Ultratech 4e: No cost/weight modifiers for tech level?

[weby]

Originally Posted by RyanW

The only examples in 4e I can think of off the top of my head are cases where some breakthrough vastly increases production capacity, like high quality steel at TL7+, and antimatter with certain forms of superscience.

The robots seems to go down in price. I mean things like androids, warbots and such. Like take the base android UT41. The TL 9/10/11/12 models are 75,000/50,000/30,000/25,000 and the specs get better too.

But as for others, cannot remember others either, though there is likely also some other limited case like that.

[weby]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

In the "Laser and Blaster Design" article in Pyramid 3/37 a 4x progression is to be found in the charts and that's what I try and use in settings with multiple TLs of equipment available.

The 4x progression/TL was seen also in few other places before that nice article, like in the Exploding Power Cells energy. But that article made it clearer.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by RyanW

The only examples in 4e I can think of off the top of my head are cases where some breakthrough vastly increases production capacity, like high quality steel at TL7+, and antimatter with certain forms of superscience.

The example that comes to my mind was brilliant missiles, which come down in price 5-fold at TL10 compared to their TL9 prices.

[MrTim]

Originally Posted by weby

Sure it could have gone up from 1 point to 2 points in GURPS terms for a +1.

But a +1 is not such a dramatic improvement.

It actually kind of is, at least at lowish skill levels. A +1 to a skill of 9 increases your chance of success by a third.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by weby

Sure it could have gone up from 1 point to 2 points in GURPS terms for a +1.

But a +1 is not such a dramatic improvement.

It may not be 'dramatic', but it is significant. Consider that in terms of range, it means seeing and hitting things about 1.5x as far away. In terms of general skill use it means either not having to spend twice as long to get the same bonus, or being able to shave 10% off the time you'd normally take.

In terms of general task difficulty, it means that -1 task (unfavourable) to someone less skilled is effective a +0 task (average) for you, and an average task for them is favourable.

It's also the difference between basic equipment and good equipment, and between good and fine equipment. I think you are under-estimating the importance of bonuses, and that your assessment of how much of a bonus gear should give will 1) result in 'bonus inflation' (and thus penalty inflation as GMs try to keep skill checks challenging), and 2) will cause gear to be over-valued over characters' skills. The latter is already an issue in HT and UT games, with Wealth being able to purchase a lot of very flexible bonuses that non-Wealthy people have to pay points for. The bigger the raw bonuses gear gives, the lower the value of character skill levels.

Thus I think that simply giving out very big bonuses is both unrealistic, and damaging to game play.

[Culture20]

Originally Posted by weby

In then obviously we had the smart phone explosion, so lets take a 2010 model, iPhone 4. It was a "oh, they are getting heavier again?" compared to the nokia from 2002.

Smartphones are more acurately labeled pocket computers with built in modems and cell phone capability. They’re smaller than laptops by far.

[Flyndaran]

As to phones, there is the joke about how they were getting smaller and smaller until the time they could stream adult videos.

But seriously, it seems more like they add new functions rather than drastically improving the main phone function.

[(E)]

One thing I discovered diving into Biological research was that weight and size improvements are not consistent between disciplines. Product A which is mainly biological shrinks and lightens at a different rate with technological advancement than the mainly mechanical Product B and both are different to the electronic Product C

[weby]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Thus I think that simply giving out very big bonuses is both unrealistic, and damaging to game play.

Yes, It is entirely possible that it is meant to be as: dedicated hobbyists have skill 10, normal pros 11 and the ones you see on top magazine covers skill 12.

And that the normal professional photographer in 1930 could well have only had a skill of 8 or 9 on that scale compared to 11 now.

Though from what I have read in the GURPS books the scale between merely passable to good to among the best is normally bigger.

Also for playability a larger spread in skills tends to be more fun as it allows the better characters succeed relatively more often giving them more satisfaction of success for things they have focused on.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by weby

Also for playability a larger spread in skills tends to be more fun as it allows the better characters succeed relatively more often giving them more satisfaction of success for things they have focused on.

Higher TL equipment giving bigger bonuses doesn't do that though. It just inflates everyone's numbers if it's a skill they care about at all.

A bigger skill range is, in my opinion, best achieved by encouraging players to build their characters with different niches, and giving them a large enough point budget that they can afford decent skill levels.