The Raider Class Corvette "mystery"

[Mamatried]

I have fallen completely for this ship, I find it to be just awesome, both the Raider I and the Raider II

I know that any and all stat write ups I find will be fan made, most vary as well though not significantly.

Where I see most variation is within crew size, starfighter compliment and to a degree weaponry.

However I have not seen any write up that takes into account what we actually see from the battlefront game and that matches the Wookiepedia (also fan made) description.

I have seen crew size on this ship ranging from 190 to 40 however reading the wookipedia and watching the game footage we have the dicrepecny in that the ship is described as being able to be operated by 2 crew members, one pilot and a co pilot, with the later (after joining the rebel alliance) a further modification allowing the ship to be operated by only 1 person, the pilot.
We also see this from game footage
The game and the size of vessel and crew is considered to be canon.

So my question is then about automatization, about systems allowing a reduced crew.

In the Sequel Trillogy We see the "Haldo maneuver" where for flight purposes at least we have a large captial ship piloted by 1 person only.

Now I am of the oppinion and have always been that the crew of all ships as listed is the total crew on board, with "gunners" being the portion of the crew dedicated to the role.

Seeing a ship with 182 crew and 25 gunners to me is a crew of 182, with 25 of this crew dedicated as gunners when in combat.

If I look to earth naval vessels we see this being the case, the laundry and the cook are both "gunners" when the ship is in combat, we never see a operating grew, with added gunners manning their guns constantly.

So my question regarding the Raider in particular is what is the minimum crew required for controlled flight, not optimal combat capabilities, but general operation and controlled flight?

if we look to literature we have raids where a fairly small number of operatives steal ISDs and other large captal ships, and none of these raiding units are in the 1000s or 10 000s in fact most are barely in the 100s and most being less than that even....

I dare say that if a group of 100 raiders can steal, and escape with an ISD, then the needed crrw for operation and controlled flight can not be in the many thousands, not even in the low hundres, and in many if not most cases regrdless of ship in the same size range and smaller, the needed crew is in the low dozen even in the one to ten range.

Now going back to the corvus, this ship was operated according to all infomation out there by the inferno squad, which in turn was one man short by the time of the game. with one member killed on a mission in the inferno squad novel.

So if then a full 4 member spacila forces squad can operate the ship for mission purposes, then having full access and operating capabilities of the ship¨s weapon suite will be required, making this ship in particular fully combat capable with a crew of 4, as the onferno squad counted 4, later 3 and later under the rebellion still less than 8.

With the orignal 2 man operation capability and the later 1 man modifucation I would not add a skeletong crew number nor a +X penalty for the small size crew.

I can see how this varies from ship to ship and on captial ships in particular, but it also makes me want to revise most if not all crew siszs

To me the Crew Size is the total numbers of crew, gunners that we nromally seem to add to this (nonsense in my oppinion) I would include in the number of total crew

this will also not reduce the crew significantly and the gunner number does refect the vessels weapons and systems suite.

1000 crew with 55 gunners is not 1055 totla crew, but 1000 crew where 55 are dedicated gunners.....

So this is a bot of a rant I notice so I will end this by asking you guys how do you see crew size, gunners, and above all minimum operating crew and would the 2 person and later 1 person listing of the corvus (a raider corevette) and would you apply penalties for it?

I would allow a raider to be fully operated by 4, with a full flight capability with 2 people alone, with no skeltong crew penalty.
https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Corvus_(Raider_II-class)

[jtanzer]

While I understand your reasoning, I wouldn't allow that for my game. The main reason why is that the Corvus was specially designed for use by Inferno squad, thus potentially trading some offensive/defensive capability for support capability. As a result, I would consider the 'standard' Raider-class requires more crew to operate. Based on the Core Sourcebook and the ship's capabilities relative to the CR90, I would give it a crew of around 125, with a skeleton crew of 25-50.
_________________
The best villians are the ones the PCs create.

[Mamatried]

yeah that makes sense to me when it comes to standard vessels.
I have the raider at a crew of 42 + passengers/troops 30

but my point is how far can the technology of the star wars universe automate ships and to what degree.

We have several starfighter size and light freighters with weapons able to fired from cockpit by pilot at a cost of fire control (and MAP)

we have some modifications allowing a ship to run fully (no penalties) with 1/3 the crew required at a minimum of 1 of course.

