SpaceMaster 2nd Edition: Computers

 

The late 80's and early 90's were a strange time for the role of computers in pen-and-paper games. I remember the 4k to 4 megabyte supercomputers old Space Opera in the late 1970's, and those seem laughably quaint by today's standards - but who could have known?

ZIP Drives

SpaceMaster falls into the pattern of limiting CPU power and storage for programs, given a computer and the programs loaded on it. They have 3cm diameter memory disks which hold 100 megabytes (like a mini CD or a ZIP Drive). Your computers have "mark numbers" which rate power, CPU, RAM, and storage. A Mk 10 computer would have 10 CPU points, 20 RAM points, and 100 storage points.

Some programs have "unit picks" and those can add a skill roll bonus to certain skills (mainly science/technical, but evasion and tactics can also be unit picked up. These give you direct skill roll bonuses.

The lesson is, when talking about computers, never use today's terms or even capabilities. Likely 10 years from now they will be mass-producing silicon wafers with every movie and song ever created in bulk and those will be how you stream legacy data. Next year you buy a new chip with the new stuff added on and you don't have to store that in memory. Could we see that coming? Probably not, so it is best to invent your own terms and processing units and de-link them from technology that will look archaic by the time the game goes to print (or most people find out about it).

Oh, You Didn't Buy...

Some of the programs are hidden penalties (which I don't like), such as the Target Lock-On program and heavy energy projectors being at a -30 to-hit without this program. I just feel those lock on systems should come with the guns and you should eliminate having to remember to buy this for each and every design. You are paying enough for those giant turret lasers, why are you space arms manufacturers ripping me off with optional extras that I really need?

Answer: because they are space arms manufacturers.

Also, in Star Strike, they (for the most part) discard this computer system and opt for a simplified one. So if your primary use for computers in your game is for starships, ignore the computer rules in this book (except for the reference programs) and go with Star Strike's rules. I don't like they "kind of" abandoned this system and still support programs (reference) from this one, make the systems independent, use on or the other, and clean this up.

Either way, the computers cost millions of credits and they take a considerable amount of time to spec out, buy programs for, and design. And you have to buy auxiliary computers if you want back-up systems.

Space arms manufacturers, everybody. 

SimComputer

Part of me dislikes these types of overly detailed computer purchase and simulation type rules. Yes, I know they are needed, but I would like these to be optional purchases that give bonuses to the baseline systems, not required for everything as an add-on checklist to every purchase I make and if you forget N-Space course you are not going anywhere. It is like buying $30 cup-holders in a new car and being forced to buy the $70 cup holder protectors as well, and you just feel you are being nickled and dimed instead of making meaningful choices.

Bonuses and Extra Function

If I buy "advanced space targeting" give me a +10 on weapons fire - otherwise - just use my base skill and the targeting systems that came with the ship's weapons should be enough for "basic usage." By default, the ships "parts" should come with with enough switches, screens, and control panels for basic use. Weapons come with basic control and targeting. Jump drives can do basic jumps. In-space drives can thrust and get you places, but you will be working on pen and paper and your space telescope to plot a course.

If you want to automate these, get extra functionality, link them together, plot courses on a holographic map, improve them over and above standard, or get bonuses over your basic skills - then you break out the checkbook and see the glint in the salesperson's eyes. Cool stuff and bonuses will be extra, please, but at least they shall be meaningful options that give in-game effects and not cup-holder covers.

There is that point where you will do anything to get out of the spaceship dealership, and it is done by making you wait until dinner and you will sign anything as long as the ordeal ends. It seemed like a great idea to buy a starship today, but please get me out of here! I get that feeling when I read through these design rules and see how one requirement is tied to another, and my brain melts at having to initial 300 pages of forms in 250 places.