Starship gear cost

[DhAkael]

So my PC's will be getting their very own stripped down runner ship. I've got the cost listed for plenty of weapon systems in Dimension Book 2. But does anyone know where I can find the cost of FTL drives or stealth systems and the like? Can't find them anywhere, done checked D. Books 2, 3, 6 and 13.

Well the FTL drives are listed in 3-Galaxies I believe (Pg. 132) but they are base-cost; no price-by-tonnage. As for other systems? NONE of the authors of the Phaseworld books (even Carella) saw fit to, y'know, write up an actual "build your own" space ship section. Only the Aliens Unlimited: Galaxy Guide has anything even close... And it's NOT a Phaseworld book if you talk to the rules-lawyer whiners on these here forums which I never do; their opinions don't count, as they are a bunch of stodgey kill-joys.

Sadly it is up to YOU, as the GM to figure out whether or not you will use the material that is available or kick the writers who negelected to provide you with 'canon' tools to do your job in the three-peice.
Your call.
Me? I use everything at my disposal (D20 future, Alternity, AU:GG, etc), a calculator, 3 advil and a ream of scrap paper to do peicemeal starships.
It may be clunky but it works.

[Braden Campbell]

NONE of the authors of the Phaseworld books (even Carella) saw fit to, y'know, write up an actual "build your own" space ship section.

That's not entirely accurate.

Some of us created large spreadsheets and gave up entire weekends trying to find the underlying mechanics of how Mr Carella came up with Phase World ship stats, only to discover in the end that there is no rhyme or reason to them. Yes, there is no by-the-numbers Build A Ship ruleset, but it's not for a lack of trying.

I saw fit to; I simply couldn't.

[DhAkael]

NONE of the authors of the Phaseworld books (even Carella) saw fit to, y'know, write up an actual "build your own" space ship section.

That's not entirely accurate.

Some of us created large spreadsheets and gave up entire weekends trying to find the underlying mechanics of how Mr Carella came up with Phase World ship stats, only to discover in the end that there is no rhyme or reason to them. Yes, there is no by-the-numbers Build A Ship ruleset, but it's not for a lack of trying.

I saw fit to; I simply couldn't.

Appologies... but you have to admit, not having anything specificaly Rifts/Phaseworld available for number-crunchers makes the people who only do canon want to gnaw their legs off in frustration.
Personally I couldn't care less if the system I use is from a completely different game setting (re; Aliens Unlimited: Galaxy Guide) or game company and I just have to fudge things around a bit to make them fit in Phaseworld.
After all; it is the job of the GM to make things fit.

You try and tell people that there are alternatives and they just winge & whine that there is nothing "OFFICIAL".

[taalismn]

I just figure...no guidelines? Open season on the spare parts bins.

[BookWyrm]

"Hey Krell, I got a guy here lookin' for a Z-23 hyperspace modulator. Do we have any?"
"I think so, look in the blue bin by the Kittani serpent-segents."
*sounds of metal being rustled around*
"I don't see them!"
"Did you look in the BLUE bin, where I said?"
"Yeah!"
"Try the Green one, over by my workbench."
"......there are THREE green bins by your workbench!"
"The one NOT marked 'Hands Off, Philmore!' ?"
"....Oh, I see it!" *more rustling* "Got it!"

[taalismn]

If you really want to add hazard to your bargain basement starship parts, feel free to raid this old thread for ideas:
http://palladium-megaverse.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=75673&hilit=starship+flaws

Dunno if we covered them, but 'reconditioned' and 'recycled' engines might have flaws such as Inconstant Rate of Travel(one hour it goes 5 light years an hour, the next 2 lyh, then back up to 4.5 lyhs), Slow Recharge(can only go for about 25 light years before needing 3d6 hours to recharge), Inaccurate(arrives 4d6 million miles off course), or Susceptible to Gravity(drops out every time any large object in normal space exerts more than .05 G in its vicinity, or else it burns out if left on a planet's gravity field).

