2 hours ago, Aetrion said:

The C-ROC is an extreme outlier in the system in terms of cost to performance ratio. If you're looking to create a pocket battleship for your party and aren't interested in doing any fancy flying there is nothing that gives you more bang for your buck. It's low cost, it doesn't require a huge crew, and it can carry enough shields and armor to be practically immune to anything a fighter can carry that doesn't say limited ammo on it.

That said, one huge thing people tend to overlook with ships is sensor range, because that's actually quite a big deal if your GM takes it into account. The diplomatic Consular cruiser has Extreme sensor range, the militarized version has Long sensor range, both of which allow these vessels to spot enemies long before most enemies would be able to see them. That can make a huge difference, because a Consular cruiser can see a Star Destroyer before the Star Destroyer is in firing range, a C-ROC cannot. Basically if you're in a ship with long or extreme sensor range you get to pick your fights, if you're in a ship with short or medium sensor range you just have to deal with whatever crops up.

Your reading of Sensor Range doesn't follow anything we see in Star Wars. Ships (including fighters) can detect, identify, and communicate with targets well beyond any effective weapon ranges (i.e., past Extreme). What the Sensor Range really represents is the range at which detailed scans can be performed and electronic warfare can be conducted.

On 7/2/2018 at 10:33 PM, nichendrix said:

The problem is that all Gozanti stats (Armor, HTT, and SST , etc.) have to do with the fact that they are Silhouette 5 ships, at least per the Fully Operational book, the base stats are all consequence of their silhouette, that are later modified by other factors. It is unfortunate that FFG could not think of a way to add more detail to this silhouette system in order for us to have better depiction of how ship stats change with their size and role on the fleet.

Not really, the VCX-100 is sil 5 as well and it is inferior in every regard to those Gozanti's. There are many sil 5 ships which do not compare to the Gozanti variants, which seem to players cheap cruiser option once you are upgrading the weapons.

13 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Your reading of Sensor Range doesn't follow anything we see in Star Wars. Ships (including fighters) can detect, identify, and communicate with targets well beyond any effective weapon ranges (i.e., past Extreme). What the Sensor Range really represents is the range at which detailed scans can be performed and electronic warfare can be conducted.

I am not so sure about this. Or better, I am not so sure that your typical star wars ship will detect other ships which are running silent past that FFG sensor range.

We have as well examples in canon that you can sneak past ships sensors even when you are within their weapon range, just by disabling your transponders. If the transponders are running, sure, com range and detection should be no issue even beyond extreme, because you are getting a strong beacon to focus your com signal, etc

But in a combat situation you will not send your transponder code to your enemy and announce your present to them.

6 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

But in a combat situation you will not send your transponder code to your enemy and announce your present to them.

In a combat situation, the energy output of your engine is MUCH GREATER THAN anything your transponder is putting out.

Just now, HappyDaze said:

In a combat situation, the energy output of your engine is MUCH GREATER THAN anything your transponder is putting out.

And your ships ECM is obscuring most of that apparently. ?
Not that you would need too if you are running silent and turn off your main engine to hide.

11 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

And your ships ECM is obscuring most of that apparently. ?
Not that you would need too if you are running silent and turn off your main engine to hide.

Running silent and operating in combat are not at all the same.

I also play that ECM does not obscure exhaust because that's just silly. If you want that, get a Whisperthrust Engine.

17 hours ago, Aetrion said:

The C-ROC is an extreme outlier in the system in terms of cost to performance ratio. If you're looking to create a pocket battleship for your party and aren't interested in doing any fancy flying there is nothing that gives you more bang for your buck. It's low cost, it doesn't require a huge crew, and it can carry enough shields and armor to be practically immune to anything a fighter can carry that doesn't say limited ammo on it.

That's sort of the problem, as I've been saying all along this thread, that's as far as what is always shown in SWU as it gets. They are transports who could hold their own into aggressive negotiations with the average small smuggling or pirate vessels, nothing more than that. The many times it appeared as patrol craft they were show to be quite easily destroyed by anything with more teeth on it, like starfighters and more heavily armed transports like the Ghost or the Millennium Falcon. This is what FFG folks didn't seem to get from the depiction of these ships in SWU.

17 hours ago, Aetrion said:

That said, one huge thing people tend to overlook with ships is sensor range, because that's actually quite a big deal if your GM takes it into account. The diplomatic Consular cruiser has Extreme sensor range, the militarized version has Long sensor range, both of which allow these vessels to spot enemies long before most enemies would be able to see them. That can make a huge difference, because a Consular cruiser can see a Star Destroyer before the Star Destroyer is in firing range, a C-ROC cannot. Basically if you're in a ship with long or extreme sensor range you get to pick your fights, if you're in a ship with short or medium sensor range you just have to deal with whatever crops up.

