Great White Games/Pinnacle Entertainment Group

[Weird Dave]

Over the last few years I've been struggling with trying to get a science fiction game off the ground. I was torn between three systems - Alternity, Savage Worlds, and GURPS. Each had its perks (I wanted to use the Star*Drive setting, so Alternity was the original game) but one of the things that drew me away from Savage Worlds was its lack of a cohesive vehicle system. Specifically one that allows the players to upgrade their vehicle, in that case a starship.

So a few days ago I got to thinking about a unified vehicle system for Savage Worlds and came up with a system that I think maintains the Fast! Furious! Fun! feeling of the core SW game without adding TOO much complexity.

Savage Worlds Alternate Vehicle Rules

This document outlines a new method of handling vehicles that replaces not only their construction but also their stats. The basic idea is that a vehicle is treated more like a character, with attributes and derived statistics. Each vehicle is made unique through the use of Edges and Hindrances, which also allows the upgrade of a vehicle by a proper mechanic. Like characters, however, weapons are treated as “equipment” though there are limitations within that as well.

Revised Statistics
As presented in the Savage Worlds Explorer’s Edition vehicles have the following statistics: Acc/Top Speed, Climb, Toughness, Passengers, and Cost. Size and type were added in the Sci-Fi Gear Toolkit but primarily as an expression for each type of vehicle (starships, mechs, ground vehicles). They did not seem compatible with each other.
Introduced in these rules are a uniform set of statistics for vehicles that have rough equivalents to character attributes. While adding a bit of complexity, creating vehicles becomes much like creating NPCs, which Savage Worlds already handles with great ease.
To start with each vehicle is denoted as belonging to a certain class, identifying its primary use. These classes are as follows: Ground, Air, Water, and Space. These have the following assumptions, which can be modified through Edges and Hindrances. These assumptions can also be changed based on the setting.

Ground: Vehicle has 4 wheels
Air: Vehicle has wings
Water: Vehicle has an open hull
Space: Vehicle has an enclosed hull

All vehicles have the following basic attributes, rated on the d4 to d12+ scale just like characters.

Bulk: How big the vehicle is, determines crew requirements and Weapon Platforms. Also affects Acc, Toughness, and Handling.
Agility: How maneuverable the vehicle is, helps to determine Acc and Handling.
Vigor: How durable the vehicle is, helps to determine Toughness
Tech: How advanced the underlying technology is, compared to other vehicles of the setting. Also determines the minimum skill rating the pilot needs (Boating, Driving, Piloting) and crew requirements.
Power: How much power the vehicle has for internal systems; this attribute can be 0 for vehicles that have no internal power systems (such as those that rely on wind or manpower to move them). Also handles fuel efficiency.

Vehicles also have the following derived statistics:

Acc: How many inches per round the vehicle can increase speed. Acceleration is equal to the sum of the vehicle’s Agility and Power die types.
Top Speed: The top speed the vehicle can achieve in combat scenarios. Top Speed is equal to the sum of the vehicle’s Bulk and Power die types, multiplied by 5.
Toughness: How much damage the vehicle can take before it suffers a Shaken or wound result. The vehicle’s Toughness is equal to the sum of the Bulk and Vigor die types. All vehicles also have a base Armor equal to ½ the Bulk die type.
Handling: How maneuverable the vehicle is, represented as a bonus or penalty to control rolls (Boating, Driving, Piloting). Handling is equal to the difference between the vehicle’s Agility and Bulk die types divided by 2 – if Bulk is higher it will be a penalty, and if Agility is higher it will be a bonus.
Crew + Passengers: How many people are needed to man the vehicle, not including weapons (if any). This is displayed as a number + another number; the first number is the required crew and the second is passengers. Required crew and passengers varies by Bulk, Tech, and Power die types; refer to the below chart for the exact numbers. Cargo Space can be converted to passengers on a 1:1 ratio.
Cargo Space: This is number of cargo spaces the vehicle has. The number is based on the vehicle’s Bulk die type, as seen in the chart below. Passengers can be converted to Cargo Space on a 1:1 ratio.
Weapon Platforms (WP): How many slots the vehicle has available for mounted weapons. This is equal to the vehicle’s Bulk die type.
Climb: Air and Space class vehicles have a Climb statistic as well, which determines how many inches the vehicle can climb each round. Climb is equal to the vehicle’s Acc for Air and Space class vehicles.

