are fired as shells, which explode on contact with the enemy and unleash their destructive power.
Mecha-mounted area-effect weapons with the mecha as the center of the area are generally not useful for space combat, though grappling mecha have used them to great effect.
Mecha weapons modified for space combat treat their furthest normal range increment as their first (during space combat), and set all other range increments accordingly.
Projectile weapons modified in this way deal half their normal damage as fire damage instead their normal damage type.
Space Modification PDC modifier: +6
as for combat rules i just can't stomach the idea of space combat its dull as dish water just like vehicle combat. d20 mechanics just can't handle the scale properly.
it comes down to 1 player rolling a pilot check versus the npc while the rest of the party try and find something interesting to do. like roll sensor checks or try and repair stuff.
if you could find a way of scaling defence, hit points, weapon damage etc etc it may be worth a look.
oh yeah and get a big grid like the size of your house or most ships will never be on the grid for more then a turn
Cruising and Full Throttle speeds would turn the fight into a chase scene, following something similar to the chase scene rules, if used for a certain number of rounds or exit the battle grid... I'll figure it out.
Afterburners would probably see the most use giving fighters that well needed boost to counteract their current velocity and bring them closer to the enemy in the same turn.
What did you mean by scaling? Up or down, and hasn't someone already done that? :P
TheRealOrion -- If no one else feels so inclined, I'll work on this, too... Just be sure to remind me if it looks like I forgot.
Here's a thought, though: How about not especially further-penalizing characters not proficient zero-G combat, and instead allowing people who take Zero-G combat to make use of better zero-G tactics (read Ender's Game), possibly through different feats with it as a prereq?
While other guys are suffering from space sickness, and the penalties entitled there, you're jumping, sliding and shoving to everywhere they don't want you to be.
For realistic space combat there are a number of factors in play.
1. Starships are usually far beyond visual range requiring advanced sensors and possibly telescopes/cameras to see each other. Maneuvering between starships at these ranges is usually to gain a better attack or defensive position. Electronic warfare and stealth techniques will be heavily employed to deny an opponent the ability to level decent attacks while providing one's own ship better attack advantage.
2. When Starships reach tactical scales (d20 Future) this is because either one ship is allowing the other to approach willingly or because it is disabled, or because one ship is traveling at a much higher velocity and basically does a flyby.
3. Various types of weapons at extreme ranges will have radically different uses from basic tactical combat. Projectile weapons travel in a linear direction at a fixed velocity, past a certain range and any starship regardless of size can easily evade projectile fire, but huge formations of projectiles can force the other ship into a less advantageous postion when it acts to evade. Beam weapons lose coherence over distance, but within the coherent range they hit instantly, this usually demands ships reach closer ranges to use beam weapons. Missiles have virtually unlimited range as they can be launched as projectiles and when they get close enough go active and actively attack the target. Mines are pretty dumb, but if another ship is hell bent on overtaking you a spread of mines in their path will rock their world.
To simulate realistic space combat it would suggest either using an abstract combat system that only really cares about range and relative vectors between starships, or a MUCH larger grid scale. In either case the thrill of fighter combat really gets lost as ships are moving in a much more set-piece fashion. Tactical combat can still work as written but does need a few modest tweeks.
Option 1: I would suggest describing the longer range combat as the situation set-up for the tactical combat. Such as: "Your ship came under fire today and had its main engines knocked out as well as sustaining moderate damage. While attempting to make repairs the attacking ship sends you a signal demanding that you power down your defenses and prepare to be boarded. With your main engines out all you can do is watch as the enemy ship comes into view. You still have maneuvering thrusters and weapons and defenses are still functional, do you try and fight it out or let the enemy ship board you?" This allows the players to either enter tactical combat (rules as written) or they can let the hostile ship try and board them thus allowing for a character scale ship-board combat opportunity, their choice.