That is something worth notice, since it is a trait almost always forgotten in game sessions, but I think your reading on this could be a little off, but not by much.

1 hour ago, SEApocalypse said:

Not really, the VCX-100 is sil 5 as well and it is inferior in every regard to those Gozanti's. There are many sil 5 ships which do not compare to the Gozanti variants, which seem to players cheap cruiser option once you are upgrading the weapons.

If you use the rules as written in Fully Operational, the things that affects most stats are Silhouette and Frame Profile. Frame Profile will give you your base silhouette and base HTT. STT is always shown to be determined as a Silhouette multiplier, as are your encumbrance capacity, your defence, and additional HTT. There is no reason for Gozanti to have such good HTT, STT and Defense, since theoretically it follows the same frame profile as the VCX-100 and the Wayfarer (Medium Freighter) yet, it has the stats of a Corvette profile, which it isn't.

1 hour ago, SEApocalypse said:

I am not so sure about this. Or better, I am not so sure that your typical star wars ship will detect other ships which are running silent past that FFG sensor range.

We have as well examples in canon that you can sneak past ships sensors even when you are within their weapon range, just by disabling your transponders. If the transponders are running, sure, com range and detection should be no issue even beyond extreme, because you are getting a strong beacon to focus your com signal, etc

But in a combat situation you will not send your transponder code to your enemy and announce your present to them.

Actually sensors in SWU are good enough that a ship with good sensors could detect the power signature of a droid on a completely shut down ship half a star system away. Sneaking wither would rely on active and passive counter measures combined or with complete shut down of all ship's systems.

2 hours ago, nichendrix said:

Actually sensors in SWU are good enough that a ship with good sensors could detect the power signature of a droid on a completely shut down ship half a star system away . Sneaking wither would rely on active and passive counter measures combined or with complete shut down of all ship's systems.

So extreme range? ?
Range Bands are rather flexible. ?

10 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

So extreme range? ?
Range Bands are rather flexible. ?

Using the in universe perspective, the basic sensor functions all seems to have extreme range, it is common to see even small ships like star fighters being able to detect a ship (specially a big one) going out of hyperspace and entering a system, although these informations seems to usually be very basic ones. They can detect a ship, they can tell you it's a big ship or a small one, but usually nothing more than that.

On the other hand, when you are in range of most active sensors, you can have far more detailed information, like what kind of ship, what are their shield's and weapon systems status, how many (and sometimes what kind) of sentient beings are on the ship, if there are droids and how many there are. In range you can also interfere in a more active way with the other ship's systems and sensors. So I think that the sensor range is the range in which a ship can actively get detailed information and also influence the sensors of other ships, not just the range for the most basic kind of detection.

8 minutes ago, nichendrix said:

So I think that the sensor range is the range in which a ship can actively get detailed information and also influence the sensors of other ships, not just the range for the most basic kind of detection.

That sounds remarkably similar to what I stated. ?

1 minute ago, HappyDaze said:

That sounds remarkably similar to what I stated. ?

Yeah, I suppose it is essentially the same thing. Yesterday I was nearly asleep when I replied, so I skipped some messages.

12 hours ago, nichendrix said:

Using the in universe perspective, the basic sensor functions all seems to have extreme range, it is common to see even small ships like star fighters being able to detect a ship (specially a big one) going out of hyperspace and entering a system, although these informations seems to usually be very basic ones. They can detect a ship, they can tell you it's a big ship or a small one, but usually nothing more than that.

Entering or leaving hyperspace seems to create a system wide "shockwave" which is detectable by passive sensors already, simply because it sends out a rather strong signal. I have yet to see any example of this being usable to detect the exact location of a ship. Basically it seems you can not sneak into a system with a hyperspace jump, because those will create a short burst on the sensors of basically everyone in the system.

That kind of information seems useful to investigate the general area if even, but nothing else.

41 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

Entering or leaving hyperspace seems to create a system wide "shockwave" which is detectable by passive sensors already, simply because it sends out a rather strong signal.

I don't know if you could call it a "shock wave" or if you can say it can be picked by passive sensors. Since it was never explained in detail in the novels, comics, movies and TV shows. It really is unclear if you can detect a ship coming out of hyperspace without looking for it, since all the times we are reading/watching about either heroes, rebels , outlaws, military units in action, they would always have a reason to look for threats coming from hyperspace. The question is, they are always actively looking for it, or their sensors automatically detect these things regardless of if they are looking for it.

41 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

I have yet to see any example of this being usable to detect the exact location of a ship.

It is shown many times that they can do exactly this, nearly every situation where Thrawn makes an ambush or blockade, we see that he could detect the exact location his enemies would come out of hyperspace, it is shown that at least most big warships, like star destroyers, frigates, cruisers, etc., could detect where a ship is coming out of hyperspace.

