Hi I'm planning to run this module soon. I've been trying to wrap my head around the race mechanics but it's not clear to me.

From JoY:

"The cloud car's speed determines the relative positioning of the cars during each leg of the race. The ships with the highest speed are leading the pack, while those with the lowest speed are trailing behind. Cloud cars at matching speeds are considered to be in the same range band as each other, while each additional difference in speed indicates another range band further away. For example, the Player Character piloting his Storm IV at speed 4 would be in short range of all the other cloud cars going speed 4, while a cloud car racing at speed 5 would be at medium range from the PC, and another pilot taking his time at speed 2 would be at long range relative to the PC's airspeeder.

In order to determine the order of the cars going the same speed, the pilot with the highest total number of [successes] is in the lead, the pilot with the second highest total number of [successes] is next behind him, etc. [Advantage] can be used to break ties, with PCs breaking ties after that. The pilot in the lead for his range band adds [boost die] to his next Piloting (Planetary) check.

[Failure] during the competitive Piloting (Planetary) check indicates that the pilot overshot the buoy on the first try and doubles back to pass within range. The pilot proceeds to the next leg of the race but suffers a penalty of [setback] added to his next roll.

In order to determine the overall winner, add that crew's speed each round to what is called their Place Value; whoever has the highest Place Value at the end comes in first and wins . There are other ways to add to that total or subtract from other pilots' Place Value, detailed in Table 1- 4 : Spending [threat, advantage, triumps and despairs] in Racing, above."

The way I read this:

1) the RELATIVE distance and place each racer is from one another within a leg (or at any given point during the race) is determined by their speed and then their score during the piloting checks. This seems to be narrative only.

2) The final outcome (winner, second, third etc.) is determined by their overall place value which is cumulatively scored for all rounds plus or minus any modifiers based on advantage/disadvantage. So an example race with 2 vehicles:

Vehicle 1: Keeps speed at 4 for all 7 rounds. On odd rounds they get two advantage (+2 place value) and on even rounds they get -2 two treat (-2 place values).

(4+2) + (4-2) + (4+2) + (4-2) + (4+2) + (4-2) + (4+2) = 30 place value

Vehicle 2: Alternates between speed 3 and 4 each round and has no place value modifiers (i.e. no threat or disadvantage)

3 + 4 + 3 + 4 + 3 + 4 + 3 = 24

Alternatively, it might mean that you are only doing this at the end of each round (not summing all rounds). So if you lead in the final round (speed + place value) you win the race? That would be odd though given that you could race the first six rounds at a speed of 1 to keep the difficulty low and wrack up advantage each round, then punch it in the final round top speed (4 or 5) and win the race?

If you'd done this, or have suggestions, please advise!

After stewing over this a bit more I wanted to state the problem.

The winner of the race is determined by a running total of place values (i.e. the sum of speeds as modified by advantage/threat etc) but there is no way of reflecting this ( as written in the rules) narratively. So a ship that has fallen far behind wouldn't really know it until the race is over since their relative distance (range bands) are determined by the speed the ships are traveling.

40 minutes ago, VadersMarchKazoo said:

So a ship that has fallen far behind wouldn't really know it until the race is over since their relative distance (range bands) are determined by the speed the ships are traveling

Except for the ability to keep a running place tally on the board through the whole encounter. That would make it pretty clear where everyone stands overall at any given time, thus allowing the players to decide when to take risks or play it cool.

3 hours ago, Ghostofman said:

Except for the ability to keep a running place tally on the board through the whole encounter. That would make it pretty clear where everyone stands overall at any given time, thus allowing the players to decide when to take risks or play it cool.

Yeah, I thought about that. The issue is that the rules says that ships at the same speed are at the same range. But if you are keeping track of 'place' then you can't have it both ways since these may or may not agree. This would mean that you'd need another mechanic to determine range.

For example, the first and last ship (by place) may be at the same speed (say 4) but the middle ships (place 2 and 3) may be at a different speed (say 3). So by "place" they are at some farther range with two ships in the middle but by speed they are at the same range and the middle ships are further.

Sorry to complicate things but this is the issue.

4 hours ago, VadersMarchKazoo said:

Yeah, I thought about that. The issue is that the rules says that ships at the same speed are at the same range. But if you are keeping track of 'place' then you can't have it both ways since these may or may not agree. This would mean that you'd need another mechanic to determine range.

For example, the first and last ship (by place) may be at the same speed (say 4) but the middle ships (place 2 and 3) may be at a different speed (say 3). So by "place" they are at some farther range with two ships in the middle but by speed they are at the same range and the middle ships are further.

Sorry to complicate things but this is the issue.

It's cool, it's a tricky thing.

So the "position by speed" is just certain scenes, not the overall race. Think if it like a Movie, in some shots the racers are close and directly interacting, in others it's a wide shot where not so much.

This works the same, so you can work that into the narrative. Describe the checked stages, but then use the results to describe the wide shot that follows. Talk about a racer pulling wide and haveing to rejocky for position again, and apply poor rolls to subsequent speed decisions.

If you really need to justify the mechanics, when you pitch the race describe it not just as a matter of speed, but of skill. Have the race governed by a droid that, in addition to calculating speed also calculates time and performance on the track. So yeah, you might floor it the while time, but if you're swinging wide turns, missing buoys by a kilometer, and so on, the evaluator will still rank you lower and add time to your run as a penalty.

On 10/25/2019 at 7:43 PM, Ghostofman said:

It's cool, it's a tricky thing.

So the "position by speed" is just certain scenes, not the overall race. Think if it like a Movie, in some shots the racers are close and directly interacting, in others it's a wide shot where not so much.

This works the same, so you can work that into the narrative. Describe the checked stages, but then use the results to describe the wide shot that follows. Talk about a racer pulling wide and haveing to rejocky for position again, and apply poor rolls to subsequent speed decisions.

If you really need to justify the mechanics, when you pitch the race describe it not just as a matter of speed, but of skill. Have the race governed by a droid that, in addition to calculating speed also calculates time and performance on the track. So yeah, you might floor it the while time, but if you're swinging wide turns, missing buoys by a kilometer, and so on, the evaluator will still rank you lower and add time to your run as a penalty.

Thanks for the feedback. I agree that sometimes you just have to look at things narratively and not sweat the details. In this case however, I'm just trying to make it easy to understand and imagine so that the players can be more invested in it.

I'm thinking I will use speed to determine the relative ranges for the first phase only (before the first competitive piloting check) as described in the rules. After that, I will keep track of the current position (ie rank) of the various ships in the race during each phase (based on the overall rules to determine the winner using place values) and then say that the relative range that two ships are from one another are based on their positions in the race during that phase. Ships within one position of each other will be in short range, 2 positions from each other are at med range and 3 positions are long range.

So: Ships in positions 2 and 3 will be short range from one another (planetary scale) but ships in positions 1 and 3 will be medium range from one another.

I made a spreadsheet that will track their current position in the race based on their cumulative speed and place value modifiers as written in the rules.

I think these rules will make it easier to conceptualize and should be easy enough to track.

I found this whole race mechanic too complicated. I just narrated what happened according to the dice rolls, creating some interesting fights for position