I've only ever hosted space chases with a bit of shooting as they flee. I'm about to host my first "real" space battle, and I want to make it easy for my rules-averse group of players. (It will still be somewhat of a chase, but I expect a lot more action.)

One thing I'm not clear about is what happens after Gain the Advantage expires. Let's say one pilot initiates, and to make it simple the difficulty is Average (speeds are the same, etc). Next pilot tries to cancel this with +1 difficulty, but fails. So the first pilot, on the next round, can use Evasive Maneuvers but shoots normally. After this, being the end of the turn after which they Gained Advantage, the Gain the Advantage is lost. Does this mean pilot 2 can now initiate Gain the Advantage, and is that at normal Average difficulty? Or do you track Gain the Advantage through the life of the encounter? I'm assuming it resets to Average.

On a different note, one of the opposing ships will be a Gozanti TIE carrier. The players have an upgraded HWK-290, with engines boosted to Speed 5, an auto blaster, and twin Medium lasers. The way I see it, they can be at Medium range (outside the range of the Gozanti's guns), fly at speed 5 to Close range, shoot, then spend Strain to fly again back to Medium. This makes the Gozanti somewhat of a sitting duck...although they'd probably burn through Strain before they could bring it down. There will be lots of terrain, so they may not decide to risk going too fast, but I can completely see my players trying this out. Thoughts?

They'll be able to fire one weapon at the Gozanti before they leave range (and it'll have to be fired by the pilot as he's the one moving the ship). However, this is similar to the move, shoot, move BS that some players try to do in ranged combat where they kite minions out of range. The simplest way to 'fix' this is to have the Gozanti go in the other direction and open the range more. Then the PCs will have to move twice just to get in range.

Also, don't forget the TIE cover that can pound the HWK while the Gozanti kites the players.

As for GTA, I think you have it right. Once it expires after a round (something which is RAW, but with which I personally disagree), things reset and it becomes anyone's game to try to regain it. This means that it's next to useless for single-pilot craft as they need to use their action to both fire and GTA.

Yeah, the TIEs will be a barrier for a bit, but I don't expect them to last long. Thanks for the tip about the one shot max though, I hadn't absorbed the fact that's it's all during the pilot's turn...logically everyone should be able to shoot during that round...then again if other gunners could shoot, then the Gozanti should be able to return fire. So they will definitely have to stay in range.

This means that it's next to useless for single-pilot craft as they need to use their action to both fire and GTA.

I don't think that's right. GTA lasts until the end of the pilot's next round, so at the beginning of the next round they can shoot. Basically, do GTA round 1, shoot round 2...lather, rinse, repeat.

Yeah, the TIEs will be a barrier for a bit, but I don't expect them to last long. Thanks for the tip about the one shot max though, I hadn't absorbed the fact that's it's all during the pilot's turn...logically everyone should be able to shoot during that round...then again if other gunners could shoot, then the Gozanti should be able to return fire. So they will definitely have to stay in range.

This means that it's next to useless for single-pilot craft as they need to use their action to both fire and GTA.

I don't think that's right. GTA lasts until the end of the pilot's next round, so at the beginning of the next round they can shoot. Basically, do GTA round 1, shoot round 2...lather, rinse, repeat.

True, but how is giving up an entire round of shooting worth it when the difficulty of hitting is so absurdly low and the benefits of GTA so marginally beneficial?

Yeah, the TIEs will be a barrier for a bit, but I don't expect them to last long. Thanks for the tip about the one shot max though, I hadn't absorbed the fact that's it's all during the pilot's turn...logically everyone should be able to shoot during that round...then again if other gunners could shoot, then the Gozanti should be able to return fire. So they will definitely have to stay in range.

This means that it's next to useless for single-pilot craft as they need to use their action to both fire and GTA.

I don't think that's right. GTA lasts until the end of the pilot's next round, so at the beginning of the next round they can shoot. Basically, do GTA round 1, shoot round 2...lather, rinse, repeat.

True, but how is giving up an entire round of shooting worth it when the difficulty of hitting is so absurdly low and the benefits of GTA so marginally beneficial?

Depends on what you're shooting at. Small fighters shooting at ships with more facings and not enough shields to cover them all... a better advantage than against another small fighter with no shields.

