d20 Future + Alternity Warships–anyone else done this?

[Ranger REG]

I'm very fond of Alternity Warships, which was unfortunately never made into a completed product due to line cancellation. I was rather disappointed with d20 Future's starship rules, which were far too simple and took the "abstract" thing a bit too far. They're also horribly unrealistic even for a sci-fi starship idea.

So, I'm thinking of taking Alternity Warships and d20 Future's starships chapter and causing them to collide in true H-Bomb fashion (mushroom cloud and all). Has anyone else attempted to tackle this daunting task?

Would you be surprised that they used Warship as part of their resource into designing the existing d20 Future ship creation rules?

 

[tjoneslo]

My gaming group thrives on complexity. I want to convert almost everything. I'll still be keeping the hit points and damage on the system and scale used in d20 Modern (I've never been a fan of their damage tracks), and I'm curious as to what I should do with the phases vs. combat rounds issue, but other than that, everything looks pretty simple with a smart head and a bit of tweaking.

Have you seen the starship construction and combat rules in the Traveller D20 handbook? It does a lot of what you are asking for. It's not completely D20 Modern/Future, but it may give you more ideas of how to write/convert D20 rules.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

4) Movement requires accelleration, accelleration accumulates speed, and speed is used in maneuvers such as turning, pretty much just the way it works in the Warships rules, with momentum carried over from one round to the next. Missiles must also accellerate and maneuver to reach their targets with an acc of 6 and a maneuverabilty of 5, which is handled on the turns of the gunners who fired them. Movement occurs on the pilot's turn, and any maneuvers will require a full-round action.

I think this explains why WotC can never get it done right. (Not that they really tried.) I personally would hate to use such a system. Acceleration = math (and it's harder to use on a sheet of graph paper too) unless the two ships are travelling in the same direction on roughly parallel paths and have the same acceleration and speed (eg it doesn't happen). But there are people who would love to do that. You can't get them to agree.

5) Weapons and sensors cover arcs of fire like in Warships.

I have a problem with this one too. It requires you to use a grid (you don't have to in D20 Future, but it's nice). Plus it makes the game more complicated than is necessary. (I would expect no one would ever bother making a weapon mount without a turret [or equivalent] anyway.)

8) There is no 'jinking' as in Warships. The pilot's defense modifier covers this.

Why not? It's for pulling off cool maneuvers. In Two of Minds, a StarDrive novel, the weapons officer yells at her pilot because she keeps missing targets. She says that it's hard to hit the enemy ships when her ship is jinking all over the sky.

Besides, the proposed jinking system (the one proposed by the authors) is simple. I don't see why maneuvers can't be cool and easy to do mechanically, but I almost never see it done.

 

[genshou]

Would you be surprised that they used Warship as part of their resource into designing the existing d20 Future ship creation rules?

That's not very hard to see after reading even a page of either sourcebook. So no, you didn't tell me anything I didn't already know

The problem is the amount of information from Warships that they took out. Some of us like to know sensor ranges and how far a missile can go!

 

[genshou]

I think this explains why WotC can never get it done right. (Not that they really tried.) I personally would hate to use such a system. Acceleration = math (and it's harder to use on a sheet of graph paper too) unless the two ships are travelling in the same direction on roughly parallel paths and have the same acceleration and speed (eg it doesn't happen). But there are people who would love to do that. You can't get them to agree.

But by the same token, have you looked at the amount of raw acceleration d20 Future ships are capable of performing? At PL 7 and beyond, inertial compensation can keep up with it. But in a PL 6 ship, we're talking a maximum of 145 g's of acceleration. Now tell me how your PL 6 crew is enjoying their movement rules without becoming creamy peanut butter against the bulkheads. Better yet, explain how the ship is holding together under such extreme duress.

The problem with d20 Future's rules is that it blatantly ignores these things without even offering a modicum of realism or even a sci-fi technobabble to explain why it's not happening. And having thrust-based ships be so maneuverable in the first place? What a joke.

At least the acceleration rules keep with what realistically happens in space, ie why in the world would a ship have a maximum base speed of 3,500 feet per round, reachable in overdrive (x4 base speed) in a single round and capable of being turned in the opposite direction at full thrust also in a single round? Sure it makes for more book-keeping using acceleration, but at least you can't crunch the numbers for a scant few seconds in order to prove that the heroes should be jelly, or have players calling on the fact that there's no true "maximum speed" in space until you approach relativity and exceed the energy output of your engine.

 

[Captain Tagon]

At least the acceleration rules keep with what realistically happens in space, ie why in the world would a ship have a maximum base speed of 3,500 feet per round, reachable in overdrive (x4 base speed) in a single round and capable of being turned in the opposite direction at full thrust also in a single round? Sure it makes for more book-keeping using acceleration, but at least you can't crunch the numbers for a scant few seconds in order to prove that the heroes should be jelly, or have players calling on the fact that there's no true "maximum speed" in space until you approach relativity and exceed the energy output of your engine.

The only problem is some people don't "care" about what realistically happens in space and just want to play a fun game. For those people, the extra math isn't fun while big space ships jinking around is.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

Well, I picture someone doing the following:

Rules Light: Ala Star Frontiers basic rules. Ships have facing, hit points, once they're destroyed, it's over. Simple, basic, and easy.

Rules Heavy: Ala Star Frontiers Advanced: Firing Arcs, compartments, targeted systems, explosive decompression on crew, ship detonations, etc etc etc.

You can have easy builds, or more advanced builds for people who are interested in that.

 

[genshou]

The only problem is some people don't "care" about what realistically happens in space and just want to play a fun game. For those people, the extra math isn't fun while big space ships jinking around is.

True, but I've never found a futuristic sci-gaming group so willingly ignorant to all scientific laws. It's really hard to keep up the suspension if disbelief with starships screaming through space at such ridiculously high accelerations. But, if such simplicity works for your gaming group, there's no reason to bog down combat with trivial number-crunching. I just hail from a gaming group full of math and science majors.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

Part of the suspension of disbelief involves things making sense.

Now, some of that depends on your group.

My group wants emergency blast doors to drop down, isolated gunner's bays in case of decompression, compartmentalized system, redundant systems.

Inertia dampers/compensators.
Energy shields.
Independent power supplies.
Rated life support systems.
Computers, complete with different classes of software.
Robot assistance with battle damage control.
Distances on all 3 axis, not just 2.

My group is NOT happy with the rules-lite version presented in d20 Future.

 

[genshou]

Part of the suspension of disbelief involves things making sense.

Now, some of that depends on your group.

My group wants emergency blast doors to drop down, isolated gunner's bays in case of decompression, compartmentalized system, redundant systems.

Inertia dampers/compensators.
Energy shields.
Independent power supplies.
Rated life support systems.
Computers, complete with different classes of software.
Robot assistance with battle damage control.
Distances on all 3 axis, not just 2.

My group is NOT happy with the rules-lite version presented in d20 Future.

Warlord Ralts, what you're asking for is in the Alternity Warships rules. Have you considered them, as I have?