Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

[Spence]

DrTemp brought up something I thought I'd comment on. I would have mentioned this on the original thread, but they are all throwing formulas at each other and I didn't want to get hit

 

Anyway, here goes. While I don't think StarHero itself needs a "plug and play" starship contruction system. I feel the lack of one in AlienWars and Terran Empire is decidedly weak. Yes they have several charts containing "drives" and such, but no coherant discussion of "space" or "volume" needed. I also think that the lack of any deckplans of common ships is one of the things driving the proverbial nail in the coffin. A starship battle game doesn't need deck plans but RPG's need them in a very bad way. If a group of PC's are just traveling then having maps and deck plans are not that critical and can be adlib'd as required. But if the PC's are playing "crew" they need to really know where everything is.

 

For example:

 

The scene - the PC's are on a merchantman that has been overtaken by pirates. They were outgunned and not able to outfight or outrun the enemy ship. So the plan is to let them dock and turn the tables by taking out the pirates during the boarding action.

 

With no deck plan.

 

PC#1: We'll set up ambush points in the ship. When they come aboard we'll let them move into the ship proper and then hit them. GM are there good ambush area's?

 

GM: Lets see (rolls dice) yep.

 

PC#2: Good we do that. Let us know when we are fighting.

 

With a deck plan.

 

PC#1: We'll set up ambush points in the ship. When they come aboard we'll let them move into the ship proper and then hit them. The main airlock is here (points on plan). Upon entering they can go straight or imediately to their left.

 

PC#2: We need to draw them left. That leads to crew quarters and commons. If they go straight they hit main life support, the computer core and medical. I really wish these merchant ships were laid out with a little more thought about defense.

 

PC#3: Do you think we could get them to use the ventral maintenance access somehow?

 

PC#1: I wish, but pirate doesn't mean stupid.

 

 

With a deck plan the players have the "common knowledge" they would have. If they are crew they know the ship, like you know your house. Remember in StarWars when they hid under the deck plates in the smuggling storage to avoid the Deathstars troopers? That would never have happened in a normal game because no one would have come up with it on the fly unless they had seen it before. But a group of PC's who have plans of their ship, and who engage in smuggling would probably have hidden compartments drawn in where ever they could get away with it. That level of detail simply does not exist without deckplans. and without some kind of starter examples the large majority of people simply don't know where to start in transferring a ships "stats" to a paper "map".

 

I know that there are just too many different ways with hero that a starship can be done to be able to make deck plans of them all. But a few deckplans of the "standard" small ships. Say a small scout and a small merchantman. say the IES Gagarin (TE pg176 ) for one and a merchant. Especially a merchant. I know of many more games that revolve around adventurers that own/use a converted merchant vessal than any games where the PC's are military. I am really confused by the predomenance in TE of massive warships while the small ships that can be crewed by a player group are virtually nonexistant and trying to find the mainstay, merchantmen, is almost nonexistant.

 

I would love to see a supplement along the line of "Merchanter" or "FreeTrader". with a few basic deckplans and suggestions of how to go from "stats" to "deckplans".

 

just a thought.

[MitchellS]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Anyway' date=' here goes. While I don't think StarHero itself needs a "plug and play" starship contruction system. I feel the lack of one in AlienWars and Terran Empire is decidedly weak. Yes they have several charts containing "drives" and such, but no coherant discussion of "space" or "volume" needed.[/quote']

Terran Empire does have a discussion brief discussion on the size/volume of power systems but it seems a little squed. For example the small fusion power plant should take up about 18 cu hexes. The Gagarin has a size of 10x5. We can also assume it is 2 hexes tall. So it has a volume of 100 hexes. If the power plant is 18% of the entire ship that does not leave much for everything else.

 

I also think that the lack of any deckplans of common ships is one of the things driving the proverbial nail in the coffin. A starship battle game doesn't need deck plans but RPG's need them in a very bad way. If a group of PC's are just traveling then having maps and deck plans are not that critical and can be adlib'd as required. But if the PC's are playing "crew" they need to really know where everything is.

I'd take it a step farther and say that it would even be nice to have pictures for many of the ships and other vehicles within TE, AW, and STK. I'd say over half of the vehicles in the 3 books have no pictures assigned to them, let alone floor plans.

[Aroooo]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I've kept quite through these threads, because I think the subject has been talked to death. I will say that I do agree that TE could have put a little more emphasis on the player character 'ship classes,' but I'll live with the lack. There are so many web resources for ship deck plans that in the long run I don't think the lack matters. And from the 'story' viewpoint Spence uses in his example, those available plans should be more than suffficent for a GM to tell a good story.