Thoughts? Sorry about the long post, but I wanted to encapsulate the heart of the system. I've got much more details regarding specific Edges, Hindrances, weapons, and optional rules. Anything good or bad or missing from these base attributes?
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"Weird Dave" Olson
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[Harboe]

Hmmm... it would be easier to determine for me, if I knew what a basic car, an 18-wheeler and a tank (for example) would be written out as in a modern day setting.

Is 5 Power much? 25? 50?
Same for the other stats. Like Tech Level, which seems like a useful thing with a lot of implications that are sadly left up to my imagination
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[Weird Dave]

Good point. All of the attributes except for Bulk assume a d6 is "average" - your modern day, run of the mill vehicles will have stats like this:

Early Car (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d4, Vigor d6, Tech d4, Power d4
Acc: 8, Top Speed: 40, Toughness: 12 (2)
Handling: 0, Crew: 1+5, Cargo: 1; WP: 4
Cost: $2K

Motorcycle (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d8, Vigor d4, Tech d6, Power d4
Acc: 20, Top Speed: 40, Toughness: 8 (1)
Handling: +2, Crew: 1+1, Cargo: 1; WP: 2
Hindrances: Open Design
Edges: Increased Torque, Long Hauler, Two Wheels
Cost: $3K

Dirt Bike (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d8, Vigor d4, Tech d6, Power d4
Acc: 14, Top Speed: 40, Toughness: 8 (1)
Handling: +2, Crew: 1+1, Cargo: 1; WP: 2
Hindrances: Open Design, Thin Chassis
Edges: Long Hauler, Off Road, Two Wheels
Cost: $2K

Compact Car (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d6, Vigor d4, Tech d6, Power d6
Acc: 12, Top Speed: 50, Toughness: 10 (2)
Handling: +1, Crew: 1+2, Cargo: 1; WP: 4
Hindrances: Cramped Space, Thin Chassis
Cost: $5K

Mid-Sized Car (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d6, Vigor d6, Tech d6, Power d6
Acc: 12, Top Speed: 50, Toughness: 12 (2)
Handling: +1, Crew: 1+4, Cargo: 1; WP: 4
Cost: $13K

SUV (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d4, Vigor d6, Tech d6, Power d8
Acc: 12, Top Speed: 60, Toughness: 12 (2)
Handling: 0, Crew: 1+4, Cargo: 5; WP: 4
Hindrances: Fuel Hog
Edges: Off Road, Extra Cargo, Easy Power
Cost: $10K

Sports Car (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d8, Vigor d4, Tech d6, Power d8
Acc: 24, Top Speed: 60, Toughness: 10 (2)
Handling: +2, Crew: 1+2, Cargo: 1; WP: 4
Hindrances: Cramped Space
Edges: Increased Torque, Easy Power
Cost: $20K

Semi Truck (Ground)
Attributes: Bulk d4, Agility d4, Vigor d10, Tech d6, Power d6
Acc: 8, Top Speed: 50, Toughness: 16 (2)
Handling: -2, Crew: 1+4, Cargo: 1; WP: 4
Hindrances: Lumbering
Cost: $8K
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"Weird Dave" Olson
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[Boldfist]

It's late and I'm just reading this... but I've been wanting to make vehicles more like characters since I saw something similar in the Serenity RPG. And the ships with Edges/Hindrances from Pirates of the Spanish Main.

There has to be a fun and easy way to do it. I'll reread your post in the morning and put up my notes that I had from a year or so ago when i was wanting to do the same thing!
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Norm "No Relation" Hensley

[Control]

Weird Dave,

At first glance I like it a lot. I'd love to see you post it on Savegapedia or Savage heroes. Let me know if I can help, play test, stat conversion etc.

