Book 2: Battle

Chapter Five: Buildings

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Chapter Sections:

Creating Buildings

When one of the StarShip Civilizations sends down troops to secure a planet, the first order of business is to build a base of operations.  In small operations, the SpaceMen might use their captain's BattleJeep as a command center.  In more prolonged operations, the bases are huge sprawling fortresses, several levels high with further levels underground.  Within the base walls are facilities for vehicle maintenance, weapon repairs, and dorms for the SpaceMen.  The walls themselves are usually dotted with heavy weapon emplacements and built from fortified StrongCrete, capable of standing up to an incredible amount of punishment from those who would do it ill.
If you don't want to go to all the trouble of constructing a building, you can throw up some walls and fortifications.  These can hamper enemy monement and give cover to troops and weapon mounts.  For every five inches of length and three Brix of height, the base cost is one point.
Computing the base cost of a building is not quite as easy.  To do this, measure the distance in inches between the two furthest corners of the building (round up).  Multiply the number of inches by 10 and you have the base cost of the building.  For a building with multiple stories, compute the base cost of each story separately.  Note that catwalks, battlements, and roofs don't count as additional stories.
Sample BasesHere are a couple examples of foundations for buildings you might construct.  If you have a ruler or even a string handy, it shouldn't take very long at all to figure out which two corners are furthest apart.  In the first example, you would use the distance from A to F.  You could choose to split the building into two parts and pay for the C to B part and the E to D part seperately, but if they're connected it will always end up cheaper just to pay once for the whole thing.  You don't have to use the corners of the "bounding rectangle" of the base - in the second example, you would use 2 to 3 as the furthest two corners, not 1 to 4.  In general, the larger and more nearly circular your building is, the more area you'll get per point spent.
Buildings, walls, fortifications, and in fact any building component (like doors, radar dishes, weapon emplacements) have five possible AV Ratings, summarized on this chart:
Building Armor Value Ratings
Equivalent to:
Wooden shacks, huts
x 1
Plastic, unmotared stone, 
log walls, sandbags
x 2
Concrete and stone
x 4
x 8
x 12
Once you have chosen which AV Rating you want, multiply the base cost of the object by the multiplier in the PointX column.
Next you will want to furnish your base.  Interior walls, stairs, ladders, and regular doors are all free, put them wherever you like.  All parts of a base besides the defensive exterior wall have an AV Rating two levels below the base itself (minimum AV 1d10).  This includes exterior doors, so you either want to avoid making very many of them or you'll want to beef them up a little.  If you want to strengthen an object, multiply its cost by the multiplier in the PointX column in the chart above, just like walls.  For this purpose, consider doors to have a cost of two points, and interior walls and stairs to have a cost of two points per five inches.  A lot of the time, you will want to leave out walls and roofs so that there's room for you to get your hands inside and move minifigs around.  Make sure your opponent is aware of where these 'virtual' walls and roofs are so there's no confusion later.
A ComputerBank should be located somewhere in the base.  This is free, but there should be one in the base somewhere.  Backup ComputerBanx can be built for 5 points apiece.  ComputerBank security is very loose, since SpaceMen aren't particularly bright and often get killed faster than they can learn new passwords.  It takes a full Attack Phase for a SpaceMan to take control of a ComputerBank he has gained access to.  If one side gains control of all of a base's ComputerBanx, the base belongs to them.  If they miss even one, the previous owners still have full control.
It is important to maintain control of a base!  Only the side with control can use base features like doors, mounted weapons, and Outstanding Architectural Features (OAFs).  If all of a base's ComputerBanx have been destroyed, then all of the base's weapons fire at -3 Skill, all the doors open, and none of the OAFs function.  The lights all go out, the TVs are stuck on the Weather Channel, and the showers only run cold water.  If you want, you can build an independent ComputerConsole into any door, mounted weapon, or OAF for one point.  That object can now be remotely controlled from any ComputerBank by the side that controls it.  If enemies destroy or gain control of the base ComputerBank, the object still functions for its original owners.  However, if enemies gain access to the ComputerConsole, they can take control of it even if they don't control the ComputerBanx.
Vehicles may be housed in the bases.   Hopefully, the doors will be big enough that they can get in and out; otherwise they may only drive around inside.  Flyers
will require landing pads or runways; these do not cost any points, they only require that some SpaceSlaves clear some land near the base.

Heavy weapon emplacements can be built in the wilderness for 12 points.  Weapons may be mounted on buildings or weapon emplacements the same way they are mounted on vehicles, except that each weapon must be manned by a SpaceMan.  Refer to the Mounting Siege Weapons section of Chapter Six: Siege Weapons for more information.


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Destroying Buildings

We spent a lot of time going over a lot of possible ways to handle building destruction, but all the rule sets were too complicated, too deadly, or too stupid.  So, when a building is penetrated by an attack, it's entirely up to you to decide how big a hunk of the building to break off.  Depending on the type and strength of the attack, you might either chop a little crack in the wall, knock down a big section wall, collapse a portion of a building, or flatten a building completely.  You and your opponent are going to have to decide the matter between yourselves.  We're sorry, but that's all the advice we can give you on that subject.
Remember that if a section of a building is destroyed, the troops and objects in that section are probably going to take some damage.  If the building section was destroyed by an missile or energy weapon, for instance, there's going to be an explosion that does the building's AV in Explosion Damage.  If a SpaceMan is standing on top of a tower that collapses, he'll take damage from the fall and from whatever rubble lands on him.
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