Call for Starship & Vehicle Combat Examples

[cmdrx]

Thanks for the replies. I had a lot of fun playing around with this and see where I am going to do some minor changes to my personal games.

That fusion gun hit was just an example of a (very) lucky critical hit and also to show how the basic system clumps range bands together. In the advanced system, you use the actual hex/Kkm to determine range mod. Using that system that crit would have only been a threat as it would be -4 to hit not per range band, but per HEX!

Also, I think the -1USP per range band rule was repealed, although it is in the book.I asked about it on CoTI before. I'll need to check errata on that one.

I've done some other CT conversions with ships that have Meson screens. They aren't that effective against the big spinals folks. A type T meson will plow through a Factor 9 screen nicely. And then there's that gawdawful crit range.

I do have on question though, do meson screens loose their bonus on a critical? Not that it matters much, 16d20x10 and 7d20x10 will still pretty much vape anything.

My next example will be a fighter dogfight. This is interesting because you only have one crew, the pilot, doing the tasks. First he does the nav range check(I allow the use of pilot skill in place of astro), then only one thing after that in that round (fire, evade, jam, etc...)

Thanks again for the comments.

 

[cmdrx]

Ship combat example #3 - Fighter Dogfight

The craft we'll use for this example are my own design.
The X-TEK F-1000xt Hornet-class Fighters.

Combat Stats:
TL15
15dt
M6, Agility 6, Init +6
Computer Mod/1, Sensors: Close, Comm:Close
AC23
AR6
SI77
Triple-Pulse Lasers:
USP3, +3 to Hit, 3d10(19 x2), 45Kkm(Short)
Pilot skill is a flat 10 for everything.

Fighters have very short ranged sensors and the encounter is set at 0 hexes (right on top of each other). Both are aware of each other at this range.
The fighters now check for range. #1 Rolls 14+10 for 24, #2 roll 12+10 for 22. #1 decides to put some distance between him and the enemy fighter, increasing to short range.
Initiative is rolled. #1 7+6=13, #2 15+6=21. #2 Acts and decides to open fire.
Roll is 12+10(skill)+3(usp) for 25 v. AC 23. A hit is made on #1. 3d10 -6AR come out to 1d10-4. Result is only 3SI. (Armour is your friend!). The Internal is rolled: 37+5(pulse laser) comes out to 42, a fuel hit. and with a secondary roll of 56, the fuel tanks are hit. Fighter#1 looses 10% of its reserves.
Fighter#1 now fires back. Roll of 19 is a threat with pulse lasers and the roll of 13+10+3=26 confirms the critical. #2 takes a full 3d10 x2 with no AR reduction. A total of 43 is rolled. Also Fighter #2 looses a point of AR (now 5). Internal is rolled with a 56(+5 for pulse) 61. Fire control. Secondary roll is 32. F#2 looses a laser and the USP is reduced to 2.

Round #1 results:
F#1: 3/77SI 10% fuel loss
F#2: 43/77SI Weapon degredation to USP2, Armour degredation to AR5

Round #2
Range check: F#1 23, F#2 13. F#1 increases range to medium.
Initiative: F#1 16, F#2 26. F#2 fires.
Total roll is 15+10+2(degraded usp) -2(medium range) for a 25 v. AC23. A hit.
Not a crit so armour will still soak some of the hit. 2d10 - 6AR leaves 1d10-5. A roll of 3 on d10 means that there was no effect (GOOD Armour!)
F#1 returns fire. 17+10+3-2 makes a 28 vs AC 22.
Damage is 3d10 -5AR or 1d10-3. A roll of 8 scores 5SI to F#2.
Internal is rolled for an engineering hit, Manuever drive. M drive down to 5.

Results of Round #2
F1: 3/77SI, 10% fuel loss
F2: 48/77 SI. Weapon deg(-1). Armour deg(-1). Mdrive deg(-1).

Round #3
Range check: F#2 gains the check increases range to long. F#1 does not persue and lets F#2 bug out.

Here we have learned that armour is a good thing to have.
Pulse lasers rock.
And I build a mean fighter!

 

[apoc527]

Very nice Commander X. Keep 'em coming!

(What do you think of my earlier suggestion of letting both crews roll for Sensor Jamming and Sensor Lock independent of initiative?)

 

[Ellros]

Excellent examples, many thanks.
I do think a better ship combat system is needed though. The way the examples are, ship combat might be over 'too' quickly. Maybe the crits need to be toned down a wee bit? And then again...
I do think though that the ship combat system was designed around small ship(ie PC's ship) combat. I don't think the T20 system is built for capital ships. After all, in High Guard, one meson spinal hit did not usually vape a similar size ship quick.

