Fly Free or Die in Starfinder
Last week when Jason Tondro announced a three volume adventure path for Starfinder that involved shipping and trading cargo for money to pay for your starship I got kind of excited. Starfinder had previously abstracted all the ship related costs in their space fantasy adventure game, anyone looking fro even a little more accounting like say docking fees is dismissively told to go play traveller. That’s unfortunate because Traveller has its very own kind of 1970s play and 40 years of lore and baggage that you don’t need if all you want are cargo and trade.
Bare Necessities
Say I’m an ace pilot uplifted bear, I run short haul cargo off a minor trade station and evade Vlaka pirates in my trusty cargo ship, I work for the company and dream of owning my own ship one day. I have a young copilot that I’m teaching the ropes and a Pahtra mechanic that’s forgotten more about starship repairs than most people will ever know. If your trusty cargo ship is something like a Short Empire seaplane and the pirates fly planes that look suspiciously like Polikarpov I-15s I might be looking out for CnD letters from Disney for ripping off Talespin, but as long as my players never know, and are having fun do it anyway.
Short Empire (cargo plane)
Level: 4
Price: $ unknown
Type: Large air vehicle (114 ft. wide, 88 ft. long, 31.75 ft. high)
Speed: 140 ft., full 300 ft., 200 mph
EAC: 11; KAC: 11; Cover: total cover
HP: 15 (7); Hardness: 5
Attack (Collision) 7d6 B (DC 9)
Attack no cannon
Modifiers: +2 Piloting, –4 attack (–6 at full speed)
System: autocontrol, comm unit
Autocontrol
Some vehicles have autocontrol, Baloo ties a rope around the controls (yoke). This enables you to spend your actions on tasks other than piloting, but is far less capable than an autopilot. You can engage autocontrol as a swift action after taking a drive or race action, and it lasts until it is disengaged (also a swift action) or until the vehicle is no longer capable of moving. When you’re using autocontrol, the vehicle becomes uncontrolled, but each round it moves in a straight line for the same distance and at the same heading and speed as the last pilot action (moving as if taking two drive actions if drive was the last action the pilot took, or as a race action if that was the last action the pilot took). The autocontrol uses the result of the pilot’s most recent Piloting check as the result of its Piloting checks.
Comm Unit
Cargo planes needed radios to call for takeoff and landing, to radio distress and call for rescue when the inevitably crash land somewhere.
Air Pirate fighter (Polikarpov I-15)
Level: 3
Price: $ unknown
Type: Gargantuan air vehicle (32 ft. wide, 20 ft. long, 7.25 ft. high)
Speed: 155 ft., full 330 ft., 220 mph (rate of climb 7.6 m/s)
EAC: 11; KAC: 11; Cover: partial cover
HP: 9 (4); Hardness: 5
Attack (Collision) 7d4 B (DC 8)
Attack light reaction cannon (1d10 P) Polikarpov I-15s had 4 7.62mm machine guns
Modifiers: +2 Piloting, –2 attack (–5 at full speed)
System: comm unit
Comm Unit (Radio)
Sky pirate fighters have radios for issuing orders from the squadron leader to the other planes. The radios of the 1930s were limited range.
More Tales
Say I’m a human ace pilot with my own ship, super loyal if flawed mechanic, love interest that’s a spy, eccentric bar owner right out of Casablanca, and we haul cargo all over while foiling the evil plots of space nazis, and my trusty ship is a Grumman Goose, space is the South Pacific and the Azlanti are pre-war Japan and Germany, it might be Tales of the Gold Monkey. In an early episode of Talespin Kit Cloudkicker lists off the excuses to Baloo that they’ll tell Rebecca for why they are late, the list is basically a summary of the first 4 or so episodes of Tales of the Gold Monkey right down to the cannibals and hurricane.
