If you are the pilot of a starship and decide to take the glide minor crew action so you can fly and fire your ship's weapons during a round are you vacating the pilot role when you do the glide?
In the text for the rule it doesn't say you leave the pilot's position to do the glide so why would you have to take the automatic 0 on the pilot's initiative roll. The rule says:
"If a starship has no one in the pilot role, that starship acts as if its pilot had rolled a 0."
The pilot is still in his role as pilot and he is using the ship's computer to assist him flying the starship and also firing the ship's weapons.
I consider the tradeoff for being able to do this is you can only fly at 1/2 speed and you add 2 hexes to your turning ratio.
No, you aren't vacating the pilot role when you glide. You're vacating the pilot role at the start of the engineering phase, when you choose to take the gunner role this round.
It doesn't say that in the rules for minor crew actions and glide though.
You're gliding because you want to use normal gunner actions instead of Snap Shot, right? That means you need to be in the gunner role for this round.
The rules for changing roles say that all role changes are done at the start of the round, before the engineering phase.
If you change role to gunner before the engineering phase, you aren't in the pilot role at the start of the helm phase. It has nothing to do with the Glide action, itself.
Yes, but in the wording of the minor crew actions and glide it doesn't say you are changing roles in order to do them. It even says if you are piloting a tiny starship you might always be the pilot.
It also says that minor actions are meant for crews that aren't at maximum crew compliment. So why would glide handicap the crew again when they are already handicapped from the beginning.
Minor Crew Actions
Minor crew actions are computer-aided actions that allow a
starship limited functionality if it doesn’t have the necessary crew
to fill all the roles (for instance, the lone crew member aboard a
Tiny starship might always be the pilot but may need to fire one
of the vessel’s weapons in an emergency). You can take a minor
crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other
action was performed this round for the role associated with that
minor crew action. A minor crew action can be performed only
once per round and doesn’t count as your action.
Glide (Helm Phase, Minor)
You move the starship at half its normal speed. The starship can
take turns during this movement, but the starship’s distance
between turns increases by 2. You can add your ranks in the
Piloting skill to the starship’s AC and TL for this round. You can
only take this action if no other pilot actions have been taken
during the helm phase (including glide).
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I think you need to zoom out from just looking at the minor crew action. What is the total list of actions that you intend to take in the round?
If you intend to take a role action, you must be in that role. For the whole round. Because you only change role at the start of the round, before the Engineering Phase.
A given crew member can only be in one role.
Are you planning to be in the pilot role, but using glide instead of a normal pilot action? Otherwise you either:
A. Are not in the pilot role because you ARE in some other role. This is not defined as patt of the Minor Crew Actions rules because it is not about Minor Crew Actions.
Or
B: Cannot be using glide, because you did use a pilot action, and You can take a minor
crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other
action was performed this round for the role associated with that
minor crew action.
As for the statement that you might always be the pilot of a tiny starship, the whole sentence reads as a description of staying in the pilot role and using snap shot. It is not a statement that you can stay in the pilot role and use the non-minor actions of other roles at the same time.
Minor crew actions are computer-aided actions that allow a starship limited functionality if it doesn’t have the necessary crew to fill all the roles (for instance, the lone crew member aboard a Tiny starship might always be the pilot but may need to fire one of the vessel’s weapons in an emergency).
Glide isn't handicapping a small crew at all. It is an action that allows the ship to move and gain pilot ranks to AC and TL in a round when there is no one in the pilot role. That's a better position than that ship would be I'm without glide as an option. Not having a pilot and needing to rely on Glide is still likely to be a bad situation, though.
I am in the pilot role and I'd like to glide and fire in the same round.
The minor crew action to glide takes the place of a normal pilot action. There is no other piloting action. The glide replaces it.
I think it allows you to do two things at once in a round to make up for having a smaller sized crew.
Minor crew actions don't count as your action for the round:
"A minor crew action can be performed only
once per round and doesn’t count as your action."
So as the pilot I'm gliding and also firing a weapon.
