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Damage Rating Conversion Chart

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CadetNewb

CadetNewb

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Right now, I'm talking to a newer player about the Damage Rating system, and there's currently a rather gray area that's come up. Most consider the jump between ADR 5/SDR 1 to SDR 2 to be an exponential increase, where the SDR 2 weapon will be an instant kill to anything ADR, regardless of its structural points. However, the conversion chart suggests that the jump is multiplicative instead, meaning that SDR 2 = ADR 10. At the same time, my impression is that most older players simply consider the conversion chart to be a hold over used to handle the old DR system. Which do we go with?

Personally, I prefer it if SDR 2 = ADR 10, as that would alleviate a lot of headaches and allow larger vehicles such as tanks and frames to mount appropriately powerful weapons which scale to their size.
 
I want it to be simple. But I also sometimes want to mount a weapon bigger than a platform should at the cost of its defence or usability.
 
If someone can point out to me what the present problems are with what Fred posed, I'd be more than happy to help rewrite it.
 
This is me writing down the guidelines for the revision of the Damage Rating thingie in order to address a lot of outstanding issues reported about it throughout the years.

However, it consists in me dumping down information, rather than make it fit for all audiences. I know Cadetnewb, for one, was greatly interested in seeing this revised and he's pretty much a champion at poking holes in wiki pages to help clarify them. Not saying the effort need e exclusive to him, but what makes sense to me in writing might not make sense to another.

Basically, most of what was to be designed is done (as far as I'm concerned). The wording of it though is another matter entirely, and needs to be up for review.
 
I'll look it over and ask Cadetnewb to highlight any parts that they think need work. Hopefully it won't give Cadet too much work and I can get this done relatively quickly.
 
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Let's take a step back for a moment guys; there's two things I'm addressing here.

First and foremost, what's up with that conversion chart that I linked? One of the newer players is trying to make some tech, but it's tossing us both for a loop since his interpretation of it is completely different from my own and what I took to be the norm. Though the latter issue is something that's bothered me and many others for a long, long time, this one is more important for the time being, since it's directly concerning the efforts someone's making on creating new stuff for the setting.

Second, it would be really nice if we could fix the DR system, since it's been a problem that's been swept under the rug for a long time. We're all focusing on this one right now though. XD Yes, it's under the rug, but it's still a problem that exists, and is there, hence, why it's always coming back to haunt us like a ghost that hasn't been set to rest. It's not always levitating objects/small children or watching us pee, but it's there.So far, there are three main manners that I'm aware of in which we could try to fix it.
  1. The proposed fix that @Fred has is actually not bad at all, and probably good, since it's a narrative driven system that gives a general, rough idea of how things are, and lets the GM have plenty of wiggle room to focus on the plot itself. Its weakness would be in requiring to convert all articles of the current system over to it, which is no easy task.
  2. There's the one that @Kai suggested where there's simply a new category slipped in between Armor and Ships called MDR for "Mecha Damage Rating", which would basically be what vehicles such as APCs, Tanks, Fighters, Bombers and Frames/Mecha would use. The simplicity of this would be in how it just plugs into the current system, and would only require changing a smaller group of articles.
  3. Then there's my own ideas. I've tried not once, not twice, but three times to try and figure out something. In general, my attempts all mostly focus on expanding the pre-existing system to include more points in every category, allowing us to have a wider range of weapons and vehicles. (However, all attempts I've made have ended with me doing a head-desk and giving up from a combination of complexity and there not being enough of a consensus as to how we'd fix the DR system. I like to think we're all Neko inside and impossible to herd. That aside, you guys don't have to look at the attempts it in detail, but there's info at the top of each to read about why we've all tried in the past. )
To prove a point on how ineffective the current DR system is as a guideline - and one that's often used as a rule instead when it's not supposed to be - we cannot or are not supposed to have any 'one-shot' power armor snipers or 'shotgun' type weapons that can down a PA quickly at close range. The current system is good for general use with Power Armor, their assault rifle analogs and mini-missiles, but the higher we go, the more dysfunctional the system gets.
 
Looking at the conversion chart, it looks like the jump between SDR1 and SDR2 is an attempt to address the gulf between a PA mounted system and a Starship mounted system. Though it works, I feel it causes a headache, because the gap is rather large and there is no opportunity to fit a weapon that might function somewhere in between.

