Making a ship's history from character classes

[BackworldTraveller]

Has anyone tried to make a character class for a Ship?

The standard character classes make a number of assumptions about the type of sophont that come apart when that type is "Ship".

Not all the stats are applicable
Not all the skills are applicable (e.g. Most ships are unlikely to need Drive, or Flyer unless associated with Remote ops. Survival and Athletics don't really feel right)
Not all the mustering out benefits are really pertinent

In Mongoose the Events don't match universally well.

Are there any prepared examples in people's ATU rules?

 

[Grav_Moped]

Hadn't really thought about it, but it's a terrific concept!

Many, if not most, PC's ships have decades of history behind them. This is fertile ground for campaign back-story and adventure hooks. A process to generate this backstory procedurally would be quite useful.

The brute-force way to do this is to generate the crew in a system like MgT with elaborate Events, and then declare those events to have happened on (or with regard to) the ship in question (or its crew taken as a whole). Align the terms of service so they end at the present day and then slot the events into the ship's timeline appropriately.

A more accurate version is to do this while assuming a bit of crew turnover. Maybe a failed (or close) survival roll means the individual left and is replaced by someone else?

In other words, treating the crew's character generation process as the summary of a very long RPG campaign based around that ship.

For military ships, maybe just use the chargen for the command crew. Civilian ships count only the chargen after the point the character is skilled enough to have been hired into their position (or, in systems that allow career changes, when they enter a career suitable for them to be part of the crew).

 

[Fovean]

Yeah, great idea

The D66 Event tables from the Mongoose 1e career books could come in handy for something like this. Free Traders could use Merchant Prince, military ships use High Guard, scout ships use Scouts…

Four or five rolls for a 25-30 year old ship could give quite a backstory, good/bad reputation, justify or create new quirks… heck, even Enemies and Rivals for the ship itself.

Might play around with this a bit, thanks!

 

[kilemall]

Going CT HG....



Hmm start with


STR Ship Hull Code
DEX Agility
END Jump range
INT Computer Model
EDU Sensor fit
SOC Percentage of ship devoted to High Passage staterooms/weapons


Enlist 4+ in branch primarily designed for.


If fail, roll draft, or roll 8+ general for next selected branch, else ship ends up in the Ship equivalent of Others/Drifter.


Skills include automation/robots added, upgraded ship's vehicles, better programs, etc.


Promotion means a more famous/accomplished ship.



Aging rolls invoke a negative quirks table.


Benefits table includes Ship's Money as part of the ownership deal, modifications or favors owed/contacts made, subsidized merchant, mail contract, etc.



Maybe TAS equivalents are things like ship registered in Merc Guild, Trading Bloc or Explorers Organization.

 

[Condottiere]

After the Falcon was attacked by TIE fighters as they attempted to escape vessel, L3 was uploaded into the Falcon by Calrissian, acting as the ship's navigational system. This helped the gang escape the gravity well and leave he Kessel Run so they could deliver the coaxium to Savareen.[2] The Falcon's computer convinced her to accept the integration. After Calrissian took the ship from the planet during the showdown on Savareen, the last bit of L3's independent processes shared a message with the gambler through the ship's computer screen. The Falcon finished merging with L3 as she mentioned that her time with Calrissian had been fun.[10]

...

Now one of its droid brains,[11] L3 remained part of the Falcon, accompanying Solo and Chewbacca in their further adventures. She served the Falcon when Solo and Chewie used it to help Luke Skywalker destroy the Death Star during the Battle of Yavin.[17] She also helped Solo and his friends escape from the Hoth system following the Battle of Hoth. During the escape, as the protocol droid C-3PO tried to repair the Falcon's damaged hyperdrive, he informed Solo his ship had a very peculiar dialect.[18] Calrissian later piloted the Falcon when he and the Sullustan Nien Nunb destroyed the second Death Star during the Battle of Endor.[19] Calrissian again flew the ship during the Battle of Exegol, helping to lead the Resistance and Citizens' fleet to victory over the Sith Eternal and Galactic Emperor Sheev Palpatine.[20]

 

[BackworldTraveller]

