Hello,

During an encounter, any player with mechanic skill can remove one system strain as an action. But after the encounter, the book says a starship will recover 1 system strain every day.

So my question is, what prevent a player from spending an hour in hyperspace after a fight removing the rest of the system strain?

In Fly Casual, for exemple, a threat in an Astrogation check means for exemple a surge from the hyperdrive that inflicts 1 system strain on the ship.

Is that really worth a threat, as a player can spend a single action fixing it in a minute ??

What do you think ? would you prevent players from fixing strain outside of encounter or something similar?

Thanks

It's the difference between Structured and Narrative play. As soon as it says Action, that means it's not something you can just spam repeatedly during narrative play.

It's the difference between Structured and Narrative play. As soon as it says Action, that means it's not something you can just spam repeatedly during narrative play.

To build on this, Strain (personal or vehicle) seems to be one of those things that only matter when you're currently engaged in conflict and each round counts toward success and failure. In narrative play it's not important. If the crew is just setting up a jump and nothing urgent is going on then that point of System Strain is pretty insignificant. If they need to jump to get away from an imminent supernova then it may matter.

The book doesn't go into it but narratively what occurs is exactly what a flight crew does on fighter and other military aircraft, even civilian aircraft. They inspect the hell out of everything. They have manuals and know the failure rates on expected points of failure in critical parts. They go through and tighten fiddly bits that have come loose, they top off fluids, they run diagnostics and fail safe checks on primary and back up systems, they replace worn looking parts, they do reboots and software clean up maintenance, etc. That's all occurring over that day long period of time. The more days it takes represents the increased level of 'Strain' the vehicle was put under and the level of maintenance required to keep it flight/combat ready. The once an encounter means the engineer knows exactly what comes loose first in combat and fixes that during the encounter.

Oki, so you cannot fix system strain during narrative play. For exemple you escape a fight into hyperspace with 10 strain points below your max, then 3 days later you emerge from hyperspace with 7 points below your maximum?

The problem in that situation is for exemple, you engage another fight just after exiting from hyperspace. If the fight is long enough, like 7 rounds, an engineer could potentially fix all strain points in those 7 rounds...

You know what I mean ?

Another way to run it is that System Strain can be recovered in Narrative play, just like regular Strain Threshold — a good night’s sleep (or equivalent), and you’re good to go.

In the case of System Strain, that could represent the mechanics going around and doing all the inspections and fixing everything up with no rolls required — it just takes around 24 hours or so outside of Structured Time.

For bigger ships with more System Strain that needs to be recovered, you’ve probably got more Technicians going around fixing things, so the total amount of wall clock time required is roughly the same.

Or maybe System Strain is fully recovered at the end of each Session.

Or maybe you just recover System Strain at the “speed of plot”, and leave it at that.

So, if it makes sense for your story for the System Strain to remain in place and continue to hamper the players, then it does so.

If it makes sense for the story for the System Strain to be quickly recovered, then it does so.

Each GM is going to run their own game their own way. They have to decide what makes sense for them and their game, but then once they do that, they should be consistent.

Good points all around.

You can look at a metric mechanic two ways: 1) Will this amount to tedious bookkeeping? or, alternatively, 2) Might I be robbing the players of interesting consequences if I reset it immediately?

Whatever you do, don't encourage stuff like this...

"Wait, don't destroy that last TIE yet, I've almost finished fixing the ship. Stay in combat for a few more minutes and we'll be good-to-go! "

This is another case where the designers were trying to be too clever and ended up making the game feel "not seamless" If your players want to repair strain on the ship let them, whether you are narrating through or structuring through time. Otherwise you get these logic holes that just piss players off and break the bubble of the game logic.

Your goal as a GM should be to make the game as star wars logical, seamless, and similar to the cinematic feel of the movies as possible.

Ask yourself how would this scene look on the screen?

Would this get "wiped" and proceed onto the next scene?

Does this scene have dramatic importance?

If you need the players ship to be damaged/strained in the next encounter. Let them know that something happened to the ship right before the encounter and make fixing it part of the encounter. Maybe the enemy used a ship bad motivator it doesn't matter. Now you got what you wanted as the GM and didn't rob the players of their free will.

I noticed, no one has mentioned that Damage Control errata (and printed in F&D) changes repairing System Strain to “Using this action, any Player Character who makes a successful Mechanics check recovers one point of system strain per success.” Although that could just be because it's not really relevant to the conversation.

I've generally used System Strain as an. . . encounter/scenario resource. If the crew HAVE THE TIME to scour the ship, removing System Strain, and it will have little narrative impact on the story going forward, then I generally allow it. The single point a day I consider the result of mere system self-diagnostics, regular maintenance, and rest, particularly for the smaller ships that the PCs are more likely to be working on. On truly immense or complicated ships, this might be about the best they can hope for even with crews working every hour of the day.

Now if time is tight or the PCs are going straight from one scenario to another I might not allow them to recover System Strain, or preferably, make a challenge of it (time for a montage!), making how much SS they recover the result of the crew's scramble to get the ship ready for the next scene.

