Starship Rules

Pokemon Spaceship rules:

While pokemon are an indispensable part of combat and warfare throughout the galaxy, a space-farer has another tool he must consider and take care of. His ship. Not only is the ship a mode of transport, and protection against the horrible ravages of space, but it is the first line of defense against space-marauders, and the first weapon to be used in wars raging across the known galaxy.

BUILDING YOUR SPACESHIP:

Along with your starter, each player also receives a tier-one spacecraft.
Rules-wise, your spacecraft is based off of a pokemon. The ship's stats are as thus:

Hull Integrity (HP):
This lets you know how much damage your ship can take before being disabled. Once disabled, the ship shuts down, rerouting all power to life-support. This disables your weapon-systems and shields, leaving you wide open to be finished off.
From your Hull Integrity, you can derive your ship's HHP (Hull Health Points). The formula is:
Ship Level + (Hull Integrity x 3) + 10
1 HHP = 100 HP, in case you're thinking of taking down a space ship with a handgun.

Ballistics (ATK)
Your Ballistics dictates how much damage you do with attacks that are physical, not based on energy. This includes bullets, as well as ramming-based attacks. These attacks bypass energy shields, but are stopped by strong hulls. This number is added to your attack roll, exactly as attacks usually work.
1 BAL = 10 ATK, so don't get shelled by cannon fire.

Hull Strength (DEF)
Your Hull Strength determines how much damage you may subtract from physical attacks before the attack starts dealing damage to your Hull. This applies to Ballistic attacks only. Energy weapons rip right through tough hulls.
1 HUS = 10 DEF.

Energy (SATK)
Your Energy rating dictates how much juice you pour into your energy-based weapons, such as lasers, electric discharges, and the like. These attacks rip through strong hulls, but are stopped by energy-based shields. This number is added to your Special Attack roll, exactly as Special attacks usually work.
1 EN = 10 SATK.

Shields (SDEF)
Energy shields used to deflect energy-based weapons. This determines how much damage you may subtract from special attacks before the attack starts dealing damage to your Hull. This applies to Energy attacks only. Ballistics ignore your shields.
1 SHLD = 10 SDEF.

Maneuverability (SPD)
This has nothing to do with how much thrust your ship has (Thats covered under your capabilities), but instead how fast it is at carrying out your orders. Ships with higher Maneuverability act first in battle.
1 MAN = 1 SPD, meaning that ships, trainers, and pokemon are all on equal footing initiative-wise.

The ship's evasion stats are derived from your HUS, SHLD, and MAN as if they were equal to the corresponding pokemon stat.
Pokemon and trainers outside of a starship may ignore starship evasion when aiming at starships. (See "Battles On Foot" below for more information.)

Step one: CHOOSE A POKEMON TO BASE YOUR SHIP ON

For PCs just starting out, this pokemon should be the base form of a reasonable three-tiered pokemon family. Design-wise, your ship may or may not be based on this pokemon, but it will be based on this pokemon as far as statistics and capabilities go.

STATS: Your ship has the same base stat spread as your chosen pokemon only using the six ship stats outlined above. Choose a nature, which symbolizes the personality of the one who designed your ship, and what statistics he valued over others when he built your ship for you.

After that, you may now add 15 tune up points to your ship's statistics, while keeping base relations in mind. After that, derive the ship's HHP, and evasion stats.

Essentially, you just built a pokemon, except huge, made of steel, and you can ride inside of it.

CAPABILITIES:

  • Overland: The pokemon's Overland score applies to how far your ship can travel through space in Kilometers per turn. It also takes one “Tick” of movement to turn your ship 90 degrees, so a faster overland means you can position yourself into firing your weapons easier. If your pokemon has a Sky or Levitate that is higher than their Overland, they may use that movement as their Overland instead for the purpose of movement through space.
  • Sky: If the pokemon has a Sky speed, that means that this ship is able to travel through harsh atmospheres at no penalty. Without a Sky speed, you can only travel through planetary atmospheres and solar windstorms as fast as your overland halved. If a pokemon has a higher Sky speed than an Overland Speed, you may instead ignore their Overland and use their Sky movement for flying through space.
  • Alternate Movement Capabilities: If your ship has an alternate capability, then that means it is able to traverse that terrain without taking damage. A Burrow capability means the ship can travel through solid ground (For example, the surface of planets, or through asteroids), while Swim means the ship can operate underwater without breaking. If the ship does not have the applicable movement capability, trying to traverse that terrain will damage the ship. Without a burrow speed, you crash into solid ground, and without swim, you almost immediately begin to leak and take on water, and your electronics will malfunction.
  • Power: Your ship's towing capacity. Generally, multiply whatever the pokemon's weight limits were by 100.
  • Jumping: The higher of your two Jump numbers is your ship's thrust when moving sideways or up and down. Treat this as a normal movement capability, called "Lateral Movement."
  • Other general Capabilities: Starship Capabilities

ABILITIES: Choose one ability from the pokemon's basic list and apply it to your ship. GMs should exercise their imaginations to figure out how abilities should be expressed by a Space Ship.

MOVES: Your ship's moves represent what weapons your ship has equipped. Tier-One ships have four slots for weapon systems. The Fore, your forward facing guns, The Aft, your rear-facing guns, Portside, the left-hand side guns, and Starboard, the right hand side guns. You may assume that you have in storage any move that your ship's pokemon learns up to level 10. The moves have the same dice rolls and the same general effects, but upscaled so that they do HHP instead of HP (Remember, 1 HHP = 100 HP). You may slot any moves you have in storage to any of your ship's four slots.

When your ship inevitably upgrades, your ship will gain more slots for weapon systems. Until then, you've got four. Don't waste them. To offset this, when you're at the dock, you can switch out your ship's weapons freely and keep the unused moves in storage. You might even sell off your useless early-game weapons for money or scrap. Instead of learning from TMs or Move Tutors, you can instead buy new weapons for your baby. Your TM and Move tutor lists are instead compatibility lists for your ship. Your ship will gain new weapons naturally as you upgrade it (See: Leveling Up Your Ship). Think of TM weapons as third-party add-on programs, and level up and egg moves as the weapons that come standard with the ship.

If your ship has a connection move, you're in luck. You may assign your connection attack to any of the ship's cardinal directions without taking up that direction's slot without needing to take an edge.

