Update #55 - 2021
almost 4 years ago – Wed, Feb 03, 2021 at 12:04:38 AM

Hey there.

Welcome to the new year, everybody. We hope you all had a good holiday. It was super chaotic here (hense the delayed update... sorry about that) and we're finally getting back to "normal."

We do wanna just say that we're still alive, but we have just been trying to figure some things out on our end.

Anyway, just wanted to drop a quick update so you knew we're still here.

-Project Lead Spirit

Update #54 - Quick Update
almost 4 years ago – Wed, Nov 11, 2020 at 07:49:51 AM

Hello everybody.

Sadly, there's very little to report this time around, but I thought I'd give you all a quick check-in at least.

There's been very, very slow progress over the past couple months. Day jobs have just gotten in the way (especially mine, as the production facility I work at is still in busy season, and a few months behind schedule...), and my computer was down for a few weeks recently as it overheated and fried itself.

Fortunately, no data was lost thanks to the project files being spread between secondary drives and online platforms. The only thing lost was time to be able to work on the project (ironically, the couple weeks that the system was down was when I would have had the most time to work on things recently...).

I personally hate that things are taking as long as they have and still are on the project, and I honestly stress over it more than is healthy... My goal right now is to have things done, printed, and shipped by this time next year at the latest. I can't definitively set a release date yet, but that is the goal I'm shooting for, come hell or high water, if I can... Not just to get the stress off my own back, but because I feel like I've let you all down thus far...

That all said, we're otherwise all doing fine, just trying to get by with all the craziness in the world right now. Hope you are, too.

- Project Lead Spirit

Update 53 - A Quick Look Into the Current Process
about 4 years ago – Fri, Sep 04, 2020 at 01:54:10 AM

Hello again!

We are still working through the book, albeit still at a slower pace than we would like. It is tough though when the team is so small and most of us are currently working very busy full-time jobs cause of Covid now... We do hope you all are safe during this uncertain time, though, and we will continue pushing forward as best we can.

Aside from that brief update, today I wanted to give you all a bit of insight into the process we are currently going through in trying to get the book written. This is the long, arduous part of the project that has proven to be the part of the cake that we bit off but admittedly weren't fully prepared to chew.

Initially, I was trying to undertake this whole process myself, as I was the one who fully knew what the writing needed to be like, but the burnout and stress became too much for me (which, in all honesty, has been a big part of the delays the project has undergone). Fortunately, a couple of the other team members have stepped in now, volunteering their time to assist in writing as best they can, which is what's helped enable things to start rolling again, even as slow as it's been.

Now, with that out of the way, let's look at the process of how the book is being written.

Firstly, a lot of notes were created during the brainstorming stage of the project. These tended to be put into a handful of documents stored where the team all had access to them. These documents comprised everything from mechanics to lore to just random ideas that may or may not even get implemented. After this initial stage, however, certain things got scattered across various locations, especially during play testing. Tweaks, changes, and new ideas that cropped up during testing tended to just get written down on whatever was on hand at the time. Also, a lot of things were actually solidified on the fly during the writing of many of the update posts, and even then, a lot of things were changed after the posts. These methods, while convenient in the short term, proved to be detrimental in the long run as now things needed to be compiled into a single space for each piece of an already complicated puzzle. This has been an ongoing chore, and is still being done even now.

Once these notes are compiled, they are being put into documents that are either sent to one of the two team members helping me out, or saved for me to go through. These notes are taken an a section is written using them. Some are small, simple one paragraph sections or subsections (such as "Healing Items"), while others are longer, more intensive sections that make more sense to do as a whole (such as "Character Creation").

After the writing is completed, it then will get passed around to a couple of different team members for proof-reading, including a screening by me to ensure everything is up to spec and sounds fairly cohesive with the rest of the writing. Sometimes, this might lead to a re-write, which takes additional time.

Once a section meets approval, it gets put into folder with all the completed documents. From here, it is copied into the master text document that contains the raw text copy for the book. This is what will get used when it's put into the graphic layout for the book that will ultimately be what goes to print, but that's a whole other topic.

And that's our look at the process we're going through. Apologies for it taking waaaay longer than it ever should have, but thanks for sticking with us this far. We promise that the project WILL get done, one way or another.

Anyway, catch ya for next month's update, and stay safe out there!

- Project Lead Spirit

Update #52 - Star Ship Mechanics
over 4 years ago – Thu, Jul 02, 2020 at 02:59:21 PM

Hello everybody!

