Weapon Emplacements on Starships

[CRMcNeill]

WEG's rather lackadaisical style of describing weapon emplacements has always irked me somewhat, as it is quite obvious that some capital ship weapons are obviously capable of covering more than one fire arc. In the interests of accuracy, I'd like to add additional notation to individual weapon systems, which may reflect additional capabilities.

New Fire Arc Notation:
Front / Left / Right / Back - The weapon may engage any target in the arc designated.
All (Replaces Turret) - The weapon may engage any target in all four arcs.
Any - The weapon may engage any target in any one arc per round. This may be expanded to include the designation Any Two (which means any target in two adjacent fire arcs per round), or Any Three (as Any Two, but with three fire arcs)

Types of Weapon Mounts & Emplacements (in order of expense and complexity, least to greatest):

Fixed - The weapon is bolted down to a specific position relative to the craft to which it is attached. The weapon is then aimed by positioning the entire ship. This is most commonly found on snubfighters, but is occasionally found on larger vessels. One outsized example would be the Death Star's superlaser.

Pivot Mount - The weapon is mounted coterminous with the hull, either extending through it, or mounted on an external mount with control linkages attaching the weapon to the gunner's position inside the ship. Fire is limited to one arc due to the gunner's position inside the hull. Usually used for starfighter-scale weapons, but can be used for capital ship weaponry, as well. Examples include the quad-laser cannon mounts as demonstrated in the Rebel Alliance Sourcebook.

Ball Mount - The weapon is mounted coterminous with the hull, but uses an ingenious mounting system that allows it to cover two fire arcs. The gunner can control the ball remotely or can be located inside the ball itself. Examples include the composite beam turrets on the LAAT/i gunships

Gun Port - The gun is mounted in an eplacement that is open to space. Atmosphere is maintained in the emplacement via a magnetic field. Like the pivot mount, fire is limited to approximately one arc due to the gunner's position inside the hull, but this mount has the added advantage of allowing the entire weapon to be retracted into the emplacement, with the additional protection of an armored blast door when the weapon is retracted. In addition, this makes repair and maintenance of the weapon much more convenient. Examples include turbolaser emplacements as seen on the Death Star (E4) and the Venator-Class Star Destroyer (E3).

Tower - The gun is mounted on a protrusion that extends it outward from the ship's hull. Tower based weapons are generally equipped to cover a greater arc of fire, but are also more exposed and vulnerable, so the tower itself must be armored to protect the weapon. The crew can either be stationed directly at the weapon or they can control the weapon remotely from a station beneath the tower. The increased visibility provided by the tower will generally allow the weapon emplacement to fire into three or four arcs (depending on the weapon's installation). Examples would include the turbolaser towers on the Death Star and the quad-laser emplacements on a Lancer-Class Frigate

Turret - The gun is mounted in an armored pod that can rotate and elevate independent of the hull. It is generally even more heavily armored than the surrounding ship. The turret's independent mobility allows it to sweep and cover between two and three fire arcs, depending on its installation. Examples include the flank turrets on the Imperator and Venator-Class Star Destroyers.

Single Emplacement - One weapon or multiple linked weapons, controlled by a crew of 1-5

Battery Emplacement - Multiple individual weapons, usually of the same type, mounted in close proximity, and generally coordinated or linked in some fashion. Battery crews generally include 2 to 3 crew per weapon, plus an additional 2-3 battery control crew. Batteries can fire in unison at the same target, or may act independently to engage multiple targets. Batteries are named by the number of weapons in the battery; dual = 2, triple = 3, quad = 4, main = 5, heavy = 6.


My thought here is that the manner in which a weapon is mounted will have an effect on its degree of coverage. A big example would be the Lancer Frigate; its capsule specifically states that its quad-laser armament is mounted on towers, extended out away from the hull. IMO, the stats should reflect that the weapons should be able to cover more fire arcs than just one. IMO, a Lancer's fire arcs should read something like 5 front/left, 5 front/right, 5 rear/left, 5 rear/right. This would allow the ship to focus up to half of its armament into any one fire arc.

Furthermore, these emplacement rules could be used to modify the stats for existing ships, and help generate rules for new ships.

I'm tired and rambling and not entirely sure what kind of point I'm trying to make, but I would like some feedback. Thoughts?
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[jmanski]

I'm like you in that I don't like WEG's fire arcs. At all.

Your thoughts are interesting (and I likey, btw), but it seems like a lot of work to go through all the ships and reclassify their fire arcs.
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Blasted rules. Why can't they just be perfect?

[CRMcNeill]

[ZzaphodD]

Id remove the 'fixed' Mount. Given the ranges and speed of space combat I cant see these really being used. You would end up with a ridiculously low range because you couldnt hit anything, alternately add the RAW missile modifiers based on the speed of the target.

Also, I cant really see the Imperials rotating the entire 160 km Death Star to aim the superlaser.
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My Biggest Beard Retard award goes to: The Admiral of course..

[garhkal]

I can see actually turning things into 6 arcs.
Fore, Aft, Port, Starboard, Top and Bottom.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[ZzaphodD]

[CRMcNeill]

[CRMcNeill]

[ZzaphodD]

[garhkal]

[ZzaphodD]

[Rerun941]

[CRMcNeill]

[garhkal]

True, but that is imo where the rebelion would be good at since many of the cap ships are crewed by true 3d critters (mon cal)...
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[CRMcNeill]