The first thing I notice is that the vehicle class seems too leave out a few options. For example;

Ground: Vehicle has 4 wheels (no tracked vehicles, walkers, or hovercraft?)
Air: Vehicle has wings (no rotorcraft, dirgibles, balloons?)
Water: Vehicle has an open hull (submarines?)
Space: Vehicle has an enclosed hull

Might I humbly suggest changing them to;

Ground: designed to operate in contact with or close to the ground.
Air: designed to operate in an atmosphere.
Water: designed to operate on or in a liquid environment.
Space: designed to operate in a vacuum and microgravity.
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[Control]

Now lets see if I can use what you've posted to build a zeppelin!

Zeppelin
Attributes: Bulk d8, Agility d4, Vigor d4, Tech d4, Power d4
Acc: 8, Top Speed: 60, Toughness: 12 (4)
Handling: -2, Crew: 5+25 , Cargo: 50; WP: 14

I want to make it more fragile, and it would probably have hindrances like Lumbering & Long Hauler.

Also I'm just guessing on the basic stats because I don't know what a d8 Bulk, or a d4 tech translate to.
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[Weird Dave]

Those are quite good stats. I've been wrestling with the Bulk comparison, and here's how my thought process has gone in terms of examples.

d4 - A car
d6 - Millennium Falcon
d8 - AT-AT walker
d10 - Titanic
d12 - star destroyer
d12+ - Something bigger???

It's still very loose. Your Bulk d8 Zeppelin is quite large but not the king of the skies, so it works quite well. You could have a smaller scout zeppelin as well.

The reasoning behind the class assumptions is to have a base to be modified. If we assume that Ground vehicles are standard to have 4 wheels, than we don't need to do anything to make a car. To make it hover, however, would require the Hovercraft Edge. Or to reduce the wheels, like a motorcycle, would require the Two Wheels Edge.

Similarly for Air class vehicles. Your zeppelin would have the Envelope and Gondola Edge, changing it from a winged Air vehicle to a balloon air vehicle. The submarine is a Water class vehicle with the Submersible Edge. I post my full document to Savagepedia later today I'm thinking - I hope that will clear it up.
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"Weird Dave" Olson
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[steelbrok]

Like Control I liked the way ships were built like characters in the Serenity RPG. I wonder if it would be possible to use the existing character attributes (strength, agility etc) and so scale the vehicles directly to people and animals

Yes, this would mean something like the Death Star having a strength of something like d12+1000 but at the level of vehicles that are more character scaled this might be an easier way to compare [the deathstar is beter treated as a city than a vehicle anyway]

thus handling might be based on agility, spaces/cargo on strength etc

[Weird Dave]

Basing vehicles on the character attributes is exactly where I started. Two of them made it over - Agility and Vigor. Very portable, very easy to bring over to vehicles.

The other three - Strength, Smarts, and Spirit - I had difficulty defining what they meant in terms of vehicles. What does Strength actually measure in Savage Worlds? How strong you are, your lifting capabilities and melee damage. What does that mean for a vehicle? Vigor kind of covers the generic "how strong is it" in terms of health and damage, and I wanted a unified system for size. Bulk became my answer.

Similarly Smarts and Spirit didn't seem to translate well. I'm certainly up for suggestions, but the switch over to Tech and Power seem to fit the vehicle mold a bit more naturally.
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[Alcamtar]

Can the vehicle make attribute rolls? I can see soak rolls (Vigor) but I can't really picture making a Bulk roll. It seems to me that if you're assigning dice, they ought to be rolled. Also can a vehicle be a Wild Card? The Millennium Falcon was great at soaking damage, TIE fighters not so much.

If the vehicle has an AI or autopilot then it would have its own Agility, Smarts, and Spirit. Non-AI vehicles would rely on the driver/pilot to provide these traits, though it might have a bonus or penalty to agility based on handling. This interpretation also allows a crossover between vehicles and robots.

Not sure about Bulk. Another way to handle this would be Mass -- does the vehicle have enough Power to propel its Mass? The difference could be a modifier to acceleration and handling.

Do vehicles have a Size rating (like creatures do) that affects Toughness and perhaps bulk?

