Warships

From the beginning of time, humankind has engaged in warfare. Conflict, violence, and conquest are a part of the human condition, which is a fact of life that seems unlikely to change with the simple advance in technological progress. While science fiction often features benevolent aliens and incredible social advances, it is ultimately a genre of speculation about the human condition. And that means that war is a central theme of a great amount of science fiction. Some of the most famous works of the genre feature interplanetary, interstellar, or even intergalactic conflicts of staggering scale. Even the stories that present humanity as a united, advanced species often pit terrifying and implacable aliens against the forces of civilization; science fiction stories without the specter of warfare are the exception, not the rule.

The Warship As A

Weapon . . .

Of all the weapons that may be employed in these futuristic conflicts, the warship is the most complex and powerful. Like any weapon, it may be used in the defense of the innocent, the oppression of the weak, or the destruction of a mortal enemy. Unlike a pistol or a rifle, though, the warship has the capacity to affect issues on a planetary scale. Characters serving aboard a warship are affecting the plot at an epic level, and deciding the fates of entire worlds.

. . . And An Instrument

Of Diplomacy

The most effective weapon is the weapon that is never needed. In the delicate balance of power between rival societies, a warship is a statement of intent and resolve. It is a deterrentthreat in being. As the visible symbol of a nation’s strength and certainty, the warship is often a center of diplomacy and intrigue. Showing the flag over the skies of distant worlds can bolster weak allies, intimidate enemies, and sway undecided parties in favor of the nation that has demonstrated its ability to project force to the planet in question. Just being in the right place at the right time can sway the course of events in favor of the nation willing to show its teeth. When showing the flag is not enough, gunboat diplomacy is still one of the most direct tools of statesmanship available to a society’s leaders. If the presence of a warship is the most powerful factor in a contentious situation, the judicious application of a little force may produce results that diplomacy alone couldn’t match. Quick strikes to neutralize the capabilities of rivals, replace difficult local leaders, or simply seize a better position may not call for the military destruction of those who oppose the cause the warship supports.

Finally, the ancient art of espionage is one more aspect of diplomacy. A warship is an excellent platform for all kinds of secret operations, covert strikes, sabotage, intelligence-gathering efforts, and clandestine meetings. In fact, most warships spend as much time in diplomatic missions as they do in fleet exercises or similar preparations for war.

Surveys, Exploration, and Research For centuries, the navies of Earth’s maritime powers backed extensive efforts to explore and chart the world around them. While some of this effort produced clear national benefits—the discovery of new lands to colonize, for instance—these same efforts were also instrumental in shaping our understanding of the world we inhabit. Military vessels carried scientific expeditions to the far corners of the world and contributed greatly to the advance of knowledge. Major warships detached to exploration or scientific missions are a staple of science fiction. Knowledge is power, after all, and the more the characters discover about the universe, the better they can represent their society’s interests. Even if a ship is assigned to strictly military tasks, space is full of anomalies, mysteries, and uncharted systems for the characters to explore and study.

Spacepower

As soon as humanity mastered the technology of crossing seas and oceans, seapower began to shape the course of history. It only stands to reason that, as humankind expands into the galaxy, the control of space as the common ground between myriad island-worlds will be just as important as seapower was to the historical interaction of Earth’s rival nations. The ultimate point of spacepower is to use space travel to support your own goals and ends, while denying your enemy the ability to do the same. The logical extension of this philosophy is simple. Most naval enterprises consist of one of four basic missions: Protection of the homeland, defense of the spaceways, projection of power against enemy states, and the disruption of another nation’s use of commerce, communications, and transport. A warship under the command of a group of player characters in a roleplaying game is not a license to threaten or destroy any who offend the characters. It’s an instrument of national policy, and characters in command of major warships aren’t looking out just for themselves—they’re looking out for the interests of their nations. In time of war, they may be required to serve as part

of a fleet raiding enemy territory, defending a vital sector, or quietly avoiding enemy contact in preparation for a major clash. They might be tasked with extended missions of commerce raiding, tedious blockades of enemy systems, or convoy duties. In other words, the great majority of naval missions are designed to impede the enemy’s command of the spaceways or to use spacepower to advance the nation’s war aims. Seeking out and destroying the enemy fleet wherever it hides is a strategy reserved for a fleet confident in its superior strength or desperate enough to take a big gamble.

How Do I U Se This Book?

Warships consists of five basic parts. Chapter 1 through Chapter 3 outline the mechanics of combat between capital ships and their escorts, first as a system suitable for miniatures and then as an expansion of the ALTERNITY game space combat rules. Chapter 4 covers some of the issues of real science in a space battle. If you want your space battles to be more “realistic,” you’ll find information here for adding more science to your science fiction. Chapter 5 contains a detailed ship construction system for creating warships, heavy transports, and space stations for your own ALTERNITY campaign. Finally, Chapter 6 introduces the concepts of space stations and other bases to the game..

