Rules For Spaceship Combat (4E) [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 08:12 PM

Statting out is correct; use the 4e mechanics to your advantage.

AC is determined by Armor (for Heavy Craft) or Armor + Pilot DEX/INT (for Light Craft), and Dodge (Reflex), Sensor (Willpower), and Body (Fortitude) are calculated as normal (with special "Shield" armor that gives bonuses to Dodge). Different ships can give different inherent bonuses to each Defense. Each ship has an array of Powers which are either always available (at will), require a cool down after firing (Encounter; perhaps you can use the Recharge mechanic too), and one that requires a major resupply to fire again (Daily).

Fight on a combat grid as normal (3D is just too hard!) with terrain and status effects as normal.

If you really want to get fancy, you can make the ships work like classes, in that they can be "leveled up" in space combat with new Feats (to reflect the pilots getting better with their ship) or new Powers (from tinkering with the ships and getting new gear). The stats used for using powers depends on the weapon tech being used, and so on.

Of course, this presumes that Space Combat will be a major part of your game. You can work out a much less complicated situation if space combat is not that important.

black dragoon

2008-09-21, 08:19 PM

Drat. Wait you mean there is no conversion system to be had?!:smallfrown:
That is insane. THey really want to kill us off I guess.

Oslecamo

2008-09-21, 08:23 PM

Beleriphon

2008-09-21, 08:27 PM

I'm going to suggeste checking out the Star Wars Saga Edition rules. They have space ship combat, and most the rules are similar enough to D&D4E that you can fill in the blanks, or make the necessary changes without too much trouble.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 08:29 PM

It also depends on what type of spaceship combat that you like.

Could you provide the spaceship kind of battle you would like more to represent?

The simplest way is simply making all ships count as characters with lots of reflavoring, with powers being the diferent weapons available and all, but I think that's a little cheap.

Nah, you don't need to go whole hog - and the class system works very well for ship-to-ship combat, IMHO.
Light Fighter Craft = Strikers (highly maneuverable, precision weaponry)
Heavy Fighter Craft = Defenders (heavily armored, brute force weaponry)

You probably won't have any Leaders or Controllers in the scrum, but you might want to allow a larger Base Craft to provide buffs from afar; it'll be best for the game if these large crafts aren't able to really defend themselves without Fighter Craft support.

Recaiden

2008-09-21, 08:31 PM

I suggest you do have rules for character vs. ship combat, because the players will try something crazy. Other than that, stat blocks for ships is the way to go.

Oslecamo

2008-09-21, 08:36 PM

You probably won't have any Leaders or Controllers in the scrum, but you might want to allow a larger Base Craft to provide buffs from afar; it'll be best for the game if these large crafts aren't able to really defend themselves without Fighter Craft support.

Leaders would be comunication/radar ships helping the others better maneuver.

Controlers would be the experimental ships with crazy weapons like EMP rays(sleep) and big area bombs.

Do remember, 4e makes leaders almost indispensable. If there isn't an repairbot, player's ships will go down. Fast.

And I suport there being player to ship combat. Just give a bigger size for the ships and make their weapons deal proportianilly more damage and also have more HP.

And heck, I may join that campaign.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 08:38 PM

Leaders would be comunication/radar ships helping the others better maneuver.

Controlers would be the experimental ships with crazy weapons like EMP rays(sleep) and big area bombs.

Do remember, 4e makes leaders almost indispensable. If there isn't an repairbot, player's ships will go down. Fast.

Nah, you just give the PC ships better self-repair and they'll be fine. The reason why I didn't include Controllers & Leaders, is because I had trouble envisioning them as one-man crafts... though you could do them like that too.

But you were right originally - a lot depends on what Leliel is looking for in space combat.

Oslecamo

2008-09-21, 08:45 PM

Nah, you just give the PC ships better self-repair and they'll be fine. The reason why I didn't include Controllers & Leaders, is because I had trouble envisioning them as one-man crafts... though you could do them like that too.

The problem is precisely with how much "better self repair" is enough. The game assumes you have a leader patching people up, and is pretty well balanced at that.

As for being one man crafts, well, actually none of the ships should be. Even fighters usually take two pilots for better and worst, and heavy defenders would certainly have more than a single man piloting them.

The extra crew would be considered part of the ship, for simplicity's sake. The player is the leader of the ship, and the crew suports him.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 09:10 PM

The problem is precisely with how much "better self repair" is enough. The game assumes you have a leader patching people up, and is pretty well balanced at that.

As for being one man crafts, well, actually none of the ships should be. Even fighters usually take two pilots for better and worst, and heavy defenders would certainly have more than a single man piloting them.

The extra crew would be considered part of the ship, for simplicity's sake. The player is the leader of the ship, and the crew suports him.