Option 2: Play out the longer range combat. This can be accomplished either by using a larger grid scale (say 1,000 miles per square) fought at cruising speeds and probably a longer time scale (minutes or hours). Or long range combat can be resolved using something more abstract. I think the larger grid scale is self-evident and starships that enter the same square can move to tactical scale combat (500-foot squares) for say 5-10 rounds at which point the ships drift far enough away that they return to the larger grid scale.
An abstract system can play in discreet turns that account for movement, attack, and defense options that the players make. Each turn of long range combat is assumed equal to 10 rounds of tactical combat.
Movement: at the start of each turn each starship chooses an opponent (if only 2 starships this is easy) and decides if they want to close or escape from their opponent. A starship can only choose an opponent to maneuver against if their sensors detect the other starship. Starships that both choose to close have their velocity, direction, and distance (range) become more closely matched. Starships that both choose to escape have their range become further apart. When one starship chooses to close and the other escape the pilots make an opposed pilot check, the winner has their option win and selects the new range condition. Lastly if one starship is maneuvering against a starship that isn't opposing them that starship is able to freely decide change in range. A change in range can only be made by one category at a time (see below).
Range: Starships are in one of five abstract range conditions: Tactical, Short, Long, Extreme, Detected. At tactical range starships are engaged in tactical combat (normal combat rules) with ships starting at a range of 10 squares (5,000 feet) from each other; they are assumed to be traveling at the same velocity and direction from one another. At short range all of a starship's weapons can effectively be used but are considered to be working at 10 range increments (-20 to attack with projectile and beam weapons). At long range a starship can only use projectile and missile weapons, this is beyond beam range. At extreme range a starship can really only effectively use missile weapons. And at detected range a starship can see another starship but lacks the means to do anything. Beyond this starships are completely disengaged.
Attack options: Each starship then takes turns declaring their attacks. A starship can only attack if its sensors detect the other ship.
TACTICAL range starships engage in tactical combat. Starships engaged in tactical combat cannot maneuver against ships at range allowing those ships free movement against the ships in tactical combat.
SHORT range a starship may make attacks with its weapons as if at 10 range increments; and deploy mines, an opponent that chooses to evade the mines causes the ships to become one range term further apart, otherwise one mine is assumed to strike and damage the opponent ship.
LONG range a starship may make conditioning projectile weapon attacks, if the defender chooses to evade then at the end of the turn the ships become one range term closer; missiles may be used to attack as normal.
EXTREME range a starship can only launch missile attacks. And at dection range no attacks are possible, though ships can maneuver against one another.
DETECT range a starship can only maneuver against another starship.
Defense Options: A starship is able to take defensive measures when attacked and attempt to break sensor contact by the hostile starship(s) at short or longer ranges. At tactical range starships fight using tactical rules. A starship can always defend itself even if it can't detect the other starship(s).
EVADE, a starship can attempt to evade projectile attacks made from long range, this is instantly successful, but causes the other starship to become closer by one range term at the end of the turn.
ESCAPE, a starship can ignore projectile attacks made from long range and simply run, this keeps range the same but now the pilot must make a reflex save (DC 15), success means nothing hits, the number of points of failure are the number of hits the attacker scores.
MISSILE DEFENSE, a starship is able to use its point defense and anti-missile measures as normal against missile attacks.
ELECTRONIC WARFARE, a starship can use any EW systems to try and break sensor contact with one enemy each turn. This requires both sensor operators to make opposed computer checks, if the defender succeeds then the attacker immediately loses sensor contact and must re-establish, if the attacker succeeds then sensor contact is retained. The defender does not have to have to detect the other starship.
SENSOR SCANNING, a starship uses its sensors to detect a starship that it currently does not have sensor contact. This is a simple computer use check (DC 10 + the other ship's EW bonuses).
LAUNCH CARRIED SHIPS, a starship that carries other ships can launch these, these ships travel along side the launching ship until the start of the next turn when they can act independently.
