How do you do starship combat?

[vecna35]

I have been hit with the bug again to examine how we play the starship combat rules. I also have spent the better time here reading threads on this. Now far be it for me to rehash an old thread but the starship miniatures thread got me thinking. The creator of this system intended not to use miniatures but have more of a dramatic on the bridge feel. That is cool but some advice on that post surprised me.

1. A suggestion for the GM to keep the distance chart behind the screens and not in front of players.

2. To describe the action, using flavor text of the results

I still see exidence that players and GMs decide what maneuvers to use at the start of their turn and not at the start of the round. (which sort of makes sense)

These 2 points surprised me being a wargamer who used the downloadable card maneuvers found here on these boards...some of which I made myself. My group always had the fasa/wargaming mentality so we would just reveal what we had chosen and make rolls. It never dawned on me to just describe the results and tone down the mechanics. In fact when the maneuver cards were made one thing that was left out that bothered me was the flavor text. I think I will try one night to have a combat where I keep my rolling hidden and not talk out loud the game mechanics and then describe the flavor text without mentioning the actual manuever. Perhaps that is the best way the game was meant to originlly be played.

If your wondering the way we go about it its also quite fun.
First off I use all cards, my players love the colors of blue, yellow and red for representation and the look of them. secondly Don mentioned that he was thinking of releasing the extra rules that would convert the game to a table top coda format, something along the lines of "silent death."
I have come up with house rules that has facilitated the game over to table top and have since been using a space mat and star trek micromachines to represent the ships. I also designed some stands that are retractable so that a 3d effect can be used. Basically 1 increment is 4 inches. ie to go from extended +1 to long range is 2 increments for Coda and 8 inches on the tabletop. In order to gain any elevation players need to play a manuever card that changes it. I won't bore you with details but suffice it to say it will be different to try it the other way.

[RaconteurX]

The maneuver cards were not available when my group was still active, but we found the more abstract system both fun and liberating. Rather than fretting over where some little marker was on a piece of paper, we let ourselves really get into our roles. Casualty reports would stream in from the doctor, damage control parties would be dispatched by the chief engineer, target acquisition and weapons readiness would be barked out by the tactical officer, etc. There was a real feel of battle-born chaos and confusion at times. Great fun.

[jkp1187]

What are these "maneuver cards"?

[spshu]

Originally posted by jkp1187
What are these "maneuver cards"?

I assume he is talking about the cards available in the Starship Combat Cards thread.

[vecna35]

I would like to point out that I went ahead and created most of the manuever cards for the ESO. You should find them here on these boards.

Just remember kids Cards are picked and turned upside down only at the top of the first round thereafter (on round 2 and onwards), they are picked then only during your turn and not before. (ie at the top of the round).
The NG book does not describe this and you have to dig a little to figure out the sequence. The sequence in the NG book is oFF.

[vecna35]

bump