This is designed for flying mounts and big monsters so it needed a little bricolage to make work for flying ship combat - but not much. The main 'work' was extending the flight modifiers table to account for colossal things - such as a 120 hull point drow Deathspider.
We took the same stat sheets from Spider Moon for the ships - 3.5e being close enough to 5e - but here the victory conditions were adjusted. Aces High assumes a tight hairball of a combat with no lateral movement, just altitude, so there was no 'off the board' escape route, just climbing up and out.
Owing to a screw-up in my reading of the rules we did two tests but I think both are interesting and hinge on one missed set of 3 words.
First test - we plotted out the flight modifier tables, identified the appropriate mod for a Colossal ship is +0 and therefore assigns zero stunt dice to the Deathspider. Reading through the rules we realise the only way for the Deathspider to 'escape' is through altitude and without a stunt dice it cannot climb. So Test One is pure brute force - can the Deathspider shoot down the Manowar before it is picked to death. The Manowar has 4 stunt dice based on being Gargantuan but having a relatively good speed of 90ft.
Round 1: We set our timer and scramble, dicing off for starting altitude - the Deathspider ends up at 6, the Manowar at 5. Next is initiative and to no ones surprise the ponderous Deathspider loses. The Manowar goes to its first round, drops its stunt die and gets 4,4,4,4 - giving an available 3-of-a-kind to cash in for an Angle (additional action). The Manowar shoots with disadvantage for lower altitude (by mistake, see end of round lessons). A hit is scored, inflicting some damage and dropping the Deathspider an altitude level. At this point we realised the Deathspider was on a clock - 6 hits, even at minimal damage, were going to cause 6 losses of altitude and run the Deathspider into the ground. We later interpreted that as the rigging getting chewed up so badly it lost control, even if the hull was still intact.
The Manowar then burn their 3-of-a-kind for an Angle to take another action and fires again with forward ballistae and no disadvantage. Another hit and a crit. More damage but worse, the crit knocks d4 altitude levels off - and the roll came up for '3'. Normally in a round you only lose altitude once from damage - except for crits. The Deathspider is now down at altitude 2 - that clock just got shorter.
Firing back, the Deathspider strikes twice with light ballistae but the Manowars hardness soaks much of the damage. It too loses an altitude level.
Round 2: the Manowar rolls 1,1,3,4 - no angles. It zips in for a pair of hits - with AC 8 the Deathspider is a difficult target to miss. It loses one more altitude level. The Manowar choses to burn a stunt die for a Fangs Out pass. The ships roll off with their flight modifiers - and the Manowar wins. Two more strikes cause damage but no crits so no further altitude loss. Pushing it again, the Manowar burns another stunt dice - and this time fails the contested flight check. Now the Deathspider gets to take a free attack and opens up with their ballistae. A successful hit puts damage on the Manowar who burns another stunt dice for 'Evasive Maneuvers' and gains that dice worth of altitude instead of losing it. On the Deathspiders own turn it fires its remaining weaponry for another strike, low damage and no further altitude loss.
Things are not looking good for the Deathspider which is skimming the mountain tops trailing rigging at this point.
Round 3: The Manowar rolls 2,4,4,4 on their stunt dice. They attack, for 2 hits, driving the Deathspider down and it is now a pancake at the end of the round. The only thing to play for is whether it manages to knock down the Manowar as well. The Manowar spends its 3-of-a-kind to take another pair of shots, putting the Deathspider below half hit points and auto-losing a level of altitude per round. The Deathspider shoots back at disadvantage and lands a glancing blow and the Manowar spends its last stunt dice for Evasive Maneuvers and spirals away as the round ends and the Deathspider impacts.
Things we did wrong - forgot that unspent stunt dice carry over round to round. Missed that weapon crews are passengers and so do not get disadvantage for being at lower altitude. Failed to notice that everyone gets a minimum one stunt dice. Practically this last meant that the Deathspider was doomed - it had no way to claw back altitude.
It was really quick to run the first round so after a short break we racked up the ships for a second go. We said the win condition for the Deathspider was to climb to the top of the altitude stack - 12+ - representing getting out of the gravity well and punching to Spelljamming speed. This time around things went like lightning. The Manowar wins the scramble, starting at 6 an altitude level above the Deathspider (5), and then wins initiative again.
Round 1: the Manowar gets 1,1,3,4 on stunt die, the Deathspider gets a 3. The Manowar burns a die to gain 3 altitude and (now above the Deathspider) fires with advantage. Shots land home and the Deathspider takes damage but drops their only stunt die to Evasive Maneuver 3 altitude levels higher to level 8. The Manowar captain realises they do not have much time before the Deathspider escapes - 2 more rounds like this and they are away. The Manowar opts to go Fangs Out and wins the flight check, landing 2 more hits.
The Deathspider gets their round and fires, without disadvantage despite being lower altitude because they have weapon crews. Their heavy ballista lands a hit and the Manowar captain chooses to Evasive Maneuver up 1 level to altitude 10. They also carry over a stunt die.
Round 2: the Manowar gets 2,3,3,4 and hold a 4 from before. The Deathspider rolls a 3. The Manowar burns their 3-in-a-row for an immediate angle to take their shots. They are now very aware they have to get the Deathspider below half hit points to start them sinking to buy themselves time. They land a hit and the Deathspider burns their stunt die to Evasive Maneuver to altitude 11. The Manowar then takes their main action and land 2 more hits. They go Fangs Out and succeed for another hit, then Fangs Out with their last stunt dice for two more hits. This leaves the Deathspider still at more than half hull points so things are not looking great.
It comes to the Deathspiders turn and with their height advantage they fire their main batteries with advantage. All shots land - a heavy ballista, a light ballista and a critical hit by a light balista. The critical hit inflicts over half-total damage to the already slightly damaged Manowar and the heavy ballista delivers the coup-de-grace. The Manowar tumbles out of the sky as the Deathspider makes its escape.
Things that were fuzzy - ballistae take longer to load than we were allowing - they can be over-crewed which makes them faster to fire and the ships did have sufficient crew on-board but I think there may have been a limit we were not heeding with multiple Fangs Out, Angles, etc. Talking through it, it seems reasonable to us that the action rounds for ships would be longer than for griffon riders or dragons so time available to reload makes sense.
Note through out this, the Deathspider did not get access to the 'Bugging Out' maneuver - the Manowar was 50% faster, unless it was crippled, there was no way the Deathspider could just turn tail and run.
If we were to re-run it, the Evasive Maneuvers giving the full score on the die in altitude levels is potentially huge - so to make things slightly harder for the Deathspider we would half the result of its Altitude result from the Scramble.
Overall, this is a great fun system to run - quick as anything; 3 rounds to finish when it was the Manowar driving the Deathspider into the ground and only 2 when we figured out things properly. All this was with basic crews, no heroes, magicians, archers or anything which made it very quick. Certainly I think the ship-scale of things is quick enough you could easily layer on a party running around doing things without slowing things up too bady.
Thanks for bringing this to my attention! I might adopt this to my future Lin Carter's Green Star based game... (as it often focuses on flying mounts)
ReplyDeleteGlad you found it useful - its a good quick system when you don't have lots of crew and weapon systems to deal with. I use it quite a lot at my own table.
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