CT LBB:2 Starship Armor solution
- Thread starter ddamant
- Start date
What about plasma or superplastic metal, like a HEAT round, which would not diffuse in a vacuum?
pendragonman
Absent Friends Margrave
I personally like the bomb pumped laser warheads for prox missiles
A way of doing "Book 2" armor that I've used before is essentially this:
I had some notes for costs to install or repair (roughly compatible with Mongoose armor prices), and for higher tech armor materials (cover more areas, sustain more hits), but those are details - the basic idea stays the same. I also considered allowing multiple "layers", but a single layer seemed to work well enough for my game.
My motive was to provoke roleplaying opportunities, such as "Direct hit to our engineering section. We can't take another hit like that!" Armor is cheaper to repair than drives, so I could ratchet up the space combat frequency a little and not always ruin the players financially.
Also, because armor is bought separately for main and engineering sections, you could, for example, have an armored merchant whose cargo and passengers is safer than normal, and which would cost less to build that a fully armored ship. Or spend some leftover space in a ship's engineering section for some armor to protect the drives.
I had some notes for costs to install or repair (roughly compatible with Mongoose armor prices), and for higher tech armor materials (cover more areas, sustain more hits), but those are details - the basic idea stays the same. I also considered allowing multiple "layers", but a single layer seemed to work well enough for my game.
My motive was to provoke roleplaying opportunities, such as "Direct hit to our engineering section. We can't take another hit like that!" Armor is cheaper to repair than drives, so I could ratchet up the space combat frequency a little and not always ruin the players financially.
Also, because armor is bought separately for main and engineering sections, you could, for example, have an armored merchant whose cargo and passengers is safer than normal, and which would cost less to build that a fully armored ship. Or spend some leftover space in a ship's engineering section for some armor to protect the drives.
I would tend to go with an Ablat armor mechanism in that case, easily swapped out and replaced, and more readily explained as an add-on if slapped onto an existing hull.
Of course there should be limits in the case of aftermarket strapped on armor, as in the jump and maneuver values should degrade with the greater 'tonnage', and any 'hot' landing/takeoff through atmo should burn it off.
If the ablat is 'built-in' into the design, then the regular hull would deal with the heat and the ablat would be slide in slabs, replaceable after taking the 'skin' off. Still a trip to the shipyard but should be a LOT cheaper and faster to replace then armor proper.
I like it. You could reserve internal tonnage to hold the armor (requires better dock to repair, but protected by the hull) or strap it on (easy and cheap, but degrades performance and could cause trouble with drive ratings for starships).
SDBs and unstreamlined boats would probably have "armor packages" available to them, whereas starships would probably need to use internal mountings....
BTW - I went with ablation rather than the more popular to-hit modifications because I decided to build off of how drives take damage.
Which makes me wonder if a more "LBB2-ish" system would be to have standard armor packages that are rated by letter code (with tonnage and cost determined by their material/TL), and a table that tells at which letter code a hull size is considered protected. As locations are hit, erode a letter code per hit until the location is no longer protected. Nah, then people are going to want partial protection below the threshold, and at that point we might as well just be going for High Guard.
SDBs and unstreamlined boats would probably have "armor packages" available to them, whereas starships would probably need to use internal mountings....
BTW - I went with ablation rather than the more popular to-hit modifications because I decided to build off of how drives take damage.
Which makes me wonder if a more "LBB2-ish" system would be to have standard armor packages that are rated by letter code (with tonnage and cost determined by their material/TL), and a table that tells at which letter code a hull size is considered protected. As locations are hit, erode a letter code per hit until the location is no longer protected. Nah, then people are going to want partial protection below the threshold, and at that point we might as well just be going for High Guard.
Actually, I like that.
Something like, you get +1 protection -- a DM-1 to be hit -- for each letter code above your hull's letter code. Each letter code of armor is a flat tonnage. And armor ablates one level when penetrated.
Ye cats, I like it.
What might that flat tonnage schedule be? It would have to be enough to make a Trader think hard before installing armor. So a 200t Trader wouldn't normally sacrifice 20 tons for armor, but he might give up 10 tons. So somewhere in there.
Therefore, how about this:
(0) (Assumed) Hull Volume = A=100t, B=200t, C=300t... up to Z=2400t, then we get fancy.
(1) Armor Volume = use the Jump Drive Volume table. So, same schedule as jump drive letters. Maybe cheaper than jump drives though?
(2) Armor DM = amount by which it exceeds the hull code. So Armor C on Hull B = 20 tons, DM-1 to hit.
