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Old 06-09-2010, 10:22 PM   #21
Qoltar
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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Originally Posted by blacksmith View Post
A few months to get it started. You need just a few areas to start an you can ship stuff to them from homeline easily enough to set them up.
So ....by late 2026 / early 2027 how many of these secret bases would be in operational use?


I'm only asking because I'm running an IW mini-campaign and this might make an interesting McGuffin or wrinkle in things.

Kind of like that "Enterprise" episode where the Vulcans really did have a secret base at the P'Jem monastery - after protesting so much that they didn't.


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Old 06-10-2010, 12:18 AM   #22
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

They needn't use a single staging world. There are probably plenty of colony or deserted worlds in 6 and 7 that could be used on an ad hoc basis.

I'm inclined to agree with the idea that Centrum and Homeline aren't likely to directly hit each other's bases and colonies though. It's a cold war and both sides are quite averse to a hot one.

And the idea works just fine in 3 and 4 where Centrum can't respond. A base in Q3 could be used for missions to Reich-5, Merlins 1, 2, and 3, and Shikaku Mon.
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Old 06-10-2010, 06:41 AM   #23
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

This all reminds me of a third "source line" I created… They consider projector stations too juicy/vulnerable a military target, and rely almost entirely on conveyors and portals; their equivalent of a quantum conveyor is a VTOL craft small enough to fly through most portals, with a tunable oz beam(like a FEL) for forcing portals open.

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If centrum starts attacking commercial operations then things are very different.
I don't think it's particularly different from Centrum's perspective. Remember, they don't have private corporations; if centrans are mining gallium in some alternate Pleistocene Australia, it's a project of Logistics Service(possibly in conjunction with Interworld Service).

I think Infinity and the Centrum would each dearly love to hit the other with an all-out scorched-earth assault — it's just that they can't. One of the things that makes the real Cold War less-fun to game is that it consisted of both sides holding back, and SJG seems to have deliberately avoided that in this setting.

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So ....by late 2026 / early 2027 how many of these secret bases would be in operational use?
Well, if I were GMing, here's a good setup for Infinity:

Q7: Centrum has the monitoring tech and the facts on the ground here, so Infinity probably relies on the ad-hoc approach for the most part. However, Centrum's ability to monitor "the Quiet Ways"(portals) is mythical to limited; Infinity may well have a black project based on a portal between some Q7 line and some Q6 line. (If they're lucky, they've found a portal between Q7 and Q5 or lower that they can actually exploit.) This is probably the closest equivalent to P'Jem; if they aren't lucky, both timelines have an autochronous population who will take an interest in their alleyways being used by conveyors, and organizations like White Star are used to bring a modicum of control. (They also may do something like manipulate the local psychiatry to include "hallucinations of vehicles appearing and disappearing in a flash of light" as a standard symptom of schizophrenia.)

Q6: One where colonization is starting, plus a rolling pair of "Secret and Top Secret" ones whose use is limited to stave off Centrum finding them. Probably also a handful which are used as "receive-only" bases, with conveyors then portalled to a line(probably on Q6) where they can conveniently line up on a projector site.

Q5: For any organization which can operate openly on Homeline, it makes the best safehouse. You might find other groups using similar ideas, though, possibly involving licensed conveyor traffic to some quiet Q5 world where they base their own conveyor fleet.

Q4: At least one which has become a de facto colony. Look at America once the freeway system was built — freeway junctions would naturally accumulate gas stations, restaurants, and hotels until they became towns. Each major projector station on Homeline is mirrored by an Infinity landing platform surrounded by developments leaning town-wards. There are probably other distributed sites; in order to prevent such an establishment from blocking conveyor use, Infinity may require them either to build it underground, or to start with a parking lot on the ground floor.

Q3: As Q4, but with less development and more of a frontier atmosphere.

The Centrum, however, can do this with more impunity; unless Infinity gets a squad-portable parachronic detector in-country, they can't see what's going on. There are probably Blue, Indigo, and sometimes Green worlds used as conveyor hubs in this manner on Q6, Q7, Q9, and Q10. They might also do the portal trick… just in case.

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They needn't use a single staging world. There are probably plenty of colony or deserted worlds in 6 and 7 that could be used on an ad hoc basis.
I kind of naturally assumed that; when I send PCs to a hotspot, it's often through a safer line. Sometimes this is one with The Secret open, but more commonly it's one with a similar culture(enough that the same costumes will work for a quick jaunt). This is probably my main use for the "frisson of difference" close parallels on IW88.

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And the idea works just fine in 3 and 4 where Centrum can't respond. A base in Q3 could be used for missions to Reich-5, Merlins 1, 2, and 3, and Shikaku Mon.
I'd probably make an exception for Reich-5 and Shikaku-Mon; a conveyor is a self-contained working prototype of parachronics. Any line they're afraid might develop parachronic technology should probably be accessed using only projectors, so that if a quantum conveyor is captured, they only get half the puzzle.
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Old 06-10-2010, 06:57 AM   #24
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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So ....by late 2026 / early 2027 how many of these secret bases would be in operational use?
Why secret? Some at least will be clearly obvious, as staging areas for in quantum search and rescue personnel and such. How explicitly for this it needs to be or just use an industrial worldline as the base.
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Old 06-10-2010, 07:03 AM   #25
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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This all reminds me of a third "source line" I created… They consider projector stations too juicy/vulnerable a military target, and rely almost entirely on conveyors and portals; their equivalent of a quantum conveyor is a VTOL craft small enough to fly through most portals, with a tunable oz beam(like a FEL) for forcing portals open.


