| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
So having played starship encounters in Starfinder 1e, and apparently having had the more uncommon experience of it having gone generally positively for my players as far as an experience, I do have some ideas for how to make it work with the 2e system, as far as what works and what doesn't. This is definitely for the mentioned more in-depth starship rules and not for the less in-depth more narrative ones, although there might be some stuff here that's relevant for both.
Firstly, roles and stations: we should loose them. Roles like "pilot", "gunner", "captain", "engineer" ect are kinda superfluous in that they most often just get mapped onto a specific class or two, with in actual practice not much flexibility between starship role and player classes. So honestly if you want specialized actions they should probably be attached to specific classes or class abilities like spellcasting and not a system of "roles". The same goes for "stations". I can understand the I guess cinematic appeal of making players use an action to switch between bridge stations, but in my experience it was often the least "fun" thing for my players to do, honestly the hardest to make flow smoothly and used the least. Basically there can be general types of actions anyone can do, and maybe some that are class restricted, but not "roles" that kinda but not really work with some classes but not others. It would just simplify things.
Secondly the action economy: I think something more akin to the 2e 3 action system would be much better, but like not a direct cut and paste. I think the "phases" are good and basically giving each member of the party/crew one thing to do per round is also good. A more flexible system and allowing them to enhance each other's actions in subsequent phases I think can both give everyone something different to do as well as let them take part in the "cool" stuff of shooting and piloting the ship. Because I have run 1e encounters where a shield rotation or a good scan that let an enemy system be targeted was the "big moment" of a battle. So provide plenty of things to do with shields, scanners, ship systems and the like to add to the outcome.
So the starship acts as a single entity, with each crew member contributing 1 action that they can distribute across 3 phases, plus the possibility to react to an opponent. Actions taken by crew members in a phase can impact actions taken by crew members in a subsequent phase. So power can be redirected to weapons or sensors or engines or shields in the 1st phase, and used by another player in the 2nd phase to boost their own action somehow in the 2nd or 3rd phase. Or maybe make quick repairs in the 1st phase, to then boost power in the 2nd phase, to then have a big attack or getaway in the 3rd phase.
As an aside I think the better non-combat possibilities as well as "cool" stuff like cloaking and space magic are set up the better. Stealth missions and space hazard dungeons (asteroid fields and nebulae) and other things are great possibilities for starship rules and I think also help ameliorate the issue of "only the pilot and gunner get to do cool stuff". Start off with things for satrships to do where power management or scanning or navigation or other stuff are vital to success. In most space shows every bridge station has something important, if not essential to do. That should be kept in mind.
Thirdly crew teamwork: this is completely essential to making starship encounters work, so another change I'd make is instead of placing steering the ship on 1 player, make it, by default a group decision. Similarly for choosing between opponents to target. It's really what's made it go the smoothest and given the most satisfaction to my players. They are a crew, build the rules around that. It's an inherently collaborative process, much more so than regular combat encounters, it should be built with that in mind.
Penultimately the ships: drop the small ships. The fighters, racers and small shuttlecraft were just so awkward to run with only 1 or 2 crew. They're much more akin in scale and function to mechs anyway, and I think there should be enough of a demand that they can both use the same system hopefully. I would say a minimum crew floor of 3 for a proper "starship" and anything else is a mech or "space vehicle". There can be "NPC" rules for things like fighters or drones that enemies can launch, and a more smooth and robust system can be made for space dogfights later. Which I'll reiterate strake me as more akin to what mechs would be doing anyway.
Lastly: building a ship. While I understand the appeal of just dropping a pre-made ship for a crew or adventure, the bast way to have players invested in their ship, is for them to build it, which is again another collaborative process. It basically becomes an extra character, a kind of quasi party member each human party member gets to put a little bit of themselves into. I think the system should be robust and have options, but also shouldn't be so overly complicated and ponderous that it can be a chore. The 1e system had a lot of interconnected dependencies for systems which while interesting could make actually building the ship a bit of hurdle.
|
Penultimately the ships: drop the small ships. The fighters, racers and small shuttlecraft were just so awkward to run with only 1 or 2 crew. They're much more akin in scale and function to mechs anyway, and I think there should be enough of a demand that they can both use the same system hopefully. I would say a minimum crew floor of 3 for a proper "starship" and anything else is a mech or "space vehicle". There can be "NPC" rules for things like fighters or drones that enemies can launch, and a more smooth and robust system can be made for space dogfights later. Which I'll reiterate strake me as more akin to what mechs would be doing anyway.
I'm a big fan of trying to mix vehicle, mech, and smaller-sized starship combat (not necessarily just small and time starships) there were several pages of starship ideas talked about during the field test but those pages seem to have been hidden.
Gargantuan Mechs are pretty close in size to the low end of size medium starships. I think a recategorizing of the star ships sizes would help. Tiny, small, and medium should all be in the same group that plays well with mechs and vehicles. The low end of medium ships are what is commonly used as hero ships. I think medium ships should be defined as bigger than small ships but not taking up more than a 24x30-inch flip map, because you want hero ships to fit on a map.
The next size up from medium hero size ship would be too big for normal mech and vehicle combat and be the biggest size ship for normal starship-only combat that would let the PCs have a base ship that could be used if the PCs all had separate ships, it's all so a good size for common transports and pirate ships.
Above that you get into capital ship combat. Capital ship to capital ship combat could be similar to normal starship combat just with bigger weapons and heavier armor and shields, but I think hero ship vs a capital ship might be more like attacking a castle where the hero ship is part of a bigger attack on the capital ship, where the PCs succeed and wing the battle buy achieving smaller goals like taking out the capital ships shields or other targets.
Lastly: building a ship. While I understand the appeal of just dropping a pre-made ship for a crew or adventure, the bast way to have players invested in their ship, is for them to build it, which is again another collaborative process. It basically becomes an extra character, a kind of quasi party member each human party member gets to put a little bit of themselves into. I think the system should be robust and have options, but also shouldn't be so overly complicated and ponderous that it can be a chore. The 1e system had a lot of interconnected dependencies for systems which while interesting could make actually building the ship a bit of hurdle.
I think this is a good idea for groups that want to do that, but doesn't work well for organized play. For groups that are not building a ship together, one way to get players more involved with the ship is by letting them pick customizable options for their station on the ship. Doing it this way also helps make the group prepared for starship combat, both by having player know what their role on the ship is and then knowing how their station works because they picked the mods for it.
If each station has its own separate allowance of upgrade points then players don't have to worry about figuring out if I do this, then we don't have enough points for you to do that. For organized play a character custom station setting could be applied to whatever ship they decide to use and wouldn't have to be figured out every time.