Grumman Goose (cargo plane)
Level: 4
Price: $ unknown
Type: Gargantuan air vehicle (49 ft. wide, 38.5 ft. long, 16 ft. high)
Speed: 140 ft., full 300 ft., 200 mph
EAC: 11; KAC: 11; Cover: total cover (the KAC/EAC are suggested by Ultimate Vehicles, a CR 3 combatant construct would have EAC 16, KAC 18, 16/17 if you consider a cargo plane an expert.)
HP: 15 (7); Hardness: 5 (The Warhawk would have 40 hp in D20 Modern by Rich Redman’s vehicle building rules, listed are from Ultimate Vehicles) A CR 4 Combatant Construct built with the Monster rules from Alien Archive would have 50 hp. 45 hp if you consider a cargo plane an expert.
Attack (Collision) 7d6 B (DC 9)
Attack no cannon
Modifiers: +2 Piloting, –4 attack (–6 at full speed)
System: autocontrol, comm unit
Autocontrol
Some vehicles have autocontrol, Jake usually tells someone else to hold the controls. This enables you to spend your actions on tasks other than piloting, but is far less capable than an autopilot. You can engage autocontrol as a swift action after taking a drive or race action, and it lasts until it is disengaged (also a swift action) or until the vehicle is no longer capable of moving. When you’re using autocontrol, the vehicle becomes uncontrolled, but each round it moves in a straight line for the same distance and at the same heading and speed as the last pilot action (moving as if taking two drive actions if drive was the last action the pilot took, or as a race action if that was the last action the pilot took). The autocontrol uses the result of the pilot’s most recent Piloting check as the result of its Piloting checks.
Comm Unit
Cargo planes needed radios to call for takeoff and landing, to radio distress and call for rescue when the inevitably crash land somewhere.
Flying Tigers
Before WWII, Jake was a Flying Tiger pilot, and we see him in an episode fighting against a Japanese Zero. The Flying Tigers flew Curtiss P-40 Warhawks and mostly fought Nakajima Ki-27 allied nickname “Nate” fighters.
Warhawk fighter (Curtiss P-40)
Level: 3
Price: $44,892
Type: Gargantuan air vehicle (37.3 ft. wide, 31.7 ft. long, 10.8 ft. high)
Speed: 155 ft., full 330 ft., 334 mph
EAC: 11; KAC: 11; Cover: partial cover (the KAC/EAC are suggested by Ultimate Vehicles, a CR 3 combatant construct would have EAC 14, KAC 16)
HP: 9 (4); Hardness: 5 (The Warhawk would have 40 hp in D20 Modern by Rich Redman’s vehicle building rules, listed are from Ultimate Vehicles) A CR 3 Combatant Construct built with the Monster rules from Alien Archive would also have 40 hp.
Attack (Collision) 7d4 B (DC 8)
Attack medium reaction cannon (2d10 P) Curtiss P-40 Warhawks had 6 .50 cal machine guns
Modifiers: +2 Piloting, –2 attack (–5 at full speed)
System: comm unit
Comm Unit (Radio)
Warhawk fighters have radios for issuing orders from the squadron leader to the other planes. The radios of the 1930s were limited range.
Nate fighter (Nakajima Ki-27)
Level: 3
Price: $ unknown
Type: Gargantuan air vehicle (37.1 ft. wide, 24.8 ft. long, 10.8 ft. high)
Speed: 155 ft., full 330 ft., 290 mph
EAC: 11; KAC: 11; Cover: partial cover
HP: 9 (4); Hardness: 5 (The Nate would have 34 hp in D20 Modern by Rich Redman’s vehicle building rules, listed are from Ultimate Vehicles)
Attack (Collision) 7d4 B (DC 8)
Attack light reaction cannon (1d10 P) Nakajima Ki-27s had 2 7.7 mm machine guns
Modifiers: +2 Piloting, –2 attack (–5 at full speed)
System: comm unit
Comm Unit (Radio)
Sky pirate fighters have radios for issuing orders from the squadron leader to the other planes. The radios of the 1930s were limited range.
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