Spaceships

These are rules for creating spaceships in [https:*fate-srd.com/fate-core Fate Core], designing and upgrading them. They were designed with the "end of humanity" space setting in mind, which is a space/cyberpunk setting with grounded technology. Therefore, very exotic tech like force shields and anti-gravity are not covered. Also, this is why prices are given in bitcoin, although they could easily be adapted to other scenarios.*

Spaceships are much like any other character: they each have a their own skills, stress points and stunts. However, they can be controlled by more than one character simultaneously, if each one is an operator of a "combat station". Thus, many characters can have meaningful actions during a conflict between spaceships.

## Character actions during a combat exchange

Any character that is manning a combat station can take one action during a conflict exchange. If a character is in the pilot seat, it can control the ship's movements and roll the ship's evasive maneuvers.

More than one character can man the same combat station. In that case, they can both roll against their effective skill and the best value becomes the official result for that ship's action.

If one character is controlling more than one combat station, it can perform multiple actions, although that is very inneffective. The character chooses the lowest skill value across all combat stations, and splits this value among the actions it wants to perform.

## Fate Points

Characters can spend fate points during spaceship combat as usual. In almost every case, spaceships do not have fate points themselves. However, some very unique, iconic ships, may have fate points themselves, and maybe even a refresh value. In this case, the spaceship's fate points can be spent by any character performing an action in one of its combat stations, instead of using one of their own fate points.

## Spaceship Skills

The skills a spaceship can have also indicate how effective its own systems are at performing said actions. When a character is manning a combat station, if its skill value is lower than the spaceship's skill, it can use the spaceship's skill instead.

Also, some spaceship skills are interpreted differently than character skills.

Each skill is listed in their "spaceship" names, but the skill a character uses in this combat station are also listed in parenthesis.

### Shoot

The main skill used to attack other spaceships. Shoot is the ability to use the spaceship's weapons effectively. Also, every point in a spaceship's "shoot" value allows for the choosing of another type of installed weapon. Point-Defense cannons (PDCs for short), which are the main defense against missiles, are also used with "shoot".

### Drones (Drive)

This is the ability for the spaceship to deploy hundreds of combat drones, called a "drone swarm", which fly into another spaceship and attack it directly. Using the drone swarm requires a completely different skill set than using the other ship's weapons, and is therefore related to a different skill

### Evasion (Drive)

This is the ability to use the spaceship's maneuvering thrusters to attempt to evade attacks. Using such evasion methods invoke the G-force rules, listed below.

### Thrusters (Drive)

How fast can a ship accelerate with its main thrusters. This value is given in "G"s of acceleration. Most ships have a "cruising" speed of 1G, even if their actual capability is greater than that. Ships with a "thrusters" value of 0 can accelerate up to 0.3G.

### Sensors (Investigate)

This skill allows a spaceship operator to detect others in combat, identify an opponent's status, pinpoint weaknesses and track down escaping vessels.

### Stealth

This is the skill used to take advantage of opponent's sensor blind spots in order to sneak up on them, blinking out of their radar. Stealth is opposed by Sensors, and an advantage created with this skill can be used to improve on all attack and defense actions.

### Cargo

This value indicate how much cargo space a ship has. This is imporant in a conflict because this space may be filled with special ordnance that can be reloaded during a conflict.

Depending on its size, a ship's cargo space may also house other ships, turning it into a hangar. The amount of ships that can be housed in cargo space depend on the ship's size (explained below).

* Ship Size 3: Each cargo point can carry 1 ship of size 1.
* Ship Size 4: Each cargo point can carry 1 ship of size 2, or 10 ships of size 1.
* Ship Size 5: Each cargo point can carry 1 ship of size 3, or 10 ships of size 2, or 100 ships of size 1.

Cargo space can also be used to house special missile ordnance (see below). The amount of warheads that can be stored depend on the ship's size.

* Ship Size 2: Each cargo point can carry 1 special ordnance warhead.
* Ship Size 3: Each cargo point can carry 3 special ordnance warheads.
* Ship Size 4: Each cargo point can carry 10 special ordnance warheads.
* Ship Size 5: Each cargo point can carry 30 special ordnance warheads.