Gliding allows me to do this, but not also take a pilot action such as a flyby.
Snap shot allows me to take a piloting action such as flyby and also fire weapons, but with the limitations of snap shot.
It handicaps the smaller crew who always has someone in the pilot role because the pilot can't nominally fly the ship and also fill some of the roles that aren't manned.
The tradeoff is 1/2 speed and increase of 2 in turning radius. If the penalty was loss of initiative, 1/2 speed and increase of 2 in turning radius then why would anyone ever use it? It is extremely rare for a ship to go for a round without a pilot.
Kent is correct. If you are in the pilot role, Snap Shot is the only action you can take to fire a weapon.
Glide is only going to come up in the unusual cases where you don't have someone in the pilot role. That is all it does, and all it is for.
You are the only crew or a limited crew is one scenario, but unfortunately the rules don't also state you can't do it with a full crew too.
Kent's explanation could possibly be exactly what the rules intended. However, I think the way it is written it doesn't definitively say you leave the pilot position and move to gunnery when you glide.
I'd love to see a Faq clarification on this because the only nuance that I think is not clearly defined in the CRB from what Kent laid out regarding Snap Shot and Glide is:
Are you not in the pilot role when you Glide?
Was Gliding meant to allow you to do full gunnery and limit your options to fly your ship? Since Snap Shot is clearly meant to allow you to fully pilot your ship and limit your gunnery options.
You are the only crew or a limited crew is one scenario, but unfortunately the rules don't also state you can't do it with a full crew too.
Kent's explanation could possibly be exactly what the rules intended. However, I think the way it is written it doesn't definitively say you leave the pilot position and move to gunnery when you glide.
I'd love to see a Faq clarification on this because the only nuance that I think is not clearly defined in the CRB from what Kent laid out regarding Snap Shot and Glide is:
Are you not in the pilot role when you Glide?
Was Gliding meant to allow you to do full gunnery and limit your options to fly your ship? Since Snap Shot is clearly meant to allow you to fully pilot your ship and limit your gunnery options.
You can't perform a gunnery action unless you are in the gunner role. You can't be in the gunner role unless you change your role at the start of the engineering phase.
Changing Roles
You can switch between roles (or assume a role if you don’t already have one), but this change must occur at the start of a round before the Engineering phase. You can switch to the captain or pilot role only if that role would otherwise be vacant (or if the character in that role is unable to take actions).
So, at the start of the round, you must declare yourself a gunner, leaving the pilot role unoccupied. You can then take the glide minor action and a gunnery action on subsequent rounds.
You can't be in two roles. You must declare yourself a gunner and not a pilot at the start of the round to do the glide+shoot actions.
This is where the rules definitively state that you must leave the pilot role to perform a gunnery action.
Agreed, but is the minor crew action supposed to be an exception to the rule so that you can do two things at once because the wording for minor crew action leaves room for interpretation.
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The minor crew action is an exception and does allow you to do more than 1 thing in a round. But each minor crew action does that in a very specific, unambiguous way.
In the case of snap shot, it provides an exception by being a gunnery action that you can take when not in the gunner role.
In the case of glide, it provides an exception by being a pilot action that you can take when not in the pilot role.
Snap shot does not allow you to remain in the gunner role, but perform a science action.
Glide does not allow you to stay in the pilot role and perform a gunnery action.
The minor crew action that you take only perform's the minor crew action. It does not confer the ability to take normal actions that do not correspond to your role. There isn't a grey area here where you might be able to get around the requirement to be in the right role for the normal crew action you want to perform.
Hopefully the new book coming out will explain these rules in more detail since there will be more explanation on flying smaller starships with less crew.
Glide just has so many drawbacks in exchange for what you get. You lose initiative, you go only 1/2 speed, and your turning ratio is upped by 2.
I basically think Glide would actually be useful if you didn't automatically lose initiative. You already take such a big penalty in movement. A tiny fighter's thrusters max out at 14 and so that takes you down to 7 and you can only turn after moving 3 hexes, plus you lose initiative. You already have limited weapons even if you wanted to broadside and your best asset, your speed is negated.