 

Aroooo

[Curufea]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

It depends how you play.

Some GMs don't like location based gaming, and some do.

Great examples of scifi that doesn't worry about locations include Blake's 7, Dr Who and Farscape. Whereas it is important to Star Trek and Babylon 5.

 

You get the same thing in fantasy as well - you have games that are character based, and you have some that are wandering through a dungeon (and many other sorts of course).

 

There is also the philsophy of not rigidly defining things - one reason I hate the D&D system.

However, stylistic examples could be given - the authors shouldn't presume that their readers have access, or knowledge of, what these things normally look like (ie deck plans). But not the entire fleet.

[Spence]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I've kept quite through these threads, because I think the subject has been talked to death. I will say that I do agree that TE could have put a little more emphasis on the player character 'ship classes,' but I'll live with the lack. There are so many web resources for ship deck plans that in the long run I don't think the lack matters. And from the 'story' viewpoint Spence uses in his example, those available plans should be more than suffficent for a GM to tell a good story.

 

Aroooo

 

You are absolutely correct. I'm not meaning anything bad against Hero or the products. I just feel that it isn't that much to ask for a few deckplans of the specific ships in AW or TE. In Battleground Champions the mall and construction site were awsome maps. In Viper they only had 4 maps, 3 of the Aerie and 1 of the Ninr Dragon Palace. They serve as fantastic examples of how to layout a "secret base" with only two pages worth of space in the book. The maps have uncountable value for the newer GM in planning and mapping of a secret base. While I acknowledge I can go to GURPS or many other scifi games for deck plans, I would love to be able to say, "Pick up a coopy of Battleground Terran Empire, it has a fantastic deckplan of an Imperial outpost, a Garagin Scoutship and a Free Trader. Use them for comparison as you draw the deckplans of that Frigate."

 

I understand that H may not want to put out a book of deckplans that could not possibly cover a fraction of the possibilities, but I also don't think it is too far out of line to ask for one or two one page deckplans from the established campaign settings. After all I'm just asking. The only scifi RPG I know that didn't suffer when it didn't have deck plans was/is the StarTrek games. And that was because there are loads of ST deckplans already published.

 

Just another slow moving thought

[DrTemp]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

There are so many web resources for ship deck plans that in the long run I don't think the lack matters.

 

True, but 1) Terran Empire an Alien Wars would really profit from a deck plan book as proposed (setting-feeling-wise) 2) there's probably "a lot" (as far as SF RPG's are concerned...) of money-earning potential in such a product, because while one can use foreign setting deck plans with AW and TE, the other way round this is also true.

 

Plus, the ships from Jovian Chronicles are virtually the only ones with deck plans and spin gravtiy AFAIK... and there are not that many deck plans of them

 

UES Centauri and UES Jupiter deck plans, now!

[Rapier]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I've really come over to the other side of the fence. I did a wander through Terran Empire over the holiday. While I am still very much convinced that spacecraft design has no place in Star Hero.

 

However, without having read through it [star Hero] I do think it should have included some discussion about how to design a starship building system (much like FH spent some space on how to design a magic system).

 

I also think that Terran Empire should have spent some space on, if not starship design systems, at least given full examples (pic & stats) for a number of the ships. That way you would at least have some kind of measuring stick to hold your own designs to.

 

I think there is a real lack, so far, in viable starship designs and design methods in the Star Hero line.

[Spence]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

It depends how you play.

Some GMs don't like location based gaming, and some do.

Great examples of scifi that doesn't worry about locations include Blake's 7, Dr Who and Farscape. Whereas it is important to Star Trek and Babylon 5.

 

You get the same thing in fantasy as well - you have games that are character based, and you have some that are wandering through a dungeon (and many other sorts of course).

 

There is also the philsophy of not rigidly defining things - one reason I hate the D&D system.

However, stylistic examples could be given - the authors shouldn't presume that their readers have access, or knowledge of, what these things normally look like (ie deck plans). But not the entire fleet.