TYPING All Starship types are exactly the same as the pokemon they are based on.

Flavor of the pokemon types Starship weapons, like pokemon moves, are typed. However, while they work on the same typing system as pokemon, they operate on a different kind of flavor. You have to assume that when a starship uses "Razor leaf" it's not actually shooting leaves. It's using a ballistic attack that shoots slicing projectiles with biological properties. Those properties rip through ships that work on aquatic-focused systems, like water-types, but are stopped short by ships with a lot of flame-retardant padding, such as fire-types. It takes some mental gymnastics to justify why this attack hits that ship in this way, but so do certain pokemon type/move combinations. Here's some suggested flavor for each "Type" of ship.
Bug Bug-typed ships are lightly-hulled, lightweight ships. A lot of them are used in industrial or salvage purposes, and come standard with "Threaded" towing cables, sensors with increased effectiveness, and the ability to operate within atmosphere and in open space. Since Construction and salvage tend to have large crews, they are said to "Swarm" around whatever they are working on. Bug-type weapons have lessened effectiveness against other types, seeing as how they're usually repurposed construction/salvage machinery, but are good for gumming up the works of other ships.
Dragon Dragon-type ships are generally military warships, designed for planetary conquest. They are commonly used whenever war breaks out. They resist some of the more common ships by design, but have a couple unfortunate flaws in their design leaving them vulnerable to low temperatures and supernaturally-imbued attacks. Dragon attacks are designed with destruction in mind.
Ice Ice-type ships aren't very well-suited to war-time. They are fragile ships, whose own cold core temperatures leave them relatively vulnerable to a lot of attacks. They are designed for transporting refrigerated goods, usually food or frozen water, across the galaxy. Designers usually build these kinds of ships with a lot of armor to make up for their structural weakness. Ice-type weapons, however, have proven to be an incredibly effective tool of war, and are useful in defending the ship's precious cargo.
Fighting Fighting-type ships are just what they sound like. They are close-range space-fighters, designed for combat. They are mostly built around delivering hard-hitting, armor-piercing ordinance, and are therefore very useful as wall-breakers. Fighting-type weaponry is any weapon that can pierce through hard armor, such as Steel, and Rock, or are effective against pirate vessels.
Fire One of the "Big three" of ship design. As space-travel evolved, one of the more common fears was fire. Fire in a vacuum is an insidious killer. It doesn't actually flare up and spread like it does on earth. Instead, a lasting fire with a lot of fuel will smolder, dealing a lot of damage before even becoming noticeable. By the time you smell smoke, it's too late. Fire-type ships are warships designed around this, with weaponry designed to set the interiors of other spaceships on fire. Seeing as how they carry so much flammable ordinance, they have insulated themselves against the possibility of fire being used against them. However, this leaves them weak to liquid saturation weapons, which goes right through insulation.
Flying Flying-type ships are a design of ship that are made to actually enter the atmospheres of planets. Flying ships have effective thrusters and more efficient aerodynamics, letting them fly through air as well as through vacuum. Flying-type weaponry is a technical marvel as well, using the reserves of gasses stored within to attack other ships, even within the vacuum of space. Very effective in blowing apart ships with weak structures, but with very badly insulated systems, making them vulnerable to electric damage.
Grass One of the "Big Three" of ship design. With space travel becoming more common, large amounts of people needed to be transported. These "Ark" ships were built more for the comfort of passengers inside than for their effectiveness at space travel. Grass-type ships have a lot of weaknesses related to these creature comforts - very flammable, weaker structural supports, delicate onboard environments that are vulnerable to rapid changes in temperature - but because of this are extremely comfortable for anyone riding inside. Grass-type weaponry are usually based around disabling and inconveniencing enemy starships, but a few are also based around ordinance that would be effective in chopping down and working trees or for construction.
Ghost Ghost-type ships are quite mistrusted in the galaxy. These are usually stealth ships, reconnaissance ships, or powerful warships that employ subtle tactics as well as overt ones. Most are owned by government military powers, but many have been either stolen or built by pirates. Ghost weaponry has two purposes. Disable the enemy's computer, and then overwhelm the enemy with extreme force. However, all ghost-type weaponry comes pre-programmed with a failsafe to never attack ships with a "Normal" type Civilian marker.
Ground Ground-type ships are an oddity in the galaxy. They operate using sophisticated gravity-well technology allowing shockwaves, or "Gravity Quakes" to be felt through a vacuum. While shockwave weapons have been used for centuries on planets, it wasn't until the first Diglett-class ship was invented that the technology was able to apply the weaponry to a space-environment. While they are completely ineffective against Flying types, whose atmospheric technology makes them completely immune to gravity-based weaponry, they are a huge threat to many other common kinds of starships. Their excellent insulation also have the side effect of making them immune to electrical interference.
Electric Electric-type ships are a specific kind of ship based around attacking a ship's computer with controlled EMP bursts. These bursts can either damage the ship's hull, or cause the ship's computer to lock up. They usually have a very high energy output, and Flying ship's atmospheric weaponry, seeing as how it conducts electricity well, are extremely vulnerable.
Normal Normal-type ships are ships that don't really fit any other design scheme. They have no special traits or attributes, other than a weakness to conventional weaponry used by Fighting Types. They have one small hiccough, though. Normal-type weapons, usually sold for the sake of self-defense, are extraordinarily bad at hitting ships with extremely good stealth and evasion systems, like Ghost-ships.
Poison Poison-type ships are sabotage-focused ships, with hacking and viral warfare in mind, usually delivered through the vector of malicious nanomachines. Rather than attack the enemy's ship directly, poison types attack the ship's onboard computer, causing self-destructive things to happen. However, this is ineffective against Steel types, which are just so damn well-built that even with computer viruses causing problems, their hull cannot be harmed in this way. Poison-type weaponry can also comprise of the launch of corrosive nanomachines designed to destroy rather than implant viruses or reprogram the computer, equally ineffective against ships with Steel hulls.
Psychic Psychic-type ships are a class of ships, mostly of Deoxyn design, which use supernatural energy to attack other ships. The same energy that keeps Deoxyns inflated also powers these ships, and is utilized in these ship's weapons. These ship's weapons have a limited amount of "Telekinesis" against other ships, although not in any functional or constructive way. They also may use this power to cause strange things to come over the battlefield, or to introduce strange programming into enemy computer systems. Psychic-type ships are strange, and very specific to Deoxyn culture.
Rock Rock-type ships are a class of ships, mostly of Xects'es design, with tough hulls made of thick, rigid plates. While this is good at keeping out most conventional attacks, it isn't very good at keeping out much else. They may look tough, but Rock-type ships are the victim of ineffective sophomore, Xects'es ship design, which does not take into account the existence of common armor-piercing threats and unconventional means of attack. The weapons, on the other hand, are valued as well-made tools of war. The ideas used in Rock-type ships led to Xects'es' next and more successful effort: Steel.
Water One of the "Big Three" of starship design. Water-type ships have one job: Transport water from point A to point B. With this job also came the development of one of the most unexpected and unconventional weapon styles in the galaxy: Liquid Saturation Weapons. Essentially, that's a fancy way of describing attacks which use liquid as the destructive vector. Early weapons used water, but that proved to be unfeasible, as water is precious. Modern weapons use similar but non-potable liquids and gels. The main point is the same: Use high-pressure water to weaken a ship's hull, or simply to spray into the cracks of enemy ships and cause damage.
Dark Dark-type ships are one of the preferred ships of pirate vessels. They are tricky ships, with lots of different roles and purposes, but with the shared traits of utilizing underhanded tactics.
Steel Ships of Xects'es design, using what they learned from building Rock-type ships. Steel-type ships have perfected the use of armor. It's more flexible than in Rock ships, allowing defense from a greater array of threats, while still allowing the ships to have absurd thickness to its armor. It's still weak against armor-piercing, but it's also ineffective against flammable ordinance, and Shockwaves. However, it's resistance to nearly everything else more than makes up for it.
Fairy Ships of Deoxyn design, using what they learned from building Psychic-type ships. Fairy-type ships take the design ethic begun by Psychic-type ships - namely, the use of supernatural power in their weaponry - and focuses it further to incorporate more effective offense and defense. A rare and largely untested ship-type, but with a very effective reputation. Humans and Xects'es scoff at the name, but "Fairies" in Deoxyn lore are very often thought of as horrifying beasts.

