Power cores

[wrathgon]

I'm Givin' 'er All Aye've Got, Cap'n!

Nearly everything on a ship consumes power in some form or another, whether firing missiles, scanning far into space, or simply sitting on standby. A power core can provide weeks or even years of faithful service, but it can only produce a certain amount of energy at any given time. A ship overloaded with activity on all fronts will quickly find itself out of free power, and out of further option.

A power core has a Power Rating (PR), indicating the maximum amount of energy it can produce per round. In casual circumstances, a power core will run at a lower speed, and produce only the power necessary to run the systems, no extra. Like living creatures, the heart of a ship beats faster in life-and-death situations, to ensure that all systems have enough power to do what they need to do to protect the crew. A power core produces its maximum amount of energy per round, and any energy left over after all the systems have been fed is placed in a buffer to fuel special actions. A power core's Maximum Capacity (MC) determines how much energy can be buffered at any one time; extra energy is lost.

All systems have a PC, a Power Cost. This number represents the energy a system consumes while running in a low-power mode, such as on standby or while performing routine tasks. Attacking with shipboard weapons or performing special actions with other systems have an additional cost.

Ships may have as many systems of any kind installed as they please; the power core's PR is the only limiting factor. Much like shipboard weapons, power cores can be linked in sequence to provide additional power, with only the size of the ship providing a limit to the number of power cores and ultimately all other systems. Linked cores must be identical, and each doubling adds one-half the base PR to the total generated power. Two linked fission reactors, for instance, generate 60 PC per round. Four would generate 80 PC, eight would generate 100 PC, and sixteen would generate 120 PC.

An ultralight ship may have 1 power core. A light ship may have 2 power cores, while a mediumweight ship may have 4 power cores and a heavy may have 8 power cores. A superheavy ship may have 16 power cores, but particularly large ships of this size could have more, as the GM determines.

Shut Down: Anyone can perform this action on their turn. An unused system can be turned off, reducing its PC to 0. The points it would have consumed are instead placed in the buffer. Turning a system on again is a full-round action for the character. The system is not functional until the same turn it was activated on the next round. A cannon re-activated on turn 5 cannot be used until turn 5 of the next round.
 

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