Convertin GURPS CLASSIC ROBOTS for use with 4e

[Qoltar]

Just discovered or found this thread..... (Thanks Hal)

One big question - What would be the points range for Robots or Androids usable as typical player characters?

Just wondering.....

- Ed C.

[hal]

Originally Posted by Qoltar

Just discovered or found this thread..... (Thanks Hal)

One big question - What would be the points range for Robots or Androids usable as typical player characters?

Just wondering.....

- Ed C.

That's a good question overall - but truth be told, the answer will have to be firmly in the realm of "What the GM desires".

Think about it for a second - the 3e rules stipulated that a standard beginning character was set at 100 points. The GM could allow higher points or lower points, but the book set the standard at 100. Now, in 4e, the standard becomes 150.

Page 83 of GURPS CLASSIC ROBOTS - sidebar, gives a guide on how many points that robotic characters should be built upon, but those guidelines tend to be for GURPS 3e, not 4e. If a 100 point character is the standard for 3e, and 150 points is for a standard 4e campaign, then perhaps you might want to go with 150 to 225 points for your robotics characters in your campaign. Since I don't know what you as a GM wish to do, I can't really advise you better. :(

[Bengt]

Originally Posted by Qoltar

Just discovered or found this thread..... (Thanks Hal)

One big question - What would be the points range for Robots or Androids usable as typical player characters?

Just wondering.....

- Ed C.

4e UTs Android + Volitional AI is about 150 pts for just the templates.

[weby]

Originally Posted by Bengt

4e UTs Android + Volitional AI is about 150 pts for just the templates.

A TL 12 warbot + Volitional AI is about 900 points for the templates to show the upper end of androids. (With the maximum AI IQ being 14 and with the upgrade options you can easily exceed 1000 points before buying any skills or such).

[Bengt]

Originally Posted by weby

A TL 12 warbot + Volitional AI is about 900 points for the templates to show the upper end of androids. (With the maximum AI IQ being 14 and with the upgrade options you can easily exceed 1000 points before buying any skills or such).

I think we have different definitions of "typical player characters". :)

Originally Posted by Ultra-Tech

The warbot is a nonhumanoid fighting machine the size of a subcompact car. It weighs half a ton (without weapons) and is available in submarine, walking tank, and aircraft versions. All models have a pair of manipulator arms.

[weby]

Originally Posted by Bengt

I think we have different definitions of "typical player characters". :)

Given that the basic set has an example robot character that is 1665 points, having 1000+ points does not seem unusual for an android.

But yes, I do not see 1000 point characters as anything unusual if the campaign fits such, that is especially true if a character has to do things like buy DR in an Ultra Tech games with the standard rules of 5 points/point of DR when the expected DR levels are high.

[hal]

In light of the comments made about point totals...

*teasing grin*

Here's one of the problems I have regarding Robots as characters from a GM's point of view...

What is the difference between a Robot that always has 18 DR as a function of built in armor, and one that can wear the same kind of external armor that a human being can - and largely doesn't take it off? In one case, this 18 DR costs character points, while in the second case, it is functionally the same, but doesn't cost character points.

It is those kinds of things that inflate the point cost of robots and even of Cyberpunk characters wearing cyberwear equipment.

Having a cybernetic eye that requires one to take "Blindness" with the mitigator "cybernetic eye" is akin to saying "Blindness - biological eye" because either way, if you damage the eye, the person is blind. In one case, the game mechanics ignore something for the biological character, but impose a different set of mechanics on a player character who happens to be non-biological.

Which brings me in a round about way, back to my initial words to Qoltar - without knowing what he wants to do, I can't really offer him advice on what he should do.

I do know this however...

If Qoltar were to say "Hey Hal, I need help, can you build me a robot and help me to price it as if it were a character" I'd tell him "Sure - give me a price budget for the manufacturing cost of the robot, and I'll tell you what its point total value would be in either of GURPS 3e values or GURPS 4e values (or both) so that he can see what I did to get to where I got. A "Show by example" if you will. Ultimately? The problem has unique aspects to it where the robot is limited by the design of its body, the complexity of its computer, and the programs it carries within its computer. These limitations are NOT present in a biological character - which in its own way, should be less pricy than the same deal with a standard biological character.

For example - skill programs. The more points those skills have, the higher their complexity value becomes. Eventually, a robot's skill will reach a ceiling that biological characters would never experience.


Advantages - those too can be converted into software, which have their own complexity ratings, which too, will take up valuable real-estate in the computer's memory. So - robots as characters face some limits on their construction in GURPS ROBOTS than they do in GURPS ULTRA-TECH for 4e.

To put this into perspective? GURPS ULTRA-TECH for 4e builds robots strictly on points. GURPS ROBOTS builds robots as vehicles, and attributes point costs AFTER the creation of the robot.