EVOLUTION: As ships are not natural creatures, they do not evolve. However, they can be upgraded. As soon as your ship is at the proper level for evolution, or if you have the proper item to send it down a particular upgrade path (Say, different kinds of elementary ores to upgrade the hull of your Eevee ship down any of its various evolutions) you may pay a premium at the dock to have your ship upgraded to the next tier. If your evolutionary family has three tiers, they gain two weapon slots on tier two and two more on tier three. If an evolutionary family has two tiers, they start with an extra weapon slot on tier one, and gain three weapon slots on tier two. If a pokemon does not evolve. They begin with all eight slots unlocked from the beginning. You may choose which side of the ship to install your shiny new weapon slots, but it is prohibitively expensive to uninstall those slots once they are bolted down.

Upgrading your tier-three ship with a “Mega-Stone Engine” manufactured by Cliff Jewlry can cause your ship to briefly overclock its output, boosting its stats, and giving it different abilities. However, this overclocking takes a lot of energy, and can only be done briefly, and only once before returning to the dock for repairs. Activating the Mega-Stone Engine more than once per visit to the docks may cause damage to your ship.

BIOLOGICAL INFO: Ships cannot breed. Ships do not need food, except for regular refueling. Ships are usually referred to as female by humans, Male by Xects'es, and have no gender to Deoxyns.

Fuel; How does that work? I mention regular refueling here. Naturally, because your ship is a vehicle, it requires fuel to function. What that fuel IS can vary from ship model to ship model - Eco-friendly grass or flying types might run on high energy biofuel, while industrial steel types might run on high-octane superfuel. Any discussion about whether or not a fuel is safe for the environment is largely a moot point when you're travelling through open space, and only matters within planetary atmospheres. Because of all of this, if your ship runs out of fuel, it stalls. Weapons and Programs can be used (those work off of the ship's electrical systems and are unaffected by fuel) but movement is impossible without fuel to burn. When fuel runs out, all movement capabilities are set to zero until the ship is refueled.
Units of Fuel Fuel is measured in "Units." I don't specify what kind of fuel it is, and it doesn't matter to the rules. Fuel is fuel. 1 unit of fuel represents one day of continuous movement. On days where the ship does not move very far (Say, the ship only runs a quick errand from one colony to another and the trip takes barely half a day, or you deploy the ship for a few minutes of of combat before docking) You don't have to start counting fuel units. Those trips are more or less "Free." However, long journeys where the ship is moving towards a far away destination, such as another planet or solar system, may take many days and therefore many units of fuel.
Sharing fuel Fuel may be shared freely, but transferring any amount of fuel between ships is considered an extended action taking ten to thirty minutes depending on the size of the fuel units and size of the ships, and cannot be done during battle.
Ship size and fuel It may seem unfair for a small size ship to get the same "Gas mileage" out of a unit of fuel than a Gigantic-sized ship. If this is the case, you might enact a houserule that small-to-medium ships consume less fuel per day than Large-to-gigantic sized ships. Perhaps the smaller sized ships only consume half of 1 unit of fuel per day, while the big ships consume 1 full fuel. However, you must also remember that larger ships can carry smaller ships, making fuel largely irrelevant if your party is of a makeup where your ship can hitch a ride on a party member's. Either way, don't worry about it too much. The "Unit" of "fuel" is meant to be abstract, so you don't have to think about balancing size against how far you can go.
Fuel Prices I suggest making fuel cheap, because pokemon is all about exploration, and allowing players cheap fuel gives them more mobility through the universe. However, don't discount using fuel prices as a plot point, or as an obstacle which must be overcome.
"Milk Collector" ships Miltank and Gogoat-class ships are special. See the "Capabilities" section for more information.

WEIGHT and SIZE: Naturally, most starships are big. That is an understatement. HOW big depends on the Weight Class and Size of the original pokemon. It's unfeasable to define exact weights, of course, but your ship's Weight Class (The number used in junction with Low Kick and Heavy Slam) is still the same. It just only applies to moves used by and against other starships. A pokemon using Low Kick against a starship might seem like a good idea, but remember that the max damage is still based on Weight class 6, and that 1 HHP is equal to 100 HP, so you're unlikely to do much damage even with a max DB Low Kick.
Size, on the other hand, is very definable and very important. Keep in mind that the examples given are only approximates to give you an idea of the kind of ship that size would be. Don't take them as gospel.

