goblinoidgames.com

The armour rules could be used for old ships from the start of the Zangid War, just before the formation of the Confederacy - maybe a ship with one Tauran officer aboard, as an observer/advisor/nanny? Ships from that period, refitted for "modern" use, could be called "Ironclads" - yes, I stole that!
Grif

I'm not sure what penalty the armour would have on ironclads against "current" confederation vessels. I'd leave that for another thread, though.

Oh - by the way, it's an irregular verb that must be conjugated correctly:

I pay homage.
You research.
He steals.

PLEASE do an online campaign of this (not PBS)! I would play in a heartbeat!

Great work so far! Can we get stats for Vipers, Cylon Raiders and the main characters like Starbuck and Apollo?

daddystabz wrote:PLEASE do an online campaign of this (not PBS)! I would play in a heartbeat!

I'd love to. Unfortunately, geography is not my friend. While the internet has opened up new ways of communicating, there is still the problem of time zones. Given that most of this board seem to originate in the USA (GMT -5 to GMT -8) and I'm in Zulu Time (GMT), this puts a considerable limit on the mutually compatible times for gaming. It's a problem I keep running up against on non-Euro boards.

daddystabz wrote:Great work so far! Can we get stats for Vipers, Cylon Raiders and the main characters like Starbuck and Apollo?

Vipers and Raiders are already in here, under the Small Craft sections. They're too small to have meaningful stats under the current S&S system for describing starships, so I just followed the format for shuttles as given in the rules.

Main characters is a bit of a sticker. I may provide them, but they'd only be my interpretations - and I certainly wouldn't use them in any game of mine! My philosophy is that they'd only get in the way of PCs. I've played in games where the referee had "canon" characters interacting with PCs, and wondered what on earth we were doing there. It's not something I'd want to inflict on any players of mine.

However, given I'm on leave at the minute (work shutdown over Christmas), I shall give some thought to what certain characters might look like.

Some thoughts on what the important characters in Battlestar Galactica might look like in S&S 2e terms. They reflect my own views on what the characters should be. If anybody has different ideas, I'd love to hear them. One thing I have noted is that my interpretations of the characters are rather low level.

Commander Adama

**These stats are purely conjectural**

Race: Colonial
Class: Military/Command 9

St: 11 Co: 12 De: 11 In: 15 Ch: 17 PP: 11

HP: 49 Defense: 0 Psi Points: 11

Combat: 20/20 Contact: 17 Science: 16 Technical: 16

Psi Powers: Psionic defence techniques (see below)

Commander Adama is the commander of the Galactica and the leader of the refugees fleeing from the destruction of the Twelve Colonies. He is respected by his crew, and acts as a father figure to many of the Warriors under his command. He rarely takes part in combat, instead using his tactical genius on the bridge of the Galactica.

Adama has no psi powers, but is trained in the use of psionic defence techniques. This is a result of his participation in a special training program at the Warrior Institute.

Captain Apollo

**These stats are purely conjectural**

Race: Colonial
Class: Military/Command 4

St: 13 Co: 12 De: 14 In: 14 Ch: 16 PP: 11

HP: 22 Defense: -1 Psi Points: 11

Combat: 16/16 Contact: 11 Science: 10 Technical: 10

Psi Powers: None

Apollo is the son of Adama, and looks set to follow in his father’s footsteps. He is considered to be mature beyond his years, and had led Colonial Warriors on many skirmishes against the Cylons.

Lieutenant Athena

**These stats are purely conjectural**

Race: Colonial
Class: Military/Fire Control 2

St: 10 Co: 13 De: 11 In: 16 Ch: 15 PP: 11

HP: 12 Defense: 0 Psi Points: 11

Combat: 13/13 Contact: 8 Science: 9 Technical: 12

Psi Powers: None

Athena is the daughter of Commander Adama, the commander of the Battlestar Galactica. She serves on the Galactica as a bridge officer, although she is a competent Warrior in her own right.

Cassiopeia

**These stats are purely conjectural**

Race: Colonial
Class: Scientific Enlisted 6

St: 10 Co: 15 De: 15 In: 12 Ch: 15 PP: 11

HP: 32 Defense: -1 Psi Points: 11

Combat: 8/9 Contact: 14 Science: 13 Technical: 8

Psi Powers: None

Cassiopeia was one of the civilian survivors of the destruction of the Twelve Colonies. Originally a socialator, she soon made herself useful on the Galactica as a medical technician.

