Spaceship Hit Points"

[night-hunter]

I'm attempting to run a Vorkosigan campaign. In designing the spaceships, apparently I'm missing something, as the only mention of hit points is that they are decade value from the listing as basic dST/HP in the Hull Size Table. The examples- the Ariel, et al only list this value as a part of the statistics table. The Ariel, as a light cruiser, is listed as dHP=100. This seems VERY low for a warship, particularly given the listed beam weapon and missile damages.

There is apparently an implication that this dHP figure is applied to each of the 20 "systems" in the starship design. Is this correct?

I've also run across a reference to cHP where each cHP=10dHP=100HP -which implies a need for massive number reduction, and also implies a very high HP for some starships.

Help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, night-hunter.

[jacobmuller]

The Vorkosigan spaceships design system is taken from Spaceships.
Both use decade-scale ST, HP, DR and weapon Damage, ie your warship with dST/HP 100 has 1000 player character scale ST and HP.
It's 1Gj plasma cannon does 4dx5(5) dDamage vs it's dDR10 gives an average damage of 68dHP. Or in player character scale, 4dx50(5) vs DR100 and 680HP injury.
The dHP are the vessel's total, with each section being more akin to a body's limbs. Weapon damage is compared to the original dHP and tallied as for a pc but enough damage in one hit can disable or destroy that section, cf Major Wounds.
Surge: IDHMBWM a Major wound calls for a HT check or system shutdown. I'll check my books asap for the ship equivalent, unless someone ninjas the answer:D
The HT stat isn't scaled:D
cScale is something you're more likely to see in high-value Supers games.

[Varyon]

I can't comment on Vorkosigan, but GURPS Spaceships in general adheres to the fairly-realistic "eggshells with hammers" view of spaceship combat - without superscience force fields and the like, spaceships of equal TL can very easily kill each other within only a few hits. The trick is not getting hit (using point defense against ballistic weapons, killing-the-other-guy-first against beam weapons).

[night-hunter]

I think I followed that up to the point where you arrived at the 4dx5(5) and 68dHP average damage. Where did the "(5)" derive from? And where did the 68 derive from?

The Plasma Mirror can deal with 400-600K DICE of decade damage depending on SM - something is seriously wrong somewhere with the mechanic.

[JP42]

Originally Posted by night-hunter

I think I followed that up to the point where you arrived at the 4dx5(5) and 68dHP average damage. Where did the "(5)" derive from? And where did the 68 derive from?

4d = 14 average dDamage. x5 = 70. Armor divisor 5 reduces your dDR from 10 to 2. 70 - 2 = 68

The Plasma Mirror can deal with 400-600K DICE of decade damage depending on SM - something is seriously wrong somewhere with the mechanic.

The largest Plasma Mirror can defend against up to 600,000 dice of dDamage per 10 minute turn. 1,000 dice per second. Yes, that's quite a lot, but it's an enormous ship, and could be the target of rather a lot of attacks in that time - a single beam weapon gets off 30 aimed shots, after all.

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by night-hunter

I think I followed that up to the point where you arrived at the 4dx5(5) and 68dHP average damage. Where did the "(5)" derive from?

(GURPS Vorkosigan Saga, pg 231)

A 1 GJ plasma cannon does 4dx5(5) burn sur dDam.

Originally Posted by night-hunter

And where did the 68 derive from?

Not sure. 4 dice * 3.5 average result on 1d6 * 5 = 70 burn sur dDam.

Originally Posted by night-hunter

The Plasma Mirror can deal with 400-600K DICE of decade damage - something is seriously wrong somewhere with the mechanic.

Dunno. Are plasma weapons considered useful against ships equipped with a plasma mirror in the books? The above 1 GJ plasma cannon counts as 20 dice per shot.

The Military Courier (pg 206) has a 300-dice plasma mirror (over 20 second turns).

(pg 94) indicates that plasma weapons are being discarded in favor of the gravitic imploder lance.

[jacobmuller]

Originally Posted by night-hunter

I think I followed that up to the point where you arrived at the 4dx5(5) and 68dHP average damage. Where did the "(5)" derive from? And where did the 68 derive from?

I think the others have the answer covered. The weapon are on page 231. I see they have Surge explained too:D So, 4d average 14, *5 s 70, armor divisor (5) vs dDR10 leaves 2; one system destroyed, one disabled and one check for Surge that can disable a system or, on Crit Fail, that section.

I'd completely forgotten the plasma mirrors:D

[Langy]

Originally Posted by night-hunter

I'm attempting to run a Vorkosigan campaign. In designing the spaceships, apparently I'm missing something, as the only mention of hit points is that they are decade value from the listing as basic dST/HP in the Hull Size Table. The examples- the Ariel, et al only list this value as a part of the statistics table. The Ariel, as a light cruiser, is listed as dHP=100. This seems VERY low for a warship, particularly given the listed beam weapon and missile damages.

Nope. That's the right HP value, and it's for the entire ship (not for each system). And yes, this does mean that ships get destroyed in one or two hits and can't slug it out. Check out this thread for a big discussion as to why those HP values were given and the desire to 'fix' them, making larger vehicles more survivable.

[night-hunter]

Thanks folks! I think I understand now!