  • Small-size Starships (1 square) are usually little one-seater ships with maybe a little room in the back for small cargo. Think of Balls from Gundam, TIE fighters, Captain Olimar's SS Dolphin, and any other small-size space craft. In mecha terms Ingrams from Patlabor would count. In Real-world terms, think about fighter jets.
  • Medium Starships (1 square) have more room in the back for cargo or passengers. The Cockpit may seat between 2 and 4, but don't have to. Think of Firefly or The Millennium Falcon. If it's a mecha, then it might be the size of the RX-78-02 Gundam. In real-world terms, think about Commercial airlines. A Medium ship can generally carry a Small-sized ship inside of it.
  • Large Starships (2x2 square) are starting to get into the territory of warships and flagships, instead of being classed as "Fighters." Ships like this may have multiple positions for crewmembers to pull their weight, or they can be one- or two-seaters with a large amount of cargo space. The USS Enterprise, Alien's Nostromo, and Gundam's White Base are pretty good examples. Mecha-wise, Voltron/Golion is getting into "Large" territory. In real-world terms, think about Aircraft carrier. Generally, Large starships can carry up to four medium starships if it has no other cargo, or 6 small-size starships.
  • Huge Starships (3x3 square) are big space warships. Ships of this size are more commonly thought of as "Captained" rather than "Piloted" although the rules do not change. Large amounts of cargo space and crew space. Larger ships like Imperial Star Destroyers fit this class. Mecha-wise, Gunbuster is a perfect example. People in real life don't make ships this big. Huge starships can carry about 2 large ships, 9 medium ships, or 18 small ships.
  • Gigantic Starships (4x4 square) are ridiculously huge. Usually constructed in space, and have strict rules about when and where they can enter a planet's atmosphere without messing up the planet's ecosystem by blocking out the sun or affecting the planet's tides with its local gravity. On the smaller end of this spectrum, the Excelion, the ship that carries around the Gunbuster, is a good example. On the larger end, you've got the Cathedral Terra, the Moon sized (Because it was literally the moon) space-ship from Gurren Lagann. Mecha-wise, the Super Galaxy Gurren Lagann, made by combining the Gurren Lagann with Cathedral Terra (Once again, literally The Moon), is the best comparison to be made. Naturally, ships in Terrafell probably won't get quite that big, as the largest Gigantic Starship available will probably be the Wailord-Class Starship, which can carry 2 Huge Starships, 4 large starships, 16 medium starships, or 32 small starships.
  • Odd Shapes: Remember, just like pokemon, starships can be shaped strangely. A Steelix-Class ship may by Gigantic (8x2) instead of (4x4). No matter the shape, you should be able to dock about the same amount.

SKILLS: Athletics is carried over straight to the ship, and your ship does not have a native Focus skill. However, the other skills instead represent the highest possible capabilities of your ship. For Acrobatics, Combat, Stealth, and Perception, if you are required to roll for that skill, always use the lowest of the pilot and pokemon's skills. This represents the importance of good piloting, but also the importance of a machine with good specs. A great pilot in a terrible machine is held back by the capabilities of their machine. A terrible pilot in an amazing machine can't meet the potential of the ship with their meager skills. Always keep your own pilot skills in mind when pairing your character with a ship. That said, if the pokemon this ship is based on has an extra bonus attached to their skill (For example, 3d6+2 rather than simply 3d6), then even if your pilot has less than 3 in that skill, they may add on the +2 bonus, and if they have more than 3 in that skill, they may add on the +2 bonus. Look for ships with close skill sets to your trainer, but also keep an eye out for skill sets with lots of good extra bonuses to help out pilots with fewer skills.

HELD ITEMS: Ships cannot hold items, per se. However, they can have modular upgrades installed. You can't just stick a rotten apple core on your ship's dashboard and call it leftovers. You need to find the modular upgrade called "Leftovers" and put it into your ship's upgrade port. Ships generally only have room for one of this kind of upgrade.

Step Two: UPGRADING YOUR SHIP

For every battle your ship takes part in, your ship will salvage scrap equal to about how much experience the pokemon would have gained from the battle. Essentially, Scrap is your ship's experience, except you may not apply it until you reach a dock. Everything else about “leveling up” your ship is the same, except for evolution.
Once you're past the level threshold for evolution and/or you have the necessary item to upgrade your ship to its next tier, you may then pay a few thousand credits to upgrade your ship to the next tier.
At the same rate that a pokemon would gain tutor points, your ship will gain System Updates. They work basically the same way.
At level 20, a ship's onboard computer may download a patch that allows you to use another ability from the basic or advanced lists. At level 40, another software patch allows you to use a third ability from any of the ship's lists. Once installed, Abilities are prohibitively expensive to uninstall.
Also at the dock is where you can apply [Tune-Up] Features to your Starship.

Poke-edges are essentially the same, except you may spend "System Updates" to gain poke-edges while at the docks. All poke-edges are eligible for starships, appropriately re-fluffed for a machine.

Step Three: SHIP-TO-SHIP COMBAT

Ship combat works more or less like normal pokemon combat, just blown up to galactic scale. On your trainer turn, you may apply any orders to your ship/to your ship's crew to give yourself an edge. If you have the relevant edge or feature, you could also spend a turn repairing your ship on your turn.

FACING:

Generally, when aiming targeted attacks, you may only use an attack if the side of the ship with that weapon installed is facing your target, so watch your positioning. The rule is if you can draw a straight line from the side of your ship with the weapon to the target without overlapping the space your ship occupies, that is a legal shot. Ships may only move forward or backward, and must use one tick of their “Overland” movement speed in order to turn. Otherwise, they can strafe from side-to-side or up-to-down, thus keeping their same facing, using their Jump capability instead of their overland. For example:

FROAKIE has an overland of 5 and a jump of 2/2. Therefore when facing FENNEKIN, he can either move towards or away from his opponent, or he can strafe from side-to-side. If The FORE WEAPON of the Froakie is something good against Fennekin, like Bubblebeam, strafing would be useful to use in order to stay mobile while still keeping the same facing towards the Fennekin.