We also have ships gutted and chaged internally to various degrees, the acclamator stands out here being a armed transport, though some are retrofitted or factory modified to be carriers and cargo transports.

And i fall down on a ship for controlled flight only requires a very very small crew. I can not imagine Solo and the others raiding shipyards and stealing ISD came in the 10s of thousands, rather in the 10s or 20s total, maing it impossible by the listed stats to pull off such a feat.

so How many crew is actually required to have controlled flight in a ship, mainly a capital ship?

I was going to run a mission where the players (5 in total) were taked with stealing a raider. However with a minimum crew of more of than 5 and a skeleton crew penatly this will be impossible to pull off, unless a ship any or most ships can be flown with control by a mere handful of people.

I can see how cold starting is not an option, then engineers and others are required and more. However a ship that is powered up IMO can be flown by only 1 person, as this has been seen on screen, it has been in books and comics and thus imo should be canon enough for controlled flight alone.

How can a "small" commando team steal a ship that ny consesus (imo wrongly) needs 1000+ people to fly.

I am only taking about flight, not combat or anything fancy, but flgiht alone incuding a hyperspace jump.

The current Raider I statted out had to make it possible a 1/3 crew making it 42 x 0.33 for 14 (rounded up) and I chose to add a +5 for the difficulty.

When a ship is described as being able to be piloted (I read that as flight alone and the limited if any weapons contrlled by cockpit) by 1 or 2 perople I can not undertand the extremely high crews.

I also belive that the crews should include gunners, not have them added as in crew 1000 AND 55 gunners, thi is to me a 1000 crew with 55 dedicated as the gunner role...making it not 1055 but a 1000 total etc.

So to me the flight alone, should require pilots only, np matter the size and crew requirement of the ship as long as it is not a cold start.

Holdo was alone, she did not take 1000 rebels with her in death, she was alone, piloting controlled and jumped with a large captial ship, proving it is possible withing the universe.

so what would be reasonable to require for a group size to steal a corvette size vessel, again in flight alone and with a possible jump

[jtanzer]

I think the confusion here comes down to what 'operate' means. IMO, there's a difference between piloting, something that can be done by a single person, and operation, which is a much more involved task involving multiple ship systems acting in concert. For example, a small crew, say 5-10 people, could fly the ship to a destination, however they wouldn't necessarily be able to operate the ship effectively. Thus, they would be required to take on a small crew in order to ensure the ships was operational. Thus the skeleton crew requirement is the minimum number of people required to ensure full operational status. Any fewer and the crew will be overworked, which mechanically would be expressed as a penalty to the Starship Operations skill.

Of course, this leads to the possibility of the players being able to assign crew to individual departments. thereby attempting to reduce or eliminate the associated penalty. How the GM chooses to handle this would be up to them, however I personally would then assign penalties to the appropriate skills in a manner that reflected the crew assignments.
_________________
The best villians are the ones the PCs create.

[Mamatried]

yes, I am of the opinion too that operation and "flight" are different in diffculty and requirements.

I am thinking flight only, controlled flight that is, meaning no blind jumps and all that. A controlled flight of the vessel.

Without going into the holdo maneuver or the description on the corvus saying it was originally designed for two pilots (with the rest of inferno squad taking turns) I am still on the "a group of players 3-6 should be able to pull off a captial ship heist, and flee with the ship without this being deemed impossible becuse of misunderstandings on the operation and flight issue.

I have seen the ISD Emancipator formerly Accuser being stolen by a crack team of special forces led by Han Solo, and given they used a certain ship, to board the ISD it would limit their numbers to around 20

and this is a ISD, it was sucessfully stolen by this small group, so why not a smaller group on a smaller vessel?

My plan was for the players to flee a planet using a imperial corvette, I was unsure if I wanted to use the raider or the vigil for this and then hand this ship over to the sector rebel cell.
I landed on the Raider class due to the very low crew requirement for full combat operation as well as the equally low flight requirements.

My logic is that if 20 people can take over and fly away with an ISD then a group of 3-6 players (4 in total) should be able to get away with a corvette in the "same" manner.

So yeah I belive it is much about the misunderstanding between flight alone and operation, to me the latter is "combat" and the first is mere mobility