Tactical combat adjustments: Starships entering tactical combat are assumed to 1) detect each other and 2) are traveling in the same direction and velocity. All opposed ships start at 10 500-foot squares away from each other, while friendly ships can start at any range next to each other. A minimum 20x20 square battle grid would probably be appropriate with ships starting about 5 squares away from the center.
TACTICAL SPEED: Starship tactical speed is the ability of the ships to maneuver against each other, thus smaller ships have a higher speed value relative to larger ships. Base tactical speed for starship size classes: Ultralight 6 squares (3,000 feet); Light 5 squares (2,500 feet); Mediumweight 4 squares (2,000 feet); Heavy 3 squares (1,500 feet); and Superheavy 2 squares (1,000 feet). Better engines can provide speed bonuses.
MANEUVERING: Since the starships are acting relative to each other they can freely move and change facing per rules as written. Any starship that leaves the defined battle area returns to long range combat and starts at short range and has free movement against ships engaged in tactical combat. All starships can pass through squares occupied by any other starship (friend or foe) but must end its movement completely in unoccupied squares, this simulates flying over or under another starship.
ATTACK PENALTY: Starships of a larger size category attacking starships of a smaller size category do so with a -20 attack penalty in addition to range increment penalties. Only autofire and point-defense systems ignore this penalty. So a Superheavy Battleship attacking an Ultralight Fighter takes a -20 attack penalty to do so. This attack penalty also applies to long range combat.
WEAPON SCALE: Starship weapons do greater amounts of damage depending on the size of the starship. Ultralight and Light starships use standard weapon damage scales. Mediumweight starships do 2x damage per weapon. Heavy starships do 4x damage per weapon. And Superheavy starships do 8x damage per weapon. These scales also apply to long range combat.
FIGHTERS: Starships of Gargantuan or smaller size can perform special fighter maneuvers. These are Defend, Roll, Bug, and Surge (see next entries).
DEFEND: Fighter maneuver; with at least one weapon set to autofire, at the start of its turn the fighter can declare it is using its weapons and maneuverabilty to function as if it had a point defense system when one isn't otherwise installed. The fighter can only move by taking a 500-foot shift and it recieves a +4 bonus to defense. The fighter cannot otherwise attack normally, and this maneuver ends at the start of the fighter's next turn.
ROLL: Fighter maneuver; the fighter may at any time between the end of its turn and the start of its next turn choose to roll out of one attack delivered against it, this causes that attack to automatically miss. This maneuver cannot evade missile attacks and once taken no other defensive maneuver can be attempted.
BUG: Fighter maneuver; the fighter may at any time between the end of its turn and the start of its next turn choose to evade one missile fired against it, this causes the missile to automatically miss. This maneuver cannot evade anything but missile attacks and once taken no other defensive maneuver can be attempted.
SURGE: Fighter maneuver; at the start of its turn a fighter may declare a surge, this is an instantaneous high velocity speed boost. The fighter moves at 4x speed and can only travel in a strait line and cannot avoid other starships but can stop movement at any time. A fighter that surges is ignores any point defense attacks that it triggers by moving through threatened spaces. A fighter can only attack other starships that are along its line of movement.
(There are probably a few other obvious adjustments that I am missing here given the late hour that I am writing this.)
This is a bit of a shoehorn, but this keeps most starship combat in the realm of the fluid abstract system. For sake of keeping track of where everyone is relative to each other a grid can be used with each square of distance relating to a range level. For single ship combat it isn't needed, but with multiple ships it helps to keep track of the action.
TACTICAL: ships share a common square on the abstract grid, these enter tactical combat. After 10 rounds all ships still in abstract move and any that enter the tactical range join tactical combat if it is still ongoing.
SHORT: ships that are in adjacent squares but do not share a square in common.
LONG: ships that are two squares away from each other.
EXTREME: ships that are three squares away from each other.
DETECTED: ships that are four squares away from each other, beyond this these ships are no longer detected and leave combat.
