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Old 10-28-2014, 11:15 PM   #11
CaelibDarkstone
 
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

That makes sense, tbrock1031. Does that mean that firing photon torpedoes (as guided missiles) and ship-mounted phasers (probably more like beams) would be treated as 2 separate skills?
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Old 10-28-2014, 11:20 PM   #12
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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Originally Posted by CaelibDarkstone View Post
That makes sense, tbrock1031. Does that mean that firing photon torpedoes (as guided missiles) and ship-mounted phasers (probably more like beams) would be treated as 2 separate skills?
Most likely, by the RAW. You might get a bit of mileage for your ship's tactical station by combining the two into a single "Ship's Weapons" skill, but that's entering house-rule territory.
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Old 10-28-2014, 11:28 PM   #13
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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Originally Posted by tbrock1031 View Post
Most likely, by the RAW. You might get a bit of mileage for your ship's tactical station by combining the two into a single "Ship's Weapons" skill, but that's entering house-rule territory.
Okay, I guess it makes sense that those would be two separate skills. Someone with Gunner(guided missiles) could program missiles manually when scanners were down, etc. I'll split the points to give a security officer skill with both.

(On a side note, thank you for all of your work on the Marvel Reboot thread over the years. It is truly an inspiration to read through.)
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Old 10-29-2014, 12:23 AM   #14
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

On your ships, what are the standard stations? I know Captain's Chair, Helm, Science, and Tactical/Security would be available, but I'm curious if these are the main four or if you've got other ideas in mind?

The Enterprise-D seems to have two helm stations, while Voyager seemed to have one. Both have Tactical above and behind the Captain, though TNG called it "Security".

And to be honest, unlike TOS I'm not sure which station on their bridges was the science officer's station, if such a post existed at all.
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Old 10-29-2014, 12:43 AM   #15
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

I'm curious, why did you choose to set Phaser damage so low? In the show, a direct hit from a pistol is generally fatal, or at least incapacitating. With 3d(2) burn and RoF 1, you've essentially guaranteed that it cannot kill in one second, and tough foes like Klingons can shrug off an average shot (especially if their armor is at least as protective as ballistic cloth). Your rifle has a little more stopping power, but is still unlikely to kill, and has scarcely more accuracy than the pistol.

Not saying these decisions are wrong, but they may lead to unintended consequences, like Starfleet officers preferring TL8 shotguns and carbines for their superior stopping power.
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Old 10-29-2014, 02:03 AM   #16
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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I'm curious, why did you choose to set Phaser damage so low? In the show, a direct hit from a pistol is generally fatal, or at least incapacitating. With 3d(2) burn and RoF 1, you've essentially guaranteed that it cannot kill in one second, and tough foes like Klingons can shrug off an average shot (especially if their armor is at least as protective as ballistic cloth). Your rifle has a little more stopping power, but is still unlikely to kill, and has scarcely more accuracy than the pistol.

Not saying these decisions are wrong, but they may lead to unintended consequences, like Starfleet officers preferring TL8 shotguns and carbines for their superior stopping power.
I've been working on my own captain-and-crew space opera for awhile, and one thing I did a lot was study Star Trek a lot (especially DS9, which is my favorite ST series, so hat-tip to you, Caelib) and it's a remarkably inconsistent series when it comes to weaponry. Characters will often take a hit that seems to leave a wound no larger than a bullet wound, and the main cast regularly survive it, not as flesh wounds (a phaser hit is enough to at least leave them wounded and vulnerable, or unconscious and in dire need of medical assistance). Mooks might be simply badly hurt, instantly dead, or disintegrated by the blast. Furthermore, the weapon seems to do absolutely nothing to ship bulkheads, which regularly serve as cover, or rocks, which do the same, unless the crew needs to blast through rocks, in which case they work perfectly fine, except when they mysteriously don't.

And yes, it's true that Caelibs depiction might make a slug thrower superior to a phaser... but that's often true. If you have a RoF 1 (or 3) weapon that isn't particularly accurate, fails to penetrate most cover, and can seriously wound or kill me when it hits, and I have an RoF 8-12 weapon that isn't particularly accurate, fails to penetrage most cover, and can seriously wound or kill you when it hits, then I think I have the superior weapon, even the the latter is a modern assault rifle/carbine.

