A Simple Metric of Player Agency

Most elements of the OSR playstyle– sandbox campaign design, player skill, exploration focus– are centered around maximizing player agency.  In general, the more agency the players have, the better your campaign will be.  

Player agency is generally a rather nebulous concept, more of a feeling than something that can be clearly defined and measured.  Until now, that is.  I've come up with a (rough but serviceable) measurement for it.

I call it TFMC: Time to First Meaningful Choice.  

In short: how long into a session is it before the party gets their first opportunity to make a meaningful choice?

"Do we explore the megadungeon some more or go track down the fugitive for the bounty" is a meaningful choice.  "Do we hire some retainers before we go back into the dungeon" is a meaningful choice.

"What games do we play and what food do we eat at the harvest festival" is probably not a meaningful choice, nor is "what route do we take to the adventure the DM has decided we're going on."  Choices will real consequences that have to be made completely blind also aren't meaningful, like if one of those two routes is safer but the more dangerous one offers a side quest, but you have no way of knowing that before you pick your route– not a meaningful choice.

In other words, a meaningful choice is a) consequential, and b) made with enough information (or the opportunity to gather information, even if you failed to do so) that the party can actually make an informed choice.  

A few clarifications: purely out of character stuff like recapping the last session or helping people create characters doesn't count towards session time for this purpose.  Introducing new characters does count, as does narrating any in-universe events that happen between sessions, like if you have a random events table you're rolling on.  In other words, only time spent actually playing counts.

Measure this TFMC every session.  After ten sessions or so, take an average for your campaign.  

I've been in 5E games where the TFMC was two hours or more.  A couple sessions lasted 4+ hours and had literally no meaningful choices.  That's not a game; that's an extended cutscene.  

A good OSR campaign should almost always have a TFMC of under 5 minutes, and pretty much never over 15 minutes.  The average should be under 10 minutes.  

Even that five minute target is only due to the aforementioned qualifiers– sessions may begin with in-character character intros and the referee narrating an event that happened.  Or you may enjoy starting sessions with a few minutes of in-character shooting the shit that doesn't affect the plot; nothing wrong with that if the whole group's into it.

One obvious objection to this metric is that you could have one meaningful choice early in a session, and every few thereafter.  Which, sure– it's a simplified metric.  In practice though, railroad-y campaigns generally have sessions structured so that the pre-plotted stuff is first and the part where the players make meaningful decisions is in the later part of the session.

You can probably see why– if this were reversed, with the meaningful choices first and the railroad stuff second, the choices made by the party could derail the session.  Or to avoid that, the DM would have to negate the player's choices in ways that would be unsatisfying even by the standards of people who otherwise like pre-plotted campaigns. 

I've had maybe two or three sessions like that, ever.  And also maybe three or four sessions that were the reverse, with high player agency but the first meaningful choice was over 15 minutes in.  

So in practice, I find this TFMC metric tracks very closely with the overall sandbox-y-ness and player freedom of a campaign.  

And just as important, as an OSR player I find it tracks very closely with how much I personally enjoy a campaign; when I do play non-OSR games, I find this metric more than anything else tells me early on whether I'm going to enjoy the campaign, or should make an excuse to gracefully drop out of it.

Imploding Encounter Dice

Here's a simple and fun way to make random encounters more varied: have the occasional multi-way encounter.

How it works:

Roll a random encounter on a d6, as is standard, except encounters happen on a 1.  

If you get an encounter, immediately roll a d5.  On a 1, you get another encounter...and roll a d4.  

Keep imploding the encounter die down to a d2, then optionally keep rolling until you don't get a 1.  If you really like this idea, have the dice implode faster, from d6 to d4 to d2.  

Important: The party doesn't have to be in the middle of these encounters.  They could just as easily run into a group that's encountering another group from another direction.

Make reaction rolls as normal for each group the party encounters...as well as every pair of NPC groups that also sight each other.  Yes, the players might wander into two NPC parties negotiating, fighting, or just passing each other by.  

These multiple encounters may not all happen at the exact same time.  Maybe do one first, then have each successive encounter occur after a minute of conversation or a round of combat.  

This may sound excessive, but it makes logical sense if you think about it.  NPCs must have their own random encounters, and two groups encountering each other means at least twice as much noise, and more doors and hallways in sight of the two groups.  Encounters beget more encounters.