Moving on to address the second portion:

  1. If the biggest issue is simply converting the numbers over I would be happy to provide aid in that regard as I frequently spend hours wandering odd sections of the wiki anyway. Adding in a new guideline to pages (possibly preserving the present DR system for a time to make the transition easier) wouldn't be a big hassle for me during my wanderings. As well I would focus on addressing the more frequently visited pages such as gear that is presently in IC use, these would obviously get priority.
  2. On this subject, I vaguely recall that MDR used to be a part of the DR system and was phased out. I can't remember the details on it for certain, however it strikes me a little odd that this was the case, and leaves me to wonder what the reasons were in favour for the removal at the time.
  3. I took a quick look at the systems that you linked to. While the expanded DR range would be useful the main question that comes to mind was: Are you advocating padding out all armour systems? The comments around the SP sections seemed to suggest increasing the 'hit points' as it were. This seems like a bad idea to me, as forum based RP is in my opinion ill suited to fights that bare similarities to digital RPGs. I can not speak for others however the idea of grinding down an opponent's health IC is not as appealing as using tactics and equipment to defeat foes, I personally believe that it would be more satisfying to have a plan come to fruition and have the reward of quickly killing a foe rather than having to work around the knowledge that it will take several attacks to finish a single enemy, unless the enemy is intended to be difficult to kill for example a heavy tank being assaulted by PA or infantry depending on the technology involved.

On to the last part:

Reading that left me feeling somewhat bitter. The sentiment of not having one hit kill weapons to make things fair is one I can understand, however what happens when a player wants to play the role of a sharp shooter? Or have a load-out focused on close quarters combat where one might need a hard hitting weapon to put down a foe with minimal risk? It seems like a bad idea to streamline the system to make alternative tactics unfeasible as it reduces the combat situations to rote encounters with little by way of options that the players have to explore.

After writing that I realize that I may have misinterpreted what you intended by your last paragraph @CadetNewb, and if that is the case please disregard my previous paragraph.
 
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I've heard enough whining over the years with the DR issue to figure that rather than just keep poking a loose tooth, we actually yank it out, get it over with, and leave room for a new one to grow.

I figure new submissions can stick to that, while more used elements in the setting can be grandfathered in gradually as they are employed. Straight up conversion would be a finicky process; one need only look to my example near the bottom of how a Plumeria-class would be to understand that; some of it is based on what it is intended to destroy, some other is intended while also taking into account what it ought to damage and not destroy, and lastly the role of the weapon and how it was intended to be used.
 
Currently, I'm still rather left in the dark in regards to the conversion chart. Was SDR 2 the same as ADR 10 this whole time? Are we allowed to use ADR 10/SDR 2 stuff on larger things? Or is it just a conversion chart for the old DR system? I was hoping some tech mods like @Nashoba or @Kyle would weigh in too, because I'm previewing something and the player is throwing me for a curve ball with it.

As for what you've said @Eistheid you're relatively on the mark. The old DR system before the current one apparently did have MDR and even ran off of a 1-10 system, but details on it are sketchy. It's simply not here anymore, so if we make a new one, we can't even be sure we're repeating the mistakes of the old one, or tell if the change was overkill or unneeded. As for the numbers of the DR system itself, they don't matter as much as you think - they're there to give a sense of relativity between pieces of tech. Some GMs do think of it as HP, while others might think of it as a mean time until failure, either for catastrophic detonation or a small but ultimately fatal breach for the user. The fact that the current system is flexible enough to let GMs interpret it as they'd like in that manner is, I admit, a good thing the current system has going for it. In regards to adding more Structural Points to things, it'd only apply to vehicles. I pointed out earlier that the current system is pretty decent - but not great - for power armor. As for your observation on players trying to take on roles with different weapons, either sniping or room clearing with a shotgun, that's pretty much what I was thinking, and is one of the major shortcomings of the current system

Also, after thinking about it some more, I now realize why I'm uncomfortable with the DR suggestion @Fred made. It goes right back to what I said before; relativity. The system doesn't give a very good sense of that at all. Compare the Hostile, Daisy and Mindy 2A for an example; the Hostile at 15 SP is only a little shy of being twice as tough as the Daisy at 8 SP, while the Mindy 2A had 6 SP prior to its 2C update. The DR system he's suggesting doesn't convey such a drastic gap like the one between the Hostile and Daisy, or a small and nuanced one such as that between the Daisy and Mindy 2A. Instead, it focuses more on the weapons, and specifically, an individual weapon's lethality against a category. This doesn't give a very loose idea of a 'time to kill', while the current system at least does, even if it's up to GMs to interpret. Is a single level up going to buy another second of protection, or three? Again, it's lacking a sense of relativity between them I think. On top of that though, I'm not sure how it's going to affect platforms with multiple weapons - I admit, I haven't thought that deeply yet.

