Example Of Starship Combat
Source Tech Core pg. 176
The following is an example of how tactical starship combat plays out. In this adventure, Aras is the GM. Dustin is playing Chk Chk, a moody shirren mystic; Jenny is playing Navasi, a roguish human envoy; Jessica is playing Iseph, a quiet android operative; and Mike is playing Obozaya, a gruff vesk soldier. The party is investigating a distress signal from a small, supposedly abandoned mining colony on an asteroid. Aras: The distress signal is coming from an asteroid a few hours of travel away from your current location. Are you doing anything as your starship slips through the void toward your destination?
Obozaya (Mike): “Time to Lock and Load.” I'm counting our ammunition in the gunnery.
Chk Chk (Dustin): “Let's see what secrets the void holds.” I'm Scanning for Magic. Do I feel anything through the magic conduit? Scan for Magic allows a character to detect the presence or absence of magic within the starship's sensor range much like the spell detect magic.
Aras: Nothing—for now, at least. Iseph (Jessica): I'm Flying the Ship. As always. I want to Boost Thrusters to get the starship away from all the rocks floating out here.
Navasi (Jenny): Chk Chk has magic covered, so I'll Scan our Surroundings for everything else. There's a hazard on the sensor map, so Aras rolls a secret check for Navasi to notice it. She fails to notice the tachyon burst, but it isn't the only danger.
Aras: The sensors ping, and a surge of divine rage blasts the magic conduit. A massive, purple vessel looms in the sensors. It's an ambush—roll for initiative!
Aras reveals the sensor map, placing an Azlanti Sovereign Dominator four zones behind the player starship. Everyone rolls Perception for their initiative. Jessica gets a total of 22. Jenny rolls 16, Mike rolls 10, and Dustin gets 14. Aras rolls for the Dominator and gets a 21, then records the initiative order from highest to lowest. Thanks to their choice of exploration activities, everyone but Chk Chk can take a special free action when they roll initiative. Since she was Locking and Loading, Obozaya can Lock On to the Dominator to get a bonus on her first attack. Iseph gets to Evade, granting their starship a +1 circumstance bonus to its AC until their first turn. Navasi can Scan Target, attempting a Computers check against the Dominator's Will DC. Jenny rolls a 26. The Sovereign Dominator has a Will DC of 27. The Scan Target fails, so Navasi still learns about the Dominator's model name and its battle stations—a generator, a gunnery, a pilot's console, and scanners—but she can identify only one of the battle stations, allowing the crew to target it with other actions later to potentially cause it to become malfunctioning.
Navasi (Jenny): I'll identify the gunnery. “Obo, try to take out their guns!” Aras: That'll have to wait—Iseph's up first.
Iseph (Jessica): Got it. I'll Change Heading with my first action, then Juke with my second.
Jessica rolls a 28 total on her Piloting check to Juke, which beats the Dominator's Perception DC of 27. With a success, the Dominator is off-guard to the player starship for 1 round.
Iseph (Jessica): “We've got them right where we want them.” I'll use my third action to Evade again.
Aras: You'll need that AC bonus—it's the Azlanti starship's turn. It Boosts Thrusters to get you in range, then hits you with a beam of amethyst energy. Someone roll a Will save!
Mike rolls a 9 and adds the starship's Will modifier of +12, for a total of 21—a failure against the Dominator's Lissala's Eye save DC of 23. With that failure, the player starship is now off-guard to all attacks from Azlanti starships for 1 round.
Aras: Finally, the enemy starship fires on you with a bolt of electricity.
Aras rolls a 34 for the Dominator's Strike, which is a critical hit on the starship's AC of 24 for a whopping 35 electricity damage. The player starship's 20 Shield Points are taken out instantly, and the remaining 15 damage is dealt to its Hull Points. The electrical discharge also triggers the tachyon burst hazard. The starship critically fails this time, causing the generator to become malfunctioning.
Navasi (Jenny): “I'd better fix that if we want to get our shields back online!” I Stride from the scanners to the generator, and I rolled a 17 on my Computers check to repair it.
Navasi needs to helm the generator to repair it, so she must Stride twice to reach its location on the starship map. The DC to repair a malfunctioning battle station is 15, so her 17 succeeds.
Aras: The generator buzzes back to life. You can use it to Generate Shields next turn. Chk Chk, you're up.
Chk Chk (Dustin): “Embrace the pain. I'll hold us together for now.” I use a 1st-rank spell slot to cast cosmic fortification from the magic conduit, then a 3rd-rank slot for cosmic bombardment to return fire.
Chk Chk can cast starship spells using his own spell slots while helming the magic conduit. Cosmic fortification restores a total of 7 Shield Points to the starship, and cosmic bombardment deals a total of 16 force damage to the Sovereign Dominator without requiring any checks.
Aras: The barrage of divine missiles leaves the Azlanti ship's shields battered and barely intact.
Obozaya (Mike): “Time to finish the job!” I'll Target Battle Station—choosing the gunnery Navasi pointed out, obviously—then Area Fire with our farseeker missiles.
Since Navasi's Scan Target identified the Dominator's gunnery, Obozaya can target it. Thanks to Obozaya's primary target ability, she first Strikes the Dominator as a free action, rolling a 25—a hit! The Dominator takes a total of 17 piercing damage, tearing through the rest of its shields and taking 1 Hull Point damage. Since Obozaya used Target Battle Station and the Strike dealt Hull Point damage, the Dominator's gunnery is malfunctioning. The Dominator rolls a 21 on its Reflex save against the Area Fire—a failure—and takes another 10 piercing damage.
Aras: The mighty Azlanti warship looks seriously battered as your missiles explode all around it. Its shields and guns are both down—this ambush probably isn't going the way that crew had hoped! But what's that seven-sided portal materializing at the edge of your sensors? Uh oh, it looks like Azlanti reinforcements have arrived!