Nah, I think you can make the case for one-man fighters. Heck, they're a staple of nearly every Space Opera Anime I can think of. Plus, nowadays we can just assume Expert Systems take care of most of the "hard" stuff in piloting in space.
I think we're going for a pretty soft Sci-Fi setting here. :smalltongue:

As for "how much extra healing" I'd say probably 2 surges an Encounter would be enough. Each Leader only has a 2/Encounter Surge ability that is supposed to cover everyone and himself, and every PC has a single surge of their own, so giving everyone 2 Second Winds an Encounter will probably be fine. Maybe 3 if you really want to buff the ships.

I like the idea of ships-as-classes. Keep up with the Outlaw Star feel and you can even give them melee & ranged weapons too! :smallbiggrin:

Beleriphon

2008-09-21, 09:52 PM

There's always the option of little robot buddies akin to R2-D2 fixing the ship up as it goes along.

Yakk

2008-09-21, 10:03 PM

Quick Spaceship Rules
Spaceships have the following core statistics:
Scale: Number
Defenses: AC: ## Reflexes: ## Fortitude: ## Will: ##
Hull Points: ##
Shield Points: ## Recharges: ##@## per day
Sensors: ##
Initiative: ##

----

Spaceships exist on a scale larger than people. People are scale 0, a fighter is scale 1, a destroyer is scale 2, a cruiser is scale 3, and a battleship/carrier is scale 4.

You get a +10 bonus to hit something 1 or more scales larger than you, and a -10 penalty to hit things for each scale smaller then you they are, when targeting Reflex or AC. You take a -10 penalty for each scale when targetting Will or Fortitude for each scale larger than you. You get a +10 bonus to Fortitude based attacks for each scale smaller than you your target is.

When you damage something higher scale than you, you deal 1/10 (rounded down) damage for each scale (2 scales = 1/100th, etc).

When you damage something smaller scale than you, you deal 10x damage for each scale (2 scales = 100x, etc).

However, you can target the components of a larger ship.

Targetting ship components is like targeting something 2 scales smaller than the ship they are on. Each component has the shields, hull and defenses of the full ship, and damage to the component causes no direct damage to the full ship. If the full ship uses a shield recharge, all component shields are fully recharged.

If you 'destroy' a component, the ship takes a specific negative effect.

Standard components:
Shield Generator: No shield recharges, and damage to shields is doubled (save ends).
Weapons: Half damage on all attacks, and -5 penalty to hit (save ends)
Drives: Target is slowed, and takes a -5 penalty to reflexes (save ends)
Power Generators: Double Hull. Target is dazed (save ends).
Command and Control: Double Shields. Target is stunned (save ends).
Life Support: -5 penalty to will defense (save ends).

----

This lets Fighters engage a Carrier in a way that actually hurts the carrier, but isn't "I shot it and the battleship died".

----

Smaller ships generally move faster than larger ships, with some exception. Large ships generally have a huge range advantage over small ships -- except, the effective engage range on smaller ships is bounded by twice the range of the smaller ship.

This means that standard space warfare tactics is to send your lighter ships forward to screen your heavies,
----

Ships are divided into roles. Ship roles include:
Interceptor -- moves fast, decent damage, not that tough
Ordinance -- lightly armored, long-range weaponry
Escort -- close in point defense
Stealth -- ambush tactics
Heavy -- Bulkier -- easier to hit, more HP/SP, less accurate, bigger guns
Flak -- Makes the situation more annoying for the enemy
Leader -- subtype. Aids allies with slides and boosts.

Interceptor: 14+Level AC, 14+Level Reflex, 10+Level Fort, 12+Level Will
10+4/Level shields, 5+3/Level Hull
4+Level attacks-vs AC, 2+Level attacks-vs-other

Ordinance: 12+Level AC, 10+Level Reflex, 12+Level Fortitude, 14+Level Will
8+3/Level shields, 4+2/Level Hull
5+Level attacks-vs AC, 3+Level attacks-vs-other
Extra damage

Escort: 16+Level AC, 12+Level Reflex, 12+Level Fortitude, 12+Level Will
10+4/Level shields, 8+4/Level Hull
6+Level attacks-vs AC, 4+Level attacks-vs-other
Low damage, but mark-like abilities

Stealth: 14+Level AC, 12+Level other defenses
8+3/Level shields, 5+3/Level Hull
4+Level attacks-vs AC, 2+Level attacks-vs other

Heavy: 10+Level AC, 10+Level Reflex, 14+Level Fortitude, 12+Level Will
12+5/Level shields, 12+5/Level Hull
2+Level attacks vs AC, Level attacks vs Other
High damage
May make only 1 move action per turn. Changing direction requires a standard action.

