So we ran our first starship combat encounter the other night, and one thing that really showed was that it's hard for everyone to find something to do on the ship. It devolved into PC ship moves and shoots, enemy ships move and shoot, PC ship moves and shoots, enemy ship moves and shoots, ad nauseum. I'm kind of stumped as to how to make starship combat interesting. They are wanting it, too, so I feel obligated to spice things up. I did try injecting some excitement by having some shots penetrate the shields and cause some damage in the engine section, but it didn't take long to fix it and then it was back to the A/B/A/B/etc. pattern. I need some help with this one...

There's a side bar in the CRBs that gives some additional options to do in space battle. However, I think that mainly the GM's responsibility to give the players something to work with:

Hutts chasing you? Let the face character negotiate with them (I was on my way to pay you back, I swear).

Authorities? You jump to hyperspace and they followed you! Find that tracker quickly!

Assassin? Oh no, they boarded you before take off, now defend the ship from the inside and outside too!

Get creative and think up problems inside of the ship, not just outside. You need to have scenes in the ship, otherwise it's just shooting back and forth.

Edit: +1 - Always have a ticking clock. Give them a fix amount of rounds (3-6) to accomplish the objective otherwise consequences happen. It speeds up these kind of scenes and raises the stakes to have some tension in the scene.

There have been a few attempts to improve space combat, you might scour the Compiled resources list:

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/85616-compiled-resources-list/

For my own games I think it's far more interesting to present space combat as a "chase". I put chase in quotes because any skill can be used to get further towards the goal, and there should be a goal beyond just attrition. I generally don't spend more than a turn or two in actual combat, the PC's main goal is usually to achieve the mission (take out the listening post, install the virus, pick up the survivors, etc), and to achieve this (for examples...) the pilot has to get through the terrain from A to B (figure out ahead of time how many total successes they need to make that happen), the shooter has to make the shot, the techie has to jam transmissions (this can include messing with enemy targeting), the face has to negotiate/stall, etc. Then they have to hide, flee, or clear the path before reinforcements show up...and reinforcements always show up... 😁

I've also dispense with all the "maneuvers" one can make, they are clunky and hard to keep track of. Also, if you include any kind of terrain (which you should IMHO) then going too fast becomes suicide. It keeps the combat aspect simpler while encouraging more interesting skill usage.

My favourite home-brew mechanic, stolen from Traveller, is "Never Tell Me the Odds". It's assumed there is terrain (asteroids, debris, clouds, canyons) to leverage for this effort. The PC pilot sets the difficulty to whatever they want. Then they roll and anybody (NPCs) who wants to follow has to roll as well. If they don't follow, it's assumed they lose track of the PC's ship somehow (at least for a turn or two). If they do follow, failure can be lethal (especially against minions), but of course if the PC fails that is problematic too. I generally assign hull damage for net failure, strain for net 1-2 threat, and crits on 3T+ or Despair (against minions, this is fatal).

Lastly, I tend to scale in waves. They might meet a patrol, but barring poor rolling I know they can handle it within a couple turns. This gives a turn or two of breathing room while they proceed with their mission...and of course failures or despairs on those rolls can trigger other complications: another wave, an ambush, etc. Lather, rinse, repeat. By the end the enemy is scrambling and calling in much bigger guns, so the PCs have to scram or suck vacuum. That's the basic template, easily adjusted for the mission/goal and elements shuffled as needed.

19 hours ago, whafrog said:

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For my own games I think it's far more interesting to present space combat as a "chase". I put chase in quotes because any skill can be used to get further towards the goal, and there should be a goal beyond just attrition. I generally don't spend more than a turn or two in actual combat, the PC's main goal is usually to achieve the mission (take out the listening post, install the virus, pick up the survivors, etc), and to achieve this (for examples...) the pilot has to get through the terrain from A to B (figure out ahead of time how many total successes they need to make that happen), the shooter has to make the shot, the techie has to jam transmissions (this can include messing with enemy targeting), the face has to negotiate/stall, etc. Then they have to hide, flee, or clear the path before reinforcements show up...and reinforcements always show up... 😁

I've also dispense with all the "maneuvers" one can make, they are clunky and hard to keep track of. Also, if you include any kind of terrain (which you should IMHO) then going too fast becomes suicide. It keeps the combat aspect simpler while encouraging more interesting skill usage.

So, basically, a kind of skill challenge?

Has anyone had any luck in porting over the Genesys vehicle combat actions? I was thinking of porting them over, but now that whafrog mentions something similar to skill challenges, I'm thinking that might be the best bet...

4 hours ago, Inquisitor Tremayne said:

So, basically, a kind of skill challenge?

Sort of. You have to define your waypoints/story beats before the encounter, and decide how many successes it takes for each waypoint. So "arrive at the debris field without being detected" might be waypoint A; sneak towards the escape pod with the survivors might be waypoint B; etc. Anybody can contribute to these efforts and I usually allow a full round so every PC gets a chance to do something. Somewhere between waypoint A and B they might be detected by a pair of TIEs on patrol, and they need to eliminate them before the alarm can be raised, etc, so there might be a couple turns of combat. So it's not really a skill challenge where you're just racking up successes and comparing results.

4 hours ago, Inquisitor Tremayne said:

Has anyone had any luck in porting over the Genesys vehicle combat actions? I was thinking of porting them over, but now that whafrog mentions something similar to skill challenges, I'm thinking that might be the best bet...

I looked at it, but haven't actually tried it out as it didn't seem to streamline anything. The thing is, since this is a narrative system, I prefer to play the entire game in that zone rather than micro-manage speeds and turns and evasive maneuvers, etc. If I wanted that, I'd play X-Wing. So the chase mechanic (expanded to allow any skill to drive the story forward) is my go-to for just about any situation.

I do also have "dogfight" rules, which *is* a skill challenge: PC contested piloting roll against NPC. If the PC wins, they and everybody on the ship that is shooting gets upgrades; if they lose, the NPC gets them. This lasts until a contested roll to exit the dogfight succeeds, or somebody takes the hit and flees. Then it's back to chasing.