This marks the end of the first round of combat. The second round moves back to the top of the initiative order with Iseph's turn, ready to press their advantage before more foes show up. Now, it's your turn…
Obozaya (Mike): “Time to Lock and Load.” I'm counting our ammunition in the gunnery.
Chk Chk (Dustin): “Let's see what secrets the void holds.” I'm Scanning for Magic. Do I feel anything through the magic conduit? Scan for Magic allows a character to detect the presence or absence of magic within the starship's sensor range much like the spell detect magic.
Aras: Nothing—for now, at least. Iseph (Jessica): I'm Flying the Ship. As always. I want to Boost Thrusters to get the starship away from all the rocks floating out here.
Navasi (Jenny): Chk Chk has magic covered, so I'll Scan our Surroundings for everything else. There's a hazard on the sensor map, so Aras rolls a secret check for Navasi to notice it. She fails to notice the tachyon burst, but it isn't the only danger.
Aras: The sensors ping, and a surge of divine rage blasts the magic conduit. A massive, purple vessel looms in the sensors. It's an ambush—roll for initiative!
Aras reveals the sensor map, placing an Azlanti Sovereign Dominator four zones behind the player starship. Everyone rolls Perception for their initiative. Jessica gets a total of 22. Jenny rolls 16, Mike rolls 10, and Dustin gets 14. Aras rolls for the Dominator and gets a 21, then records the initiative order from highest to lowest. Thanks to their choice of exploration activities, everyone but Chk Chk can take a special free action when they roll initiative. Since she was Locking and Loading, Obozaya can Lock On to the Dominator to get a bonus on her first attack. Iseph gets to Evade, granting their starship a +1 circumstance bonus to its AC until their first turn. Navasi can Scan Target, attempting a Computers check against the Dominator's Will DC. Jenny rolls a 26. The Sovereign Dominator has a Will DC of 27. The Scan Target fails, so Navasi still learns about the Dominator's model name and its battle stations—a generator, a gunnery, a pilot's console, and scanners—but she can identify only one of the battle stations, allowing the crew to target it with other actions later to potentially cause it to become malfunctioning.
Navasi (Jenny): I'll identify the gunnery. “Obo, try to take out their guns!” Aras: That'll have to wait—Iseph's up first.
Iseph (Jessica): Got it. I'll Change Heading with my first action, then Juke with my second.
Jessica rolls a 28 total on her Piloting check to Juke, which beats the Dominator's Perception DC of 27. With a success, the Dominator is off-guard to the player starship for 1 round.
Iseph (Jessica): “We've got them right where we want them.” I'll use my third action to Evade again.
Aras: You'll need that AC bonus—it's the Azlanti starship's turn. It Boosts Thrusters to get you in range, then hits you with a beam of amethyst energy. Someone roll a Will save!
Mike rolls a 9 and adds the starship's Will modifier of +12, for a total of 21—a failure against the Dominator's Lissala's Eye save DC of 23. With that failure, the player starship is now off-guard to all attacks from Azlanti starships for 1 round.
Aras: Finally, the enemy starship fires on you with a bolt of electricity.
Aras rolls a 34 for the Dominator's Strike, which is a critical hit on the starship's AC of 24 for a whopping 35 electricity damage. The player starship's 20 Shield Points are taken out instantly, and the remaining 15 damage is dealt to its Hull Points. The electrical discharge also triggers the tachyon burst hazard. The starship critically fails this time, causing the generator to become malfunctioning.
Navasi (Jenny): “I'd better fix that if we want to get our shields back online!” I Stride from the scanners to the generator, and I rolled a 17 on my Computers check to repair it.
Navasi needs to helm the generator to repair it, so she must Stride twice to reach its location on the starship map. The DC to repair a malfunctioning battle station is 15, so her 17 succeeds.
Aras: The generator buzzes back to life. You can use it to Generate Shields next turn. Chk Chk, you're up.
Chk Chk (Dustin): “Embrace the pain. I'll hold us together for now.” I use a 1st-rank spell slot to cast cosmic fortification from the magic conduit, then a 3rd-rank slot for cosmic bombardment to return fire.
Chk Chk can cast starship spells using his own spell slots while helming the magic conduit. Cosmic fortification restores a total of 7 Shield Points to the starship, and cosmic bombardment deals a total of 16 force damage to the Sovereign Dominator without requiring any checks.
Aras: The barrage of divine missiles leaves the Azlanti ship's shields battered and barely intact.
Obozaya (Mike): “Time to finish the job!” I'll Target Battle Station—choosing the gunnery Navasi pointed out, obviously—then Area Fire with our farseeker missiles.
Since Navasi's Scan Target identified the Dominator's gunnery, Obozaya can target it. Thanks to Obozaya's primary target ability, she first Strikes the Dominator as a free action, rolling a 25—a hit! The Dominator takes a total of 17 piercing damage, tearing through the rest of its shields and taking 1 Hull Point damage. Since Obozaya used Target Battle Station and the Strike dealt Hull Point damage, the Dominator's gunnery is malfunctioning. The Dominator rolls a 21 on its Reflex save against the Area Fire—a failure—and takes another 10 piercing damage.
Aras: The mighty Azlanti warship looks seriously battered as your missiles explode all around it. Its shields and guns are both down—this ambush probably isn't going the way that crew had hoped! But what's that seven-sided portal materializing at the edge of your sensors? Uh oh, it looks like Azlanti reinforcements have arrived!
This marks the end of the first round of combat. The second round moves back to the top of the initiative order with Iseph's turn, ready to press their advantage before more foes show up. Now, it's your turn…