I have a game where two star ships will be playing a cat and mouse game. The players ship is a smaller Archer class ship and the NPC ship is a much larger Klingon scout. The system has a small colony that is, however, too big for the Archer class to be able to evacuate. The system has solar fares and radiation enough to stiffle scanning to a certain extent. There are planets abd moons, also asteroid clusters spread around. The players need to keep the Klingon ship away from the Colony with hit and run tacticts and stealth when they can. Just long enough for help to arrive in about 36 hours. Any thoughts on different ways to run this?
Some ideas:
Regarding the radiation: I would treat this as constant zone effects. Designate a “radiation interference X” trait to each zone that fits your map design. I would recommend two ratings (1 and 2), three at most. Trying to fire at a ship present in such a zone raises difficulty by X; if the firing ship is also present in said zone (i.e. close range) you could allow to lower difficulty by one (i.e. X-1). You could also grant cover (cf. p. 226 of the Core Rulebook).
Regarding the solar flares: Since these are events rather than constant effects, I would give sensor operationers and/or navigators the possibility to “chart” and “predict” solar flares, effectively creating traits for ship movements and/or attack. If they can predict solar flares and coordinate actions accordingly, they could effectively use the flares as some kind of short time concealment. Traits could either be advantageous for your players (e.g. lower difficulty to hit as the Klingons do not see them coming early enough) or disadvantageous for the Klingons (e.g. needing to do another sensor sweep before they can attack again). They could also raise the effects of maneuvers (attack/evasive pattern etc.) by 1.
Planets and moons could be their own zones, but don’t overcomplicate your map. I, personally, would recommend to assign zones to planets only, using the moons to describe different effects of a zone (e.g. to determine cover, or allowing certain maneuvers (e.g. evasive pattern) to be more effective (incrementing their effect by 1, seldom(!) 2).
Asteroid clusters are perfect zones to grant Cover (p. 226 of the Core Rulebook). Combine Cover with the occasional “dense” and/or “fragile” effect to make it more interesting.
Since you specified help to arrive in 36 hours, you could also think of letting the players create an extended task for the Klingons. Players hide, defining with their rolls the work track and/or magnitude of the task. They are hidden and cannot attack while the Klingons are searching for them. To spice things up, let players roll each time before the Klingons roll on their task, to define Resistance for this specific Klingon’s roll.
If you happen to own the Utopia Planitia Sourcebook, look at the Zone Hazards optional rules on pp. 233 ff. (esp. the table on p. 235).
Thanks. All very helpful. I’ll look tonight at utopia planitia book as well.