So I was looking over several pieces of OGL material when dealing with ship and sailing and I have to wonder, what stats have to be on the (Sky)ships for Pirates of the Bronze Sky? Let me know.
So I was looking over several pieces of OGL material when dealing with ship and sailing and I have to wonder, what stats have to be on the (Sky)ships for Pirates of the Bronze Sky? Let me know.
Hmm, yeah, I've been thinking about this. Ship rules are a dilemma. You don't want them to be too super complex but if you're playing a sailing/piracy focused game you want them to be crunchy enough to make for a more exciting naval battle sequence than "Yeah, I guess you close with them and board."
You want to be able to:
1. Run something where a pursued ship has a chance of getting away, but not an automatic thing - which means not a flat speed, but something based on ship and wind and Profession: sailor
2. Have a lively cannon fight
3. Have multiple PCs be able to contribute meaningfully in a given turn, so making various skills count
4. Board!
In terms of ship stats that feed into this,
1. Some kind of speed, expressed as a bonus and a factor of sails and wind / rowers (and, probably, cargo load).
2. Some kind of maneuverability, expressed as a bonus and a factor of sails and wind / rowers.
3. Number of sections and hit points per section (you don't want one ship to have "200 hp" or whatever - you want multiple sections with hardness/hp each.
4. Number of cannon/armaments you can mount - ideally broken up by broadside, chase, etc.
5. Crew complement/cargo tonnage.
So I was looking over several pieces of OGL material when dealing with ship and sailing and I have to wonder, what stats have to be on the (Sky)ships for Pirates of the Bronze Sky? Let me know.
Tough one. This kinda depends on your rules. It can vary. Are you planning on something akin to the d20 vehicle rules? I like the rules in Airships, but I don't like their speed ratings. Their 'engines' were always too vague. I also like the idea behind the vehicle stats in Star Wars SAGA. Not OGL, but giving vehicles a sorta monster stat block isn't an idea that they can claim as product identity. Has been discussed before, and I see merit in it. On the other hand, you could possibly stat them the same way as animated objects, or similar at least. The real challenge is to get the stats too different from creature stats so that dragon combat is easier.
What about ships that may be 'constructs' or symbionts? Or even powered by elementals? Will those come into play?
Developer
|
So I was looking over several pieces of OGL material when dealing with ship and sailing and I have to wonder, what stats have to be on the (Sky)ships for Pirates of the Bronze Sky? Let me know.
In terms of movement, a ship is only as good as its pilot: the profession (sailor) skill or a new skill (such as profession (pilot)) could be used in a similar manner to the Fly skill in Pathfinder in order to perform various ship maneuvers. Different ships could grant flat bonuses to the pilot's skill (or even penalties for really slow ships), or they could have different bonuses for different types of maneuvers if you wanted to be more detailed. As far as speed goes, each ship can have a base speed and the pilot needs to make a certain skill check (DC 10 or 15) to move at that speed. by getting 20 or 25 on their check they can bump the speed up a bit. The speed can also be modified by things like wind and damage to the ship.
You definitely need to describe rules for damaging ships. How much damage needs to be done to knock a hole in the hull? What about knocking the mast down?
And basically all of the other things that Ernest already said... how many cannons? How much cargo?
I would also add: what is the ship's power source? Does it need to be "refueled?" Is it possible to give the ship "boosts" by using up fuel faster? What happens to the ship if its power source is destroyed? Does it still float, "dead" in the air? Does it fall and crash?
You want to be able to:
1. Run something where a pursued ship has a chance of getting away, but not an automatic thing - which means not a flat speed, but something based on ship and wind and Profession: sailor
OK. For this I would be doing a combination of my original Haven: City of Violence rules, Spycraft's Chase rules and Adamant's Chase rules.
2. Have a lively cannon fight
Oh Yea! Pluse I was to know the effect magic will play also.
3. Have multiple PCs be able to contribute meaningfully in a given turn, so making various skills count
OK
4. Board!
This is manditory. Especial for me. I would like rules to playout full boarding rules with PC and NPCs fighting it out and I would like quick rules for those who don't want to play that out.
In terms of ship stats that feed into this,
1. Some kind of speed, expressed as a bonus and a factor of sails and wind / rowers (and, probably, cargo load).
Check.
2. Some kind of maneuverability, expressed as a bonus and a factor of sails and wind / rowers.
Check.
3. Number of sections and hit points per section (you don't want one ship to have "200 hp" or whatever - you want multiple sections with hardness/hp each.
Check.
4. Number of cannon/armaments you can mount - ideally broken up by broadside, chase, etc.
Check.
5. Crew complement/cargo tonnage.
Double check.
You definitely need to describe rules for damaging ships. How much damage needs to be done to knock a hole in the hull? What about knocking the mast down?
Good idea. Have to start working on this.
I would also add: what is the ship's power source? Does it need to be "refueled?" Is it possible to give the ship "boosts" by using up fuel faster? What happens to the ship if its power source is destroyed? Does it still float, "dead" in the air? Does it fall and crash?
This is a HUGE debate I am having, will there be a power source based engine room or will the skyship use lighter than air material with magic providing thrust? I have to think this over carefully.
|
You definitely need to describe rules for damaging ships. How much damage needs to be done to knock a hole in the hull? What about knocking the mast down?Good idea. Have to start working on this.
I would also add: what is the ship's power source? Does it need to be "refueled?" Is it possible to give the ship "boosts" by using up fuel faster? What happens to the ship if its power source is destroyed? Does it still float, "dead" in the air? Does it fall and crash?This is a HUGE debate I am having, will there be a power source based engine room or will the skyship use lighter than air material with magic providing thrust? I have to think this over carefully.
Personally I hope you go power source as it adds more to the game. With that you have things like using more "fuel" to go faster, perhaps adventures where you run out of fuel and need more etc. I think it offers a lot more pro's than con's compered to just lighter than air material with magic thrust.
