Designing Bogey Encounters
Generally speaking, vehicle combat encounters are set up the same way that traditional melee encounters are set up. For example, an even-CR vehicle combat encounter consists of one bogey (NPC-operated enemy vehicle) per PC-operated vehicle of the same CR as the average character level of the party. Bogeys can even have roles, exactly like monsters, with many of the same benefits those roles provide (see Bogey Roles for details).
However, a few of the rules that apply to PC-operated vehicles are different when applied to bogeys. This page addresses these differences and makes some recommendations for designing interesting vehicle combat encounters.
Bogeys
NPC Vehicles are referred to as "Bogeys" to differentiate them from monsters and from PC-operated vehicles.
Facing Changes
Bogeys can make facing changes after move actions slightly more efficiently than PC-operated vehicles. After any Move or Double-Move action, a Bogey can choose to make a single 45-degree facing change or a 90-degree facing change, either left or right of their current facing, without the need to expend focus. If they wish to change their facing more than this, they must spend their focus for the round to do so (see below).
Using Focus
Bogeys do not accumulate focus, nor can they accumulate stress. Instead, bogeys can perform the Focus Action swift action to then perform any one action which requires focus. This is intended to keep the GM's attention on the combat, instead of on book-keeping. Note that the Focus Action swift action doesn't actually do anything, except allow the bogey to then perform an action which requires focus.
If a bogey is forced to spend focus, but has no more swift actions available this round (e.g. due to moving off the edge of the map), they take 1 point of damage per point of focus they are forced to spend. This damage cannot be mitigated by any defenses (such as DR) and is always deducted from the bogey's remaining durability. If a minion-role bogey takes damage from pilot error (needing a focus action they don't have), they are instantly destroyed, and award XP and salvage as though the players had defeated them (which is usually true, since the players probably forced the error in some way).
The most common reasons that bogeys will need to spend focus are:
- Facing changes greater than 90-degrees after a Move or Second Move action
- Performing the Sudden Halt action in place of a move
- Making an attack outside of their forward firing arc