Character Actions: Each character can then act aboard their starship to keep it in fighting shape either by flying (pilot), detecting/EW (sensor operator), firing weapons (gunner), directing (commander), repairing/reconfiguring (engineer), or aiding (co-pilot). Each turn has the various characters choose to perform a certain action. This means that it isn't just the pilot's show when engaged in combat. It also means that a starship can simultaneously perform several actions such as maneuvering, attacking, defending, and fixing because each character is responsible for doing one of those things.
This looks like a lot, but in practice it boils starship combat down into something quick and manageable.
Major points: there ain't no stealth in space, and heat radiation is a major issue.
Given an appropriate power source, lasers have unlimited ammo, but they'll fry the ship with waste heat unless you find some way to keep them cool. Some deal with this by building inside a comet and using ice as a heat-sink; if you want to be able to maneuver, you'll need something more like radiators.
Radiators are huge, hot, cannot be armored without destroying their function, and generally couldn't be better targets if you painted a bull's eye on them, so you'll want to keep them out of the way of enemy fire. Make them thin and flexible so you can withdraw them into some kind of armored case. Of course, that means they can't actually radiate while you're getting shot at.
So, the typical space battle starts when all involved combatants spot each other, almost invariably at extreme distance, far beyond anyone's effective weapon range. Depending on how soon they recognize each other as hostile, there may be an exchange of pleasantries or guided missiles. Time to shine for the point-defense gunner, or the diplomat if you've got one.
Distance closes, both sides try various tricky maneuvers, trying to anticipate the other's movements (and thereby hit with a kinetic weapon) or use the communication link to hack the other side's computer, or run the defense end of same. Various outriders are deployed, if available, both to provide supplementary targeting data and to draw fire away from the main ship.
Ships close to energy-weapon range. Radiators withdrawn, so the clock is ticking. Lase your enemy's critical systems, while you jink and tumble to prevent them from "doing unto others." Eventually, somebody takes a hit somewhere important, or starts to worry about heatstroke, so the radiators come back out to signal surrender.
Of course, there's no way to be sure they won't just cool off, slap a patch on it, and chase after you as soon as your back is turned, so the only way for a ship-to-ship battle to end decisively (short of the total destruction or one or both sides) is to send a boarding party to secure the losing ship from the inside.
There are a few critical numbers for every ship. Hardness, HP, and maneuverability are already covered. Thrust (measured in meters per second per second) is how many G's of acceleration the ship's engine can produce. No directional stuff; it's easy enough to spin around and point the main engine whichever way you want to go. Delta-V (measured in meters per second) is how much the ship can change it's speed before refueling. Endurance is how long (measured in rounds) the ship can have it's radiators safely retracted before the power core overheats. Energy weapons speed up the clock with every shot; venting coolant buys time, but coolant is in limited supply. Overheating deals 1d6 fire damage to the ship (and possibly everyone onboard) on the first round, 2d6 the second round, 3d6 the third, and so on, with no upper limit.
Cinanev -- That's a lot to reply to, but from what I think I got out of it, it sounds like it'll work well.
Strange_Person -- This sounds very cool (though kind of battletech-ish). I think that, if LASERs and other beam weapons are going to have an overheat effect on enemies, they should do less damage in the short run than railguns and the like.
Just a thought.
No, lasers have an overheat effect on the user, to balance their unlimited ammo.
Ohhhhh, that makes sense as well. I was thinking along the lines of the "flamer" weapon from battletech, which gives the user 1 heat point, and the recipient 5.
Your idea makes more sense, though.
Cyberdave -- Is there anywhere I can find the system without buying the book? I understand that you like the whole system very much, but I don't much like all the simplified rules it introduces into normal play.
If I do have to buy it, is the book reverse-engineer-able? There could be some stuff I actually like in the book, aside from the space combat engine, and might import into my modern/3.5D&D games.
