What is the effect of not having a full crew complement on a ship? It isn't much problem on a YT1300,since it is listed as crew 2, minimum 1.

But the Wayfarer has a crew requirement of 10. I am afb, and dont remember the breakdown, but I think some of the crew positions were just called crew. If your group isnt large enough to fill all the slots, what effect does that have on the operation of the ship?

I guess you could add black dice or upgrade difficulties to actions, but how many crew do you need to fly at a minimum? And in what positions? I could see requiring at least 1 pilot, 1 other cockpit crew, and 2 engineers to safely operate the ship. But if you add 1 black die per missing crew member, that would be 6 black dice on a pilot check.

I figure most groups might get some droids to fill some of the slots, but what kinds would they need?

Does anybody have any thoughts on this?

Pilot, Co-Pilot, Engineer, Cargo Master and 6 Crew for a fully stocked ship. I'd say 2 or 3 would be the skeleton crew as the rest are for the cargo.

I'd add either a Set Back Die by 1 or increase the difficulty by 1 or 2 if it's just the Pilot and Engineer.

Pilot, Co-Pilot, Engineer, Cargo Master and 6 Crew for a fully stocked ship. I'd say 2 or 3 would be the skeleton crew as the rest are for the cargo.

Unless you also count shift coverage for 24 hour days.

For a skeleton crew, I probably wouldn't throw any setbacks, but I'd penalize the crew in the form of extra maneuvers as they have to switch between different consoles, or run from one end of the ship to another during combat.

According to some of the deck plans I've seen, the cockpit has 6 stations. I'd probably flag those pilot, co-pilot, sensors/comms, navicomputer, shields/engineering, and maybe a cargo master station to monitor the cargo hold. If the PCs are going to be switching hats during combat, it'll cost a maneuver to move from one station to another. Likewise, if the ship suffers damage at the far end of the cargo hold, and if the engineer wants to make emergency repairs, he'll have to take 3 or 4 maneuvers to get there.

And, if the PCs will be using the ship for cargo hauling, all the menial labor will likely fall on them, since they don't have a crew complement to handle loading and unloading.

I think it depends on the ship. Most smaller silhouette ships (5 and under) can probably be flown by one pilot alone. Whether or not you can do much of anything else depends on the ship. I don't think there needs to be a penalty because a pilot trying to do many different actions is already going to be limited in how many and what types of actions can be undertaken. Capital ships by their very nature generally need multiple people to run properly. How many can realy be left to the GM as the story needs.

Very true.

Pilot, Co-Pilot, Engineer, Cargo Master and 6 Crew for a fully stocked ship. I'd say 2 or 3 would be the skeleton crew as the rest are for the cargo.

Unless you also count shift coverage for 24 hour days.

Why do you need to do that? The Falcon flew in Hyperspace with no one at any controls. Han and Chewie were in the main area while enroute to Alderaan. Someone might need to be awake should an alarm go off, but in the normal day-to-day you don't need someone at the controls while in a lane except to exit Hyperspace.

Pilot, Co-Pilot, Engineer, Cargo Master and 6 Crew for a fully stocked ship. I'd say 2 or 3 would be the skeleton crew as the rest are for the cargo.

Unless you also count shift coverage for 24 hour days.

Why do you need to do that? The Falcon flew in Hyperspace with no one at any controls. Han and Chewie were in the main area while enroute to Alderaan. Someone might need to be awake should an alarm go off, but in the normal day-to-day you don't need someone at the controls while in a lane except to exit Hyperspace.

Aside from Engineering issues that crop up during flight, there are still mass shadows and items that would pull the ship out of hyperspace. Not having someone on the bridge when an alarm goes off could easily spell disaster for everyone on board. While perhaps not always necessary for "day to day" operations, would you want to be on a ship without a safety net?

And in a game setting, well...everyday is special.

Pilot, Co-Pilot, Engineer, Cargo Master and 6 Crew for a fully stocked ship. I'd say 2 or 3 would be the skeleton crew as the rest are for the cargo.

Unless you also count shift coverage for 24 hour days.

