I still use Diaspora to think about spaceships:
Lois McKendrick, T2
V-shift 3
Trade 4
Beam, Torp, EW 0
Hull/Data/Heat 3
Stunts: Civilian (3 bp), Interface Vehicle -- ship's boat (1 bp), slipstream (1 bp), Full Kitchen (1), Full Gym (1)
Aspects: Cargo Hauler, fraternal love, best food in the sector, trust lois, Huuuuge
As opposed to:
Iris, T3
V-shift 5
Trade 5
Beam, Torp, EW 0
Hull/Data/Heat 3
Stunts: Civilian (3 bp), slipstream (1 bp), Skeleton Crew (1 bp), Cheap (2 bp), kitchen and treadmill (1 bp), Plentiful rooms (1 bp)
Aspects: Passenger Liner, Dirty but good bones, transparent walls, galley kitchen, luxurious finishing
That explains it, for sure. Somebody increased tech levels, and the Iris is downright easy to keep in the black. The Lois is much harder.
I'm interpreting V-shift to be a combination of size, efficiency, and distance to transition, rather than continual G force acceleration per say. The higher V-shift for the Iris means, in part, that she can transition much quicker than the Lois.
I'm looking forward to Diaspora 2nd edition.
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On 2nd thought: The Lois takes weeks to get to where it can transition, so may only have V-shift 1. That frees up 3 bp, which I can spend on Escape Pods (1 bp), and Safety Backups (1 bp).
ReplyDeleteOr, better: Large & Exemplary Crew (1 bp)
ReplyDelete"Cheap" does run up the operating costs, and the higher TL may limit where maintenance is available.
ReplyDeleteI like what you have done with bp expenditures on "fluff" items.
Someone who remembers the rules!
ReplyDeleteI can find neither my hardcopy nor my pdf. Luke Miller, do you know how Broker interacts with maintenance rolls? The SRD only says it assists, but that's not well defined. Is it amplification or limiting? Or what?
As for the fluff: yeah! I had bp to spare, as these ships have absolutely zero weaponry. These are an interpretation of ships from the Solar Clipper series, and the Iris is depicted as smaller, needing only a tiny crew, and significantly more advanced. She's also, when we first run into her, in really awful shape.
It amplifies maintenance rolls, adding +1 when the broker has a skill is higher than the Trade value.
ReplyDeleteI thought this was a little thin, as it meant a pinnacle skill Broker became useless once he was on board a Trade 5 ship.
So I hacked in a more detailed system that allowed brokerage successes on acquiring and selling cargoes to store their benefit (or failure) to modify future Trade rolls (including maintenance).
My thing had some problems with escalation, but I think it could be tuned.
I'd love to read it.
ReplyDeleteI feel like I played a pinnacle Broker, and ran into this problem. But, that was years ago and my memory is faulty.
I never put together anything formal, but it basically uses the AW concept of "Hold" or the Assets/Wealth system of granting temporary free invokes.
ReplyDeleteI have some "maybe someday" ideas around putting some of my hacks into a presentable format, but I have not played in years so it hasn't been a high priority.
And I don't think there's a way to buy off cheap, change aspects, or stats of a ship within the system, is there?
ReplyDeleteto modify an existing ship? no.
ReplyDeleteBut the nice thing about Fate is that it is modular and easy to hack on a whim.
Yeah. In a couple ways, easier than AW. And in other ways much harder.
ReplyDeleteI do not need to start a project of hacking Diaspora. I do not need to hack Diaspora.
If nothing else, I can wait for 2nd edition. And hack that, possibly into a pbta hack.
I honestly don't understand what is particularly hackable about AW with its class specific moves and advancement schemes -- but that is probably a different conversation altogether.
ReplyDeleteI don't mean that it isn't -- obviously it is because so many people do -- I just don't get it.
I'm happy to talk about what I find so good about hacking AW and it's children. And I'll do it without ever talking about GNS, too.
ReplyDeleteHere's my first blush at the ship modification thing: cost levels are generally geometric, just take one cost level less than the total ship cost (assuming old and new cost are equal).
ReplyDeleteMy more detailed approach would be something like this: I treat Fate "skill" levels as similarly geometric. use that to break out the cost of each individual subcomponent and then recombine them (three cost:1 items might be a cost:2 operation, or something like that).
Yeah, I like the idea of a cost of one lower than the ship to reconfigure it.
ReplyDeleteAnd if what you're doing will increase its value (get rid of cheap or civilian), then it's gotta be one lower than the new cost.
That being said, use a fate cheap and other skills could be used, while still affecting the wealth track. So, an apex mechanic could redo a ship's interior and it'll hit the wealth track of whoever is paying for it -- one would think the owner/captain type.
Cheap reduced by 1, civilian by 2. Civ ship is 6, so a cheap civ ship is 5. Buy it for five, then get rid of the cheap for also five. That is, you wind up buying the price and taking the risk twice.
And to upgrade a civilian ship to MG -- adding weapons or whatever that means in the fiction -- you'd pay 7.
I think that makes sense, but I'd want to playtest it. In any event, it's a good pass.