Alright, so I got my copy of Starships and Speeders. I look over the stats for the Onager class Destroyer with one of my regular players (make note, who is a huge Halo fan), and we both have our jaws just drop at the insane damage potential for the heavy mass drivers.

Now I know mass drivers aren't new to Star Wars, but they are fairly rare in terms of use.

Has anyone done any sort of stat write ups for other models of mass drivers (light, medium, etc)? And, as per my player, have any of you allowed usage of a small variant on a starfighter?

Here are the RAW stats for the mass-drivers from the Keldabe-class Battleship from Dangerous Covenants: Damage: 14; Critical 3; Range [Extreme]; Blast 4, Breach 4, Inaccurate 1, Limited Ammo 10, Slow-Firing 2.

11 minutes ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

Here are the RAW stats for the mass-drivers from the Keldabe-class Battleship from Dangerous Covenants: Damage: 14; Critical 3; Range [Extreme]; Blast 4, Breach 4, Inaccurate 1, Limited Ammo 10, Slow-Firing 2.

My favorite sentient airplane.

Those stats seem to be of a medium variant in comparison, since all the stats are a little more than halved in terms of damage output

16 minutes ago, GameboyAK said:

My favorite sentient airplane.

I'd say thanks, but how many sentient airplanes do you know? I'm worried it may be faint praise.

17 minutes ago, GameboyAK said:

Those stats seem to be of a medium variant in comparison, since all the stats are a little more than halved in terms of damage output

Oof. What're the Onnager's stats? I take it it's some sort of primary weapon?

26 minutes ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

I'd say thanks, but how many sentient airplanes do you know? I'm worried it may be faint praise.

I mean, to be fair, your only competition is the sentient fighter jet from that old movie Stealth soooo...

26 minutes ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

Oof. What're the Onnager's stats? I take it it's some sort of primary weapon?

I don't have the book in front of me, but it was along the lines of this:

Damage:20 / Range: Extreme / Critical: 3 / Breach 10, Blast 15, Slow Firing 3, Linked 1 (no Inaccurate or Limited Ammo)

Edit: had my roommate send me the splat. Edited stats accordingly.

1 hour ago, GameboyAK said:

And, as per my player, have any of you allowed usage of a small variant on a starfighter?

There is a turret-mounted mass-driver cannon on the AT-TE, which is silhouette 4; might not be too out of place on a larger starfighter.

13 minutes ago, GameboyAK said:

I mean, to be fair, your only competition is the sentient fighter jet from that old movie Stealth soooo...

Fair enough!

13 minutes ago, GameboyAK said:

Damage:20 / Range: Extreme / Critical: 3 / Breach 10, Blast 15, Slow Firing 3, Linked 1 (no Inaccurate or Limited Ammo)

Yowzah. That hurts. It isn't excessively strong, but it ignores the armor on an ISD and does about 15% of its HTT in one hit.

3 hours ago, Edgehawk said:

There is a turret-mounted mass-driver cannon on the AT-TE, which is silhouette 4; might not be too out of place on a larger starfighter.

I've flipped back and forth on this one as a light version. The only things that kill me are the facts that it really doesnt act like a mass driver cannon and that it does require a decent size walker for it to be mounted. Even a heavy starfighter would be kinda hard pressed to use it. For reference, I try to picture it on something like an ARC-170 or a Y-Wing and it just seems a bit much, hence my hesitation. Your thoughts?

3 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

Yowzah. That hurts. It isn't excessively strong, but it ignores the armor on an ISD and does about 15% of its HTT in one hit.

Agreed, but then there is the linked 1, and the fact that it is designed as a support ship for a small fleet. Even against a Home One MC80, this thing packs a punch.

What really scares me is the option for a composite beam turbolasers

Damage: 15 / Range: Long / Critical: 2 / Accurate 2, Breach 5, Auto Fire, Slow Firing 2, Vicious 2

Mass driver seems scary until you realize what an equivalent size star destroyer can do with massive batteries of turbolasers. Most of time, I'd prefer two score of turbolasers.

5 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Mass driver seems scary until you realize what an equivalent size star destroyer can do with massive batteries of turbolasers. Most of time, I'd prefer two score of turbolasers.

It's designed to be a siege weapon, to bust through planetary shields and take out the generator on the surface. Its role in a fleet is to stay at range and hit the largest ship it can. Yes, Turbolasers can do the same job, but you need to dedicate more turbolasers to the same job against heavy armor, like Mon Cal ships, in order to achieve similar results, all with several linked, while this has the potential to deal 42 damage in a single roll. Soften up a target after it's been hit by the this, and by the time it's ready to fire again, it can deliver a knockout punch.

4 hours ago, GameboyAK said:

It's designed to be a siege weapon, to bust through planetary shields and take out the generator on the surface. Its role in a fleet is to stay at range and hit the largest ship it can. Yes, Turbolasers can do the same job, but you need to dedicate more turbolasers to the same job against heavy armor, like Mon Cal ships, in order to achieve similar results, all with several linked, while this has the potential to deal 42 damage in a single roll. Soften up a target after it's been hit by the this, and by the time it's ready to fire again, it can deliver a knockout punch.

Against any target that can move to close the range, turbolasers are better. This includes shooting MonCal cruisers. This is because mounting a pair of linked mass drivers takes up the place of > 40 turbolasers.