I know, I know. I said this update would be at the beginning of June and not July, but at least this time I'm only off a month. Not only did this post take longer to write than originally anticipated, things are also still getting back towards normal, but it's still slow going, so please bear with us. We do hope you all are still doing well through all this craziness in the world right now.

Today we'll be taking a brief look at the Star Ship rules that will be included in the system. These rules are still being ironed out and heavily in flux because of it, but we have enough of it pinned down to make an overview of what some of our final plans are for it. As such, what's shown here is likely to still be tweaked or reworked before the final release.

Star Ship Rules

Star ships are complex things, but they don't have to be as far as mechanics go. We've striven to reach a happy medium between the depth of star ship design and simple game mechanics that still allow for a lot customization and fun when it comes to these integral sci-fi vehicles. Let's start with the basics, shall we?

The Basics

To start with, all star ships have a name, tier, and class.

Ship names are fairly self-explanatory, and don't really affect anything game wise. Simply name your ship how you want to. There are certain naming conventions that will be provided in the book for things like navies and possibly the different races, but these will really only be suggestions for you to fit your ship in to the lore of the Galloping Stars' main universe. Ultimately, name your ship what you want to!

Tier, however, does have an impact on the game mechanics. Your ship's tier defines what available classes it can be, as well as its size on the battle map (which, much like regular combat, is assumed to be grid based). 

There are currently 6 tiers of ships:

• Tier 1 (T1) - Small personal craft (shuttles, fighters, etc.)
• Tier 2 (T2) - Smaller crewed ships (frigates, small freighters, etc.)
• Tier 3 (T3) - Medium crewed ships (destroyers, cruisers, etc.)
• Tier 4 (T4) - Large crewed ships (carriers, battleships, etc.) / Small space stations
• Tier 5 (T5) - Mega-ships (dreadnoughts, super-carriers, etc.) / Medium space stations
• Tier 6 (T6) - Large space stations and living cities

Keep in mind that most players and their parties will be limited to Tier 1-3, while Tier 4-6 will mostly be seen operated by governments, militaries, and companies. This is simply a matter of economics as most of the larger ships will cost more Bits to purchase and operate than the players can afford, even as a group, but the GM (and the story) can always determine otherwise. For example, let's say the players clear out a Tier 4 space station and want to use it as their hideout, or if they board a Dreadnought and usurp the captain and gain the loyalty of the crew, they may be able to gain control of a larger ship.

Continuing on, once you've picked your tier (or, if you want to start with class and let that define your tier) class is the most important choice to make as it will determine much of your ship's capabilities. We won't list all the classes here, that's something you'll have to wait for the final book for, but we will discuss how the classes affect things briefly.

Class determines the ship's:

• Speed
• Armor
• Hit Points
• Shields
• Module categories/quantities

Note that Speed, Armor, HP, and Shields are also affected by the modules on your ship and the power levels assigned to each. Which leads us to our next topic – Power.

Power

Power is the most important resource for any star ship. It is the lifeblood of the vessel that runs everything from the weapons on down to the life support systems. No matter how good the crew is, without power, the ship would cease to function. However, power is also not an unlimited resource, and it's careful distribution across systems for differing situations is the basis for the star ship mechanics in Galloping Stars.

Each ship is outfitted with a magical reactor core that provides the energy necessary to run it's basic systems at a minimum level plus a quantity of additional power that can be distributed where necessary. Each module on the ship will have a power requirement to operate at it's minimum capability. For example, the ship's engines (a basic module) will require 2 levels of power to operate at their minimal level. However, modules can also be "overcharged" by directing more power too them, allowing for increased effects. More on this a little later.

Each reactor core has a Maximum Power Output, which is the total amount of power it provides, as described above. However, in the event of a main reactor shutdown a back-up power supply, denoted in the rules as the ship's Reserve Power, will be activated. This output of this reserve power supply is often less than half of the primary one, but is enough to maintain some function of the ship until repairs can me made. This reduced power supply must be managed carefully, though, as the limited energy means you may have to make some hard decisions such as turning off the life-support systems for a short time to gain a boost of speed from the engines in a desperate attempt to escape from your pursuers.

In the event that both of these power sources fail, the ship will be completely dead in the water and without life-support, the crew will likely perish unless a timely rescue is made.

Maximum power level for any module is 5 (in general at least, though there will be ways to make exceptions to this rule), while minimum requirements will depend on the individual module.

As you can see, power is very crucial to star ship operation, and an integral part of the core mechanics for these vessels. But what all are they able to power? To answer that, let's take a look at modules next.