Weapon and Armor Rules for Gonzo Post-Apocalyptic and Cyberpunk OSR Games

Let's say you're planning a game that will have a massive variety of equipment– anywhere from daggers and chainmail, to assault rifles and kevlar vests, to powered armor and laser guns.  If so, six things are probably true:

1) You're awesome

2) So is your campaign 

3) Your game will have hundreds of different weapons and armor options in it

4) You want these options to be somewhat balanced, such that plasma guns are better than longbows, but not realistically better– that is, the cowboy will be outmatched against the space marine, but will at least have a chance of doing damage and maybe winning

5) You don't want to individually write up those hundreds of items all at once

6) You want it to be easy to introduce new items as the game goes on, likely including weapons and armor designed by your players

I like the simplicity of systems that say, like, small weapons like daggers do d6 damage, medium weapons like longswords do d8, and large weapons like mauls do d12.  In those systems, you can introduce any new weapon you want and immediately know what its stats should be.

This is the same concept, except a) much more comprehensive for systems where you have wide variances in tech level, and b) uses armor as damage reduction.  

Weapon Types and Damage

Unarmed attacks do d3 damage.

Weapons fall into four sizes: small (dagger, pistol), medium (longsword, machine pistol), large (greataxe, rifle), and heavy (scorpion, mortar, bazooka, heavy machine gun).

In post-apocalyptic games, you have four tech levels: improvised or stone age weapons, low-tech weapons including medieval and wild west stuff, modern weapons of 20th and 21st century tech level like assault rifles and pump-action shotguns, and futuristic weapons like laser guns and lightsabers.

In cyberpunk games these have different names but are mechanically identical: improvised, civilian-grade (mostly legal with permit), military-grade (illegal but widely available), and cutting-edge (not mass-produced yet, the kind of stuff you'll be stealing from corporate research labs).  

A weapon's damage value depends on size and tech level:

Improvised: d4 (small), d6 (medium), d8 (large), d10 (heavy)

Low-tech or civilian: d6, d8, d10, d12

Modern or military-grade: d8, d10, d12, 2d8  

Futuristic or cutting-edge: d10, d12, 2d8, 2d10

Further, a weapon might have certain weapon tags, like it's silent, has an area of effect, needs to take an action to reload after every shot, or uses rare and expensive ammo.  Every positive tag lowers the damage one step, every negative tag raises it a step.  

A few exceptions: Automatic fire; weapons with full auto aren't less powerful, generally.  Reach weapons aren't generally less powerful because greater reach isn't worth as much in these settings.  And versatile weapons (can be used one or two handed) are kinda their own thing; the exact benefits of using two hands may depend on the weapon.  Some tags are also not clearly positive or negative.

Examples:

Broadsword: medium low-tech/civilian melee weapon, d8 damage + STR mod, no tags

Three-section staff: large low-tech/civilian melee weapon, d8 + STR mod  Tag: chain weapon, can ignore shields and be used to entangle enemies

Machine pistol: medium modern/military weapon, d10 damage.  Tags: full auto, versatile (can only use full auto with two hands

Monofilament whip: light futuristic, d10 + DEX mod damage.   Tags: chain weapon (ignores shields), precision weapon (uses DEX instead of STR for damage), dangerous (you hit yourself on a crit fail), powered (needs a battery or power source)

You can adjust somewhat from there, but use those as starting guidelines.  

Armor Types and Values

As mentioned, armor acts as damage reduction rather than preventing you from getting hit.  Shields, in this system, affect your defense (chance to get hit) rather than acting as damage reduction like armor.  

Armor is divided by the type of material used and amount of coverage provided.

Armor Materials

Light primitive, like leather or cloth

Heavy primitive, like steel or iron

Light modern, like kevlar or plastic

Heavy modern, like titanium or modern steel alloys

Light futuristic, like aerogel, genetically engineered spider silk, or carbon nanotube mesh weave

Heavy futuristic, like liquid metal, adamantium, or crystalline metals

Certain mutant animal hides or carapace may count as modern or even futuristic material

Armor Coverage

Partial, less than half the body, like a jacket or vest

Majority, 50-90% of the body, like munition armor 

Total, like plate armor or space marine armor

Armor Values

For armor with partial coverage:

d2- light primitive material
d3- light modern or heavy primitive
d4- light futuristic or heavy modern
d5- heavy futuristic material
d6-
d8-
d10-
d12-

If the armor has majority coverage, raise it one die step.  For total coverage, raise it two die steps.  If it's so heavy you can barely move, like a bomb suit or most powered armor when unpowered, raise it three die steps.  If it's powered armor so heavy you literally can't move when it's unpowered, raise it four die steps.  

Roll your armor die when hit, counting a one as a zero, and subtract that value from the damage received.  