Getting Started Before you start a combat, you’ll want to track down a large mat or poster printed with hexagons, preferably at least 3/4” or 1” in size. Smaller hex maps are printed in the Appendix for you to photocopy. Spaceship miniatures are fairly easy to find in any good hobby store; if you can’t find real metal miniatures, buy a five-pack of MicroMachines or Star Wars or Star Trek plastic miniatures. Of course, cardboard counters work, too. As you explore the rest of the book, try building your own spaceships using the rules in Chapter Five. You don’t need to run an ALTERNITY game to play Warships as a set of tactical and strategic rules for interstellar warfare.

As an ALTERNITY Rules Expansion If you’re reading this book, it’s pretty likely that you’re both an ALTERNITY player and a fan of epic space combat. Warships should be very useful to you, since it expands your game on several fronts. Not only do we present rules for all kinds of starships in this book, but there’s also a tremendous amount of information that will help you to put your players on the bridge of their very own capital ship. Use the rules in Chapter 5 to create the setting for your

gaming group’s next adventure. Imagine what your players will do when they have the whole galaxy ahead of their characters, and the perfect plot device—a starship—to explore its most distant corners.

What’s New Here?

A quick primer to some of the concepts contained in these rules: Acceleration: Acceleration is the amount of velocity a ship can add to its current speed in a single phase. For example, a ship with an acceleration of 1 (one megameter per turn per turn) can increase its speed from 2 to 3 megameters per turn in a single turn. That’s about 4,000 Gs, in case you were wondering. Accommodations: Accomodations are any facility installed to provide living space for crewmen, officers, troops, passengers, and passengers traveling in cold sleep. Armor Check: An armor check is a roll of the ship’s armor rating to negate some or all of the primary damage of an attack. Secondary damage always leaks through a ship’s armor. Artificial Gravity: Artificial gravity is any means of simulating Earth-normal gravity on a spaceship. Constant acceleration or centrifugal force can simulate gravity, but this term normally refers to advanced technology that actually generates a controlled gravity field for a ship. Attack Roll: An attack roll is a crew check for the purposes of attempting to use a weapon against an enemy ship. Battery: A battery is a grouping of weapons of the same type. For example, a battleship with four strong force guns might group all four into a single battery. Batteries are often referred to as primary, secondary, and tertiary, depending on how many the ship carries. Class: Class is a general measure of the ship’s size and capability, ranging from small craft to super-heavy. Compartment: A compartment is one room or a small number of rooms dedicated to the same purpose and located in the same part of the hull. In Warships, systems need not be assigned to specific compartments—the hit location check indicates what systems are endangered by any enemy shot. Control Die: All Attack Rolls and crew, sensor, and damage checks are based on the ALTERNITY game system Core Mechanic. The control die is always a d20, rolled as a part of one of these checks. Core Mechanic: Almost all die rolls in the ALTERNITY game system are based on the core mechanic: Roll a d20 control die and add or subtract a second situation die. A roll is successful if the total of the control die and situation die is less than or equal to the appropriate skill score or target number. The core mechanic is explained in Chapter 1: Basic Combat. Course: Course is the current heading of the ship. A ship must maneuver to change its course. Crew Check: A crew check is a roll against the quality rating of the crew. Sensor checks, attack rolls, and damage checks are all just varieties of the crew check. Critical Damage: Ships have four damage tracks: stun, wound, mortal, and critical damage. Compartment damage represents damage that can destroy one or more of the ship’s compartments with a single hit. Damage: Weapons inflict some amount of stun, wound, mortal, or critical damage points with a successful attack roll.

Exceeding the target’s wound damage track cripples the vessel; exceeding the mortal damage track destroys the vessel; and exceeding the critical damage track causes the target to explode or disintegrate. Damage Check: A damage check is a crew check made to determine whether or not a system exposed to damage continues to function or not. Demand: Demand is the amount of fuel, stores, or power consumed per day by a system. For example, a crew of ten men demands ten days of stores per day. Downgrade: When a weapon strikes a target whose toughness exceeds the weapon’s firepower, the weapon’s damage roll downgrades one or more damage categories— mortal to wound, wound to stun, stun to no effect. Drive: The drive is the ship’s faster-than-light engine or mechanism. Efficiency: Efficiency is a measure of how many days of power a single hull point of fuel contains. For example, a fuel with an efficiency of 20 holds 20 power-days per hull point; a single hull point could power a demand of 1 per day for 20 days, or a demand of 10 for 2 days. Embarked Craft: Embarked craft are fighters, launches, strike craft, and so on carried in a ship’s hangar or docking clamps. Engine: The engine is a ship’s slower-than-light engine or propulsion. Fire Mode: Fire mode is the type of attack a particular weapon can make: normal fire (F), battery fire (G), burst fire (B), or autofire (A). Firepower: Firepower is the general power of an attack, which is compared to the target’s toughness to determine if the damage is upgraded or downgraded. Firepower ratings range from Small (the same as an Amazing rating in the ALTERNITY game) to Super-Heavy, and generally correspond with the class of the ship. Fuel: Some power plants and engine systems require large amounts of fuel—usually, hydrogen. Hull: Hull refers to the ship’s specific type—destroyer, battleship, carrier, and so on. Hull Points: Hull points is a measure of the hull’s size. Systems installed in the ship take up hull points. Launched Ordnance: Launched ordnance are missiles, mines, bombs, and similar weapons that deliver a warhead to the target. Life Support: Life support is a system that provides heat, oxygen, and a safe environment to the ship’s crew in the middle of deep space. Mm (Megameter): A megameter is a unit of measurement equal to 1,000 kilometers. Each hex on the mapsheet is assumed to be 1 megameter wide. Mortal Damage: Mortal damage is serious damage to the ship’s structural integrity and systems function. Mortal damage is more serious than wound damage, but less dangerous than compartment damage. Power: Many of a ship’s most vital systems require large amounts of power. Power is produced by the ship’s power plant, and then distributed to the various systems that are