[drewkitty ~..~]

What I don't like is that the "Rifts" ship making tables are "Story Based" w/o any costs attached in the text, rather then by credit/tonnage costs as the AU:GG ship construction tables.

[Warshield73]

NONE of the authors of the Phaseworld books (even Carella) saw fit to, y'know, write up an actual "build your own" space ship section.

That's not entirely accurate.

Some of us created large spreadsheets and gave up entire weekends trying to find the underlying mechanics of how Mr Carella came up with Phase World ship stats, only to discover in the end that there is no rhyme or reason to them. Yes, there is no by-the-numbers Build A Ship ruleset, but it's not for a lack of trying.

I saw fit to; I simply couldn't.

I have been running Phase World since '95 and in that time I spent a lot of time trying to create a chart for building ships. The best I could do was try and create additional ships that fit into the existing structure but the addition Fleets of the Three Galaxies even blew that to hell. What Phase World really needs is someone to completely redo the spacecraft, FTL travel, and space combat. Carella created a great setting, one I never get tired of playing and running in, but I have done so many house rule changes to the spacecraft over the last 20 years that it is unrecognizable.

I really hope someone creates a megaversal space travel and combat system before Mechanoids space comes out.

[KLM]

Shameless self-advertising, as usual:
http://web.t-online.hu/saga/SDRtech.pdf

[KLM]

What Phase World really needs is someone to completely redo the spacecraft, FTL travel, and space combat.

Actually, I would start from the very basics - if an assault rifle does 4-5d6 sdc, then a .50 BMG or similar round does WAAAAY more than the meager 7d6 listed.

Same for MDC. An EBA having aroung 80 MDC for 8 kgs, than a power armor with like 80 kgs of armor bolted on it would not have something in the range of 250 MDC, and especially an 18 ton Enforcer robot vehicle would not have a laughable 350 MDC.

Same for weapon damage - it is really gamebreaking if a few strapped-together MD rifles "outdamage" a heavy vehicle mounted weapon - and even having the same range...

[guardiandashi]

What Phase World really needs is someone to completely redo the spacecraft, FTL travel, and space combat.

Actually, I would start from the very basics - if an assault rifle does 4-5d6 sdc, then a .50 BMG or similar round does WAAAAY more than the meager 7d6 listed.

Same for MDC. An EBA having aroung 80 MDC for 8 kgs, than a power armor with like 80 kgs of armor bolted on it would not have something in the range of 250 MDC, and especially an 18 ton Enforcer robot vehicle would not have a laughable 350 MDC.

Same for weapon damage - it is really gamebreaking if a few strapped-together MD rifles "outdamage" a heavy vehicle mounted weapon - and even having the same range...

yes and no on the MDC armor aspect, I have been thinking about this for a while (years) and my other favorite game (Battle) runs into a similar issue, I think damage capacity should have a number of factors, 1 how tough the mounted gear is IE internal framing, gear itself (the squishy person) reinforced pilot compartment, engines transmission etc then you have the armor, I would have armor having 2 main factors, 1 toughness per area and toughness per thickness the 2 combine to get an effective toughness for armor.

re the body armor if its for instance 1 inch thick plating and provides 80mdc over x area
and the power armor has 3 inch thick plating over (roughly) the same area then it should have ~3x the mdc

on the other hand the enforcer or a vf series veritech (or other giant robot) could have 10x the armor amount but if its only 1/2 as thick as the body armor (in durability/thickness) then I could see it not having as much "armor" as you would expect with 1x the armor mass (because its effectively tissue paper)

[KLM]

OK, I wrote a few sentences about "realistic" combat/damage systems, but
at the moment I would be happy to have twice the MDC for a twice as heavy target of the same type

re the body armor if its for instance 1 inch thick plating and provides 80mdc over x area
and the power armor has 3 inch thick plating over (roughly) the same area then it should have ~3x the mdc

on the other hand the enforcer or a vf series veritech (or other giant robot) could have 10x the armor amount but if its only 1/2 as thick as the body armor (in durability/thickness) then I could see it not having as much "armor" as you would expect with 1x the armor mass (because its effectively tissue paper)

First, I am not sure, that - even for homogenous armor - an armor three time as thick has "just" three times as many "HP" (in our case MDC).

