So I'm currently looking at vehicles and their cost and am having a hard time justifiying the gold investment for a PC. On the GM side, I can't figure out how to use them.
A vehicle has AC, HP and a fort save which roughly matches a creature of their level and has no listed weapons. Ballistas in Guns and Gears target Reflex saves which don't exist on a vehicle.
Is an Airship immune against Fireballs because there is no reflex save? Does the Airship fall out of the sky once it reaches its BT (which is easier than killing an on level creature)? If so, it's the easiest way to TPK a party. How are stats like AC and Fort even coming up during gameplay? How can I justify the Gold cost to make it worthwhile without homebrewing and replacing everything?
GM Core pg. 213 2.0 Vehicle Statistics wrote: Saving Throws The vehicle's saves (typically only Fortitude). If a vehicle needs to attempt a saving throw that isn't listed, the pilot attempts a piloting check at the same DC instead. Pages 212 and 213 are what you are looking for, with clarifications that vehicles can still retain functionality but at a penalty while broken
Making a satisfying vehicle system that includes things like momentum is obviously an uphill battle in a turn-based encounter system. I've tried playing with those rules once and it was surprisingly okay considering, but I definitely wouldn't go into it expecting the experience to be completely seamless.
The answers to your mechanical questions are in the rules: For saves which the vehicle doesn't have, the driver makes a Piloting check instead. When it's broken, it still functions but with penalties: "It takes a –2 penalty to its AC, saves, and collision DC, and the DC of all piloting checks related to the vehicle increase by 5. The broken vehicle's Speeds are halved."
As for acquiring a vehicle, for something like an AP that doesn't plan for vehicle usage at all, it obviously won't be a great purchase or might even disrupt things. It's the kind of thing you probably want to agree on between players and GM before either introduces it. Then, it might just be provided to the PCs for story reasons or there's a particular challenge they could choose that would be near insurmountable without the right vehicle (which then gives them a reason to save up that much cash).
So when including in combat, have you found that the vehicle itself will be focus fired or how long the vehicle survives focus fire? My players will be on a ship that will sink/fall out of the sky if it's destroyed.
In a similar vein PCs could just focus fire the enemy ship to take it out. How did that work out?
Given that my players will be on a single ship I'm also interested in if the Hardness will prevent me from setting them up against 4x level-2 enemies since the hardness will probably be much higher than an NPCs damage and Critical Hits (Level 9 Sailing Ship: 15 Harndess; Level 7 NPC moderate damage: 17). Have you used any ship weapons?
I find that typically the vehicles hardness makes it a rather unwelcoming target when not using proper weaponry, most ranged characters will struggle to put any more than a dent into a ship of similar level, Most of the time its more relevant to target weapon mounts that can deal significant damage to your ship. Exposed crew and especially the pilot make for juicy targets too and this becomes the main way of handling an encounter if the vechicle is of significantly higher level compared to the party.
Siegeweapons or similar are also the main way of letting melee martials in on the fun. Especially in larger vehicles as you typically need a pilot and a crew that is larger than the party itself complete with any other passangers. I had one scenario where two melee martials helped load and aim the cannon while a caster provided spells and pulling the trigger.
What weapons and if you decide to just turn it into a boarding scenario depends on the partys level and what kind of encounter you are looking for.
Only occasionally, most of the combat was still between creatures (especially when enemies came close, as it hardly serves you to destroy their vehicle after they've boarded yours). There was a decently quick path towards getting an on-level vehicle to Broken if you invested resources into that (max level spells) and focus fired it, iirc. In an environment where that threatens to become a no-brainer strategy I might increase HP or Hardness somewhat, maybe by a difference of a level or two. Notably it's an object, so if you have a dedicated Crafter with Quick repair and Master or better you can sustain quite a lot.
Have not used ship weapons, no.
demlin wrote: 1) Is an Airship immune against Fireballs because there is no reflex save?
2) Does the Airship fall out of the sky once it reaches its BT (which is easier than killing an on level creature)? If so, it's the easiest way to TPK a party.
3) How are stats like AC and Fort even coming up during gameplay?
4) How can I justify the Gold cost to make it worthwhile without homebrewing and replacing everything?
Some of it could be answered by just reading the rules in full. Some of it - by thinking about your campaign.
1) No. Obviously. "If a vehicle needs to attempt a saving throw that isn't listed, the pilot attempts a piloting check at the same DC instead." That's if the situation permits. If there's no acting pilot, it's autofail (but not crit fail) I suppose.
Also vehicles are objects and have object immunities, so a lot of effects simply don't work at all. Not fireballs, but a lot of others.
2) What do you need for your campaign? I'd imagine it becomes
Wow! What do you think? I've found rules for that!
"When a vehicle is broken, it becomes harder to use. It takes a –2 penalty to its AC, saves, and collision DC, and the DC of all piloting checks related to the vehicle increase by 5. The broken vehicle's Speeds are halved.
A vehicle reduced to 0 HP is destroyed, like any other item. If the vehicle is in water when it's destroyed, it sinks; if it is flying, it falls and everyone aboard takes falling damage. A pulled or rowed vehicle that becomes wrecked, regardless of which method of propulsion the vehicle is using at the time, deals its collision damage (no saving throw) to the creatures pulling or rowing it, and the creatures may have to be physically freed from the wreckage."
3) See above. Also remember immunities.
4) What do you need for your campaign? Do PCs need to get somewhere inaccessible by feet? Do they need to move faster? On a difficult terrain? Move a lot of cargo? Have a ship battle? Is this justification enough?
If you or your PCs don't need anything from the list, why are vehicles even a thought?
I think another issue is that of vehicles being stated and printed at a specific static level, and not being written with a variable level in mind.
IMO, this is not a small yikes, and is kinda terrible, as it basically guarantees that each vehicle will need to be improvised to become the level the GM needs it to be, *especially* if it's going to be used in combat.
I'd honestly say it's kinda "mandatory" for any GM to sketch out some napkin math to figure out how to scale vehicle stats, which has abnormal considerations like "large passenger count vehicles should have a big bonus to HP, but how much?"
And to be clear, you cannot "trust" the paizo-presented examples, you've got to go into it assuming they are inconsistent / "wrong".
The Firework Pogo and Steam Trolley are both L4, but the literal pogo stick that holds 1 has 70HP, 17AC, yet the 8 person Steam Trolley has 50HP, 15AC.
(yes, one can always invent pseudo-narrative justifications for inconsistent stats, but I think we can all agree that a pogo stick should be more fragile than an entire trolley, lol)
.
I really don't like that a GM has to both completely improvise the stats in addition to potentially needing to massage the gameplay of their mechanics.
With that much "fixing" needed to use pf2's vehicles, I don't blame anyone for tossing out the whole system and sketching out some rolls of their own for the one scene in their narrative involving vehicles in combat.
Thank you :)
I think I've got a better picture now over how it plays out in combat.
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