Still, this was enough for me to instead favor something based off of the current system.

I do think Fred's got a good point though; we might as well just pull the tooth or tear off that bandage. Sooner or later, things will get converted, and if it isn't converted, it's likely unused. Assuming we can bring ourselves to agree on the same solution!
 
Just a note, but the standing issue with implementing MDR or the fourth section again would be how it impacts all of the factions differently. Some factions would be much stronger, some factions would be much weaker, and I'm not sure we could really keep everyone happy by implementing that kind of change. I'm all for a new DR system, but this site's primary focus has always been on ships and PA combat. If you effectively weaken PAs, you're taking away from one of the site's pillars, not helping to build it up.

Not saying that mecha shouldn't have a system that makes their strength relative, but we have to keep in mind where the focus is. There's a lot of RP that's been based around PA being almost as strong as, or in some cases, JUST as strong as, mecha, and handwaving a new system into place that doesn't account for that will just result in even more confusion down the road.
 
Cadet,

I have been reading this discussion. This is quite obviously not a new discussion. The DR system has had multiple suggestions in the time I have been here. I am saving my comments for when a proposal is submitted. I do feel that our system needs adjusting, and the issue that Aendri brought up has been the crux of the issue. PA vs Mecha and how to not break the site.
 
I've put some thought into the effects a change would have on the balance of power and while it would have benefits to some factions in allowing their increased size to actually represent heavier weapons... It wouldn't be an overwhelming change.

For example: Yamatai's space based forces are represented by the Mindy. It is fast, small, and tough for its size compared to what other nations tend to produce. Then they can be fielded with an Aether Beam Sabre-Rifle. It is already canon that Aether pokes holes in everything. This would place even the normal fire of the rifle on a level where if it punched a hole in a larger Mecha it could kill the pilot potentially with one shot. Combine that with the capability of Yamataian forces to literally appear behind their enemies instantly using teleportation packs, and you can have a Mindy assassinate even a larger unit than itself with relative impunity.

You say that it would greatly upset the balance of power in the setting by allowing larger platforms to function as larger platforms should with heavier weapons, armour, and increased systems, however even with the new system it wouldn't put a huge dent in the lethal status of Yamatai's trademark unit.

Taking the time to look beyond the flat numbers highlights that even with the possibility of tougher units it wouldn't cripple present forces. It would simply require handling combat in a slightly different manner to take advantage of the strengths of the PA being used rather than relying on a shield of numbers to allow reckless action.

That is my opinion anyway.

Edit: Fixed a bit of the wording...

Also it comes to mind that no other nation has weapons technology on par with Yamatai, at least no where the reliable lethal nature of Aether weapons come into play, since they're prolific among the SAoY. To futher compound this Yamatai is insulated from an attrition of experienced personnel due to their use of the ST system. Lor and Nepleslia while capable of recovering dead soldiers still has a much higher chance of permanently loosing personnel in the course of a war which would mean that they would steadily weaken as veterans are lost.

However, in spite of all that I have said. I personally find it distasteful to fight against the improvement of the roleplay mechanically based on possible ramifications that one faction might end up a little stronger in the end. At the end of the day we're supposed to co-operate and write a story for everyone to enjoy and it strikes me as odd that there is this heavy emphasis on the factions nuking each other which would be pointless and leave no one happy so I can't see why everyone keeps clinging to it.

Edit 2: Another thought occurs, it could be fun to have a reason to dust off a Tasha or two, or bring in a couple Nodachi fighters to provide heavy support for a group of players in PA. It would give the players the option of calling in fire support from more than their home ship depending on on the situation which could allow the players to plan around using heavy fire support to create an opening to overwhelm a tough foe.
 
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I'm coming clean:

I have literally no idea how DR or SP works, nor am I interested. I get less out of it than what it wants me to put into it.

So I put numbers I see in other articles in and talk like I know what I'm talking about.

So far, its been seven years. Nobody seems to have noticed.

Forgive me for I have sinned
 
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You're all still discussing things that I consider already solved on my wiki article.