Magic could still be the source though, one of Terry Brooks books had air ships in it with magic crystals that provided the ability to fly and could be used for thrust but at a much higher use of the power, while sails was normally used to provide thrust. (take this with a grain of salt it has been years since i read the book so going off memory here)
I would also add: what is the ship's power source? Does it need to be "refueled?" Is it possible to give the ship "boosts" by using up fuel faster? What happens to the ship if its power source is destroyed? Does it still float, "dead" in the air? Does it fall and crash?This is a HUGE debate I am having, will there be a power source based engine room or will the skyship use lighter than air material with magic providing thrust? I have to think this over carefully.
That can be huge. Need to determine early own, because admitting too many different power sources can confuse things. I thought this was a problem with Airships.
Another thing to determine, if ships are converted ocean vessels. Some can be purpose built, while others converted. This can be converted designs, or actually converting a galleon.
Please, no matter what you finally do, don't let the scale of illustrations be off. Spelljammer, Airships, and Aerial Captains Guide all have this problem to a greater or lesser extent. The designs and drawing need to be close & believable.
Another thing to determine, if ships are converted ocean vessels. Some can be purpose built, while others converted. This can be converted designs, or actually converting a galleon.
These ship ARE NOT coverted from ocean vessels. They are built specifially for flying. I have been inspired design-wise from Babylon 5 Minbari and Shadow spaceship "organic" looking design. That will give the setting a distinct look that I want to see. Plus we will be influenced ship-wise from some of the races in Spelljammer (Drow and Mind Flayer designs are too cool!)
Please, no matter what you finally do, don't let the scale of illustrations be off. Spelljammer, Airships, and Aerial Captains Guide all have this problem to a greater or lesser extent. The designs and drawing need to be close & believable.
Well I am hoping to ask Ki Ryn Studios to do all the actual deck tile design on the skyships. They have done great designs on thie line of spaceships and have kept them to scale.
|
Developer
|
The power source of the ship should make sense in the context of the rest of the setting: if you've got lots of stuff powered by magic, you should go with magical airships. If, on the other hand, you have lots of mechanical/clockwork/steam contraptions, the ship should have an "engine" with some sort of fuel. A combination of those ideas would be to have a magical fuel (such as a crystal, or a liquid, or even a gas, or crystals that are vaporized, releasing energy) which powers a mechanical ship's propellers, wings, balloons, or whatever else it uses. When I ran a "steampunk" D20 game for my friends back in the day, this latter method is the one I used.
Another thing to determine, if ships are converted ocean vessels. Some can be purpose built, while others converted. This can be converted designs, or actually converting a galleon.
I forgot to mention that we will have an aircraft carrier type skyship. We will just have flying monsters as the "airplanes" with the riders as "pilots".
|
Developer
|
Another thing to determine, if ships are converted ocean vessels. Some can be purpose built, while others converted. This can be converted designs, or actually converting a galleon.I forgot to mention that we will have an aircraft carrier type skyship. We will just have flying monsters as the "airplanes" with the riders as "pilots".
Sweet. If that's the case, you'll want to make sure those monsters can fully interact with the ships - hurting them, being hurt by them, chasing them, and so on...
|
Personally I hope you go power source as it adds more to the game. With that you have things like using more "fuel" to go faster, perhaps adventures where you run out of fuel and need more etc. I think it offers a lot more pro's than con's compered to just lighter than air material with magic thrust.
I would also add: what is the ship's power source? Does it need to be "refueled?" Is it possible to give the ship "boosts" by using up fuel faster? What happens to the ship if its power source is destroyed? Does it still float, "dead" in the air? Does it fall and crash?This is a HUGE debate I am having, will there be a power source based engine room or will the skyship use lighter than air material with magic providing thrust? I have to think this over carefully.
Slaine's world has skyships powered by weirdstones, whose earth energy gets recharged when it runs low by sacrificing animals (mostly) to them.
Size category, which would be anything from Large (a small rowboat or skiff) to Gargantuan or Colossal
A problem with d20 Modern's approach is that most ships end up being Colossal with a few Gargantuan instances. This obviates the whole point of having size categories and, as a result, they all have large negative modifiers to defenses and manouevrability. You could decide whether this is OK for backward compatibility or you want to make a new scale range for ships.
Some systems, such as Adamant's, also have ship-scale hit points, while others keep compatible damage scales and just give ships some amount of Hardness.
I sympathise, though, with the point up thread that location damage is more exciting than a pool of hull hit points. I've often thought a system could go further: have nothing but a chance of system damage effects to each location and not track hit points at all, on the theory that any shot that doesn't visibly disable something is minor damage that doesn't affect the ship's function.
Maybe minor damage would need to have a battering effect, cracking and weakening structural supports, that gave a modifier to further damage checks to that location. It could also make the ship look less impressive, penalising later Diplomacy and Intimidate checks until repaired.
Here is one for you all, how should we handle three dimensional combat?
|
Developer
|
Begin ramble...
.
.
.
.
The more I think about it, the more I think that the movement system and aerial combat system need to be relatively abstract. Three-dimensional combat with ships is not something that many people are going to handle using battle-mats and grids (correct me if I'm wrong). Now, I don't know what other systems might have already covered in terms of three-dimensional combat, but it seems to me that this system ought to focus more on fast-paced action than nitty-gritty movement details.
The system should support a player who wants to say "I want to outmaneuver his ship so we're above him, then we'll launch our dragoons!" The GM says, "OK, make a maneuver check. That's Profession (Pilot) with a +4 bonus against the Dusty Leviathan's Aerial Maneuver Defense. You succeed? Awesome! You're above them and they'll need a successful check to get out. In the meantime, you can launch the dragoons!" rather than "I want to turn the ship 90 degrees to port and move 150 feet. Err, and 30 degrees "down" please. Are we above them yet?" "Yes you are, but they move 100 feet forward again. You didn't have enough aerial actions left to launch your fighters..."
