Battlesuit ST

[Joseph Paul]

Does it bother anyone else that Battlesuits are built with no upper limit to their mechanical power? ST 10 trooper gets in his suit and he has ST 20. ST 30 humanoid gets in the same model and the suit performs at ST 40. Why isn't that extra 20 points of ST available to the ST 10 guy? Mechanically what is happening here?

I am of a mind to write up suits in 5 point ST steps that are a hard upper limit on what the suit can do. So ST 10 trooper in a ST 15 suits can strike and lift at ST 15. ST 15 trooper is gaining no real benefit outside of increased encumbrance (and having a hefty cestus on his hand all the time; something else not taken into account with Battlesuits).

Any Pyramid articles cover this and alternatives to mechanical systems that have no upper bounds on performance?

[Celjabba]

You can use fixed ST (Gurps Super iirc). In which case a ST 20 suit have ST 20 no matter if driven by a fly or Thor.
Or you can use + ST that add a fixed amount of ST.
I don't believe there is a pricing scheme for a suit that instead increase ST by a set percentage of the wearer ST.

[Joseph Paul]

Fixed ST is more to my mind set and gets rid of magically expansive mechanical systems. I would just detail several models with different ST for any particular suit in UT or Basic so that it had different uses. Lighter faster ones with less ST for scouting and others with more ST for specific assault/engineering roles.

[sir_pudding]

Presumably the idea is that a realistic exoskeleton augments rather than replaces wearer strength. Because ST is quadratic, adding ST is really a multiplier for the characters lifting power. A very strong exoskeleton that just moves on its own without feedback would probably break your limbs.

[weby]

The third edition battlesuits all had fixed ST that is not based on wearer ST. I never understood the reason for the change in 4e. The fixed ST made more sense from a technical standpoint.

How could the TL 9 battledress suddenly lift 10 times more weight if worn by a stronger wearer. The material technology or the arm motors did not get any better...

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Presumably the idea is that a realistic exoskeleton augments rather than replaces wearer strength. Because ST is quadratic, adding ST is really a multiplier for the characters lifting power. A very strong exoskeleton that just moves on its own without feedback would probably break your limbs.

The whole point of the battlesuit/exoskeleton is the feedback mechanism, the feedback mechanism should not be strong enough to cause extra fatigue in any case as something that would break weaker limbs would do even to stronger people.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Presumably the idea is that a realistic exoskeleton augments rather than replaces wearer strength. Because ST is quadratic, adding ST is really a multiplier for the characters lifting power. A very strong exoskeleton that just moves on its own without feedback would probably break your limbs.

That becomes silly if you are doing battlesuits for superheroes. We have, say, a battlesuit that boost Tony Stark from ST 11 to ST 31, raising his BL from 24 lbs. to 192 lbs. Now Peter Parker puts it on. Does it raise his ST from 31 to 51, and his BL from 192 lbs. to 520 lbs.? On one hand, the factor of increase has gotten smaller, which sort of makes sense; but on the other, the absolute increase has gone from 168 lbs. to 328 lbs. And it could be even worse! Suppose Prince Namor puts it on; does it raise his ST from 81 to 101, and his BL from 1312 lbs. to 2040 lbs., a boost of 728 lbs?

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by weby

The whole point of the battlesuit/exoskeleton is the feedback mechanism, the feedback mechanism should not be strong enough to cause extra fatigue in any case as something that would break weaker limbs would do even to stronger people.

That feedback means that you are still lifting things with your own muscles, and the exoskeleton is just augmenting that by supporting you. Lifting something with an exoskeleton is more like lifting something with help (where you get to sum the BLs of the lifters) than it is like telling a robot (or using a forklift or jack) to lift something. If it was like a robot arm, and just moved around without regard for the movement of the limb inside, that would be bad, for obvious reasons.

Originally Posted by whswhs

That becomes silly if you are doing battlesuits for superheroes.

Sure, but superheros are already silly! Superhero powered armor isn't really the same thing as realistic powered exoskeletons and probably ought to use different mechanics.

[The_Ryujin]

Don't mind me... just going to leave this link over here
http://gurb3d6.blogspot.com/2016/09/...owered-up.html

While not a Pyramid articles, it does play one on TV.

But for a simpler fix, change it from a flat ST bonus they give to a basic lift bonus.

Just add 10 to a Battlesuits ST bonus, figure basic lift from that and then subtract 20 from the basic lift. This is the suits Basic Lift bonus.

Then all you have to do is re-figure the wearers ST fro their new Basic Lift while in the suit.

Now as you can see, that's pretty clunky. That's probably why they went with the flat +X system we see. Though, for the most part, the flat bonus works so long as the wearer is with ST9-12 or so.

Also giving the suit a fixed ST doesn't really add up. Exoskeletons are supposed to be man amplifiers, they user their lifting power to help you lift more. Your ST is part of the system.

[weby]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

That feedback means that you are still lifting things with your own muscles, and the exoskeleton is just augmenting that by supporting you. Lifting something with an exoskeleton is more like lifting something with help (where you get to sum the BLs of the lifters) than it is like telling a robot (or using a forklift or jack) to lift something. If it was like a robot arm, and just moved around without regard for the movement of the limb inside, that would be bad, for obvious reasons.

Why do you see that the force exerted on the user has to be so high? That is the things I do not see.

I think you are missing the point of how feedback in a exoskeleton type thing works. There are sensors that feel what direction you are pushing in and then tells the motors to mimic that move. Thus in effect you are indeed telling the robot to move the arm as you do, but as you stop moving the robot stops moving so there are no crushed limbs (unless there is a bug of course).

Why do you think that the robot would be deliberately programmed to continue moving even when it feels the user stops movement as you seem to imply with your crushed limbs comment?

There likely needs to be a proportional feedback to the user/power use by the exoskeleton based on used power so they can "feel the weight" of objects, but the scaling of that feedback does not have to be the same for all users, it could easily be something you program as part of the fitting routine. Current technology already allows scaling force within a range fairly easily, thus for the ST 8 person the feedback could simulate lifting 5lb object at highest end and for a ST 15 person it could simulate a 20 lb object.

[Flyndaran]

Isn't the real reason just, because most gamers don't want to add squares then square root the result to get proper additive quadratic strengths?