Ace
The Ace Pilot is to Vehicle combat what the Soldier and Mercenary are to personal weapons combat. Her arms and armor are the weapons and shields of a sleek starship roaring through space, or an airspeeder shrieking through the atmosphere. A veteran of countless engagements, the Ace has proven her skill again and again by virtue of facing the enemy and surviving- and making sure the enemy did not. She has several kills to her credit, and her combat maneuvers are occasionally studied and discussed in training academies for their ingenuity and effectiveness.
Base Abilities
- Maneuvers: Aces have special flying maneuvers that they practice. Each maneuver is considered to be "Red" and inflict 1 Stress on their ship, unless that Maneuver is already supported by that ship type (see its Maneuver Dial), in which case it is considered "White". These special Maneuvers give them the edge in vehicle contests (chases) and dogfights. A Level Zero Ace selects 1 Maneuver. Other maneuvers are purchasable from the talent tree. The Ace is then able to use a Maneuver even if the ship doesn't support it natively.
- Hot Seat: By spending 1 Motivation, the Ace is able to roll for any Ship Station, if they are in the pilot's chair and they don't have an all-in-one console. (This represents them either shouting precise instructions to a helper, or leaning out of the chair to hit an auxiliary switch)
Ultimate Abilities
- Punch It!: By spending 3 Motivation, an Ace can engage their Hyperdrive during combat or another dangerous situation to make a quick jump from Close to Extreme Range. If their navi-computer is linked to other ships, those ships can opt to follow the Ace on this short jump. Note that the Ace still needs to make a Navigation check to avoid getting lost.
- Double Shot: By spending 3 Motivation, on the Weapons phase of Starship combat, the Ace is able to fire a weapon twice. In Shipstation combat, the Pilot is able to perform a full maneuver and also fire the forward weapons twice, even though each ship weapon can usually only be activated once per turn.
Knowledge
- Ships: Aces have an extensive knowledge of ship specs and abilities and can recognize most by sight, some by engine sounds and a few by smell!
Motivators
- Fly Casual: Whenever the Ace spends at least 10 minutes just flying around in a vehicle for the fun of it, they gain 1 Motivation.
- Open Throttle: Whenever the Ace is able to push a vehicle's Speed to its maximum, they gain 1 Motivation. This can include using the highest forward dial setting during a dogfight.
Knowledge: Ships
The Ace knows the specs and stock loadouts for various ships in the galaxy, and is able to determine any ship's rough specifications. This includes armor, hull points, shield rating, speed, power and common weapons placements. This also includes the number of hard-points and most common loadouts and special equipment for that model of ship and its rough cost.
Hit Points
An Ace gains 1 Hit Point per level.
Leveling Table
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1 |
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2 |
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3 |
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4 |
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5 |
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6 |
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8 |
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9 |
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10 |
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11 |
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12 |
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13 |
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14 |
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15 |
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16 |
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17 |
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18 |
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19 |
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20 |
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Talent Tree(s)
- Extra Maneuver (x6): The Ace selects another Maneuver from the list.
- Signature Move (x4); One of the Ace's Maneuvers is reduced in difficulty by 1 level (Red->White or White->Blue), making it easier to perform and reducing the Stress inflicted on the ship. A Maneuver can only be selected once for each Signature Move.
- Don't Touch: Whenever the Ace's ship suffers damage in an attack, the Ace gains 1 Motivation.
- How Dare You: Whenever the Ace's ship suffers System Damage, the Ace gains 2 Motivation.
- Increased Deftness: The Ace's permanent Deftness score increases by 1.
- Increased Intelligence: The Ace's permanent Intelligence score increases by 1.
- Increased Perception: The Ace's permanent Perception score increases by 1.
- Increased Toughness: The Ace's permanent Toughness score increases by 1.
- Bullseye [Passive]: The Ace automatically converts Focus results into Hits if the target ship is inside their Bullseye Arc (straight ahead).
- Improved Bullseye [Passive]: The Ace automatically converts Focus results into Critical Hits if the target ship is inside their Bullseye Arc (straight ahead).
- Deft Hand [Passive]: The Ace can reduce any Maneuverability Penalty by 2 point to a minimum of 0 for a given vehicle. If a ship does not have a Maneuverability Penalty, it instead gains up to a +2 maneuverability bonus. This will also improve the ship's Passive Defense by +2.
- Keep it Together [Power Defense]: As a Reaction, the Ace can spend 1 Motivation to maneuver their ship as it is struck so that the blow hits the toughest spot. This converts up to 3 of the attacker's Critical Hits into normal Hits.