Cargo space can be used to carry consumables and increase the time a crew can remain onboard before restocking. A ship, by default, carry enough consumables for 1 month, with a full crew complement. Each cargo space used by consumables increases this time in 1 more month.

### Size

This is not a skill used in the traditional sense. It indicates how big a spaceship is. It can assume 5 values:

* 1: Very small ships that house one to three people, tops. Called "gunboats".
* 2: Small ships that are usually light, maneuverable and fast. Crew is 3 to 10 people. Also called "corvettes".
* 3: Medium ships used for a variety of engagements. Crew is 11 to 30 people. Called "destroyers".
* 4: Big ships mainly used as command centers, with a lot of equipment and resources. Crew is 31 to 100 people. Named "cruisers".
* 5: Very big ships which can operate independently and are the backbone of an engagement's control structure. Crew is over 100 people. Called "battleships".

To find out a ship's size, add up all its other skills and divide the value by 10, round up.

This value imposes a penalty in all attack rolls when confronting ships of different sizes. Thus, a ship of size 1 attacking a ship of size 3 has a +2 to their rolls, as the larger ship is easier to track, whereas the size 3 ship would have a -2 to all its attack rolls, since its weapons are bulkier and heavier.

However, this value also imposes a negative penalty on a smaller ship's damage when attacking a larger ship. When a smaller ship attacks a greater ship, its final damage is decreased by the size difference. Therefore, if a size 1 ship attacks a size 3 ship, it must have a final damage value of 3 or more in order to cause 1 point of stress damage on the larger ship.
## Stress Points: Hull and Armor.

Every spaceship has, at least, 1 point of "hull", which are its "physical stress" slots. Greater ships have a greater "hull" value. A ship's "hull" equals its size.

However, ships can have an outer layer of hardened composites, an "armor" plating. Any ship can be plated with armor, up to its "hull" value. Thus, a ship with "hull" 2 could have, at most, "armor" 2.

Armor works by adding to a ship's stress points. A Ship with "hull" 3 and "armor" 2 would have, in fact, 5 physical stress slots. The largest battleships, when fully armored, have 10 physical stress slots.

## Cost of a ship in bitcoins.

In order to determine the actual cost of a spaceship in bitcoins, add up the cost for each skill with the cost for the ship's hull and armor. Each skill point has a cost which depends on its value. A skill of 1 costs S$ 1000, and every skill point beyond that increases this cost by 5 times. Therefore, a skill of 2 costs a ship S$ 5.000, and a skill of 3 would cost it 25.000. The highest skill value of 8 would cost S$ 78.125.000, or B$ 0.78.

Hull and armor follow a different formula. For hull, take the ship size as base. A size 1 ship's hull costs S$ 10.000, and every size category after that increases this price 10 times. Thus, a size 5 ship's hull costs S$ 100.000.000, or B$ 1.

For armor, each point costs a flat 1x of the ship's hull. A ship of size 3, for instance, costs S$ 1.000.000. Each armor point would also cost another S$ 1.000.000.

## Stunts

Spaceships can be equipped with stunts, which may alter some of its capabilities, or add others. Each stunt increases the final ship's cost by 50% of its original cost. Below, are some example stunts:

***Aerodynamics*** This ship can enter and leave Earth's atmosphere (or the atmosphere of an Earth-like planet), and even fight effectively within the confines of a planet's atmosphere.

***Combat A.I.*** This ship's computer can work independently of one operator, and act as if one of its combat stations were manned, even if it isn't. This stunt can be selected multiple times. Each time, the ship can operate independently of one more operator. If this stunt is selected enough times, it can potentially create entirely autonomous ships.

***Combat Thrusters*** This ship is maneuverable! It can attack smaller ships as if it were 1 or 2 size categories smaller. Not available for size 5 ships.

***Heavy-Duty Weapon*** Choose one of the ship's attack weapons (not its PDCs, nor its missiles). When this weapon strikes at a target, its final damage is increased by 1 point.

***Repurposed Space*** This ship repurposed one of its cargo points into another attack weapon. This doesn't increase the ship's "Shoot" value, but does grant it another attack option. If a ship with this stunt has no cargo space, it can be determined that, instead, it repurposed the space previously used for escape pods.