@OsakanOne, the wiki page I linked basically says this: if you fire a weapon that's meant to destroy a power armor, then it'll likely have the potential to be lethal. Just like knifing someone will probably be lethal too. But a lethal weapon doesn't mean that it will be applied as lethally as intended: knife in the chest is far more threatening than knife in the shoulder. But a knife is unlikely to harm a power armor. A power armor weapon is more than likely to splatter someone non-armored. An anti-power-armor weapon is pretty unlikely to destroy a tank or a shuttlecraft even if you hit it in a tender spot, but fire enough times at the same place and deterioration probably will do the rest. That's a different deal if you're running around with an infantryman with a bazooka; the bazooka can probably do something to the tank, right? Odds are a power armor needs to watch out for it too. Etcetera etcetera.

As for the nuances, the GM figures those out. No HP system, because life doesn't have HPs. If you want a plotshield, then that's your energy fielding/forcefields/barrier. There's a suggestion for how good they could be, but their endurance is really up to the GM and his interpretations of the unit.

@CadetNewb, you're worried about nuances. That 8 SP versus 10 SP, that 8 SP versus 16 SP. I maintain that it doesn't matter; the narrative doesn't have enough pull typically to make it be significant anyhow. If you have a heavy power armor, then you have a heavy power armor and that's it. If a GM wants to maintain that one needs to be seen as more rugged to another, that's his call. We can't stop it, and we honestly shouldn't try anyways.

I keep expecting help just to make refinement. If this keeps up and that no one is interested - heck, the feedback I get is "I understand fine so far" - I'm going to submit it and put an end for this years-long sordid affair. If you want to influence it before the die is cast, I suggest you do it now. I'm sick of seeing these topics around.
 
@Aendri - that's actually a good point, and as I said before, the idea of creating an entirely new category for vehicles was just one proposed idea, and not one that I favored, with that being one of the reasons. Currently, just as we have GMs who portray power armors as having very little power gap between themselves and vehicles, we also have GMs that ignore the current DR system and do the opposite. Rather than having this discrepancy, we should have something that is somewhere in the middle as to cater to both groups.

What do you think about increasing the SP of vehicles and the DR range for weapons? They'd be still in the same category, but the increased pool would better represent them being tougher and more powerful.

@Nashoba - right now, everyone is focused on the second topic matter rather than the first. Nobody's given me an answer in regards to the CURRENT system, and all the talk is focused on making a new one. Are you able to throw me a bone here in regards to this?

@Eistheid - again, that's roughly what I'm aiming for. A DR system where vehicles would beat PA in a face to face fight, but would lose if the PAs were playing it smart and took advantage of their own strengths, using those against the enemy's weaknesses.

@OsakanOne - I don't blame you.

@Fred - The thing is, that nuance gives the creator of whatever power armor or vehicle some degree of respect for what they envisioned it to be. It gives people who make tech the option to give quirks to their stuff. Some might prefer to even use the DR system to represent how different a piece of equipment is from the rest. What if something is shield heavy with little armor? Or thick with armor but equipped with very thin shields? A GM can choose to ignore it in favor of their own narrative decisions in their RP, but between the choice of to be or not to be, I'd rather have the former.

I can't bring myself to help you with your DR system because I simply haven't been able to warm up to it yet Fred. If it's a product, you've gone ahead and set it on the table, but you haven't made a sales pitch. Can you try and convince me to buy it at least?
 
Nuance didn't matter at the time I joined this site. Weapons went from Heavy Damage to Total Annihilation, and did so from power armor to kilometers-long battleships. It was confusing, the descriptions didn't help any player know the potency of their tool since everyone's baseline was racked waaay up.

Then one day a hapless little player asked Wes: "O Mighty Wes, I sit at this ship's tactical station and I don't really understand the arsenal provided to be in your lofty setting and transcendantory technologies. Could you please save us poor masses struggling with these and illuminate them with your nearly infinite wisdom?"
(I will neither confirm nor deny that this is what I actually said)

The Mighty Wes waved his hand, and radiance spread around the internets (well, some of it). SARP weaponry gained something similar to the Ohm scale, from 1-to-10, and mostly having something to do with penetration values. Which helped, but also at the same time kind of not. So then, the Allmighty Wes lifted both hands up, and the DR system was changed into that of today, making it so that despite it not fighting past narrative very well we had an idea of how many Hellbore Cannon shots were required to destroy a Ur-Quan dreadnought (at -6 crew a shot, that was 7).