Also it is shown that they can get a rough sense of the ship coming out, they cannot specify the model of the ship, but can pin point their probable size/category. As far as my knowledge goes, it seems that at least Star Destroyers could get a sense of what ship is coming out of hyperspace, something like identifying them as starfighter-sized ship, or a light-freighter-sized ship, or frigate-sized ship, and so on.

41 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

Basically it seems you can not sneak into a system with a hyperspace jump, because those will create a short burst on the sensors of basically everyone in the system.

Yes, you can sneak into a system with a hyperspace jump, but it requires a certain amount of planning , the correct use of the ship's system and a tad of luck.

Whenever we see people sneaking into systems, they proceed in one of the following ways:

1. The enter the system by making a jump in the outskirts of the system, the farthest away from where their enemy is stationed, in order to be as close to out of their enemy's sensor range.
2. They jump very close to something very massive, like a planet (specially gas giants), the rings of a planet, an asteroid belt, a nebula, or any other object that would project a big mass shadow in the hyperspace.
3. They attach themselves to a bigger ship with the proper clearance to enter the system and hitchhiking to their destination.

In all cases, the hyperspace jump into the destination system is either followed by the ship's complete shutdown and/or by engaging their ECM cyctems in order to deceive their enemy's sensors.

A classic scene in SWU is the "the glitch scene" , a scene where a sensor's officer detects the rebels' ship coming out of hyperspace, but since the rebel crew always engage their ECM upon entering the system, the blip of the rebel's ship just flick and disappear, and the Imperial are left wondering if it was a malfunction or something else. Star Wars: Rebels is quite prolific with this kind of scene, a variation of it happens in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, when Finn's team infiltrates Supreme leader Snoake's ship.

It's simple...

One ship is a heavily armed and armored transport ship.

The other is a luxury yaht.

One will cost a lot more than the other for no real reason other than the fact that it's a luxury item.

26 minutes ago, OddballE8 said:

It's simple...

One ship is a heavily armed and armored transport ship.

The other is a luxury yaht.

One will cost a lot more than the other for no real reason other than the fact that it's a luxury item.

Not Exactly, Gozanti's are really armed transport ships, utilitarian in nature. But Consular's are not always luxury vessels, since not all of them we produced in the diplomatic version, there is the combat version (which is in AoR), which is a warship in the Corvette/Light Frigate range. In the end, it will cost more due to size, role and systems involved on acquiring and maintaining a big ship (Consular is twice the size of the Gozanti).

On 7/3/2018 at 3:35 AM, HappyDaze said:

I do have all 30 or so books, and I have been comparing the stats of ships--what I consider the best option--for years, and I have certainly not reached the same conclusion as you. I have done this both for my own purposes and for playtesting. The crafting rules simply do not make ships that are much like the examples we have at all.

Is there a comparing table somewhere on the internet on these stats? I would really like to see them too

8 hours ago, Rimsen said:

Is there a comparing table somewhere on the internet on these stats? I would really like to see them too

You can use this.

On 7/9/2018 at 2:53 PM, nichendrix said:

I don't know if you could call it a "shock wave" or if you can say it can be picked by passive sensors. Since it was never explained in detail in the novels, comics, movies and TV shows. It really is unclear if you can detect a ship coming out of hyperspace without looking for it, since all the times we are reading/watching about either heroes, rebels , outlaws, military units in action, they would always have a reason to look for threats coming from hyperspace. The question is, they are always actively looking for it, or their sensors automatically detect these things regardless of if they are looking for it.

Even passive sensors would need to be actively "used".
The difference between passive and active sensors has nothing to do with actively monitoring sensors or not. It's about sending a signal out yourself or just listening. A bats echolocation is an active sensor, your eyes are a passive sensor.

Hyperspace entry seems to show up on passive sensors. If that would not be the case then each ship entering a system would be able to detect on it's own passive sensors that it has been detected entering the system …

3 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

Even passive sensors would need to be actively "used".
The difference between passive and active sensors has nothing to do with actively monitoring sensors or not. It's about sending a signal out yourself or just listening. A bats echolocation is an active sensor, your eyes are a passive sensor.

Hyperspace entry seems to show up on passive sensors. If that would not be the case then each ship entering a system would be able to detect on it's own passive sensors that it has been detected entering the system …

The thing is, most vessels we see seems to have some sort of automatic scanning function running in background looking for ships coming out of hyperspace. It is rare to see a scene describing someone really looking for it, usually its just a buzz in some console telling the heroes someone came out of hyperspace, and then they start looking to extract more detailed information. In the end I guess that there is a combination of active and passive sensors in the process.