***Smuggler Compartments*** Some of this ship's cargo space is hidden, both visually and electronically, and is able to pass inspection scans without revealing its contents.

***Solid-State Afterburners*** This ship can cause a retroactive feedback of fuel exhaust which greatly improves its acceleration, for a limited time. Once per scene, it can burn its exhaust and increase its "Thruster" value by 2. Make a "Thruster" roll with the original value. This increased speed lasts for 3 exchanges plus 1 per success shift.

***Special Ordnance*** This ship contains a special ordnance that can be loaded in its missile's warheads. Choose one special ordnance type. The ship starts with 3 of such warheads, and can house more if its cargo allows. This stunt can be selected multiple times, each time granting access to a different special ordnance warhead. This stunt is only allowed for ships size 2 or larger.

***Spinal Mount Weapon*** Choose one of the ship's attack weapons (not its PDCs). This weapon can strike at larger ships as if it were 1 or 2 sizes larger. Only 1 spinal mount weapon is allowed per ship.

***Stealth Composites*** This ship is coated in nanotech stealth composites that can render it effectively invisible to enemie's systems. This is sensor invisibility, not optical invisibility. It gains the "Stealth" aspect, which can be invoked to get a +2 to stealth checks or to grant -2 in opponent's attempts to track it. It could even be invoked twice to get both benefits.

***Superconducting Hull*** This ship's hull grants it further protection from electromagnetic beams. When targeted by such a weapon, it only causes system damage if its attack roll succeeds by 4 or more.

***Transponder Mask*** A ship's transponder is its unique identificator. This ship can mask its original transponder signature with an array of other signatures, allowing it to assume many different "identities". This is usually considered illegal.
## Ship's Weapons

Every point in the "shoot" skill allows for the selection of a different ship weapon. Each ship weapon have different uses and statistics. Each weapon is a different combat station. Therefore, the "shoot" skill allow for as many combat stations as its value. When selecting weapons for a ship, each weapon can be selected more than once. Each time it is selected, a new combat station is added that allows for another operator.

Ship weapons have attributes of their own.

### Range

This is the range of a weapon in conflict zones. A range of 1 means the weapon can only effectively attack targets which are 1 conflict zone away. Sometimes, range may come in two values, separated by a dash, such as: 2-4. This lists the minimum and maximum ranges of a weapon. Attacking targets which are closer than the minimum range impose a -2 penalty to the attack roll for the difficulty in tracking these targets.

### Max Damage

Most weapons have a maximum damage value. If the final value of damage in an attack roll is greater than this, then the damage is capped to its maximum.

### Armor penetration

Sometimes, particularly powerful weapons can penetrate armor more easily. When a weapon with this statistic strikes an armored opponent, it ignores a number of armor points which are equal to its "armor penetration". Thus, for instance, a ship with "Hull 3" and "Armor 2" would only have 4 stress slots against a weapon with "armor penetration 1", and only 3 stress slots against a weapon with "armor penetration 2". If a weapon had greater armor penetration, it would have no impact on a ship like that, because then all of its armor would already be ignored.

### Tracking

Tracking weapons are expert at pinpointing evading targets. A weapon's tracking can impose a penalty on an opponent ship's "evasion", according to its "tracking" value. If a weapon has a negative tracking value, it adds to the target's evasion roll.

### Weapon List

* ***Gauss Guns***
	+ These are the "default" weapons of a ship. Gauss guns shoot magnetic-accelerated, non-exploding metallic projectiles at high speeds.

**Range:** 1

**Max Damage:** 3
* ***Railgun Cannon***
	+ A railgun cannon is a huge, faster version of the gauss gun. It shoots an extremely fast projectile that can hardly be avoided.

**Range:** 2-3

**Armor Penetration:** 2

**Tracking:** 2
* ***Point-Defence Cannons***
	+ Small cannons with good tracking that are basically used to defend against incoming missiles. Without PDCs, a ship can hardly defend against missiles. It could be used to target another ship directly, but would deal minimal damage.

**Range:** 0

**Max Damage:** 1

**Tracking:** 1
* ***Laser Cannon***
	+ Lasers have extreme range, but require constant aiming at precise points in order to cause damage.