Why do you need to do that? The Falcon flew in Hyperspace with no one at any controls. Han and Chewie were in the main area while enroute to Alderaan. Someone might need to be awake should an alarm go off, but in the normal day-to-day you don't need someone at the controls while in a lane except to exit Hyperspace.

If you need to pilot in a high traffic area (other ships, asteroids, etc.) it could be useful.

The Wayfarer is one of the suggested starting ships, and the book in most places assumes a party size between 2 and 6 people. FFG seems to be assuming that even a smaller party can fly a Wayfarer without trouble.

I would default to whatever fits the spirit of the game. If dashing from one role to another in ship combat is exciting for you and your players, then by all means run with it. But if a small party wants to fly a wayfarer around and doesn't want to deal with NPC crew or whatever, then let them do it without penalty. Your laser-swords-in-space game doesn't need to be realistic.

The Wayfarer is one of the suggested starting ships, and the book in most places assumes a party size between 2 and 6 people. FFG seems to be assuming that even a smaller party can fly a Wayfarer without trouble.

I would default to whatever fits the spirit of the game. If dashing from one role to another in ship combat is exciting for you and your players, then by all means run with it. But if a small party wants to fly a wayfarer around and doesn't want to deal with NPC crew or whatever, then let them do it without penalty. Your laser-swords-in-space game doesn't need to be realistic.

So very true!

Amusing: So does that mean a group of 8 players can pilot a capital ship no problem with none of the additional support needed? A buddy of mine seems to think so...

Amusing: So does that mean a group of 8 players can pilot a capital ship no problem with none of the additional support needed? A buddy of mine seems to think so...

I suppose if it fits the spirit of the game. In that case the spirit of the game would have to be a bit silly .

Amusing: So does that mean a group of 8 players can pilot a capital ship no problem with none of the additional support needed? A buddy of mine seems to think so...

I suppose if it fits the spirit of the game. In that case the spirit of the game would have to be a bit silly .

One of the guys in our group (we take turns GMing various games) wanted the 8 of us to commendeer an Republic era Acclimator and fly it around. I told him it was a bit big for just the 8 of us, so we had to look up the crew in Saga Edition to get an idea of how many were needed....yeah....4 thousand...I told him the base idea was cool, just the ship needed to change to something a bit smaller. The group sometimes gives these wild ideas, but, I've been gaming with the guys PC and Tabletop, for 12 years now, and surprisingly, no fights have broken out over ideas or views, thankfully. *crosses fingers*

Well they could probably fly it around, but not much more than that.

At a certain ship size, you're gonna just need NPCs to be background chatter. Not necessarily doing anything on a turn-by-turn basis in combat, but around.

At a certain ship size, you're gonna just need NPCs to be background chatter. Not necessarily doing anything on a turn-by-turn basis in combat, but around.

Droids. Really crappy droids.

To fly a ship in a short-duration emergency situation, even capital ships, I would say very few crew are needed.

To keep the ship maintained and running, all it's weapons firing, load / unload cargo, manage small craft, provide stewards for the passengers and keep the **** thing clean among many other tasks; that's what a full crew compliment is for.

Taking the wayfarer as an example, to just hop in and fly the ship safely on a quick flight of a day or two I would rule crew 2 minimum.

For the Acclamator, heck go for it with 8 people... if your sole objective is just to nick it and fly it to a near-by system. Better pray nothing goes wrong on the trip.

To fly a ship in a short-duration emergency situation, even capital ships, I would say very few crew are needed.

To keep the ship maintained and running, all it's weapons firing, load / unload cargo, manage small craft, provide stewards for the passengers and keep the **** thing clean among many other tasks; that's what a full crew compliment is for.

Taking the wayfarer as an example, to just hop in and fly the ship safely on a quick flight of a day or two I would rule crew 2 minimum.

For the Acclamator, heck go for it with 8 people... if your sole objective is just to nick it and fly it to a near-by system. Better pray nothing goes wrong on the trip.

And they would say...but we want stuff to happen. lol Ah well.