Starship questions?

Hi there. I know I'm tempting fate, but I'm offering to answer any starship construction or combat questions that you all may have. I realize that the system isn't perfect (damn word count), but we did try to do as good as job as possible in the space and time we were given.

With that said, I have also just finished the manuscript for the Starships book coming out later this year, which expands the system in whole new directions and touches on the areas that didn't get a proper treatment in the NG (such as the 21st and 22nd centuries for example). I'll apologize now if I have to resort to the stock answer of "that's in the Starships book." ;)

I'm pleased to see a thread on making new Traits--that's something that allows you guys (and us) to take the system in new directions. Maneuvers are also a fun area to expand the system. Hopefully you'll take advantage of the open architecture to make the system your own.

So, with that said, fire away and I'll check your penetration against my threshold! :D

Oh, I'll be compiling some errata soon, hopefully.

Umm... I'd be happy to help proof read the Starships Book. Perhaps you could post it here and we could ALL proofread it?

Alternatively, I'm sure it would make a great FAQ! :)

Here's one question that's been bothering the owner/operator of my FLGS:

For Design Defect (Warp Propulsion System and Impulse Propulsion System), what is the time increment for the 2 structure of damage? Is it one hour, the same as the periodic reliability test?

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Originally posted by Don Mappin
With that said, I have also just finished the manuscript for the Starships book coming out later this year, which expands the system in whole new directions and touches on the areas that didn't get a proper treatment in the NG (such as the 21st and 22nd centuries for example). I'll apologize now if I have to resort to the stock answer of "that's in the Starships book." ;)

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While we're on the subject of what's in the starship book :) , I've got to at least ask: did the Borg Cube that Decipher rumored would be included actually make it?

CB

I'm sworn to secrecy on the Borg cube. You'll have to wait and see. :)

I'll check on the Design Defect. I have a gut answer but I want to run it past Matt first.

I apologize for being off-topic, Don, but do you intend to open an errata thread (and its counterpart "questions" thread) for the whole NG like the PG or limit it to Starship/combat rules ?
Apart from that, no question so far :)

With a good enough roll for initiative in starship combat your enemy has to reveal one or two of his maneuvers he plans for the round.
Now if you choose not to re-roll initiative every round, does this apply in all the following rounds as well, or just in the first round of combat?

And if it's the same in every round, does it change due to initiative penalties incurred through damage, i.e. can a later change in initiative cancel the "enemy reveals maneuver" rule?

Simple question...
A system has a reliability of C and suffers one point of damage from incoming fire. Does the ship suffers the penalties from having lost E, D and C or just the C box?
What if this box of damage was used intentionally to reinforce shields or upgrade another system?

Another question...
In starship combat, the use of beam weapon seems weak in comparison with missille weapons. Voyager has a missille penetration of 5 all and beam weapons of 5/4/4/0/0. What is the advantage of using beams in this case. I know in star trek, starships got a limited amount of torpedoes but is it actually in the rules?

Thanks in advance...:p :D

Errata: Yes, but my schedule is hell right now. Fortunately the NG isn't as rules-heavy as the PG, so the list of rules errata is shorter. Also, I don't want to offend anyone by putting out the NG errata too early. We all know how that upset people buying the PG. ;)

I'll probably ask Doug Burke to pull together a list. :)

Initiative: If you roll for initiative once per combat then extraordinary successes reveal the opposing ship's maneuvers) at the start of the first round only. If you choose to roll every round then every round a commander may have to reveal a maneuver depending on the initiative results. (I don't recommend re-rolling every round: it slows things down a bit much for my tastes.)

System Damage: No, a system C that takes a point of damage, marking off its top box (out of three), does not suffer the effects of the D and E damage as well. This rule never changes regardless of how the damage is received. (Higher damage ratings only mean you can take more of a beating before your systems go offline--they still degrade over the course of a battle, hence the cumulative penalties.) Hope I explained that in a manner that makes sense.

Beams vs Missile: Penetration aside, beam weapons have several advantages over missile weapons:
1. They do not inflict splash damage at point blank range.
2. You can target specific systems (Target System can only be used with a beam weapon).
3. You can vary (lower) their penetration. Missile penetration is fixed.
4. There are several cool beam upgrades that missiles don't get (in the Starships book).

I realize 2 and 3 are probably new information and you can choose to 0-rule them out of existence if you prefer.

Page 141: "Missile weapons fired at close range cause full damage to the defender...but the attacker suffers half penetration damage against his shields."

Should that read "Missile weapons fired at point blank range...", or is there further splash damage at point blank?

Correct. You’ll see this one a lot and I grimace every time. Before “point blank” there was “close.” Later, when we unified everything over to the PG ranges, some of those instances of “close” were never properly hunted down and renamed.

So, any reference to “close” in the NG text actually refers to “point blank.”

Defiant's cruising speed is listed as warp 6, but for her engine type should be warp 8.

Is this a typo, or an aspect of her engine problems?

All right, I've been having a go at the starship construction rules, trying to stat up various ships we haven't been supplied yet and give them good values relative to those the NG supplies us. While doing so, I've tried constructing the ships profiled in the NG, and come up with some problems. Namely, if I build a ship to have the exact same stats as one given on pp. 146-157, most of the time I end going over the allowed space for a vessel of that size. For example, the Intrepid-Class is built spending:

3 space for Atmosphere Capable
3 space for additional Standard Transporters (extra emergency & cargo free up to # of standard ones)
2 space for shuttlebay
1 space for extra tractor beam
4 space for sensor system
7 space for operations system
6 space for life support
6 space for impulse
7 space for warp
18 space for phasers
12 space for photorps
12 space for deflectors and extra threshold
total space used: 81

At size 6, only 77 space is allowed. No "extra" space is granted by taking a flaw or reducing the structure points, so the Intrepid Class has spent 4 more space than the construction rules allow.