Also, if a 100 kg, 2m tall human (gear included) wear 10 kgs of armor, than a 4 meter tall humanoid weights 800 kg, and his armor weight 80 kg.

Frankly, in the first case, we have a "skin area to be protected" of like two sq. meters - 5 kg armor/sq. meter.

In the second case we have a twice as high body, with four times the body surface - 10 kg of armor per sq. meters.

. . . .

Then we have to deal penetrating damage (if there is any), armor wear for shots deflected and all in a compact "game engine" - ie. no more rolls to be neccessary than
they are now.

[KLM]

But till that few decades I use the current values, and the above ship design ruleset were made
for them.

[MaxxSterling]

The trick isn't making existing ships fit into a set of rules that never did exist. Just make a new ship building system, print it in a book and then say all the pre-existing ships are either one-off builds, specialty ships or deem them void, and re-stat all of them using the new system and print them in the back of the new book!

This isn't rocket science. Make a system and print it, we will buy it. List: Item, Price, Availability, Tonnage, Range, Features, Variants. Galaxy Guide already has a huge base from which to build from, use that. The end.

[eliakon]

The trick isn't making existing ships fit into a set of rules that never did exist. Just make a new ship building system, print it in a book and then say all the pre-existing ships are either one-off builds, specialty ships or deem them void, and re-stat all of them using the new system and print them in the back of the new book!

This isn't rocket science. Make a system and print it, we will buy it. List: Item, Price, Availability, Tonnage, Range, Features, Variants. Galaxy Guide already has a huge base from which to build from, use that. The end.

Make a rule set, that produces ships almost but not quite as good. Then say that the mass production units are not custom builds but detailed designs. they cost more to develop and thus are better than run of the mill stuff......

[Nightmask]

The trick isn't making existing ships fit into a set of rules that never did exist. Just make a new ship building system, print it in a book and then say all the pre-existing ships are either one-off builds, specialty ships or deem them void, and re-stat all of them using the new system and print them in the back of the new book!

This isn't rocket science. Make a system and print it, we will buy it. List: Item, Price, Availability, Tonnage, Range, Features, Variants. Galaxy Guide already has a huge base from which to build from, use that. The end.

Make a rule set, that produces ships almost but not quite as good. Then say that the mass production units are not custom builds but detailed designs. they cost more to develop and thus are better than run of the mill stuff......

A flaw in this is that custom work is generally superior not inferior to production run stuff, due to the attention to detail that goes into custom work. This is why prototypes are often seen to be of superior ability to production runs, because they put all the best and cutting edge stuff into it then chopped out things when finalizing the design for mass-production.

[KLM]

A flaw in this is that custom work is generally superior not inferior to production run stuff, due to the attention to detail that goes into custom work. This is why prototypes are often seen to be of superior ability to production runs, because they put all the best and cutting edge stuff into it then chopped out things when finalizing the design for mass-production.

Again as always:
http://web.t-online.hu/saga/SDRtech.pdf

Some quotes:
"- Price (prototype cost): In Three Galactic Credits. Market cost for mass produced ship is about 50% to 60% less than
the prototype cost, while the market cost for ships that produced in limited numbers is about 25% to 35% less than the
prototype's price."

"Ships hull and the various armor options may be constructed from various materials. The listed weight/mass, M.D.C.
and price values found in the Hull and the Armor section is for average, industry standard materials. Stronger and
lighter materials are available..."

"STL drives (except the fuel tanks), FTL drives, communications, sensors, electronic warfare equipment, support
systems, guns, shields, reactors and batteries are available in the market in newer and older configuration too. The
newer variant of a ship system is smaller and lighter ..."

