[Phil Masters]

Chapter 3

I'd recommend that all Transhuman Space GMs review this chapter at some point. It may not affect PCs or even major NPCs very much, but consideration of what high-TL10 biotechnology can do to and for a society should have some interesting consequences for campaigns.

* Manna (p.80): There's no "universal food" mentioned in TS that I recall, and one might suspect that capitalist bioengineering companies would regard the idea as dangerously unprofitable... Assuming that it's feasible, of course, which might be an open question. (Your universal crop would need to grow equally well everywhere. Ask any gardener how feasible that is.) Some more benevolent TSA nations may be working on these lines, but let's not forget that the TSA is actually quite capitalist itself in many respects.

* Blood Roses (p.80): A handy and vicious trap for slightly more lurid TS games. Likely to be somewhat legally controlled, though.

* Residential Trees (p.80): This sort of thing does crop up in TS, but it's not widespread. Frankly, microbots and cybershells probably allow one to throw up cheap, adequate housing much faster, without having to worry about the quality of the soil underneath - and the two years quoted for a residential tree to grow strikes me as seriously optimistic.

* World Trees (p.80): The subject of research out in the Deep Beyond, of course. Trying to conduct TL11 genetic engineering that far from a proper technological infrastructure must be great fun.

* Fungal Infonets (p.82): Might be feasible in TS, though as in other cases, the big question is going to be "Why bother?"

* Fungal Surveillance Net (p.82): See above, and anyhow it's TL11. Surveillance dust seems like a better option all round.

* Smart Fungi (p.82): Might be under consideration for sneaky biowar/infowar purposes, I guess. Probably a bit susceptible to targeted countermeasures, though.

* Gengineered Insects (p.82-4): Basically a variant treatment of the "Insect Bioswarm" idea from TS, and might be useful in games.

* Doolittle Dolphin (p.89): A straight conversion of the template from Under Pressure (complete with the Delphis second-generation variant), and while it's tempting to preserve the GURPS tradition of multiple dolphin templates, one should use this as written.

* Jagrilla Hound (p.89-90): A cheerfully sinister legacy of the 3e version of Bio-Tech; I think it may have been mentioned in various TS sources, but never showed up in the books. It looks like it's fully within the scope of TS biotech, though chimerical uplifted warbeasts are rare at best - a bioroid version might be rather more plausible. Makes a neat quasi-terror weapon, but really, a competent human or simpler bioroid with the right tools is likely to be cheaper and deadlier. Still, just the thing for some screwed-up dictator's personal bodyguard.

* K-10 (p.90): As the name implies, best seen as an earlier precursor of the K-10A (as detailed in Changing Times) - and can be used as such. One problem, though; the template has Extra Legs (Four Legs), which is already included in the Quadruped meta-trait which it also has. Oops - time to submit an erratum. Also, should always have Dead Broke in TS games.

* Monkey Plus (p.90): It'd help here if I hadn't recently been looking at Nina Conti videos on YouTube... But anyway, yes, another good straightforward adaptation of a Fifth Wave template.

* Neo-Coon (p.90): Plausible for TS (and fun).

* Neo-Horse (p.91): Ditto. Likely to be a bit of a toy, so no one's likely to invest in developing the Wonder-Horse variant. (Developing a super-mule for future phases of the Mars colonial effort might be interesting.)

* Octosap (p.91): Weaker but slightly smarter than the treatment in Under Pressure; still, a useful guide to the principles of conversion, which is a little more fiddly here than sometimes. (Under Pressure also has the markedly smarter Octosap II.) The Astropus variant comes out a little different to the treatment in Changing Times, I'm afraid.

* Space Cat (p.91): Plausible in TS terms, if a bit space-operatic. If it can avoid litter tray issues, I could imagine this appearing out in the Belt.

* Ganesh (p.92): Another Fifth Wave conversion, tidying the thing up a bit (losing the insane 3e HT 16) and demonstrating that 4e makes the concept much more viable for PC use. (254 points saved - anyone converting a campaign which has one of these as a PC is going to be grinding their teeth.)

* Neo-Gorilla (p.92): Uplifted apes do exist in the TS world, and this is probably a very plausible template for one version thereof.

* Neo-Pinniped (p.92): Another useful update from Fifth Wave. Note that this gets some adjustment in the errata for the book.

* Ursamorph (p.93): This doesn't appear to come from TS, but in fact, it's quite similar (but not identical) to the Guardian Bear given "bestiary format" stats in In the Well. Anyone who wants a character sheet for a Guardian Bear could start with the Ursamorph template, maybe buying ST and DX up a bit.

* Non-Sapient Animals (p.93): I think that pharm goats are canon for TS, so now we have stats. The neo-vampire bat might show up in some Broken Dreams-esque games.

* Construction Coral (p.94): Basically much as covered in Under Pressure (p.94).

* Biovehicles (p.96-101): Not much covered in TS, and anything useful on these lines is likely to be a bit bleeding-edge for the technology. Still, there might be some work being done (aside from the bioship project noted in Spacecraft of the Solar System).

More to follow...