LOE Ship Test Rules

OK, Shrike was wondering about things PCs could work on, so rather than cross over into stuff I'm already doing, here's a skeleton of the early ship rules. Subject to change of course - this is just a rough framework. The idea is that equipment is added to the slots, and as technology gets more advanced ships have more space to work with. Note that these additional slots are NOT automatically gained - unlike oLoE there are no discreet tech levels - the TL numbers are just markers to indicate roughly in the tech tree where these ships fall. Each refinement must be separately researched. So if you want super star galleys you will have to research them.

I have only included the slot gains as a rough guide, and only on some ships. They are subject to change as the cost of various systems that might be added is determined.

Now, unlike added caps in oLoE slots are actually filled with discrete systems. Thus unlike adding "+1 weapons", a Ship of the Line might have "2x +1 medium muzzleloader cannon banks" and "2 x +2 heavy muzzleloader cannon banks" to simulate multiple decks of large numbers of 24 pounder and 36-48 pounder cannon. Each weapons fit has a SPECIFIC amount of damage it deals that does not change based on class. Thus to make more powerful weapons loads you must usually stack multiple weapons together. A battleship with "+1 medium gun" has exactly the same gun loadout as a destroyer with "+1 medium gun"

Nevertheless, these systems are still based on what existed in old LoE, so the basic concept of the ships doesn't change, just how they're built.

So what I need are lists of added caps for everything based on the old weapons, armour, engines and other systems going up to TL3 at least. Then we can start playing with slot costs, damage and other abilities.

Discussion

Battleships look like they could use an increase to 12 guns/armor; 'heavy' grade weapons would increase in size a bit to compensate and would gain additional penetration.

Freighter and Light Carrier designs added for discussion. --Shrike 21:04, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

For the steampunk stuff, I've suggested the magic milieu where I think you should be able to buy the required tech to get those weapons, since I don't know what any of the techs would be called yet. -Screwball

As costs with many decimal places look ugly, it might be a good idea to multiply all final costs with a constant, such as 1000.

The price of a weapon system is higher the more power is crammed into a single weapon slot. This could be used to estimate where on the milieu range a given weapon goes. Example: a weapon that costs between 100 and 200 is in milieu 2, a weapon that costs between 400 and 500 is in milieu 5, and so on. The scale would depend on the constant that the final price is multiplied with.

Alternatively, dividing the cost of the weapon by the number of slots it takes up could be used only for TL calculation, without affecting the cost that the player has to pay for the weapon.

Stuff needs to cost enough that filling all the slots available is usually a bad idea.

Thoughts on Costs

Cost should be dependent on how effective the weapon is. To measure effectiveness, I use the average number of hits per turn here.

Most Costs

Base cost: suggested: ((11-TN)/10)*(number of dice)
Where TN is the target number for the roll. This formula gives the average number of hits for a weapon without any modifications.
Example: a TL2 Cannon 8+ would have a base cost of (11-8)/10*1 = 0.3

P#: This mod reduces the enemy armour by 1 for every increment of P, which corresponds to an increase in effectiveness against armoured ships only of 10% per increment. As it's not an increase against every target, I suggest that cost only increases by 5% per increment of P.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+P/20)

B# I'm not sure if shield piercing works the same way as armour piercing does. If it works the same as armour piercing, then the price increase should be similar: 5% per increment of B.
suggestede: (current cost)*(1+B/20)

S# Another of the “increase effectiveness by 10% per increment” mods. If I'm not mistaken, every target has a soak roll though, and therefore the increase in cost should be the full 10%.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+S/10)

AA# 10% increase per increment, only good against air units.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+AA/20)

Flak# 10% increase per increment against air units, 10% decrease against ships. Those two cancel out IMO.
suggested: no cost change

PD Don't know the mechanics, so I can't calculate cost

Slow Reduces effectiveness, depending on enemy speeds. No reduction at all if used against immobile targets, up to 70% reduction against targets with a TN of 4. (I'm assuming that this is as high as it goes). Most targets will probably be somewhere in between, so around 35% effectiveness reduction is my guess. For the sake of simplicity, let's reduce the cost by one third (33%).
suggested: (current cost)*2/3

Alpha# This one is difficult, as it's hard to judge how much of a drawback the “once per battle” limitation is. Figuring that out would depend on the average length of battles. The following formula arbitrarily assumes that battles take 10 turns. The effectiveness increase depends on how many rolls the weapon already gets.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+ (number of dice + Alpha)/((number of dice) * 10))

Guided# Effectiveness increase depends on the innate accuracy (TN) of the weapon.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+(TN-1)/10)

Single shot Hard to tell without playtesting. Arbitrarily decrease cost by a factor of 10 for now, similar to what was used for battle length for the Alpha mod.
suggested: (current cost)/10

Air I don't know the rules for shooting down missiles. No suggestion yet.

Energy Same as for Air, no suggestion until more about possible countermeasures is known.