I guess that's why they're minor crew actions since they are never used.
I'd also want clarification if you can do minor crew actions when you are in a bigger ship with a full compliment of crew.
I'd also want clarification if you can do minor crew actions when you are in a bigger ship with a full compliment of crew
This is answered in rules that you quoted before.
You can take a minor crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action. A minor crew action can be performed only once per round and doesn’t count as your action.
That's the requirements you need to meet. Number of crew is not among them. You can take a snap shot on a ship with a full crew if and only if none of them took a gunnery action. Same for glide and pilot actions.
Is that what the designers really intended though because they also said:
"Minor crew actions are computer-aided actions that allow a
starship limited functionality if it doesn’t have the necessary crew
to fill all the roles (for instance, the lone crew member aboard a
Tiny starship might always be the pilot but may need to fire one
of the vessel’s weapons in an emergency)."
In the the current game I am playing in our GM doesn't want us taking minor crew actions because we have a full crew.
The designers gave the example where you're most likely to want a minor action (you will almost always be better off having people actually in the pilot and gunner roles if you have a full crew).
There's nothing implying that the example is the only case where you can take minor actions, and not having a real pilot or a real gunner is a strong enough disadvantage that there's no potential balance issue.
I'm fine with that. That's what I prefer, but like I said I've been in situations where the GM doesn't want minor actions to occur because we have a full crew.
I'm fine with that. That's what I prefer, but like I said I've been in situations where the GM doesn't want minor actions to occur because we have a full crew.
That is a bit silly.
Minor actions should be allowed to happen as long as: 'no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action.'
That's the only time you should be disallowed from a minor action.
That said, the two in the CRB tend to be poor choices if you have the typical party complement of four.
I'm always looking for ways to take advantage of all the things you can do in starship combat.
I've only really been able to use Glide effectively once and that was in a SFS game under level 6 where we were flying a starship that was designed to have all its firepower in the port quadrant.
My PC was our best pilot and gunner and the other PC's weren't good gunners. All we did was fly away from the enemy and shoot from the port so I was able to Glide so my PC could fly and fire in the same round when we were a sufficient distance away from them that losing initiative didn't matter. It also allowed us to fire multiple weapons at the same time.
5 crew members in turret, every one of them in agun. Glide. Fire Deathsphere!
Sorry to necro this thread, but I'm currently playing a SFS game where Glide has become a viable choice for our group if we don't automatically lose initiative for picking it. So for the sake of discussion here we go.
I'd like to focus on this line of text in the rules.
"You can take a minor crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action. A minor crew action can be performed only once per round and doesn’t count as your action."
I interpret this as saying as you can be in the pilot role and stay in that role and still attempt a glide action. The key words being "regardless of your current role". The glide action also says that you can glide as long as there were no other pilot actions taken that round. Therefore the glide action is a piloting action.
I suppose you could stay in the Pilot role, take no crew actions in any other role, take no minor crew action in any other role, take no normal pilot actions and glide. In that case, because you have a pilot, you'd get an initiative role. I'm not sure why you would want to, but you could.
If you switched to a different role at the start of the round, so that you could take a Crew Action as well as taking the Minor Crew Action to Glide, the role switch is what would cause you to lose initiative.
Looking at the rules again there is the line. "A minor crew action can be performed only once per round and doesn’t count as your action."
Therefore, if you glide your action would be to fire your guns anyway you want whether it be a normal shot, Fire at Will, or Broadside.
Consequently, a Snap Shot would allow you to do a piloting stunt like Fly By and fire one weapon with a -2 penalty.
I can see where for Glide you are in the gunner's role and for Snap Shot you are in the pilot role now.
Now, what will expand the options for an undercrewed ship is the Consciousnesd Uplink Drive, which will add some regular crew actions to the list of Minor Crew Actions for the one person plugged into it (in exchange for some personal risk).
I still wish they would have added some wording to make this clearer in the last faq pass they did. I don't see why it would be game breaking to allow the pilot to stay in his role as the pilot and perform a glide. The tradeoff is not being able to do a stunt, flying 1/2 speed, and increased turn radius in order for you to fire your weapon systems.