It just came to me while writing that blurb, but maybe aerial combat could work sort of like the new Combat Maneuvers system. You use a ship's actions (and an Aerial Maneuver Bonus) to maneuver around, under, and alongside an enemy ship, or to maintain a certain distance, or flee... opposed by the other ship's Aerial Maneuver Defense. That allows the "three dimensions" to become abstracted and then people can focus on the fight itself rather than the boring details.
Any other thoughts? Dissenting opinions?
EDIT: This system could probably mesh well with a system for "boarding" another ship.
For the sky ships themselves, I'd say something like this :
Flight : ### ft, Manuever rating
Climb Speed : ### ft/turn
Descent Speed : ### ft/turn
STR : ##
DEX : ##
CON : ##
HP : ##
SIZE : ## ft/## ft/## ft (Length/width/height*)
Mast Height : ## ft
Propulsion Method : Sail/Elemental Engine/Muscle
If you have multiple propulsion methods (Mast and muscle) then you would have 2 different flight/manuever rating entries.
The STR, DEX, and CON would represent how much lifting capacity the ship had, how quick it was to respond to commands, and how well constructed it was. Just like a human character. The STR would of course correspond much differently on a ship. So a 20 str ship might have 100 times the lifting capacity of a human with 20 str. The Dex bonus would add to piloting checks and initiatives, and the Con bonus would add to HP.
Your HP would be based on the size of the ship (Large = 5 hit die let's say, a big canoe, Huge = 10 hit die, gargantuan = 20 hit die, collossal = 40 hit die say). The size of the hit die is based on the type. Pleasure craft = d6, merchant/utility craft = d8, and warcraft = d10?
You'd need rules for alternate construction materials :
Bronzewood : A ship created of bronzewood has DR 5/Slashing, and gains a +2 bonus to each hit die.
Darkwood : A ship created of Darkwood has DR 5/Slashing, and increases it's carrying capacity multiplier by 1 (due to the lightness of the wood allowing more cargo to be carried).
All this is off the cuff of course, it would require lots more fleshing out and testing and so forth. To perform a combat manuever you have a DC for each manuever that's modified by the ships maneuverability rating and the ships dex bonus.
*Not including Masts
EDIT : Missed the conversation on AMB and AMD, add those two to the stats as well. I like that idea. Although, you need AMD to include the pilots rating, just as AMB includes the pilots rating. No matter how nimble your ship, if you have a tyro at the controls you're hosed. And a good pilot can make a mediocre ship shine.
|
|
Begin ramble...
.
.
.
.The more I think about it, the more I think that the movement system and aerial combat system need to be relatively abstract. Three-dimensional combat with ships is not something that many people are going to handle using battle-mats and grids (correct me if I'm wrong). Now, I don't know what other systems might have already covered in terms of three-dimensional combat, but it seems to me that this system ought to focus more on fast-paced action than nitty-gritty movement details.
The system should support a player who wants to say "I want to outmaneuver his ship so we're above him, then we'll launch our dragoons!" The GM says, "OK, make a maneuver check. That's Profession (Pilot) with a +4 bonus against the Dusty Leviathan's Aerial Maneuver Defense. You succeed? Awesome! You're above them and they'll need a successful check to get out. In the meantime, you can launch the dragoons!" rather than "I want to turn the ship 90 degrees to port and move 150 feet. Err, and 30 degrees "down" please. Are we above them yet?" "Yes you are, but they move 100 feet forward again. You didn't have enough aerial actions left to launch your fighters..."
It just came to me while writing that blurb, but maybe aerial combat could work sort of like the new Combat Maneuvers system. You use a ship's actions (and an Aerial Maneuver Bonus) to maneuver around, under, and alongside an enemy ship, or to maintain a certain distance, or flee... opposed by the other ship's Aerial Maneuver Defense. That allows the "three dimensions" to become abstracted and then people can focus on the fight itself rather than the boring details.
Any other thoughts? Dissenting opinions?
EDIT: This system could probably mesh well with a system for "boarding" another ship.
You're on to something here.
Perehaps ther should be a heavy and lite version of combat.
|
Developer
|
Although, you need AMD to include the pilots rating, just as AMB includes the pilots rating. No matter how nimble your ship, if you have a tyro at the controls you're...
Yeah, I think the AMD and AMB should actually be based on the skill of the pilot and modified by the ship and other circumstances (damage to the ship, wind). Some ships would be barred from performing certain maneuvers entirely. (Like the scene in the pilot episode of Firefly, in which the Serenity escapes the reavers with a "Crazy Ivan" maneuver, which the reavers can't follow up on simply because of the nature of their ship.)
I'm not sure what I think about the idea of giving ships stats like Str, Dex, and Con, especially if they represent different things than those stats usually represent. That sounds confusing. Hit points, yes. Strength score? I don't really see where this would be applicable. Why not just state a carrying capacity in the ship's entry? This saves from having to look things up on the "Vessel Strength" chart... the "Vessel Dexterity" chart for maneuvers... and so on. (I could see something like this working but I'm wary of it right now.)
Although, you need AMD to include the pilots rating, just as AMB includes the pilots rating. No matter how nimble your ship, if you have a tyro at the controls you're...Yeah, I think the AMD and AMB should actually be based on the skill of the pilot and modified by the ship and other circumstances (damage to the ship, wind). Some ships would be barred from performing certain maneuvers entirely. (Like the scene in the pilot episode of Firefly, in which the Serenity escapes the reavers with a "Crazy Ivan" maneuver, which the reavers can't follow up on simply because of the nature of their ship.)
I'm not sure what I think about the idea of giving ships stats like Str, Dex, and Con, especially if they represent different things than those stats usually represent. That sounds confusing. Hit points, yes. Strength score? I don't really see where this would be applicable. Why not just state a carrying capacity in the ship's entry? This saves from having to look things up on the "Vessel Strength" chart... the "Vessel Dexterity" chart for maneuvers... and so on. (I could see something like this working but I'm wary of it right now.)
Not sure what you mean by 'different meanings'. Maybe I just didn't make it clear.
