Sheilds

[BlackJaw]

Keep in mind that not all setting will want to make use of force feild systems... so as an optional system:

1) Counts as armor, kinda like a deflection bonus. Sheilds make the ship harder to hit. Critical hits have nothing to do with sheilds.
Pros: simple, works like a sheild does in normal DnD melee combat.
Cons: no way for sheilds be at "50%," so you lose some possible flavor there that some people will want.

2) Counts as some kind of Temp Hit points. Damage is done to the sheilds first. Critical hits ignore sheilds. Sheilds absorb damage but don't make the ship any harder to hit.
Pros: sheilds can actualy be high or low, and disabled.
Cons: Sheilds in this case don't work like a sheild does in melee, and that is a bit counter intutive to some people.

3) Works like damage reduction. Big impressive sheilds keep all but the worst attacks out. Critical hits ignore this damage reduction. Adding more power to sheilds (a system we haven't even come up with yet) would increase the reduction amount.
Pros: Easy "more power needed" system.
Cons: not only counter intutive, but still now sheilds "at 50%" system.

[Wyvern]

I vote "all of the above". That is, I don't think that the word "shield" should be rigidly codified. It's used to mean different things in different settings (Star Trek, Fading Suns, etc.), and I think we should allow for different *types* of shield. Each could be described separately in the ship-building components list, with different names (e.g. force-shield, ablative shield) to distinguish among them, and the way each type works would be defined in the description of that component.

A couple of thoughts on the options you described: First of all, if you make a critical hit chart that allows for damage to ship components, it's possible for type I shields to be at 50%; a critical hit to the shields could reduce their AC bonus. Secondly, type II and type III shields could be combined. I'm not sure I like the idea of shields stopping *all* damage (except criticals) until they collapse, but you could have damage-reducing shields that have a maximum capacity to absorb damage. Personal shields in Fading Suns d20 work like this, although they measure damage by number of hits whereas I'd be more inclined to tally up the actual total damage absorbed.

Wyvern