Saucer Separation and Supporting Small Craft

When a Galaxy posses for example 3 shuttle before separation, it still posses only 3 after separation!
No replicator would be fast enough to increase the shuttle number!

Supporting small craft is a shipboard operation.

Derived by scale.

The small craft limit doesnā€™t magically make more shuttles. It doesnā€™t need to. What it does do is allow you to operate more at one time when youā€™re operating as two vessels. The small craft limit isnā€™t about how many you can hold inside the ship; itā€™s about how many you can have flying at once.

Captainā€™s Yacht is weird though, because by the rules as written, each vessel gets one.

Of each distinct ship. Follow the Saucer Separation rule.

Negative, you are only operating two sections of one ship.

Also:

ā€œCAPTAINā€™S YACHT
The vessel has a single additional support craft, normally mounted in a dedicated port under the saucer section of the ship.
ā€

Again, you are only operating one ship. You are merely operating in two distinct sections.

" Supportable small craft and crew support is derived by scale for the whole ship not by independent section."

This is the part where the rules do not clearly support your point. Can you quote a rule on it? Errata perhaps?

I still disagree with your interpretation of this.
Yes there are now two tactical units instead of one. But each is weaker then the original ship.
Imo the reduction by just one size is to small. Because a size class 6 ship isnā€™t twice as large as a size class 5 ship. And the separation basically halves the ship. Imo the both section should have a size of (ship size - 2) or (ship size/2).

I agree that the Saucer Separation rules are absolutely absurd and does not fit what was shown on-screen for its uses.

Iā€™m pointing out how the rules as they are written suck.

The easiest solution:
Never give the players a ship with saucer separation! :laughing: :vulcan_salute:

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I would agree if it werenā€™t a standard feature of the Nebulaā€¦:anguished:

And there you get into the added weirdness that the pod somehow still benefits the separated saucer section (by the strict reading of the rules).

In the end for all rule questions exist only one option:
The GM must decide and use common sense!

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Sure would be nice if the writers had written the rules better though. Common sense when something is unclear can work, but having to overrule clear rules that happen to be ā– ā– ā– ā–  is annoying.

At the end of the section in the core book on crew support: ā€œA shipā€™s normal allotment of Crew Support per mission is equal to its Scale.ā€
Under Launch and Landing Procedures on page 233. ā€œA starship can support a number of active small craft equal to its Scale minus 1 at any one time. This number is doubled for ships with the Extensive Shuttlebays Talent, as theyā€™re specially equipped to handle large quantities of auxiliary craft.ā€

You keep harping on the very first line, focusing on the specific phrase of two distinct ships. This talent does not create two distinct ships. It is one ship splitting in two. You want a more specific reference on exactly that? Re-read the saucer separation talent. Specifically:

ā€œReconnecting requires the same Task with Difficulty 1, but from crew in both parts of the ship; if either Task fails, the reconnection fails.ā€

That specifically says both parts of the ship. Not two separate ships.

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Itā€™s ok, believe what you want. Iā€™m writing this game off as being artsy trash. This isnā€™t the first issue Iā€™ve had with the rules, and this is the second chance Iā€™ve given it. I just canā€™t deal with the ignorant rule choices the designers made and the sloppy playtesting that let this kind of thing through. Thankfully I only bought one book and two pdfs. I was going to order the rest of the books for a game my group wanted me to run, but Iā€™m going to run something else (anything else) instead.

Well, you are certainly entiteled to your opinion there, even if I disagree with you. Out of curiousity, which pdfs did you get?

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As with all rules, common sense should apply. For a Galaxy class vessel, you have a single Captainā€™s Yacht, even if both sections have the Talent after the separation. It also does not make sense that a separated ship can support more small craft than a normal ship.

Many of the rules provided are merely a framework and are open for interpretation and for adjustment depending on the circumstances. Personally, I think this works very well with Star Trek and with my GM style.

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Ok, so there are a lot of comments, meaning I didnā€™t read them all, but the context you are planning on this coming up is very important. What is the situation likely to be?

This is one of those RAW vs RAI situations in my opinion. Technically speaking, yes you end up with two scale smaller ships, and this ships would be capable of supporting additional small craft.

However, baring in mind that the saucer separation is designed for use in emergency situations to be able to keep the majority of crew out of danger, Iā€™m not sure your crews would be spending hours to build all those extra small craft (it isnt how many can be flying at once, it is how many the ship supports in terms of being powered up and in mission ready condition). You are of course entitled to go and do that, but if I was running that game and that suggestion came up, I would definately view it as an attempt at power gaming.

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Having now had chance to catch up on the other comments, Iā€™d be interested to know @HappyDaze, which other RPGs are you comparing STA to in terms of your expectations? And what style of game do you usually tend to play?

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TBH if you write off an RPG after a couple of rules issues then I can only infer that you write off pretty much every RPG out there. Iā€™m not saying you have to enjoy this game, I just find this attitude puzzling.

I think a very important point that many people are missing is that this system is not supposed to be an accurate representation of the Star Trek Universe, and the rules have not been designed to detail the minutia of how things like starships operate. The system is designed to feel like a Star Trek episode or film, where how things operate from episode to episode can change dramatically.

Common sense should be applied to rules but liberties can also be taken in lieu of ā€œcanonā€ representation e.g.:

  • Problem - Saucer section does not have Torpedoes
  • Solution - Your ship does
  • Problem - Saucer section does not have shuttle bays
  • Solution - Your ship does
  • Problem - Rules are not clear how many shuttles can be supported when separated
  • Solution 1 - Ship has fixed limit regardless of separation
  • Solution 2 - Separated ship has 2 bridges so can now support independent limits.

IMO Star Trek Adventures has itā€™s own unique variant on Rule #0 straight from the mouth of Gabriel Lorca:

ā€œUniversal law is for lackeys. Context is for kingsā€

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