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Old 01-29-2016, 02:06 PM   #11
Minuteman37
 
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
A complexity 3 machine is a late 1950s computer, not an early one.
Tech and Toys just lists TL7.25 as the 1950s and not any more specific then that.

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
It needs a lot of development and at least one TL7 invention (to provide a memory - there are several ways) from a mid-1930s technology base
I think you're over blowing this, in this situation we're two years away from a natural jump to TL7 and only need another quarters TL to get this thing running.

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
If this guy is TL12 and going to guide TL6 engineers, he's going to need to have learned a bunch of skills at TL6 beforehand, or cope with a -11 TL penalty.
Then he does or he's actually only TL8 or he's just that good with computer related sciences. Your focusing on the wrong thing here John.

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Originally Posted by johndallman View Post
Taking a whole lot of TL12 computers, and some very robust power converters with him seems more practical.
Again John, your not working with the premise I've outlined and instead are trying to reengineer it to something that better fit's your style. I'm sorry, but that's not what I want here. I'm trying to get help with the BBEG for a weird war two game I'd like to run if you didn't pick up on the that already.
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Old 01-29-2016, 02:10 PM   #12
ericthered
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

The 7.25 doesn't give him much of an advantage, actually. With out a Thuamological Coding suite (which he doesn't have an would take a huge amount of talent to write) He's left doing everything by hand.

Everything takes 30 times as long unless you want a big penalty.
Every script can only run once.
He's the only one who can run them.

And until he gets his software, it doesn't matter if he has complexity 5 machines.

The complexity 2 computer just gives him a -1 to effective skill -- if he's taking the 30 times as long. If he's an adept this is not nearly as painful. But he's going to be one mage against an army unless he upgrades more gear than a simple mainframe -- and that's kind of a different game.
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Old 01-29-2016, 02:18 PM   #13
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

If he brings the equivalent of a cell phone, he should have enough computing power to use Greater Strengthen Mind with a decent area effect to give some top scientists (read: high IQ) the skill to design a proper mainframe.

His next order of business should be ensuring Hitler remains disease-free, doesn't get addicted to a cocktail of drugs, and delaying the invasion of Poland a bit longer. Once Germany has the technological advantage and a leader with a functioning brain, the war is won. Throw in using Involuntary Sacrifice via the Jews that would have been executed anyway and Voluntary Sacrifice from the most devoted soldiers, and you can send your men in with some serious stat boosts.
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Old 01-29-2016, 02:31 PM   #14
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

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Originally Posted by Minuteman37 View Post
I'm trying to get help with the BBEG for a weird war two game I'd like to run if you didn't pick up on the that already.
Well, I suggested I might be being too rationalistic for your desires in my first post in this thread, but you didn't respond to that, so I carried on.

The guy is starting with just himself, and it's a big war. His best bet is probably to get machines built and train lots of magicians. That way, all the different factions of Nazis get to have their own cool things: mega-tanks for the army, sea-monster submarines, aircraft that seem uncomfortably like dragons, and so on.

Once he's escaped an attempt by a faction to kill or control him, he starts building his own faction, and making sure it's really well defended. That leads to a campaign climax where the PCS have to attack a magical college, built deep underground in tunnels, with all sorts of horrible defences.

He can get the V-2 project cancelled on the (quite true) grounds of ineffectiveness, to free up money, talent and space for his projects.

More like what you wanted?
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Old 01-29-2016, 02:44 PM   #15
ericthered
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

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Throw in using Involuntary Sacrifice via the Jews that would have been executed anyway and Voluntary Sacrifice from the most devoted soldiers, and you can send your men in with some serious stat boosts.
If you're allowing mass sacrifice with Technomagic (I see two different reasons to not allow it, but I'm sure some people do it) He can stop the Russian winter.

Gentle Winter
Greater Control Chance (6)+1,500,000 yard radius (72) + 3 bonus (20) + 6 months (16) = 114*3 = 342

This won't stop winter totally, but reduce all logistics rolls, rolls vs the cold, and so forth by 3 across the European part of Russia (including the caucuses, poland, and so forth). That single ritual might do the trick. Totally out of the reach of someone with path skill 16, but if you're allowing mass sacrifice, drum up some cultists and let things roll!
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Old 01-29-2016, 02:55 PM   #16
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

I think arriving in 1939 is a problem for your time traveller. Assuming he somehow worms his way into the Nazi leadership before May, he still has to build his first computer, and it took the British nearly a year to build Collossus and the Americans three years to build ENIAC. While a time-travelling wizard can probably do a lot to alter Germany's fortunes, the opportunities after 1942 are pretty bad.