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If, however, Froakie's Bubblebeam is on his STARBOARD WEAPON, then Froakie needs to turn his starboard towards the Fennekin. He uses one tick of Overland to turn himself 90 degrees, and then can use his remaining Overland to move 4 km, OR you can use your Jump to turn yourself 90 degrees and move yourself towards or away from the Fennekin.

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Or maybe you want to use some more complicated movement options. Maybe try this:

The Froakie first moves forward 2 km. However, his bubblebeam is on his AFT WEAPON. To get the correct facing and a clear shot he could have simply moved forward 4 km and used his last tick of overland to turn his back to the Fennekin and fire the bubblebeam. However, SPACE DEBRIS is in the way. Instead, the Froakie could move forward 2 km, spends a tick to turn his ship to face up, moves up 1 km, clearing the space debris, then uses his last tick to turn his back to the fennekin, before firing the bubblebeam.

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Naturally, there's one more movement option to consider: Diagonals.

Diagonal movement on a grid is slightly more complex. When a ship is facing diagonally, when it moves forward or backward, each space diagonal from the space that the ship is occupying represents two ticks of movement. Since Froakie has 5 overland, he moves forward along the diagonal axis and counts by 2. He can only move 4 spaces because of this, although it does allow him to use his last unused tick to rotate his ship onto another axis. Moving sideways is the same way. 2 Jump allows you to strafe once along the diagonal towards your ship's port or starboard.

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Roll your accuracy check. If it hits, subtract the enemy's relevant defensive stat against the damage dealt, subtract the rest from the enemy ship's HHP, just like in normal pokemon combat.

Moves with AoE, like bursts, instead radiate out from your ship in a circle as normal. No need to worry about facing for those.

Using Hex Grids instead of Square Grids

If square maps don't do it for you, feel free to try out Hex maps for your space battles! Hex grids make drawing cones, moving in diagonals, and figuring out ranges a lot easier than in square maps, and the "Facing" rules explained above become more dynamic when you have 6 ways to face instead of 4, but as a trade-off, cardinal movement becomes a little more awkward in certain directions, and pokemon of larger sizes (2x2, 3x3, 4x4, etc.) have to have their shapes defined better. I would NOT recommend Hex maps for pokemon combat on foot, but for starships, it might be a fun change.

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Here are some size suggestions. If they work, great.

0 HHP:

When you hit 0 HHP, your ship's hull is breached and its innards are damaged. In order to save your ass from dying instantly, all non-essential systems for human life must shut down in order to divert power to life support to compensate for the sharp drop in oxygen and onboard atmosphere. This means your shields and weapons are depowered and cannot be used, and, since your hull is already basically ruined, you can't very well use your Hull Strength either. You are a sitting duck. If your ship hits -50 HHP or -200% HHP, whichever is lower, It is completely destroyed. Hope you got to the escape pod (Don't worry. Every ship has an escape pod.)

Status Effects:

Status effects work mechanically the exact same as they do with normal pokemon. However, they are flavored as various ship malfunctions.

Poison: A sophisticated, learning Virus infecting your ship's onboard computer system, causing small, damaging malfunctions all over the ship. Bad Poison is a more catastrophic variant. Naturally, ships with very good antiviral software, like Poison types, are immune.
Paralysis: An EMP pulse has taken out your electrical systems. Ships with very good insulation, such as electric-type ships, are immune.
Burn: Your ship's interior has caught fire. You should probably put it out. Ships designed to cause fires, like fire types, are usually quite flame retardant and are thus immune to burns.
Freeze: Your ship's exterior has become frozen solid. Low-temperature-focused ships, like Ice types, are immune.
Sleep: Your ship's computer has frozen. Sudden impacts from damaging moves can cause your computer to unfreeze, or you can "Take a Breather" to kick the dashboard and unfreeze it.
Confusion: Your ship's computer glitches out. It might work, but it might not, or it might resolve itself.
Enraged: Your ship's non-combat weapons are disabled, forcing you to use your ballistics and energy weapons.
Infatuation: A dummy program is loaded onto your ship's computer to register an enemy as an ally, making firing on them difficult.
Fainted: Your hull has been breached, and all of your non-essential systems have been shut down. Only systems important to life support will operate.
Slowed, Stuck, or Trapped: Your engines have been compromised or gummed up by something.
Tripped: You, the pilot, have been thrown out of the cockpit. You must spend a shift action to get back in.
Vulnerable: You, the pilot, have been stunned temporarily, leaving your ship unable to dodge.
Blindness: Your sensors are compromised or gummed up by something.
Others: Other status afflictions are more or less identical to how they work with pokemon, except with the caveat that the pokemon is huge and made of metal.

Step Four: How do Trainer interact with Starships?

Generally, trainer classes having to do with raising Pokemon, such as Mentor and Ace Trainer, do not apply to raising Starships. However, classes that have to do with [Orders] CAN apply if the Trainer Edge "Daredevil" is taken. If a class requires the use of a specific [Training] feature, such as Rider's Use of Agility Training, or Duelist's use of Focused Training, you may apply the equivalent [Tune-Up] ability instead both as a prerequisite for taking the class, and as a trigger for the class's gimmicks. Keep in mind, however, that only Pokemon may be affected by [Training] and only starships can be affected by [Tune-Ups], so be careful when taking a class you may not be able to take full advantage of at all times. the Additionally, classes that have to do with technology, such as the Engineer and Upgrader branches of researcher, can apply their stuff to starships. Upgraders can apply Upgrades to Starships, although augmentation shock may still occur. Engineers can use the "Overclock" feature on their ship, as well as any Pokebot part which does NOT grant extra moves.

Original Space Classes: Look here for original Trainer Classes having to do with Starships.

Training Sessions?

Instead of Training, you can instead "Tune-up" a number of starships equal to your Technology Education Rank. This works identically to how Training works with Command ranks, including experience training to get a number of free scrap based on your Tech Education Rank to level up your ship, and using [Tune-Up] Features.

Battles On Foot

Just because Starships are balanced around Ship-to-ship combat doesn't mean you should discount the possibility of throwing a Starship at the party as a difficult encounter. It IS possible for a party on foot to defeat a Starship. It's just very difficult, and may take a while.