[taalismn]

What I've found in Palladium definitely referring to FTL drives:

FTL Drive Systems:

(UWW Jump Drive)
30 million credits (20 light years/instant)

Mechanoid Trilogy:(error percentage not shown)

-Leebarmin Hyper-Drive
970,000 credits( .35 light years/day)
-Loxan Warp System
20 million credits( .47 light years/day)
-Po-Tang Warp Drive
60 million credits( 1.6 light years/day)
-Gendo Jump System
12 million credits( 1.25 light years/day)


House Rule(adapted from Rifter # 34 Galactic Tracer Starship Creation Rules by Eric Fackler)
I use the build point cost x 1 million credits for the drive cost, though prices may vary according to where you're buying and from whom.
-CG-A
10 million credits ( 1 light year/hour, light year/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-B
20 million credits ( 2 light years/hour, 2.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-C
30 million credits ( 3 light years/hour, 3.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-D
40 million credits ( 4 light years/hour, 4.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-E
50 million credits ( 5 light years/hour, 5.2 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-F
60 million credits ( 6.5 light years/hour, 6.7 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-G
70 million credits ( 7 light years/hour, 8 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)


I ignore the propulsion systems in Aliens Unlimited, because they properly should be relativistic for most of them, rather than FTL.

I also believe Rifts Manhunter has iron-powered FTL drives with attendant prices listed, but couldn't find/dig up my copy in timely fashion.

[drewkitty ~..~]

What I've found in Palladium definitely referring to FTL drives:

FTL Drive Systems:

(UWW Jump Drive)
30 million credits (20 light years/instant)

...snip

Is this the UWW Rift jump drive?.

I also believe Rifts Manhunter has iron-powered FTL drives with attendant prices listed, but couldn't find/dig up my copy in timely fashion.

FTL-1 Drive: uses 10 kg of consumed iron control element per LY.
25 LY/day, 100 LY max per single jump length.
The base cost is variable, due to different ship sizes.: 150 kcr/200 kcr/250 kcr

FTL-2: refined from the FTL-1 drive, using 9.6 kg of consumed iron control element per LY.
32 LY/day, 125 LY max single jump length.
The base cost is variable, due to different ship sizes.: 30kcr/40kcr/50 kcr

Note: Yes, the above listing for the MH FTL drives' costs are exactly what the book says they are. However, the MH book is riddled with typos so the costs should be inverted between the two types so the FTL-2 has the higher of the costs IMO.
Note2: the three ship sizes are scout (small), Cruiser (med.), and Explorer (Large).
Note3: both these FTL drives are powered by ether a fusion or anti-matter power generator. The Iron is used to control the Warp Field the drives produce, but is consumed in the process.

[taalismn]

What I've found in Palladium definitely referring to FTL drives:

FTL Drive Systems:

(UWW Jump Drive)
30 million credits (20 light years/instant)

...snip

Is this the UWW Rift jump drive?..

Yep...sorry, I forgot to add in that part of the title.

[Warshield73]

The trick isn't making existing ships fit into a set of rules that never did exist. Just make a new ship building system, print it in a book and then say all the pre-existing ships are either one-off builds, specialty ships or deem them void, and re-stat all of them using the new system and print them in the back of the new book!

This isn't rocket science. Make a system and print it, we will buy it. List: Item, Price, Availability, Tonnage, Range, Features, Variants. Galaxy Guide already has a huge base from which to build from, use that. The end.

The best idea here is just to re-stat the old ships with the new system. The descriptions are fine but the stats are all out of whack.

Has anyone else encountered problems with numbers of crew? I have revised downward the number of crew for most ships, especially the small ones like the Scimitar and the Berserker.