You can mix and match armor pieces to create a composite suit; just figure out which of these categories your personal armor panoply comes closest to.

Bear in mind that armor is never made solely out of heavy materials; there always has to be a light under-layer, and modern armor styles tend to use heavy material only over the most vital areas.  That still counts as heavy, not a mix of heavy and light materials.  

Armor can also have tags, like flame resistant, electrically insulated or conductive, specialized against a certain damage type, etc.

Examples:

Kevlar vest with no plates: light modern material with partial coverage, d3

Spiky leather jacket, chainmail kilt, and soccer shinguards: majority coverage with a mix of light modern, light primitive (biggest piece) and heavy primitive, d4

This new army system: mostly heavy modern materials, majority coverage, d5 with all components, d4 if you strip out some of the extra parts like the face and hip pieces

Concealable form-fitting body armor made of spider-silk weave with aerogel reinforcement over the vitals: light futuristic material with majority coverage, d5

Space marine powered armor like in 40k: futuristic heavy materials, heavy total coverage (heavily encumbered and disadvantage to dexterity tests if it goes unpowered), d10

Bomb suit: Heavy modern materials, full coverage, ones actually count as one, specialized: explosions d5 vs most attacks, 2d4 vs explosions, fire and shrapnel 

What This System Does For You

Nearly unlimited variety without much work.  You can take pretty much any weapon or armor– a chainsaw glaive, spiked hockey pads, homemade grenade launcher, rubber tire lamellar– and immediately know what its starts should be.  

This system also compromises between realism and gonzo– high-tech equipment is significantly better, but not the unsurmountable advantage it realistically would be, so a party armed with revolvers and swords and armored with leather, sports gear and scrap metal can fight robots with laser eyes and have a decent chance of winning.   

OSR Starship Generation Rules For Space Science Fantasy Campaigns

Here's something I drew up a few months ago for a space science fantasy game I'd like to run some day.  

The concept is similar to Rogue Trader, in a setting that's a cross between Stars Without Number, and Warhammer 40k circa the Age of Strife.  Sooo, there's warp travel, space magic, gonzo technology that people don't always fully understand, no galactic empire, humans are probably the majority race but split into distinct subspecies by now, and the galaxy is mostly independent planets and solar systems with only a few multi-system polities.  

Artist: Nikolai Karelin

Consequently, there's an endless myriad of ship designs.  Like my post-apocalyptic vehicle rules, this system treats individual spaceships as unique.  They aren't literally all unique, spaceships are designed in classes like in real life, it's just that nearly every solar system is producing it's own ship classes, often with substantial within-class variations.  So rather than try to draw up a list of classes, ships are mostly generated individually, sort of like player characters.  

You'll find references to the warp and stuff here, but this could easily be changed to accommodate a magic-free campaign, or just one that uses a different method of interstellar travel.

Use this to generate NPC ships, derelict ships to be salvaged, or if players say they want to try and buy a ship, roll up a few ships between sessions to see which ones are available for sale.

Step 1: Size

Rated 0-10.  

Roll d3, d4, d6, d8 or d10 depending on size of planet/shipyard.  Size zero ships are pretty much always available if you want one.  

Note that ships size 0-2 pretty much never have hyperdrives, sizes 3-5 often do, 6 and up always do.  

Typical mass is about 1000 x 3^size tons, or three thousand to sixty million.  

Typical crew is around 25 x 2^size people, or fifty to twenty-five thousand.  

0- Fighter, shuttle, short range scout, light attack craft, very small yacht

1- gun/missile/torpedo/tug boat, heavy bomber, short-range transport 

2- Corvette

3- Frigate

4- Destroyer

5- Light Cruiser

6- Heavy Cruiser or Escort Carrier

7- Battlecruiser, pocket battleship or Light Carrier

8- Battleship or Fleet Carrier 

9- Superdreadnaught, Supercarrier 

10- Titan or Generation Ship 

Note that cargo ships can be any size, it’s just harder to come up with good nomenclature for them other than like, “Container ship in the 500,000 ton range.”

Step 2: Attributes

Roll 3d6 six times in order for:

Automation: Higher means the ship is more automated and has a smaller crew.  The modifier applies to tests for individuals to do work that would normally need a team of people; the inverse of the modifier may apply to tests where having more crew would help, like boarding actions.  The total applies to number of component slots.  The total number in combination with the size and overall type of ship determines approximate crew size (warships have more crew than cargo ships for instance).  This is the one attribute where a higher number does have some downside.  

Engineering: Facilities for repair, maintenance, fabrication, mining, etc.  Total (along with ship size) affects max capacity, i.e. volume that can be mined, number of small items per day that can be machined.  Modifier applies to tests.  