Not trying to be critical, just offering a different viewpoint. (yes I come from HERO-land)

[Weird Dave]

All of those are good points and questions! Exactly the reason why I put these rules up there.

Vehicles can make attribute rolls. For instance, in what I have currently the "captain" (or controller, if there is no captain) would have to make a Power roll to avoid overheating under certain circumstances. Energy shields allow you to soak damage with the Tech attribute. Currently vehicles do not get Wild Dice, but that could certainly be modified with just a few teaks.

The other aspect I wanted to introduce was the idea that the appropriate vehicle attribute would replace a character's Wild Die in certain circumstances. An engineer making modifications would roll their Repair plus a Wild Die equal to the vehicle's Tech. The controller would roll Boating/Driving/Piloting with a Wild Die equal to the vehicle's Agility.

I hadn't thought this through all the way yet so this is top of the head musings.

Bulk is still strange. You don't really make a Bulk check, but I wanted a number associated with size that scaled. You could pretty easily remove Bulk and replace it with Small, Medium, Large, Huge, Gargantuan, Super Gargantuan, but I think you would need to apply a numeric value to those as well. The sliding die scale offers a pretty elegant solution, PLUS rough guidelines if the GM wanted to have the vehicle make a roll to do something related to size (i.e., squeeze into a narrow opening before two boats closed the gap ala Last Crusade).

There is merit to making vehicles Wild Cards, though the existing SW:EX don't cover them (vehicles get 2 wounds and that's it and don't soak). Muse away!
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"Weird Dave" Olson
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[Weird Dave]

Creatures have Size Modifiers, reflecting how easy or difficult they are to hit based on their size. Makes sense.

Vehicles have Bulk attributes for comparison between vehicles. A Bulk d4 car and a Bulk d4 starship are comparable in size, enough where they don't receive bonuses or penalties to shoot at each other. I think you could compare the Bulk attributes for vehicles to get a size modifier that would work. A Bulk d6 ship shooting at a Bulk d4 ship takes a -2 penalty (or -1 if you wanted to have the difference). That same Bulk d4 ship shooting at the Bulk d6 ship would get a +2 bonus (or +1).

Vehicles to creatures, however, is where things get very ... messy. Maybe take the Bulk attribute die type to get its Size Modifier, or divide the Size Modifier for the creature by 4 to get a rough approximation of its Bulk.
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"Weird Dave" Olson
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[Bill]

Instead of "Bulk" you could use "Structure" and the derrivative of this as your vehicle "Toughness"?

This has been tried before but tends to break down when building up or comparing differnent things. Living creatures tend to work ok but vehicles, especially super large and tiny but powerful fighters just seem to break this limited system.

Now the Pulp and Sci fi toolkits both have ideas for vehcile construction so players can tweek them.

My players in the Slipstream game want to keep their ship but "improve it" beyond trading cargo for weapons. toward that end I am letting them pick the stats for a ship that has more what they want and "rebuild" the ship to cover it. Now I do like the idea about a ship having personal edges and hindrances to make it unique. Again not a new idea but one worth pursueing;>)
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[slade]

I would say you been a bit optimistic on motorcycle handling!

[RPTroll]

Space 1889:Red Sands is a Savage Setting that has a nice cloud ship construction section in it. It can also be used for Ether (space) ships. I developed a spreadsheet to help with the construction construction. Here's a screen shot.



You can find it at http://rptroll.blogspot.com/search/label/Space%201889

Let me know when you guys get to a point where you're happy with this thread's design. I'll gladly do a similar one for a more generic vehicle sheet.
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[steelbrok]

You might want to check the "Spaceships as Characters" section in this document

http://chaosmeister.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/savage-space-version-1_0.pdf

[ogbendog]

The rules for characters works best for things about 6' tall and 150-250 lbs. It would be tricky to make up rules allowing PCs as small as mice or as big as elephants.

So you might need vehicle systems with scales. I mean, one for personal vehicles; motorcycles, cards, buses, small planes, small helicopters.

a different one for battleships, aircraft carriers, etc.

[Virgobrown72]

I use the Vehicle/Starship creation rules from the Sci Fi Toolkit for all my vehicles, and it works really well...
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