Ships characteristics

The strengths and weakness of different ships and weapon systems in the game are shown through their characteristics. These show how fast they are, how much damage they can take and so on. You can see an example of a ship's stat sheet below.

UCM Lysander - Stealth Lighter (27 pts)

Points Cost (Pts) - All ships in the game cost points to field in your fleet. Ships with a higher points cost will generally be more potent, but you will not be able to field as many. This number is for a single ship within that group.

Name	Scan	Sig	Thrust	Hull	A	PD	G	T	Special
Lysander	6"	0"	12"	2	6+	2	1-3	L	Atmospheric, Full Cloak, Launch, Open, Rare

Stats Bar - The strengths and weakness of different ships and weapon systems in the game are shown through their characteristics. These show how fast they are, how much damage they can take and so on.

Type	Lock	Attack	Damage	Arc	Special
Barracuda Missile Bay	4+	2	1	F/S/R	Close Action

Weapon Systems - This shows what weapons the ship is armed with. Accuracy, damage potential, arc of fire and more are shown here.

Load	Launch	Special
Dropships	1	-

Launch Capacity - Some ships are able to launch Dropships, Bulk Landers and more. If the ship has a launch capacity, it is shown here. Ships without any do not have this bar on their stat sheet.

Stealth Observation

This ship can Survey a Cluster regardless of its Battlegroup Tonnage value.

Special Rules - Some ships have unique special rules that are detailed here.

Stats Bar

Each ship has its own unique stats bar. Each column shows a different aspect of the ship.

Name

What the ship type is called. Certain ships may have individual and unique names, but they always belong to a 'class' of ship. The name of the ship's class is shown here.

Scan

The Scan characteristic shows how good a ship is at spotting the enemy through a combination of sophisticated sensors, predictive software and crew competence. Scan range is primarily a 'technology' characteristic dictated by the best possible equipment that can be crammed on board so most ships from a particular race will have the same Scan value. Certain weapon systems can only be used within Scan range or become more effective when used within Scan range.

Signature

Signature shows how visible a ship is on enemy sensors and how far away it can be spotted. Most ships use forms of active countermeasures like chaff, ECM (electronic countermeasures jamming) and other technologies to hide the ship by reducing its signature as much as possible.

These countermeasures are considered to be in constant use and are taken into account in the ship's overall Signature. Certain kinds of damage, hard manoeuvring and firing weapon systems can all act to temporarily increase a ship's Signature. Signature can also be reduced in some circumstances, such as by issuing the Silent Running order for example.

Thrust

Thrust is a ship's maximum move distance per game turn in inches. Several factors such as the ship's orders or battle damage can affect available Thrust. Under ordinary circumstances a ship must move at least half of its available Thrust for movement each turn (see the Orders and Special Orders sections of the rules for more details).

Hull

Hull is the number of damage points a ship can withstand before it is destroyed. Hull is a function of overall size and inherent structural integrity. This means it is possible for ships with good armour to have a weak hull and vice versa. Lost Hull points can be tracked on a ship's base using the pegs and number system provided, or if players prefer with a dice/counter placed beside the ship.

Armour (A)

In comparison to civilian vessels, true warships are always 'armoured' in some way to make them more resistant to damage. This can range from the basic hardening of individual components and incorporating multiple back-up systems to being sheathed in metres-thick plates of highly advanced armour.

In game terms the Armour characteristic is a saving throw on a D6 against each point of Hull damage taken expressed as 3+, 4+ etc. When a ship is damaged roll a D6 for each point of damage inflicted on it. Each successful armour save prevents one point of Hull damage.

Point Defence (PD)

All fighting ships carry some sort of point defence to protect themselves against small objects. Point Defences are the equivalent of Active Countermeasures on ground based units; systems that identify and neutralise incoming threats to the ship - everything from meteorites to nuclear-tipped missiles.

The exact weapons used can take many forms: pulse lasers, rapid fire gauss guns, interceptor missiles, flak rockets, energised plasma arcs - the list is endless. All of these are small, fast-firing weapon systems with the response time necessary to intercept tiny, rapidly-moving targets at close range.

For the most part Point Defence relies on quantity rather than quality. The number indicated by this characteristic indicates the number of dice the ship can roll in self-defence when attacked by enemy Close Action weapons and some Launch Assets. These rules are covered later on.

Group (G)

Group indicates the normal operating parameters for ships of this class within the larger fleet. Smaller vessels such as frigates will tend to operate in groups of one to four of the same type of ship working together, while large vessels might only be found together in one or twos. The Group characteristic is used when choosing a fleet before the game (see Fleet Selection).

Tonnage (T)

There are four main Tonnage categories in Dropfleet commander: Light (L), Medium (M), Heavy (H) and Super Heavy (S). There are also some ships that fall between the classes such as L2 and H2. As with the Group characteristic, Tonnage is primarily used in conjunction with Fleet Selection as players will often have to consider the Tonnage of the vessels under their command. Tonnage also figures into scenarios where victory conditions are often calculated using the tonnage of surviving vessels.

Special

This section lists any special rules that may apply to the ship. This represents particular traits of a ship's design, special abilities or weaknesses the vessel may have. A detailed list of all common ship Special Rules can be found in the Ship Special Rules Section.

Some ships have unique rules that are specific to that faction and ship class alone, such as sensor jamming abilities or situational bonuses. Any unique Special Rules not in the 'Special' section of a ship's stats bar will be shown following the bar with details of the unique rules used.

Weapon System Characteristics

Most ships in Dropfleet are armed with one or more weapon systems. These can range from a mass of turret-mounted rail cannons to huge spinal-mount energy weapons capable of cutting enemy craft in half with a single blast.

Lock

Lock is the weapon system's 'to hit' roll and represents a combination of tracking speed and power-up delay as well as inherent accuracy. When rolling to hit, each of the weapon system's Attack dice scores a hit if it equals or beats the Lock value.

Attack

Attack shows the number of Attack dice the weapon system rolls, with each dice typically representing a salvo or volley from the same weapon system. Each attack dice has to score equal or higher than the weapon's Lock value to score a hit.

Damage

Some weapon systems hit harder than others and will do a corresponding amount of damage to an enemy hull. Damage indicates the number of Hull points inflicted by each Attack dice from the weapon system which successfully hits and damages a ship.

Arc

Each weapon system has a designated fire arc it can make attacks into. There are 4 arcs: F - Front, F (N) - Front Narrow, R - Rear, S - Side. Side facing weapons may also have an addition notation, i.e. Right or Left.

If the weapon has no extra note and only says S it may fire to either side - left or right. If it has the (Right) or (Left) notation it may only fire on that side (in addition to any other arcs shown).

Weapon arcs are normally 90 degrees but some weapons systems are restricted to a 22 degree narrow (N) arc instead. Ship bases include these arcs for ease of use thin ridges delineate front, side and rear arcs, and the raised area at the front the base shows the front narrow arc.

e.g. a ship has three weapons profiles. One has arc: F/S/R, the second has arc: S/R, and the last has arc: F/S (Right).

In this case the first weapon would be able to fire from its Front arc, either Side arc or its Rear arc.

The second weapon could fire from either one of its Side arcs or its Rear arc.

The last weapon may only fire from the Front arc or the arc on its Right side, as it has the S (Right) notation.

Weapon special

A number of weapon systems have special rules to reflect their effects. See Special Weapons Rules for more information.