A Str for a human indicates the damage he does in melee and how much he can carry. A ship would have a str stat that indicated how much damage it did when ramming (modified by size and speed of course, but that's the base for the damage) and the amount of weight it can carry. That's pretty much the same definition. Now, the ship has a different multiplier for carrying capacity, but so does a quadruped vs biped, or a large vs small vs huge creature.
Dex is how nimble a character is, it boosts AC, and adds to initiative and CMD. A ships dex would indicate how nimble that ship is, it would boost the ships AC, add to it's initiative and AMD. It adds to characters reflex saves, and to ships reflex saves.
Con is how healthy/robust a character is. It indicates how easy a time it has making fort saves, and influences HP. A ship's CON affects fort saves and affects HP.
Maybe I just didn't explain them well enough, I just assumed it was inherent in the names that they'd behave like the base stats of a human character.
|
Developer
|
Okay mdt, I see what you're going for here. I think this could work: the main problem I foresee would be that if the scores behaved differently than normal scores (for instance, if Str 35 for a ship meant something different than Str 35 for a dragon), people might get confused. What does Str 18 for a ship mean? It certainly doesn't get +4 to attack rolls like a normal character. What about your ship's Dex? Does it add its Dex bonus to AC? Can it be caught flat-footed? Does it roll initiative? Clearly the "ability scores" would mean slightly different things (even if they represented similar qualities), so it might be better not to give them the same name.
I don't think assigning "ability scores" to ships is the way I would go about it, were I designing such mechanics, but I could see that sort of system working out. One advantage to giving ships stats in the manner you're proposing would be ease of comparing them to flying monsters, such as dragons which might attack the ships.
Okay mdt, I see what you're going for here. I think this could work: the main problem I foresee would be that if the scores behaved differently than normal scores (for instance, if Str 35 for a ship meant something different than Str 35 for a dragon), people might get confused. What does Str 18 for a ship mean? It certainly doesn't get +4 to attack rolls like a normal character. What about your ship's Dex? Does it add its Dex bonus to AC? Can it be caught flat-footed? Does it roll initiative? Clearly the "ability scores" would mean slightly different things (even if they represented similar qualities), so it might be better not to give them the same name.
I don't think assigning "ability scores" to ships is the way I would go about it, were I designing such mechanics, but I could see that sort of system working out. One advantage to giving ships stats in the manner you're proposing would be ease of comparing them to flying monsters, such as dragons which might attack the ships.
Yep, that's what I was going for.
For strength, well... A ship doesn't have melee attacks other than ramming or sideswiping. However, in both cases, a stronger (read that as having more 'heft' to it, mass, etc) is going to have bonuses to slam or sidewswipe another craft (of course, if it's hitting something even bigger, then it's going to hurt itself as much if not more than the other ship). Basically strength would represent how much integrity and mass the ship had, how 'strong' it is with regards to hitting objects or carrying things. That's pretty much what str means on a human too.
Obviously, the ship itself doesn't have a BAB, the people on board do. So the level 10 fighter using the forward harpoon is much better than the level 4 rogue using the arbalest in the crow's nest. However, I could see an argument for the SHIPS dex being used in conjunction with the character's BAB for ranged attacks, representing the fact that a fixed weapon relies on the ship's nimbleness, not the gunners. Handheld weapons, like crossbows, would just use the character's base stats, but probably have a penalty for 'ship maneuvering in combat', basically treacherous ground.
A ship could be caught flat footed (the pilot would be caught by surprise, thus the ship is not manuevering, and loses it's Dex bonus to AC). That's a staple of ship combat, be it aerial or oceanic, but especially the 'villain swooping from cloud cover'. A ship would have to have an AC, and the dex of the ship would add to it (a nimble cutter is harder to hit than a wallowing pig of a barge). It would need to have an Initiative (for performing combat manuevers like 'Pull Away', 'Swoop', 'Dive', etc). The pilot would of course be controling it, but no matter how fast his reactions are, he can't force the ship to react any faster than it can physically. You'd actually end up with a situation where a ship acts on the slower of either it's initiative or the pilots.
Basically, I'm of the school of thought that introducing radically new things to a system should be minimized. If you can reasonably get an existing mechanic to work, even if it requires a minor tweak or loses a bit of 'realism', it's better than making up an entire new system for it. There is already a system for physical stats, movement speed, etc. This is built into large flying monsters, and it's simpler to adjust flying and ocean ships to fit into that system than it is to create a new system. Creating a new system means you have to come up with a method of converting str/dex/con for monsters to the new system anyway, which if you are going to do that, why bother with the new system? It's just another rule set the players have to learn, the GM has to keep track of, and that can be broken by feats and expansion equipment. Better to use the existing bits. So, a 'sail of speed' would add to the ships speed, a 'Rudder of Dexterity' would add to it's dex and so on. Already in the rules, and just needing a 'ship equipment' multiplier on the base costs of items to fit them to the ship. Much easier than coming up with an entirely new system that represents sort of the same thing but called something different, and then on top of that here's the conversion rules for making a dragon fit into the ship system. Oh and here's another rule for getting equipment to work with the ships. And another for magic interacting (since there are no saving throw entries for reflex/fortitude for most spells) with the ships.
Wow, that was a lot longer than I thought it would be. Didn't realize I had that much to say. :)
|
Developer
|
Well, I would argue that aerial combat, being such a big part of a game/getting like this, deserves having its own micro-system. Aerial combat is just as important as (if not more important than) magic in a steampunk game, and magic has its own system. I also think that making a new abstract aerial combat system would be less complex than trying to integrate ships into the existing combat/monster stats system. Obviously a certain amount of integration is necessary, but I don't really think this sort of combat should work the same way as "regular" combat. Your mileage (air speed velocity?) may vary... :)
|
This thread really hits on the crux of the design problem with an airship game -- the "base game" (SRD/PFRPG/etc) doesn't contain vehicular design/combat rules. This foundation needs to be rolled in alongside the base game rules.
I can only offer this advice, for free, probably worth the price:
* Keep it simple. Try to make vehicular combat as close to individual combat as you can -- initiative, attacks, armor, movement, etc.
