Narrative Crew Actions

The following action can be taken by any crew member.

These actions can be taken only by a crew member who’s filling the captain role.

These actions can be taken only by a crew member who’s filling a chief mate role (Character Operations Manual 146).

These actions can be taken only by a crew member in an engineer role.

These actions can only be taken by a crew member in a gunner role. For a gunner, a ranged attack roll counts as a valid option for a skill check; when a gunner chooses to make a ranged attack during narrative starship combat, they gain a +3 bonus to the roll.

These actions can be taken only by the crew member who’s filling a magic officer role (Character Operations Manual 148).

These actions can only be taken by a crew member who’s filling the pilot role.

These actions can be taken only by a crew member in a science officer role.

Some starship crews (whether PC or NPC) might try to board one of the opposing vessels during starship combat to take the fight to a more personal level. Pages 40–41 of the Starship Operations Manual describes one way to handle such an event during standard starship combat. A narrative starship combat boarding action can be resolved in a similar fashion.

If the enemy forces have the capability to board the PCs’ starship, they can do so as a Use a Special Ability tactic. Finish the round, allowing the PCs to take their narrative starship combat actions, and then pause the starship combat. Note any damage done to both starships in case the starship combat needs to resume, and then proceed to run a standard tactical combat. If the PCs triumph over the boarding party, the narrative starship combat can begin again; however, the GM might decide that the enemy forces have been completely defeated. If the PCs are defeated, then they might be taken captive or even killed, depending on the campaign.

If the PCs want to board an enemy starship, at least one PC should devote their narrative starship combat action to that course and attempt a skill check against the enemy ship’s Hard DC. Any number of PCs can attempt this check, and as long as at least one PC succeeds, the group can board the enemy ship. As stated above, note the damage done to all starships and run a standard tactical combat, this time with the PCs as the aggressors.

In standard starship combat, PCs receive additional Resolve Points at the start of the fight to spend on high-level crew actions. The same is true for narrative starship combat. At 8th level, a PC receives 1 additional Resolve Point at the start of narrative starship combat. At 16th level, this increases to 2 additional Resolve Points. These points can exceed a PC’s normal pool of RP, and unspent points gained in this way are lost at the end of the starship combat encounter.

A few classes grant abilities that can improve a character’s skill check, such as the envoy’s expertise and the solarian’s sidereal influence. Such abilities can be used in narrative starship combat, unless the ability states that it can’t be used in combat. If the ability takes an action to activate (such as a standard or move action), a PC can do so at the beginning of a round instead of changing roles; a spellcaster can use this opportunity to cast a spell that grants a bonus to skill checks, for instance, but they can’t target anyone on another ship (or a starship itself). If the ability has a duration, assume that a round of narrative starship combat takes about 1 minute.