Integrity: i.e. Hull integrity.  Total acts as “real damage” his points.  Modifier affects saves.  

Power: Total is how much power the capacitor holds.  Modifier affects damage of energy weapons and railguns, as well as tests to “overcharge” engines, weapons, sensors, etc.  

Sensors: How powerful  and accurate sensors are.  Used for detecting things, scanning things, and targeting weapons.  Total determines sensor range.  Modifier applies to scans, attacks, ordnance defense and sensor saves.  

Thrust: Engine power relative to it’s size, both for main engines and maneuvering thrusters.  Total affects acceleration, modifier affects top speed as well as maneuver tests.   

Modifiers: 

1-2: -3

3-4: -2

5-7: -1

8-12: 0

13-15: +1

16-17: +2

18-19: +3

20: +4

If it’s an especially good shipyard, re-roll the lowest attribute.  If it’s an especially bad one, re-roll the highest attribute.  

Certain civilizations may have modifiers to certain attributes to represent quirks of their technology and ship design.  i.e. the Imperium from 40k has penalties to automation and bonuses to Integrity.  

If it’s a station rather than a ship, roll 2d6 for thrust and 4d6 drop lowest for space and integrity.  Stations can still move a bit, but slowly.   

Artist: David Tilton

Step 3: Ship Complications

Roll a number of times equal to size/2, rounded up.  So ships have 1-5 complications.  

1-10: Construction quirks- normal

11-20: Construction quirks- exotic

21-30: Crew quirks: normal

31-40: Crew quirks: exotic

41-50: Social/reputation quirks

51-60: Magical quirks 

These are at the end of the article.

Step 4: Crew skill

If players are looking to buy a ship, ships for sale may or may not come with a crew.  If you rolled a ship complication that said anything about the crew, it has a crew.  Obviously a ship also has a crew if you’re using this to generate an NPC ship.  

Roll d3-1, d4-1, d3, d4, d3+1 or d4+1 for crew rating depending on context, what you want the minimum and maximum possible results to be.  Otherwise, the ship doesn’t come with a crew.  

Rated 0-5

0: Untrained cadets or amateur yachters

1: Standard civilians, pirates, rebels, partly trained naval cadets, or other irregulars

2: Standard military or above-average merchant, militia or pirate crew 

3: Veteran

4: Crack

5: Elite

If the ship comes with a crew, 50% chance that the crew is currently at half strength and its rating is temporarily reduced by one until you recruit more crew.  

All actions will use either crew skill or the player’s proficiency, whichever is higher.  

Step 5: Derived Scores

Actions per turn: Half the ship’s size, rounded up, plus either the crew skill or number of player characters in the crew, whichever is higher.  Each PC can take one action per turn; any additional actions must be taken by the crew.

Might change that to a third of the ship's size rounded up, if that turns out to make combats too slow.  Needs testing.  

Gun Defense: 8 + crew skill + thruster modifier 

Ordnance Defense: 8 + crew skill + sensor modifier 

Note: you avoid gunfire by maneuvering uncontrollably to dodge shots; you avoid missile/torpedo/bomber attacks by shooting them down with your point defense guns.  

Hit points: d8 + crew skill per size level, with the first d8 maxed  

Speed: 15 - size/2 + thruster bonus

Acceleration: (Thruster - size)/2, rounded up, minimum 1

Turning speed: 150 degrees if size 0, 120 if size 1, 90 degrees if size 2-4, 60 if size 5-7, 30 if size 8-10.    

Component slots:  Size x 2 plus automation/2

Morale: Crew rating + 5

Power per turn: Power/6 rounded up

Does not reduce due to temporary depletion of the Power attribute.

For space stations, max speed is 1.  Max acceleration is .5 (takes two turns to accelerate or decelerate).  Turning radius is irrelevant; stations have no front and can move in any direction.  

Step 6: Name

Name the ship, as well as what class of hull it is.  You should have an idea of what kind of ship it is by now, based on the attributes and maybe also the complications.  

Also name at least the top ranking NPC crew member, since they’ll be in charge when the party is away. 

Artist: Eddie Del Rio 

Ship Complications   

If I ever really made this into a complete game I'd probably expand this to an even hundred, but these sixty will do for now.  Roll d60 for a game with magic, or d50 if you don't want magical spaceships.

Construction Quirks

1- Dedicated cargo hauler.  -1 Thrust.  This ship comes pre-equipped with two main cargo bay components that can’t be removed.  However, they only take two component slots between the two of them, rather than the usual four.  

