Space Combat bugs and problems

[cybertroll]

Hello, this is my first post.

I would like to discuss with you some problems I have encountered during my last game in Star Wars D6.

My players own a Ghtroc 720, slightly modified. Maneuvrability 1D+1, shields 1D, Hull 3D+2, one double laser cannon on turret and an ion cannon fixed.

The pilot is very experienced, he has 8D on space transports, 9D for the Ghtroc.

If he decides to full dodge, there is no way that anyone can actualy hit the ship. He can stay there as much as he likes, the ship with 10D dodge simply won't be hit (average dodge result is 35 + range diff goes usualy over 40).

This means that a space combat can realy go to an almost static condition with the enemy ships also full dodging, the gunners of each of the ships shooting just in case they will roll a few 6s on the wild die. That was at least what happened when they encountered two enemy ships, one of them with 2 gunners, average skills around 6d-7d. The average dice rolled were almost similar (ranging from 8d to 10d).

The second problem I encountered is that the capital scale tractor beams are almost of no use if the ship still flies.

While the scale difference is not much of a problem for turbolasers and laser cannons of capital scale (since a capital ship has many of them and can combine the attack against a single target), the tractor beam projectors are usualy 1 or 2 and on different arcs.

With +6d to the dodge roll due to the scale, it is almost impossible to capture a small ship even if its pilot is quite useless (let's say 5d on space transports). The tractor beam gunner will roll his skill (let's say 5d) with the control for a total of 7d to 9d while the useless pilot will roll an average 12d. Simply almost impossible to grab the ship.

I would very much like to know how you handle similar situations.

[adamlumina93]

Hello

I had a similar problem regarding players and the use of full dodge.
The first rule I use is that if a player declares full dodge they have to describe how they are full dodging (weaving in and out of asteroids, ships, traffic) in my opinion trying to do a full dodge in open empty space in pointless as that would just be your average piloting roll. Part 2 to this rule is that whatever bonus the ship gets to dodge is the same bonus I apply to the gunners on the ship who are trying to shoot back. Another option if you like is try and use the quick draw from Han Solo and the Corporate Sector sourcebook. Sorry mine is at home and I dont remember the complete rule off-hand

For your second problem I use die caps in my game to alleviate this problem. Give them a look and you might find out that they help. Another thing to remember with tractor beams is that the players or any other ship would probably not get a reaction roll because they wouldnt know that it is coming, unless they are doing sensor checks for powered up weapons. Hope this helps

[cybertroll]

[adamlumina93]

About the bonus, here is an example

The range difficutly is 10 between ship A and ship B. Pilot in ship A decides to do a full dodge and rolls 25. Now the new difficutly for ship B to hit ship A is 35. Now if ship A wants to fire back at ship B that 25 for the dodge roll would apply to the gunner(s) on ship A also. So the difficulty now to hit ship B is 35. I think that fairly accounts for the ship doing barrell rolls and loops and corkscrews which would be going on during a full dodge action scene.

The biggest thing that I want and try to stress to my players is that whatever rules that their PCs want to use also apply to NPCs. Therefore if players want to use full dodge that is fine but they shouldnt get upset if an NPC they are fighting wants to use it also. My group voted and they agree with my rulings about full dodge in my campaign. Imo it is just a game balance issue, and in my 9 years experience GMing players like to find rules like that to save their own skin but dont understand that it is a universal rule for both PC and NPC. The majority of groups I have GMed for have just wanted to omitt full dodge from the rules because it can slow down game play.

When I use the quick draw rules for space combat I dont give players any bonus for fire control, as to me fire control implies that the computer has a few seconds to aquire target and range.

[jmanski]

I don't add the range modifier when dodging. If the PC rolls 25, the Star Destroyer must beat 25- I think this is even in 2nd ed. rulebook-something about you may accidentally dodge into the enemies fire.
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[Boomer]

The diffrence between full dodge and reaction dodge.

Full dodge adds to the range diffrence. 8d dodge +10 for medium range making a full dodge as 8d+10.

Reaction dodge, depending on which rules you go with, either is the die roll alone, still add the difficulty but subtracts MAPs for any other actions, or some combination of the two.

Myself, I have reactions and actions seperated as two groups. You are allowed one action and one reaction without penalty. Any more and than you get MAPs to all.

Now, as for the guy with 8d in his piloting roll. Why arn't you doing the following?
1. Die simplification chart. Turns 5d into the static result of 15. making 15+3d his skill roll.
2. Tougher enemies, with better targeting. Why stale-mate? Hit em and make em run!

Finally, about the tractor beam. Yeah you can't dodge it. Your going to have to use sensor rolls to detect it first. Otherwise, Han would have simply manuvered around the Death Star's tractor beam after following that fighter.
And no, the computer never warns suddenly of "incoming lasers". And how you dodge someone directly on your tail? Same way pilots do today, radar info+plus piloting skill since they know bullets are coming and are going to be manuvering like crazy to not get hit.

