d20 Future - Ship Sensors
- Thread starter Masada
- Start date
GuardianLurker
Adventurer
A Word about Ranges...
Yep. All nice and detailed.
However, your ranges are ... impractical. At best.
Here's somethig to consider: jump-drive based communications travel at 5 ly range increment and have a 50 ly range. 5 ly/hour is roughly 40000 x lightspeed. Or roughly 1750x the fastest FTL drive listed in the book.
If you limit yourself to lightspeed comms, with the ranges you've given...
1x10^7 miles is roughly one light minute (a little less). Which would be crossed in a little over 2 seconds by a ship using gravitic redirecting drive. And a full 58 seconds before the detection is reported. It that case, a starship will be shot at before it knows it has company.
If you assume drive-based sensors with the same ranges, the target has roughly 2 seconds (the unknown's transit time) to decide what to do. That's just enough time to make a surprise roll before entering combat. (1 minute/40000 is practically instantaneous for these purposes).
Either situation denies the use of the tactics your post is trying to support.
However, if you assume drive-based sensors (PL7 and higher), most of the post can still be used, it's just that everything within a solar system will be in the first range increment.
Moreover, I've done a bit more reading since then.
It's already covered by the rules. What you're aiming for is Jam Transmissions (the ships native emanations being the transmission in question) or Scramble/Unscramble Transmission (when you're trying to alter your sensor signature). (D20 Future, pg. 10, Computer Use skill)
Certainly, it'd be worth having a feat that gives boni to this...
Sensor Operation
Prerequisite: Computer Use 2 ranks
Benefit: When operating a starships' sensors to perform any sensor action, you receive a +4 bonus.
Tac-Witch
Prerequisite: Sensor Operation
Benefit: When trying to Jam, Scramble, or Unscramble Transmissions, you receive a +4 competency bonus.
Now, on to the rest of the post....
Proximity alarms:
Pointless. In the few situations they could be legitimate, such as combat and jump drive exits, the ship won't be able to do anything to correct things. Any other occurences would represent a wilfull neglect of duty (a criminal action).
Transponders:
Your Knowledge(Civics) checks are too high. In the modern world, this is something that occurs both frequently and easily. A compent professional lawyer (someone with at least 5 ranks and a few boni) should be able to handle this easily. I'd use a DC of 15. Note that disabling your transponder wouldn't prevent the ship from being detected, but be a signal equivalent to "I'm a non-combatant, I surrender, please don't hurt me." Seeing this in a peaceful situation probably would get you boarded, for many reasons.
Sensor Conditions:
Gas Giant, Solar, Hard Radiation: -5
Gas Clouds, Debris Fields: -2.
BTW, most of these are covered in d20 Future, pg. 10.
Beating Sensors:
These are great conditional modifiers. <yoink>
Running Silent:
The range restrictions make this rather meaningless. The ability would only be useful in combat, and the passive range works out to be 10 squares, well within many weapon ranges.
Yep. All nice and detailed.
However, your ranges are ... impractical. At best.
Here's somethig to consider: jump-drive based communications travel at 5 ly range increment and have a 50 ly range. 5 ly/hour is roughly 40000 x lightspeed. Or roughly 1750x the fastest FTL drive listed in the book.
If you limit yourself to lightspeed comms, with the ranges you've given...
1x10^7 miles is roughly one light minute (a little less). Which would be crossed in a little over 2 seconds by a ship using gravitic redirecting drive. And a full 58 seconds before the detection is reported. It that case, a starship will be shot at before it knows it has company.
If you assume drive-based sensors with the same ranges, the target has roughly 2 seconds (the unknown's transit time) to decide what to do. That's just enough time to make a surprise roll before entering combat. (1 minute/40000 is practically instantaneous for these purposes).
Either situation denies the use of the tactics your post is trying to support.
However, if you assume drive-based sensors (PL7 and higher), most of the post can still be used, it's just that everything within a solar system will be in the first range increment.
Moreover, I've done a bit more reading since then.
It's already covered by the rules. What you're aiming for is Jam Transmissions (the ships native emanations being the transmission in question) or Scramble/Unscramble Transmission (when you're trying to alter your sensor signature). (D20 Future, pg. 10, Computer Use skill)
Certainly, it'd be worth having a feat that gives boni to this...
Sensor Operation
Prerequisite: Computer Use 2 ranks
Benefit: When operating a starships' sensors to perform any sensor action, you receive a +4 bonus.
Tac-Witch
Prerequisite: Sensor Operation
Benefit: When trying to Jam, Scramble, or Unscramble Transmissions, you receive a +4 competency bonus.
Now, on to the rest of the post....
Proximity alarms:
Pointless. In the few situations they could be legitimate, such as combat and jump drive exits, the ship won't be able to do anything to correct things. Any other occurences would represent a wilfull neglect of duty (a criminal action).
Transponders:
Your Knowledge(Civics) checks are too high. In the modern world, this is something that occurs both frequently and easily. A compent professional lawyer (someone with at least 5 ranks and a few boni) should be able to handle this easily. I'd use a DC of 15. Note that disabling your transponder wouldn't prevent the ship from being detected, but be a signal equivalent to "I'm a non-combatant, I surrender, please don't hurt me." Seeing this in a peaceful situation probably would get you boarded, for many reasons.
Sensor Conditions:
Gas Giant, Solar, Hard Radiation: -5
Gas Clouds, Debris Fields: -2.
BTW, most of these are covered in d20 Future, pg. 10.
Beating Sensors:
These are great conditional modifiers. <yoink>
Running Silent:
The range restrictions make this rather meaningless. The ability would only be useful in combat, and the passive range works out to be 10 squares, well within many weapon ranges.