Flak: 14+Level AC, 12+Level Reflex 12+Level Fortitude 12+Level Will
10+4/Level shields, 5+3/Level Hull
4+Level attacks-vs AC, 3+Level attacks-vs other
No penalty to hit for area attacks.

----

Ie, these are renamed versions of the DMG monster roles, mostly.

----

For a PC ship, you'll need to treat it like an item or something that modifies the PC's stats.

----

This a good starting point?

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 10:18 PM

Nice!

The scaling mechanisms look pretty good, and we can fluff the "Save Ends" from some sort of auto-repair. I presume that Shield Points are HP you can regen via "surges" while Hull Points require actual repair?

Also, for my own happiness, I'd rename "Leader" to "Command" so that you can have Command-Class Interceptors (that are painted red :smallwink:).

Now we need speeds, though. I figure we can keep using Hex speeds for tactical movement, so Interceptors Move 7, while most other ships Move 6. Heavies move 5.

Hmm... range will become an issue for outsized ship combat if we stick to standard maps - stupid space being so large...

Asbestos

2008-09-21, 10:21 PM

Magitech Space Pirate

I think we're moving TOO much into sci-fi and too far away from the magic. Possibly ships can allow pilots to channel the divine/arcane through some section of the ship? That'd make leader/controller ships a little easier I think.
"Does that thing have a giant hammer and anvil painted on it? Why is it glowing? AHH! I'm hit!"

Beleriphon

2008-09-21, 10:23 PM

Hmm... range will become an issue for outsized ship combat if we stick to standard maps - stupid space being so large...

Use the Saga system. Range it in squares, or grids or whatever. Leaves the specifics vauge. A single "grid" could be 500m, or it could be 500km depending on where the weapons are zeroed to at that specific time. This way it leaves fast ships fast, and big slow cruisers big slow and cruisery, but vague enough to not be a problem when you need to scale things to up close and personal broadsides.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 10:36 PM

I think we're moving TOO much into sci-fi and too far away from the magic. Possibly ships can allow pilots to channel the divine/arcane through some section of the ship? That'd make leader/controller ships a little easier I think.
"Does that thing have a giant hammer and anvil painted on it? Why is it glowing? AHH! I'm hit!"

Meh, we haven't even gotten to how PCs move around. We'll get our Lightning Cannons and Heat-Seeking Magic Missiles in a bit :smalltongue:

Though you might be onto something. Perhaps ships really are tied to the classes: martial ships have the standard guns & missiles, but other power sources can operate real magitek stuff, like Lightning Cannons!

So there might be Warlock Ships, Wizard Ships, Paladin Ships and Cleric Ships, along with the more standard classes.

Ascension

2008-09-21, 10:59 PM

I don't really know 4E, but I've just got to say that the rogue ship needs a cloaking device.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-21, 11:42 PM

I don't really know 4E, but I've just got to say that the rogue ship needs a cloaking device.

No, no, the Warlock ship gets a cloaking device. It works very well, y'see:

Warlocks: Advanced Stealth Ships. They use the Tao to hide from conventional sensors and bizarre Hex Matrices to attack the Leyline Pattern of enemy ships.

Rogues: Typically pilots of Interceptors and Scouts, they rely upon short-ranged precision rifles to bypass shields and armor. In order to line up their shots, they need to be free from enemy cover-fire, so they often attack from hiding, or with the aid of a Mauler (Fighter) or Martyr (Paladin).

Wizards: Pilots of the finicky Arcanus-class ship, they manipulate the lost magitek of The Empire to produce effects that even the largest ship cannot. They can fire powerful bolts from great distances, cause the aether to burn with plasma (fire), and fill space with derbies that is dangerous to fly through.

Clerics: Blessed by the followers of the Many Faces of Space God, the ships of the devout are a marvel to behold. In addition to standard armaments, the Holy Ships are covered with icons and relics that, under the faithful hands of a cleric, can produce miraculous effects without reliance on technology or magitek!

Paladins: A special type of Holy Ship, the Paladins pilot Martyr-class vessels, which are armed with the best conventional firepower that can be produced by Sapience, and then consecrated by priests at Blessed Shipyards. These holy munitions seem ordinary in the hands of ordinary pilots, but when used by Paladins...

BobVosh

2008-09-22, 01:16 AM

I can't believe I would be the only lazy person who would do Alternity, Dragon Star, or some other system just for the combats.

Although since my gaming group enjoys lots of collectibles/gaming stuff besides D&D we have been known to do stuff like Battlestar Gothica for SW ship combat.

