D20 Future Q&A With Rodney "Moridin" Thompson and JD Wiker!!

[Ranger REG]

Not clunky at all...but why do you need a hit location chart for that? Why can't that just be the normal description type stuff you use in combat? See, to me, hit points represent more than just how much damage you can take, encompassing everything from near-misses and glancing blows to actual physical damage. Otherwise, the HP increase as you gain experience makes little sense. Just because I've been in combat longer means my body can take more damage? Seems odd.

With regards to body hit locations, I'd rather leave that as a variant rules. Even I won't use it myself.

While I sympathize with Ranger REG's desire to target ship components in combat, I don't think a distributed hull point system is the answer. After all, how would you cover all the possibilities? What's to say that one ship's shield generators don't take up 80% of its hull points, while another takes up a measly 10%? You can never cover all the possibilities like that. I have yet to find a suitable mechanic for targeting individual sections (such as Engineering, Bridge, etc.), though targeting individual weapon batteries, external shield generators, etc. is as simple as considering them individual targets with their own hull points, Defense, etc.

To be honest with you, I too don't like the idea of distributing a ship's total hit points toward specific ship's functions or systems. That's too much calculating and bookkeeping, every time a general hit reduces the ship's total hit points, you have to randomly determine which systems' hit points go down too.

It's better to have the system itself have separate hit points, or better yet, something along the line of the Injury System (using ship's damage like OFFLINE, DAMAGED, DESTROYED, etc.). And that is something the Engineer can try to fix. ("Ye have mo' power, but da engine cannae take any mo' hit, cap'n!")

 

[Olive]

And as the ship takes damage, all you need to do is make rolls on this chart. For example, a note that says "when a ship reaches 50%, 25%, 10%, and 5% hull points, roll on the critical hits table" suits me just fine.

This idea I like. I'll have to work one something like this for the game, if and when I run it...

 

[d4]

Yeah that does seem to be the case, but it isn't mentioned, and it's something I think should be because remember with characters those additional attacks only come from Base Attack Bonus, but a ship has no BAB to be used to designate the # of attacks.

well, note that creatures with multiple attacks (such as claw/claw/bite) that are not based on BAB also use the -5 penalty for secondary attacks.

you are correct that it isn't explicitly stated in the starship combat chapter, but it's a basic principle of d20 combat that secondary attacks are always at -5.

 

[Brad Hindman]

Perhaps this is mentioned somewhere and I just missed it, but what happens if I have a gunner with iterative attacks. Can she fire a ship mounted weapon more than once per round?

 

[Justin D. Jacobson]

1) The book is great. Where some people have complained about it being "skeletal," I think quite the opposite. I would call it "tight." You managed to cram alot of info in an astonishingly low number of pages. (For what we're planning on doing with it, check out my sig.)

2) The hit point threshold system looks similar to what Goodman did with their Dragonmechs. I looked at it briefly awhile ago, but I think that's an alternative that at least has managed to find a foothold in the gaming community.

3) Question: Whose idea was it for the quotes that begin each xenomorph entry? Did it come from Mutants & Masterminds? I think it's a great idea, really gives a feel for the aliens; we'll definitely be doing that in Dawning Star.

 

[C. Baize]

Not clunky at all...but why do you need a hit location chart for that? Why can't that just be the normal description type stuff you use in combat?

Certainly. I've played in games where this was certainly the norm, and they were fun enough, to be sure.
I've found that my players like having that little bit of extra say in where things go, though. I haven't found any players, yet who have minded the one extra roll, for the extra fun.
Everyone is different though. I encourage people to try a hit location chart, and see if it's good for them. If not, then they know it isn't, and they know why it isn't. If it is, then they have another dimension to the game.

 

[JDWiker]

Taken from page 177: "Nonheroic robots don't get class levels. However, they can recieve factory-installed skill and feat software, allowing them to emulate specific skills and feats as part of their programming..."

Skill Web (PL 8; pg 186), and Feat Web (PL 8; pg 187): "A feat (or skill) web allows a robot with ordinary class levels to gain feats (or skills) as normal for its class"

These two things seem to be in conflict to me.

Hm. To me, too. Looks like somebody added some rules to my text. In fact, taking a closer look at the Progit/Net/Web text (none of which I wrote), it appears that whoever wrote it completely disregarded the idea of maximum skill ranks.

Sadly, I don't know how to answer your question here. You should address this to Wizards of the Coast.

JD Wiker

 

[jezter6]

Disclaimer: I don't own d20 Future yet, and will likely wait for the MSRD update before I decide to purchase it if I do.

Here's my thoughts on the whole space combat and time issue. And it seams simple enough to implement.

So a round is six seconds in melee combat, but why not just say that 1 round of ship to ship combat takes 1 minute, or 30 seconds, or 5 minutes, or whtever seems more appropriate. That way, even if you blow it away in 10 rounds, or 20 rounds, or whatever is appropriate for the HPs of the ship, that it would (in game terms) actually be 10 or 20 minutes, instead of 1 or 2 minutes.

Wouldn't that generally solve the problem of starship combat? So you lower the HP of the ships to a more reasonable amount of time to play out in real time, without making it seem like it took only a 30 second fight to blow down a battleship...

Sounds like an option that isn't really a rule-breaker but makes combat feel like it was more epic than it really was.

 

[JDWiker]

Ok then could you explain something else to me then? The Strike Cruiser PL7 has the option of having one of a set of two batteries of weapons. Let's say for example we use it as written and we pick the first set of weapons for it. So it has a battery of 4 antimatter guns and a battery of 3 plasma missiles. The antimatter guns' listed attack bonus of +4 seems to be right, since this ship has -8 for colossal size, +5 for improved targeting computer, +4 for the gunners attack bonus. That gives us a total of +1. Now the battery configuration of the guns adds a +3 because there's 3 guns in the battery after the first, which added to our +1 gives us a +4, which is listed by the weapon. However on this same set of guns it lists the 3 plasma missiles as having a -2 bonus. Why? If the targeting computer works on all attacks then shouldn't it be at a +3 bonus? I came to my conclusion on the targeting computer after I noted that the plasma missles was down by 5, the bonus for the targeting computer. Is the attack bonus a typo in the book, or is there something else that is lowering the attack bonus for the battery of plasma missiles?

Because the basic calculation for the attack's bonus comes from the gunner's attack bonus, it's based on an actual person (or crew) firing the weapon. And as with other types of attackers (characters, creatures, and so on), additional attacks suffer a -5 penalty. (And a further -1 because the second attack has one less weapon in the battery.)

Well perhaps I should explain

[snip]

(Once again, to represent how much their organization has put into building/engineering them.) but shouldn't there still be some ECL attached, or should I just have the less fortunate faction players have to deal with always being unequal?

My opinion is no, no more than there should be an ECL difference between 1st-level characters who have high Wealth scores, and 1st-level characters who have low Wealth scores.

Heh, how?

Send email to Wizards' web team (you can generally find contact info on the web page), or post on their message boards.

JD Wiker

 

[Buddha the DM]

Hm. To me, too. Looks like somebody added some rules to my text. In fact, taking a closer look at the Progit/Net/Web text (none of which I wrote), it appears that whoever wrote it completely disregarded the idea of maximum skill ranks.

Sadly, I don't know how to answer your question here. You should address this to Wizards of the Coast.

JD Wiker

Alright thanks for at least reviewing my question.