Based on past conversations, I began messing around a bit to try and find a way to satisfy two problems I have had in the past with Starmada X fighters. First and foremost, as I am approaching it from a VBAM background, I was looking for a way to reasonably interface the VBAM stats with SX fighters. Secondly, I was looking for a way to create more varied and interesting fighters.

Now, I like how fighters work in SX. They are simple and to the point, and I like that in a pickup game... however, in a campaign setting (like VBAM) or in a universe with a greater focus on fighters, I would much prefer to see more exotic fighters flying around.

What follows are a set of rules that are based on rough notes of what I have come up with thus far. If anyone has any ideas on how to improve the concept, I would appreciate them!

Tech Levels
The central conceit to this line of thinking is that SX tech levels should  be involved in designing the fighters.

First, and most obviously, the Engine TL of a fighter determines the fighter's base Speed. This speed can be increased or decreased using the custom fighter traits Fast and Slow respectively. You start at Speed 10 at Engine TL 0, decreasing the Speed by 2 for each Engine TL below it or increasing it by 2 for each Engine TL above it. This fix has been discussed here before.

Now that Speed is known, how to figure the VBAM traits for the fighter? I have created a bracketing system for Cost, Maintenance, DV, AS, and AF based on the system that Noel Weer used in the ground combat charts for Stars Divided. In this case, all fighters begin at a starting level at a combined TL 0 and are modified up or down accordingly based on the fighter TL. For instance, if an empire has a total combined TL of -5 right now, then that means that they would have to perform 5 negative bracket adjustments to the fighter, in one or more of the 5 fighter stats. If the TL was +3 instead, then 3 positive adjustments could be made.

One distinction that this system makes in regards to DV is that the number of hits a fighter can take is equal to its DV. The "standard" DV at TL 0 is 2, providing it the equivalent of the Heavy trait. As DV goes down, you can currently drop to 1 hit per fighter, 3 hits per 2 fighters, or 1 her per 2 fighters. Going upwards, you get more and more hits per fighter, and can improve this still if you apply the Heavy modification to the fighter. The custom fighter mods can still be added ala Starmada Edition because they typically come with bracket penalties to correspond to the bonuses they confer, thus allowing them to pay for themselves.

Now, to the case of weapons. For this I decided to look at the problem as converting VBAM rating into available Weapon SU. The Weapon SU available to represent a fighter's AS and AF are calculated separately, but can be pooled under certain circumstances (more on this later). To calculate the values, you take the combat factor times 5, minus 2 if the factor is astericked (*). So an AS 2 fighter would have 10 SU for weapons. You then take the Weapon TL of the fighter and go design the weapons, figuring the SU without regard to arc (as fighter retain their 360 degree arc of fire and halving of shields at the moment simply to keep things simpler). In the case of range, divide the max range by 3 to determine the actual range of the weapon. A RNG 3 gun would then be a RNG 1, RNG 6 is RNG 2 (Extended Range equivalent), and so on.

There are a few limitations for AS and AF weapons. AS weapons cannot have a ROF greater than 1, while AF weapons cannot have a PEN greater than 1 AND the weapon must be able to damage enemy fighters. If both these requirements are met, then the points from AS and AF Weapon SUs can be combined to allow for the mounting of either heavier guns or more guns.

That is the general idea in a nutshell. I haven't touched Special Equipment yet, though things like Drones and Mines should be allowable to be included within the allowed SU. However, I haven't even thought about that yet.

The tests I have conducted thus far have created some interesting fighters. The live-fire test of these fighters two types of fighters, one that was a slower analog to the standard Heavy fighter (Speed 6, Hits 2, 1 @ Autocannon: RNG 1, To-Hit 5+ ROF 1, PEN 1, DMG 1) and then a strange, older light fighter with missiles (Speed 4, Hits 3/2, 1 @ Light Autocannon: RNG 1, To-Hit 5+ ROF 1, PEN 1, DMG 1, Must Re-Roll To-Hit Dice; 5 @ Fighter Missiles: RNG 1, To-Hit 5+ ROF 1, PEN 1, DMG 1, Must Re-Roll PEN Dice, No Hull DMG, Expendable).

The fight didn't see the light fighters being all that useful, due to their lower speed (but, then, they were TL -3 across the board for the most part!), but they did get into a few dogfights. Their missiles suck, but it was definitely something different. The other fighters fought fine, as they were pretty normal.

I have not tested high end values yet to see just how broken things can get on that end of the spectrum; however, if the equivalent of Vorlon or Shadow fighters are mind-blowingly more powerful than normal fighters, I don't see anything wrong with that.

The biggest problem here is that trying to point cost these things is all but impossible, I bet. For my purposes that is not a problem, but for pickup games it definitely would be.

I just thought I would throw the idea out there and see what people had to say about it.

Thanks,
-Tyrel