As for internal damage... if you have, or can get a hold of the reprints, First Ed Twilight 2000 has an interesting system for damaging internal components after armor penetration. I may dig my rules out and see if I can work something out. You could also try using TNE's vehicle combat (2nd ed Twilight 2000) version for percentage damage after penetration.

 

[cmdrx]

I've decided to make a few changes to my home T20 ship rules based on the examples I've done here. I share them with you all now.

1. There should be better sensor/encounter rules. Mind you CT did not have them, but MT, TNE, etc.. did. I propose that before combat starts, all ships roll for detection. If the ships are being good lil boys and girls and have their transponders on, detection is auto at the range of the sensor. If not, it's a sensor roll at DC20 modifyed by range and size. When a ship detects another it is then 'aware' of that ship. Ships that are not aware of another will be flat footed should the ship that detected it decide to attack. This is the 'submarine/stealth' combat that Traveller is known for. This also leads to the possibility of stealth hulls/EM masking technology. It ups the DC for detection by TL.

2. The range check. The check for astrogators should use the same or similar mods as does vehicles. I suggest using current speed speed (not acceleration) of the vessels. A ship moving faster is going to have a better chance of closing on or outrunning the other. Also don't use range bands, use hexes (15Kkm). The winner of the range check may adjust ranges by a number of hexes equal to the difference in speeds.
Example. one ship currently has a speed of 6 the other 4. Astrogation is rolled. #1 gets a 12+10+6=28. #2 rolls 15+10+4=29(lucky roll). #2 may adjust range by 2 hexes.

3. After range check should come the sensor lock/jamming rolls, provided the ships have adequate crew to do this. Capital ships have no problem, smaller ships (as the PC's would have) may be only to perform one such action or none at all. Thanks to apoc527 for this suggestion.

4. After all this, initiative is rolled and all actions as per the book are rolled.

5. Damage. Meson guns are just too leathal! I suggest ignoring the rule that spinals increase the threat range by 5. A natural 15 is enough. Also, reduce the crit damage to x5, with the extra radiation damage you'll have a x10 effect anyway (instead of x20).
Also, this was mentioned in personal combat. Let AR reduce damage dice and then apply damage multiplyer. This will still hurt, but not instantly vape. Also since we are using hexes, neg mods due to range will play a part. Also reinstate the -1 dice of damage per range increment. This prevents fusion guns from vaporization sniper attacks. (Mind you this is still a valid tactic in personal combat)

6. Damage Threasholds
This is something I'm working on. When a ship takes SI damage, the amount in that single hit should influence the internal damage done. Maybe something for each 10% of SI add +5 to the internals roll. Exmaple. A scout would have a threashold of 10SI. Say someone does only 5SI to it. Roll regularly. a 25SI hit would add +10 to the internals roll. (Round the result down).

"What do you think sirs?"

 

[apoc527]

All of it very good so far! For number 6, that's a great idea. I just got some Jovian Chronicles stuff and Damage Thresholds is what the Silhouette system is all about. They work pretty well, as far as I can tell, and I think it's a good idea for Traveller too. Obviously, we can't use the same mechanic, but we can say something like this-

0-10% SI : Minimal Damage, Roll once at -10% (or something, numbers aren't worked out)

11-25% : Light Damage, Roll once normally.

26-50% : Moderate Damage, Roll once at +10%

51-75% : Severe Damage, Roll Twice at +10%

76-99% : Critical Damage, Roll Three times at +15%

100% : Disabled, use normal rules

200% : Destroyed, use normal rules

What do you think of something similar to that? Alternately, if that's too many different damage levels, we could just bring it down to 25%, 50%, and 75%. Drop the "minimal damage" level altogether.

 

[shockwave]

Fellow players,

I've got a few question wrt some discrepencies in T20.

First, according to the rules on pg 163, you'll get a larger defense score by ADDING 3 seperate sandcaster turrets (TL 7 Tri-turrets) USP (2+2+2=6 USP defense total) via combining the 3 sandcaster turrets (again, TL 7 Tri-turrets) into one battery of three turrets (4 USP defense total). This advantage can be applied to any TL of sandcaster and become more pronounced at higher TL.

Second, the wording for point defense lasers doesn't seems to correspond to the "formula" given to calculate the DC.

Third, if using the advance ship's combat, how many times can point defense fire at incoming missles? Since missle salvos are moving like ships, it could be reasoned that missles may take more than one tactical round to hit.

Fourth, pg 178, the advance missle rules mentioned "alter its future position marker placement". Is the "future position marker" similar to those used in CT game "Mayday"? If so, where could I find the rules for T20?

Fifth, pg 178 missle rules also state the missle will only allow 6 rounds of accelerations. Is this 6 strategic or tactical rounds?