needed at that moment. Along with hull points and money, power is one of the key limitations in ship design. Power Points: Power points is a measure of how much power a system produces or requires. A ship producing 100 power points could power five systems requiring 20 points each, 10 requiring 10 points, and so on. Primary Damage: All weapons are rated for how much damage they produce on an Ordinary, Good, or Amazing hit. The die range and type (stun, wound, mortal, or critical) of damage listed for the weapon is considered to be the primary damage of the attack. In addition, a weapon hit inflicts secondary damage equal to half the primary damage in all categories (stun, wound, or mortal) below the primary damage. For example, a CHE missile inflicts 1d6+1 points of wound damage on a Good hit; if the damage roll came up 5, the primary damage of the attack would be 5 wound points. The secondary damage is 2 stun points. Primary damage can be partially or completely blocked by the target’s armor check. Secondary damage is never affected by armor. Primary damage may upgrade or downgrade depending on the weapon’s firepower and the target’s toughness. Progress Level: Progress Level is a measure of the technology a particular society or civilization has achieved. Progress Level ranges from 0 (the Stone Age) through 6, 7, 8, and 9—the Fusion, Gravity, Energy and Matter Ages. Secondary Damage: A successful weapon strike causes secondary damage equal to half the primary damage in all damage categories below the damage inflicted by the initial strike. In other words, if a weapon inflicts 6 points of mortal damage as its primary damage, it also inflicts 3 wound points and 3 stun points as secondary damage. Always round down. Armor has no effect on secondary damage. Sensor Check: Sensor checks are a special kind of crew check made for the purpose of using the ship’s sensors to detect a target. Situation Die: The situation die is the second half of the Alternity game’s core mechanic. It may be a d4, d6, d8, d12, or d20 that is either added to or subtracted from the d20 Control Die as part of a skill roll, Crew Check, or similar task. The situation die reflects conditions that make success more or less likely. A minus die (-d4, -d6) is an advantage, since it reduces the result of the control die and makes it more likely that the roll succeeds against the target number.

Step: A step indicates an increase or decrease in the difficulty of an attack roll or crew check. A bonus step (or minus step) lowers the situation die by one type—d8 to d6, d6 to d4, d4 to d0, d0 to –d4, and so on. A penalty step (or plus step) increases the die by one type—d6 to d8, d8 to d12, and so on. Stores: Stores are food, water, and other expendable materials required by a crew in space. A ship’s crew consumes one day of stores per crewman per day, so a crew of 400 requires 400 days of stores per day in space. Stun Damage: Stun damage is minor damage that is unlikely to cause a major system failure, hull breach, or structural damage. System Damage: When a ship suffers damage from a successful attack roll, one or more of the ship’s systems may be affected. The hit location check is a roll on TABLE 2-4 to see what system a particular hit affects. Target Modifier: The target modifier bonus or penalty to any attack roll made against a particular ship, based on its size. Large ships are bigger targets and easier to hit than small ships. Tech Track: Not every device or technology may be available to all civilizations at the same Progress Level. The tech track codes certain types of ship systems to particular branches of technology, which may or may not be available to a particular civilization. Toughness: Toughness is a measure of the ship’s resistance to weapons fire. While armor negates some or all of the damage of an attack, a ship’s toughness may cause the category of damage inflicted (stun, wound, mortal, or compartment) to downgrade before armor is even rolled for. Type (Damage): The nature of an attack—low impact, high impact, or energy. Various types of armor protect against different types of attacks at different levels. Upgrade: When a weapon strikes a target whose toughness is less than the weapon’s firepower, the weapon’s damage roll upgrades one or more damage categories—stun to wound, wound to mortal, or mortal to compartment. Warhead: The warhead is the business end of a missile, bomb, or mine. The warhead determines how much damage the weapon inflicts. Wound Damage: Wound damage is significant damage that may knock out minor systems, create holes in unimportant compartments, or wreck unprotected equipment on the exterior of the ship. More serious than stun damage, but not as bad as mortal or compartment damage.