Mewtarthio

2008-09-22, 01:16 AM

Warlocks: Advanced Stealth Ships. They use the Tao to hide from conventional sensors and bizarre Hex Matrices to attack the Leyline Pattern of enemy ships.

And here I was thinking the Warlock Ships would be constructed entirely out of the screaming souls of the damned.

Grynning

2008-09-22, 02:47 AM

Adventurer's Vault has added rules for vehicles, including Airships. While the craft in AV aren't really meant for dogfighting type battles, you may want to look over them to get some ideas for mechanics.

Warlocks: Advanced Stealth Ships. They use the Tao to hide from conventional sensors and bizarre Hex Matrices to attack the Leyline Pattern of enemy ships.

Watched Outlaw Star more than a few times I see :smalltongue:

Tengu_temp

2008-09-22, 03:43 AM

Yakk

2008-09-22, 08:12 AM

Ship speed/range/engage/acceleration
Fighter 3/1/4/1 (scale 1)
Destroyer 2/2/6/0.5 (scale 2)
Cruiser 1/4/10/0.25 (scale 3)
Capital 0.5/8/18/0.1 (scale 4)
Fortress 0/16/34/0 (scale 5)

Engage: Max range which you can be SHOT at.

Speed: Number of space-hexes you move per turn at most.

Range: Default weapon range. Some weapons have extra range (like double).

Acceleration: How much you can speed up/slow down per turn.

Movement:
You have 3 actions per turn -- Minor, Repair, Standard. In addition, sometime during your turn you must move your ship.

Ships have a VELOCITY property. At the start of movement, you can increase or decrease your VELOCITY by your acceleration free of charge.

Fighters can afterburn and use a standard action to accelerate.

A repair action is taking a single saving throw. You can use a standard action to take an extra repair action on your turn.

Destroyers get 2 sets of actions per turn, Cruisers 3, Capital ships 4, and Fortresses 5. Generally you cannot repeat the exact same action -- fire the same weapon twice, for example. You can repeat repair attempts.

(Note that this doesn't apply to the move phase of your turn).

Repairs that work take effect at the END of your turn.

Stationary ships can accelerate towards "change facing" at a cost of 1 per facing side. For the sake of abstraction, once you have purchased a facing change, your spin velocity is 0.

Moving ships can change their facing by 1 for every square they move.

Ships weapons are mounted fore, aft, or left/right broadside.

Some weapons are mounted "wide", with extra-wide arcs.

Invent some excuse for space combat to be two-dimensional (ships pull themselves along the magical space-weave, which is (locally) flat? In some areas, folds of the space-weave shoot off from the main weave along seams. These joins are tactically important.)

Each space-hex is 100 squares in size.

Rules are needed for "Fighter Wings" as individual units.

Fighters and Destroyers can fit many-in-a-square.

No more than 2 cruisers in a square.

Capital ships take up 2 hexes.

Fortresses take up 7 hexes.

Oslecamo

2008-09-22, 09:19 AM

Ok, now I think you're complicating too much.

Keep the usual move+standard+swift actions per turn.

Weapons are powers. You have at will weapons, ecounter weapons and daily weapons. Or we can use the monster system, and have weapons that randomly recharge.

No facing. It hasn't been used for years in D&D now.

Also, reduce the penalties/bonus of size. For each size diference you have +2 to hit and deal -2 damage. Trust me, if you start using multipliers, the system can go overboard very easily. 4e has very little multiplying effects.

Asbestos

2008-09-22, 10:56 AM

I think we need some feedback from the OP on this. Is the 'Magitech Space Pirate' setting he plans on using something more akin to Spelljammer or Star Wars. The difference is immense! Based on what people have been posting it seems the community saw 'spaceships' thought 'sci-fi' and ran with it. I'm still stuck in Spelljammer mode though and my giant squid with rigging are shooting at each other with giant crossbows as they navigate the ether while maintaining personal gravity and atmosphere through magical craziness, they might try to ram each other as well. I'm keeping the Space Hippo people out of it though, they were never a good idea...
From the Spelljammer perspective, more fantasy sailing in 3-d space than anything else, I see the 'fighters' as something more akin to a spelljamming dinghy from which the characters can act and attack from, rather than Viper Mk IIs.

Here are some visuals for those either too young or too forgetful :smallsmile:

http://www.geocities.com/asibal_2000/spelljammer/ships/hammership.jpg
http://lost.spelljammer.org/SpiderMoon/preview/Warbird.jpg
http://www.spelljammer.org/ships/aa/MantisPic.jpg

Leliel

2008-09-22, 12:16 PM

Yeah, I want a sci-fi spin.

EDIT: And, yes, I like Yak's stuff.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-22, 12:24 PM

Yeah, I want a sci-fi spin.