 

[JTSmythe]

Originally posted by cmdrx:
3. After range check should come the sensor lock/jamming rolls, provided the ships have adequate crew to do this. Capital ships have no problem, smaller ships (as the PC's would have) may be only to perform one such action or none at all. Thanks to apoc527 for this suggestion.

I think that sensor locks and jamming should occur during the active phase of combat (i.e. after initiative).

For ship game play that can make things more interesting and give the players active options.

But for stealth attacks esp. if we use the detection system that you suggested above, I can imagine a scenario where as a surpise action the sensor guy can lock and the gunners fire...then after the initiative roll the suprised ship can jam or return fire.

With a fighter or a scout with only one or two actions/rd there can be some EW as a part of combat.

 

[JTSmythe]

Originally posted by apoc527:


What do you think of something similar to that? Alternately, if that's too many different damage levels, we could just bring it down to 25%, 50%, and 75%. Drop the "minimal damage" level altogether.

I think this would be better...getting rid of the minimal damage category.

 

[Vladimir]

Do the vehicle weapons stats seem wrong to anyone? From what I can interprit 1vl = 1kg, and a vrf gauss gun is 2000vl which would be 2000kg. I've looked up previous supplements such as the TNE RCEG and they give a mass for a vrf gauss to be about 150 to 400 kg(includes cassette). Also the vl for the mass drivers is way to much, and the power requirements on the lasers is to little. OK, I guess mass drivers and gauss guns are the same. One easy fix may be to drop the vl by a factor of ten, and increase the power usage.
Any recomendations?

 

[sandman]

Originally posted by Jim Bunk:
Do the vehicle weapons stats seem wrong to anyone? From what I can interprit 1vl = 1kg, and a vrf gauss gun is 2000vl which would be 2000kg.

I'll stop you right here...

1vl = VOLUME, not mass

1vl of feathers won't weight the same as 1vl of lead. You can have a camping tent of many vl but weighting less than your backpack.

As for the Laser's power requirement, I didn't check that up, so you may be correct.

 

[thomryng]

Originally posted by cmdrx:
Combat example #2....

Thanks cmdrx! Those examples are very helpful. Of course, my players may not be thanking you...

cheers,

thom

 

[Ellros]

Originally posted by Jim Bunk:
Do the vehicle weapons stats seem wrong to anyone? From what I can interprit 1vl = 1kg, and a vrf gauss gun is 2000vl which would be 2000kg. I've looked up previous supplements such as the TNE RCEG and they give a mass for a vrf gauss to be about 150 to 400 kg(includes cassette). Also the vl for the mass drivers is way to much, and the power requirements on the lasers is to little. OK, I guess mass drivers and gauss guns are the same. One easy fix may be to drop the vl by a factor of ten, and increase the power usage.
Any recomendations?

It's listed in the book 1200vl = 1 ton (1000kg)

 

[hemulen]

----
cmdrx:

Combat example #2
using Gionetti class Light Cruisers
----

Hi, good examples!

A couple of queries:

1/ In D&D, initiative is rolled only once, at the start of combat (or when a new combatant enters the fray). After that, it remains as rolled from round to round unless someone uses the Delay or Refocus actions. I'd assumed that it's the same for T20 - or have I missed a rule?

2/ In example 2 one of the ships fires it's spinal mount weapon, and the other (having lost the use of it's weapon) fires the batteries. Why doesn't the first ship fire it's batteries as well? Is it a case of fire the spinal mount OR fire the batteries?

3/ On the Vehicle Mounted weapons table, various weapons have a ROF of 4/10/20/100 etc. Presumably the normal stats are for a single shot, and they can fire up to this ROF? That is, e.g. the VRFGG is 2d12 damage, if it uses it's 100 ROF would it get +10 to hit/+10d12 damage as per the table on 151? I assume that it would.

But if so, why is its ROF listed as 100, whereas other weapons are listed as 1/4/10/20/100? Does that mean that it can ONLY fire at ROF 100?

cheers,

Mark

 

[cmdrx]

From Mark:

Hi, good examples!

A couple of queries:

1/ In D&D, initiative is rolled only once, at the start of combat (or when a new combatant enters the fray). After that, it remains as rolled from round to round unless someone uses the Delay or Refocus actions. I'd assumed that it's the same for T20 - or have I missed a rule?

You are right, D&D 3e does do one initiative roll for the entire combat. I had forgotten.
We always did the roll each round meathod so it stuck in my head. I would assume you could also do the Delay, Refocus actions.

2/ In example 2 one of the ships fires it's spinal mount weapon, and the other (having lost the use of it's weapon) fires the batteries. Why doesn't the first ship fire it's batteries as well? Is it a case of fire the spinal mount OR fire the batteries?

