Stocking your Life Pod

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by (E)

In case you land in water a raft would be handy.

One hopes that the pod floats. As long as most of its volume is inside the pressurised volume it should. Something that can function as a paddle would be handy, as would some way of rigging a sail. Bits of pod no longer needed are probably the best source of paddles and masts.

[The Colonel]

Is there an inventory for the Soyuz re-entry vehicles anywhere out there? IIRC the Soviets loaded them down with all sorts of stores as they lacked the ability to work out where they would land or how long it would take to retrieve them.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

I see it now. i missed his 200 pounnd limit the first time through.

So this is a "Pray we land on an earth habitable planet life-pod" then Fred?

It is a fundamnetal assumption of the setting that life pods will end up on Earth-like planets a significant percentage of the time. If this were not true there would be no life pods.

Nitpicking about retained/intrinsic velocity and the difficulties of matching orbits is off-topic. These problems are also assumed to be solved or again, there would be no life pods.

It is easy to create situations where life pods make no sense but that wipes out the basic "castaway" fictional trope.

If the pod lands in water it floats. UT is clear on this and it would be another "everyone dies" scenario if it didn't float.

The pod is assumed to be stocked by the ship-owners and probably to a legal standard. Passengers would be advised to keepa "go-bag" containing "sturdy clothing and footwear" that they can grab when the misjump alarm goes off.

I'd have milspec Assautl Boots (UT p. 173). Those add TL/2 to Hiking skill in addition to be indestrutible in normal use. The basic Protective Coverall (UT p. 178) is a very reasonable choice for "sturdy clothing". Together that's another 6 lbs per passenger but we can probably put that on the individual passengers' weight allowance.

A machete would be nice but there's a hatchet in the group basics. Swap out one for the other if prefer.

At TL 10 you can throw in a Morph Axe (UT p. 83) and replace a lot of basic tools.

If you start worrying about gear for serious arctic or desert or bad atmosphere situations it eats up that 200 lb weight allowance quite quickly.

If you need to take your pod apart you can do that with the Mini-Laser Torches (UT p.80). They give you 3 minutes of cutting power off a B-cell but the E-cell can recharge a B-cell 1000 times.

I knew there was better gear in HT than in Basic but there are only so amny books i can go through at one time. Thanks for anything you spot from HT.

Replacing the backpacks for the ones from HT frees up another 9.5 lbs so we're at maybe another 16 lbs of possible stuff.

[TGLS]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

The pod is assumed to be stocked by the ship-owners and probably to a legal standard. Passengers would be advised to keepa "go-bag" containing "sturdy clothing and footwear" that they can grab when the misjump alarm goes off.

So how fragile are these ships if the ship will soon become uninhabitable (blow up, irreparable life support failure) after a misjump? Or does it just appear more likely given that's what we're focusing on?

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

ISo this is a "Pray we land on an earth habitable planet life-pod" then Fred?

That life-pods are useful is a setting conceit, sort of "science-fantasy". In a very rigorous setting, yes, you are always better off staying with your spaceship and trying to repair it. Even if you have some sort of problem with the reactor the solution is not to leave your highly capable life support system, it is to eject the core and trigger the distress beacon.

But given that it's a conceit of the setting:

I suspect that the designers' assumption would be that in most situations in which a life-pod gets used that the crew would already be in pressure suits of some sort. So that is worn already, and probably doesn't count towards the weight allotment. Likewise, footgear would likely be assumed already, unless the setting has "ship slippers" as standard or something.

Your lists look pretty good.

Stocking Torpine is a neat idea.

Having seen a lot of survival equipment, I suspect that a solar recharger is more likely than a E cell.

A shelter of some sort is pretty key. In any halfway realistic setting one might claim that they are better off staying/living at the pod, but forcing use of the pod seems like a GM's mechanism to encourage exploration. So, encourage exploration. Give them a tent. Or at least a tarp.

Agree, a compass is pretty key. There is one in every survival kit I've ever seen. As is cord of some type.

Agree a raft is unlikely. If they land in an ocean the pod should float, and in that situation one would not want to leave the pod, anyway. A raft is of no real benefit. However, including fishing tackle and some sort of purification/desalinization rig might be handy. But I guess the vapor canteens cover water, huh? And ne would never be sure of what the fishing would be like on alien worlds. Here on Earth, castaways with access to food and water have drifted around for over a year and survived. Usually they collect rainwater, granted. And the ones with the longest records generally ate their fellow castaways. But still...

For something just "stocked to a legal standard" don't for get to make everything of cheap quality. :) And a simple, cheap backpack is much more likely than an LBV or such.

Some sort of cold-weather parka or the UT equivalent seems like a pretty obvious need for people who might get stranded on an unknown world.

I could argue that a stranded group is expected to stay together, so they wouldn't need the four radios. I'd make it two radios, assumed to be one for the exploring pair and one for the basecamp pair. You want to be in at least pairs, not alone, and the radio in the pod provides the needed redundancy. Likewise, the "legal standard" might be one first aid kit instead of three (plus the crash kit, that is).

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by TGLS

So how fragile are these ships if the ship will soon become uninhabitable (blow up, irreparable life support failure) after a misjump? Or does it just appear more likely given that's what we're focusing on?

It sounds like they'll be engaged in firefights over mostly deserted but habitable planets.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Responsive Fabric (UT39) says otherwise - it's TL10 and isn't one-size-fits all, though it is better than normal clothing.

True. But I was mostly meaning 'straps, easements, and such' to allow or greater range of sizing rather than responsive Fabric.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It is a fundamnetal assumption of the setting that life pods will end up on Earth-like planets a significant percentage of the time. If this were not true there would be no life pods.

Then aside from rope and a pair of climbing gear, it looks like what I'd have packed out (at a strict 200 pound limit).

I knew there was better gear in HT than in Basic but there are only so amny books i can go through at one time. Thanks for anything you spot from HT.

There isn't much else in HT that's of use or 'better' than UT.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by acrosome

Tha
Having seen a lot of survival equipment, I suspect that a solar recharger is more likely than a E cell.

<shrug> The solar gear in UT is much too heavy. So are the tents and the cold weather stuff. Except for the envirobag which is an insulated and heated sleeping bag good to -50 F even without power.

There are practical limits to how bad an environment you can expect untrained persons to survive in and you'd be lucky to cover even one of them within the weight limit.

An item I forgot to mention is the Holdout Gyroc. It's .25 lbs and $50 and if you load it with Flare rounds it becomes a flare gun. Only these flare rounds will fly to more than a mile overhead and illuminate like starshell. I'd think it'd be visible from orbit.

I hate to put an ammo using weapon in a UT survival kit but Gyrocs are very very versatile. You could carry several diffeeent kinds of gyroc ammo with the remaing .75 lbs (7 rounds)

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by ericthered

It sounds like they'll be engaged in firefights over mostly deserted but habitable planets.

No, nobody has said anything about combat and it is not assumed as a basic part of the life pod scenario.

Combat pilots ejecting over hostile territory would be a different scenario with a smaller amount of gear but involving trained personel.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

<shrug> The solar gear in UT is much too heavy.

That's why I posted the Solar Recharger from HT. $100, 2 lbs at TL 8. By TL 9 I expect it's half the weight and charges faster.