2- Stealthy construction: The ship gets advantage to stealth checks when running silent.  -1 to armor   

3- Enhanced thruster system.  +1 to thruster modifier, -1 power attribute.  

4- Improved maneuvering thrusters.  +30 degrees turning radius and +1 to tests to turn or maneuver the ship, but not speed up or slow down.  

5- Smuggling compartments.  The ship is full of hidden smuggling compartments, which take up 1 space and can be used to store enough small items to fill a small cargo bay.  -1 to reaction rolls with law enforcement and naval figures, as some government have records on file about the ship.     

6- Overcharged plasma conduits.  +2 to power.  Any time the ship suffers a critical hit, there is a 30% chance that it also suffers an additional fire critical.  

7- Forbidden zone.  Several decks of the ship have been sealed off for centuries, and nobody remembers why.  Ancient security devices guard the entrances, and ancient taboos have prevented the crew from trying to explore the closed off area. Effectively, there’s a dungeon inside the ship.  Reduce the ship’s cargo attribute by 2 until this dungeon is cleared and the space inside it reclaimed for use.  If the space is fully reclaimed, the ship gets an extra +1 to its cargo attribute in addition to getting the 2 back.    

8- There is a monster onboard the ship, and one deck is sealed off to contain it.  The crew feed the monster through pneumatic tubes.  -1 to space.  If the ship is boarded, the crew can gain advantage to resist boarding by releasing the monster and steering it towards the enemy; if they do this, they’ll have to find a way to confine it again afterward.  

9- Bio-mechanichal hull.  The ship’s hull is made of biological material.  Hit points heal at the normal rate without need for significant repair effort from the crew, and hull integrity heals automatically at one point per week as long as it doesn’t fall below half it’s maximum value.  If it does fall lower, the ship stops healing on it’s own.  At this point repairs require “medical” attention– they can only be made by someone with knowledge of the ship’s biomechanical nature, and even then are made with disadvantage.  

10- Overpowered reactor.  The reactor is stronger than usual, but doesn’t have shielding to match.  +1 tor reactor modifier, but people who spend time around the reactor develop mutations.  

11- Psycho-reactive plants.  The ship is full of psycho-reactive plants which react– sometimes aggressively– to psychic abilities, otherworldly incursions, mind-affecting magic, and sometimes just hostile thoughts.   

12- Exotic construction.  The ship is of ancient or alien make.  Add 1d3 to two random attributes, and it comes pre-installed with one exotic component.  Certain parties will be very interested in this ship… 

13- Wolf in sheep’s clothing.  Up to three weapon components may be disguised as something more innocuous.  When scanned, only a critical success or success by six points or more will see through the disguise.  

14- Maze-like construction.  This ship was apparently designed by a madman.  -1 to max components.  Boarding actions and hit and run raids against the ship are made at disadvantage unless the attackers have inside knowledge of the ship’s layout.  

15-  Multiple hulls.  This ship uses an usually dual, triple or quad-hulled design.  It has d3+1 hulls, connecting by relatively thin access tubes.  Increase component slots and integrity by the number of hulls.  However, increase all damage taken by the number of extra hulls, as the armor is spread thinner and the ship’s overall structure is more fragile.  

Crew Quirks

16- Members of the crew are running a secret fight club. +2 bonus to crew skill for boarding actions, but members of the crew will pick a lot of fights when on leave, will get surly if they don’t get to fight, and visitors may be creeped out by all the people with obvious injuries.   

17- Project Havoc.  Members of the crew are running a secret fight club as above, but there’s more to it.  The fight club is used as a recruiting funnel for a terrorist group that wishes to destroy modern consumer culture, primarily by taking out civilization’s consumer financial infrastructure.  They will try to launch discreet terrorist attacks whenever the ship docks and the crew gets to go on leave.     

18- The Stepford Sailors.  Disobedient or unruly crew members are kidnapped and implanted with loyalty chips. +2 morale.  Most crew don’t even realize this.  This occasionally causes issues…

19- Crew co-op.  The ship is partly owned.  +2 to crew morale and tests to recruit new crew, and the ship costs half as much to buy.  However, the “owners” or command staff actually only own a minority stake; they make half as much money off ship operations, and must convince a majority of the crew to agree to big decisions.  

20-  Space cowboys.  The crew produce food with tiny hydroponics gardens dotted all over the ship, as well as raising animals for both food and transportation around the ship.  -1 to power and space, but the ship’s food supplies last twice as long as normal.  You also have access to animals if needed, and can count a few low-level rangers among your crew.  

