Anti-air weapons

Not a 35 displacement ton weapon. Its a 35,000 kilogram weapon, so weights 35 tones. According to the vehicle creation books, a 35,000 kilogram weapon takes up 11 cubic meters. A displacement ton is 13.5 cubic meters.

So the Orbital Defense Gun is a 1 displacement ton weapon. Add in turret controls, and some ammo storage, this could easily be a barbette weapon, though weaker then the standard railgun barbette.
 
Jeraa said:
Not a 35 displacement ton weapon. Its a 35,000 kilogram weapon, so weights 35 tones. According to the vehicle creation books, a 35,000 kilogram weapon takes up 11 cubic meters. A displacement ton is 13.5 cubic meters.

So the Orbital Defense Gun is a 1 displacement ton weapon. Add in turret controls, and some ammo storage, this could easily be a barbette weapon, though weaker then the standard railgun barbette.

Okay, a star ship turret sized weapon. Not a jeep mounted AA by any means & designed for anti ship duty.
 
Another reason why the arbitrary and completely crazy (IMO) "50x scale modifier" for starships vs. vehicles drives me nuts. In GURPS, there is no distinction, and one finds gravtank mounted fusion guns that do more damage than starship grade fusion guns (the turret mounted ones, which I had to add to MGT anyway).

Colin suggested in one of these threads that 5:1 was more reasonable, but I think I like my 20:1 or 10:1, with some kind of special rule to prevent unarmed starships from being shot down by dudes with M-16s (or the 3rd Imperium equivalent).
 
I've since ditched the structured combat systems entirely - but when I was experimenting with the MgT systems based only on the Core book personal weapons, I set a 'damage divider' of 30 plus 6 points per armour point of a ship.

This meant a grenade or TL 9 rocket launcher or laser rifle wouldn't likely puncture a hull without some hit DMs. Interior walls I used a 'damage divider' of 15 - so there was potential to 'blast through' or puncture a wall.

Either circumstance 'serious firepower' weps like the PGMP/FGMP with a decent chance of puncturing a hull and even destroying systems.
 
Interesting system.

I have to ask, despite the OT risk. If you've ditched the structured combat systems, what do you use? (Secondary question: is that for face-to-face or PbP or both?)
 
apoc527 said:
In GURPS, there is no distinction, and one finds gravtank mounted fusion guns that do more damage than starship grade fusion guns ...
I also prefer that approach. A weapon of the same type and power does
the same damage, no matter where it is mounted, whether starship, vehi-
cle or ground installation. Starships usually, but not always, have better
armour than vehicles, but usually, although not always, weaker armour
than ground installations.
 
apoc527 said:
Colin suggested in one of these threads that 5:1 was more reasonable, but I think I like my 20:1 or 10:1, with some kind of special rule to prevent unarmed starships from being shot down by dudes with M-16s (or the 3rd Imperium equivalent).

That's why I came up with the min kinetic energy a ship hull (with out additional armour) has to be able to shrug off. That gives me a base line. I can look very quickly at non-energy weapons and see it it meets that threshold. Energy weapons I look at size and power source and compare with ship based weapons.
 
Either circumstance 'serious firepower' weps like the PGMP/FGMP with a decent chance of puncturing a hull and even destroying systems.

A general shot at an armoured starship's flanks, probably not, and I'm fine with that - the biggest problem with the x50 system is that you can't do a 'called shot' - a starship is not an continuous unbroken shell of armour - there must be some external features a PGMP could blow off fairly easily (e.g. antennae, turret optics, barrels, possibly hatchways, aerofins, etc).
 
locarno24 said:
the biggest problem with the x50 system is that you can't do a 'called shot' - a starship is not an continuous unbroken shell of armour - there must be some external features a PGMP could blow off fairly easily (e.g. antennae, turret optics, barrels, possibly hatchways, aerofins, etc).

Not really. Given the TL and the fact that today, aircraft skin can be the antenna and those other things can easily be covered by hull material (indeed made of it), it is an unbroken shell of armour.

A PGMP or FGMP is not a threat unless you stand next to the ship and slowly work on cutting the hull.
 
apoc527 said:
...I have to ask, despite the OT risk. If you've ditched the structured combat systems, what do you use? (Secondary question: is that for face-to-face or PbP or both?)
Nothing formalized, or I'd share it... all adhoc right now as I've only played out three 'combat' scenarios (all F2F). I basically use the book stats for baseline damage and range (though I give these out so can modify as needed), but there are no discrete turns or other artificial limits (like major/minor actions) - these are roleplayed and Referee (and Player) determined. Ex: 'Initiative' is roleplayed (though mutual surprise would be an exception) while dexterity and experience factor in to who hits first/successfully avoids hits using rolls when necessary. I also support called shots as a general rule and modify damage accordingly (making more use of the 'effect' of the hit check) and use 2d6 and a 1d6 roll for every skill/task check (used for time with non-combat checks). Notably, I don't roll damage dice - no 16d6 for me, thank you - but I am using the damage dice as a baseline multiplier based on effect.

It has worked really well - with the players, by and large, self regulating their own actions and seemingly more willing to accept injury for the drama. They don't have to memorize or try to maximize game rules or ask twenty questions when the rules don't cover what they want to do (nor argue their interpretation of the rules) - just play out what they want and listen to the Referee. Of course, this is a small group of players who are not married to the rules (or even have the books) and first time roleplayers.

The question is not completely OT - when it comes to using personal weapons against ships I plan on looking at the type of 'munition', number of rounds and timing. A PGMP or FGMP can damage any starship system/hull even if armoured IMTU (however exotic TL could overrule this), but it can depend on range/charge/number of 'shots'. I plan on using task style rolls for this - as the players are trying to achieve an objective. Armor and the power (related to damage dice count) will factor into this as DMs with weapon types determining difficulty. For my purposes I want to know if you succeeded, really succeeded, or whether a bullet ricocheted and hit your buddy ;)
 
Given the TL and the fact that today, aircraft skin can be the antenna and those other things can easily be covered by hull material (indeed made of it), it is an unbroken shell of armour.

Depends on the application. Through-hull comms is used, but even then it's often an antennae embedded in the hull material (and fairly close to the skin). For something directional, significantly less so.

You can cover a radar array with aircraft skin (it invariably is), but that's because the nose-cone is pretty thin and doesn't block the radar transmissions.

Armoured traveller hulls can resist nuclear and near-nuclear detonations; it seems a bit unrealistic for them to resist EM/Radio/Thermal/laser pulses on that scale and yet also be transparent enough to be used for a passive IR or LIDAR sensor blister that doesn't impact the sensitivity of the device under it, especially when we're often talking about exactly the same class of radiation.
 
locarno24 said:
it seems a bit unrealistic for them to resist EM/Radio/Thermal/laser pulses on that scale and yet also be transparent enough to be used for a passive IR or LIDAR sensor blister that doesn't impact the sensitivity of the device under it, especially when we're often talking about exactly the same class of radiation.


Those IR and other sensors then aren't under a "transparent" blister but small pop up turret type devices. Otherwise, reentry heat would be VERY problematic. Actually, now that I think about it, GURPS came up with that to explain what we are talking about.
 
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