What I've found in Palladium definitely referring to FTL drives:

FTL Drive Systems:

(UWW Jump Drive)
30 million credits (20 light years/instant)

Mechanoid Trilogy:(error percentage not shown)

-Leebarmin Hyper-Drive
970,000 credits( .35 light years/day)
-Loxan Warp System
20 million credits( .47 light years/day)
-Po-Tang Warp Drive
60 million credits( 1.6 light years/day)
-Gendo Jump System
12 million credits( 1.25 light years/day)


House Rule(adapted from Rifter # 34 Galactic Tracer Starship Creation Rules by Eric Fackler)
I use the build point cost x 1 million credits for the drive cost, though prices may vary according to where you're buying and from whom.
-CG-A
10 million credits ( 1 light year/hour, light year/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-B
20 million credits ( 2 light years/hour, 2.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-C
30 million credits ( 3 light years/hour, 3.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-D
40 million credits ( 4 light years/hour, 4.5 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-E
50 million credits ( 5 light years/hour, 5.2 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-F
60 million credits ( 6.5 light years/hour, 6.7 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)
-CG-G
70 million credits ( 7 light years/hour, 8 light years/hour for Promethean-made drives; x1.5 cost)


I ignore the propulsion systems in Aliens Unlimited, because they properly should be relativistic for most of them, rather than FTL.

I also believe Rifts Manhunter has iron-powered FTL drives with attendant prices listed, but couldn't find/dig up my copy in timely fashion.

Has anyone done a custom system to replace FTL? I have played around with some stats switching everything over to a hyperspace system but I have never used it in actual play. Has anyone done something like this?

[KLM]

Warshield73:

Again, and again and AGAIN :
http://web.t-online.hu/saga/SDRtech.pdf

This is a complete ruleset for designing ships in the 3 Galaxies. FTL systems included.

[Warshield73]

Warshield73:

Again, and again and AGAIN :
http://web.t-online.hu/saga/SDRtech.pdf

This is a complete ruleset for designing ships in the 3 Galaxies. FTL systems included.

Yeah I know, I down loaded this months ago and it is pretty good. Although I said

Has anyone done a custom system to replace FTL? I have played around with some stats switching everything over to a hyperspace system but I have never used it in actual play. Has anyone done something like this?

I am not really talking specifics of ship design but a change to the setting. Your rules just seem to use the basics of Phase World including FTL, weapons ranges, and crew levels which are the things I am messing with.

[guardiandashi]

Warshield73:

Again, and again and AGAIN :
http://web.t-online.hu/saga/SDRtech.pdf

This is a complete ruleset for designing ships in the 3 Galaxies. FTL systems included.

Yeah I know, I down loaded this months ago and it is pretty good. Although I said

Has anyone done a custom system to replace FTL? I have played around with some stats switching everything over to a hyperspace system but I have never used it in actual play. Has anyone done something like this?

I am not really talking specifics of ship design but a change to the setting. Your rules just seem to use the basics of Phase World including FTL, weapons ranges, and crew levels which are the things I am messing with.

not exactly sure what you mean by replacing the ftl system unless you mean combining/swapping ftl models?

examples that come to mind of different ftl models that I am familiar with:

star treks "warp system" where different ships have some ftl multiple of C but still basically travel in normal space (its just compressed sort of)

robotech /battletech/bsg (new) fold or jump drives take time to spin up, but once they go, they travel vast distances effectively instantly.

star wars "hyperspace" they travel through an alternate dimension where stuff has "mass shadows" but they are NOT in normal space

babylon 5 verse where they have "jump gates" to get in and out of "ftl space" although some capital ships have their own "internal jump gates"

classic buck Rodgers, and also stargate series where you use gates that form "wormholes" between the gates (of course in stargate most ships use an alternate ftl model as they can't use the gate system

david webers honorverse where the ships mostly transition in to various "compressed dimensional spaces of "hyperspace" Ie the "alpha bands ~10 dimensions or bands across ranging from say 80% to 70% of the "real" distance beta bands 50%-60% of the "real distance" etc, (and they also use natural wormholes that "typically" link 2 or more star systems through wormholes / wormhole nexii

webers path of the fury-verse where they use an ftl drive based on sliding down the edge of the event horizon of an artificial black hole generated by the ship (or some missiles) and top speed is based on factors of the balance of the relative mass of the artificial singularity and the ship