Using a carefully interpreted Robots' career
Empress Lü
STR: n/a INT: 6 (0) PSI: n/a
DEX: n/a EDU: B (+1)
END: n/a SOC: 0 (-3)

Built: Flammarion (SM0930 A623514-B W Ni Po ImDb)
12 Terms

Skill DMs
Gunnery (Turrets)+2; Mechanic+2; Pilot (Spacecraft)+2
Electronics (Computers)+1; Engineer (Life-Support)+1; Engineer (Power)+1; Explosives+1;
Life Science(Psychology)+1; Space Science (Robotics)+1; Steward+1, Tactics (Naval)+1; Trade (Assay)+1
Admin-0; J-o-T-0;
Electronics-0; Engineer-0; Gunnery-0; Life Science-0; Pilot-0; Space Science-0; Tactics-0

Benefits
Advanced gadgetx3; Armour upgradex4; Personality Upgradex2; Transportation Upgrade; Skill; Application

Notable Term Events
1) Weapon, Service Event
2) Upgrade Event (Computer Upgrade)
3) Upgrade Event (Computer Upgrade)
4) Collisions Likely: Armour Upgrade
5) Dangerous Role. Advance one grade: Computer Upgrade
6) Involved in an assault in a space station! Gunnery upgraded
7) Robotics Experiment. Computer Upgrade. Patron (Scientist or Scout)
8) Collisions Likely: Armour Upgrade
9) Secret downloaded into computer
10) Upgrade Event (Basic Gadget)
11) Attached to Human Operator: Ally

It was a fun game getting to this stage. I used Mongoose 1's Robots supplement modified to the Mongoose 2 skill set
The skills clearly need interpretation - the ship has control over systems but no access to them. So it can operate or diagnose but can't fix the dratted things. None of the table had Remote Ops as a skill! It can shoot (useful), offer useful insights to the lighting systems, fresh water and sullage systems, etc. Much more importantly it can fly itself.
Less useful it has to rely on default engineering for Manoeuvre and jump. And it has no idea how to Astrogate. Steward is helpful (it doesn't burn the dinners in the microwave every time) and the psychology is helping the computer anticipate the pilot's moods, while the robotics has it able to analyse it's own faults. The explosives and Assay are to do with it having been stuck in a belt for years.
The umpire ruled that although the ship was 200 years old, it only actually recalls 48 of these, having been laid up for a considerable time.

The events are helpful, but given the huge time a ship takes to accumulate skills (no promotions except by event, so no promotion or rank skills) having only 12 does become repetitive.

As a suggestion, the only way a ship can change career is by mishap event. Ships (in 1105) are things not people - and they aren't considered sophonts unless they get the appropriate event.

n.b. Armour upgrades updated the armour by 1 character scale unit NOT one ship scale unit (except the first). The reason being the tables give a lot of armour upgrades!

 

[BackworldTraveller]

The shape of a ships history would be that of the captains of the ship (or the ship's computer) for the gross outline with the details filled in by other stories. All officers (and crew) are part of the gross outline - but there could be sub-stories too. The ship was involved in a battle but Ensign Bloggs' main story line is the gambling ring on deck C. The captain had a routine cruise where his main event was a family wedding, but the 2IC had an exciting boarding action.

:coffeegulp: and for those wanting to try this at home use a 100t scout for your first attempt...Don't start with a Tigress!

 

[Nathan Brazil]

Just some ideas:

• Ships generally have no free will (until AI Ships) and are built for specific purposes , so you assign/create careers and branches based on the Ship Class and Ship Subclass definitions from T5.
• Ships could break free of their Career to have history in another career (say a roll of 11+ or 12+). I recall the armed Lightning Class cruiser that retained armaments to become an armed trading ship operating outside the Imperium. The smaller the ship, the easier it is to change hands, and thus careers and branches. Using HG Size stat could become a +-DM. Also, it may be possible to ignore the initial career based on Ship Class if you are in Adventure Class tonnages (to use a T5 term) for similar reasons.

 

[whartung]

The shape of a ships history would be that of the captains of the ship (or the ship's computer) for the gross outline with the details filled in by other stories.

