I operate on the philosophy that any target important enough to be worth making an air strike against is going to be important enough to have some starfighters or airspeeders on standby. Not to mention that any starport nearby is going to launch a squadron or so of whatever starfighters they have ready for pirate defence or interdiction duty.
Firing Starship Weaponry at Characters. Possible? Modifiers?
I'm sure cities in Star Wars would have established flight paths, speed limits, and no fly zones. Any straying from them would cause immediate response from authorities before the shooting starts. I also don't play my targets as idiots, and gun bunnies trying use a vehicle mounted weapon isn't some clever new tactic.
Another way to prevent this is to be sure to set the action somewhere where a starship and larger vehicles can't go. Like Ryloth where the majority of civilization is underground. Or in an underwater city on Dack. Or the simplest excuse: aboard a space station! Just because you can get to a place with your tricked-out ship doesn't mean it doesn't become absolutely useless once you get there.
Always be sure to take the setting into account. if the PC's goal is to wipe out a rival gang of smugglers in the middle of the Tattooine desert, then don't be surprised when they just launch a concussion missile at the camp from the lower atmosphere.
Note that Ryloth is no longer all desert according to Lords of the Sith. In fact, much of the surface is temperate and forested. I'm not really a fan of this new canon.
Hmmm, well seeing as how I'm running in an alternate storyline where the droids were blown up at the start of episode IV, hopefully they won't mind that I ignore that little rewrite.
Moral of the story: use what you want and ignore the rest. :-D
Note that Ryloth is no longer all desert according to Lords of the Sith. In fact, much of the surface is temperate and forested. I'm not really a fan of this new canon.
Yeah, the old WEG-created Ryloth was way more interesting. This smacks more of "just another planet"-syndrome.
Keep speeders to personal scale weapons, and make sure the checks for vehicle to personal combat high on dice. My players kept doing this most of the time, and stopped after a few bad shots. Also, keep in mind most starships can not hover, so while the ship can do a drive-by and shot once, after that the enemy will go to ground and hide..
Generally, I punish my players for such easy solutions, with inner-narrative ("wow man, annihilating people is bad") or with consequences ("thanks for saving the village but go away please, we don't like how you done it").
Edited by RusakRakeshMost starships actually -can- hover, they use repulsor lifts but that basically only keeps them in the air. Actually moving while using only repulsors would be very, very slow making them a great big target for anti vehicle weapons.
Also one way I disabuse my players of using vehicle weapons on personal scale targets is that it melts/vaporizes anything on them, so send them to get a macguffin and if they use vehicle weapons; Oops they torched it on accident, guess who's employer is gonna be so mad.
Note that Ryloth is no longer all desert according to Lords of the Sith. In fact, much of the surface is temperate and forested. I'm not really a fan of this new canon.
Yeah, the old WEG-created Ryloth was way more interesting. This smacks more of "just another planet"-syndrome.
I don't know... I like that they're moving away from the "every planet is made up of only one stereotypical landscape" method of making planets.
I mean, we have Tatooine (desert), Hoth (snow), Dagobah (swamp), Naboo (forest), Yavin 4 (Jungle), Endor moon (Big forest), Coruscant (City), Ryloth (Scorched rock).
It was getting kinda boring with every single major planet being just one thing all over the planet.
The way Ryloth is now is much more interesting if you ask me.
At least it means I can expand my descriptions of the official planets to something more than "it's a snow planet" in one case.
I don't know... I like that they're moving away from the "every planet is made up of only one stereotypical landscape" method of making planets.
I mean, we have Tatooine (desert), Hoth (snow), Dagobah (swamp), Naboo (forest), Yavin 4 (Jungle), Endor moon (Big forest), Coruscant (City), Ryloth (Scorched rock).
It was getting kinda boring with every single major planet being just one thing all over the planet.
The way Ryloth is now is much more interesting if you ask me.
At least it means I can expand my descriptions of the official planets to something more than "it's a snow planet" in one case.
Well, that's a theme of Star Wars. If you are running a Star Wars RPG then one faceted planets SHOULD be the norm. Sure you can throw in a multi-climate planet or a hidden forested valley on a desert planet from time to time, but making the planet consist of one sterotypical thing makes it easily memorable as the back drop for your adventure the same way G.L. used the same simplicity in the movies.