Hybrid Again, need more info about countermeasures

Power Hungry Another difficult one, as the effect depends on the other weapons on the same ship. If it has no other weapons, the effect can be 0% effectiveness decrease. If it has lots of others, effectiveness reduction might approach 100%. However, it can be assumed that players will design their ships intelligently in order to minimise weapon outage. 20% cost reduction feels fairly generous.
suggested: (current cost)*(4/5)

Range: Hard to tell before seeing the movement/positioning rules. It doesn't help that range does not fit easily into the “average number of hits per turn” measuring scale. For now: arbitrarily 2% increase in cost per range increment.
suggested: (current cost)*(1+Range/50)

Slots#: I feel inclined to just divide the cost by the number of spaces the weapon takes up.
suggested: (current cost)/slots

Example

Let's consider this weapon system:

+3 Battleship caliber naval rifle turrets
Attack: 6+ P2
Range: 16

Step 1:
Figure out the base cost.
It has a TN of 6, and rolls 1 die.
base cost = ((11-6)/10)*1 = 0.5
Step 2:
P2 mod:
new cost = 0.5*(1+2/20) = 0.5*1.1 = 0.55
Step 3:
Range
new cost = 0.55*(1+16/50) = 0.726
Step 4:
number of slots it takes up
new cost = 0.726/3 = 0.242

There are no more modifications to take into account, so 0.242 is the final cost of the weapon system.

Ships

Galley

Milieu: TL1
MDP: 1
Move: 1
Engine Slots: 1 (gain +1 slot at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 4 (gain +2 slot at TL2, +1 at TL3, +1 at TL4, and +2 at TL5)

Small Sailing Ship

Milieu: TL2
MDP: 2
Move: 2
Weapon Slots: 3 (gain +1 slot at TL3, +1 at TL4, and +2 and TL5)
Engine Slots: 3 (gain +1 slot at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 1 (gain +1 slot at TL3, +1 at TL4, and +2 and TL5)

Large Sailing Ship

Milieu: TL2
MDP: 3
Move: 1
Weapon Slots: 6 (gain +2 slot at TL3, +2 at TL4, and +4 and TL5)
Engine Slots: 3 (gain +1 slot at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 2 (gain +2 slot at TL3, +2 at TL4, and +3 and TL5)

Patrol Boat

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 1
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 2 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Engine Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 1 (gain +1 slot at TL4 and +1 at TL5)

Small Warship

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 3
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Engine Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 2 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +1 at TL5)
Option Slots: 2 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)

Cruiser

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 5
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 6
Engine Slots: 4
Armour Slots: 4
Option Slots: 4

Battleship

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 10
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 10
Armour Slots: 8
Engine Slots: 4
Option Slots: 6

Carrier

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 7
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 5
Engine Slots: 4
Armour: 6
Option Slots: 10
Cargo Slots: 10

Note on option slots:
Option Slots may be loaded with any system, but pay double space for Weapons, Engines or Armor.

Test Types

Light Carrier

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 4
Move: 4
Weapon Slots: 2 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +1 at TL5)
Engine Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 5 (gain +3 slots at TL4 and +5 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 3 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +1 at TL5)

Freighter

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 1
Move: 2
Engine Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Option Slots: 5 (gain +3 slots at TL4 and +5 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 2 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +1 at TL5)
Note: Pays double for all Hangars. Move bonus from engines is halved.

Superfreighter

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 3
Move: 2
Engine Slots: 4 (gain +2 slots at TL4 and +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 2 (gain +1 slots at TL4 and +1 at TL5)
Option Slots: 5 (gain +3 slots at TL4 and +6 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 10 (gain +5 slots at TL4 and +5 at TL5)
Note: Pays double for all Hangars. Move bonus from engines is halved.

Light Omniship

Milieu: TL4
MDP: 3
Move: 4
Engine Slots: 6 (gain +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 2 (gain +1 at TL5)
Option Slots: 8 (gain +3 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 1 (gain +1 at TL5)

Destroyer-analogue omniship. Suitable for convoy escort and patrol duties.

Note: Omniships do not pay double-space penalty for fitting non-Option systems into Options. However, they must use the appropriate system if multiple versions are available (eg, Cargo Holds)

Medium Omniship

Milieu: TL4
MDP: 5
Move: 4
Engine Slots: 6 (gain +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 3 (gain +1 at TL5)
Option Slots: 12 (gain +3 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 2 (gain +1 at TL5)

Cruiser-analogue omniship. Suitable for fleet escort, independent operations, and flotilla-leader duties.

Note: Omniships do not pay double-space penalty for fitting non-Option systems into Options. However, they must use the appropriate system if multiple versions are available (eg, Cargo Holds)

Heavy Omniship

Milieu: TL4
MDP: 10
Move: 4
Engine Slots: 6 (gain +2 at TL5)
Armour Slots: 6 (gain +4 at TL5)
Option Slots: 20 (gain +10 at TL5)
Cargo Slots: 6 (gain +2 at TL5)

Battleship-analogue omniship. Suitable for line combat duty and showing off a PhD in Fucking You Up. Also suitable as an assault carrier hull for providing a -very- safe roost for your small craft.