If you want to attempt an encounter like this, convert the ship's stats into the equivalent Pokemon Stat totals. However, do not apply evasion to the Starship. Starships will have a LOT of HP, and even weak ones will hit like a truck. It's really only possible for a party to take down a starship if they exploit type weaknesses, and hit with absurdly strong attacks. Keep in mind also that Starships are immune to Pokemon status effects, and Pokemon are immune to Starship status effects.

To keep the fight fair, you might allow the players to target the weapons, rather than the Ship's hull. Each Weapon has 100 HP, and is considered its own type, rather than the type of the Starship it's attached to. When a weapon is destroyed, it is disabled until it next visits the docks.

Naturally, fighting a Starship head-on isn't really smart. You might also allow infiltrating the ship as a "Smarter" option. This is less of a combat encounter and more dependent on skill checks, and might not always be possible. Running away may also be a smarter option, especially for lower-level parties.

Keep in mind, Players aren't going to be able to solo a Starship. It's going to be a team effort. Never throw more than one Starship at the party. Be reasonable with the Starship's levels, and be careful giving it too much HP. This kind of encounter is best for extremely offense-oriented parties, with high defenses or lots of evasion. If your party isn't doing more than 100 damage per attack with super effectives, they won't be able to defeat a starship.

Yeah, but What About Mecha Though?

Keep in mind that this setting isn't going to have TOO much in the way of mechs, outside of maybe construction robot/powered armors. However, if for some reason you want your players to use Mecha, or if you can convince your GM to let you use mecha, you can use the following optional rules.

MOVES
Mecha work on a slightly different moveset system than starships. While a starship begins with four weapons, each of which are assigned to one of its cardinal directions, a mecha begins with the following loadouts:

  • Pokemon of three-tiered families begin with TWO precious weapon slots, the right hand and left hand. Upon upgrading to your next evolutionary family, you gain two more on either shoulder, and on your last tier, you gain two more in your chest and from your head.
  • Pokemon of two-tier families begin with THREE precious weapon slots, right hand, left hand, and one of your shoulders. The second tier gains three more, the other shoulder, chest, and head.
  • Pokemon of single-stage families begin with all six weapon slots unlocked from the beginning.

As you can see, mecha are more limited in how many moves they can equip. However, to make up for this, mecha are no longer locked to different facings, like a regular-sized pokemon would be, allowing them to attack more freely than a starship can. And don't forget that you can keep unequipped moves and change your loadout any time you're in a dock.

MOVEMENT
As mecha are more agile, they can change direction without needing to spend a tick of movement. When in a situation with gravity, you have jump capabilities just like your pokemon counterpart. When in Zero-g, you have lateral movement capabilities, like starships. Additionally, outside of Zero g, mecha cannot fly unless they have a Sky or levitate capability. In Zero-g, the movement rules for starships is more or less the same.

TRANSPORTATION
No matter how big a mecha is, there is only room inside for the pilot and MAYBE a passenger if the mecha's size is medium or larger. Mecha cannot transport cargo unless it has a specific capability:

Mountable Capability Mecha with Mountable have that many extra seats within the cockpit, no matter what size it is. These extra seats aren't necessarily pilot seats, and so the pilot is still in control of the ship.

Starship Capabilities

Most of these capabilities are functionally identical to the pokemon capability, simply scaled up. However, some work very different, or have been refluffed. If a capability is not listed here, then refluffing it was insignificant, and it had no gameplay changes.

Alluring Starships and mecha who are alluring have battle software that can scramble enemy signals, making your ship appear to be a prime target. allows you to act as bait once per day.

Amorphous The same as the pokemon capability. However, to keep pilot and cargo safe, this starship cannot squash itself thinner than the cockpit and cargo hold.

Aura Reader Starships cannot have Aura Reader, and do not have auras in and of themselves. It's up to GMs whether it's appropriate for a Mecha to be able to read auras, since that falls more on the super-robot side of things.

Aura Pulse Starships cannot Aura Pulse. Once again, it's up to the GM whether a Mecha can.

Blindsense This starship or mecha comes with sophisticated image-building program based on detecting gravitational wells, allowing it to "See" in space in a process much like echolocation. Thus even if their visual sensors are disabled (Blindness), they can operate unhindered.

Chilled Refrigerated ships. Useful for transporting perishable goods.

Darkvision This starship or mecha is equipped with night vision visual technology. Cannot be blinded or Totally blinded by darkness.

Dead Silent Stealth-ships designed with silent engines. While there is no sound in space, it's still possible to "Hear" ambient engine noises using ship sensors. Dead Silent ships cannot be detected in this way.

Delta Evolution Rayquaza-Class starships are manufactured by Cliff Jewelry as the personal escort and watch-dog for CJ interests. Only two of these ships exist, and they patrol the skies of Deadly Diamond Rain and Saturn, protecting transport ships from space piracy. Because they were manufactured by Cliff, they come with Mega-stone Drives already installed without taking up a modular upgrade port.

Dream Mist Does not apply to Starships or Mecha.

Dream Reader Does not apply to Starships. Maybe Mecha if your GM feels super-roboty enough.

Egg Warmer This ship was designed as a vessel for breeders, with egg incubation in mind. It comes with an on-board incubator, which can be applied once per day to up to 3 eggs. The rules are the same after that.

Firestarter This ship is designed with or has a weapon which can reach massive temperatures. All rules for fire-typed struggle are the same.

Fortune Does not apply.

Fountain This ship is designed with or has a weapon which involves liquid ordinance, and can use it to modify struggle attacks without expending energy or ammo.

Freezer This ship is designed with or has a weapon which involves freezing temperatures, and can use it to modify struggle attacks etc. etc.

Gather Unown If your Starship or Mecha is an Unown-class, you may use Gather Unown to summon an Unown pokemon (NOT an Unown-class ship or mecha). Unown-class ships were created as research vessels to study Unown phenomenon, and manifest Unowns in the universe. Most of these ships have fallen into the hands of "Rune Masters," a strange cult of former scientists turned Unown worshippers.

Gilled More or less meaningless. Ships don't breathe. If a ship has a Swimming capability, they are also designed to be water-tight.

