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Post by finarvyn on Jan 9, 2010 11:58:29 GMT -5
In a way, the phaser is the bane of existance for a Star Trek RPG. I'm thinking of the scenes where a person gets hit by a phaser, gets all glowy, then vanished entirely. This tends to be pretty final, with few "help from McCoy" or "raise dead" options. What I tend to do is give dice of damage, but allow the glowy special effect if the target gets killed in a single hit. This means that a lot of redshirts go away but players can still recover from most phaser hits.
Of course, some other options include: 1) plots that require characters not to bring phasers (such as parties or diplomatic functions) 2) plots where characters lose their phasers (captured, tossed in jail, etc) 3) plots where it's to their advantage not to shoot people (most of the Star Trek episodes, actually, where people characters deal with are important, the Federation would be ticked if they are hurt/offended/intimidated/etc.)
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Post by rsaintjohn on Jan 11, 2010 3:06:35 GMT -5
I like the way Phasers are handled in the Japanese game Enterprise. In short, there are the four settings, and each has a different effective range which scales with the model. Effect/damage is always the same based on the setting: Type I Hand Phaser - Damage is divided between 4 settings (selected beforehand) - Stun - Effective range 30m. The other party faints unconditionally when hit.
- Destruction - Effective range 20m. Damage is resolved by one 20-sided dice (percentile dice, 0-9)
- Dematerialize - Effective range 10m. The object disappears when hit.
- Heat - Effective range 1m. The target is warmed up.
Type II Hand Phaser - General phaser, pistol type. Damage is the same as Type I, but range changes. - Stun - Effective range 90m
- Destruction - Effective range 60m
- Dematerialize - Effective range 30m
- Heat - Effective range 2m
Phaser Rifle - The range is different, but damage is the same. - Stun - effective range 150m
- Destruction - Effective range 100m
- Dematerialize - Effective range 50m
- Heat - Effective range 4m
As a side note, ranged combat is based on a table cross-referencing the character's DX against Short, Medium or Long range (each weapon has its own set of corresponding ranges) which gives a percentage. The character must roll-under or equal to the target number (which may be modified by other factors). Example: Spock has a Phaser II, and he's going to try to stun a dodging Klingon at 60 meters (for Phaser II, that's Medium range). Cross-referencing Spock's DX 16 against Medium range results in the probability of a hit at 49%. But because the Klingon is dodging, a penalty of 10% is applied and the adjusted probability is 39%. Spock rolls a 3 and a 4, so he hits and the Klingon is stunned. I like the mechanic because it somewhat encourages characters in ranged combat to resolve in a non-lethal fashion at a distance. I also like the example in the game where a Klingon is hiding behind a rock, so Kirk simply switches his phaser to dematerialize and removes the cover: GM: "The rock disappears in front of your eyes. The Klingon stands there agape." Kirk: "Is he going to shoot us?" Spock: "It's likely he'll shoot us." GM: "Yes, likely." ;D
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Post by robertfisher on Jan 11, 2010 10:15:54 GMT -5
Is there ever an instance in the show of one of anyone (other than extraordinary creatures) getting hit by a phaser and not being instantly stunned/killed?
Also, is there an instance of someone firing a phaser and missing the target?
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Post by rsaintjohn on Jan 11, 2010 12:58:46 GMT -5
Is there ever an instance in the show of one of anyone (other than extraordinary creatures) getting hit by a phaser and not being instantly stunned/killed? Also, is there an instance of someone firing a phaser and missing the target? It's a good question and I think if we limit it to TOS, the answer to both is "no". I don't recall TAS in enough detail to know. I think the kind of phaser firefights we imagine in gaming did not actually show up on screen until perhaps TNG on TV and STV in the movies. Having said that, I'm not sure we'd want to take our lead from that. Firefights with misses, limited damage and so on are there in other Trek TV shows, so ingrained into the memory of many. Second, I think this is a case where what works best for a game may have to be weighed more heavily than what was onscreen.
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Post by slortar on Jan 11, 2010 13:52:35 GMT -5
Since a lot of TOS owes its feeling to classic TV westerns (lots of brawling, the sense of exploration/living on the frontier, a lot of the sets and so on), I don't think you'd go too far wrong by borrowing certain elements of that kind of gunfighting. Lots of missed shots, hiding behind cover, people getting "winged"...works for me.
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Post by Falconer on Jan 11, 2010 14:14:00 GMT -5
I’m pretty sure the Klingon from Friday’s Child shoots and misses. That is a gunfight, isn’t it? Even though it also involves bows-and-arrows and kligats.
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Post by finarvyn on Jan 11, 2010 19:16:40 GMT -5
I’m pretty sure the Klingon from Friday’s Child shoots and misses. That is a gunfight, isn’t it? Even though it also involves bows-and-arrows and kligats. I think that technically, Klingons shoot "disruptors" and not "phasers", but I suspect the effect is pretty much the same.
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Post by rsaintjohn on Jan 11, 2010 20:01:22 GMT -5
I think that technically, Klingons shoot "disruptors" and not "phasers", but I suspect the effect is pretty much the same. I think I've read in a number of places that disruptors don't have a stun setting. Which makes for some interesting game possibilities on those rare occasions when Klingons do want to take prisoners.
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Post by robertfisher on Jan 14, 2010 23:29:09 GMT -5
Having said that, I'm not sure we'd want to take our lead from that. Firefights with misses, limited damage and so on are there in other Trek TV shows, so ingrained into the memory of many. Second, I think this is a case where what works best for a game may have to be weighed more heavily than what was onscreen. I don’t know. I think HTH brawls serve this need for the game just fine. If the game had any type of “metapoints”, I’d be tempted to say that (hand) phasers always hit, but you have to spend a metapoint to use it. Possibly with increasing costs depending on the stun/disrupt/disintegrate setting. Is that worth it to help capture the feel of the series? Is that too new school an idea for here? What if you think of them as D&D spells? Powerfully tactically but limited to a few times “per day”. Is that any worse than the reaction we had when we first learned how spells worked in D&D. ;D
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Post by Falconer on Jan 15, 2010 0:59:08 GMT -5
I agree. I think fistfights, or fights with makeshift weapons or medieval-style weapons as appropriate (it seems to come up surprisingly often in the show) should cover 95% of man-to-man combat in Star Trek. Making hand phasers REALLY fearful weapons actually enables that. Who is going to start a firefight when they know that even if you’re just “nicked” you may cease to exist? Granted, even in a firefight people are going to use “stun” most often simply because it gets the job done humanely and you can get off way more shots (in STAGFF, a “disintegrate” drains more than half of a hand phaser’s energy). But, still, are you going to risk it?
IMO, killing someone with a hand phaser should lead to almost automatic demotion.
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Post by michaeltaylor on Jul 21, 2016 14:55:55 GMT -5
I've long debated what I'd want to do about a one-hit kill weapon if I ever ran a ST RPG. I think the best middle-ground solution I came up with was to allow a hit character some sort of reflexes-based save (assuming they were aware that they were being fired upon). Success would mean the shot is only a "graze", and although not an auto kill, the shot would still do a substantial amount of damage, possibly enough to kill or incapacitate the target regardless, but avoiding the stigma of a "if you're hit, you die" weapon. I just use straight damage for non-stun settings. So on a lucky roll you COULD survive it. As for Disintegrate, I use the gamey logic that Disintegrate does even more damage, but only 'vaporizes' only if you do enough damage to outright kill the target. To me, not only would you be instantly court-martialed if you killed someone this way (and were caught!) but it's also just common sense in a world with disintegrate technology. You DON'T start that fight unless there is no other choice...
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