07-15-2015, 10:22 AM | #31 | |||||
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
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Yes, but most of the nearly ubiquitious optional specializations will exclude or heavily restrict that. Quote:
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At levels that severe, maybe. Bear in mind those should be defaults from Zoology or other applicable specializations. Microbiology isn't going to help you much there.
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I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
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07-15-2015, 01:16 PM | #32 | |||
Join Date: Jul 2012
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
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07-15-2015, 02:00 PM | #33 | |||
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
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And regardless, degree requirements and actual practical requirements don't necessarily have much relation. Quote:
Broadly, this is Diagnosis, directed at species other than your own. Biology can (per the box on p181) negate the physiology penalties to Diagnosis in some cases. But it doesn't substitute for Diagnosis. Quote:
Not a fan of the theory that academic skills are mostly useless by nature. Almost all skills have a purpose. If that purpose is a bad fit for your gameplay, well. It's not like Games (MOBA, optional specialty DOTA 2) is going to have many adventuring applications, but it seems at least as valid a flavor skill as Biology.
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I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
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07-15-2015, 02:36 PM | #34 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
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To apply for a place on an MD course, or a nursing degree, or pharmacy, or more or less any bio-medical subject, you need good exam grades in biology* and chemistry, and one or two other subjects. There are a range of subjects that would be acceptable, such as maths, physics, and psychology. Universities select students on the basis of exam grades, interviews, and sometimes other criteria. *The alternatives to straight biology would certainly include human biology, or zoology. There isn't an alternative to chemistry AFAIK. |
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07-15-2015, 03:29 PM | #35 |
Untagged
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Forest Grove, Beaverton, Oregon
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
Biology is a gargantuan mega-skill as it includes knowledge of literally everything alive on earth from humans to birch trees to deathcap mushrooms to purple nonsulfur bacteria to halophilic archaea. As well how they all relate in ecosystems, react to changes in environment, etc.
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Beware, poor communication skills. No offense intended. If offended, it just means that I failed my writing skill check. |
07-16-2015, 09:03 AM | #36 |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
In my paused secret-agents campaign, Bioengineering was used to create a nonlethal bioweapon as part of a caper (namely, to make hotel cleaning staff ill with a "natural" minor disease so that the hotel would be desperate to hire and the PCs could get someone working on the inside), and also to clone tissue to scatter around a blast area to fake a death (it worked). It was the go-to skill whenever an operation faced possible detection via forensic biology.
Biology was useful there mostly when I said, "Roll against the lower of Biology or Forensics." That was usually in the context of detecting schemes like those above . . .
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
10-10-2015, 02:14 PM | #37 |
Join Date: May 2009
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
I missed this the first time around, hence the necro...
I find it odd that Bioengineering has required specializations when it is overall a relatively narrow field when compared to Engineer, which is also IQ/H and also has required specializations. I'm inclined to make the specializations of Bioengineering optional unless something in the campaign depends on the difference between them. |
10-10-2015, 02:48 PM | #38 | |
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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Re: [Basic] Skills of the week: Bioengineering and Biology
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If you can do biological tweaking in ways that "go with the flow" of the existing systems, such as altering natural selection for selective breeding, or providing disease organisms to activate an immune system in ways that don't kill the patient, for vaccination, then useful bioengineering isn't that hard in principle. But it still involves a lot of skill if you want to do it reliably and efficiently. However, that's the equivalent in transport engineering terms of using fallen trees as rollers to move a heavy object. The equivalent of building a car is a lot harder, and we aren't there yet. Edit: If your game is cinematic, then sure, bioengineering is all one thing. But the science and engineering skills are usually written reasonably realistically. Last edited by johndallman; 10-10-2015 at 03:00 PM. |
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10-10-2015, 03:01 PM | #39 | ||
Join Date: May 2009
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10-10-2015, 03:14 PM | #40 | |||
Night Watchman
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Cambridge, UK
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basic, bioengineering, biology, skill, skill of the week |
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