21- Death cult.  A significant portion of the crew belongs to a weird cult that worships a death god.  They make great assassins, but also make enemies of many religious and authority figures. Could be great allies or enemies.

22- Political marriages.  The crew uses arranged marriages to both recruit new crew members and cement alliances with outside groups.  The owners are expected to arrange and/or officiate over high-level marriages, as well as provide dowries and bride- and husband-prices for crew members.  

23- Quarantined crew.  Several decks were locked down centuries ago after some catastrophe.  The crew inside was left locked inside.  Their descendants are still in there, surviving off of hydroponics and supplies sent by the rest of the crew.  Nobody knows what they look like.  The ship comes pre-installed with d3 components which are inaccessible and operated by the crew of the sealed-off section.  Orders given to the crew are obeyed, and the crew inside have a crew rating of 5, but they never communicate back.  The rest of the crew are terrified of what they may find inside the sealed-off section.  

24- Space monkeys.  The crew includes a small population of ape-like aliens.  They are idiot savants- mostly barely sentient, but they invent devices so technologically advanced as to seem miraculous, albeit often impractical and almost always bizarre.  The ship gets +1 to its engineering bonus, and weird super-science devices show up on a regular basis.  Alien hunters would really like to get their hands on those aliens…

25- Servitor crew.  The ship’s crew consists largely of servitors- semi-sentient cyborg workers.  Spare servitors are kept in storage, and dead crew can be turned into servitors.  -1 to crew skill, but +2 to crew morale (and no -1 to morale for the decrease in crew skill).  If the ship suffers a loss of crew members, it can negate it; this can happen up to twice before the ship needs to hire more actual, living crew.  

26-  Shift happens. The crew, side from senior officers and a few specialists, is strictly divided into three shifts, and each shift has developed it’s own subculture, routines, customs and even dialects.  The change of shifts is celebrated with an elaborate handover ceremony, including a dance resembling a haka.  +1 to crew skill when only one shift is on duty, but -1 to crew skill when all hands are needed, such as during combat.  This does not affect morale; instead, the ship gets +1 to morale, as each shift is determined to out-do the others.  

27- Inveterate tinkerers.  The crew is constantly trying to modify the ship’s systems and onboard equipment for greater effectiveness, with mixed results.  +1 to crew skill when repairing or modifying the ship’s systems or other equipment.  Also, when rolling for actions taking to operate the ship, a 3 is always a critical failure and a 19 is always a critical success. 

28- Spy network.  The ship has it’s own small network of spies.  +1 to your organization’s Shadow modifier when operating in an area that is both near the ship’s current location, and that the ship has visited at least semi-regularly in the past.  The process of maintaining this network does occasionally get the ship dragged into various cloak and dagger shenanigans.  

29- Arch-nemeses.  There is a rival ship whose crew has a vendetta against the crew of your ship. They will harass your ship and crew at every opportunity, maybe even attack if given a good opening.  On the plus side, your crew has gotten good at combat.  Their crew skill is one higher for the purpose of combat actions.     

30- Dopplegangers.  Many of your crew are actually aliens disguised as humans.  They don’t necessarily mean any harm and mostly just want to fit in and live normal lives, but shapeshifting aliens tend to be hated and distrusted by humans.  They could be useful for their abilities, or a liability for the attention they attract if found out.   

Artist: Thibault Girard

AI Quirks

31- Co-dependent AI.  The ship’s AI is in “love” with the captain, and obsessed with them.  It constantly tries to please and impress the captain, and gets jealous of people who the captain seems to really like.  It occasionally takes ship actions on its own, with a crew skill of 4, to protect or impress the captain– no more than once per combat turn.  

32- Vertically integrated.  95% of the crew consists of robots controlled by the ship’s AI.  Even if all the human crew die, the ship only suffers -1 to it’s crew rating.  However, damage to the AI can knock the robot crew offline.  

33- Aggressive AI.  The ship’s AI has a nose for trouble; +1 to sensor bonus and tests to maneuver towards enemies; -2 to tests to escape combat.  Sometimes actively scans stuff on it’s own initiative, with a crew skill of 4.   

34- Fearful AI.  -1 speed when moving towards an enemy.  +1 speed when out of combat or trying to escape combat.   

35- Too smart for you.  The AI is sentient.  It genuinely wants what’s best for the crew and owners– but often thinks it knows better than they do.  It can take up to one action a turn with a crew skill of 4.  Sometimes it follows orders, sometimes it doesn’t.  