Calling Joe Pasini please.
I still wish they would have added some wording to make this clearer in the last faq pass they did. I don't see why it would be game breaking to allow the pilot to stay in his role as the pilot and perform a glide. The tradeoff is not being able to do a stunt, flying 1/2 speed, and increased turn radius in order for you to fire your weapon systems.
The tradeoff for not having a pilot is that your initiative roll is treated as a 0.
The new consciousness uplink drive on the other hand let's you shoot, fly, divert, scan or precog as a minor action. Of course the old limitation of 'only if no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action.' still applies.
So, you can now fly as a minor action while shooting instead of glide, but your ship still has no one in the pilot role, and has an init of zero. It also appears to lose pilot ranks to AC, ouch.
More likely, you stuff your engineer in the pilot seat, and he uses the uplink drive to divert or scan on his turn.
Or you buy a VI to pilot instead of a character.
GM ruled that since pilot's piloting ranks are still added to the ship's AC he is still in the pilot seat even though he is firing weapons. Therefore, we can glide and not automatically lose initiative.
I wish Joe Pasini would come down from up high and clarify this once and for all.
Shakes fist at the sky.
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GM ruled that since pilot's piloting ranks are still added to the ship's AC he is still in the pilot seat even though he is firing weapons. Therefore, we can glide and not automatically lose initiative.
I wish Joe Pasini would come down from up high and clarify this once and for all.
Shakes fist at the sky.
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You very obviously lose init by raw. The reason behind this is that you are filling two roles at once. I really don't know why you're still looking for clarification.
The equivalent in a gunfight would be expecting to cast a spell and still full attack, it boggles the mind as to why you think it was intended.
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Looking at the rules again there is the line. "A minor crew action can be performed only once per round and doesn’t count as your action."
Therefore, if you glide your action would be to fire your guns anyway you want whether it be a normal shot, Fire at Will, or Broadside.
No. Starship combat isn't like regular combat where you declare your action as you do it. You have to declare your role at the start of the round.
You are either sitting in the gunners seat or you are sitting in the pilots seat.
If you are sitting in the gunners seat you aren't piloting, you lose initiative.
If you are sitting in the pilots chair and glide (effectively giving up your stunt) there's no mechanism for you to change your role to gunner. It doesn't matter if you gave up your action or not, you're in the wrong role to gun and you have been since the start of the round. you need BOTH your action AND your role. There's no way to have two roles in one round.
This is very black and white that what you're going for doesn't work here.
Like I said it's up to interpretation. The GM of the game I'm playing interpreted it to mean that the pilot could glide and remain in the pilot role.
There is this line of text in the minor crew action description that is up for interpretation, "You can take a minor crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action."
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I think maybe we're not quite talking about the same thing, here. That text would let you Glide while being in the pilot role, but there is nothing in that line that could be reasonably interpreted as allowing you to take a non-pilot action during that same round.
Because you're in the pilot role. So the only normal crew actions you can take are pilot actions or open crew actions.
Even if you chose not to take one of them.
Houseruling this won't break the game, but the ambiguity in the normal rules that you're pointing toward just isn't there.
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Like I said it's up to interpretation. The GM of the game I'm playing interpreted it to mean that the pilot could glide and remain in the pilot role.
There is this line of text in the minor crew action description that is up for interpretation, "You can take a minor crew action regardless of your current role, but only if no other action was performed this round for the role associated with that minor crew action."
Snap shot is the minor crew action to gun if you're piloting. You can't attack, full attack, or broadside because those are different actions than snapshoting.
Glide is the minor crew action to pilot if you're gunning. but there is no pilot. The key for getting initiative is having a pilot, not someone taking a pilot like action
AC = 10 + the pilot’s ranks in the Piloting skill + the ship’s armor bonus + modifier based on the ship’s size + bonuses and penalties from successful or failed stunts and actions
Glide does not make you the pilot. You're still the gunner.