[Nightmask]

not exactly sure what you mean by replacing the ftl system unless you mean combining/swapping ftl models?

examples that come to mind of different ftl models that I am familiar with:

star treks "warp system" where different ships have some ftl multiple of C but still basically travel in normal space (its just compressed sort of)

robotech /battletech/bsg (new) fold or jump drives take time to spin up, but once they go, they travel vast distances effectively instantly.

star wars "hyperspace" they travel through an alternate dimension where stuff has "mass shadows" but they are NOT in normal space

babylon 5 verse where they have "jump gates" to get in and out of "ftl space" although some capital ships have their own "internal jump gates"

classic buck Rodgers, and also stargate series where you use gates that form "wormholes" between the gates (of course in stargate most ships use an alternate ftl model as they can't use the gate system

david webers honorverse where the ships mostly transition in to various "compressed dimensional spaces of "hyperspace" Ie the "alpha bands ~10 dimensions or bands across ranging from say 80% to 70% of the "real" distance beta bands 50%-60% of the "real distance" etc, (and they also use natural wormholes that "typically" link 2 or more star systems through wormholes / wormhole nexii

webers path of the fury-verse where they use an ftl drive based on sliding down the edge of the event horizon of an artificial black hole generated by the ship (or some missiles) and top speed is based on factors of the balance of the relative mass of the artificial singularity and the ship

There's also the Alderson drive in the CoDominion universe which works by transporting people much like teleportation but only works at special Alderson Points around stars and only work between several points (so you may have to transit a number of jumps between star systems to get where you want to go). It's also physically debilitating to deal with and can drive a small number of people insane or kill them from the physical stress.

[KLM]

I am not really talking specifics of ship design but a change to the setting. Your rules just seem to use the basics of Phase World including FTL, weapons ranges, and crew levels which are the things I am messing with.

I see...

Adding further "faster than light" propulsion methods was not a priority.

Tweaking existing FTL methods, however IS.

Like using CG FTL to "jump" on the top of hostile ships - while keeping the Star Ghost fighter and its Phase Jump device "competitive".

Also, redefining weapon ranges too...

ADios
KLM

[Warshield73]

I am not really talking specifics of ship design but a change to the setting. Your rules just seem to use the basics of Phase World including FTL, weapons ranges, and crew levels which are the things I am messing with.

I see...

Adding further "faster than light" propulsion methods was not a priority.

Tweaking existing FTL methods, however IS.

Like using CG FTL to "jump" on the top of hostile ships - while keeping the Star Ghost fighter and its Phase Jump device "competitive".

Also, redefining weapon ranges too...

ADios
KLM

I think mainly in terms of systems like what was used on Babylon 5 or Honorvers and not as an add on but a hyperspace type system to replace FTL. I was just wondering if anyone had done anything like this in Phase World and maybe had stats for the drives. Again, I like what you have but FTL is a pain to use.

I created some basic stats saying that CG engines can open a portal, rift drives open a rift into it, and phase drive vessels just phase into it. I have been thinking in hyperspace your space speed could translate into light-years per hour, so if your ship does Mach 9 in space your hyperspace speed could be 9 LpH or maybe 4.5 LPH.

Weapons ranges have to be changed, they are ridiculously low. I looked at the information you had and it looks pretty good. I am not sure about missiles being CG as that would make them hideously expensive but I can see your point.

I have created several versions of smart multi-warhead missiles that have no warhead but have special penetration aids to get through point defense decoys and even targeting systems to help the rest of the volley. So fire just one of these in your volley of normal guided missiles and it improves the chance to hit. With the increase in range you gave missiles this would be necessary I would think.

[KLM]

Just for missiles CG propulsion:
The ruleset above was submitted to fit the existing 3galactic ships.

Now, some ships have statted out missile sizes and weights - the Runner ship in DMB2, to begin with.

And those sizes and weights make chemical propulsion impossible. Period.