movement and action penalties?

[Vanion]

It's my understanding that any movement by a character at cruising speed is considered an action. If that's right, then it counts toward a character's total MAP.

My real question is... does movement actions count toward a character's total MAP when in a vehicle... be it ground vehicle or starship. If so, then what happens when a vehicle is moving at higher speeds, such as "High speed" and the driver chooses NOT to take a movement action (or can he do that?)? Does the vehicle slow down one speed catagory and simply go in a straight line?

Example:
Bob is piloting a speeder at High speed while chasing an imperial speeder. He decides to take two shots with his blaster, but because his chances of hitting are reduced by the movement action, he decides to ONLY take the two shots and NOT take a movement action.
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"Life is not measured in years, but by deeds"

[Sabre]

My understanding of it was, the vehicle will continue to move at the same speed, but if you don't maneuver it will go in a straight line (or veer to one side or the other if it isn't aligned properly). In terms of how the book has it, treat this like a piloting roll of 0, then match the speed with the terrain difficulty, if the difficulty is over moderate (taking into account the difficulty boosts at the various speed levels) the ship will crash if no maneuver is made.

[KageRyu]

I am generally in agreement with Sabre.
Characters in a moving vehicle only need to use actions if manouvering, changing velocity, or dodging. Otherwise, moving in a relatively straight line does not take an action.
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"There's a set way to gain new Force Points and it represents a very nice system, where you're rewarded for heroism, not for being a poor conductor to electricity." ~Jachra

[Vanion]

So... if Bob is piloting his X-wing in wide open deep space with nothing around... and he decides to do nothing except fire one shot with his Starship Gunnery, then the X-wing will remain at it's current speed and move in a straight line? Right?
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"Life is not measured in years, but by deeds"

[Sabre]

That depends on if you consider lining something up in the gun sights part of the gunnery roll or part of a piloting/maneuver in an X-Wing which has only forward-firing guns. I'd rule it that if Bob were focusing completely on shooting, if there were anything to crash into, he would probably hit it if he didn't make a piloting roll. If there was anything around to shoot at and he started chasing it, he might become so intent on it that he accidentally rams it.

[KageRyu]

[garhkal]

Yup. Unless the target is just sitting there (or not changing corse or anything) he would need to do a move action.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[leao]

[Esoomian]

[TheDoctor]

I always thought these rules were a bit flawed, so I think you have to adjust to whatever makes sense.

For instance, is it easy for a TIE fighter to move through Open Space (Easy terrain) with a movement rate of 10 for 1 move of 10 space units, yet Difficult for a Freighter with a move of 3 going 3 moves covering only 9 space units in the same terrain? Are TIEs easier to fly than Freighters? Maybe the maneuverability ratings are meant to offset this discrepancy?

For my games personally, I treat space movement separately from atmospheric vehicle and character movement.

Firstly in space, there's no friction, so according to Newton, objects in space do will stay at a given speed unless acted upon.

Therefore, I treat space move as "Throttle". Hence if a TIE has a move of 10, 10 is 1/4 throttle, 20 is half, 40 is full throttle and so on.

Next, since it's in space, velocity is cumulative. So if a TIE is moving with 1/4 throttle (10), it will move 10 space units the first round, 20 the next, 30 on the third and so forth unless the fighter cuts or increases its throttle.

If a TIE moving at a velocity of 10 space units a round cuts its throttle and does not decelerate, it will continue to move 10 space units a round until acted upon.

Still with me?

Per the rules in the book, a given ship can change its throttle by up to one level per round (unless I got that wrong and it's actually two levels per round). So if the TIE is at a dead stop and wants to increase to full throttle, it will be a half throttle (20) the first round, then full (40) the second.

Ships can decelerate by a maximum of only half throttle, so many times ships simply rotate 180 degrees and apply full throttle to decelerate fully.

In open space, I do not count the velocity (whether it be 10 or 100 units per round) as multiple actions, but I do count each level of throttle as an action since it would be more difficult to maneuver a steadily accelerating vessel.

As for space with obstacles such as asteroids or starship traffic, as long as the vessel is neither accelerating or decelerating, I adjust the difficulty of based on velocity. A TIE with a velocity of 40 units a round will have a much harder time navigating an asteroid field than one traveling at 10 units a round. But in this manner, a freighter that has managed to accelerate to 10 units a round moving through the same asteroid field as a TIE that had only one 10 unit burst of throttle will have the same difficulty.

If you're not yet confused, try this on for size:

Say a TIE fighter and an X-Wing happen to match vectors and are travelling at an astronomical rate (say 100 space units a round or more!). According to relativity, in relation to each other, they are motionless. You can therefore run combat in an arbitrary field of combat (say 50 x 50 space units), and say that both fighters have a velocity of zero, but the combat field itself has a velocity of 100. Therefore both fighters can begin maneuvering and fighting one another within this "bubble" that is moving in itself 100 space units around. The GM will have to keep track of whether or not this combat field or "bubble" will collide with anything while the fighters are preoccupied with each other.

Clear? Don't feel bad if not.

The important thing is to run the game in a way that is easy for you, but also makes sense.
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"We attack under cover of daylight. Yes it's the last thing they'll be expecting, a daylight charge over the minefield." - Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC SSC

[garhkal]

[Bren]