Modules

To start with, star ship modules come in a variety of categories. These are broken up into 3 different overarching categories, defined as such:

• Utility Modules (Engines, Life-Support, Cargo Bays, etc.)
• Combat Modules (Weapons, Shields, Armor, etc.)
• Sub-System Modules (A.I., Cyber Warfare Modules, Radar, etc.)

Each of these is limited to a certain quantity, defined by your ship's class. However, each ship will always have at least 2 Utility Module slots, and these first 2 MUST ALWAYS be filled by an engine and a life support module. For example, a Fighter may have only 2 Utility Modules (its required engines and life-support modules), 2 Combat Modules, and 1 Sub-System Module.

Now, each individual module will have a level assigned to it (such as Engines II). The max level of each that you may equip to your ship is generally defined as the [tier level of your ship]  + 1. As an example, a Tier 1 ship will only be able to equip up to level 2 modules. 

However, certain modules may have a higher or lower limit depending upon the class of ship. To demonstrate, a corvette class ship is a tier 2 ship, usually restricted to level 3 modules, however, as the corvette class is known primarily for its fast sub-light speed, it is able to equip up to level 5 engines. However this comes at the expense of other module levels. In order to make space for those bigger engines the corvette can only equip up to level 2 combat modules. Note that these changes can affect specific modules (such as the corvette's engines) or whole categories (such as the corvette's combat module options).

Why take higher level modules? Because they allow for increased capability. Each level of a module may require a higher minimum power input, depending on the module, but it also does more per power level assigned to it. For example, a higher level engine module will increase the ship's speed per power level that has been directed to it. Where a level 2 engine may only output 10Ac (Universal Astronomic-Constant, the unit of distance used in sub-light space in Galloping Stars, more on that in the next section) per power level, a level 3 engine may output 15Ac per power level instead, making the [minimum/maximum] distance a ship can travel per turn go from [20Ac/50Ac] to [30Ac/75Ac].

We'll keep the full list of different types of modules for release in the final product, but we will mention that each module type has been simplified to just it's core idea for now (such as all the different reactor core types in the universe being kept to just "Reactor Core"). This is for simplicity in the system, but we may expand upon this in a future expansion release, but for now the modules are kept simplified as we feel the system is already as deep as it needs to be for most players to start with.

Now that we know a little about what constitutes building a star ship, let's take a very brief look at how they operate in combat.

Combat

Star ship operation starts with distance and movement. 

The primary sub-light speed unit used in Galloping Stars is the Universal Astronomic-Constant, or Ac for short. Note that this unit is different from the AU unit used in our world, but the AU is also used in Galloping Stars for light speed travel distances in. 1Ac is defined in Galloping Stars as being 50 feet, and in game terms 5Ac is a single block on a grid, making each grid space 250ft x 250ft.

Each ship has a speed that is denoted as a number of Ac units, almost always in multiples of 5 as this is the defined grid size for star ship combat maps in the system.

Also note, that ship sizes on a grid map are generally decided by their tier, as such:

• Tier 1 - 1/4 square
• Tier 2 - 1 square
• Tier 3 - 2 squares (1 x 2)
• Tier 4 - 6 squares (2 x 3)
• Tier 5 - 12 squares (3 x 4) or more
• Tier 6 - As Defined by Individual Ship

Most ships will not necessarily fill the entire space given to them (Most Tier 2 ships will not be 250ft wide, for example), but the additional space should be thought of as maneuvering room around the vessel.

Movement speed is based upon the level of your engines and how much power is being fed to them, with each level of engine providing an additional 5Ac (one grid square) per power level.

Space-faring combat is slightly different from regular ground-based combat. 

You still roll to hit for each attack made with a weapon, however, in this case, you roll the appropriate dice and add your Gunnery skill (regardless of weapon type), plus a weapon bonus dependent upon its tier. Certain ship sub-systems will add to this number (for example, a targeting sub-system). 

This number is then checked against the opposing ship's dodge rating, which is determined by a number of factors. Things that factor into this are it's tier, it's engines and their power level, subsystems, and the pilot or navigation skill of the character steering the ship. While these numbers are still being adjusted for balance, there are a few things we can mention now.

When it comes to the dodge rating, tier – unlike in most other cases – is actually inversely proportional. Meaning instead of higher tiers increasing a ship's capability, this is the one instance where lower tiers actually increase the ship's capability. The reason for this is that smaller ships are simply harder to hit that big, lumbering ones.