(3) Armor is damaged when the ship takes damage, i.e. when armor is penetrated. Damaged armor still takes up its alloted volume.
Boy, that's beautiful.
Although, it seems like the DMs could get out of hand. But, I bet they don't actually. Plus a natural 12 always damages armor, right?
I am thinking this will break for non-starships packing Armor-40 or so, only taking damage on natural boxcars and then being hardly the worse for wear afterwards.
You will need TL limits, I expect; max Armor equals build TL, for example.
Then bring on the swarms of nukes...
(And those favored-by-miners pulse lasers that are designed specifically to blast through solid iron, of course...)
Simpler scheme so we don't have to qualify the hull size.
Use the jump drive letter and valuation as the DM.
Alternatively, use the value to absorb hits (so armor 1 absorbs 1 hit, 2 absorbs 2, etc). I would suggest using the pulse laser 2 hit -1 DM rule for this.
Only critical hits reduces armor. Hits reduce as per drive track, and values drop at appropriate cross reference of new jump/armor value to tonnage.
Cost should be something less then the jump drive, I would suggest .5 MCR per ton.
So that gives us an armor range of 0-6, including potentially a VERY tough 6, and in case of the absorption version missiles are critical as they may penetrate rolling higher then the armor value, and in any event give several chances for a critical hit.
Ok I am coming late to this discussion, but I have given this some thought in this past year.
My 1st idea was a simple saving throw per scored hit, limited by the armor number per turn. i.e. a Armor 6 gets 6 saves vs hits per turn. The throw is a simple 4+ on a d6. Armor protects against and reduced by Critical Hits.
My second I dea is to steal the Armor penetration roll from 1st ed High Guard. Again with armor being reduced/protecting and a critical.
Of the two I like the 1st idea the most, but it adds a new mechanism.
My 1st idea was a simple saving throw per scored hit, limited by the armor number per turn. i.e. a Armor 6 gets 6 saves vs hits per turn. The throw is a simple 4+ on a d6. Armor protects against and reduced by Critical Hits.
My second I dea is to steal the Armor penetration roll from 1st ed High Guard. Again with armor being reduced/protecting and a critical.
Of the two I like the 1st idea the most, but it adds a new mechanism.
Arise! 
My thoughts currently for LBB2 armor: +1/2/3 modifying the to hit roll. Armor is Light +1, 1% of tonnage and +10% base hull price; Armored +2, 5% of tonnage and 50% of base hull price; Heavy +3, 10% of tonnage, and +100% or 2x the base hull price. Armor becomes a negative modifier on a missile's 1d6 hits, for example a missile rolls 1d6 and the result is 3, vs a +1 Light armored vessel, so the result is modified by -1 to 2. Armor is more than surface material, it represents structural reinforcement, thus armor cannot be added except during initial construction.
My thoughts currently for LBB2 armor: +1/2/3 modifying the to hit roll. Armor is Light +1, 1% of tonnage and +10% base hull price; Armored +2, 5% of tonnage and 50% of base hull price; Heavy +3, 10% of tonnage, and +100% or 2x the base hull price. Armor becomes a negative modifier on a missile's 1d6 hits, for example a missile rolls 1d6 and the result is 3, vs a +1 Light armored vessel, so the result is modified by -1 to 2. Armor is more than surface material, it represents structural reinforcement, thus armor cannot be added except during initial construction.
Actually I went back to B5-79, hulls are armored or not, with the saving roll per hit scored, 4+ on a d6...Arise!
My thoughts currently for LBB2 armor: +1/2/3 modifying the to hit roll. Armor is Light +1, 1% of tonnage and +10% base hull price; Armored +2, 5% of tonnage and 50% of base hull price; Heavy +3, 10% of tonnage, and +100% or 2x the base hull price. Armor becomes a negative modifier on a missile's 1d6 hits, for example a missile rolls 1d6 and the result is 3, vs a +1 Light armored vessel, so the result is modified by -1 to 2. Armor is more than surface material, it represents structural reinforcement, thus armor cannot be added except during initial construction.
I am trying to be coherent with the way armor works in regular combat. Though there is nothing wrong with armor giving a saving throw, it does add an extra roll. Edit, though to be clear, the +1/2/3 is actually a negative modifier on the to hit roll, so maybe to be clearer it should be listed as -1/2/3.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
The holy grail
adapting HG80 armour (broken though it is) to LBB:2
44 years later still searching.
adapting HG80 armour (broken though it is) to LBB:2
44 years later still searching.
