Spacer as Soldier

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by doulos05

Exactly what we're talking about. Now, dialing in the frequency for the local port, configuring the computer to match whatever the local communications protocols are, setting up any translation needed, etc. Those require Electronic Ops (Comms). You could do all of this with a +4 or +6 for it being a routine action. Or you could do it all using Spacer at a base roll. More complicated stuff (Like contacting the secret frequency used by the smuggling ring running out of the spaceport using their encryption package) would be beyond the scope of Spacer. Electronic Ops (Comms) or bust.

In any campaign with digital technology comparable to modern day TL8, it is very likely that all of these routine tasks can be accomplished by anyone who has even a default level of Computer Operation at the appropriate tech level and who doesn't mind having to go through a digital menu*.

It's extremely user-unfriendly to require a specialised skill usually taught only to communications technicians just to dial a given frequency with the communicator. Electronic Operations (Communications) is for using communications equipment under field conditions, even in the middle of combat, and covers all sort of field-expedient methods of getting the most out of the communications equipment and even using it for tasks it is not explicitly inteded to perform, such as patching into the comms of an orbiting spaceship with a ground-to-air radio.

You don't need it just to talk to people over a communicator in a non-combat, non-stressful situation, where range and conditions are comfortably within the design specs for the equipment, even if you need to find a number or frequency and call someone before you talk to them.

Under most circumstances, it doesn't take any skill roll to look up a frequency in the computer banks and enter it. Hell, under most circumstances at late TL8 and TL9+, the computer probably does it for you as soon as you ask it, either with voice command** or by choosing a simple icon on the computer.

*Probably Taking Extra Time for +1 or +2 so that he's at skill 14+ even with default.
**Reliable and versatile systems with it will be here Really Soon Now, which probably means they count as TL9 tecnology.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Icelander

In any campaign with digital technology compared to modern day TL8, it is very likely that all of these routine tasks can be accomplished by anyone who has even a default level of Computer Operation at the appropriate tech level and doesn't mind having to go through a digital menu*.

Pretty much. If all you want to do with an electronic communication system is make an ordinary call, you don't need a skill roll, any more than you need a Telephone Operation skill roll every time you place a call. Any points at all in Spacer certainly covers everything you need to make calls from shipboard equipment that doesn't need a skill rolls.

If you want to act as a relay a relay between two other stations on opposite edges of your reception envelope, one of whom is using a non-standard protocol, while somebody is jamming, then yeah, you need a skill roll, and Spacer isn't it.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by malloyd

Pretty much. If all you want to do with an electronic communication system is make an ordinary call, you don't need a skill roll, any more than you need a Telephone Operation skill roll every time you place a call. Any points at all in Spacer certainly covers everything you need to make calls from shipboard equipment that doesn't need a skill rolls.

If you want to act as a relay a relay between two other stations on opposite edges of your reception envelope, one of whom is using a non-standard protocol, while somebody is jamming, then yeah, you need a skill roll, and Spacer isn't it.

Agreed. I'd identify three regimes in a post-TL6 environment:

No skill required. Using any system designed for general use. Imagine a phone here on Earth right now, or the radio equivalent that any passenger vessel would almost certainly be carrying. This would include more complex systems with computerized automation, but only to the limits of what that automation is programmed to do (HAL might tell you the AE-35 antenna-steering unit is down).

Soldier/Spacer. Switching on a system that has been disconnected for some reason, or using a system designed for tactical use. Most of us wouldn't know where the breakers are for the comms on a warship, or what the TLAs on a military radio stand for, or which icon out of dozens or hundreds to click on to start a call, but that would be a few minutes of standard training for a crewman or a soldier. Observing basic COMSEC would also fall into this category.

Electronics Op (Comm). Compensating for natural interference, extending range, figuring out foreign tactical equipment, hailing on a specific frequency band, keying in manual code (like Morse), operating new or classified systems, patching (phone to radio, intercom to radio, radio to shipboard PA, etc.), penetrating jamming, relaying comms between two other stations, using comms as sensors (e.g., scanning a broad frequency range), and so on.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Electronics Op (Comm). Compensating for natural interference, extending range, figuring out foreign tactical equipment, hailing on a specific frequency band, keying in manual code (like Morse), operating new or classified systems, patching (phone to radio, intercom to radio, radio to shipboard PA, etc.), penetrating jamming, relaying comms between two other stations, using comms as sensors (e.g., scanning a broad frequency range), and so on.[/INDENT]

This still seems super weird to me. Modern TL8 shipboard radios on the trawler where I worked have a simple digital display to select radio frequency. I may not know anything about which one to select to cut through jamming or how to follow along a pre-arranged schedule of frequency hopping*, but even without any skill, I can look up a frequency on the table next to it and enter the number of it.

*In case the equipment doesn't do that automatically.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by Icelander

This still seems super weird to me. Modern TL8 shipboard radios on the trawler where I worked have a simple digital display to select radio frequency. I may not know anything about which one to select to cut through jamming or how to follow along a pre-arranged schedule of frequency hopping*, but even without any skill, I can look up a frequency on the table next to it and enter the number of it.

Hailing on a band, not a channel or freq. That means transmitting the same message across a wide variety of commonly used frequencies in rapid succession and possibly simultaneously if you have enough transmitters, and using the appropriate protocols for a hail, not just calling a single known party or sending a general "SOS." Real knowledge of the equipment and protocols is needed for that. For instance, if a bunch of Russian fighter jets are near my carrier group, and I have to warn them off without knowing their freq, I need to transmit on the most likely freqs, do so quickly enough that they aren't on top of me by the time I'm done, and in a way that won't trigger an incident even though I don't speak any Russian. Calling my own jets on a well-known freq would be a whole other ballgame, but that isn't hailing on a band.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Hailing on a band, not a channel or freq. That means transmitting the same message across a wide variety of commonly used frequencies in rapid succession and possibly simultaneously if you have enough transmitters, and using the appropriate protocols for a hail, not just calling a single known party or sending a general "SOS." Real knowledge of the equipment and protocols is needed for that. For instance, if a bunch of Russian fighter jets are near my carrier group, and I have to warn them off without knowing their freq, I need to transmit on the most likely freqs, do so quickly enough that they aren't on top of me by the time I'm done, and in a way that won't trigger an incident even though I don't speak any Russian. Calling my own jets on a well-known freq would be a whole other ballgame, but that isn't hailing on a band.

Fair enough.

[Kromm]

Letting Spacer work that way is fine; as has been pointed out, GURPS Spaceships says as much. The cutoff in GURPS Fourth Edition remains "someone with the specialized skill would roll at +4 or better," and the task must correspond to "routine use of standard equipment by ordinary personnel." The origin of that +4 isn't terribly important: a really good interface (Equipment Modifiers, p. B345), extra time (Time Spent, p. B345), or just a trivial task (Task Difficulty, pp. B345-346). What is important is that you can't confront challenges, improvise, or figure out gear you've never seen – you can only do your job exactly according to the manual for the systems you were trained on.

[Terranaunt]

Thank you for detailed explanations, this helps a lot.