Steve Jackson Games Forums - View Single Post - [UT] Help! Future Combat Revolving Around Ultra-Tech Stabbery

Seneschal · 01-21-2013, 07:09 AM

I've received lots of cool ideas from this thread. Thanks, everyone!

Okay, let's review the trends that might possibly arise:

Grenade launchers that lob sticky-nades at a low velocity would be viable personal weapons. Mere 10mm HEMP ones are enough to kill a person, even if he's armoured (which, given the ubiquity of barriers, he's liable not to be). Reactive armour or personal point-defence lasers might be devised to counter them.
Powerful or high-RoF hand-weapons--say, 12d particle beams, 15mm revolvers with HEMP rounds, gauss shotguns--would be standard-issue, even if they're overkill against an unprotected target.
The aforementioned grenades and destructive weaponry would cause massive damage if used inside space habitats, even if the number of combatants is low. They would most likely be highly restricted. Law enforcement might use stun batons or sufficiently slow-moving tranquillizer darts. As previously pointed out, gases would be a great way to circumvent barriers, take out large groups, and cause no material damage. They would also provide DR against lasers. Combat inside gas clouds, decked-out in full NBC gear, might be common.

And yes, the campaign would involve civilians. They wouldn't deal with particularly legal stuff, and they might get in some scraps, but there wouldn't be any large-scale warfare (in fact, the setting's nature leaves little room for total war, heavy artillery, and tank divisions rolling over the countryside).

Another idea that was mentioned was barriers with a "frequency". That somewhat works in Star Trek because they can't fire through their shields, so they have a "shield frequency" that the phasers are tuned to; the shield flickers on and off many times a second, and the phasers time their pulses to these windows. I figured that's why the ship suffers damage before its shields are all the way down - some blasts partially manage to sneak through when the shield's amplitude is zero. Also, borg drones are equipped with their own tunable personal shields; that's why they can pass effortlessly though force fields.

However, I don't see how this would work for a personal barrier. I assumed the weapon would always be unprotected, in order to shoot unimpeded. You would be able to hold it because the barrier discriminates against slow-moving/low-energy impacts (btw, I agree that energy may be a better choice than velocity), but it wraps around your fingers, not around the gun.

01-21-2013, 07:09 AM	#44
Seneschal Join Date: Jul 2009	Re: [UT] Help! Future Combat Revolving Around Ultra-Tech Stabbery I've received lots of cool ideas from this thread. Thanks, everyone! Okay, let's review the trends that might possibly arise: Grenade launchers that lob sticky-nades at a low velocity would be viable personal weapons. Mere 10mm HEMP ones are enough to kill a person, even if he's armoured (which, given the ubiquity of barriers, he's liable not to be). Reactive armour or personal point-defence lasers might be devised to counter them. Powerful or high-RoF hand-weapons--say, 12d particle beams, 15mm revolvers with HEMP rounds, gauss shotguns--would be standard-issue, even if they're overkill against an unprotected target. The aforementioned grenades and destructive weaponry would cause massive damage if used inside space habitats, even if the number of combatants is low. They would most likely be highly restricted. Law enforcement might use stun batons or sufficiently slow-moving tranquillizer darts. As previously pointed out, gases would be a great way to circumvent barriers, take out large groups, and cause no material damage. They would also provide DR against lasers. Combat inside gas clouds, decked-out in full NBC gear, might be common. And yes, the campaign would involve civilians. They wouldn't deal with particularly legal stuff, and they might get in some scraps, but there wouldn't be any large-scale warfare (in fact, the setting's nature leaves little room for total war, heavy artillery, and tank divisions rolling over the countryside). Another idea that was mentioned was barriers with a "frequency". That somewhat works in Star Trek because they can't fire through their shields, so they have a "shield frequency" that the phasers are tuned to; the shield flickers on and off many times a second, and the phasers time their pulses to these windows. I figured that's why the ship suffers damage before its shields are all the way down - some blasts partially manage to sneak through when the shield's amplitude is zero. Also, borg drones are equipped with their own tunable personal shields; that's why they can pass effortlessly though force fields. However, I don't see how this would work for a personal barrier. I assumed the weapon would always be unprotected, in order to shoot unimpeded. You would be able to hold it because the barrier discriminates against slow-moving/low-energy impacts (btw, I agree that energy may be a better choice than velocity), but it wraps around your fingers, not around the gun.