There isn't any room for interpretation there. Sometimes people read things the wrong way.
Our GM explained his opinion on the rule like this:
Therefore Glide and Snapshot could be exceptions to the normal ruling like cover in a 5' corridor is.
Again, my party is considering using glide because we have 4 good gunners. One is currently piloting and the other 3 are shooting. However, we want to take advantage of the opportunity to fire 4 weapons, all at the same time, without having to apply any penalties from Fire at Will or Broadside while stacking the Lock On bonus to these attacks.
I understand what you two are saying and can see how the rule can be interpreted in that way, but I also think it can be interpreted differently since there is ambiguity in the wording.
If the pilot is using snap shot then they're the pilot.
If the gunner is using glide... then they're the gunner.
A--->B does not mean that B---> A
The gunner acting like a pilot and the pilot acting like a gunner use vastly different rules. Just because the pilot acting like a gunner has their ranks added to AC does not mean that a gunner acting like a pilot does.
You keep saying that there's ambiguity in the text but you're not showing any. I have no idea what you think is ambiguous.
The ambiguity with 5 foot cooridoors was whether going along a line was going through it since lines are one dimensional and all.
If you were the pilot snap shooting, you would stop your gunners from firing. It looks like you're trying to have your cake and eat it too. You can survive a starship combat with only 3 gunners. Glide and shoot IS a viable tactic in some situations, its not what you want to do every time your pilot is 2 better of a gunner than your gunner.
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They are still the pilot, but they can either fly the ship properly and take a snap-shot, or concentrate on shooting and sort of leave the ship gliding.
This bit is flat out wrong. If they are the pilot, they cannot take gunner actions.
If you have decided to be the pilot at the start of the round, then you can only ever take pilot actions for the round (plus a minor action). If you have decided to be a gunner at the start of the round, then you can only ever take gunner actions for the round (plus a minor action). At the start of the round, if no one has decided to be the pilot, then the ship has no pilot for the round, and your initiative for the round is treated as a zero.
There is no ambiguity as you keep claiming. Your GM is simply wrong.
Is your GM's wrong ruling a bad one? Well, not particularly, though it makes gunners more valuable than pilots, which leads to everyone gunning and no one ever really deciding to be a pilot.
If it works for your group go for it. It's a houserule, but houserules are fine.
I just think the ambiguity comes from this part of the rules,
The most important part being the part about always being the pilot.
I don't think interpreting the rule this way invalidates pilots. You always need a good pilot since winning initiative and stunts are so important. The penalty to maneuverability that occurs when you Glide is significant, 1/2 speed and increased turning radius by 2. If you add losing initiative on top of that there are very few reasons to ever use Glide. Whereas if you don't lose initiative it becomes much more useable. It also allows tiny starships a reasonable chance to Broadside and continue to be extremely maneuverable like they are meant to be.
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They MIGHT always be the pilot.
That says the opposite of they are always the pilot. It would be standard operating procedure for the crew of a tiny starship to pilot and snap shot for a mere -2. That would be the SOP because the penalties for not having a pilot are so severe.
Pilots are important if you have weak weapons and or weapons at different facings. If you have a deathsphere you don't care.
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I just think the ambiguity comes from this part of the rules,
The most important part being the part about always being the pilot.
I don't think interpreting the rule this way invalidates pilots. You always need a good pilot since winning initiative and stunts are so important. The penalty to maneuverability that occurs when you Glide is significant, 1/2 speed and increased turning radius by 2. If you add losing initiative on top of that there are very few reasons to ever use Glide. Whereas if you don't lose initiative it becomes much more useable. It also allows tiny starships a reasonable chance to Broadside and continue to be extremely maneuverable like they are meant to be.
This whole response is exactly why starships without someone in the pilot role lose initiative.
For starships where facing is important (not deathspheres) winning initiative is extremely important. So, it is very, very important to have a pilot so that you can win initiative. That is the tradeoff to having guns not in your turret, your ship needs to face the enemy to hit them with those guns.