It should also be noted that by RAW, a ship's passive sensors are much more limited than what people here are saying. They only extend out the the immediate vicinity around a ship, which varies depending upon that ship's size and sensor suite. That range is listed in the ship's profile. TIE fighters sensors only extend out to Close range, which is only a few kilometers at best, whereas a Star Destroyer's passive sensors extend out to Long range, which, in space, can be several thousand kilometers, but not millions of kilometers. So, while a Star Destroyer might pick out a ship coming out of Hyperspace within high orbit of a planet, even out to the range of that planet's farthest moon, perhaps, it won't pick up a ship jumping in at the edge of the system itself, unless that planet itself is at said edge.

On 7/7/2018 at 1:36 PM, HappyDaze said:

Your reading of Sensor Range doesn't follow anything we see in Star Wars. Ships (including fighters) can detect, identify, and communicate with targets well beyond any effective weapon ranges (i.e., past Extreme). What the Sensor Range really represents is the range at which detailed scans can be performed and electronic warfare can be conducted.

According to EotE:CR p. 227 the sensor range listed is the range of passive detection of vessels, and you can pump up that by one range band through active scans by making an easy computers check, but you can only conduct an active scan in one direction at a time.

Modifications like Nightshadow Coating are also very specific on the idea that you will not be detected automatically if you are not in passive sensor range, and mods like the Pseudocloak specifically make detecting the ship harder.

Nothing in the system seems to imply that you can simply detect everything and sensor range is irrelevant unless you want to do fancy scanning.

3 hours ago, Aetrion said:

According to EotE:CR p. 227 the sensor range listed is the range of passive detection of vessels, and you can pump up that by one range band through active scans by making an easy computers check, but you can only conduct an active scan in one direction at a time.

Modifications like Nightshadow Coating are also very specific on the idea that you will not be detected automatically if you are not in passive sensor range, and mods like the Pseudocloak specifically make detecting the ship harder.

Nothing in the system seems to imply that you can simply detect everything and sensor range is irrelevant unless you want to do fancy scanning.

Believe what you want, but the rules are far from being as tight as you describe. There are many threads you can look up that will tell you that the sensor rules are poorly defined. I agree that various stealth techs make exceptions (sometimes exceptions to rules that are not defined), but the general fact is that a fighter (sensor range of Close) in Star Wars can communicate with and detect a star destroyer well before the fighter has it in effective weapon range (also Close).

36 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Believe what you want, but the rules are far from being as tight as you describe. There are many threads you can look up that will tell you that the sensor rules are poorly defined. I agree that various stealth techs make exceptions (sometimes exceptions to rules that are not defined), but the general fact is that a fighter (sensor range of Close) in Star Wars can communicate with and detect a star destroyer well before the fighter has it in effective weapon range (also Close).

That’s because the Star Destroyer has longer range communication systems with stronger transmitters and receivers that allow it to broadcast farther and pick up weaker signals.

1 hour ago, Tramp Graphics said:

That’s because the Star Destroyer has longer range communication systems with stronger transmitters and receivers that allow it to broadcast farther and pick up weaker signals.

Play it how you want. I've read X-wing novels where fighters well out of weapons range could easily communicate with each other.

20 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Play it how you want. I've read X-wing novels where fighters well out of weapons range could easily communicate with each other.

An X-Wng’s primary Weapon’s Range, like that of the TIE fighter, is Close range, as is their sensor range. Remember, though, that sensor range can be increased by one range band through the Active mode. This also works for comms if you do tight beam point to point line of sight communication along a single arc. That is how you extend communication range. The other option is to have a long range or hyperspace transceiver installed or a dedicated communication relay ship . However, most starfighters stay within Close range formation with each other, and Close range extends a few kilometers anyway, so, what you might think is out of range may be perfectly within their listed range.

On 7/29/2018 at 1:35 PM, HappyDaze said:

Believe what you want, but the rules are far from being as tight as you describe. There are many threads you can look up that will tell you that the sensor rules are poorly defined. I agree that various stealth techs make exceptions (sometimes exceptions to rules that are not defined), but the general fact is that a fighter (sensor range of Close) in Star Wars can communicate with and detect a star destroyer well before the fighter has it in effective weapon range (also Close).

Well, the sensor rules are kind of bad in the regard that they just give a flat range of detection that doesn't seem to distinguish between whether you scanning for the death star or a single person in a space suit. Still, when it comes to stealth ships you have to play it as close to the rules as you can, otherwise it's just not fair to players who give up all the extra armor, firepower etc. a ship could have instead.

I think the scene in Episode 4 where they arrive at the remains of Alderaan is kind of how sensors work in this system. The TIE fighter wasn't in com range of the death star, and the falcon couldn't distinguish it from a moon while it was already in range of the death star's tractor beams. That seems to indicate that the sensors on smaller ships really are very short range, and a large object can be seen long before it can be scanned.