Affording a spaceship?

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by Ragabash Moon

So, the average character in a Space campaign has no way of ever affording a ship without spending 100 points (or more) for wealth and then blowing it all on a ship...

So, how are you supposed to allow for players in a space campaign to have a ship?

Patron (6 or less, x1/2; Equipment, +100%; Minimal Intervention, -50%; Secret, -50%) [5, 8, 10, 13 or 15]

... depending on how much the spaceship cost.

A secret patron wishes for them to have a starship for its' own reasons and so arranged for them to have one at its' own expense. They don't know who it is, they don't realize they have one, they don't realize it was done and if they do manage to contact it they still have to make a reaction roll in order to get anything out of it. It interferes rarely; always indirectly, always secretly.

[Stormcrow]

The trouble with owning a spaceship in GURPS is that space settings tend to treat ships like cars in outer space. Realistically, spaceships are way more expensive than that, and the GURPS prices reflect the realistic cost, not the trope.

If a character takes the usual settled lifestyle of 20% of starting wealth, then you can simply consider a spaceship to be a car in space, and ignore its price as part of the 80%. An Earthbound character of Average Wealth has a car; why shouldn't a spacer of Average Wealth have a spaceship, if they're as common as cars?


If, on the other hand, the character is a wanderer and starts with 100% of starting wealth, then simply reduce the prices of spaceships to that of cars.


Summary: spaceship prices are realistic; expecting ordinary individuals to own them is not. Change to cinematic prices or ignore them.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

The trouble with owning a spaceship in GURPS is that space settings tend to treat ships like cars in outer space. Realistically, spaceships are way more expensive than that, and the GURPS prices reflect the realistic cost, not the trope.
...

Summary: spaceship prices are realistic; expecting ordinary individuals to own them is not. Change to cinematic prices or ignore them.

Quoted for Truth. Though I see them more like boats: If you own one just to get around you are wealthy, but there are lots of people who own cheap, rugged versions that provide their lively hood.

[SCAR]

If a Spaceship is merely a way for the characters to get about, then having a Patron provide one, or the GM providing one as the common 'package' for everyone is perfectly reasonable.

That does not mean that wanting to treat a Spaceship as a piece of equipment (like a sword, or a horse) for which the PC needs to pay (points and/or cash) isn't a perfectly valid and reasonable option - for which our rules (GURPS) should be able to provide us with an answer. Dismissing this option in favour or just giving them one is not very helpful.

Treating Spaceships like Cars is also not a particularly relevant argument. I can't think of a mainstream fiction setting where everyone of Average wealth owns a spaceship; A 'flyer' or 'speeder' maybe.
Spaceships are more equivalent to Planes or Yachts (larger ones)
Private shuttles might be the equivalent of helicopters, small planes or small boats, but they are still not owned by everyone.

The 'What Cost of Living Gets You' box on page 266 of Basic:Characters puts owning a small yacht into Status 3 (which is basically Very Wealthy), a private light aircraft as Status 4 (basically Filthy Rich) and an executive jet as Status 5 (basically Multimillionaire 1)!

The problem with simply using Wealth to buy a spaceship is they are expensive - not particularly surprising, and Signature Gear doesn't really help either.
I would use PK's Wealth and Signature Gear House Rules, and if a Characters spaceship is basically their home, I would have no problem with using the 80% of Starting Wealth to cover this.

In settings like Traveller, Star Wars or Firefly, where Spaceships are very common, I see no problem with simple applying a divisor to the costs. 10% of the sort of cost from a GURPS Spaceships design would make a 'tramp freighter' or small scout vessel a reasonable point purchase.
Using the 'Cheap and Used Ships' options from GURPS Spaceships 2, p27/28 is also an option. You can adjust the divisors/percentages (cheap as 20%, very cheap as 10% for instance) as above. These options have the added advantage of the ship requiring extra maintenance, which keeps the characters occupied.

The Supers/Headquarters rules suggested by the_matrix_walker are also a reasonable option if the Spaceships is more than just something provided by the GM, but not really personal equipment. The spaceship costs someone points (so it's not a freebie, and means something for the characters to look after), without it being a significant portion of their character points total.

[Sunrunners_Fire]

Originally Posted by SCAR

If a Spaceship is merely a way for the characters to get about, then having a Patron provide one, or the GM providing one as the common 'package' for everyone is perfectly reasonable.