**Range:** 5

**Max Damage:** 3

**Tracking:** -1
* ***Plasma Cannons***
	+ These cannons shoot a beam of cohesive plasma contained by a toroidal, self-containing magnetic field. They have no maximum damage cap, but are much harder to aim since they are much slower than other projectiles.

**Range:** 3

**Tracking:** -1
* ***Electromagnetic (microwave) Beams***
	+ These powerful microwave antennas shoot a cohesive beam of microwave that electrifies a ship's systems. It doesn't deal any damage in stress points, but can be used to disable a ship's systems (see further down, the section of "system damage"). Because they are essentially invisible, they are much harder to evade.

**Range:** 3

**Max Damage:** 0

**Tracking:** 2
* ***Missiles***
	+ Missiles are projectiles which carry a warhead that can deal a lot, or a little damage. They are smart, in the sense that once another ship is target-locked, evading them is extremely unlikely. However, they are the slowest of all weapons (in spite of being pretty fast, in absolute terms), and can therefore be targeted by PDCs. Missiles are assumed to have a powerful chemical explosive warhead. For special ordnance types, see further down.

**Range:** 7

**Tracking:** 4
* ***Proximity Mines***
	+ These ships can deploy an explosive overhead that is set to detonate whenever another ship enters their zone. They can be set to ignore any friendly ships, but once they detonate, any ships in that conflict zone will take damage, regardless of being friend or foe. This damage cannot be avoided, and have no maximum damage cap. Proximity mines can be armed with special ordnance warheads, if the ship has access to them.

### Special Ordnance

Some ships may carry specialized missile warheads. These are available through the "special ordnance" stunt. Special ordnance types are:

* ***Nuclear Warheads*** If an armed nuclear warhead manages to strike a ship, don't bother with damage. It, and everything within, is utterly vaporized. Size 5 ships may leave some pieces of themselves behind, but survivability of its occupants is unlikely. Any other ship in the same zone takes 3 points of indefensible damage (which causes a random system damage). If a nuclear missile is shot down by a PDC, it is destroyed harmlessly. However, it may be set to explode not "at" the ship, but "close" to it. In this case, the explosion affects the conflict zone as described, but the targeted ship is damaged like any other. Such proximity attacks cannot be stopped by PDCs.
* ***Corrosive Warheads*** This is a concentrated corrosive nanomaterial that, upon impact, is sprayed upon the target ship. This causes 1 point of damage at the end of the affected ship's next turn, plus another point of damage at the end of every turn, until the ship is completely destroyed. In order to prevent that, the affected ship needs to emergentially overcharge its hull, which causes a complete system reboot. The entire ship cannot take any action on the next combat exchange.
* ***EMP Warheads*** This works like an "Electromagnetic Beam" attack, but affecting every ship in a given conflict zone. If the missile isn't shot down by PDCs, the EMP damage cannot be defended. Furthermore, it doesn't affects just one a ship's systems, but three, at random, for every ship in the zone.
* ***Dummy Signature Warheads*** This missile doesn't attack a target, but splits into 3 and follows along its mothership. Each of the 3 dummys emit the same EM signature as the mothersip. Any attack made upon the mothership has an equal chance to strike a dummy instead. Dummys cannot defend from attacks, and are destroyed once hit, regardless of damage.
* ***Stealth Warheads*** These missiles have regular warheads, but are covered in EM-shielding coat. This make it much harder for PDCs to detect them. PDCs have -2 to defend against such missiles. Cannot be combined with other types of special warheads.
* ***Jamming Warheads*** The missile releases thousands of small circuits which resonate with various radio frequencies, and then sends out a small EMP that electrifies them all. This creates a resonating interference which jams ship's sensors. Any ship attempting to detect anything within, or through the affected zone (including the ship which launched the missile) suffers a -2 penalty in "sensor" rolls. This lasts for the whole conflict.

## G-Forces

There's a big problem with space combat: human beings. Speeds in space combat are extreme, so much so that even the slightest turn may impose G-forces that most humans just cannot withstand. There are some actions that, when performed by a ship containint human operators, may cause them all to make a "G-force roll". This is a "Physique" roll with specified result effects.