It's not like your campaign isn't going to have varying backdrops during your PCs travels. A fantasy campaign has a single world with varying adventure backdrops such as a swampy jungle, thieves' den, majestic forest, ruins, glacial north, enemy fortress, sweltering desert, bustling city, erupting volcano, etc on one planet because the entire campaign is limited to that ONE planet. A Star Wars campaign will be bouncing around from planet to planet so those ARE your varying backdrops: swampy jungle (Dagobah), thieves' den (Tatooine), majestic forest (Endor), ruins (Yavin), glacial north (Hoth), enemy fortress (Death Star), sweltering desert (again, Tatooine), bustling city (Coruscant), erupting valcano (Mustafar), etc.
I don't know... I like that they're moving away from the "every planet is made up of only one stereotypical landscape" method of making planets.
I mean, we have Tatooine (desert), Hoth (snow), Dagobah (swamp), Naboo (forest), Yavin 4 (Jungle), Endor moon (Big forest), Coruscant (City), Ryloth (Scorched rock).
It was getting kinda boring with every single major planet being just one thing all over the planet.
The way Ryloth is now is much more interesting if you ask me.
At least it means I can expand my descriptions of the official planets to something more than "it's a snow planet" in one case.
Well, that's a theme of Star Wars. If you are running a Star Wars RPG then one faceted planets SHOULD be the norm. Sure you can throw in a multi-climate planet or a hidden forested valley on a desert planet from time to time, but making the planet consist of one sterotypical thing makes it easily memorable as the back drop for your adventure the same way G.L. used the same simplicity in the movies.
It's not like your campaign isn't going to have varying backdrops during your PCs travels. A fantasy campaign has a single world with varying adventure backdrops such as a swampy jungle, thieves' den, majestic forest, ruins, glacial north, enemy fortress, sweltering desert, bustling city, erupting volcano, etc on one planet because the entire campaign is limited to that ONE planet. A Star Wars campaign will be bouncing around from planet to planet so those ARE your varying backdrops: swampy jungle (Dagobah), thieves' den (Tatooine), majestic forest (Endor), ruins (Yavin), glacial north (Hoth), enemy fortress (Death Star), sweltering desert (again, Tatooine), bustling city (Coruscant), erupting valcano (Mustafar), etc.
I know, I'm just saying that I find it refreshing to break from the norm sometimes.
I mean, we have Tatooine (desert), Hoth (snow), Dagobah (swamp), Naboo (forest), Yavin 4 (Jungle), Endor moon (Big forest), Coruscant (City), Ryloth (Scorched rock).
I know, I'm just saying that I find it refreshing to break from the norm sometimes.
In all seriousness, if it helps your sensibilities you can consider many of the Star Wars one-landscape planets to actually have varying geographies; we just see one of them due to the plot and lack of fly-bys of the entire planet. Using your examples:
Tatooine: Desert is what we see. But, air is abundant. Large forests in valleys or deep ravines?
Hoth: Glacial is what we see. But, air is abundant. It's a tidally locked planet and we are only seeing the cold side? It may be much different along the twilight band or upon the hot side? Or, the entire planet is cold, but only glacial as you get nearer the poles?
Naboo: We actually do see forests, oceans, plains, hills, lochs (?), mountains, and possibly a swamp upon Naboo.
etc.
Since I contributed to the derail, here is my contribution to bring it back. I haven't used this in play yet, but after debating what to do with the Planetary weapons vs Personal target I had gone to a x5 conversion during play. I liked the ratio, but still thought there was something lacking. Shouldn't that Turbolaser have a Blast radius? Knockdown? So, I thought the simple answer would just to have a different version of Planetary weapons when engaging Personal targets:
I still can't seem to post images or insert shortened links (freezes up), but there is an image in this link:
Here are the basic conversion rules I used:
Damage: x5
Critical Rating: /2 round down
Blast: Damage x5, Radius increased (note the range letters in the Blast quality in the table)
Range: Close becomes Long or Extreme. Short+ becomes Extreme.
Also note the Vicious rating on some of the high end weapons which basically ensures a good chance of instant death if you (as a GM) don't want to say "your'e dead" without actually resolving the attack.
It's all untested (other then x5 damage) so probably will need some tweaking on qualities (weaker or stronger).
Edited by Sturn