I have not put this to my group yet, as I've not really fully formed it. But this kinda started growing from comments on other threads.

Damage Control Action can only be performed once per encounter as we all know.

One of the suggestions i've read is that only damage caused in that combat can be repaired IN THAT COMBAT.

Which kind of makes sense to me, since if replicates the idea that if you could'nt fix it before, you can' fix it now... until you have the time/parts/tools to do so. (External damage in Encounter one, suddenly becomes repaired in Encounter 2 etc).

Now this could mean you end up going into encounters with Damage already there.

My idea is that you CANNOT repair Damage after an Encounter that remains AFTER you have tried Damage Control and Manual Repairs, thus temporarily reducing your HT until you can lay up and actually do the work in a dry dock.

Meaning leaving damage for a time artificially reduces your natural buffer before Critical Hits.

Think of it as Damaged Hull Plating. Until you can land and buy new material to fix this, it means your ship is naturally more susceptible due this gap in your armour. It cannot be fixed by Damage Control in the next encounter, as you cannot go out and magically have the parts to fix this in a combat.

Obviously, hash repairs could be made without drydocks, in worlds where facilities are not available, but this would fall into the narrative of the time.

Thoughts?

(Additionally, was there a rule that said you cannot heal more damage to a person than they took in an encounter? Or am I thinking of another game system?)

Cheers!

Just MHO, but I think it's not worth the time as a GM to micro-manage these kinds of details, and the players won't thank you. This is not the kind of exciting information the players need to think about to propel a story forward. Never mind that there are myriad other similar anomalies in this (or any other) game...and it is a *game*, not a simulation.

The existing rules work fine. If you need a rationale to explain why you healed more damage after a combat than you took, then, sometimes it's easier to replace an entire component than to fix a semi-broken one.

One simple thing you could do is say that any damage "repaired" during an encounter using Damage Control (or whatever) is only really repaired during that encounter. After the encounter, the kludge of emergency plating and spliced wires comes apart and still requires proper repairs. If this would bring you over HT threshold, then you can apply the "one under threshold" rule and let the ship limp into a dry dock on emergency power. This way, you don't have to rationalize why the repairs didn't need credits or proper parts to be repaired, and will prevent munchkin players from only performing repairs during encounters to avoid spending the cash

I'm a little confused on what the issue is.

Are your players getting in trouble because they think they can just sit on damage, and then wait till the next encounter to "fix it for free"? That just seems risky.

And even if they are succeeding at that, all that means is you can start reducing quest rewards to no long include funds to repair their vehicles...

Damage control, the way I see it anyway is making either small repairs or releasing trapped energy from within the system. "Oh, just open the valve here and release the coolent from where the blaster cannon had hit. Otherwise looks like the hull held up."

I see what you mean though. It does seem rather strange that one could simply fix up a wound that was not able to be fixed last battle. Though then again, that's easily solved by simply stating that they can't make damage controls until they have actually taken damage. Once they have, who knows, now a entire section has to be replaced, thus the party simply chose to reroute sensors around the damaged area or remove large chunks of broken area entirely, making the ship more stable then it was before but not getting rid of the issue at hand and still necessitating a landing at a dry dock.

The answer to that would be to keep the number of starship combats down, but sangificant in plot value in order to ensure each encounter carries as much potential as the last.