So... what do you think about Yakk's stuff so far? Is it what you've been looking for? What more would you like?

Yakk

2008-09-22, 01:10 PM

Ok, now I think you're complicating too much.

Keep the usual move+standard+swift actions per turn.

Um, there are no swift actions in 4e D&D.

Standard, Move, Minor.
I changed it to
Standard, Repair, Minor
however, Repair really should be a Mechanical action (ie, deal with your hardware systems).

If you have the 4e move-action, you end up with ships that turn on a dime. You also run into problems with balancing weapon range and ship speed.

The table wasn't random -- it was intended to encourage ships to deploy defensively in layers. A layer of fighters, a layer of destroyers, a layer of cruisers, then your capital ships.

Unguarded capital ships would be weak against a fighter-rush, as the engage range of fighters is short. (In effect, they are so small, you have to be at point-blank range to attack them). But fighters who tried to pass through a fighter, destroyer, then cruiser defensive shells would be chewed up.

Weapons are powers. You have at will weapons, ecounter weapons and daily weapons. Or we can use the monster system, and have weapons that randomly recharge.

*nod*, naturally.

No facing. It hasn't been used for years in D&D now.

Then you don't have dogfights. Which makes a space game sad. :(

Also, reduce the penalties/bonus of size. For each size diference you have +2 to hit and deal -2 damage. Trust me, if you start using multipliers, the system can go overboard very easily. 4e has very little multiplying effects.

Do you want a single fighter to be able to destroy a battleship?

Do you want level 1 battleships to have 1000s of HP?

I tried to make a system where fielding battleships, cruisers and destroyers where all practical options for a battle. You could instead make a system where battleships are obsolete, and all fighting occurs between fighters and escorts, with the carriers attempting to hide from fights.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-22, 01:34 PM

@Yakk
How are you dealing with fractional acceleration? I must have missed something (perhaps it's in the Star Wars system - don't know that) but since Fighters have 1 Space Hex of Acceleration and everything else has >1... does that mean that pretty much nothing moves on it's turn? Or does it have something to do with Capitol Ships having multiple "turns?"

Also: Facing. Necessary, particularly for Space Rogues - now they can actually get CA by coming from behind :smallbiggrin:

But you'll need to figure out which facing carries which components too. And "top" isn't an option, obviously :smalltongue:

@Outlaw Star
In another thread, I realized that 4e could be used to make a very Outlaw Star-style RPG with only moderate reflavoring. Warlocks are custom built to be Tao Pirates :smallbiggrin:

Asbestos

2008-09-22, 01:40 PM

Do you want a single fighter to be able to destroy a battleship?

Do you want level 1 battleships to have 1000s of HP?

Why have level 1 battleships at all? Using the MM as an example there are no level 1 dragons and you don't really get into the really big ones until upper paragon and epic levels. I'd equate level 1 PCs in their starting fighters going against battleships to be complete suicide, much like a level 1 party going against an elder dragon.

Tiers can exist in space just as much in groundpounding adventure.
Heroic:
PCs do the basic low level stuff here and operate the lowest level of craft, more lightly armed shuttles than military grade fighters. You might not even make it into space much, eradicating station based problems such as gangs, tribble infestations, and minor mysteries. Space based adventures may be missions such as serving as hired guards for small company freighters, thwarting the small pirate raid on an outpost, or intercepting smugglers. Generally you aren't operating too far from friendly civilization.

Paragon:
PCs are established heroes at this level, they've made a name for themselves and have upgraded their craft. Paragon tier PCs operate fighters on par with those used by most major militant organizations and can easily have their own light capital ship to house them. The PCs adventure primarily in space, station and planet bound missions are generally less mundane and involve thwarting major assaults, or launching their own, against the established authority. Space adventures involve taking part in military battles, eradicating major pirate groups, and pressing out into unfamiliar space. At this level the PCs actions may decide the fates of entire corporations or governments.

Epic:
The PCs operate ships whose quality surpasses even the latest military vessels. In fact, the adventuring party itself is a major organization of legendary status, capable of cowing most systems. PCs can expect to take on the greatest ships of the largest empires or push beyond known space into other dimensions. Major missions involve playing a decisive role in galaxy threatening conflicts and battling monstrous unknowns from beyond space. PCs can expect to 'ascend' to some form of immortality, be it transferring their minds into the computer of a great warship, melding their consciousness into a star, or developing technology to a level that allows them to break away from the constraints of 4-dimensional space, traveling anywhere and everywhere with but a thought.

Oslecamo

2008-09-22, 02:34 PM

Um, there are no swift actions in 4e D&D.

Standard, Move, Minor.
I changed it to
Standard, Repair, Minor
however, Repair really should be a Mechanical action (ie, deal with your hardware systems).