I originally bought the book for the sake of reverse engineering it to d20 Modern. My findings were as follows: the system is not actually simplified, its made more elegant. That is to say, all of the rules are streamlined into a single coherent rule set without any strange sub-sets of rules that work in a mechanically different way from everything else. In other words, you know how the major problem of d20 Future is that all of the various mechanics are different? Player mechanics, robot mechanics, vehicle mechanics, starship mechanics... its all streamlined. Modifier tables have been simplified... but there is still an equal amount of complexity in potential types of modifiers (concealment, improved concealment, cover, improved cover, total cover, etc.). Finally, the condition rules were streamlined into a single condition track. The end result in play is not simplification, but ease of use. The game actually features combat that is a lot more tactical, and character creation that is a lot more varied and complex, than d20 Modern has ever been.
That being said, if you are dead set on sticking with d20 Modern and its mechanics, you might still find aspects of the book useful. There are certainly some concepts that you can swing from one game to the other without too much work.
However (and you are not going to like hearing this), if you want starship rules, its not Star Wars Saga the core rulebook you want to buy, its Starships of the Galaxy. Starships of the Galaxy is the Starship rulebook for Saga. While it can largely be used stand alone, it has a couple concepts that you might not get without the Saga core rulebook.
I don't know. For what its worth, I recommend both books. I honestly think that they are mechanically far superior to the d20 Modern line (and god I hate saying that). Something nice I found though, my d20 Modern books convert very nicely into Saga mechanics. The Helix Warrior/Dreadnaught got converted into a single Saga prestige class. The same happened with a number of other d20 Future advanced classes. Cyberscape is almost usable as is (for Saga). Honestly, I would not be able to build my Land of Nod setting without both the Saga book, and my Modern books... so I'm happy that at least nothing has become dead shelf space.
The big thing that erks me the most about Saga, is that they got rid of skillpoints. I'm one of those weird people who prefers the complexity of the skill system in 3.x to what I've heard about Saga (class skills are automatically equal to your level, and cross-class are equal to half.)
Thanks for the advice.
Cyberdave, how well do you think using the Mecha-creation system for starships would work?
I played with using the d20 Future mecha rules for starship creation, but was never fully happy with the results. Playing around with what I liked, and trying to get it to work, is where a lot of my house rules came from.
Which Saga book were you looking at? Like I said, the core rulebook for Saga really does not have very many starship rules in it. The Starships of the Galaxy book does have rules for both modifying starships, and to some extent, building your own. It also has rules (IE: the prices and slot costs) for starship weapons. Like I said in my last post, if you are getting the Saga system for starship rules, you are going to need both the core book and the Starships of the Galaxy book (which has the vast majority of the starship rules inside it).
The rules for building your own starship, even in Starships of the Galaxy, are a bit lackluster. They are sort of designed with player balance in mind, so sometimes there are ships in the codex that could not be built using their rules. The rules are very good for modifying existing starships however. I find that their ship codex (in that book) is very extensive, and its very easy to build ships for your games/setting by picking a Star Wars ship that largely fits your design specifications, and then modifying it slightly to suite your needs. Honestly, the Saga starship rules (mostly found in Starships of the Galaxy) are pretty much the best d20 starship rules I have used/seen to date.
That being said, and knowing me, I've still created some house rules for the Saga starship system that I feel makes the system run better as a whole, or at least, more militaristic and tactical (which is to my liking). You can find my house rules inside my Land of Nod setting (there is a link in the first post of that setting). However, I really didn't need many house rules for Saga. I found 1 page to 1 and 1/2 pages were more than enough. If you know me, and you have seen what I felt I needed to do to make the Future system playable, that says something.
Anyways, if you do decide to go with the Saga system, and you need any help after reading the Starships of the Galaxy book, shoot your questions my way. I would be happy to help. Also, you can look up some of the starships I have adapted for my setting in the Land of Nod link as well (links to specific starship designs and flavor text are also found in the first post of that setting).
I was actually talking about the d20Future Mecha creation system. Guardian's of the Order is a Star Wars book, yes?
No.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guardians_of_Order