And finally, die caps vs die bonus scaling.
The situation you mentioned with the fighter scale IOn Cannon and the 4d hull capital ship. 5d is rather high end Ion Cannon, for one thing. Unless multiple hits are scored the capital ship can be up and running again in a few rounds.
And the average for 5d is 15-20. But without any die able to get more than 4 as a result, the max is going to be 20. The uncapped 4d only as 12-16 as it's average, but can get higher than that, reaching the maximum of 24 on a very lucky roll.
All in all, this makes the average range of ion damage 0-8. 0-5 is a single controls ionized result, which can be cleared in a single round on a very easy repair roll. 8 is two controls ionized result, each one requiring a repair roll of 8, than 5.
Usually you have technicians working round the clock on a capital ship, so this makes that high-end 5d ion cannon the fighter is carrying... useless.
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My backpack has jets!
I'm Boba the Fett!
And I bounty hunt for Jabba Hutt,
to finance my 'vette!

[Grimace]

Too true on the die cap, Boomer. I've never seen a more problems with Die Caps over the "Added Dice" method.

Anyway, that's not the main target of this topic.

First off, how did this pilot get 8D or 9D in Transports? I take it he's played for quite a long time? If you just gave him that many to start, you're asking for troubled times keeping adventures interesting and challenging for him in the piloting department.

Second, use combined fire and multiple attacks. Sure, the pilot can dodge, and dodge, and dodge, but eventually he's going to flub up, or run out of room to dodge, and those shots are going to hit and take their toll. One or two, even half a dozen rounds where the guy manages to avoid being hit is nothing too severe for unbalancing the game, but if you can't figure out ways to limit the full dodge or have more enemies than he can possibly avoid, then you're doing something wrong.

Third, stop using the "added dice" if you want to avoid the massive amounts of dice. Go back to Die Caps, or if you don't like that, use the new D6 Space scales and apply static modifiers for scales instead of extra dice.

Finally, as has been mentioned, there is no dodging tractor beams. They're not visible, you can't tell when they're being used, you simply get nabbed or they miss you and you continue on your merry way. If the cap ship is trying to tractor beam a wildly zigging and zagging ship, they deserve to have difficulties grabbing them. If the ship is simply flying along, it'll never know a tractor beam is being aimed at it and being activated until they simply stop moving in the direction they wanted. Mainly, though, tractor beams have always struck me as a retriever of damaged or powered down ships that have yielded. I tell you what, an Imperial Star Destroyer pulls up in front of me and tells me to power down and prepare to be boarded, unless I'm wanted with the Death Penalty by the Empire, I'm likely to listen, as the plethora of guns and fighters and troops on that ship is enough to make me say "Yessir. Right away sir." and then be tractored into the big hangar bay of the ship.
OR, they simply blast me until I either blow up or cease to move, and then I get tractored in and jailed for a very long time. That's how I've always viewed the main use of tractor beams.

[Boomer]

Tractor beams can also be used against ships to keep them from manuvering the way they want to. You can pull or push.

Damn fun pushing a little suuport gunship into it's bigger brother capital ship.

As for caps, yeah. The fighter scale Ion Cannon is not usually going to cause problems for a capital ship with so much hull strength. Things like Star Destroyers need a double shot from a big ol, 8d, capital scale planetary defense Ion Cannon.

And we are all giving the same resounding answer about hitting the guy with 8d. Just use more troops, with more skill, and hit em already! All there is to it, and you'll be back to good ol fashioned game.


...just for fun...
8d Ion Cannon averages 24-32. 4d Capital Hull averages 12-16. Average ionization result on a hit is 8-20. Now, that is just in one hit. First round, if the result is smack dab in the middle with 14, 3 controls ionized results, the first with moderate difficulty, the capital ship will NOT be able to act next round, no matter what. Not even taking MAPs using a large crew for multiple repairs, most ships will just be unable to do anything else...
and than the second shot impacts. Most likely resulting in a controls fried, no chance of recovery, they need to be replaced.
_________________
My backpack has jets!
I'm Boba the Fett!
And I bounty hunt for Jabba Hutt,
to finance my 'vette!

[garhkal]

[Akari]

Ever heard about coordinated attacks and what they can do? Some space vessel commanders (especially the big imperial ones) can command hundreds or even thousands of gunners with ease, resulting in monstrous bonus dice. Its really easy to hit smaller starships this way, even with crack pilots and high maneuverability.

[Darius]

Just out of curiosity how did you get a scale difference of 6d ? Ghtroc (starfighter scale) vs capital ship is only 2d.

[garhkal]

Darius the scales are Character, Speeder, Walker, Starfighter, Capital, and Death star...

character to speeder 2d
speeder to walker 2d.
character to walker 4d
walker to fighter 2d
speeder to fighter 4d
character to fighter 6d
fighter to capital 6d
walker to capital 8d
speeder to capital 10d
character to capital 12d
capital to death star 6d
fighter to death star 12d
and so on...

2d from each scale up to fighter, then 6d from fighter to capital to death star...
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[Sandokiri]

Going back to the original situation real quick... when you get a 1 on the wild die, do you *roll* for botch, or do you arbitrarily determine whether it's a penalty or a botch?

You could get some relief when the botch allows the Ghtroc to avoid all fire this turn, but the unusually jukey flying causes the sublights to stall for a round...
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[Darius]

why is the scale difference so vast ? there are some pretty small capital ships out there.

with a difference of 6D starfighters would never get hit yet i am sure some have been hit in the movies. and even starfighter torpedoes would never hurt capital ships.
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oops - i didnt mean to make it go off

[masque]

It's not a matter of the size of the ship, it's the size of the weapons. The Skipray Blastboat, for instance, is a starfighter sized ship, but its weapons are so powerful that it's classified as capital.
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