Lieutenant Starbuck

**These stats are purely conjectural**

Race: Colonial
Class: Military/Security 3

St: 14 Co: 12 De: 14 In: 11 Ch: 16 PP: 14

HP: 17 Defense: -1 Psi Points: 14

Combat: 16/16 Contact: 10 Science: 8 Technical: 8

Psi Powers: Hunches, Lucky

Starbuck is an ace pilot and Warrior. He is also an inveterate gambler and enjoys the high life and status that comes with being a Colonial Warrior. He is never without a fumarello, even in the cockpit of a Viper.

Starbuck is not psionically trained, but he does have psionic abilities. He often gets psionic flashes that give him insight into situations - although these often lead him into trouble. He also is incredibly lucky and, by spending 1 PP, can alter the result of any dice roll by +/-1.

Great work so far! I'm loving it. If you wanted to run something I'd sacrifice and take the time hit on my end to better accommodate you. I might be able to snag a friend or 2 also to play.

In addition, I'm wondering how you could handle Viper pilots? What skill would you use for piloting? Would you only use raw Dex?

daddystabz wrote:In addition, I'm wondering how you could handle Viper pilots? What skill would you use for piloting? Would you only use raw Dex?

It would depend on the situation, really. My choice? Given the situation, I would reckon that virtually all Colonial military personnel would have some training in flying small craft, although you could argue that only full-blown Warriors would be able to fly Vipers in a combat situation. Then it would come down to what they wanted to do. In a furball, I would use a straightforward Combat skill check. Reasoning: you are jockeying for position for a shot. If, on the other hand, somebody was trying to do some stunt flying, then it would come down to a Technical check. Reasoning: you are trying to push the craft to its limits and engineering knowledge helps here.

Anything else would depend on the situation. Trying to avoid your craft being caught in an explosion? How about a save vs Death? After all, you are trying not to die.

Get creative. The straightforward ability check should be the check of last resort for the referee, in my opinion.

It just seems to me that BSG features a lot of space combat in Vipers/Raiders and that a combat check might not be good enough to simulate how Starbuck, for example, is one of the finest pilots in the fleet. If using your recommended method above Starbuck would be a pretty crappy pilot, given a Technical score of only 8. Apollo would only be slightly better with a score of only 10. It makes me think there should be a Piloting skill you can use for maneuvers in a Viper. I find myself kind of tempted to make a small skills list for a game like BSG. Maybe use pilot (Viper) for maneuvers and Combat for attacks. You could roll Technical for pushing the ship to its limits and a Save throw for saving vs. death when she is about to explode. What do you all think?

It seems we would need to write actual ship stats for a Viper and for a Raider too, building off the stats used for normal capital ships but also including a maneuverability characteristic.

What do you all think about this?

As I said, my version of things is rather low level. If you want Starbuck to be a better pilot, then there are a number of remedies. First off, bump him up in level. Second, remember that I have given him an ability to trade PP for dice modifiers. Finally, you can give him a straight-forward add to his Combat roil when piloting a Viper. Personally, I though using Combat checks is a perfect way of emulating the jockeying for a firing position in a furball. If you make the roll, you get your shot. If you don't, then either there was no opportunity or you missed.

A score of 16 in combat is actually quite good, hitting 80% of the time with no modifiers. Being able to push a stunt which is beyond the capabilities of your craft 40% of the time is also very good. It's all just a matter of comparison against the others, really, and depends on your game. As I said, the stats are purely conjectural.

Skill system - why not? There are plenty of skill systems out there that can be tagged onto D&D clones. If you find one that works, sing out. Personally, I'm not that enamoured of them. The old BECMI proficiencies system works so long as you restrict it to things that aren't covered by the character classes, in my opinion. After all, if you have a climbing skill based on DEX, then one of the thief's abilities becomes less useful.

If you want more granularity in the designs of fighters - go for it! I just tried to keep them within the RAW as much as possible. If you're interested, I did write a vehicle combat system with notes on vehicle construction a while back (link - https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B9m0sXWdlPDQZGViZDg5ZWQtYTFjZS00MWFkLWIzOTItNTgxMDRiZTI0ZTNi if you're interested). If you ask, you'll probably find other people's ideas knocking around as well.

I'd like to see your take on things - after all, there is less information on BSG than on ST. I did think of posting some of my ST:TOS ship designs to the appropriate thread, but I didn't think it was worth it for minor differences in things like Power Pile Base or the number of beam batteries.

The more the merrier!