As the aggressor in GtA versus snub fighters about the best it buys you is a break from that guy taking pot shots at you since most small ships don't have turrets (Space Superiority Tramp Freighters being the notable exception). Against larger ships, if you GtA and chose wisely you get to make the call which shield facing you opt to deal with, and depending on the vessel you can drastically affect the quantity and quality of incoming fire. Plus with the accursed HWK-290 (I only call it that because it hands down smokes everything in it's silhouette class) the likely hood of two somebodies having a non zero mechanics skill can keep that strain under check all day, every day, assuming you aren't getting more system strain from sources other than the extra maneuver. 2 strain on a HWK-290 is only a P difficulty, And since the pilot is hiting and fading every turn, any two characters that are at least Int 2 should be able to keep the hamster from having a heart attack on his little wheel with a steady stream of Damage Control action.

For an added benefit when trying to take down a capital scale ship, if you would allow called shots against the weapons emplacements a la the X-Wing and TIE Fighter computer games, or the pilot racks up some serious advantages or triumphs while shooting, if you take the teeth off one side, you may still need to maneuver to keep in the safe zone, but suddenly you no longer have to bounce in and out and in and out of weapon's range. As a third possible alternative for dealing with the challenge of a ship that much bigger and better armed (and fair warning this is not technically RAW, but sort of makes sense and was how I handled cap ship kills in the old TIE Fighter game when I ran out of missiles) If you can get close enough to a capital ship, and I mean stupidly, dangerously, "you are about to trade paint, then explode and die" close to the ship's hull, they may not be able to bring all the guns to bear on you even in that arc with an added benefit of any fighter that takes a shot at you and misses has their own cap ship backstopping the shots.

I highly recommend looking up Emperor Norton's space combat houserule thread. Gain the Advantage, though he words it a bit awkwardly, is fixed. The rule changes are minimal and fairly easy to understand.

As the aggressor in GtA versus snub fighters about the best it buys you is a break from that guy taking pot shots at you since most small ships don't have turrets

By the official rules, you do not gain this benefit.

Officially, any ship can fire at any other ship using any of its weapons whenever it wants, regardless of the arc in which a weapon is mounted or the relative positions of the ships. This is often extremely "unrealistic" (it's one of many great abstractions/simplifications made by the rules), but it is the rule nonetheless.

So even if you gain the advantage against a TIE fighter, it is still free to fire at you with its forward-facing weapons, just as it otherwise could.

So even if you gain the advantage against a TIE fighter, it is still free to fire at you with its forward-facing weapons, just as it otherwise could.

This came up last night, with one player having trouble wrapping his head around it at first, while the other two were relieved that the game mechanics didn't require them to break out the graph paper and rulers, or mock it up with X-Wing. Overall it went pretty well. They learned you can't go Full Throttle (speed 6) through space debris and expect to get anywhere or not slam into something I messed up a few details, but after noticing decided to keep it messed up consistently and fix it next time.

One good thing that others have noted before: if the PCs are broadly capable it does let everyone be involved in the action in an effective way. The techie is also the pilot as well as the pistolero, but the face has some computing, so he could do scanning, jamming, and fire discipline.

I do find, and this is true of personal combat as well, that keeping track of everybody's various boost dice and upgrades can be tricky. I need a little chart to hand the players so they can keep track of it.

Thanks all for the input!

So even if you gain the advantage against a TIE fighter, it is still free to fire at you with its forward-facing weapons, just as it otherwise could.

This came up last night, with one player having trouble wrapping his head around it at first, while the other two were relieved that the game mechanics didn't require them to break out the graph paper and rulers, or mock it up with X-Wing. Overall it went pretty well. They learned you can't go Full Throttle (speed 6) through space debris and expect to get anywhere or not slam into something I messed up a few details, but after noticing decided to keep it messed up consistently and fix it next time.

One good thing that others have noted before: if the PCs are broadly capable it does let everyone be involved in the action in an effective way. The techie is also the pilot as well as the pistolero, but the face has some computing, so he could do scanning, jamming, and fire discipline.

I do find, and this is true of personal combat as well, that keeping track of everybody's various boost dice and upgrades can be tricky. I need a little chart to hand the players so they can keep track of it.

Thanks all for the input!

Regarding the part I bolded in your above post, that's why most NPCs have very few Talents and why players generally only control a single PC.

I do find that it can be a bit tricky in playtests where some of my players will control two PCs that have been built immediately before the session (sometimes beyond starting PC-levels, is indicated by the playtest) and the players have not seen the characters "grow-up" into their abilities naturally through play. They're pretty good with the mechanics of these games though, so it's only occasionally an issue.