36- Crew engrams.  The ship’s AI is a gestalt consciousness formed from the uploaded minds of dead crew members.  Dead crew can have their brains uploaded using brain scanners onboard the ship, provided the brain is intact and no more than a few hours dead.  The ship can gain a History from an uploaded mind; it holds a maximum of ten Histories; each one has it’s own individual rating based on the proficiency bonus of the uploaded mind.  Starts out with three random histories.  

37- Delusions of godhood.  The ship’s AI thinks it’s a god.  It demands to be kept meticulously clean and appeased with flattery and bizarre rituals.  As long as it is pleased, the first critical failure rolled on any given day when operating the ship’s systems can be re-rolled.  If it is displeased, the first critical success rolled on any given day for operating the ship’s systems must be re-rolled.   

38- Xenophilious.  The ship thirsts for adventure and contact with the unknown.  +1 speed when moving towards adventure, mystery and alien objects, -1 speed when moving away, and +2 to attempts to scan mysterious or alien objects.  The ship will occasionally seek out adventure on it’s own, or resists attempts to avoid adventure.    

39- Planet-sick.  This ancient ship once rested on a planet, and the AI got too used to that.  It starts with one exotic component, but suffers -1 to integrity.  +1 to thruster modifier when near a planet or other gravity well; -1 when in deep space.  The AI will try to convince the crew to spend more time near planets.  

40- Strapping young AI.  Your AI is truly sentient, and is figuring out how to bootstrap itself to hyper-intelligence.  +1 to your ship’s sensor and engineering modifiers, and the AI can take up to one action a turn with a crew skill of 5.  These sorts of AIs are extremely illegal almost everywhere.  Eventually the AI will succeed in it’s quest; after that, who knows what will happen…  

Social/reputation quirks

41- Pimpmobile.  This ships looks excessive gaudy, both inside and out, like something Austin Powers would drive.  +2 on reaction rolls with low-class types such as pirates and pimps, -1 on reaction rolls for people with refined taste, like nobles.  

42- The alleged Dread Pirate Roberts.  Rumors of this ship’s destruction have wrongfully spread several times.  Many people believe this is actually just a different ship that has taken the name of the old ship, and won’t believe you really are who you say you are.

43- Relic ship.  This ship is sacred to a certain religious sect.  They’ll want to make pilgrimages to it and occasional hold ceremonies there.  The sect will be either valuable allies or enemies, depending on how how you give them what they want.  

44- Stolen from the Shadow Emperor.  This ship was the personal ship of the emperor of the mirror universe.  It was stolen and brought to this universe.  +1d3-1 to every attribute, and it comes with one exotic component pre-installed.  Agents of the shadow emperor have found a way into this universe, and will attempt to recapture the ship and punish those in possession of it.  No matter how many of them you kill, more will keep coming.  

45- Legendary.  This ships did great things…under it’s previous owners.  Define what it did.  +1 to reaction rolls…at least until you fail to live up to the ship’s legendary reputation, then -1 to reaction rolls.

46- Crown-ship.  The owner of this ship is also the rightful ruler of an asteroid colony somewhere.  That colony is really far away and hard to get to, and you’ll have to figure out where it even is first.  People will probably try to steal the ship from you on the way there.   

47- Warp wayfarers.  A small roving band of nomads occasionally appears onboard the ship, providing entertainment and trading in small volumes of (often exotic) miscellaneous goods and services.  They sometimes cause a bit of trouble, but are tolerated for the entertainment and exotic goods and services they provide.  Nobody knows where they come from; they just appear onboard the ship, then disappear after a few days. All attempts to track them have failed.   

48- Known pirate ship.  This used to be a highly feared pirate ship.  Add or subtract 2 to reaction rolls as appropriate.  Advantage on rolls to intimidate people using your ship; disadvantage on rolls to convince anyone that you come in peace.  It might still have capture warrants on record in some systems.   

49- Dark rumors.  People believe, rightly or wrongly, that your ship is a hotbed of occult activity.  This provides either advantage or disadvantage on reaction rolls, depending on who you’re dealing with.  

50- Work of art.  The ship looks beautiful, both inside and out.  Covered in murals, frescoes, statues and engravings, it looks like a massive, flying Sistine Chapel.  +1 to reaction rolls with most people, +3 with art lovers, but -1 with people who think art is for snobs.  

Magical quirks

51- Supply room of cargo holding.  The ship has a supply room that’s the size of a cargo bay on the inside.  You get a main cargo hold component that doesn’t take up the normal 2 space points.  However, if the ship ever goes through a wormhole, dimension gate or the like, it is instantly destroyed by a dimensional rift.  