My solution was to throw away Star Trek as inconsistent nonsense and build my own setting/rules. Nobody can say my material is "inconsistent with the source material" because it's original. But with Star Trek, you'll always get people saying it's inconsistent with the source material, because Star Trek itself is inconsistent. Unfortunately, Caelib doesn't have this luxury. Still, 3d is appropriate for a pistol, and 5d is appropriate for a carbine (I would go 6d for the rifles, but I tend to see them as rifles. Carbines aren't a bad interpretation).
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Old 10-29-2014, 02:11 AM   #17
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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Originally Posted by tbrock1031 View Post
For shooting photon torpedoes, I'd probably go with Artillery (Guided Missiles). At least in the TOS-cast movies, photon torpedoes appear to be physical objects with source-programmable guidance systems; I don't think that'd change by the TNG/DS9 era.
DS9 and Voyager both had photon torpedos on-screen. The "photonic" part is just a warhead attached to a missile. Calling it a torpedo is just a tradition from the days of naval battles.


And the only reason Troi had a bridge position was because of her Betazed abilities allowing her to sense emotions through the main view screen. Non-empath councilors don't spend much time on the bridge.

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Old 10-29-2014, 02:31 AM   #18
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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My solution was to throw away Star Trek as inconsistent nonsense and build my own setting/rules. Nobody can say my material is "inconsistent with the source material" because it's original. But with Star Trek, you'll always get people saying it's inconsistent with the source material, because Star Trek itself is inconsistent. Unfortunately, Caelib doesn't have this luxury. Still, 3d is appropriate for a pistol, and 5d is appropriate for a carbine (I would go 6d for the rifles, but I tend to see them as rifles. Carbines aren't a bad interpretation).
Good point about the shows being inconsistent in their portrayal of damage. And I agree that 3d-6d is appropriate for small arms. So I guess my main question is why the rate of fire is only 1, when GURPS generally makes continuous-beam lasers RoF 10. That itself could justify some of the inconsistencies seen in the show, since getting shot could mean anything from 1-10 actual hits. Including high and low damage rolls, and occasional criticals, this could cover the full spectrum of slight injury to complete disintegration.
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Old 10-29-2014, 02:47 AM   #19
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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Originally Posted by vierasmarius View Post
Good point about the shows being inconsistent in their portrayal of damage. And I agree that 3d-6d is appropriate for small arms. So I guess my main question is why the rate of fire is only 1, when GURPS generally makes continuous-beam lasers RoF 10. That itself could justify some of the inconsistencies seen in the show, since getting shot could mean anything from 1-10 actual hits. Including high and low damage rolls, and occasional criticals, this could cover the full spectrum of slight injury to complete disintegration.
That's certainly what I did in my game, not just for the reasons you cite, but also because I like the idea of a devouring laser beams scything across a group of baddies or carving open a door.

(I used field-jacketed X-ray lasers and Plasma weapons, if you're interested)

But the Star Trek phaser is pretty clearly rof 1. Someone lowers their hand, aims with great concentration, pushes a button, and then one guy falls over, or one mark is made on a bulkhead and so on. Yes, you regularly see them point their phaser at a pile of rocks and pump energy into it for several straight seconds, but they very rarely (that inconsistent thing) sweep it across a bunch of baddies in a sort of continuous beam. In fact, when you see "rapid fire" versions of phasers, like what the Defiant is equipped with, they typically fire in a rapid little pulses. These are usually depicted as unique or special weapons.

(Oddly, I've seen several episodes where they use phasers set to a "fan pattern" to sweep for changelings, but they never use that setting to shoot at bad guys. You'd think it'd be really effective. Given that the fan pattern doesn't even disturb the delicate house plants in the rooms they sweep, though, it might be more of a light slap on the wrist that merely knocks a changeling out of his shapeshifted form)

One criticism I often hear about star trek is that their phasers are the equivalent to winchester rifles, which is hardly "high tech" (this is probably intentional, though, because Star Trek was supposed to be "Wagon Train to the Stars"), so your overall point is valid, and is yet another reason I ditched the source material as anything other than an inspiration, but if Caelib is trying to be true to the source material, I think he's pretty accurate. The one thing I would change is I would give more of an armor divisor (I'd go with (5) or (10), because they're always making hay about how armor is useless against phasers), but given that this would also cut through cover better, I see why Caelib is hesitant to do so.
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Old 10-29-2014, 02:53 AM   #20
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Default Re: GURPS Star Trek (DS9 era)

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Originally Posted by tbrock1031 View Post
Most likely, by the RAW. You might get a bit of mileage for your ship's tactical station by combining the two into a single "Ship's Weapons" skill, but that's entering house-rule territory.
If you use the X-ray warheads from SS4, they use Gunner(Beams) instead of Artillery (Guided Missile). Given that photon torpedoes seem to be a form of energy weapon that's attached to a warp missile, that might not be a far-fetched way to run them.

(The other way would be to treat ship-board phasers as disintegrators and photon torpedoes as anti-matter warheads on warp missiles, and then make everything cosmic, like the shields and the plating, which isn't a bad approach and pretty true to the source material, but plays holy hell with your hit point dynamics. If you thought spaceships were eggshells armed with hammers before...)
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