* That being said: vehicular combat is probably going to be slower than man-to-man. Maybe 1-minute turns instead of 6-sec?
* Vehicles can move and fire much easier than individuals can, so there should be less choice between maneuvering and attacking -- on a typical turn, a vehicle should be able to maneuver at its current speed AND fire all ready guns.
* I would recommend against tracking damage on individual parts of a ship just as we don't track damage on limbs and torsos. It just simplifies things.
* Individual crew bonuses (Dex, BAB, skill) will probably count for less in vehicle combat than in man-to-man, in comparison to weapon accuracy, ship maneuverability/speed, etc.
Hope this helps.
I have to agree with mdt/Mike/delabarre above. On all points! :)
There is (currently) no comprehensive system in place for vehicular combat, (other than the current char/monster rules) and those that exist in other systems just cannot cover EVERY possible type of vehicle. And obviously there are just as many ideas of what such a system should look like as there are people reading this thread! ;)
2D sailing ship combat is completely different, and no less difficult, than modern jet fighter combat. Or dueling dragons,... And all can use good strategy, lucky dice rolls, and special abilities/magic to change what would otherwise be an 'easily predictable outcome' in any particular battle. (Example, it is said that a Learjet cannot perform a barrel roll, but I bet a crackerjack fighter pilot could make a liar of them!) :)
I would recommend coming up with a basic ships stat list (as suggested above, after all you DO need some way to track damage, etc.) but keeping it as simple as possible otherwise. It might be more accurate to use ship models in aerial combat, but a lot easier to have running fun with the battle if you keep it narrated and loose.
No answers here, only more questions! I do like all of the suggestions for the ships stat blacks above though, I'm making notes for future use, thanks guys!
:D
Airworthiness: Or use a ship Dex below
Hit Points/DR per section:
List of saves for the ship:
Ship stats: Str (Use as Con for Saves), Dex (A maneuverability rating)
Critical Hits chart: Yes ships do have critical things to worry about. Maybe come up with your own critical hits card deck for the airships.
Base Speed: Like 3e vehicle rules, then modifiers/multipliers based on motive force
That is just off the top of my head. I also like templates for ships too. Maybe some races can get more out of a design naturally than others. If you get right down to it, look at standard bestiary entries & try to modify it to fit an airship.
Hey Mike,
I agree, it's going to have to have it's own section and rules, you can't get away from that. I'm just saying it makes sense to keep things as close to the 'core' as possible.
Let me give an example, if I can. If you've ever played BattleTech and MechWarrior (tabletop combat vs RPG) the two systems were created seperately, and you have to convert things over to get your pilot character to work properly with a combat pilot rating. Rather than have the RPG deal with the combat system in the table top, they wrote two completely different systems and then wrote a converter between the two. The effect was you had to learn two different game systems to play one story. Having done it, it's not a fun thing, and I advocate avoiding it. As an example, die rolling was different from one to the other. :)
I'm just saying it should be built so as to mesh as well as possible with the existing ideas and the core system.
As was suggested above, I agree that ship combat rounds should be different than standard combat rounds. I would suggest something like the following though.
One round in a vehicle combat = one round in a character combat (you'll see why in a sec). However, a vehicle can only perform a 'maneuver' check every N rounds (based on maneuverability). The reason for this is, a dragon with flight 120 is basically a ship, but it can execute attack and/or manuever each round. A ship is not as manueverable as a living organism obviously, so it takes it longer to be able to make it's manuever (I'd suggest a range of 3 to 6 rounds, based on manueverability). However, weapons should be able to be fired independent of the ship's movement. Just like a rider on a horse can fire a cross-bow regardless of whether the horse is running, walking, or kicking (he might get penalties depending on what the horse is doing of course, just as the crew might have penalties based on the ship's movement). The weapons would fire as fast as they can (An arbalest that requires 3 rounds to reload would fire every 3 rounds if the gunner decides to fire it).
|
Developer
|
Hi mdt, I keep checking back to see if you've posted because this is a really interesting discussion!
I haven't played Battletech or Mechwarrior but I can see how it would be troublesome to try to work with both of those systems.
I think we both agree that the system should be built to mesh with the existing ideas / core system: we just disagree about how it should mesh, I think.
I do not think that ship-to-ship combat should be measured in standard 6-second rounds with crew members taking independent actions, because that would take a really long time in play. Are you going to roll for every character who fires a cannon? Every character climbing the rigging and making adjustments? Are you going to track reload times for every gun? "Crews 1-4 will fire in 2 rounds, crews 5-6 will fire in 4 rounds..."
I'd want something more abstract. Give a ship and its crew an aerial maneuver bonus (AMB) dependent on things like the size of the ship and the skill of the pilot(s), maybe the (abstracted) number of crew members. (Full crew +2, partial crew +0, insufficient crew -2, whatever.) So each ship has an AMB and an AMD (defense). These stats are basically all you need to figure out aerial movement. How do you integrate this with monsters, like dragons? Give them AMB's and AMD's, too. It's just two stats, after all, and in a sky pirates RPG, aerial combat is such a big deal that it makes sense. Or figure out something with the Fly skill: maybe it acts as AMB/AMD for monsters. You might ask why I don't suggest just giving the Fly skill to a ship: because there are many factors such as crew, size/speed, pilot, and so on which aren't usually calculated into a skill, so I think something different is needed.
Rather than having crew members fire independently, the ship itself has an attack (or two or three) that it can perform. The attack is penalized if you're not in optimal position (based on the AMB/AMD rolls). You can dance around your opponent's ship all day if you're fast enough, firing your little guns and avoiding their big ones. Until they launch dragoons! (I keep saying that and I don't even know what it would mean...)
I think this meshes well with the core system. We're still using the core rule: d20 + modifiers vs. target number. We're still using some sort of rounds even if they're not traditional ones with every single character rolling initiative.
Once one ship "boards" another, we start normal combat rounds.
