Labs (Laboratories) in UT & HT vs. Labs in Spaceships. What gives?

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I already pointed this out, but the numbers in HT are the same as in UT.

As a participant in all the playtests in question I can tell you that the subject did not come up as best as I can remember. The numbers might well be the same as in 3e.

"Lab" is an abstraction anyway. I'm sure HT is pretty good about specific items of equipment but a generic "lab" that covers an entrie field and is conicidentally the same cost and weight as all the equipment you need for a completely different science specialization seems like an obvious and arbitrary simplification of complex realities.

If nothign else you might notice that the HT/UT "labs" don't include buildings to keep the equipment in much less power and life support for the users.

[Kallatari]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

If nothign else you might notice that the HT/UT "labs" don't include buildings to keep the equipment in much less power and life support for the users.

But Spaceships accounts for these separately. First you have to pay $200K for the Habitat to get the equivalent of two cabins - and thus cover the cost of gravity, life support, etc. - and then you add an additional +$1M to turn it into a lab. You could have that cost without life support, as you get twice as many cabins, so only need "half" the habitat to get the same sized lab.


Back to the main question, I've noticed several anomalies along those lines, going both ways (e.g., everything you get with the Control Roll is significantly cheaper than if you purchased each of them separately, including computers, very-long range comms extrapolating costs from communicators in HT, radar, etc.). The Laboratory was admittedly the most significant difference in price, if I remember from my work at bringing everything in line with each other.

Anyway, my houserule in this case was two-fold. First, I changed the cost of Semi-Portable Lab to $60K instead of $75K, ruling that it was merely a Fine Quality (+2) suitcase lab, at x20 the cost and mass - which is the standard that applies to everything else in the rules.

Then, with respect to Spaceships (or buildings), I require that you purchase the habitat (thus at least $200K), and then, instead of adding $1M for a lab, you add +$60K for specifically the price of the Semi-Portable Lab. If a lab costs difference by specialty, modify the $60K accordingly (as you would the Semi-Portable Lab).

The +(TL/2) for best available lab comes when you combine 100 such labs together.

The fact that more people can use it, to me, is window dressing. When you have a larger (i.e., better quality) toolbox, of course more people can use the tools at the same time, as you'll likely have multiple slightly different hammers, screwdrivers, etc., and perhaps only a few rarer items that you'll only have 1 off and have to time-share. Spaceships is effectively telling me that a semi-portable laboratory, which fills a room in terms of equipment, is easily useable by 2 people at once without.. probably means back up equipment, additional vials and burners, larger fridge, multiple plugs and battery supplies, whatever. Personally, *I have no problem with that.

I personally let my players share first aid kits by passing bandages around and such. I would be more restrictive on something like a mini-tool kit, but not a full size kit or larger. The way to limit sharing or too many people at once is to give them a "number of uses" before you have to replenish the supplies, and set up a cost for supplies. Multiple people using the kit, lab, tools, whatever, just uses up the supplies faster. Doesn't necessarily make sense for all kits or labs, though, so judgement is required.

[Flyndaran]

I imagine our resident geneticist would love to have a fully equipped state of the art lab for so cheap.

[Kallatari]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I imagine our resident geneticist would love to have a fully equipped state of the art lab for so cheap.

Yeah, no kidding. But I just used the value there without changing the cost... other than making things match between the two, using HT/UT as the basis.

Granted, I could have gone the other way, started with the $1M from Spaceships for the semi-portable, dividing by 20 for fine quality gives a $50,000 for the basic lab kit... but that then seems a little too expensive for a small, easily portable 10 lbs kit. Seemed too expensive for my liking.. and I didn't feel knowledgeable enough to pick a middle ground that would be appropriate.

[Anthony]

The appropriate middle ground depends a whole lot on what a lab is supposed to actually let you do. Realistically, a lab isn't entirely or even primarily a bonus to tasks; mostly, it determines what you can do at all, and then equipment quality may affect how good a job you can do.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

As a participant in all the playtests in question I can tell you that the subject did not come up as best as I can remember. The numbers might well be the same as in 3e.

"Lab" is an abstraction anyway. I'm sure HT is pretty good about specific items of equipment but a generic "lab" that covers an entrie field and is conicidentally the same cost and weight as all the equipment you need for a completely different science specialization seems like an obvious and arbitrary simplification of complex realities.

If nothign else you might notice that the HT/UT "labs" don't include buildings to keep the equipment in much less power and life support for the users.

Well, yes, it is an abstraction, but it's an abstraction that permeates the rest of the gaming activity.
'I need to fix a paper shredder. Now, I have an Electronics Repair toolkit in my inventory, but I wonder if it includes a screwdriver type #6 that matches one of its screws.'
'I am using a Silver Crescent type of punch, so he will get a +1 to Parry if he decides to defend with a Swampy Woodland arm parry, but -1 if he tries the Shaky Bamboo parry against it.'

These things are mostly abstracted by necessity, as a GM and player can not be expected to be proficient in the intricacies of all the skills out there. Or else there goes death to roleplaying and life to playing oneself only. Usually, when a player wants to perform a chemistry task, the GM has to answer what does the PC need in terms of tools.
The problem is that the tools in SS and UT/HT are the same, but with wildly different prices and masses.

[Captain Joy]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

The problem is that the tools in SS and UT/HT are the same, but with wildly different prices and masses.

Maybe the "tools" are the same, but I think a UT/HT vs. Spaceships lab are quite different in scope. E.g. A man-portable lab may be as good as the spaceship's lab as far as collecting and analyzing a sample of an infected colonist's blood. But once the contagion is discovered, you're going to want to use the spaceship's lab to find and mass produced a cure. You might be able to do both of these with a the man-portable lab, but it would take much longer.

Of course, this does not address why a full room-sized lab from UT/HT differs in any way from the same room-sized lab in Spaceships. The only thing I can offer is that the UT/HT lab does not include the costs for the fairly regular replacement of consumables, and Spaceships lab does.

I'm being a GURPS apologist here. I have no real insider knowledge into why the prices and masses are different. My guess would be the games effects of price and mass for labs was arrived at independently in all cases, without consulting the other books. Different assumptions resulted in different results. What these assumptions are, and how they arrived at the stats given, only the authors can tell us for sure.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

The problem is that the tools in SS and UT/HT are the same, but with wildly different prices and masses.

I think that there is an unspoken assumption that Suitcase, Field and Semi-Portable labs are only good for the sort of work you'd do in the field and would be inadequate for many longer and more complex tasks. For one thing, they include no (or at best limited) storage facilities for samples and probably have a very limited supply of any perishables needed.

Then there's the fact that the portable labs require housing, for some kinds of work very specific and expensive housing. Add to that power requirements.

I won't pretend that once this is all accounted for, the prices will match exactly, but as a GM, I'd react to a suggestion that Labs on a research ship will consist of Suitcase labs stored in personal quarters by reminding the player that this would mean that there were a lot of tasks that he simply could not do with his tools unless he had a real Lab module.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Well, yes, it is an abstraction, but it's an abstraction that permeates the rest of the gaming activity.

It hasn't permeated my gaming activity. In fact it's never come up at all.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It hasn't permeated my gaming activity. In fact it's never come up at all.

On the contrary, people regularly use abstract toolkits and other stuff in RPGs, install abstract programs on abstract computers with no regard for compatibility between architecture/OS and the program (which is not a given), etc. and nobody notices. It's just the way things are.