- Evasive Maneuvers [Quick Defense]: As a Reaction, the Ace can spend 1 Motivation to quickly maneuver their ship to avoid a hit. This allows them to roll their Dodge +3 bonus dice against the attacker's roll.
- Counter Shot [Finesse / Defense]: As a Reaction, the Ace can spend 1 Motivation to fire their ship's weapons, with +2 bonus dice, to destroy an incoming Missile attack. This is a Contested Roll versus the attacker's, but the Ace must exceed the attacker's number of Hits by at least 1 to destroy the missiles (or torpedoes).
- Helix Shot [Finesse / Attack]: As an Action, the Ace can spend 1 Motivation to fire their weapons as they perform a spiraling dive, this causes the weapons to strike different sections of the target. The Ace rolls their weapon attack +2 (Beam or Missile). Each Focus Result counts as a Critical Hit for this attack.
- Evasive Shot [Quick Attack]: As an Action, the Ace can spend 1 Motivation to both attack and change their ship's speed by 1 (or performs a 1x maneuver straight or 1x banking maneuver) and then fire their weapons with a +1 bonus at the target.
- Clip [Power Attack]: The Ace can spend 1 Motivation to ram their ship into their opponent's. The Ace rolls their Deftness + Piloting as an attack roll. Both ships take damage equal to the attacking ship's Speed in damage dice, but the Ace can roll their Dodge instead of Default Defense as part of the damage avoidance.
- Shortcut Runner [Passive]: The Ace has a mental map of hyperspace lane shortcuts which, while dangerous, shave off 50% time and fuel from jumps. Each use of a shortcut costs 1 Motivation.
- Traveler: On the Maneuver Dial the Ace can add a 1-Boost to their longest Straight Maneuver. This inflicts 1 Stress on the ship but does not count as an additional Maneuver (i.e. the Ace could still use the Boost Maneuver). The During the Helm Challenge, the Ace can also increase their ship's speed by 2 instead of 1 whenever they choose the "Increase Speed" Action.
- Long Shot: The Ace can hit targets further away. Whenever the Ace is attempting to hit a target in Medium Range, they get a +2 bonus. When attempting Long Range they get a +1 bonus. They can also attempt to hit targets at Extreme Range, which is normally not possible.
- Strafing: By spending 1 Motivation, the Ace can split their damage dice to attack two ships within their main firing arc. They get +2 bonus attack dice when using this ability.
- In the Zone [Passive]: The Ace is considered to always have "Partial Focus", which allows them to use 1 Focus result as either a Hit or an Evade on each turn without using an Action or spending Motivation.
Starship Maneuvers
Maneuvers in the Helm Challenge
- Koiogran Turn: The Maneuver: K-Turn (white) (Koiogran turn) bearing advances a ship straight forward, changing its facing by 180º. This uses the same template as the Maneuver: Straight (white) maneuver.
- Segnor's Loop: The Maneuver: Segnor's Loop left (white) (left Segnor's Loop) and Maneuver: Segnor's Loop left (white) (right Segnor's Loop) bearings advance a ship at a shallow curve to one side, then reverses its facing. This uses the same template as the Maneuver: Bank left (white) and Maneuver: Bank right (white) maneuvers.
- Tallon Roll: The Maneuver: Tallon Roll left (white) (left Tallon Roll) and Maneuver: Tallon Roll right (white) (right Tallon Roll) bearings advance a ship at a tight curve to one side, sharply changing its facing by 180º. This uses the same template as the Maneuver: Turn left (white) and Maneuver: Turn right (white) maneuvers.
- Full Stop: The Maneuver: stop (white) (stationary) bearing does not move the ship from its current position. This bearing does not have a corresponding template. A ship that executes this maneuver counts as executing a maneuver, does not overlap any ships, does trigger the effects of overlapping any obstacles at range 0, and continues to be at range 0 of any objects it was touching before executing this maneuver.
- Reverse Straight: The Maneuver: Reverse Straight (white) (reverse straight) bearing moves the ship straight backward. This bearing uses the same template as the Maneuver: Straight (white) maneuver.
- Reverse Bank: The Maneuver: Reverse Bank left (white) ( left reverse bank) and Maneuver: Reverse Bank right (white) (right reverse bank) bearing moves the ship at a shallow curve to one side, changing its facing by 45º. This bearing uses the same template as theManeuver: Bank left (white) and Maneuver: Bank right (white) maneuvers.
- Barrel Roll: The Maneuver: Pilots can barrel roll to move their ship laterally and adjust their position.
- Boost: The Maneuver: The Pilot can add a tiny bit more speed by using a 1 straight, or 1 Bank maneuver.
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