I don't think it's particularly different from Centrum's perspective. Remember, they don't have private corporations; if centrans are mining gallium in some alternate Pleistocene Australia, it's a project of Logistics Service(possibly in conjunction with Interworld Service).
So you have no colony or mining worlds in Q6 or 7 in your world because centrum would nuke them? The point isn't differentiating private companies from infinity the issue is that direct attacks on the others production worlds is a declaring a full scale hot war not the cold war of the setting.
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I think Infinity and the Centrum would each dearly love to hit the other with an all-out scorched-earth assault — it's just that they can't. One of the things that makes the real Cold War less-fun to game is that it consisted of both sides holding back, and SJG seems to have deliberately avoided that in this setting.
Only if you add in things like Centrum wiping out Q6 mining settlements.

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Q6: One where colonization is starting, plus a rolling pair of "Secret and Top Secret" ones whose use is limited to stave off Centrum finding them. Probably also a handful which are used as "receive-only" bases, with conveyors then portalled to a line(probably on Q6) where they can conveniently line up on a projector site.
Once Centrum nukes a colony or two people will not want to live there all that much.
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Old 06-10-2010, 07:52 AM   #26
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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So you have no colony or mining worlds in Q6 or 7 in your world because centrum would nuke them? The point isn't differentiating private companies from infinity the issue is that direct attacks on the others production worlds is a declaring a full scale hot war not the cold war of the setting.
I would say instead that it's a matter of not having any target that's both juicy and available. Things that would be worth it for Centrum to nuke go through the secret bases, which become less-secret as they're used, and must be replaced. If you move that stuff through a busy colony world, then yes, expect it to get nuked. (Unless you can pull off "hidden in plain sight", but a pattern of doing so raises the heat on all available targets anyway.)
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Old 06-10-2010, 08:00 AM   #27
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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I would say instead that it's a matter of not having any target that's both juicy and available. Things that would be worth it for Centrum to nuke go through the secret bases, which become less-secret as they're used, and must be replaced. If you move that stuff through a busy colony world, then yes, expect it to get nuked. (Unless you can pull off "hidden in plain sight", but a pattern of doing so raises the heat on all available targets anyway.)
The goal is resources, so colony worlds are the kind of thing they want. The whole point is they want more worlds, while infinity seems to be situated to make good use of the the abundant Q6 worlds.
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Old 06-10-2010, 10:20 AM   #28
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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The goal is resources, so colony worlds are the kind of thing they want. The whole point is they want more worlds, while infinity seems to be situated to make good use of the the abundant Q6 worlds.
Are colony worlds the kind of thing they want? I'd say killing noncombatants is a means, not an end. And it's not like the home line will be particularly dependent on a colony. So to what end?

There's also short-term vs long-term. Sure, resources are zero-sum, so eventually Centrum will want whatever Infinity has, and vice versa, unless new vistas open up. But for now, they have all the materials and personnel they can safely exploit, and they can't really steal non-echoes without serious fortification. Also, extermination isn't a goal, subsumption or subjugation is.

Look at what happens in anchors. Both sides move in cautiously, limiting their traffic and side effects to keep their influence stealthy. Centrum tries to sway the locals… and when it doesn't shift, both sides are already set up. Infinity has a sensor net in place, so both sides can see what's going on, and they both have the manpower and influence to act. So it turns into a warzone, sometimes literally.

There is a "holding back the hot war" aspect on a smaller scale, WRT every timeline in Q6 and Q7, echo or not. Just not on the larger scale, where moving things to another timeline is an option. Think of the Pacific Theater in WWII; if the US had gotten The Bomb earlier, how many of those occupied islands would've been nuked?

Mind you, Centrum probably has planned attacks against each of Infinity's concentrations, and vice versa. If the war does heat up, there may be a burst of quick bombings. But an empty parallel is almost as useful for military actions, it's the truckers and tourists who find these obvious bases useful.



Finally, note that I don't like this, it's just how I read the canon.

That third source line I mentioned was used in great part to stir the situation; they attacked, Homeline and Centrum united against them, and after a war the two sides are left in an uneasy truce. The resulting setting doesn't have a cold or hot war, it's much more Man Vs Nature, with social friction resulting from the Homeline/Centrum alliance being barely older than the PCs and forged under duress. Oh yeah, and I usually eliminate the Super Time Nazis.

The only time I've run a vanilla IW setting, it started with the PCs being hipped in Q11, with Infinity and Centrum being present entirely by reference.
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Old 06-10-2010, 12:15 PM   #29
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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Are colony worlds the kind of thing they want? I'd say killing noncombatants is a means, not an end. And it's not like the home line will be particularly dependent on a colony. So to what end?
The home lines are more and more dependant on colonies all the time. Centrum would be hurting so much more from their nuclear war if it wasn't for parachronic travel after all.
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There's also short-term vs long-term. Sure, resources are zero-sum, so eventually Centrum will want whatever Infinity has, and vice versa, unless new vistas open up. But for now, they have all the materials and personnel they can safely exploit, and they can't really steal non-echoes without serious fortification. Also, extermination isn't a goal, subsumption or subjugation is.
That is why they want to move more worldlines closer to them why else would they do that?
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Look at what happens in anchors. Both sides move in cautiously, limiting their traffic and side effects to keep their influence stealthy. Centrum tries to sway the locals… and when it doesn't shift, both sides are already set up. Infinity has a sensor net in place, so both sides can see what's going on, and they both have the manpower and influence to act. So it turns into a warzone, sometimes literally.
And your version of this setting is highly against cannon.

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Finally, note that I don't like this, it's just how I read the canon.
It goes against canon in several ways though.
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Old 06-11-2010, 09:28 AM   #30
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Default Re: Infinite Worlds: Cross-Quantum operations

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That is why they want to move more worldlines closer to them why else would they do that?
The main reason apparently is a long-term goal of causing Homeline itself to shift (Infinite Worlds, p54).
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