That does not mean that wanting to treat a Spaceship as a piece of equipment (like a sword, or a horse) for which the PC needs to pay (points and/or cash) isn't a perfectly valid and reasonable option - for which our rules (GURPS) should be able to provide us with an answer. Dismissing this option in favour or just giving them one is not very helpful.

RAW, affording a spaceship means you've invested a significant chunk of points into the necessary advantages.

A TL 9 space fighter clocks in at G$5.31M. Its' adventuring gear and so isn't included in your CoL. This requires Wealth (Multimillionaire 1; Adventuring Lifestyle; Conditional Ownership (20%), -4%) [72] to afford said space fighter. If your characters are budgeted 150/-50 ... Heh.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by SCAR

In settings like Traveller, Star Wars or Firefly, where Spaceships are very common, I see no problem with simple applying a divisor to the costs. 10% of the sort of cost from a GURPS Spaceships design would make a 'tramp freighter' or small scout vessel a reasonable point purchase.

Which you have to be careful with, or you run into people cornering the ten foot pole market by buying a lot of ten foot ladders and a saw.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

The trouble with owning a spaceship in GURPS is that space settings tend to treat ships like cars in outer space. Realistically, spaceships are way more expensive than that, and the GURPS prices reflect the realistic cost, not the trope.

Realistically, spaceships as seen in rpgs (and movies and TV series, etc) do not exist and all prices for them are made up. The 10s and hundreds of millions you see some places are just someone's idea of what a ship _should_ cost. It's no more "realistic" than any other number.

Multiple editions of the Star Wars RPG have told us that the price of a used "Stock Light Freighter" is 25,000 credits. Given their commonness in the SW universe this is probably consistent with the prices of comparative items.

Chris Thrash who has worked on the ships in the Serenity RPG tells us that Mal spent the equivalent of a few 100k on hi ship and that this is quite close to what a small used cargo ship costs on 21st century Earth.

If your universe is conciev3ed as a place where small and cheap starships are common then any system that tells you they should cost 10s of millions is _wrong_ (for your universe at least).

Just remember to be consistent. If small starships are cheap then power plants and computers and weapons of that size are cheap too. Perhaps building ships in your universe is 100x easier than Gurps Spaceships seems to think. Divide all prices by 100. Nobody connected with it is likely to complain.

Go through UT and adjust prices downward there too. If a sued ship is 25k then a heavy blaster pistol won't be $5600. Same for armor and so forth. Dividing by 10 looks about right.

If you don't want to reprice everything individually tell your players that the in-game "credit" is actually worth 10 meta-game Gurps $.

So remember, prices in settings not at all like contemporary 21st century Earth are all _arbitrary_. Change what doesn't work in your game.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

If your universe is concieved as a place where small and cheap starships are common then any system that tells you they should cost 10s of millions is _wrong_ (for your universe at least).

This is quite true.

The problem is that spaceship construction rules tend to assume "spaceships are like ironclads, container freighters or jumbo jets.", they're huge, equipped with lots of expensive specialized subsystems - multi-thousand horsepower engines, heavy cargo handling gear, powerful radars, guns - built and maintained by specialists at heavy duty industrial facilities, crewed by dozens, if not hundreds of people, and owned by corporations, governments, or maybe an occasional billionaire.

Spaceship *plots* tend to assume "spaceships are like sailing ships", those are small, don't carry much expensive gear (cannon excepted, and private ships *didn't* normally have more than a couple of those) built of about the same materials and skills to manufacture as a large house, crewed by a handful of people, and affordable by anybody who could pay for a large house. Note that modern yachts, which are still small and don't have much equipment you wouldn't put in a house, are still in the same price range as a mansion.

The two views are not really consistent with each other, you really need to decide which one applies to your setting's standard ships.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by ericthered

I see them more like boats: If you own one just to get around you are wealthy, but there are lots of people who own cheap, rugged versions that provide their lively hood.

A good comparison! Yes, boats are probably a better analogy for most space settings.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Realistically, spaceships as seen in rpgs (and movies and TV series, etc) do not exist and all prices for them are made up. The 10s and hundreds of millions you see some places are just someone's idea of what a ship _should_ cost. It's no more "realistic" than any other number.

There's real, and then there's realistic. I'm not talking about anything real.

[Verjigorm]

Truckers, Commercial Fishermen, all sorts of people who own large, expensive, specialty vehicles typically have something in common: they don't start out owning their own rigs. They are financing them from a bank or similar credit institution and paying for them on a monthly or annual basis. Ships and aircraft are significantly expensive that to own one outright, you generally do need to be a multi-millionaire.