If you have the 4e move-action, you end up with ships that turn on a dime. You also run into problems with balancing weapon range and ship speed.

The table wasn't random -- it was intended to encourage ships to deploy defensively in layers. A layer of fighters, a layer of destroyers, a layer of cruisers, then your capital ships.

Remember that the OP's idea was for the party to be the escort for their flagship. This means we have about 6-8 ships total tops. Multiple layers aren't really a possibility, unless each player controls several ships.

Do you want a single fighter to be able to destroy a battleship?

Do you want level 1 battleships to have 1000s of HP?

Yes please. What's more heroic in a sci-fi seting than blowing up the enemy mothership with a single well pointed missile?

I tried to make a system where fielding battleships, cruisers and destroyers where all practical options for a battle. You could instead make a system where battleships are obsolete, and all fighting occurs between fighters and escorts, with the carriers attempting to hide from fights.

From what the OP said, I was looking at one big heavy slow flagship, that just slugs around the battlefield with a significant amount of HP, and the players being the escort, with their custom fighter and other small ships. If the flagship is destroyed, the players are doomed to die in the emptyness of space, so when enemies apear they have to do their best to protect it.

Like someone else said, we're looking at raiding/skirmishes/pirates here, not full scale war. Unless I misunderstood the OP.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-22, 02:59 PM

Nah, the scaling is good. We want to have a system where it makes sense for the PCs to have flagships to defend - if puny little Fighters can easily take out massive battleships, why build the battleship at all? There's no harm in having a little more robustness in the system, in case the DM decides to have the PCs fighting it out in between two fleets.

As it is, the PCs now have a minimum distance they have to stay from battleships to avoid being targeted, while retaining the option to risk obliteration to strike at select battleship components. That's exactly the sort of flavor that's good for any game which has space dogfighters.

Oslecamo

2008-09-22, 03:32 PM

Why are there flagships if puny fighters can take them? Simple. Because it's the big fat flagship that carries the food, fuel and spare parts to keep the fighters going.

Just like the WWII aircraft carriers. Puny airplanes can take down much bigger, strongly armored and heavily armed aircraft carriers, but whitout an aircraft carrier of their own to return to to refuel and supply, the airplanes are doomed to fall after some hours.

The japanese did think their massive aircraft carriers couldn't possibly be sinked just by air strikes. They were proven wrong, and lost all control of the seas thanks to that.

After all, if flagships are so uber, why build fighters? Just mass flagships and obliterate everything with massive artillery barrages.

Also, I don't understand the reasoning after precision targeting. Why are all the bloody vital systems of the flagship vulnerable to attack? If you can bother to build something so big, you could bother to put the important fragile components inside the armor, and not outside where any fighter can go after them.

Yakk

2008-09-22, 03:47 PM

Some thoughts:

Shockwave: Shockwave weapons are area attack weapons that target fortitude. Ships of larger scale get a +10 fortitude defense per scale against Shockwave weapons. Smaller scale ships do not take 10x damage from shockwave weapons, as their smaller cross-section makes them less vunerable to the attack.

Ak-Ak Auras: Ak-Ak weapons saturate a region with fire. Capital Ships tend to have an Ak-Ak aura. They fire 'as a ship of a smaller scale' against any ship that enters the aura or starts their turn in the aura (at most once per turn).

Ak-Ak auras can choose to ignore certain squares, but they target any and all ships in the aura. So ships with close fighter escorts tend to turn off their auras.

Bombers: Bombs are highly inaccurate, ridiculously high damage (for the scale), close range weapons. They are designed to target slow moving larger ships.

Missiles: Missiles target Reflex defense, and are high-crit weapons, and tend to have higher range than standard.

Beam: Beam weapons target AC.

Ion: Ion cannons simply fail against a shielded target. Ion cannons against a target whose shields are down target will, and cause the ship to be dazed for 1 turn. On a crit, an ion cannon causes the target ship to be stunned.

...

I was trying to create the following:
Fighters suck against Destroyers.
Destroyers suck against Cruisers.
Cruisers suck against Capital ships.
Capital ships suck against Fighters.

Fighters vs Cruisers, or Destroyers vs Capital Ships, is a pretty meh situation.

To take out an enemy Capital Ship, you will want to send your fighter cover inward, penetrate the ships surrounding the Capital ship, and then attack the capital ships components.

These attacks don't do any serious harm to the capital ship, but they do weaken it. Then your larger ships close in on the capital ship and carve it up.

However, doing this without sending the fighters in first is highly dangerous -- the engage range divided by ship speed of larger classes of ship means that they will suffer capital ship fire for more turns than the fighters did.