But HPs aren't relevant in our narrative. Knowing just how effective the damned weapon is going to be is what's relevant. And to me this answers it. "This weapon is a medium anti-armor one; shoot something like a Daisy in the head or chest, and if its barrier is down, you'll probably kill it". And the beauty of this is that it also kicks the monopoly of Aether being the top-dog on the damage scale down with the rest of the other weapon types. If the weapon is a medium anti-armor one, whether it's a railgun, some assault rifle, some grenade, a light rocket launcher or an aether saber-rifle, well, each will do that job. How well they do it, is, of course, dependent on the weapon type: aether is a directed-energy weapon that travels at the speed of light and is capable of pin-point accuracy, will probably shred through distorsion-based shielding, etcetera etcetera.

Note, howver, that this doesn't stop the ruling that an aether saber-rifle is actually a light-anti-tank weapon since it's expected to be used by a spacy power armor to take out expose starship systems like turrets. Then it's definitely that much deadlier to power armor as well... just like an infantryman can carry a bazooka and be that much deadlier than some poor dude with a pistol. Or a tank's turreted cannon and probably destroy an airplane, whereas a bomber's ordonance can most likely vaporize the tank... because bombs are scary: that's what they do - blow up some nasty shit.

The classification slates how good the weapon is, but its description isn't just fluff; it describes what the weapon specifically is, just like I mentioned about aether. That's where thw quirks, the item's identity goes, like it did before (and back then, it worked).

As for a ships overall resistance, well, you describe it. If you have a light cruiser, well, it's certainly a light capital vessel, but perhaps it's light because it was lighetened off in armor to accomodate stealth plating, extra sensors or to help its acceleration; fitting it resistances-wise in the "Large starship" category. On the other hand, it probably has energy shielding just as good as a light capital ship. You can certainly render it more complex... but it's no longer an issue of balance as it is of good design and good taste... which is originally kind of why we have mods for the NTSE forum anyways.

So, yes, I consider the proposed revision superior. It does what it was supposed to set out to do ten years ago.
 
The chart is most often used to provide a guide for estimating the damage for the lower, for example 1 SDR will obliterate a person even if wearing person armor. But the chart is not really meant to show the opposite. The basic understanding is that the only weapon that can affect the next class higher is the highest, So an ADR weapon that does 5 ADR can damage a starship theoretically. You can't make an ADR weapon that does 10 ADR, so an ADR weapon will never do 2 SDR

That being said game masters have some leeway. I recall in a plot where a GM had a craft fire hundreds of ADR weapons that were not ADR 5 and managed to destroy a civilian freighter.
 
Fred said:
You're all still discussing things that I consider already solved on my wiki article.

@OsakanOne, the wiki page I linked basically says this: if you fire a weapon that's meant to destroy a power armor, then it'll likely have the potential to be lethal. Just like knifing someone will probably be lethal too. But a lethal weapon doesn't mean that it will be applied as lethally as intended: knife in the chest is far more threatening than knife in the shoulder. But a knife is unlikely to harm a power armor. A power armor weapon is more than likely to splatter someone non-armored. An anti-power-armor weapon is pretty unlikely to destroy a tank or a shuttlecraft even if you hit it in a tender spot, but fire enough times at the same place and deterioration probably will do the rest. That's a different deal if you're running around with an infantryman with a bazooka; the bazooka can probably do something to the tank, right? Odds are a power armor needs to watch out for it too. Etcetera etcetera.

As for the nuances, the GM figures those out. No HP system, because life doesn't have HPs. If you want a plotshield, then that's your energy fielding/forcefields/barrier. There's a suggestion for how good they could be, but their endurance is really up to the GM and his interpretations of the unit.

@CadetNewb, you're worried about nuances. That 8 SP versus 10 SP, that 8 SP versus 16 SP. I maintain that it doesn't matter; the narrative doesn't have enough pull typically to make it be significant anyhow. If you have a heavy power armor, then you have a heavy power armor and that's it. If a GM wants to maintain that one needs to be seen as more rugged to another, that's his call. We can't stop it, and we honestly shouldn't try anyways.

I keep expecting help just to make refinement. If this keeps up and that no one is interested - heck, the feedback I get is "I understand fine so far" - I'm going to submit it and put an end for this years-long sordid affair. If you want to influence it before the die is cast, I suggest you do it now. I'm sick of seeing these topics around.
Click to expand...

What's an SP? I never got that. And threshold?
 
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