The main advantage to this system, I think, is speed. We all know that d20 combat can be a little slow. Massive battles need some sort of abstraction or they take forever. Aerial battles are no different. Either way the players/GM need to learn some new rules, so "new system" isn't as scary as it sounds, I think. Maybe it's just me but I dread the idea of tracking foot-by-foot movement in the air. Three dimensions. No battle-mat without spending a lot of time/money making it work. Yikes.
Looking forward to further discussion...
Reading some of this comments and thinking to myself, I think I will have to split movement (chasing) and movement (combat) into systems they work together and are independent at the same time. For example you can chase after another skyship until you get into "close range", then you change over to skyship-to-skyship combat with combat driving manuevers. I think this system is going to be a hybrid of several OGL systems currently available.
Hi mdt, I keep checking back to see if you've posted because this is a really interesting discussion!
LOL, glad you're enjoying it.
I haven't played Battletech or Mechwarrior but I can see how it would be troublesome to try to work with both of those systems.
I think we both agree that the system should be built to mesh with the existing ideas / core system: we just disagree about how it should mesh, I think.
Actually, I don't think we disagree at all, I think it's terminology we're really talking about. That and going back and forth on pros and cons.
I do not think that ship-to-ship combat should be measured in standard 6-second rounds with crew members taking independent actions, because that would take a really long time in play. Are you going to roll for every character who fires a cannon? Every character climbing the rigging and making adjustments? Are you going to track reload times for every gun? "Crews 1-4 will fire in 2 rounds, crews 5-6 will fire in 4 rounds..."
I think I need to pull up another hoary (as in aged, not as in bad) game system. The original FASA Star Trek RPG. It was honestly one of the easiest, yet most robust, systems I've ever played or run a game in. There was one major issue though, and that was starship combat. It was very very good as a starship combat game. And very very good as an RPG game, but when you mixed the two it had major issues.
You see, I think you are correct that the ship system should be simple if you are only doing ship to ship combat and every player has their own ship. The problem with the way you are looking at it is, I think, that you are looking at trying to simplify things to keep the game moving, but, you're also completely wasting the PC's in the process. If the people on the ship don't get to do anything and only the pilot who controls the ship, then you have an issue with one person taking up half a game session.
One reason I had suggested keeping it to normal rounds is that it keeps issues with the rest of the system from creeping in. For example, a wizard on ship A can cast 10 fireballs in 1 minute at an enemy ship, while if the ship round is 1 minute the ship can only fire it's weapons once and the wizard can't cast any spells, despite being able to do so if he was just standing on deck fighting a dragon that had landed on the deck. Same goes for a druid with call lightning (indeed, some spells won't last an entire turn).
Now, can you get around it? Sure. The way to do that would be to put 'magic cannons' on that channel a fireball into a hellstorm (boosts the area and damage of the fireball), but then you are incinerating any exposed crew on the other ship by upping the dice. Again, I like the idea of simplifing the combat and making it longer, but, when you do you are compressing time and other parts of the system start breaking (magic especially).
I'd want something more abstract. Give a ship and its crew an aerial maneuver bonus (AMB) dependent on things like the size of the ship and the skill of the pilot(s), maybe the (abstracted) number of crew members. (Full crew +2, partial crew +0, insufficient crew -2, whatever.) So each ship has an AMB and an AMD (defense). These stats are basically all you need to figure out aerial movement. How do you integrate this with monsters, like dragons? Give them AMB's and AMD's, too. It's just two stats, after all, and in a sky pirates RPG, aerial combat is such a big deal that it makes sense. Or figure out something with the Fly skill: maybe it acts as AMB/AMD for monsters. You might ask why I don't suggest just giving the Fly skill to a ship: because there are many factors such as crew, size/speed, pilot, and so on which aren't usually calculated into a skill, so I think something different is needed.
I would like that too, and you could do that, but you have to strip all the spell abilities off any passengers/crew because it breaks their class abilities. Another example is a wizard with a wand of Make Whole could cast 10 make wholes per round and keep the ship's HP at max, and it would make a LOT of sense to keep a dozen wands around to keep ships whole in combat, if you stretch the time out. And again, if you simplify it too much, you take most of the players out of the game for the combat.
The only way I could see doing that is to make the game strictly an aerial combat RPG and get rid of most of the magic using classes. Again, doable, but not something anyone would put out as an expansion to the game system.
Rather than having crew members fire independently, the ship itself has an attack (or two or three) that it can perform. The attack is penalized if you're not in optimal position (based on the AMB/AMD rolls). You can dance around your opponent's ship all day if you're fast enough, firing your little guns and...
System cut off the rest of your post, but I honestly do see what you are talking about (it reminds me of an old Dreamcast game called Sky's of Arcadia, an excellent game). But that game was one person in control of one ship, and nobody on the ship had magic.
|
Developer
|
You bring up some good points about magic getting kinda funky when you start changing how fast things are going. I guess when I think "steampunk with airships" I don't really think "high magic," but when you're trying to have your system stick true to Pathfinder and D&D, you need to find a way to have both.
If you're bothering to run an airship battle between two ships (I'm talking maneuvers, pre-boarding), then it's probably assumed that all of the players/characters are interested in that sort of thing. That's the type of game it is. If all of the players are not interested and you just want to get to the close-combat, ship-to-ship boarding action, then you ought to just be making a single roll to see if a ship successfully closes and boards with another ship, and then roll initiative. Why bother with a chase scene and a bunch of maneuvers if all you really want to do is fight your way to the enemy captain and toss him overboard? Play the parts of the game that are fun. If everyone is playing a game about sky pirates, they better damn well have something cool they can do on an airship, or they're going to get bored quick. Playing a ranger, druid, or paladin? Get a flying mount and participate in the aerial maneuvers. Playing a melee fighter? Launch your grappling hook and board the other ship, fast, or get dropped off on it, or something. Or maybe your character is the captain. Playing a character who can't do anything while battling sky pirates is like playing a D&D character who loses his powers when he goes underground. "I guess we'll leave this part to the adventurers." "Why, what are you playing?" "A ditch digger..."
