Questions about DWS Ground Vehicles

[Devari]

Hi Steve,
I really like the ground vehicles described in the DWS - they cover a lot of the technology that you would expect to exist in Star Trek (such as phaser tanks) but haven't actually seen on screen. The only thing that I find confusing is that the damage conversion for ground vehicles in the DWS seems exceptionally low. Using the listed 1 GV damage = 2 personal scale damage, a type II phaser ends up being much more powerful than a phaser tank's main gun, and could destroy a phaser tank in about two shots! However, I find that if I use a damage conversion of 1 GV damage point = 25 personal damage points (and keep the listed conversion of 1 starship damage point = 50 personal damage points), the vehicle stats end up working perfectly. With this conversion, weapons inflict the following amounts of personal scale damage:

Type II phaser (full power): 200 points
Type V vehicular phaser: 250 points
Type IV shuttlecraft phaser: 400 points
Type XII phaser tank vehicular phaser: 600 points

This makes a phaser tank's main gun 50% more powerful than a shuttle's Type IV phaser, and gives the tank roughly the same hull and shield ratings as a federation shuttle. Does this sound about right? It makes sense to that hand-held phasers and disruptors should to do essentially no damage whatsoever to a phaser or disruptor tank, and that a phaser or disruptor tank's main gun would be more powerful than a shuttlecraft's phasers. Is this closer to what you had in mind for the capabilities of phaser and disruptor tanks, or is my reasoning off base?

(P.S. I know that this is the Spacedock forum, but since Steve wrote the DWS I figured that this would be the best place for this thread - sorry if its in the wrong place!)

[Steve Long]

Once again, my answer is "I wrote that so long ago I don't remember exactly what I did, or why I did it." I've designed too many games and game rules since then to recall exactly what was going through my head at that time.