What are your thoughts on the Technology differences between our world and Car Wars?

[ARBco]

Originally Posted by D351

Well, I know it isn't dieselpunk, so what do you call this genre of alternate history?

As tortured a term as it is, it's pretty much post-post-apocalypse, where the end of the world as we know it happens, but a decade or several decades afterwards, things are back to semblance of normalcy. Sure, the pizza truck may have a machinegun on the roof rack, but you can still order pizza, and if that's not a sign of civilization stabilizing, I'm not sure what is.

It's after the apocalypse, but the stories are more about civilization returning than falling apart. But I'm veering a bit too far off-topic.

[Chris Goodwin]

"Plastic" armor could as easily be ceramic, or foamed aluminum, or Kevlar.

Before metal armor came along, did we know armor was plastic?

[harmyn]

Originally Posted by Chris Goodwin

"Plastic" armor could as easily be ceramic, or foamed aluminum, or Kevlar.

Before metal armor came along, did we know armor was plastic?

I think the Compendium v2.5 refers to the Plastic Armor as being based off a form of advanced Kevlar.

I also really like the idea of the bioplastics algae design. And maybe as far as using it for fuel goes, the quality or properties of it is such that it isn't feasible to turn into fuel even at $40 or $50 a gallon. Not sure how that works, but there could be some unknown factor in the process that messes with making it fuel but it is able to be used in the manufacture of plastics.

And ARBco, you are also right about how the world is working. We are actually roleplaying the effects of the apocalypse as the world tries to pull itself up from the ashes. I have a friend who doesn't like cyberpunk/shadowrun type games because of their severe dystopian nature, but loves Car Wars because while the world is still has hellish aspects to it, it is pulling itself out of the ruins.

[woodchuck]

Originally Posted by D351

Well, I know it isn't dieselpunk, so what do you call this genre of alternate history?

Battery Punk? Electric Punk?

[Buzzardo]

Zap Punk. :)

[owenmp]

I have read in several media sources over the past 10 years at least 70 percent of oil is consumed for energy. If vehicles no longer operated on gasoline and other substances from standard oil (pumped out of the ground), the world supplies of oil should be sufficient for decades to support plastics manufacturing.

An important timepoint where Car Wars timeline diverges from the real world is the nuclear terrorism attack on Beirut, Lebanon. In the 1980s and 1990s, Beirut was a focus of attention in the Middle East. If terrorists would detonate a nuclear weapon in the Middle East, the target would more likely be Jerusalem than Beirut.

Today the alternatives and supplements to gasoline internal combustion engines (ICEs) listed below are in production or almost in production. Car Wars never mentioned these technologies because they never existed or were only on drawing boards in 1981.

Alternatives to gasoline ICEs appear to be more technologically possible. The main obstacle appears to be having enough financial resources to get these technologies into mass production.

* Hybrid Gasoline-Electric Battery Systems
* 85% Ethanol-15% Gasoline (E85)
* 10% Ethanol-90% Gasoline (E10)
* Biodiesel (Produced commercially and by consumers)
* Turbocharged Diesel (Best examples are Audi's Le Mans Prototype Race Cars)
* Methanol (Used in IndyCars for years)
* Sulfur-Free Diesel
* Cellulosic Ethanol
* Isobutanol (Used in American Le Mans Series)
* Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS)
* Algae-Based Fuels
* Sugar Cane-Based Ethanol
* Natural Gas

[Buzzardo]

Also, plastics can be made from vegetable oils. It's being done from soy beans today.

[swordtart]

Plastic from corn (maize) starch.

Gasohol appears in the road altas for Australia (number 7?) where it is reported to come from cane sugar.

In my own campaign gas cars are fairly common in Florida (using ethanol). I have assumed cane sugar and fruit production to have recovered fairly quickly. Given the overall economic depression of the area (according to the setting) the crops are produced by using cheap labour rather than though expensive technology.

[Too Bo Coo]

I've been adapting Crossbows and Chassis to 5e, I like a low tech, no lasers games.

But it is fun to have an old skool CW slug fest with the full auto rules....

[D351]

This may be only tangentially related to the subject, but being that the cars are largely electric, does that mean that if a Car Wars movie ever happened, the cars would be quietly humming instead of roaring engines? Seems like a weird move. That could actually be quite jarring on film... Just imagine deadly cars that are deadly silent...