As for System Strain and instances like an Astrogation check, I find circumstances make a big difference. If the ship is free and clear after it jumps, System Strain may just not be a valid choice for spending Disadvantage. If the crew has to wait a few rounds before it is clear to jump, then it may be a good opportunity to suffer system strain immediately. Another good opportunity to inflict System Strain would be as the ship suffers complications while exiting hyperspace, meaning the crew wont be able to deal with it until they arrive at their destination, and thus also have to deal with what ever other trouble might be waiting for them.

I've started playing in a small starfighter campaign (mostly to help us familiarize and experiment with the starship rules), and I found how I manage System Strain has a BIG impact on how starfighters perform in a scenario. Spending SS can give you a leg up on your opponents, but at the risk of pushing your ship too close to the edge. It has become one of the more interest parts of space combat, especial for my Hotshot Ace.

Crimson-Red thanks for your message, and thanks to everyone else!

Crimson-Red could you tell me how do you manage system strain in your game? I know a starfighter is different as you cannot repair inflight ! but your experience would be really appreciated on that

Admittedly, our starfighter game is small, and only a few sessions in. I have been taking notes, and working on write-ups, that I plan on sharing when I get further along (I'm a very slow writer, so it may take awhile).

I've found reading and rereading the starship chapters of the core rulebooks (and any other relevant books like Stay on Target), then using what we find there makes a big difference. I didn't realize before hand how important System Strain would be for starfighter combat until considering how small a starfighter's Threshold is and the different options for suffering it like Boost Shields, Increase Power (Astromech only), Punch It, Talents, Threat (remember, it affects you opponents too), and second Pilot-only Maneuvers. All of these can shift the balance of a dogfight, for instance, you find your self at Speed 1 or 2 and about to engage a TIE racing at 5, Punching It to get your speed up would be wise before you or them Gains the Advantage.

Don't forget your Astromech, if you have one, they can help manage System Strain if you're suffering or assist your piloting to help prevent it. They can be a HUGE advantage.

Use your Advantage, Triumph, and opponent's Threat as often as you can, this is part of what makes a dogfight interesting and adds twists to the narrative. Find ways to generate Advantage, Triumph, and opponent's Threat. This is why you use Gain the Advantage instead of 'he who shoots first, wins!' (We have found this is a bit of a mindset thing, you might find both players and GM need to mutually agree to avoid deadly slug-fests to make space combat more interesting). Any Advantage, Triumph, and opponent's Threat you generate can be spent to shield you from incoming attacks and help out-fly your opponents.

Sensor Ranges are relevant! Most starfighters have small sensor ranges (Close or Short), even when they use active sensors, and move very fast, meaning most fighters encounter each other right on top of each other. Instead of wasting maneuvers and actions on closing, they can often get right to dogfighting. This does give a big advantage to those fighters who have longer sensor ranges or bigger ships relaying sensor information, especially if they are armed with longer ranged weapons. This can can generate means and methods to significantly alter the shape of the battlefield ("Interceptors, take out those support ships!").

That said, don't be afraid to start combat at a distance, using the terrain to create interesting and challenging ways of closing and using talents like Shortcut. This can also help reduce the significance of the initiative check (and thus the 'he who shoots first, wins!' approach).

I'm sure I'm missing something, but I'm suffering mental overload considering all the variables... hence why I'm a slow writer

Crimson-Red could you tell me how do you manage system strain in your game? I know a starfighter is different as you cannot repair inflight ! but your experience would be really appreciated on that

As far as dealing System Strain in Starfighters specifically - to stay on topic - Both the pilot and the astromech (if you have one) should be able to perform the Damage Control Action in and out of combat. I like to think of it as Systems Management; redirecting power, transferring coolant/heat, discharging static buildup, disconnecting inoperative systems, etc..

For example, an A-Wing pilot just survived a dogfight with a TIE/In, but is suffering some Heavy System Strain, so for his next turn, instead of seeking out a new target he takes an Evasive Maneuver, and a Average Difficulty Damage Control Action. Assuming nothing goes wrong, he is free to dive back into the fray on the following round.

If he is travelling from one fight to another, I'd be fine letting him use that time to continue recovering System Strain.

Edit:

To take it further, maybe he pushed his A-Wing too far and his systems shut down leaving him disabled and an easy target. He immediately uses a Hard Difficulty Damage Control Action to restart his ship systems, He succeeds, surprisingly well in fact! Spending two Advantage to take two Maneuvers, he Punches It, negating enough of the new System Strain with his ranks of High-G Training to keep the A-wing flying, then takes Evasive Maneuvers in hopes of surviving the until the next round (again resorting to High-G Training)! He is seriously stressed out, but he is back in the game for the moment!

Excellent ! you gave some pretty goods exemples thanks a lot. I didn't actually realized the impact of sensor range 'till now !

As for system strain, I think I understand it well now, it is more about adding a new level of tactic, it shouldn't be really important outside of structured gameplay. I need to assimilate all the very good information I had on this topic now, thanks alot everyone :-)