[UT] Exoskeletons with armour and mounted weapons

[theothersarah]

I'm working on building some standard infantry kits for my sci-fi setting. One of the concepts is a heavy weapons trooper based around using a Ranger Exoskeleton to carry normally-mounted weapons like the Gating Laser laser but is somewhat lighter and stealthier than someone in a full battlesuit. This has led me to a few questions that I haven't been able to find an answer for in the Basic Set or Ultra-Tech.

1. If you have the strength to use an ST *M weapon without mounting it on a vehicle or tripod, how many hands does it use? In spite of the lack of the dagger icon on any such weapons I've seen, can I assume two-handed unless you have 1.5x/2x the necessary strength?

2. Could I plausibly justify a trooper wearing a bioplas bodysuit with the exoskeleton? If so, would the -1 DX penalty for stacked armour apply in this situation?

My plan is to give a trooper the Ranger Exoskeleton, assault boots, a light infantry helmet with visor, and if allowed a bioplas bodysuit to provide at least basic protection just in case.

My setting also includes improvised armoured civilian exoskeletons as described in Reign of Steel: Will to Live and I would like to check if my interpretation is correct. By adding 12 pounds of steel plating (or one pound of some form of military-grade armour) to the weight of the exoskeleton - not covered by its weight exemption when powered - I can add +1/+1 DR to it. Is that how it works?

Thanks!

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by theothersarah

1. If you have the strength to use an ST *M weapon without mounting it on a vehicle or tripod, how many hands does it use? In spite of the lack of the dagger icon on any such weapons I've seen, can I assume two-handed unless you have 1.5x/2x the necessary strength?

2. Could I plausibly justify a trooper wearing a bioplas bodysuit with the exoskeleton? If so, would the -1 DX penalty for stacked armour apply in this situation?

My plan is to give a trooper the Ranger Exoskeleton, assault boots, a light infantry helmet with visor, and if allowed a bioplas bodysuit to provide at least basic protection just in case.
!

1. Yes, 2 handed.

2. Sure. that's a no-brainer. I'd assume any concealable suit could be worn inside the exo-frame.

Your planned armor load is terribly light. It seems mostly calibrated against pistol-sized weapons. I'd expect it to be much too light.

I will also note that the Commando Battlesuit si stealthier than your loadout becasue it has Radar Stealth and IR Cloaking. It can have chameleon added as standard where I'd find it hard to do that with your piecemeal rig.

Really, you are asaving about 100 lbs over the Commando suit but a good bit less than the apparent $40,000 after you go back and add must haves liek the IR cloaking. The helmet with the battlesuit also comes with very useful items builk in compared to the Infantry Combat Helmet.

Since you've already committed to the 50lbs of the Ranger and probably a 70lb weapon that's marginalizing that 100lb difference too.

I don't know what you're going for but i can't justify the "savings" of not going with the full battlesuit.

[theothersarah]

Mostly stylistic - it's for a race that's a little weaker than humans on average and needs some extra help carrying a support weapon to a fight. Sort of like their version of a two-man team where one person carries the gun and the other carries the ammunition, tripod, spare barrels and such.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by theothersarah

Mostly stylistic - it's for a race that's a little weaker than humans on average and needs some extra help carrying a support weapon to a fight. Sort of like their version of a two-man team where one person carries the gun and the other carries the ammunition, tripod, spare barrels and such.

They're going to go out like TL6 matches is a gale force wind when facing TL10 weapons. Especially when facing the kind of fire support weapons attract.

[theothersarah]

I'll have to do some thinking on this - anyone wearing anything short of a battlesuit is going to have trouble taking a few solid hits, but I have concerns with how strong the Commando is against all but the most powerful TL10 weapons.

If I go that route I'll have to work the numbers and offer my players a bit of advice when picking weapons, just in case.

