d20 Future - Weapon Batteries... Underpowered?

[genshou]

Have you taken a look at Future: Overwhelming Firepower? It was written to specifically address the weapon issues with the future SRD starships.

I'm actually not a fan of Overwhelming Firepower. I just don't like the way it handles things. As a friend puts it, "It's too stuck in the WWII naval paradigm." It just doesn't mesh with my understanding of how warship construction works with regards to weapon mounts. I'm fond of Alternity Warships but there's no logical way to adjust weapon damage between AWS and d20F.

I guess what specifically I am looking for is merely an adjustment to the rules for battery fire that makes it a sensible choice instead of a weak one.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

I think the "battery" premise was from when the construction rules were slightly different, before editing. JDWiker mentioned something about that earlier in a different thread, and it had to do with contstruction.

Something about 4 firelinked weapons could be put into the area of 1 non-linked weapon (turret ball, for example) but the tradeoff was that the weapons did less damage than if they were fired individually.



But then, I have issues with the whole starship section anyway, so I agree.

 

[philreed]

I'm actually not a fan of Overwhelming Firepower. I just don't like the way it handles things. As a friend puts it, "It's too stuck in the WWII naval paradigm."

To be fair the product description specificially mentioned real-world battleships.

That said, I hope you could at least find some ideas that inspire your own effort.

 

[lmpjr007]

To handle that I came up with this from watching Star Trek and placed it in Weapons of Starship Destruction to deal with the concept of weapon batteries.

Energy Weapons Array (PL 8)
An energy weapon array is an arrangement of energy weapon emitters located in strategic areas of a starship, space station or other type vessel. In comparison to the typical used weapon batteries which have only up to 5 weapons liked together, energy weapon array consist nearly two hundred energy emitters in the array making it possible for the weapons systems to fired more often then normal. In gaming terms, starships with an energy weapon array will fire d6+2 shots at every target within the range and firing arc of the weapon system used. Due the massive amounts of energy it takes to use this weapon system, weapons tied to a weapons array can only be fired once every other round.
Only mediumweight, heavy, and superheavy starships can be equipped with energy weapon arrays.
Purchase DC: 10 + the cost of the weapon’s base purchase DC for a 90 degree fire arc, 12 + the cost of the weapon’s base purchase DC for a 180 degree fire arc, 15 + the cost of the weapon’s base purchase DC for a 270 degree fire arc, and 20 + the cost of the weapon’s base purchase DC for a 360 degree fire arc,
Restriction: Restricted (+2)

 

[genshou]

To be fair the product description specificially mentioned real-world battleships.

That said, I hope you could at least find some ideas that inspire your own effort.

Don't take that the wrong way, Phil. It's a good product, just too rooted in one specific paradigm that doesn't fit my take on starships. I'm hoping to make little tweaks here and there to use the existing system with a few patches that make it barely tolerable. Just like I do with my beloved 3E.