Glow This Starship or mecha has a flashlight, headlights, or any other light-emitting thing.

Groundshaper Construction ships with backhoes, steamrollers, or scoopers attached and separate from your weapons. Rules are otherwise the same.

Guster Ships designed to take advantage of wind, or with wind-based weaponry equipped. May modify struggle attacks.

Heart Gift Does not apply.

Heater Warm-temperature ships. Useful for keeping warm cargo safe, and possibly useful as hydroponic ships for hot-box growth of crops.

Herb Growth Does not apply

Honey Gather Does not apply

Illusionist Applies. Uses hologram technology to accomplish what the book says. Also, the distances are scaled up to kilometers instead of meters.

Inflatable This ship is able to expand its hull. Otherwise, exactly the same as the normal Inflatible capability.

Invisibility A stealth-ship with a sophisticated active camouflage system, allowing it to appear invisible.

Juicer Shuckle-class ships are a specific kind of mobile factory ship. Despite its small size, it is designed to enter asteroid fields and mine them for material. They are designed for defense, owing to the dangerous environment it's meant to inhabit. With access to an asteroid, meteor, or other space debris, as an extended action, Shuckle-class ships can spend an hour mining the source for extra materials. You will find an amount of ship Scrap equal to half of your starship's level.

Keystone Warp Might apply to the Mecha if your GM likes super robot shenanigans. Does not apply to Starships

Letter Press Unown Starships have a hidden ability to combine on to one another. Rune Masters with access to multiple Unown-class starships may apply their letter press capability to their starship.

Living Weapon Normally does not apply. HOWEVER, if you have a Mecha with the Wielder capability, and a starship or mecha with Living Weapon, the Living Weapon pokemon may by wielded by the mecha with Wielder. Rules stay the same otherwise.

Magnetic Might be a bit OP for a starship to be able to fuck with metal like that. Lets just say it doesn't apply.

Marsupial Does not apply.

Materializer This ship is equipped with mineral ordinance, or has a hull made of stone or raw ore. Modifies Struggle.

Milk Collection Miltank- and Gogoat-class starships are a class of starship which is designed for mobile refueling in midair. If these ships are carrying surplus fuel, they may, as a shift action, transfer any amount of fuel to an ally's fuel tank, and may do this during battle if it is necessary. This is, however, not a two-way thing. Allies cannot transfer their fuel into your tank in the same way and must follow normal refueling rules.

Mindlock This starship's encryption program is unbreakable. Radio chatter and messages sent by this ship cannot be intercepted by anyone but its intended recipients.

Mountable See above.

Mushroom Harvest Does not apply.

Naturewalk Naturewalks do not apply to starships, but may apply to mecha.

Pack Mon Does not apply.

Pearl Creation Does not apply.

Phasing This ship comes equipped with an experimental matter-transformation device based on the capabilities of ghost-type pokemon. Ships equipped with this device may allow itself and everything inside of it to go through walls, but the structural integrity of the ship's hull is compromised. Rules are more or less the same.

Planter This ship is a hydroponic garden ship. You can use the onboard greenhouse to grow crops, trees, berry bushes, or other things. Planter ships are limited by their own size, and can only be used to plant as much as they can carry as cargo. Room used to plant crops cannot be used to to carry cargo.

Premonition Does not apply.

Reach This starship has extension arms, which can be used to perform melee attacks at range. Otherwise, the rules are the same.

Shadow Meld A perfected version of the Matter-transformation device. Gengar-class ships are able to use them effectively.

Shapeshifter Using a novel system of nano-metal, this ship is able to emulate the general size, shape, and approximate density of any other observed starship or mecha. Rules for Shapeshifter are more or less the same.

Shrinkable This ship can shrink its own hull down slightly. rules are more or less the same.

Soulless An interesting case. Shedinja-class ships are actually ships made exclusively from leftover parts you get by upgrading a Nincada-class ship to a Ninjask-class ship. These ships are made extremely fragile, and only ever have 1 HHP. They are also built without a life-support mechanism, sometimes with the pilot exposed to the vaccuum, and thus requires the pilot to wear a space-suit at all times. However, they also use a fairly well-known but little-used trick of physics that really only works because Shedinja ships are made of barely-held-together scrap. The hull is shaped in such a way that everything but super effective attacks slide right off. However, fire melts the weak supports, ghost attacks bypass the physical structure, Dark attacks are adept at aiming for structural weaknesses, Rock attacks crush the hull with overwhelming force, and flying attacks simply blow the whole thing apart. However, Shedinja-class ships never explode, because they use so little power, and since they have no life support, as long as the pilot keeps their suit on, they're safe from the vacuum, and thus even after they are disabled, they can easily be repaired no matter how obliterated they get. These have been nicknamed "Soulless" ships by superstitious pilots who have known many Shedinja-class pilots whose suits ripped, killing them by exposure while their ship was perfectly salvageable. These are dangerous ships to pilot, and due to their close association with space piracy (Who favor cheap, expendable starships), piloting one has questionable social connotations.

Split Evolution The designer of this starship has multiple possible upgrade paths you can take, depending on how the ship was tuned when it was first put together. Mechanically identical.

Sprouter Shaymin, Celebi, and Xerneas-class starships are ships designed for Terraforming operations. Shaymin ships are Human vessels used to seed Shaymin across an eligible planet, monitor their life cycles, and collect them either before they metamorphose into their Sky Forme, or capture the sky Shaymins to re enter them into breeding stock. Celebi (Deoxyn-owned) and Xerneas (Human Owned) ships are designed with a more traditional terraforming operation in mind, used to mass-landscape planets which show the promise of life. It works somewhat like a 3D printer, but on a planetary scale, creating favorable landscapes, digging deep trenches in the ground for oceans, lakes and rivers, and using and compressing the materials gathered from digging oceans to create and shape mountains into being. After the landscape stage, atmospheric conditioning is performed - in a way operating kind of like a zamboni, slowly driving through the upper atmosphere of a planet laying down the outermost gaseous layers - ozone, ion, etc - and then working its way down to the planet itself, pumping out the architect species' preferred cocktail of Oxygen and CO2. With a stable atmosphere created, Deoxyns begin the slow and steady process of seeding the planet with appropriate greenery, one sector of each continent at a time, while water is synthesized or imported (Or, if the planet is lucky enough to have frozen ice caps or underground aquifers, they simply use those to give the planet a good start). Humans have a much easier time. Once water and air are on the planet, all they need to do is withdrawl Xerneas and send in Shaymin. Generally, the pilots of these ships are also the main architect of the planet.
Deoxyn-created worlds are, on the whole, far more "Designed" than human worlds. Deoxyns value planetary architecture as an art form in and of itself, and thus believe it's worth going slow to create an aesthetically pleasing and functional world. Human-created worlds are, however, far more "Wild" in their make-up. It's not known what kind of habitats the Shaymin will create on the planet in each sector, and often two Shaymin will encroach on one another's territory, creating spots of lush forests of completely disparate and incompatible greenery. Humans tend to enjoy this more wild approach, and view the taming of these new habitable planets as the conquering of an unknown frontier.
Xects'es have not perfected a way to reliably terraform planets to their own specifications, but Celebi or Xerneas ships can sometimes be loaned out and recalibrated for a Xects'es architect.