So there's my two cents on the "but then only the pilot can do anything" bit. Can't do anything in this part of the game? Sorry, you made your character wrong. (To be fair, the system itself, if it is going to be focused even a bit on airship battles, had better say so up front and/or make sure that every character is able to participate by virtue of the mechanics somehow. You can't 100% blame the player if the system allows you to make a useless character.)
Well, see, that's why I said let the weapons be crew served. Even if that cannon's only firing every 3rd round, the fighter can fire it (or the ranger, or the rogue). Same with the arbalest. The problem with 'get a flying mount' is that you can't do that until pretty high level (12th or 15th I think).
But anyway, we're hashing the same stuff over and over again now. I think we both agree the system has to mesh in well with the core system. It's just what level of depth it meshes that we disagree on. Unless someone comes along to actually build the system, at this point it's all academic gamer 'jawing' back and forth. :)
|
Developer
|
Good point: whatever ship combat system it ends up as, it needs to be able to handle a PC wizard on deck casting 1 fireball per 6 seconds at a range of 400 ft + 40 ft / caster level. Among other interesting spells.
If I designed/ran a steampunk game with airships, the ability to do this would be absent from my game.
Since I'm not actually designing this system, let's assume that this character is around.
He's got to make concentration checks every round because the ship is moving around. Possibly very quickly. Oh, and it's being hit by huge exploding cannonballs. In what version of the rules can spellcasters reliably cast under those conditions? In what version of the rules do spellcasters have enough hit points to survive being struck by a cannonball?
Let's assume, again, that we have a brave and/or stupid spellcaster who wants to stand on the deck of the ship and has an awesome concentration check. Maybe he's level 20. How do we handle his actions? One standard action per round. Yeah, I know an "aerial combat round" is 30 seconds. I know you can cast 5 fireballs in that time. Not in this system. You can cast 1. You're on a flying ship. It's moving fast. People are running around. You're not always in range. The reason doesn't matter, it's an abstract system. When you get close enough to board and we roll initiative, then you can cast every 6 seconds. Make whole every 6 seconds? Well, you're running around to the various parts of the ship that have been damaged, it's shaking and diving and tipping and there are explosions everywhere. You can cast once per aerial round.
That's how I'd do it...
|
Developer
|
Well, see, that's why I said let the weapons be crew served. Even if that cannon's only firing every 3rd round, the fighter can fire it (or the ranger, or the rogue). Same with the arbalest. The problem with 'get a flying mount' is that you can't do that until pretty high level (12th or 15th I think).
You've got to be 12th or 15th level to have a flying mount by virtue of your class abilities, but there's nothing that stops you from just buying a horse in Pathfinder/D&D, so the aerial equivalent of the horse should be available similarly in this game. That's assuming you aren't altering the classes.
But anyway, we're hashing the same stuff over and over again now. I think we both agree the system has to mesh in well with the core system. It's just what level of depth it meshes that we disagree on. Unless someone comes along to actually build the system, at this point it's all academic gamer 'jawing' back and forth. :)
Yeah, you're right. :) Then again if we go at it long enough, we'll have not one but two complete aerial combat systems!
Add in ships performances, akin to different types of sports cars. I loved the system from the old James Bond game from Avalon hills, where each car, or ship in this case, has a set of performance stats in regards to speed, turning, de-acceleration, etc. where they had a maximum performace for each category.
It was then up to the player if they wanted to push these performance barriers, called redlines in the James Bond, that influenced your dice rolls. But if you succeded based on your skill and luck of the roll, then you could make your car, or ship in this case, perform wonderous maneuvers. For instance, in pirates of the carribean, where they dropped the anchors to turn faster.
I wish I still had the game, to explain the mechanic better. But the farther you pushed the barrier, the harder it was to make the roll.
|
|
He's got to make concentration checks every round because the ship is moving around. Possibly very quickly. Oh, and it's being hit by huge exploding cannonballs. In what version of the rules can spellcasters reliably cast under those conditions? In what version of the rules do spellcasters have enough hit points to survive being struck by a cannonball?
Those circumstances are far from ideal and the caster would surely have to make concentration checks. But consider: 18th C British marines could cyclically load and fire muzzle-loaded muskets, under cannonfire, on a rolling/pitching ship, while hanging from the rigging.
|
Developer
|
Those circumstances are far from ideal and the caster would surely have to make concentration checks. But consider: 18th C British marines could cyclically load and fire muzzle-loaded muskets, under cannonfire, on a rolling/pitching ship, while hanging from the rigging.
Point taken. It's possible to do some crazy stuff. But do we know how many of them fell in the ocean and drowned? :)
I guess my general point is just that you can't take spellcasting for granted.
You're right that they've got to be made to fit in somehow though. What do you think of my suggestion to only allow 1 action per "abstracted" round even though spellcasters "should" get to cast 1 spell per 6 seconds?
I would take whatever skill you are using in regards to riding, boating, airship skill check, etc. and roll that first in regards to what your mount, boat, or airship is actually doing at the time.
The success of that roll, would influence what you are trying to do while riding, boating, etc. in regards to concentration or other skill checks.
This places value in actually training in riding, boating, airship, etc.
Those circumstances are far from ideal and the caster would surely have to make concentration checks. But consider: 18th C British marines could cyclically load and fire muzzle-loaded muskets, under cannonfire, on a rolling/pitching ship, while hanging from the rigging.Point taken. It's possible to do some crazy stuff. But do we know how many of them fell in the ocean and drowned? :)
I guess my general point is just that you can't take spellcasting for granted.
You're right that they've got to be made to fit in somehow though. What do you think of my suggestion to only allow 1 action per "abstracted" round even though spellcasters "should" get to cast 1 spell per 6 seconds?
Actually, it's not that hard. Strap the wizard to the mast, rope around his waist. He's not going to fall over all he has to do is then stare at the enemy ship and move his hands to cast (assuming he doesn't have still spell).