Higher level engines, as well as more power being directed to them, will provide a small bonus to the dodge rating as well, due to their capability to maneuver the ship quicker. Some subsystems will also give a bonus to dodge rating as well.

And finally, a ship's pilot/helmsman will be able to add their Piloting (for Tier 1 & 2 ships) or their Navigation (Tier 3+) skill to the ship's dodge rating. This is applied in one of two ways. If they are actively trying to dodge an attack (such as a star fighter attempting to out maneuver a missile), then they make a roll on their appropriate skill. If the dodging is passive (such as a ship that is being struck first as part of an ambush), then the skill is applied without a dice roll (just the skill and its appropriate modifier).

Another main difference from space combat is that, instead of Armor being a fixed value that deducts from damage, Armor and Shields both act as additional pools of hit points that must be depleted before damage starts to be done to the integral structure of a ship. And the order of depletion typically goes Shields > Armor > Hull Points (HP). There might be exceptions to this rule as certain weapons may do some combination of damage to each, or ignore shields completely. Also, there will be some weapons that do increased damage when used against shields, against armor, or against an exposed hull (such as arcano weapons which do double damage to shields, but half as much if used against armor).

Shields are only available if a ship is equipped with a shield module, and like most other things, their capability is determined by the module level and the applied amount of power. Armor, however, is denoted as a base value determined by a ship's tier and class, and then additional armor is applied in additional plating (list as a type of sub-system) that provides a flat bonus on top of the base value, determined by the level of the plating. Power does not factor into armor values.

Beyond that, there is one more major thing to mention about star ship combat. Star ships all have hard points and volatile components on board. There is always the chance for something to fail or explode when the opponent lands a critical hit after your shields are down, even if there are still armor plates left on your ship. This is usually handled by rolling on a table whenever a critical hit is landed, and can include anything from disabling sub-systems to a reactor shut down. Certain weapons may increase the odds of certain critical strikes at the expense of other capabilities, such as an EMP-based weapon being more likely to shut down systems or the reactor, but it likely won't do much physical damage to the ship.

Now, as it's getting long already, that's all we're gonna look at for the Star Ship mechanics. That's the main stuff anyway. There is still more too it, of course, but we hope this enough to give you an idea of where we're headed with this part of the rules. We also want to note that the other vehicle mechanics for the system will largely a stripped down version of these mechanics hybridized with ground combat. If you all would like a brief overview of how that would look, let us know and I'll make that the update for next month.

Until then, thank you all for your continued patience with and support for the project!

- Project Lead Spirit

Update #51 - A Long Overdue Update - News Both Good and Bad
over 4 years ago – Mon, May 11, 2020 at 09:11:08 PM

Hello everybody!

Both good news and bad news today. First, let's start with the bad news, and follow it up with the fairly exciting good news:

To start, we do want to apologize for delayed update. Things have been exceedingly crazy again the past few months, and the Covid-19 chaos has done nothing but add to the stress. I want to assure you the project is still being worked on, with progress still happening albeit slow. We are still trying to push ourselves back to some state of normalcy, but it may be a bit still before we're back to full steam ahead.

Unfortunately, due to everything that's been going on, we regrettably must call another delay to the release of the project. This delay will, for the foreseeable future, be an unspecified amount. However, this does not mean the project is on hold. It simply means we don't know at the moment exactly how much impact Covid will ultimately have on the release date or how long it will take us to all get back on our feet.

Now, bad news aside, here's the good news: we can officially unveil the primary cover art for the rule book. 

This artwork comes to us from the ever fantastic Dreamchan!

Please note that this doesn't mean the book is ready for print yet, though, but it is certainly a step in the right direction! This also is the main cover art. The alt-art variant for higher tier backers is still being sorted out at this moment.

Some additional info we wanted to share is current state of the project as a whole. The system is still in the long, arduous process of translating everything from bullet points and in-congruent paragraphs and notes to a single, coherent rule book form. This process is the longest, most intensive process and has caused many rounds of burnout and stress, and is where the project is primarily held up at because of this. Beyond that, there are still some minor sections that still need fleshing out (including one that we'll mention next), as well as a few parts that are still being tweaked and balanced such as equipment tables and ability values.

However, one of the systems we are still fleshing out is nearing a point where we can introduce it to you all in at least a rough form. And, we think it's one you all will be excited to see. So, stay tuned for our next update, planned for the beginning of June, where we'll present to you the first glimpse at the groundwork for the star ship and vehicle mechanics!

See ya there!

- Project Lead Spirit