Stealth Self-explanitory. This ship is extra stealthy.

Telekinetic Don't think of it as telekinesis. Instead, think of it as a sort of tractor beam the ship can use to immobilize objects and freeze enemy starships in place. It allows this ship to tow, push, and hold objects allowed by their power capability from a range of 8 km. Most of the other rules are the same, just scaled up.

Telepath A ship with an electromagnetic receiver cranked up to the max. Designed to intercept enemy comms. When attempting to break into enemy bands, roll the pilot's focus against the enemy pilot's focus.

Threaded A ship which comes with a set of strong towing cables. Otherwise, the threaded rules are mostly the same.

Tracker A ship which is adept at "Listening" to background radiation, ambient background noise, and other signifiers of starship activity. The rolls are all the same. Starships with dead silent do not give off any of the things the tracker is looking for, and thus cannot be tracked in this way. May only be used to track other starships or mecha.

Tremorsense A ship equipped with tactile-sensors. As long as the ship has contact with solid ground, it can give an accurate readout of solid objects inside the ground, empty spaces underground, or any other anomaly within 5 km.

Underdog Baby's first starship.

Volatile Bomb Mostly meaningless, since Ships do not have loyalty.

Wallclimber With access to surfaces large enough to hold it, this starship can deploy landing gear to "Walk" on the surfaces of planets, moons, and asteroids, the surfaces of larger starships, buildings, or any other object large enough for a starship to walk on it.

Weathershape Castform-class Starships have a reactive coating attached to their hulls, which reacts to humidity. If the ambient humidity in the surrounding area rises too high or too low, as it does when starships use the "Rain Dance" or "Sunny Day" programs, the Castform's appearance changes accordingly. Additionally, when being pelted by small, hull-disrupting objects, such as starship weapons that spread damaging chaff around the surrounding area, like Sandstorm and Hail, it can react to the temperature of the tiny object in order to deflect them, and changes appearance accordingly.

Wielder Only really relevant for mecha. Works basically the same way.

Wired Does not apply to Porygon. With Rotom it's only relevant when switching between formes. The Rotom-class starship is actually a very small ship, which can be used to latch onto and manipulate ordinary electronic equipment to create a larger starship around itself. Think of how Lagann can Lagann Impact with larger Ganmen to take control of them. Most ships have firewalls against this, so you can't take control of another starship willy-nilly. You CAN however, take control of large vehicles with an electrical circuit present, such as planes, tanks, Ships, or cars, or you can take control of large repositories of electricity, such as power plants/power generators, and supercolliders. This affects your Rotom-class starship's size, and gives you a new typing and a free move chosen by the GM to place into your movelist, which may be equipped whenever your Rotom ship is in this form and is automatically unequipped and placed into storage if this form is abandoned.

What about real Rotoms and Real Porygons? That is a good question. Here's the answer: all starships and mecha are equipped with firewalls and anti-hacking software which keep Rotoms and Porygons out. However, a pilot can manually disable the firewalls on his OWN ship, in order to allow the pokemon to take control. For Porygons, the pokemon effectively becomes the pilot, and the pokemon's piloting stats are used instead of yours. In Rotom's case, the rotom takes control of the entire ship, turning the ship into a gigantic Rotom. In this forme, the Rotom is considered a Rotom-class starship, retains it's own moveset (Ignoring the moveset of the ship it took over completely), and gains one of the ship's types and gains one move to add to its own moveset, as usual for forme changing. Assign each of Rotom's moves to one of the facings of the ship it inhabited. However, you cannot pilot a spaceship and command a pokemon in the same round, so having an extra ship for your Rotom won't be very efficient. If your ship goes below 0 HHP when a Rotom is inhabiting it, the Rotom faints, and the ship is disabled.

X-Ray Vision Self-explanatory.

Zapper Electric systems can be focused outward, allowing Struggle attacks to be electric typed.

Starship Abilities

Most abilities for Starships work identically to how they work for normal pokemon. However, a few abilities require some rejiggering because of the space setting, their mechanical nature, or because of the kinds of environments pokemon usually find themselves in. Here's a list of changed abilities:

Seasonal
Since starships spend most of their time in space, Seasons are meaningless. Instead, these ships have very sensitive instruments which change modes depending on where within a solar system's habitable zone you are.

  • Within the "Hot Zone" of a star system, the area closest to a system's sun, this ship changes to its Summer form, and gains the Grass Pelt ability.
  • Within the "Habitable Zone" of a star system, the area where life can be naturally sustained, this ship changes to its Spring form, and gains the Run Away ability.
  • Within the "Cold Zone" of a star system, the area furthest away from the system's sun, this ship changes to its autumn form, and gains the Rivalry ability.
  • When this pokemon is outside of a system's solar zones completely and is travelling through deep space, this ship changes to its Winter form, and gains the Thick Fat ability.

Rivalry and other Gendered abilities
Since starships don't have gender, instead, these abilities activate based on the gender of the pilots. Why would you build a starship that way you ask? Shut up, that's why.

Mini-Noses
Add the following line to the effect text of Mini-noses: "Each starship Mini-nose knows only a single ranged attack, but may ignore facing rules when launching that attack. Since the nose is mechanical in nature, Starship noses do not regenerate naturally, and must be repaired by visiting the docks."

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