And practically, your capital ship is really really expensive. You'd rather burn fighters and then knock out the enemy ship without losing your capital ship...

----

Now, you can simplify the scaling. Have 3 scales -- Fighter, Cruiser, Capital ship. Have the "components" be 1 scale smaller, and have weapons (like bombs) that are designed to hit 1 scale larger targets.

Toss on Fortress above Capital Ship:

Fighters move 4, Cruisers 2, Capital Ships 1, Fortress 0.
Engage Range for Fighters is 5, Cruisers 10, Capital Ships 20, Fortress 40.
Weapons range for Fighters is 2, Cruisers is 6, Capital Ships is 15, Fortress 30.

Fighters speed up/slow down by 2 per round.
Cruisers speed up/slow down by 1 per round.
Capital ships decide to stop, and then next turn they don't move. If they are stopped, they have to decide the turn before to start moving.

Fortresses take up 7 hexes (big circle).
Capital Ships take up 2 hexes.
2 Cruisers can fit in a hex without crowding, but not with a capital ship.
Lots of fighters can fit in a hex.

Fighters can change facing by 1 for each hex moved, or arbitrary if at a stop.

Cruisers can change facing at the end of their turn unless at a stop. At a stop, can change facing by 2 per turn.

Capital Ships must come to a stop to change facing. Once at a stop, can change facing by 1 per turn. If they do so, they cannot start moving.

...

That might be a "cleaner" variant.

Oracle_Hunter

2008-09-22, 04:12 PM

@Oslecamo

Why are there flagships if puny fighters can take them? Simple. Because it's the big fat flagship that carries the food, fuel and spare parts to keep the fighters going.

Just like the WWII aircraft carriers. Puny airplanes can take down much bigger, strongly armored and heavily armed aircraft carriers, but whitout an aircraft carrier of their own to return to to refuel and supply, the airplanes are doomed to fall after some hours.

The japanese did think their massive aircraft carriers couldn't possibly be sinked just by air strikes. They were proven wrong, and lost all control of the seas thanks to that.

This turns the game into Fighters & Carriers, which are fine if you don't want larger craft to have any role at all. That's fine if that's the kind of game you want, but some of us like to think that Space Is An Ocean (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SpaceIsAnOcean) and our Battleships need Wave Motion Cannons (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WaveMotionGun) :smallbiggrin:

After all, if flagships are so uber, why build fighters? Just mass flagships and obliterate everything with massive artillery barrages.

If you look at the mechanics that Yakk outlined, you'll see that Capitol Ships are vulnerable to surgical strikes by Fighters (due to size modifiers) which can virtually incapacitate the ship, but it can't destroy it. This means that a mixed strategy of Fighters v. Fighters (to cripple enemy ships and to defend against enemy fighters trying to do the same) with Capitol Ships v. Capitol Ships (to actually finish off the bigger crafts). Fighters can only injure, but not destroy, Capitol Ships, while Capitol Ships cannot cope well with Fighters on their own - but won't be in mortal danger against only Fighters.

Also, I don't understand the reasoning after precision targeting. Why are all the bloody vital systems of the flagship vulnerable to attack? If you can bother to build something so big, you could bother to put the important fragile components inside the armor, and not outside where any fighter can go after them.

Aside from the metagame reason of giving Fighters something to do, it's because some components need to be open to space. Weapons, for instance, can't fire through the ship's own hull (and armored shutters can be jammed), and rockets need to blast somewhere. Likewise communications arrays or shield projectors may need to operate outside the armor to cut down on interference.

@Yakk
Ak-Ak Auras are tricky - they might make large ships even less vulnerable to Fighters, which, considering that the PCs are going to be Fighter pilots, we may not want to do. Particularly since such systems could be turned on-and-off, so a Carrier could release its Fighters and then turn on the Ak-Ak.

Aside from that, I think the "cleaner" system will work better for 4e. Though a full-fledged space combat RPG (or Mechwarriors (even more) IN SPACE) might be very fun with the original one :smallbiggrin:

Yakk

2008-09-22, 04:47 PM

Meh -- it doesn't have to be huge damage.

Remember, capital ships basically cannot hit fighters under this system.

Ak-ak weapons are weapons designed to attack fighters. They do relatively crappy damage (for battleship scales), and mean that you cannot just hang around a Battleship doing nothing.

Oslecamo

2008-09-22, 04:58 PM

I was trying to create the following:
Fighters suck against Destroyers.
Destroyers suck against Cruisers.
Cruisers suck against Capital ships.
Capital ships suck against Fighters.

Fighters vs Cruisers, or Destroyers vs Capital Ships, is a pretty meh situation.

To take out an enemy Capital Ship, you will want to send your fighter cover inward, penetrate the ships surrounding the Capital ship, and then attack the capital ships components.

