• The VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!

Voidrunner Starship Types & Deck Plans

The Voidrunner’s Codex is getting ever closer. We’ve looked at that book a few times, but now it’s time to turn our attention back to the Star Captain’s Manual, which—as you may have guessed—is all about starships!

Star_Captains_Manual_Intro_Ch1.jpg

The Voidrunner’s Codex is getting ever closer. We’ve looked at that book a few times, but now it’s time to turn our attention back to the Star Captain’s Manual, which—as you may have guessed—is all about starships! We previewed that book’s introduction chapter here.

Starships come in a wide variety of types and sizes, from mighty carriers to gleaming yachts. The type of ship determines some of its capabilities, and its grade (a measure of its size) provides other important statistics.

 

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A dozen types of ships and not one of them is really your true cargo transport that focuses on moving goods and raw materials between worlds. Those are the real backbone of a space opera civilization, and ought to be commonplace sights. While I'm sure most of the listed types could be built as a casual transport by stuffing in as many cargo hold decks as possible, a specialized design would let you pare out all the non-essential features you possibly can, trading versatility to maximize payload and letting it operate more efficiently than something that's theoretically a passenger ship hull, or a mining ship, or even a smuggling vessel like the voidskiff. If "type" has an direct mechanical effect this is not a great thing to leave out, and even if they don't not mentioning cargo haulers feels really weird. No Free Trader Beowulf calling for help in this game?

The "only one Bridge/Engineering deck" restriction is not a great fit for the genre either unless there are unseen "emergency bridge" and "secondary engineering" decks. Large vessels often duplicate critical functions, even on modern day wet-navy ships, and often even when they aren't meant to go in harm's way. Trek's TOS Enterprise had three separate bridges for backups in case of damage, for ex, and something the size of Dahak (roughly Grade 19 if the chart pattern holds steady) from the Mutineer's Moon novel is going to have hundreds if not thousands of independent bridges, drive rooms, etc.
 



Micah Sweet

Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
A dozen types of ships and not one of them is really your true cargo transport that focuses on moving goods and raw materials between worlds. Those are the real backbone of a space opera civilization, and ought to be commonplace sights. While I'm sure most of the listed types could be built as a casual transport by stuffing in as many cargo hold decks as possible, a specialized design would let you pare out all the non-essential features you possibly can, trading versatility to maximize payload and letting it operate more efficiently than something that's theoretically a passenger ship hull, or a mining ship, or even a smuggling vessel like the voidskiff. If "type" has an direct mechanical effect this is not a great thing to leave out, and even if they don't not mentioning cargo haulers feels really weird. No Free Trader Beowulf calling for help in this game?

The "only one Bridge/Engineering deck" restriction is not a great fit for the genre either unless there are unseen "emergency bridge" and "secondary engineering" decks. Large vessels often duplicate critical functions, even on modern day wet-navy ships, and often even when they aren't meant to go in harm's way. Trek's TOS Enterprise had three separate bridges for backups in case of damage, for ex, and something the size of Dahak (roughly Grade 19 if the chart pattern holds steady) from the Mutineer's Moon novel is going to have hundreds if not thousands of independent bridges, drive rooms, etc.
I assumed that you could only have one active bridge or engineering deck at time, and the backup (if it existed) only came online in the event of destruction of the main deck, or in the specialized case of a ship separation.
 


i'm sorry, CAPITAL-SIZED MECHA ARE AN OPTION?
There's no limit in the teaser - but there weren't any cargo ships either, and I'm not falling for that one again. So currently a maybe on Ideon and company?

I'm also curious to see how the system handles mecha limbs and if others ship types can mount them. Are Outlaw Star-style grapplers and mega-pistols on the table? Only rules I've ever seen that tackle those smoothly was Mekton Zeta.

I assumed that you could only have one active bridge or engineering deck at time, and the backup (if it existed) only came online in the event of destruction of the main deck, or in the specialized case of a ship separation.
That doesn't seem to be the way the limitation is worded, but it's quite possible some kind of perk or feature or whatever the the term turns out to be might allow backup systems/decks that come online if the primary deck ceases to function - or some nefarious space hippy hacks the controls to lock out the main bridge so they can hijack the ship to paradise. Really ought be some way to model that sort of thing, anyway.
 
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Micah Sweet

Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
There's no limit in the teaser - but there weren't any cargo ships either, and I'm not falling for that one again. So currently a maybe on Ideon and company?

I'm also curious to see how the system handles mecha limbs and if others ship types can mount them. Are Outlaw Star-style grapplers and mega-pistols on the table? Only rules I've ever seen that tackle smoothly was Mekton Zeta.


That doesn't seem to be the way the limitation is worded, but it's quite possible some kind of perk or feature or whatever the the term turns out to be might allow backup systems/decks that come online if the primary deck ceases to function - or some nefarious space hippy hacks the controls to lock out the main bridge so they can hijack the ship to paradise. Really ought be some way to model that sort of thing, anyway.
Agreed. If the book doesn't have it, I certainly will.
 

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