Other ships which spend more space than their size allows are:

Constitution(2273): 2 space over (assuming emergency separation system costs 1 space instead of 2 for a standard separation system)
Defiant: 1 space over
Galaxy: 5 space over
Oberth(2341): 1 space over
Hunter: 1 space over
K't'inga: 4 space over

Either I am misreading the ship construction rules, the designers "fudged" a little bit, or the designers used a different set of rules we won't get to see until the starships book comes out. Someone please clue me in on this...

-Chris Landmark

Edited 'cause I missed a rather importaint bit of info which actually causes the Herbert-class transport to come in on-cost, and somehow I spent one extra space on the 2273 Connie.

Are you accounting for cost discounts for class type (i.e., beam weapons are cheaper for "heavy" ships and torps are cheaper for cruisers)? I thought the 2273 Constitution refit was actually under the point total when I added it up.

Now, many of the TNG ships do seem to be a couple of points over...

I think you might be running into a problem that I did when I first tried the construction rules. Namely that certain size ships hav a -1 modifer on certain systems. Take the Defiant-class (it was the one I first reversed engineered.) When you take into account that as a Heavy Escort it gets -1 for all its weapons...Which I think, if you will check, brings the Defiant to exactly 0 space left over. These rules are kind of hard to find, they are in fine print under the various system charts.

This wouldn’t surprise me. When the ships were created they were done down to the point and were legal. I heard that some stuff was altered in layout, possibly without adjusting points. So, that, by association, would through a few of the ships off. I personally have not had a moment to reverse engineer these ships and double-check their points since I got the book.

With that said, yes—a number of people forget the cost bonuses associated with a system for being an explorer or a heavy vessel, for example. That could account for some cost differentials.

So, presuming the points are off on a ship:
1. You can simply ignore the difference and rack it up to Narrator fiat (like we’re going to storm your house and make sure your ships are accurate to the point?)
2. Correct/tweak the ships to put them in line, perhaps by taking a single flaw or cutting back just a tad on 1-2 systems.
3. Call me/Decipher idiots, organize a boycott, or start up some errata on the topic. :)
4. Any combination of the above.

I apologize for the mistake if any of the ships are, in fact, off.

Don, any answer from Matt on the Design Defect (impulse or warp system) time increment for subracting -2 structure?

Sea Tyger, Phantom:
No, I am not forgetting the discounts that various ship types get on components. In my Intrepid Class example, I incorporated the -1 cost to warp engines from being a "light" ship, and the -2 cost to shields for being an "explorer", and I did the same on all the other ships. Except for the Herbert Class, since I just noticed the "Support/Auxilliary classification vessles may purchase cargo units at a ratio of 10:1 point of space" bit, which would bring it into the legal camp. I rechecked my numbers for both the Defiant and 2273 Connie, and both came up over the allowable limit (though somehow the Connie cost 1 less space this time around). Though if you're giving the Defiant -1 to all weapons, Phantom, I can see where you'd come out different from me, as the "heavy" vessel only gets discounts on beam weapons. ;)

Don:
If a few things got changed at the layout stage, that would be an explanation I hadn't thought of. And it would be perfectly understandable, too.

If anyone else wants to reverse-engineer some of the NG starships and see if I'm right on this, please let me know the results. I'm not terribly concerned that they don't calculate out exactly. I just want to be sure that I'm doing the ship construction stuff right. If these ships actually do fall within the space allotments for their sizes, then I obviously am spending too much space somewhere, and I'd like to figure out where it is. If on the other hand I am doing everything right and all these ships are exceeding the allowable space by a couple points, then I'm not going to worry about my designs spilling one or two points over if I feel they need it.

-Chris Landmark
(off to organize a boycott of Don Moppin...:D)

I think this has been covered before, but I can't find the thread.

The systems damage track has 1 column for propulsion, but the ships have a reliability rating for both Impulse and Warp systems.

Does each system get it's own damage track or are the reliability ratings combined somehow?

update:
I found the answer, you take the worst of the 2 ratings.

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Its on page 139 of the Narrator's Guide under Propulsion Systems.

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Don,
In general what happens when a maneuver roll is failed?

I particular, if a ship Tactical Officer is trying to target another ships system (say warp drive) and fails the roll (by less than 10 point penalty for targeting a system) is the shot a clean miss or should I give him a "regular" hit?

It at least would make sense to me, if the shot is called and would have hit with less than the penalty for said shot, to have the shot turn into a "normal" hit.

After all, isn't that what happened in ST:Search for Spock with the Bird of Prey shooting at the Grissom? :-)

Tom

I think the weapons officer was trying (unsuccessfully) to make his foul-up look good.

I would just let it be a normal hit.

Does anyone know where the NG source books for ships can be purchased or attained?

The Starships book hasn't been released yet. Some ships are written up as examples in the Narrator's Guide, however.

Don,
are you out there?

Don has a wife, a child, a day job, and several freelance writing contracts that I'm sure take precedence over monitoring every thread on this board. It is my studied opinion, having had most of the same circumstances in my life in the past (I'm a freelancer, too), that you might cut him some slack.

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Originally posted by PGoodman13
Don has a wife, a child, a day job, and several freelance writing contracts that I'm sure take precedence over monitoring every thread on this board. It is my studied opinion, having had most of the same circumstances in my life in the past (I'm a freelancer, too), that you might cut him some slack.

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I'm not giving him a hard time, just woindering if he is still watching this thread. No I don't expect him to watch every thread, but given the author and title of this one I did think he might stop by once a week or so... :)