Actions that cause a G-force roll are:

* Attempting to "evade" any attack. G-force roll with a penalty equalling the "evade" roll result.
* Turning the ship. Normal G-force roll for a 60 degrees turn. G-force roll at -2 for a 120-degree turn, at -4 for a 180-degree turn.
* Acclerating for over 1G. G-force roll with a penalty equalling the amount of Gs of acceleration minus 1.

### G-Force rolls

Make a Physique roll with the appropriate penalties. Check the result below:

* Success by 1 or more: Nothing happens.
* Marginal success by 0: Character gets the "dizzy" boost. If compelled, it causes a -2 to one action only. If the character already had the "dizzy" boost, it becomes an aspect that lasts for the scene.
* Failure by 1 or 2: Character passes out and cannot act on the next conflict exchange.
* Failure by 3 or more: Character passes out and cannot act on the next conflict exchange, and take 1 point of physical stress damage.

## Drone Swarms

The extreme G-forces in space combat are what prevents the use of so-called "starfighters" manned by human pilots. However, nothing prevents using them as unmanned drones. Experience have taught that a swarm of smaller drones is almost always more effective than a single, big drone fighter. Therefore, ships may be equipped with a "drone swarm" that can be deployed and controlled remotely by a VR interface from within the ship.

Drone swarms behave in combat as a new character. Each drone swarm can be configured pre-combat in order to perform different actions. Drone swarms contain the same attributes as regular spaceships, but the sum of all of its skills and hull cannot exceed the original ship's points in the "Drones" skill. Drone swarms cannot have armor, nor the "cargo" skill.

Regardless of its "Shoot" value, drone swarms always contain the same weapon which are gauss guns with a range of 0. From the original ship, they are controlled by an operator using their "Drive" skill.

An operator can set a drone swarm to defend the mothership. However, the way this defense works is that the drone swarm interposes incoming attacks. Therefore, if the operator's defense roll is successful, the swarm will take damage instead, and will likely be destroyed.

Once a drone swarm is destroyed, it cannot be used again until the drones are replenished. However, motherships with cargo space may fill up their cargo with extra swarms that can be deployed if the original is destroyed.

Drone swarms are especially useful because damage from their attacks are not diminished by a target ship's size. They are considered to be a "size 1" ship, with the caveat that if they are targeted by PDCs, these have no penalty in their attack rolls.

## Managing Weapon Ammunition

For simplicity's sake, players do not have to keep track of how much ammunition each one of the ship's weapons have or consume. However, special missile payloads may require accounting, as well as a ship's supply of drone swarms.

Furthermore, a targeted shot on a ship's cargo hold can be used to "Create and Advantage" which applies an aspect called "Out of Ammo" for an opposing ship. If this aspect is compelled, the opposing ship loses access to one of their attack weapons for the duration of the conflict.

## System damage

Whenever an attack roll succeeds in striking a ship by a margin of 3 or more, and causes at least 1 point of damage, system damage occurs. System damage causes one of the ship's systems to become disabled, or maybe even destroyed.

Causing system damage is an attacker's choice. If the attacker opts to call for system damage, they may determine which ship's system is damaged. The defender, then, has the option of accepting the system damage, or negating it by spending a fate point. If system damage is accepted, the defender gains a fate point.

System damage causes a specific system of the ship to cease functioning until the end of the conflict. If the same system is damaged again, then it is completely destroyed.

Any individual weapon can be targeted as a system. Any of the other ship's skills also counts as a system (Drones, Evasion, Thrusters, Sensors, Stealth and Cargo).

There are two additional, "special" systems, that every ship has. They are "Generator" and "Bridge". These systems are usually the most protected ones on a ship, and can only be targeted if another 2 systems have already been disabled, or if one other system was destroyed. If the ship"s generator is disabled, the entire ship is dead in space, and is effectively out of combat. If the bridge is targeted, every character manning a combat station takes 2 points of indefensible physical stress damage.

Electromagnetic Beams can cause system damage without causing any point of stress damage to a ship. Furthermore, they cause system damage if their attack margin is 2 or more, instead of the usual 3.

## Combat Mechanics

Spaceship combat follows the same mechanic for character conflicts, with a few adjustments.