As to the once per abstracted round, you're going to have an argument with every player who plays a mage. 'Why can I cast 10 spells at the dragoon's that landed on deck but only one at their ship as they approach in the same minute?'. As to Dragoon, dragoon has many meanings, but for you it would be a landing party probably using long arms (as opposed to rifles as they would be in a more modern parlance).
And that's another issue with 'abstracted combat'. Just because two ships have 'boarded' with each other doesn't mean that the other ships are going to stop fighting, so now you've got 6 rounds of melee then one ship round, then 6 rounds of melee, then one ship round.
Again, I understand what you are wanting, and it's laudible. But it has huge meshing issues.
|
Developer
|
Actually, it's not that hard. Strap the wizard to the mast, rope around his waist. He's not going to fall over all he has to do is then stare at the enemy ship and move his hands to cast (assuming he doesn't have still spell).
In this case, is the wizard going to be facing the enemy ship constantly? Certainly not. He probably can't see it at all much of the time. Once it's close enough that he can see it all the time, and it's right alongside... well, we've already hit "normal" combat by then.
Player: "Why can I cast only 1 spell / fire 1 bullet in x amount of time instead of x spells / x bullets?"
GM: "It's an abstract system. Do you really want to go round by round? How late can you stay....?"
Multiple ships pose a problem for using different sorts of systems/units of time. Sort of. It's the same problem a massive land battle faces. My answer to this would be: focus on the part that's interesting. Don't bother rolling dice for the ship that doesn't have any PCs on it. Are they going to be spread around an entire fleet? This is the same sort of problem as running a normal encounter on a battlefield. How do you handle the parts of the battle that don't include the PCs? Are you really rolling for all those soldiers? No. You're probably rolling once for each side, or not rolling at all. At some point the GM just has to describe what's happening. If the "big" battle is the important part, rather than a single ship that's been boarded, play out the big battle and ignore the "grappling" ships. Maybe roll once to see which one wins. Then move on. Honestly though, in this sort of high adventure game, the focus should be on the PCs and their ship. If they've got a huge fleet and they're spread out across multiple ships.... well, why aren't you playing a war game instead of a role-playing game?
I think Louis is probably on the right track in making a couple of mechanics for various "phases" of aerial battle: chasing/closing with one another, vying for position and shooting, and boarding. They all need to mesh together, but they need not all be the same system, and if multiple parts of the battle are at different stages... well, focus on the part that's the most interesting.
Well based on some other OGL material, he is the list of stats the Skyship should have (in no particular order):
Ship Name
Ship Type
Size Category
Tonnage
Cargo Weight
Hradness
Hit Points
Aerial Maneuver Bonus
Aerial Maneuver Defense
Maneuverability
Speed
Top Speed
Turn Rate
AC
Save - Fort
Save - Reflex
Owner
Captain
Officers
Crew
Passangers
Allegience
Total Price
Weapons (fore)
Weapons (aft)
Weapons (broadside)
Special Qualities
What should we add and what should we take away? Tell us what you think
Well based on some other OGL material, he is the list of stats the Skyship should have (in no particular order):
Ship Name
Ship Type
Size Category
Tonnage
Cargo Weight
Hradness
Hit Points
Aerial Maneuver Bonus
Aerial Maneuver Defense
Maneuverability
Speed
Top Speed
Turn Rate
AC
Save - Fort
Save - Reflex
Owner
Captain
Officers
Crew
Passangers
Allegience
Total Price
Weapons (fore)
Weapons (aft)
Weapons (broadside)
Special QualitiesWhat should we add and what should we take away? Tell us what you think
Looks good. Except I have always found it hard to calculate Hradness. It is such an ambiguous quality to quantify. :P
Looks good. Except I have always found it hard to calculate Hradness. It is such an ambiguous quality to quantify. :P
Forgot to say, we will have stats for Crew, Officer adn Captain so they can effect the skyship in different ways like Feats for the skyship and do combat for boarding of course.
If we're talking about airships, you really have to work on the weapons. Fore, aft and broadside work for 2D fighting, mostly. Although you'd need broadside (port) and broadside (starboard).
With a skyship, you'd also have to worry about under-hull and over-hull mounted (firing down and up) and firing arcs.
I would personally suggest 45 degree firing arcs for 2D ships, Fore, Aft, Port Fore, Port Aft, Starboard Fore, Starboard Aft. Then for the skyships make them cones instead of arcs, and add an attitude of the weapon. For example :
Rotating Medium Cannon, 4d6.
Location : Forward Deck
Firing Arc : Port Fore, Fore, Starboard Fore (forward half of map)
Attitude : Level and Up (can fire level and above the ship)
Fixed Arbalest, 3d6.
Location : Forward Under-hull
Firing Arc : Fore (45 degrees either side of straight ahead)
Attitude : Level and Down (can fire level and below the ship)
|
Developer
|
What should we add and what should we take away? Tell us what you think
I would add "weapons (bomb bays)" - or whatever term you want to use for weapons dropped from beneath the ship.
Getting above another ship will be an extremely important maneuver in this sort of game. It's much easier to drop your weapons/troops/whatever onto another ship than it is to shoot from a distance or board from the side, and it gives you a distinct advantage: your opponents have to climb or shoot upwards.
As for 45 degree firing arcs, turns rates, and all that stuff... I'd do away with these sorts of things unless you are actually interested in having your game be played by somehow drawing or mapping 3D combat, tracking precise distances, etc. But you already know I prefer the "abstract" system of determining position/movement with "combat maneuvers." In a more complex/detailed system, more specific stats are indeed necessary.
Combat Elevations
I think you're absolutely better off to take the star trek example. Yes they can fight in 3 dimensions but 99% of the time they don't. Why? Because the audience can't follow it and even with all their visuals they can't show it well.
I think you very quickly have specialized ships for special actions. I don't know which would be the better defense 'canons' or launching more maneuverable 'fighters'.
Long range spells would be a huge advantage.
Bombs
Bombs would be really useful against ground targets as well. Considering they probably have little or no defenses.
Oathbound has the Asherake - sort of a flying lionman - at least some of their elements are OGL. They have flying slaver ships.
Sigurd