 

Exactly. But we do differ slightly in one of our definitions. To me a character based game is one where you have the most need of a layout or floorplan. If the game is character based and the PC's are a ships crew, they have a critical need of the deck plan of their own ship. After all no self respecting ships engineer can exist without knowing what kind of engines and more imoprtantly where the engines are located. That doesn't "rigidly define" the game, just one piece. Having knowledge of your own house does not mean you know what the arrangement of someones apartment in the other town is either. And I'm not implying that is what you meant. Now it the party is a group that routinely travels from world to world via passenger liner or tramp merchant, then having a number of deckplans isn't required (though they would be helpful) and a complete GM adlib of the locations works. Some of the best games I have played were like that. In a fantasy game a roving band doesn't always need maps, but if the PC is the commander of a border fort they are a must. If you don't even know where the jakes are it's kinda hard to plan anything. SH type games usualy involve traveling between starsystems and the PC's usually control/own their ship. Having a good deckplan can be important. If I was planning to GM a game based in the TE, having a few DP's to use as a rough yardstick would be really nice. Not absolutely critical, but very very helpful.

 

Anyway I am way overstressing my soapbox.

[Bucky]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Well, what is stopping us from making our own deckplans? Granted, Star Hero does not have a means of producing them, but that is no reason we can't "homebrew" a system and make our own. Heck, maybe the company might want to publish them.

 

Just because the Hero system does not have them, does not mean we have to sit around and wait on them to produce. I am sure they have alligators of their own to contend with.

[Aroooo]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Well, what is stopping us from making our own deckplans? Granted, Star Hero does not have a means of producing them, but that is no reason we can't "homebrew" a system and make our own. Heck, maybe the company might want to publish them.

 

Just because the Hero system does not have them, does not mean we have to sit around and wait on them to produce. I am sure they have alligators of their own to contend with.

 

I could certainly do a few. All I would need would be a sketch of the ship and its dimensions. (I did one for B5 BTW.)

 

Aroooo

[Curufea]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I couldn't agee more. Creativity should ALWAYS be encouraged.

 

I'll have to look at the rules now Haven't done Star Hero in over 8 months...

 

Some sort of ratio for active points and size will need to be worked out to give rough estimates on size of parts. There would be general rules - planet landing capable ships shouldn't be too fragile (but needn't be aerodynamic). Each race should have a style of ship (Xenovores for example favour vertical wing biological shapes).

 

Engine size compared to fuel tank size should be based on tech level and type of engine.

 

Warships would have nonessential parts on the outside of the ship (such as crew quarters, cargo, and empty fuel tanks). Important parts would be in the centre (bridge, reactors, computers).

 

I'll have to check some of my other scifi RPGs and see if they have construction rules suitable for deckplans.

[DrTemp]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Well' date=' what is stopping us from making our own deckplans? [/quote']

 

Probably the same thing that is stopping us from writing our own RPG system, our own RPG setting, our own ...

[Brother Jim]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

if you want ship deck plans there are several out there. i believe that SJG still makes the Traveller deck plans and there are deck plans for the Fading Suns rpg as well. the SJG ones are double-sided with squares on one side and hexes on the other

[DrTemp]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

if you want ship deck plans there are several out there.

 

Next thing you tell me is that there are other SF settings out there that I could buy.

[Spence]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Well, what is stopping us from making our own deckplans? Granted, Star Hero does not have a means of producing them, but that is no reason we can't "homebrew" a system and make our own. Heck, maybe the company might want to publish them.

 

Just because the Hero system does not have them, does not mean we have to sit around and wait on them to produce. I am sure they have alligators of their own to contend with.

 

You are correct and we already do. I'm tinkering with Profantasy's Cosmographer right now because I want my deckplans to not just be functional but look nice. But I think everyone is missing my point which is not exactly DrTemp's. I don't want or need a complete "how to build starships" book. I don't want or need a big book of deckplans. What I do want is one or two representative deckplans for the existing and established campaigns. That way when I build my own they can "fit in" with the world sense. When I ran LUGtrek I made several deckplans for different ships and they all had a nice Trek feel, because I had a few examples to refer to.

[MitchellS]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

While DrTemp is trying to be facetious in his last couple of posts he does bring up a very valid point: We should not need to buy other company's products in order to play our Hero games, no matter what the genre.

 

There seems to be a huge idea of acceptance on these message boards, probably stemming from the years when there were no Hero products produced, that we should buy M&M and SAS products if we want more Champions material, or buy GURPS or Traveller products if we want more Star Hero material, or more d20 and OGL if we want fantasy material. That's really not the idea we should be following. Paying money to other companies for something we want more of is just making their market and profits greater and taking away from money we could be spending on Hero Games' books.

 

Hero Games should have provided some deck plans in their 3 Star Hero campaign books, as well as pictures of all the ships and vehicles. It was an oversight or mistake, but everything is simple in hindsight. I doubt the Star Hero line failed because there were no deck plan but I will say the books could have gone the extra step toward being more user friendly and informative. I think all the Hero System books could use a little more cream and a little less crunch. When you think about it, the reason we buy books from other companies is to get the cream. There is no Hero System crunch in those books.