For a deathsphere on the other hand, you want a gunner in each turret you possibly can, and an engineer diverting to the shields and maybe a science officer to rebalance. Might as well glide to get some AC, and that's all you care about.
(for instance, the lone crew member aboard a Tiny starship might always be the pilot but may need to fire one of the vessel’s weapons in an emergency)
Here is where minor actions are useful outside a death sphere.
In a tiny starship there might only be one crewmember. Tiny starships don't have turrets. Facing is incredibly important for tiny starships. Therefore at the start of every round the one crewmember takes the pilot role so they can win initiative and point their guns at the target. Otherwise, if they glide, they are screwed.
This is why the sentence in the quote used above includes the words might in an emergency.
The rules on filling crew actions are crystal clear.
You must declare what role you are filling at the START of the ship combat turn.
There is no other way you can interpret that.
If you declare you are a gunner at the start of the turn then you are a gunner for the entire turn.
If you declare you are a pilot then you are the pilot for the entire
turn.
Minor crew actions are computer-aided actions that allow a starship limited functionality if it doesn’t have the necessary crew to fill all the roles (for instance, the lone crew member aboard a Tiny starship might always be the pilot but may need to fire one of the vessel’s weapons in an emergency).
A gunner cannot use snap shot because the gunner role is filled.
A pilot cannot use glide because the pilot roll is filled.
If you want your pilot to fire your 4th weapon then he uses snap shot with the -2 penalty.
Those marked with an asterisk (*) provide their benefit only against attacks from a target the shield has been aligned against.
This last part is incorrect. If actual gunner actions are taken, Snap Shot is no longer an option. (Except for a soldier pilot with the correct TIM, while making a flyby).
If you want your pilot to fire your 4th weapon then he uses snap shot with the -2 penalty.
If _____ role is filled, you can't typically take minor actions associated with ____ role.
If you want your pilot to fire your 4th weapon then he uses snap shot with the -2 penalty.If _____ role is filled, you can't typically take minor actions associated with ____ role.
Correct.
If a ship has 4 guns and 3 gunners then one of the gunner roles is not filled.
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Where are you getting 4 gunner roles from? There's one role that can be filled by multiple people, not one role per weapon.
Where are you getting 4 gunner roles from? There's one role that can be filled by multiple people, not one role per weapon.
The rules state you can have multiple gunners max 1 gunner (or gunnery team) per weapon.
Each gunner then gets to fire their manned weapon in the gunnery phase.
That would be four shots.
So that is 4 gunnery roles, 1 per gun.
Plus it is just common sense to me that a crew member can take a snap shot on a weapon that is unmanned.
So on our 4 gun mount ship that has 4 manned gunner stations we can take 4 shots.
Also on our 4 gun mount ship that has 0 manned gunner stations and just a pilot we can take one snap shot.
So it makes sense to me that if our 4 gun mount ship that has a pilot and 1 manned gunner station that the pilot can fire a snap shot on one of the unmanned gunner stations.
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"Maximum number if oeople that can occupy a role" is not the same as "multiple roles". If it was, why would this TIM exist?
Primary Fighting Style (Pilot): Whenever you use the flyby stunt and exceed the stunt’s Piloting check DC by 5 or more, you can use the snap shot minor crew action during the gunnery phase, even if your starship’s gunner has already used an action this round. This doesn’t allow a starship weapon to be used more than once per round.
"Maximum number if oeople that can occupy a role" is not the same as "multiple roles". If it was, why would this TIM exist?
Primary Fighting Style (Pilot): Whenever you use the flyby stunt and exceed the stunt’s Piloting check DC by 5 or more, you can use the snap shot minor crew action during the gunnery phase, even if your starship’s gunner has already used an action this round. This doesn’t allow a starship weapon to be used more than once per round.
You got me.
However I have been running it this way since day one and I am not changing it now.
I agree with hammerjack. Just as you can have multiple engineers or multiple science officers, you can have multiple gunners in the gunner role. There is still only one science officer role, one engineer role, one gunner role. If any of those are occupied, you can't take the minor actions associated with them.