Starship Combat Questions

[veltyen]

G'day All,

A couple of minor questions about starship weaponry under t20 and how it fits together.

Radiation Damage
Is radiation damage multiplied by USP of the weapon as normal damage is? For example does a 16d20 Meson Spinal mount do 16d12 radiation damage, or d12 radiation damage? Is this radiation damage multiplied on a critical? (ie 160d12 radiation damage from the spinal mount on a critical). Does this mean that an AR 12 ship is safe from radiation except on criticals?

Beam Lasers
What advantage do Beam lasers have. I remember something about an advantage in point defense, but I cannot locate any specific rule. Pulse Lasers have longer range, do more damage, do better damage and are cheaper. Beam lasers can get a higher USP in batteries, but the other differences make me wonder why they are more expensive.

Fighter Combat
A one man fighter can either shoot and crash, or not shoot and fly the fighter. You can have the computer fire the weapons (probably missing) but there appears to be no way to do both in the same turn (Piloting is a move action, however gunnery is a full round action). Am I missing something? Or are two man fighters the way to go.

I think that is about it for the moment.

Veltyen

 

[far-trader]

Radiation Damage

I would say that it is the same USP value so yes it would be 16d12 in your example. But I would say that Radiation damage would not apply to SI points so the damage would only need to be calculated in the case of crew hits or a black globe soaking it up. I think applying the critical to it would be extreme. It would be a little like throwing a flaming spear, you make one attack and get the spear damage possibly with a critical multiplier, the damage from the flames is an extra bonus and does not get a multiplier.

As for the AR bonus and being invulnerable, that would work except for Meson weapons of course, there the radiation damage is already inside the hull.

Beam Lasers

As far as I know you summed it up for T20. Either beam or pulse are equally effective in a point defense role as far as I can see. Maybe the reference in the description (ed.1 pg.269) alludes to a rule idea that was dropped or missed. I would certainly be tempted to grant beam lasers a +2 to hit based on that.

Fighter Combat

CT has rules for a single crew person filling two roles and I thought I'd seen similar in T20 but don't see it now. I'd suggest a -2 to checks for both tasks (any two full actions if both are in a different area of crewing, like Pilot/Gunner), just off the top of my head. Two seat fighters are definitely the way to go.

Hope that helps a bit, or at least bumps this for someone else to see and reply

Welcome aboard

 

[someoneelsehasmyname]

A AR bonus never makes a ship invulnerable, any crit will just ignore it. Doing damage directly to the SI.

In our game we havent yet multiplied the radiation damage by the usp of the weapon(I say yet it may happen now dont know depends on if the gm reads this, Hope not to many of the bad guys use weapons with radiation damage) But if 1 point of damage gets though the armor it gets a critacal hit location. That alone is enough to give anyone a bad day even if you dont add the damage to the SI lost for the attack.

 

[BetterThanLife]

If you are taking a crit from a spinal meson the radiation damage no longer matters. (Unless you are in an 8 million ton starship) Standard damage is enough to vaproize your ship without adding the radiation damage.

I do and would multiply the damage from radiation as well as normal on a crit. (It did get past the armor didn't it so radiation shielding didn't stop it.)

As far as radiation damage not doing SI damage, I don't see anywhere where it says it doesn't do SI damage though it does have a seperate chart for what it is killing once it is doing internal damage.

An AR12 ship would be fairly safe from most weapons with a low weapon factor. But not from a meson weapon. But yes it is 16D20 and 16D12 for a Spinal mount hit (I don't see it laid out specifically so I could be interpreting it wrong but I don't think so.) A Crit from a Spinal Meson is unsurvivable but a crit from a spinal particle accellerator is survivable so you would have to pay attention to this. (In any traveller universe I've played in (except one which was a special case) we tended to avoid mixing it up with capital ships.)

The two seat fighter does appear to be standard in T20. All small craft require a bridge under T20 and a small craft bridge does include 2 small craft couches, so why not have a crew of two?

Begs another question though, why do the "Standard Designs" have additional seating for the crew?

As for beam lasers, they have always done less damage in Traveller than Pulse lasers, but they have been and still are, though less so, more accurate than pulse lasers. (Which is why they have higher ratings for less weapons. 10 TL13+ triple turrets of Beam Laser is factor 9 whereas the same number of pulse lasers is only factor 7.)

When dealing with a single turret a Trip Beam is factor 4 vs triple pulse being factor 3.(Again TL13+) 4D8 damage vs 3D10 damage and the triple Beam laser would be +4 to hit instead of +3. The fact that under T20 the Pulse Laser has a longer range and the way starship combat works makes this point virtually moot, but 4D8 is likely to do more damage (and on average will do more damage) than 3D10 though not much more damage. (Average 18 vs. 16.5) Certainly not twice the damage. (For twice the cost.) Against Armor the higher factor is definitely important since you are rolling more dice you are more likely to have the highest die be max damage.

Originally posted by veltyen:
G'day All,

A couple of minor questions about starship weaponry under t20 and how it fits together.

Radiation Damage
Is radiation damage multiplied by USP of the weapon as normal damage is? For example does a 16d20 Meson Spinal mount do 16d12 radiation damage, or d12 radiation damage? Is this radiation damage multiplied on a critical? (ie 160d12 radiation damage from the spinal mount on a critical). Does this mean that an AR 12 ship is safe from radiation except on criticals?

Beam Lasers
What advantage do Beam lasers have. I remember something about an advantage in point defense, but I cannot locate any specific rule. Pulse Lasers have longer range, do more damage, do better damage and are cheaper. Beam lasers can get a higher USP in batteries, but the other differences make me wonder why they are more expensive.

Fighter Combat
A one man fighter can either shoot and crash, or not shoot and fly the fighter. You can have the computer fire the weapons (probably missing) but there appears to be no way to do both in the same turn (Piloting is a move action, however gunnery is a full round action). Am I missing something? Or are two man fighters the way to go.

I think that is about it for the moment.

Veltyen