 

The best way to get more Star Hero material is to get people to buy more books. As fans we can do that buy running some demo games at our FLGS or Cons. Even running some 3-4 session PBEM games might spark some interest. But Hero Games needs to do their part too. Some PDF previews of the books on the website might entice a few people to buy them. Maybe an official [meaning written by Steve, Darren, Ben, Allen, or James] Alien Wars or Terran Empire short story posted to the website every quarter would help generate some interest. If not a short story then a character write up or piece of tech; or maybe just a detailed timeline to explain [with write up examples] how colony worlds were settled before hyperdrives. Sometimes you need to give a little to get something more back in return.

[Bucky]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

While DrTemp is trying to be facetious in his last couple of posts he does bring up a very valid point: We should not need to buy other company's products in order to play our Hero games' date=' no matter what the genre. [/quote']

 

My point is that "should" has nothing to do with it. You don't have deck plans. You want deckplans. Your choice is to either complain, or make your own. Making your own just seems more effective to me than complaining and waiting for the company to do it for you. More likely to get you deck plans in a shorter amount of time.

 

Besides which as much as we may like science fiction, in gaming it seems to be a minority player. There are other, more profitable anvenues out there for the company than our little corner. The sad fact is, we're a minority.

 

Companies are in the business of making money. What we would do for free, they gotta pay folks for, and they have to pay them whether the product sells sufficiently or not.

 

So, curse the darkness or strike a match. Your choice.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

If you intend to design you own deckplans for spaceships (and I agree that this would be a worthwhile contribution to SH resources), The Ultimate Vehicle includes suggestions for the size of different types of propulsion systems, and the volume of fuel that each would require, in Chapter 5 under "Space Vehicle Basics" (pp. 85-92). That chapter also directs you to other system size specifics that are scattered throughout the book. (I don't have Star HERO handy, so I can't say how much of this info is included in that book.)

 

TUV also has optional formulas for calculating the mass and volume of vehicle equipment, including propulsion, weapons, defenses, power systems, sensors, communications etc. (p. 118). However, they're not very detailed and would require a fair bit of number crunching.

 

I'm reluctant to violate Hero Games's copyright by transcribing that info here, though.

[MitchellS]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

My point is that "should" has nothing to do with it. You don't have deck plans. You want deckplans. Your choice is to either complain' date=' or make your own. Making your own just seems more effective to me than complaining and waiting for the company to do it for you. More likely to get you deck plans in a shorter amount of time.[/quote']

No one is disputing you cannot make your own deck plans. But those are not official and are time consuming. The reason we purchase campaign books are to save time not spend more time creating things. If we had unlimited time we'd have no need for any book besides 5E, would we? Also we're also not all cartographers.

 

I don't expect Hero Games to give us deck plans, and that is not my point here. I would hope that someone at Hero Games will read this and include deck plans in any potential future Star Hero books. There are 4 Star Hero books published so far and none of them have deck plans. Let's hope Hero Games does not make the same mistake a 5th time.

[Aroooo]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I never advocated buying other companies products to get deck plans. There are tons available on the net for free. Sure, they may not be TE or AW specific, but for the aspect of storytelling, of giving the PC's something to use to visualize their home in space, they work just fine.

 

Given the time it takes to make deck plans, I don't expect DOJ to include them in Star Hero products. I just don't see it as financially viable, given the labor vs. volume of sales involved. Yes, we'd like them. Yes, they would probably get a few more sales. But as Bucky said, the sci-fi gaming genre is a minority market.

 

As a person who does not play a lot of supers games, I'd much rather see DOJ/Steve/anyone else's efforts go into making really good 'Champions' and general 'Hero' products to sell to a larger fan base. I'll buy them, and I'll get use out of them too. And if it keeps DOJ around that much longer (being one of the 'old timer's crowd'), the happier I'll be.

 

Appologies if I ranted.

 

Aroooo

[Nyrath]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

Some sort of ratio for active points and size will need to be worked out to give rough estimates on size of parts. There would be general rules - planet landing capable ships shouldn't be too fragile (but needn't be aerodynamic). Each race should have a style of ship (Xenovores for example favour vertical wing biological shapes).

 

If you just want something really quick and dirty, figure that every ton of fully loaded and fueled spacecraft has a volume of 5 to 10 cubic meters, and ten percent of the fully loaded mass spacecraft mass is structural mass.

