Weapons Systems

See Also: Weapon Charts 
Massive Damage: Remember when dealing with damage from weapons systems that the battles in Star Captain should be cinematic, not bogged down in rules. As such, the GM needs to be on his toes about the type of damage done to ships, especially with massive blasts from weapons like Quantum Torpedoes. Just because the bridge of the player’s ship is hit by a large blast doesn’t mean that the GM absolutely has to kill everyone on board, or destroy their ship. Imagine what happens during combat as a scene from some epic space opera film, and the rules are only here to give you an idea of how to make each encounter work. 
Arc Fire: Firing a weapon which only fires straight ahead in the direction the ship is facing requires a piloting roll in order to aim. The exception to this is if the weapon is turreted. In the case of any weapon that can be fired in an arc, it becomes more tactical and requires the skill of the operator and the tactical system, if any, that the gun is connected to. 
Weapon Quality: The quality of a weapon affects the damage it can do. Poor-ranked weapons do -1 rank of damage to the base damage listed for that weapon. Fair weapons do the base damage as listed. Good weapons do +1 the rank listed, and Excellent weapons do +1 the rank listed and have a 45 degree larger arc of fire (if the weapon has no arc, an Excellent weapon’s arc will be 45 degrees). 
Rate of Fire: Some weapons have a specific Rate of Fire, which indicates that they can be fired multiple times in one round. Each successive shot requires its own roll, but shots fired in tandem with each other due to a coupling device do not.
Laser Cannons: Laser cannons fire energy focused into laser beams, which usually appear red, green, or violet. They fire straight ahead in the direction they are mounted. 
Ion Cannons: Ion cannons fire a stream of ionic energy at a ship, which appears orange or blue. They can be set to target in a 45 degree arc from the direction they are pointing. 
Particle Propulsion Cannons: Particle Propulsion Cannons fire a stream of superheated and super-accelerated particles, appearing as a white, yellow, orange, or red stream filled with darker-colored streaks. They can fire in a 45 degree arc from the direction they are facing.
Machine Guns: Machine guns fire bullet projectiles, which is old-fashioned but inexpensive and useful against certain shields and hulls. The gun itself can hold up to 1000 bullets. For every 1000 bullets after that, one Munitions chamber is required to be attached to the gun. They can fire in a 90 degree are from the direction they are facing. 
Rail Guns: Rail guns hyper-accelerate long rods of titanium and cause them to become a heavily-damaging javelin. The gun itself can hold 50 rails, and for every 50 additional rails one Munitions chamber is required to be attached to the gun. A Rail Gun can only fire straight ahead from the ship, even if it is Excellent. 
Graviton Beams: Graviton beams are fields of electromagnetic energy which cause sections of a ship to collapse in on themselves. They require ten minutes to charge between shots and can fire in a 20 degree arc. 
Missile Launchers: Missile Launchers fire missiles from a Munitions chamber they are attached to. The damage of the attack is based on the missile used. Firing Arc is based on the type of missile being used, but normally a Poor launcher can fire only straight ahead, a Fair one has a 90 degree arc, a Good one has a 180 degree arc, and an Excellent one has a 360 degree arc.
Multiple Array Missile Launchers: MAML systems can fire multiple missiles at one time from a Munitions chamber attached to them. It takes one round for each single missile to be reloaded into the chamber once they have been fired. The damage of the attack is based on the missile used. Firing Arc is based on the type of missile being used, but normally a Poor launcher can fire only straight ahead, a Fair one has a 90 degree arc, a Good one has a 180 degree arc, and an Excellent one has a 360 degree arc. 
Hellfire Missiles: Hellfire Missiles are designed to fire straight at a target, like any regular projectile, in the direction the missile launcher is facing. Once they hit their target, they explode, causing additional damage. They are designed to penetrate hulls and explode inside the ship.
Seeking Missiles: Seeking Missiles can be programmed to seek out heat signatures, movement, or ships marked hostile by the computer. They will then follow the ship until they connect, and explode on impact, and thus their arc of fire is not important.
Proton Missiles: Proton Missiles can target ships and ship’s systems by the ship’s tactical systems, and will fly to their target and explode. This explosion causes severe damage that spreads out and does damage to everything within 5 units of the center point of the blast multiplied by the size of the ship that fired it. Damage gets lessened as it gets further away from the point of impact. They have a 20 degree arc of fire from the direction the missile launcher is pointed. 
Remote Controlled Missiles: Once the weapon has been fired, the crewmember who fired it must use his Pilot ability to guide it to its destination. This is all done from his tactical station. Only one missile like this may be fired at a time by any one station. Because of this function, it doesn’t matter what the missile launcher’s arc of fire is. 
Quantum Torpedoes: Quantum Missiles fire in a straight line from the direction the missile launcher is facing and explode in a blast which instantly vaporizes anything in their blast radius. This blast radius is about the size of ten units of space multiplied by the size of the ship that fired the weapon. Damage caused by this weapon is massive, and the GM needs to be able to figure out how best to deal with the massive chaos caused by an attack like this. 
Nuclear Warheads: Nuclear warheads fire in a straight line from the direction the missile launcher is facing, and cause massive damage over a large area. They also will have an Electromagnetic Pulse which knocks out all electronics and systems in an area double their explosive radius. This range is 50 units of space multiplied by the size of the ship that fired the weapon. 
Electro Magnetic Pulse Cannon: Electromagnetic Pulse Cannons, also known as EMP’s, cause a burst that will disable the closest ship’s system to the location of their initial blast. For every ship’s size larger the attacking ship is than the target, the EMP will reach one additional system, although there is no such bonus or penalty if the attacking ship is smaller. An EMP can fire in a 45 degree arc. Once a system has been disabled by an EMP blast, it takes a number of minutes equal to the amount of power that system requires to operate in order for the system to come back online. 
Turrets: Turrets are guns that can be of any type already listed. They operate individually from the main tactical systems, and as such either need a gunner to get inside of them and operate them manually or they need to be hooked up to an automatic targeting computer. Every gun that is connected to an ATC may fire once per round, and its rank of success is equal to the rank of the ATC. 
Coupling Device: A coupling device allows the connection of several weapons systems and allows one shot to have the same Success result for all the weapons connected to it rather than having to roll for each attack. It takes up one unit of ship’s space per weapon coupled to it, and costs 500 credits per coupling.
Category:Starships