Note: Omniships do not pay double-space penalty for fitting non-Option systems into Options. However, they must use the appropriate system if multiple versions are available (eg, Cargo Holds)

Proposed Blank Templates and Stuff

Courier

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 1
Move: 4
Engine Slots: 8
Armour Slots: 1
Option Slots: 1
Cargo Slots: 1

Basic zippy courier; meant more for quick starway travel between systems than tactical travel though.

Recon Ship (Modified Patrol Boat Hull)

Milieu: TL3
MDP: 1
Move: 3
Engine Slots: 2
Option Slots: 4

Bonuses/Penalties: Ether costs for long-range travel is cut in half Does not play double-space penalty for fitting non-option systems into options. - to be confirmed: Gains +x to stealth rolls/checks? - to be confirmed: Gains +x to sensors?

Ideally suited for carrying small teams in and out or just monitoring sectors of space silently.

Test Systems

Weapons

LOE Ship Weapons Test
MDP Magic Weapons

Armour

LOE Ship Armour Test
MDP Magic Armour

Engines

LOE Ship Engine Test
Magic Engines

Options

+1 Mobile Suit Gunslits
Attack: As per squadron
Range: As per squadron
Allows one squadron per set of gunslits to fire.

+1 Fighting tops
Represents raised areas or strongpoints for troops and marines.
Effect: +1 attack bonus and +1 terrain protection for onboard troops.

+1 Smoke casters
Effect: Can be used to create a penalty to attack for both sides.

+2 Streamlined Design (+3 for Capital ships)
While the insubstantial ether clouds rarely have have a measurable impact on performance no matter how outlandish a ship's hull form may be, some naval architects make use of aerodynamically-optimized designs to eliminate or even take advantage of this. Doing so also improves a ship's handling characteristic in atmosphere. Streamlined designs provide no bonus to a ship travelling under zero-cost transit drives (eg, sails/ramscoop) as they are travelling with the ether, instead of against it and require at least Tech/Magical Milieu 2.
+1 Strategic Speed, low cost.

+2 Slip Field
With the development of forcefields it became possible to wrap a ship in a low-power forcefield that would give it the speed advantages of a streamlined hullform without forcing it into shape that might be otherwise detrimental to efficiency. Slip Fields provide no bonus to a ship travelling under zero-cost transit drives (eg, sails/ramscoop) and require at least Tech/Magical Milieu 4.
+1 Strategic Speed, moderate cost

+0 Automation
+1 on command and electronics rolls/passive values. Halves crew.

+0 Smart Ship (TL4)
+1 on command and electronics rolls and passive values, adds 1 Option slot for Electronics. +2 Damcon. Halves crew. May not be combined with Automation.

+0 Shipboard Intelligence (TL4)
+1 on command and electronics rolls/passive values, adds 1 Option slot for Electronics. +2 stealth vs mental detection. Halves crew.

+2 Universal Backup (TL5)
Absorbs first critical hit.

+0 Escape pods
+50% crew survival

+1 Catastrophic Survival Matrix
+75% crew survival, +2 DamCon.

+1 Sensors
+1 Sensor Power

+2 Extended-range targeting
+25% range to weapons and sensors

+1 ECM generators
+1 ECM Power

+2 Scattering ECM
+3 global ECM power

+2 Concealment Field
Smokescreen effect

+3 Flagship
+ Command

+1 Bit Controller
+1 space for Weapons or Shields, counted as AIR type with no armor.

+3 Catapults
For launching planes at extremely high velocity

+X Stealth
+3 Stealth (1 space for PT and small warship, 2 for cruiser, 3 for capital ships)

+4 Overdrive
Doubles speed and +1 to all rolls for the turn. Also makes the ship glow red. One turn of usage per battle.

+2 External Dockpoint
For carrying dropships, mobile armors, etc

+1 Cargo Hold (Option)
TL1: 50 CP
TL2: 250 CP
TL3: 1000 CP
TL4: 2000 CP
TL5: 3000 CP

Specialized Cargo
Doubles CP for Passengers, Supplies, Ether (By milieu)

+1 TL3 Hangars (Option)
5 DP for TL3 planes

+1 TL4 Hangars (Option)
4 DP for TL4 planes

+1 TL5 Hangars (Option)
3 DP for TL5 planes

Specialized Hangars
Doubles DP for Mecha, Aviation, Strategic Air or Strategic Missiles

Limited Arc Weapons

Halves cost and space requirements of any given weapon but adds +1 movement points required to bring the ship to bear for each facing of the ship with a Limited Arc weapon mount.

Cargo

+1 Cargo Hold
TL1: 200 CP
TL2: 1000 CP
TL3-5: 10,000 CP

Specialized Cargo
Doubles CP for Passengers, Supplies, Ether (By milieu)

+1 TL3 Hangars
10 DP for TL3 planes

+1 TL4 Hangars
8 DP for TL4 planes

+1 TL5 Hangars
6 DP for TL5 planes

Specialized Hangars
Doubles DP for Mecha, Aviation, Strategic Air or Strategic Missiles

Test Units

LOE Test Ships
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