Actually, this is pretty clever.

Roll up a naval character.

When they hit O5 (Commander) or O6 (Captain), give then a ship.

Keep rolling until they get to O7, then they lose the ship (they move up).

And roll up another character to O5, and then give them the ship.

Keeping track of the events during their tenure as Commander of the ship.

Do that for 20 years, and you can have a ship history.

 

[kilemall]

Actually, this is pretty clever.

Roll up a naval character.

When they hit O5 (Commander) or O6 (Captain), give then a ship.

Keep rolling until they get to O7, then they lose the ship (they move up).

And roll up another character to O5, and then give them the ship.

Keeping track of the events during their tenure as Commander of the ship.

Do that for 20 years, and you can have a ship history.

Why not just roll the ship's career/lifepath, showing what events happen to it instead of a character?

 

[Fovean]

Why not just roll the ship's career/lifepath, showing what events happen to it instead of a character?

This is how I read the OP which is why I suggested just rolling on the career events tables only and interpreting the results vis a vis the ship itself.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Why not just roll the ship's career/lifepath, showing what events happen to it instead of a character?

It's the "game" vs "simulation" split. Focusing on the ship is a "game" approach, focusing on the crew is a "simulation" approach.

The quirks rules in MgT are the most "game-ish" approach. The ship as an entity has no autonomy -- it gets what the players's choices impose.

Treating the ship itself as an autonomous entity with a career of its own is a less "game-like" approach. However, it's still building the ship's history for game purposes rather than through game processes.

Using the ship's command crew (simplified in this case to the ship's successive captains) to reconstruct the ship's history is a "simulationist" approach. In effect, it's using the chargen process to simulate (in a condensed form) a multi-decade RPG campaign that ended when the player characters encountered the ship.

 

[BackworldTraveller]

It also gives some excellent quirks if you get inventive with the event interpretation. That event of "miss-jumped and spent years getting home" is a game in itself!

 

[whartung]

Using the ship's command crew (simplified in this case to the ship's successive captains) to reconstruct the ship's history is a "simulationist" approach. In effect, it's using the chargen process to simulate (in a condensed form) a multi-decade RPG campaign that ended when the player characters encountered the ship.

I never really thought about it either way (i.e. gamish vs simulationist).

Rather, simply, there's rules for Chargen (book 5) and, in theory, a character of the proper rank will have command of a ship, and the chargen has "stuff happen" to the character. Whatever happens to the character, happens to the ship.

That way there's no "new rules" to make, just roll some characters and the ship comes along for the ride. "Just how did they get that Medal for Conspicuous Gallantry? Why DIDN'T the officer get promoted? Did the ship fail an inspection?"

I don't know enough about the Navy, but it seems that the ships get ribbons and medals (and the same ribbons and medals) as people do. For example, a ship can get the Navy Expeditionary Medal.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Indeed. Aircraft get victory markings (adversary kills or completed bombing missions).

 

[Condottiere]

I'm pretty sure it was mentioned in some Traveller publication, but by the time you get to technoloigically levelled fifteen starships, they have a projected lifespan of centuries.

Though going by the spaceship design rules and one tenth of a percent annual maintenance fee, plus operation to maintenance of about fifty to two weeks per annum, there's almost no reason to scrap a hull.

 

[Nathan Brazil]

The ancient, less advanced TL ships become part of the secondary subsector fleets and though lower TL may have similar lifespans, so a secondary career as a local (semi-retired) ship might be in play.

"This old ship had a long distinguished history when it was a ship of the line in the Imperial Navy. She may be an older girl now and we don't get the glamourous assignments, but she still packs a punch and we do our part. Hail the Emperor!"

 

[BackworldTraveller]

The ancient, less advanced TL ships become part of the secondary subsector fleets and though lower TL may have similar lifespans, so a secondary career as a local (semi-retired) ship might be in play.

"This old ship had a long distinguished history when it was a ship of the line in the Imperial Navy. She may be an older girl now and we don't get the glamourous assignments, but she still packs a punch and we do our part. Hail the Emperor!"

The old ship then became the orbital port of a backworld that only uses 20% of the interior space.