Any ship may fire any of its batteries, turret or spinal, that it has at its disposal that round. The first ship could have fired everyting it had after the Spinal and prolly ruined #2's day. The example I did may have been a bad strategy, but I wanted to show how things worked. Also note that if you do fire all your weapons at once, you will have nothing for point defense later, which is one of the things I wanted to show.

3/ On the Vehicle Mounted weapons table, various weapons have a ROF of 4/10/20/100 etc.
Presumably the normal stats are for a single shot, and they can fire up to this ROF? That is, e.g. the VRFGG is 2d12 damage, if it uses it's 100 ROF would it get +10 to hit/+10d12 damage as per the table on 151? I assume that it would.

But if so, why is its ROF listed as 100, whereas other weapons are listed as 1/4/10/20/100? Does that mean that it can ONLY fire at ROF 100?

Not realy a ship combat question, but I can field it.

The way I read it is some weapons have selective fire. The RoFs that have slashes (4/10/20) may select semi-auto (1 shot per pull of the trigger) or any setting displayed (such as 4 or 10 or 20 round bursts in this example) And yes, you can either add the bonus to hit or to damage as per the burst fire rules. VRF-Gauss at RoF 100 doing 12d12 personal (7d12 vehicle) is a sight to behold.

The others that have only 1 RoF I read as either one shot or the burst setting. It may even be that its a fully automatic weapon and one pull is 1 burst shot (no single round shooting).
In T4 they had a pistol that did just this called the 'Zip' gun. It's a pistol that fired plastic shards at the target, which would be like flechettes in T20, but the RoF was a flat 200! You pull the trigger and this sucker 'zipped' away. In T20 it might be something like 21d4. (T20 only goes up to RoF 100, so this is a guess). They were Highly Illegal weapons IIRC.

I have come to respect the VRF-Gauss as a nasty APERS weapon, A quad turret can chew up vehicles nicely too.

 

[Ellros]

But if so, why is its ROF listed as 100, whereas other weapons are listed as 1/4/10/20/100? Does that mean that it can ONLY fire at ROF 100?

That's pretty much it. Hence the VRF.
So when the VRF fires, you either add +10 to hit, or roll 12d12 damage. It's going to be deadly against personnel (ie like a 20mm vulcan would be), but against starship, and vehicles, it will drop off. Removing 5 or 10 dice against vehicles/staships, and then you factor in any armor.

The others that have only 1 RoF I read as either one shot or the burst setting. It may even be that its a fully automatic weapon and one pull is 1 burst shot (no single round shooting).
In T4 they had a pistol that did just this called the 'Zip' gun. It's a pistol that fired plastic shards at the target, which would be like flechettes in T20, but the RoF was a flat 200! You pull the trigger and this sucker 'zipped' away. In T20 it might be something like 21d4.
(T20 only goes up to RoF 100, so this is a guess). They were Highly Illegal weapons IIRC.

I converted this over as a terrorist weapon for my campaign. Has the capability for 2 100 rd bursts, as a body pistol, doing 10d6. But it also gets hot as its description said. And is highly illegal.

 

[hemulen]

Great stuff - thanks for the answers!

cheers,

Mark

 

[hemulen]

Has anyone tried the advanced starship combat rules? They sort of look ok, albeit with a few typos. I dug out my ancient copy of Mayday, and was wondering if the movement system in there could be used, as that always struck me as rather neat, as opposed to the one in the book which is a bit more complex, for the same effects. I'll dig out my hex mat and some Full Thrust/Silent Death ships and play about with both sets of rules to see how they come out. I was quite surprised to see that tactical moves are down to 1 minute each, I was expecting to retain the original 20 minute turns.

I don't know how compatible Power Projection will be when the full version comes out at Salute in April, but I hope they've taken T20 into account - it would be a bit of a gaffe if they haven't!

A few associated things:

The evade action says that it can only be used at Close Range, which doesn't make much sense for this system, I assume that it means it can only be used on the Tactical display(?)

Is there any specific order for doing shipboard actions? Ships themselves move in initiative order, but what for individual crew on a ship? There are some actions that should obviously come first e.g. Captain makes roll for bonuses etc, and I think it's not too difficult to work it out, but it's not very clear.

Damage Control says something like it doubles RPs in the feat description, but in the Repairing Damage section, it is only mentioned as giving -5 to a DC for repairs.

I'm also assuming that the ranges given for specific weapons get -2 per extra range increment, rather than the -2 for Short, Medium, Long etc used in the simpler system.

cheers,

Mark

 

[tfornof]

I'm supposing the advantage to missles is that they have a range of 90,000km. Far in excess of anything except the Particle Accellerator Spinal Mount. This would be good for getting that extra salvo in at the begining of the engagement.

Fionan