Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Btw., even trickier than the Viper is the Raptor.

It is pretty obvious that a lot of the volume of the Raptor is passengers space. Naturally this is not mass (and URPS Space is mass based).

The raptor, thouh, needs ood sensors and ECM, as well as FTL.

For FTL I am not sure what to make out of the fuel requirements. While it is tempin to say it uses "one module of fuel per jump" this is totally non-canon...
...as it would scale terribly for larger ships. The Galactica and the whole fleet made more than 100 jumps in 30 minute episodes in the series. Without a chance of refueling.

Fuel requirements for jump drives seem to be neglegible, thus. So a limit of the range of a Raptor would be based mostly on limited life support (no kitchen, no sanitarian equipment etc.) and possibly some maintenance issues (maybe smaller drives "burn out" and need frequent maintenance - they could be terribly tuned to make them small).

I am pretty sure a Galactica setting can not be done without specific modules (like for Thilium engines). The price you pay for a generic rule set. A Galactica STYLE setting, though, is doable, but will naturally deviate.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

The Battlestar Wiki I'm reading says Caseless Round Autocannons. Not Rail Guns.

I don't generally trust "Spec Books" as they are rarely accurate to show cannon.


And when I say Caseless Cases go with the round, I mean, the part of the round that looks like a case on a realworld cased round.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

I agree. I basically was asking how would people stat a Viper since I was trying to make a fighter that was similar to the Viper in a space setting I am putting together. All the ideas are great so far =)

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Not sure this is sensible. I mean, seriously, I love the show. Tremendously. But the ranges they fight in are just SO small compared to what you would do in space. I also always found the Viper a tad small for what she does, even compared to "modern airspace fighters". But then, the series was done to sort of be "WW II style dogfighting". How can you justify this in your campaign, instead of people just firing off fire and foret missiles first?

Did you get your raptor done?

No, it does not. Seriously, it says most likely and lists a lot of inconsistencies in the show in this reard.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Cuz its cooler that way.

Not yet. I am working on a few different things at the moment.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Absolutly. Real space combat will be terribly boring.

But WHY is it still used? If I have an advantage through borin space combat, I will use such weapons. There must be an intrinsic reason in the setting, otherwise - it is something that will stress your player's suspension of believe.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Ignoring for the moment the tech specs, the technology you'd want to use here is combustible case. That obviates the "weak casing" plotline in the series, but by burning the case, you don't have to take it with you once fired.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Which never made sense to start with - the ammunition was caseless from the way it broke apart in his hands ;)

Anyhow, the idea to go with some slug thrower (compared to energy guns) is something that I would try to keep. IF you go with short range dogfights (which will take some energy to justify), then having those makes most sense - due to limited supplies. A fighter can not just go on shooting all the time.

I think you could seriously cut down Delta-V requirements, too. Cruising will take little / no fuel, and if you stick to what Galactica offer as "feeling", people don't run their engines full throttle too long. In fact, fuel on "hopping to planet" missions seems to be an issue.

I would love going tor such a setting, too, but my main problem is justifying the "close space" fighting, without looking like an idiot for more tech savy players.

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

Given the superscience nature of Tillium you could use the stats for either the Fusion Torch or the Antimatter Torch but have it run on Tillium fuel (rather than antimatter) and call it a Tillium Torch ;-)

Re: [Spaceships] Stat a Viper Mk II & VII
 

There's actually a couple ways to do caseless ammo. There's combustible, in which case the warhead or slug is embedded in a 'cake' of propellant. When the round is fired, the propellant is burned up completely, leaving no case. This requires a very fancy (chemically speaking) propellant that burns completely and doesn't leave any residue to foul the firing chamber. I think this is the GURPS default for caseless guns.
The second method is to put a hollow base in your warhead or slug. This is actually used in some 40mm grenades. The propellant is packed into the cavity. When the round goes off, much of the residue remains in the hollow which takes off as part of the warhead. This clears up some of the fouling problems, although again the propellant still has to be fairly clean.

One possible explanation for the Viper's guns is that they are coilgun or railgun assisted electrothermal cannon of some kind. Current railgun designs usually need to get the projectile moving before it hits the rails. Otherwise the stationary projectile is just welded into place at the start of the rails. Typically a gas or spring piston is used, but there's no reason a little more 'oomph' couldn't be used... Still it does sound like that single episode regarding the bad ammo was just a continuity error.