legality of ramming in starship combat

[Styrofoam]

So, no options in Starship Operation Manual are available for society play according to the Additional Resources. So what is the legality of the Pilot trying to ram the enemy ship in starship combat though?

From day 1 of SFS starship combat players have wanted to ram an opposing ship. For a long time, I could just say, well there aren't any rules to resolve that, so let's just stick to the rules as written for SFS games. But now there are rules, so what is the legality of just allowing the ramming rules from SOM? Still not allowed?

[Nefreet]

How would you adjudicate it, if there are no rules for it?

[Styrofoam]

Nefreet wrote:

How would you adjudicate it, if there are no rules for it?

Thats the point. The ARE rules for it in Starship Operation Manual. If there were no rules, you could think about making something up, but since there are rules, you could just use the existing rules. But those rules are not on the Additional Resources list.

[Jared Thaler - Personal Opinion]

Technically, the GM is allowed, at their discretion, to use or not use rules from a published book. I probably would only allow ramming / boarding if it was a clever way around an otherwise tedious or unwinnable starship combat.

[Gary Bush]

Per the rules for SFS, you can't ram. In a Society game it would take a extraordinary situation to allow a starship to ram another. As a GM, I would not allow this in almost all situations.

[Nefreet]

Yeah I disagree that it's a GM's discretion to use rules that are otherwise not allowed by the Campaign. Most obviously that could open up all types of abuse for a regular group of players.

[Ascalaphus]

PFS1 had some notes about the GM applying weather mentioned in the descriptions that didn't already have explicit mechanics. That also didn't really go that well when I was playing Vengeance at Sundered Crag and the GM took weather from the Worldwound setting book - half the scenario suddenly consisted of blizzards and deadly hails of frozen eyeballs. But that's really changing the adventure a LOT. Not a good experience.

[Jared Thaler - Personal Opinion]

Lau Bannenberg wrote:

PFS1 had some notes about the GM applying weather mentioned in the descriptions that didn't already have explicit mechanics. That also didn't really go that well when I was playing Vengeance at Sundered Crag and the GM took weather from the Worldwound setting book - half the scenario suddenly consisted of blizzards and deadly hails of frozen eyeballs. But that's really changing the adventure a LOT. Not a good experience.

IIRC, it is *explicitly* weather mentioned in the descriptions *in the scenario*

[Ascalaphus]

Jared Thaler - Personal Opinion wrote:

Lau Bannenberg wrote:

PFS1 had some notes about the GM applying weather mentioned in the descriptions that didn't already have explicit mechanics. That also didn't really go that well when I was playing Vengeance at Sundered Crag and the GM took weather from the Worldwound setting book - half the scenario suddenly consisted of blizzards and deadly hails of frozen eyeballs. But that's really changing the adventure a LOT. Not a good experience.

IIRC, it is *explicitly* weather mentioned in the descriptions *in the scenario*

Yeah, but there's a difference between a bit of difficult terrain here and there, or maybe a small penalty on ranged attacks; and the whole map being greater difficult terrain and 10ft visibility. That's the sort of extreme mechanics that if they're not written into the encounter, shouldn't be pulled in by an overenthusiastic GM.

[Jared Thaler - Personal Opinion]

Lau Bannenberg wrote:

Jared Thaler - Personal Opinion wrote:

Lau Bannenberg wrote:

PFS1 had some notes about the GM applying weather mentioned in the descriptions that didn't already have explicit mechanics. That also didn't really go that well when I was playing Vengeance at Sundered Crag and the GM took weather from the Worldwound setting book - half the scenario suddenly consisted of blizzards and deadly hails of frozen eyeballs. But that's really changing the adventure a LOT. Not a good experience.

IIRC, it is *explicitly* weather mentioned in the descriptions *in the scenario*

Yeah, but there's a difference between a bit of difficult terrain here and there, or maybe a small penalty on ranged attacks; and the whole map being greater difficult terrain and 10ft visibility. That's the sort of extreme mechanics that if they're not written into the encounter, shouldn't be pulled in by an overenthusiastic GM.

That was my point, the GM was clearly tapping *other* sources to justify putting in those weather elements, not the scenario.

[BigNorseWolf]

There's no mechanics for this. The legal mechanics for flying through someones space is a flybye, not a ram.

[terry_t_uk]

FWIW Ramming does appear in an SFS Scenario. It was interesting

["Dr." Cupi]

Terry Thambipillai wrote:

FWIW Ramming does appear in an SFS Scenario. It was interesting

While this is true, it is a specific mechanic in an NPC stat block due to the NPC ship having an weapon allowing that.

Tangentially, I find it interesting that the entirety of the SOP is not SFS legal. I suspect it has at least a little to do with the fact that ss combat is statistically disliked in SFS. This is, I suspect, due to ss combat being "too confusing". Adding more things to ss combat would definitely make it more so.

To be fair, much of the SOP involves ss upgrades, which can't really be a thing in society.