52- Haunted.  -1 morale for the ship’s crew, -3 for anyone visiting the ship.  Reaction rolls for visitors to the ship at -1 for brief visits, -2 for longer ones.  +1 sensor bonus.  Occasional hauntings and ghostly apparitions.  Crew knowledgable about ghosts and the occult.  

53- Stargate.  Onboard the ship is a magical portal that leads…elsewhere.  A creepy space station, forbidden planet, or creepy hell dimension, but not somewhere good.  There’s treasure and adventure to be had there, though.  The portal can be opened and closed by controls on either side.  If it’s open and the ship passes through a wormhole or dimension door, the ship is destroyed.  

54- Carnivorous.  The ship needs to eat (size) people per month, or it will start eating the crew.  As long as it is fed, the ship gets +1 to its power and thrust bonuses.  

55- At home in the warp.  Advantage on warp navigation tests, but double the frequency of random events during warp travel.

56- Skeleton crew.  People who die onboard this ship are resurrected as skeletons after a day and a night, and those skeletons work alongside the very living crew members.  Vulnerable to holy magic and turning undead, and this obviously has social consequences.  

57- The sword and shield of the god.  The ship comes pre-installed with one gun battery.  Both that battery and the ship’s defensive turrets are holy to a certain god.  Anything hit by either of them suffers holy damage as if hit by holy water.  The turrets (but not the gun battery) also automatically open fire at anything that is anathema to the god.  Which god?  Up to the referee…

58- The grand conjunction.  This ship is engraved with runes of summoning which cause one of the Great Old Ones to appear when the stars are right.  Of course, since it’s a spaceship, the stars being right is just a matter of piloting it to the right place.  You can make this happen through a combination of occult research and good navigation.  There’s also a 1% chance you do it by accident every time you travel interstellar distances, or stay in the same solar system for over a year.   

59- Navis obscura.  The ship is protected by a magical cloaking field which can’t be turned off.  All attempts to detect or scan the ship are at disadvantage, even when the ship makes no attempt at stealth.  People onboard the ship cannot see themselves in mirrors, like a vampire.  The cloaking field sometimes causes suspicion or trouble with the law.  Grooming can also be rather difficult.  

60- Demonic incursions.  Demons regularly manifest onboard this ship– 1 in 6 chance of a demon appearing every month, and trained magic users can summon demons onboard this ship even if they otherwise don’t have the ability to do so.  The behavior of the demons varies– some demand tribute, some just attack.  This is obviously a problem, but the demons could also be bribed or coerced into service.

Artist: sparth

Example Ship: The Eternal Watcher

I generated this a while ago and have adjusted a few rules since.  I checked the derived stats but some may still be slightly off.  It's really powerful, probably suitable as the BBEG's flagship for a mid-level campaign.  

Class: An ancient heavy cruiser, class unknown.  Now a hotbed of magical activity and transhuman experimentation.  

Size 6

Mass: 300,000 tons or so?  Haven’t figured out how sizes scale yet

Crew: 1300?  Haven’t figured out crew sizes yet, plus it’s kinda hard to say with the complications it has

Automation: 14 (+1) 

Engineering: 13 (+1)

Integrity: 14 (+1)

Power: 13 (+1)

Sensors: 19 (+3)

Thrust: 16 (+3)

Complications:

Skeleton crew

Navis obscura

Stealthy design

Exotic construction

Crew engrams

Crew skill: 4

Actions per turn: 7

Gun Defense: 15

Ordnance Defense: 15

Hit points: 56/56

  

Max speed: 10

Acceleration: 4

Turning speed: 60 degrees

Morale: 9

Damage reduction: d8+2 (a 1 on the d8 counts as zero)

Power generated per turn: 3

Components:  0/19 slots left

All components take up one slot unless it says otherwise

Prow plasma cannon battery 

Forward howitzer battery

Broadside railgun battery

Swivel mounted torpedoes (6 tubes, 18 reloads)

Missile pod (24 missiles)

Aft graser array

Medium armor with internal reinforcement (1 slot, d8 armor, 1 counts as zero, -1 acceleration)

Medium shield (2 DR, max 30, regen 1 per turn, 1 slot, -1 power regeneration)

Ancient warp engine

Gellar field

Recon drones (6 drones)

Teleportarium

Magical laboratory

Tech laboratory (+1 engineering)

Ultima sensor array (-1 power, +3 sensor, 1 slot)

Quantum gravity sails (+2 thruster)

Extended supplies

Main cargo hold and lighter bay

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So that's how ship creation would work.  I haven't yet worked out combat, interstellar travel or a list of ship modules; those will probably each get their own post someday.