### Zones

Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. Therefore, combat in space is basically combat in "open" space. There are not many "obstacles" in space. If, by any chance, combat is occurring next to an obstacle, such as an asteroid, you can be absolutely sure that there won't be another obstacle anywhere near it. The only exception would be combat within a gas giant's rings, but that would be less of a combat, and more of a suicide.

Therefore, combat zones are drawn as having all the same size. We recomment using an hexagonal grid, where each zone is one hexagon. Many ships can occupy the same zone, but the zones would all be effectively identical.

### Movement

A ship's "Thruster" skill indicates how fast it can accelerate. It is first used in determining whether or not combat does occur. If a ship is being pursued and has a greater value of "Thruster" than its pursuers, then most likely combat doesn't happen. When pursuing ships caught up with a defender, they have to decelerate to match its speed, otherwise they will just "zip" past it. Therefore, while in combat, we do not measure a ship's absolute speed, but their relative positions against one another.

Place the ship with the lowest "Thruster" value in the center of the board. This ship cannot move forwards or backwards, but could move sideays. All other ships can move a number of zones in their turn which equal the difference of their "Thruster" skill to the slowest ship.

If any ship changes its direction or relative speed during combat, this triggers a G-force roll of all its occupants.
## Ship Upgrades

Upgrading or modifying a ship when you have access to a dockyard is a matter of paying the fee and waiting for some time. The fee to be paid is just the difference between the new configuration to the old one. If the new configuration is cheaper, the work is usually performed for free because the workers themselves can profit from the exchanged materials. The time it takes to perform the changes is 1 day per skill point of difference, 1 week per stunt.

If you do not have access to a dockyard, it is possible to modify a ship if its cargo contains "replacement parts" that can be used to perform the modification. Replacement parts are measured in their monetary value. Each ship's size can contain a certain value in replacement parts for each cargo point:

* Ship Size 1: Each cargo point can carry S$ 10.000 in replacement parts.
* Ship Size 2: Each cargo point can carry S$ 100.000 in replacement parts.
* Ship Size 3: Each cargo point can carry S$ 1.000.000 in replacement parts.
* Ship Size 4: Each cargo point can carry S$ 10.000.000 in replacement parts.
* Ship Size 5: Each cargo point can carry S$ 100.000.000 in replacement parts.

Modifying a ship without the support of a dockyard is much more complex, even with the required replacement parts. The modification time is multiplied by 5. No roll is needed but at least one character must have a "crafts" skill which equals or exceeds the greatest ship skill level that is being modified. Modifying stunts require "crafts 4".

Regardless of how a ship is being modified, it cannot increase or reduce its size category. If modifying a ship would reduce its size category, add the "cargo" skill until the ship size remain the same.

# Example Spaceships

 Cost: S$ 10.860.000
 Shoot: 5
Drones: 0
Evasion: 4
Thrusters: 5
Sensors: 3
Stealth: 2
Cargo: 3
    2x Gauss Guns
    Railgun Cannon (spinal mount)
    Point-Defense Cannons
 *Stunts:*
    Spinal Mount (railgun cannon)
    Special Ordnance (nuclear warheads)

 Cost: S$ 135.250.000
 Shoot: 5
Drones: 0
Evasion: 5
Thrusters: 7
Sensors: 5
Stealth: 5
Cargo: 4
    2x Gauss Guns
    Railgun Cannon
    Point-Defense Cannon
 *Stunts:*
    Special Ordnance (nuclear warheads)
    Stealth Composites

 Cost: S$ 9.850.000
 Shoot: 0
Drones: 0
Evasion: 3
Thrusters: 4
Sensors: 5
Stealth: 3
Cargo: 6
    Aerodynamics
    Transponder Mask

 Cost: S$ 86.000
 Shoot: 0
Drones: 0
Evasion: 1
Thrusters: 3
Sensors: 1
Stealth: 1
Cargo: 2
    Aerodynamics
    Solid-State Afterburners

 Cost: S$ 4.387.500
 Shoot: 0
Drones: 0
Evasion: 3
Thrusters: 5
Sensors: 5
Stealth: 3
Cargo: 5
 *Stunts:*
    Superconducting Hull