As promised over on the Space Stations thread, here is the quote from the DS9 Tech Manual which got me thinking:
DS9TM pg.53
"Docked vessels up to 325 metres in length will be protected to a limited degree by the defensive shield envelope... There is some mutual benefit to both ships and station if their shields are active, since some field coupling is known to occur."
As I mentioned previously, this lead me to wonder if there should be a SD rule for improving the shields of space stations and ships docked at it. The Tech Manual implies this would only happen rarely - civvie ships would be evacuated in the case of an expected attack, and military ships would likely undock to engage the enemy.
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"Captain? Is something wrong?"
"I just had the most terrible news. I have to attend the Annual Admirals' Dinner.
I've faced Borg, Romulans and battle-crazed Jem'Hadar, but nothing compares to this."
I'm glad you found that, Captain; it's been tickling at the back of my mind since you mentioned it.
That quote leads me to believe that I can probably come up with a rule that enhances a ship's shields slightly while it's within a station's normal (non-extended) shield bubble. However, I'm still concerned about the contradictory "shutting down shields" language on pages 91-92, but I think I can harmonize the two by stating that the info on pages 91-92 only applies when a ship wants to pass through a station's active shields (that seems to be what's implied; the section's just not as clearly written as it could be).
Putting my own thoughts on this, would it be an idea to say that the shields of the docked ships stay at the same protection, whilst adopting the Threshold of the station's shields? The station could gain 1 point of Protection per 10 points of the docked vessels' shields (EG: DS9 gains 60 points if the Defiant is docked there). This doesn't make for overkill (as I said, most ships are likely to undock in order to run or fight), as the benefits don't conflict.
What I mean by that is that, if both ships and station gain a certain amount of Protection based on each others' shields, then people could argue "well, the station's shields have increased due to the docked ships, therefore the ships gain extra shields, so the station's ones go up too...". Making the benefits to the ships and station different avoids this.
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"Captain? Is something wrong?"
"I just had the most terrible news. I have to attend the Annual Admirals' Dinner.
I've faced Borg, Romulans and battle-crazed Jem'Hadar, but nothing compares to this."
Well, I'm not sure how I'd do it; first I need to delve into station-building rules and see how, if any, their shields differ (probably not at all, except in scale). But your suggestion is certainly one worthwhile approach.
Shields on Space Stations
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