So, if you want robots that aren't characters - either build them as equipment (Vehicles style) or as NPC's (GURPS ULTRA-TECH 4e style). The conversion notes at the start of this thread is intended to help those who want the vehicles style, not the character points style. ;)

[Bengt]

Originally Posted by weby

Given that the basic set has an example robot character that is 1665 points, having 1000+ points does not seem unusual for an android.

But yes, I do not see 1000 point characters as anything unusual if the campaign fits such, that is especially true if a character has to do things like buy DR in an Ultra Tech games with the standard rules of 5 points/point of DR when the expected DR levels are high.

I was thinking more of the description of the Warbot, not the cost. Not that you can't have a game where tank/submarine/aircraft combat robot will fit in, just that it's not "typical".

On the other hand, the Combat Android on the same page is more or less an archetype for certain genres.

[hal]

FYI:

I just added some information on how to estimate volumes for animal form bodies in the first post. I'm including it here for you to enjoy. This is based upon the concept that for the most part, the density of flesh and bone combined is approximately the same as water (give or take). Those creatures or people with extra fat would be larger by volume and those who are leaner, would be less volume per pound.

Weight of Flesh per cubic foot.

1 cubic foot = 28316.846592 centimeter^3
1 cubic foot = 28316.846592 grams
28316.846592 gram = 62.4279605761446 pound

[Kromm]

Almost by definition, if an android – or any other kind of synthetic person, "robot" or not – is built to do what humans cannot, it will be worth a lot of points.

Relative to biological entities (baseline humans, enhanced humans, and near-superhuman aliens), SF androids with speaking roles are almost universally stronger, faster, tougher, and more precise. They have better and usually more senses. They boast built-in accessories – notably interfaces, tools, and often weapons. They're immune to many hazards, possess superscience energy banks that enable them to function continuously for longer than living beings, and don't feel the ravages of age; their de facto maintenance requirements are nil except when the plot calls for a technical difficulty. Most enjoy the formidable intellect of a superscience computer brain, even if they're emotionally and socially stunted.

In game terms, their attributes and secondary characteristics are high across the board, they have long lists of advantages and perks, and their skills are both numerous and at high levels. Their only appreciable disadvantages are something to represent emotional underdevelopment (a couple of Callous, Clueless, Easy to Read, Gullibility, Killjoy, Low Empathy, No Sense of Humor, Oblivious, etc.), a trait to represent social inequality (Social Stigma), one or two modest technological weaknesses (like Disturbing Voice, Electrical, Noisy, Numb, Reprogrammable, Restricted Diet, Unhealing, or a very mild degree of Maintenance), and sometimes a hardwired Asimov-inspired behavior code (call it a Code of Honor). One ends up balancing many hundreds to thousands of points of abilities against perhaps -50 to -100 points of problems.

In fiction, the problems are "played up" to keep the android from stealing the show with all its special abilities. In a game, by contrast, players will do their best to avoid the disadvantages, and the GM will look like a heel if they enforce those flaws – especially as they're worth comparatively few points. Consequently, it's only fair that such beings have high point totals.

While it's true up to a point that non-androids can emulate many of the android's abilities with equipment, the heroes can't carry all the gear all the time – and on those "the starship is badly damaged and venting atmosphere," "the shuttle crashes," and "the weird radiation interferes with our technology" adventures, the gadgets simply aren't available as part of the plot. In fiction, the android might be treated as technology and be similarly compromised by the situation, but in a game, the GM has an obligation to let the players play, so that's toned down or absent. Plus gear like armor, force-field belts, potent weapons, and portable sensors is just as available to the synthetic character: If the humans have DR 30 suits, the robot with DR 20 skin can have one, too, and enjoy DR 50; if they humans have disintegrators, the artificial person can carry one of those as well as having enough ST to one-shot a dragon with a punch.

All told, I've found that there are three workable options for such beings in Actual Play:

1. If the players are open-minded, build the android on more points. The focus isn't on power but on story, and much of the time, the plot simply won't make being ageless, armored, ultra-strong, and super-fast relevant. The focus will be on dialog and social interaction, and so the synthetic character's problems more than balance out all those special abilities.
   
   
2. If the players are more competitive and the GM is comfortable with a high-points campaign, give everybody lots of points. One PC is an android, another is an alien with extensive psi powers, another is a supersoldier, and yet another is more-or-less ordinary but technically the commander, ship owner, and only person with meaningful social legitimacy.
   
   
3. If the GM is uncomfortable with high-points PCs, simply run a lower-powered game where androids are strictly NPCs.

"Toning down" androids by removing all the things that make sense for a technological wonder – say, by making them badly flawed or not very advanced – rarely works for the players I've known. Whether these beings are PCs or NPCs, the players end up spending too much effort trying to suspend disbelief and not enough time focusing on the story.