 

Alternatively, figure that every cubic meter of hull volume masses 10 to 20 kilograms. That corresponds to average pressure compartments being cubes 10 meters on a side, with pressure bulkheads averaging 17 to 33 kg/m^2.

[Curufea]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

I thought of a few more generalisations-

 

Overall shapes of the various decks can be gotten from the illustrations of the ships in the books.

OIF = ventrally located

OAF = dorsally located

Bulky = +1 to size ratio

Weapon system = 10:1 ratio (ie 10 active points = 1m^2)

Non Weapon system = 5:1 ratio

ATRI = any level higher than the minimum required for the system miniaturises it slightly.

Any spare spaces are access corridors, maintenance shafts, cabling , electrics and plumbing.

 

Also - in space there is no reason for anything to be small, or aerodynamic.

 

Anyhow - I've not had time to work out the numbers, so these are just suggestions.

 

I realise this is off-topic for a thread about asking the writers for more canon material. But other than the original post, unless we go off-topic there will be no replies that are worth reading.

[Spence]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

 

Given the time it takes to make deck plans, I don't expect DOJ to include them in Star Hero products. I just don't see it as financially viable, given the labor vs. volume of sales involved. Yes, we'd like them. Yes, they would probably get a few more sales. But as Bucky said, the sci-fi gaming genre is a minority market.

 

Actually I really can't understand this one. Many Hero posters keep saying that all kinds of things about cost for a deck plan being too high. If I pull out my copy of V(CotS) and go to page 87 I see two of a total of four maps in the book. They are the maps of the two sample Viper Nests. The only difference between them and a deck plan of a small ship, is the deckplan would cover less area. In CB there are several maps. The Gods won't decend from Mt Olympus and add $100 dollars per copy just because someone calls a map a deckplan. I'm not asking for a full blown book with hundreds of deckplans. I just think that exchanging one or two decrative art pics for one or two small deck plans would be nice. It isn't something that is going to kill me or prevent me from contiuing to buy more products. But I think it would really enhanse the future products. I know a couple of people who have bought CB. They don't play Hero and have the same opinion of it that I do of Werewolf/Vampire. Which isn't good. But they saw the maps of the mall and the construction site and had to have it. Do I think that is enough justification to make a all out multi-deckplan and ship construction book? Not at all. In fact I agree that it probably wouldn't be a good gamble with limited resources. But one or two deckplans to represent cannon for "specific" established campaign products would be far more positive than one or two art pics.

 

 

 

Appologies if I ranted.

 

Aroooo

 

 

No appologies needed mainly because I don't think I've ever read you ranting. We all get on the soapbox once in a while and that is the nearest to ranting I have ever read you.

 

Me on the other hand. I seam to have the knack of pissing people off by just saying hello. Hmm.....

[Curufea]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

HELLO?!!!?

 

You DARED to say Hello?

 

How could you!

 

 

Anyhow, back on topic. My thoughts on this are - deadline was approaching, much rushing about to get products finished, deckplans were forgotten/not even contemplated/forced to be dropped.

There may be too much of a review process between plan designer and world creator for it to fit their publishing schedule. (ie, "they are 3 metres wide, make the corridors bigger" "No, they don't have hands, take out the ladders and put in ramps" "Too green! Too green!" etc..)

[Spence]

Re: Something Star Hero needs, but hasn't-PT2

 

HELLO?!!!?

 

You DARED to say Hello?

 

How could you!

 

 

Anyhow, back on topic. My thoughts on this are - deadline was approaching, much rushing about to get products finished, deckplans were forgotten/not even contemplated/forced to be dropped.

There may be too much of a review process between plan designer and world creator for it to fit their publishing schedule. (ie, "they are 3 metres wide, make the corridors bigger" "No, they don't have hands, take out the ladders and put in ramps" "Too green! Too green!" etc..)

 

Your right. It very well could have been that way. Right now I like to mention it with a slant towards the future. When I am doing a project and everyone has let me know they would like something if possible, I keep an eye out, and if things come together right I will put it in. On the other hand if someone comes up with an idea and everyone agree's it's cool but "too expensive/hard/whatever", then even if I discover I could do it cheaply and still have quality, I don't because everyone says it's "not good". My stance is that the products are good ones as they are, but some of them could be better with one or two deck plans and if possible please add them. When I read the posts and replies concerning deckplans the feeling you get is a lot of posters are saying they think any mention of deckplans is EVIL and you must be stopped, even if they can be added they should not because someone might think a product without them is somehow not as good. I never could understand why there is so much "anti-" whenever someone mentions something they would like to see.