The Cross-Scale Spine

Development analysis of local prototype models. Current rules, game data, and book material live in Google Drive. This generated output is not rules authority and does not automatically synchronize with Drive.

Damage scales logarithmically: each scale step is x10, so a capital weapon can be enormously more powerful than a rifle while no number in play exceeds two digits.

This is a rounded abstraction, not a measurement. Real muzzle energies do not sit on clean powers of ten — a rifle round is about 3.4 kJ and a tank sabot about 10 MJ, a ratio nearer 3,000 than the 100 the ladder assigns. The ladder is chosen because it is tractable and monotonic, and it is labelled provisional like everything else.

Scale	Multiplier	Representative
0	x1	Unarmoured people, small drones
1	x10	Powered armour, heavy weapons
2	x100	Vehicles, light mechs
3	x1,000	Heavy mechs, fighters
4	x10,000	Dropships, corvettes
5	x100,000	Frigates, destroyers
6	x1,000,000	Capital ships, stations

Converting across scales

Damage at target scale = Damage x 10 ^ (attacker scale - target scale)

Attacker	Target	Multiplier	Effect
6	0	x1,000,000	Annihilated; roll only for narrative detail
5	2	x1,000	Annihilated; roll only for narrative detail
3	2	x10	Overwhelming; expect location destruction
2	2	x1	Meaningful exchange
2	3	x0.1	Damages exposed components only
0	2	x0.01	Cannot threaten the hull; must target components or crew
0	6	x0.000001	Cannot threaten the hull; must target components or crew

Why small units still matter

Components live at their own scale. A sensor array, an airlock seal or an exposed crewman is a small target bolted to a huge hull.
Angular size ignores scale. A boarding torch at 2 m hits essentially automatically.
Progress thresholds are scale-free. Sabotage, hacking and boarding accumulate Margin, not damage.

Infantry threaten warships by attacking things a rifle can actually break.