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Old 09-09-2013, 09:19 AM   #11
SCAR
 
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
It was a friend of mine that had Spaceships, and I no longer have access to it (probably get around to buying it eventually, though, I really liked the series). I think the aiming bit is rolled into sAcc - there's a box somewhere in SS1 explaining just what sAcc includes, so I'd suggest finding that. As for Improved weapons, there's never an explanation of how they work, I was simply mentioning the only two logical ways they could work - a single weapon shooting twice as fast, or two weapons in the same mounting.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spaceships.p5
sACC: The space Accuracy statistic combines the weapon’s Acc bonus, the range penalty for firing at typical ranges, and a bonus for aimed fire over several turns with the aid of active targeting systems and targeting programs.
'..several turns', not really clear enough.

My guess is you're refering to this box:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spaceships.p66
The space range modifiers assumes an Acc 18 weapon fired by a gunner performing All Out (Dedicated) aimed attack with 3+ seconds aim assisted by a +9 vehicular targeting system for a net +30. As point- blank range is actually assumed to be 100 miles for a -30 range modifier, the sAcc and Point- Blank modifiers are assumed to cancel out providing a net 0 modifier for Acc 18.
So that's 3+ seconds of Aim, nothing about 19 seconds of aim.


Anyway, these details aren't really that relevant to the OPs question. Officially Guns don't seem to support the 'Improved' Options (despite the note under the RoF table on p58), but there doesn't seem to be any particular reason not to allow it within the Spaceships Rules if you want.

Last edited by SCAR; 09-09-2013 at 09:43 AM.
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Old 09-09-2013, 09:23 AM   #12
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

Just as an improved beam weapon can be said to have multiple barrels to double the RoF, an improved gun could possibly be a gatling with multiple rotating barrels - proven in the real world to have a greater rate of fire over single-barrel guns - or be two or three guns of the same caliber side by side and treated as a single "gun" as far as the stats go.

For a real world example, consider this: Are the gun turrets on the WWII Iowa-class battleships medium batteries, or improved major batteries with three barrels? As you have to aim all three barrels at the same target and commonly fire them at the same time, I'd go with the improved major battery on each turret.
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Old 09-09-2013, 01:03 PM   #13
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by tbrock1031 View Post
For a real world example, consider this: Are the gun turrets on the WWII Iowa-class battleships medium batteries, or improved major batteries with three barrels? t.
You can not actually build an Iowa-class with Spaceships. It violates the rules for gun size. The ship is SM+12 by mass yet that SM only allows 32 cm guns while the Iowa has 40 cm main guns. You certainly can't have 9 Spinal Mounts.

After some reflection I believe the Improved option is not a rules viable choice. With a Beam weapon you're giving up something such as using a UV laser with armor divisor (2) instead of an X-ray model with a (5) to get the higher ROF.

That's because it's an Improved version of old tech.

With a Gun you wouldn't be giving up anything.
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Old 09-09-2013, 02:11 PM   #14
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
You can not actually build an Iowa-class with Spaceships. It violates the rules for gun size. The ship is SM+12 by mass yet that SM only allows 32 cm guns while the Iowa has 40 cm main guns. You certainly can't have 9 Spinal Mounts.

After some reflection I believe the Improved option is not a rules viable choice. With a Beam weapon you're giving up something such as using a UV laser with armor divisor (2) instead of an X-ray model with a (5) to get the higher ROF.

That's because it's an Improved version of old tech.

With a Gun you wouldn't be giving up anything.
You would be if you were bumped down from EM to conventional (or grav to EM).
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Old 09-09-2013, 03:06 PM   #15
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
You can not actually build an Iowa-class with Spaceships. It violates the rules for gun size. The ship is SM+12 by mass yet that SM only allows 32 cm guns while the Iowa has 40 cm main guns. You certainly can't have 9 Spinal Mounts.
Wikipedia isn't entirely reliable, but it notes displacement of a fully-loaded (Spaceships stats are based on fully-loaded weight) Iowa-class as 57,000 tons, which if I remember the Spaceships tables right (from calculating that an SM 0 ship would weigh 0.1 tons) that puts it between SM+13 (30,000) and SM+14 (100,000), leaning more toward +13. Of course, we're still running into the issue that those 40 cm guns weigh (again, according to Wikipedia) 0.2% of the ship's total mass, not the 5% SS assumes, but I don't think that number includes the turret, so maybe it works out?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
After some reflection I believe the Improved option is not a rules viable choice. With a Beam weapon you're giving up something such as using a UV laser with armor divisor (2) instead of an X-ray model with a (5) to get the higher ROF.

That's because it's an Improved version of old tech.

With a Gun you wouldn't be giving up anything.
That's kind of what I was thinking, and it's why I suggested +2 to TL and Conventional Guns having a "base" of TL 7. I think so long as the next "level" of gun (Conventional->EMag->Grav) is available, allowing for the lower one to be improved would work out.
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Old 09-09-2013, 03:14 PM   #16
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
You can not actually build an Iowa-class with Spaceships. It violates the rules for gun size.
Which rules are rather bizarre; for some reason caliber is only doubling for every +4 SM, not every +2 SM.
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Old 09-09-2013, 03:18 PM   #17
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
Wikipedia isn't entirely reliable, but it notes displacement of a fully-loaded (Spaceships stats are based on fully-loaded weight) Iowa-class as 57,000 tons, which if I remember the Spaceships tables right (from calculating that an SM 0 ship would weigh 0.1 tons) that puts it between SM+13 (30,000) and SM+14 (100,000), leaning more toward +13. Of course, we're still running into the issue that those 40 cm guns weigh (again, according to Wikipedia) 0.2% of the ship's total mass, not the 5% SS assumes, but I don't think that number includes the turret, so maybe it works out?
Spaceships battery systems include the entire weapon system including magazines. (Though not including any enclosing armor...) So it doesn't compare to the mass of the gun alone.

Also, an Iowa-class doesn't fire shells at a mile per second.
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Old 09-09-2013, 03:33 PM   #18
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
that puts it between SM+13 (30,000) and SM+14 (100,000),
You're misremembering (or miscounting, anywas). SM+11 is 30,000 tons, SM+12 is 100,000 tons. Fred was being generous when he said the 57,000 Ton Iowa-Class qualifies as SM+12.
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Old 09-09-2013, 03:52 PM   #19
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by ericbsmith View Post
You're misremembering (or miscounting, anywas). SM+11 is 30,000 tons, SM+12 is 100,000 tons. Fred was being generous when he said the 57,000 Ton Iowa-Class qualifies as SM+12.
I screwed up in reading the quick table I generated in Excel - you are correct, 30,000 does indeed count as SM+11.

Of course, as Ulzgoroth noted, the weapons used in SS and the weapons mounted on the Iowa are quite distinct (in addition to the greater velocity of SS weapons, they are actually firing guided munitions). Firing a smaller shell at a greater velocity, or a larger shell at a lesser one (as in this case), should be possible to somehow work out, although you're clearly in the realm of houserules at that point.
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Old 09-09-2013, 05:50 PM   #20
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Default Re: Spaceships: "improved" guns?

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Originally Posted by ericbsmith View Post
You're misremembering (or miscounting, anywas). SM+11 is 30,000 tons, SM+12 is 100,000 tons. Fred was being generous when he said the 57,000 Ton Iowa-Class qualifies as SM+12.
Rounding up is the general rule for SMs
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