A complete Ship section overhaul.

[Karlinator]

I've had this in the back of my mind for a while, and it certainly might not be in the next version (v2.2.0 is all about autofilling everything, including ship modules), but there are a bunch of ways in which the current Ship sheet fails to be all that useful.

• Rolling ship weapons. We've been discussing adding a field where you can type in the name of the character currently in gunnery, and the ship sheet will then use that character's AB, Dex/Int and Shoot skill when rolling the attack.
• Keeping track of Command Points. A simple number box would kind of work I guess, but I kind of want something better when we overhaul the whole section anyway. We could add some automation to it (especially for Pro users with the ChatSetAttr API script like we did for ammo).
• Building ships. The current v2.2.0 alpha includes autofilling stats for all the hulls, weapons, fittings, and defences. Calculating the total cost of the ship (and from there the maintenece cost) should be easy.
• Mods. This is a topic of some concern, as it sort of touches everything. I'm not sure if the best strategy is to add mods for ships separately to equipment mods in the rest of the sheet, but it definiately belongs in a list of things we're missing.

This is a sort of mega-thread for all ideas and suggestions for a ship section averhaul. Keep the ideas flowing!

[PanzerUXI]

Seems like bullet point 1 & 2 are the same holistic system. Building on that awesome macro someone built on Reddit a month ago. Excuse the stream on consciousness, it's late but I wanted to get my notes down:

1. On the Ship screen, start with assigning PC Characters to each of the 5 departments, with ability to assign the same PC to two departments for <5 crews. This automates the whole +1 CP for department that didn't take an action/is an NPC.

2. Include a quick menu system / main RT representing each department, that when selected sends themselves an updated RT specific to that character & department. Each Roll Template from the Ship Page to a player displays:

• Shortened Captain Order list, with their step highlighted
• Current ship CP
• Their available actions , which is general plus their assigned department - and their second department if set as above.
• Any current Crisis in effect.
• Current Range (critical to pilots)
• ex. Bridge pulls in Int/Dex + Pilot and ship speed for Escape Combat, Evasive Maneuvers, etc.
• ex. Captain create Crisis, his actions give -2 CP to department, etc.
• ex. Comms pulls Int/Program bonuses
• ex. Engineer pulls Int/Fix and ship speed, etc etc
• ex. Gunner pulls his AB, Dex/Int S & Shoot and attached hard-points.

3. This system can be controlled by a single player who delivers these updated RT's to each crew as they go down the turn order (captain?) or automated as each action is taken and resolved?

4. The Crisis roll is done by the GM in the rulebook, but seems fine the Captain can do it, or its off the sheet. The GM should also be able to select a specific crisis. The sheet should have a list to track acute and continuing crisis' and some shorthand of their effects on the ship - as well as supporting when they stack.

Other things to include in Ships:

5. The sheet should allow you to set what NPC ship you are fighting (pulled from Characters, but NPC Ship). If the GM did make it, it will allow us to pull in and automate a lot of the compare rolls some departments get. If the target is unknown (see 8) the rolls can be static and compared manually by players as GM rolls the NPC ship(s).

6. Sheet should also support range and have visual indicators of boarding range, how far until escape, etc. Bridge Department RT should have this too?

7. Sheet should display the NPC ship stat card (if linked) or be able to request it, as the rules say Comms can always see basic info on hull and obvious hard-points. Dexter pointed out the word obvious is broad as hell, and GM's might want to keep things secret/undiscovered. Maybe makes more sense for the Comms Department to "ping" the NPC ship to prompt the GM to reveal what they know vs automate.

8. It'd be really interesting to support Sensors & Detection. Half the fun of space combat in SWNr (IMO) is the hard sci-fi game of hide and seek starships/planets play with each-other. Be fun to show that moment you are seen in a cool RT export like we do Saves Successful/Failed.

9. Dexter pointed out that weapons can be manned by anyone on the ship, but only 1 per person. Gunners get the override to fire all. So it might make sense to assign the "shooter" at the weapon hardpoint level, then pull in assigned shooters dex/int & shoot bonuses. That way, keeps the bonus rolls to the weapon flexible.

To your original post, having auto-fills will be great. Mods as we've discussed are a big issue. I'll update my thoughts on that in the Mod ticket.

[PanzerUXI]

Based on Dexter's awesome feedback, made edits on rule systems I flubbed.

[joesinghaus]

This is just a hack, but an attribute with the value

@{CHARNAME|

can be used to indeed pull stats from a given character in macros.

These ideas are pretty cool. I imagine some kind of "enter ship combat mode" button which shows role selection, command points, and all the buttons we need. We can be inspired by the macro work someone did, but this is still going to require some serious UI work.

[PanzerUXI]

I'm up for it if you are!