3 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

Against any target that can move to close the range, turbolasers are better. This includes shooting MonCal cruisers. This is because mounting a pair of linked mass drivers takes up the place of > 40 turbolasers.

Agree to disagree. The Mass Drivers range, over double in Breach, Linked 1 and only a slightly slower rate of fire of any heavy turbolaser puts it as a more effective weapon in a proper fleet setup

Is it just me, or does anybody else think that weapons from The Expanse should be hopelesly obsolete in the Star Wars universe?

With that damage it occurs to me that the Onager is aptly named from an Earth point of view (just like the Roman siege engine of the same name). It may be small, but it kicks like a wild donkey.

Wow it has been a minute since I've looked at this topic. Guess quarantine has that way with people lol

So, after much consideration on this topic and some small simulations in my spare time, I've come up with this as a first draft for a starfighter mounted mass driver cannon.

Light Mass Driver Cannon

Damage: 7 / Crit: 3 / Range: Medium / Blast 2, Breach 2, Slow Firing 1, Inaccurate 1

The thought process behind this is that it takes into consideration the AT-TE is purpose built around the main gun and has 6 legs for stability, while a starfighter is more after market adding on a weapon, hence the Inaccurate. Slow firing makes sense on these types of weapons due to a recharge time, and the Breach is equivalent to the AT-TE Mass Driver. I put the range out to Medium for the fact that, in reality, the shot doesn't lose its momentum, but such a small weapon isn't going to have the same effective range as the Medium variant on the Keldabe, especially with an Inaccurate 1. However, putting it to Short or Close range puts it at a severe disadvantage to most other starfighter weapons and wouldn't be all that appealing as a weapon in general with too many cons for not enough pros.

@P-47 Thunderbolt @Edgehawk your thoughts?

The gun on an AT-TE has quite a kick (see video). Putting that on a starfighter seems a bit much. I know Star Wars is different, but think about the A-10. The GAU-8/A doesn't produce nearly as much recoil as a mass driver, but it produces enough force to through the aircraft off target if it isn't carefully balanced on the plane. The A-10 was built around the weapon, and this starfighter would have to be built likewise.
I'd suggest increasing Inaccurate to 2 and lowering damage to 5. Maybe also add a Threat/Despair result similar to that of the Superflare (Dangerous Covenants).
This would be the sort of weapon you mount on a strike bomber. You get one good shot to soften up the target and possibly neutralize some defense turrets before your torpedoes get in range. Then you drop off your real damage dealers.

Relevant bit starts at 2:05:

8 minutes ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

The gun on an AT-TE has quite a kick (see video). Putting that on a starfighter seems a bit much.

Which is why I was initially hesitant on it. However, after looking at all 3 examples we have in the system, how the AT-TE cannom behaves, I'm fairly confident with my first draft overall in terms of damage out. I could see the case for Inaccurate 2, accounting for more overall recoil on a smaller platform, but again, the AT-TE is purpose built for that gun.

As for the Threat/Despair roll, I have a hard time justifying as significant a penalty for a spacecraft. Perhaps in atmosphere, you could use something like that.

1 hour ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

The GAU-8/A doesn't produce nearly as much recoil as a mass driver, but it produces enough force to through the aircraft off target if it isn't carefully balanced on the plane. The A-10 was built around the weapon, and this starfighter would have to be built likewise.

I can see the argument there, but we have to remember, as you said, Star Wars is different. Repulsorlifts alone could account for something like this, and a 30mm gatling cannon won't behave the same as a mass driver cannon, especially with how similar, personal scale weapons work.

With all that being said, dropping the damage down to 6 and Inaccurate 2 would be the most I would do to modify it, as it would otherwise just be rendered obsolete by other types of weapons. Perhaps for flavor, you could toss in a "coil misalignment" threat/despair result, causing the Inaccurate rating to go to 4 as an alternative solution to your idea.

24 minutes ago, GameboyAK said:

With all that being said, dropping the damage down to 6 and Inaccurate 2 would be the most I would do to modify it, as it would otherwise just be rendered obsolete by other types of weapons. Perhaps for flavor, you could toss in a "coil misalignment" threat/despair result, causing the Inaccurate rating to go to 4 as an alternative solution to your idea.

Fair enough. The main advantage gained from this weapon would be in range. You'd get a volley to try and thin the ranks of incoming opponents or soften up a large target before they could return fire. At close ranges, the combination of Slow-Firing and the lack of tracking alone makes it obsolete. Mass drivers are good against slow or stationary targets, but since you can't fire a spread of them they aren't going to be as effective against small targets like starfighters.

On 5/14/2020 at 10:24 AM, GameboyAK said:

Light Mass Driver Cannon

Damage: 7 / Crit: 3 / Range: Medium / Blast 2, Breach 2, Slow Firing 1, Inaccurate 1

Light Mass Driver Cannon

Damage: 6 / Crit: 3 / Range: Medium / Blast 2, Breach 2, Slow Firing 1, Inaccurate 2

Misaligned Coils: When the user rolls 3 Threat/1 Despair when using this weapon, the GM may increase the Inaccurate 2 to Inaccurate 4. An Avergae Mechanics check can return this back to its original value.

Do not give the starfighters a mass driver, Tie pilots everywhere are cowering in fear