Would the peasant railgun be possible in GURPS?

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Jack Sawyer

I never cared for the peasant railgun idea. Apart from feeling too 'rules-lawyerly' it also relied on ignoring real life just enough to make the game-mechanics internal logic to work, then act as if the results had meaningful impact in real life. I mean once it achieves a certain momentum its going to cause problems for handover unless you're also assuming progressively more superhuman peasants.

Well, yeah. It assumes D&D rules ignore physics, until at the specific point the player trying to get away with the peasant railgun suddenly wants D&D to have rules for physics, so the railgun does something.

Sorry, nope. It continues to ignore physics forever, because D&D has no physics. It has game rules.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Well, yeah. It assumes D&D rules ignore physics, until at the specific point the player trying to get away with the peasant railgun suddenly wants D&D to have rules for physics, so the railgun does something.

Sorry, nope. It continues to ignore physics forever, because D&D has no physics. It has game rules.

This is why using ring gates and infinite falling to generate rods from god is superior.

D&D does have rules for some physics. The peasant railgun neglects to engage with them.

[fritzbc]

However, the physics in Dungeons and Dragons are so limited and obtuse that they barely count as physics. The peasant railgun interacts with the physics, if I remember correctly, in such a limited way that the Dungeon Master gets to decide if it works. Realistically at an Adventurer's League table, it would never fly (the peasant railgun and the thing being thrown). Now, would it work in GURPS? That's also up to the Game Master, like in Dungeons and Dragons, because in a wacky setting, it totally could. RAW? I don't think so.

[David Johnston2]

Even if you allowed your peasants to pass it foward with a single held action that wouldn't give it any momentum because it didn't experience any acceleration. It would just have teleported from the back of the line to the front of the line. +

[dataweaver]

In GURPS, that would be a kind of pseudo-velocity drive.

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Rolando

the original post have a big problem:
a ton of peasants is about 5 to 6 strong peasants, or maybe 7 small and weak ones.

you may get more children peasants with a ton but never enough o power the kilometer+ railgun.

Strength is a valid concern about the speed you'd generate passing an object, like it should be a combination of DX and ST like how Control Points happen in Technical Grappling