So we'll say he arrives in 1934 and manages to amass a fortune by 1937 and build his first machine by 1939 (as well as a gain a sympathetic ear with the Nazi leadership). I think that matches your initial premise better: the time traveller is set and ready to go by 1939. He's got a computer and a Fine Workspace Kit and can crank up Charms to aid the Nazis.

With a base skill of 16, a +2 Kit, and maybe a place of power +1, he's looking at an effective skill of 19 for all his charms. Looking at the table on Thaumatology: Ritual Path Magic p 26, his safe threshold is 55 (95% chance of successful casting) and he can go up to about 165 without worrying about blowing up too much (<5% of a big critical failure).

An excellent spell to cast would be Hall of Records (T:RPM p 44): the Nazis can quickly learn the location and condition of all allied units, which should allow them to avoid traps and position their own units very efficiently. Truthteller (T:RPM p51) would let the Nazis question spies and double-agents much more effectively.

I *think* that with 165 energy, you can create a charm to lower the water in the English Channel, or at least the entrance to the Scapa Flow. Invading England will be simplified if the Home Fleet is literally grounded.

Greater Create Crossroads (6, 5 yds Radius +4, Weight 150 tons +7, Duration 3 hours +3, Range 400 miles +34) is 154 energy, and (if I'm reading it right) creates a 9 yd wide portal to location 400 miles away for 3 hours that will transport up to 150 tons at a time. Tobruk to Athens is 400 miles. That should simplify supplying the Africa Korps or again, invading England.

Giving all of Hitler's generals a bonus to Strategy is cheap and straightforward, but I don't know how much it matters. Still, it's an obvious thing to try.

The time-traveller is just barely skilled enough to have a significant strategic impact in a war that really doesn't care about small tactical effects. Intelligence gathering and logistics are probably the biggest wins he has, and he can't do the logistics trick regularly. On the other hand, if at ten key battles he can transport an elite panzer division 50 miles behind enemy lines (after sifting through the Akansic Records to know exactly where the enemy lines are), that's probably enough to conquer North Africa and Russia, at which point it might be possible to negotiate a truce with the US and Britain. If not, well, I don't think he has any tricks up his sleeves to negate the atomic bombs that will be dropped on Germany if they're still in the war in August 1945, and Japan holds out for a few more years before everyone there starves. But his magic is probably really useful for diplomats, so it might just be possible to use some small scale rituals to negotiate that needed truce - and then use Hall of Records to steal the US atomic weapons plans in preparation for a WMD world.
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Old 01-30-2016, 03:41 PM   #17
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Thuamological Coding suite
That's what I meant by this
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Originally Posted by Minuteman37 View Post
Also let's assume he's able to wright the Magic software stuff who's name I'm unable to remember and can't look up at the moment. You know the one that also doubles his charm's per complexity limit.
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Old 01-31-2016, 01:11 PM   #18
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Default May not be able to blame STD for 'Dolf --

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16341329

While some of Hitler's health problems could be symptoms of syphilis there are other explanations. Apparently none of his various medical examinations detected the STD.

Also, as powerful as Hitler was he could have scrounged up some penicillin . . . from captured Allied supplies if nothing else. SOMEONE in his entourage could have made points with the brownshirted boss thereby.
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Old 02-01-2016, 10:18 PM   #19
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Default Re: Techno-Sorcery and The Nazis

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A lot of the scenarios that have the Nazis winning have the fundamental fallacy that Hitler was rational. When put like that, people would say, "You think?" But I mean he wasn't even rational in the way Stalin was. He had the mindset of a serial killer not of a Mafia don. He really could NOT avoid getting into a war with the whole world because getting into wars with people gave him thrills. You could say that Churchill liked getting into wars with people too. But he had a reasonable sense of proportion if only from being a self-satisfied member of the ruling class of a comfortable parliamentary state. It is hard to imagine Hitler keeping enough of a lid on himself to avoid going to war with everyone.

Furthermore, militarism was an inherent part of the Nazi platform. It appealed to the desire to reverse WWI, in the sense that a new coach rouses a team that had a bad year. If somehow the rest of the world could have contrived not to get into a war with Hitler, he would have been sorely disappointed.
There were two Hitlers. There was the one described above, and there was also a relatively rational and competent version of him, and the two traded off over time, sometimes one was behind the wheel, sometime the other. The latter tended to dominate more and more as time went on, though.

(I say rational and competent, not nice.)

The early Hitler often made astute, perceptive moves, and sometimes displayed considerable self-control in pursuing his goals. If our hypothetical time traveler could somehow strengthen that side of Hitler, the outcome of things might have been at least somewhat different. Whether that could be done is another matter.
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