[vierasmarius]

To help justify it, you could have this race specialize in Exoskeleton technology, reducing the cost of such systems to a fraction of normal. Their battlesuits may also be cheaper, but with far less of a discount since there's so much else that goes into one. This means that for police and paramilitary forces - where other races just have soldiers in Ballistic Armor without strength augmentation - this race would equip its troops with basic exoskeletons to even things out.

[theothersarah]

I never thought of giving them discounts (great idea :D ), but that is similar to one of the concepts I was going to run with - that at a minimum, anyone in any sort of combat situation wears a stealth exoskeleton so that they're not bogged down with something that a well-built human could carry without breaking a sweat.

And why don't they do some serious weight training to make up the difference? Because they can just strap on an exoskeleton!

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by theothersarah

I'll have to do some thinking on this - anyone wearing anything short of a battlesuit is going to have trouble taking a few solid hits, but I have concerns with how strong the Commando is against all but the most powerful TL10 weapons.

If I go that route I'll have to work the numbers and offer my players a bit of advice when picking weapons, just in case.

No battlesuit is made to withstand the strongest weaponry of its' TL. It's made to keep its' wearers from dieing cheaply.

For example, bioplas body suit v,. TL10 IR Laser Rifle ends up as 6D(2) v DR15 and your heavy weapons gunner takes 14 damage per hit and aimed fire from a Laser rifle can generate a lot of hits.

That's nowhere near TL10's strongest weapons. It's more like a light weapon for skirmishing against poorly equipped insurgents.

Of course, your PCs might go straight to the Hunter missile when faced with a support class weapon and the DR doesn't amtter against a 64mm HEAT However, you'd really want to max out the stealth against one of those and at TL10 that doesn't mean face paint and moving slowly. Those are more tactics fro sue agaisnt people with nothing better than the MKI eyeball.

It's quite possible that you shouldn't be shooting at your PCs with support weapons. Those tend to be deadly but ti really doesn't amke a lot of sense to go for $50k for aranger exo and $70k or more for a support weapon and then try and save a little by skimping on the DR.

[vierasmarius]

Something else you could do is to have simple strength augmentation built in to their versions of Tacsuits and Hardsuits, so they can combine armor and exosuit without the -1 DX penalty for layered armor, and get a discount in the process. Use the rules for combination gadgets; full cost and weight of the most expensive / bulkiest item, 80% cost/weight for anything else included (after the price mark-down for the race's specialization in exoskeletons). This way their basic infantry can have equivalent carrying capacity to the non-powered infantry of other races, without resorting to full-sized powered armor.

[theothersarah]

Yeah, the heavier weapons are deadly enough that I was only going to bring out anything bigger than a laser carbine or rifle if the players didn't find those to be challenging enough. For instance, if one of the players chooses to be a battlesuit trooper himself then I might just have to throw in the occasional support weapon.

I'm not really trying to save money though, since I'm outfitting NPCs and trying to hit a balance of theme and gameplay balance more than anything. I wanted to outfit these troops with bioplas more so that they're not "naked" under the exosuit than to make them impervious to light/medium weaponry. If the players are pinned down by a guy with a gatling laser and manage to flank him, I'm perfectly okay if he dies to a single gauss/laser spray.

But I'll have some time to figure out higher-end balance as the campaign is going to begin with combatting rebels and insurgents with TL9 weapons and cruddy improvised things like armoured industrial exoskeletons, and then ramping it up from there.

Originally Posted by vierasmarius

Something else you could do is to have simple strength augmentation built in to their versions of Tacsuits and Hardsuits, so they can combine armor and exosuit without the -1 DX penalty for layered armor, and get a discount in the process. Use the rules for combination gadgets; full cost and weight of the most expensive / bulkiest item, 80% cost/weight for anything else included (after the price mark-down for the race's specialization in exoskeletons). This way their basic infantry can have equivalent carrying capacity to the non-powered infantry of other races, without resorting to full-sized powered armor.

Great idea! I might just do that - a hardsuit offers decent protection but isn't impervious to decent rolls from a standard infantry weapon, but these poor aliens would have a tough time using one effectively without augmentation.