These attacks don't do any serious harm to the capital ship, but they do weaken it. Then your larger ships close in on the capital ship and carve it up.

However, doing this without sending the fighters in first is highly dangerous -- the engage range divided by ship speed of larger classes of ship means that they will suffer capital ship fire for more turns than the fighters did.

And practically, your capital ship is really really expensive. You'd rather burn fighters and then knock out the enemy ship without losing your capital ship...

----

Are you sure you want that? Because one of the paradigms of 4e is that no matter what the enemy is, all party members must feel equally usefull. D&D isn't suposed to be a rock-scissor-paper game, but a teamwork game where each player's ship compliments the other one.

So for example I think it would be best:
Fighters are extremely agile and hit hard.
Destroyers block enemy movement
Cruisers back up everybody else
Capital ships carry the big slow guns to disrupt the enemy formation and attacks.

So destroyers block the enemy movement, Cruisers keep everybody on their side going, Capital ships disable the enemy, and fighters deliver the killing blow. Everybody has to work togheter and stays happy.

Also, I still have the impression your system assumes there is a lot of ships. You can't just ask the players to sacrifice their personal ships as cannon fodder so the player with the capital ship can deliver the killing blow.

Well, you could always go Hahuri Hazumi style and give each player his own fleet of fighters and destroyers and whatnot.

Asbestos

2008-09-22, 05:00 PM

Yakk, not to come across as critical, I mean, you're definitely throwing good ideas out there, but I think you may be making this much more complicated than it should be. I believe the system you have in mind could stand some paring down, so as to avoid confusion and taking on a potentially too ambitious project.

There's a scaling component here that we're missing with all these classes of ships and how they affect each other in a more complex game of paper, rock, scissors. Simply put, if I have an epic tier fighter, I should be able to tear through heroic tier capital ships, regardless of their size or class. To use a real-world example what would happen if we put a fully armed, naval aircraft against some WWI Dreadnought? The aircraft would be capable of engaging and destroying the ship without worrying about detection or retaliation. I think it'd just be easier to stat these things out as Elites, Solos, etc of varying levels. Can keep in the facing and maneuverability rules just fine so to allow for dogfights.
As for weapons let's try to keep it as familiar to 4e as possible... the specific flavor really depends on how sci-fi this all is, is it BSG style or something like Eberron but advanced 500 years? (Feedback from the OP perhaps :smallwink:) But we could just go and HERO system this stuff and just name change things but keep the effects. Ranged Burst attacks already exist, awesome, let's keep them. Single target attacks? cool. Close bursts? also good, if we go sci-fi we can see these as ship centered electrical or EMP bursts or gravitic manipulation, if we go magitek these turn into blasts of arcane fire, force, or whatever. Close blasts? Hm, perhaps some directed overloads of plasma/arcane energy?
Things that target AC? Obvious
Things that target Reflex? Just as clear, these attacks ignore shielding and require some sort of evasion to avoid, be it technological or magical.
Things that target Fortitude? these rock the heck out of ships, damaging the hull, and generally making the target slower, weakened, or crippled in some other way for a time before backup systems kick on or before the magical effects wear off.
Things that target Will? these paralyze, and can damage, the various electrical or magical systems of ships. Again, the effects last until the systems reboot or shake off the effect.
On-going effects: Status effects; works with the variable time it may take for a system to reboot after suffering a shock or for the variable time a magical effect may last. Damage; things ignite, systems fail, dominoes are set into motion and take time to be suppressed or lingering energies embrace a ship, whatev.
The Aura thing? Sure, monsters have Aura's so why shouldn't ships? Some could be overtly damaging (as the example you give) and some could be buffs (increase the defenses/resistances of nearby allied ships) and some could be debuffs (reduces the speed/defenses/resistances of nearby enemy ships)

-----------------------------------
Random generic sci-fi setting questions:

Do we need 'shields'? If we go the 'hp=health' route then yes, we probably need them. If we go 'hp are abstract' then we can do away with them and get into a 'grittier' sci-fi where projectile weapons are still meaningful and ships depend on ablative shielding / evasive actions to avoid exploding.

Why are big ships necessarily horribly explosive? I bet if you hit the JET (the big ol' experimental fusion reactor) with a rocket it wouldn't level a city, sure it'd probably shoot out a plasma jet, but it wouldn't be something like the core going critical in Star Trek. The only really explosive parts of a ship I can imagine would be the generator and the weapon stores. If we're using things that depend on fission/antimatter (heck even fission might not be that bad, doesn't normally reach critical mass by chance) then sure, I can see the explosions being something to avoid. If its something else... well, it might not do much at all beyond the ship or even beyond the engine room.