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Old 03-26-2013, 06:07 PM   #11
MrTim
 
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

I couldn't tell you where in the book it is, but I could swear I remember a reference to beings existing inside atomic vortices at some point in the book. Sorry I can't be more help.
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Old 03-29-2013, 09:46 AM   #12
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Still working my way through Children amidst distractions.

I did find a cleer-cut internal dating reference. Kathryn Kinnison compares the summer form of an encountered Plooran to a Dhilian.

Dhilians were unknown to Civilization beofre they were discoved in the short story "The Vortex Blaster Goes to War". This was wirtten before Children and then later incorporated into Masters of the Vortex.

So Children does come after Masters.

I have found multiple references to loose atomic vortices but nothing to creatures living in them yet.

I have also found multiple refernces to 20 years passing, presumably since the end of Second Stage Lensman. I seem to recall but have not yet found a reference to Kit graduating in less than 5 years. It may even have been just one year to pick up the physical skills of a Lensman. He wrestled with (and defeated) Valerians somewhere.

If Kit was 19-20 and the two pairs of twins coming after him at one year intervals it would make a certain internal sense. It would be a minimum time anyway.
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Old 03-29-2013, 07:35 PM   #13
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

A brief note on martial arts in Lensman.

There's no Asian mysticism and indeed no pariculr Asian tradions but there's lots of brutal practicality.

For example, in Triplanetary one of Roger's men attempts a coup de savate (Doc's words) to Conway Costigan's head. costigan replies with a Judo Parry going to what looks like a Leg Grapple/Takedown/Stamp Kick combination.

Looks pretty durn modern to me.

In Children we see that Lensman hand-to-hand includes both Back Kick and Targeted Attack:Karate Punch/Skull, possilby intended specifically for times when users are wearing armored gauntlets.

So I believe you may consider the non-cinematic areas of martial arts fully developed for humans. You needn't do any sort of "dumbing down" because it was written in the 30s.

Velantian martial arts will _look_ utterly cinematic being full of Flying techniques.

That's the unarmed martial arts of course. Space Axe is a highly offensive art ful to TAs for the Face, Skull and Armor Chinks/Torso. Valerian forms include Axe Throwing during leaping Move and Attacks among other fun stuff. Valerians obviously put _lots_ of points into Space Axe.
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Old 04-01-2013, 11:59 AM   #14
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Let's try some more general comments on weapons now.

The earleist (internal chronology) non-obvious weapons in the series are in the Atlantis section of Triplanetary.. It's an odd mix. Captain Phyrges has some Atlantean Secret Service mini-air pistols with poisioned needles. Not quite in UT for 4e but I found a very close match in UT2 for 3e.

He also has a comapct blaster but it is not described except for fitting in a tail coat pocket (which probably makes it deringer sized and it flames when used.

Also used are rifles of apparently conventioal type and autocannons. The nuclear missiles seem to have been built few but for maximum payload rather than a paradigm of many lighter missiles. They are also heavily armored.

In the 19--? section there seem to be the numbers of nukes we expect. Possibly just a comparison to the sizes of bomber waves in WWII. The imnterceptor missiles launched by the atomic rockets such as the one Theodire K. Kinnison rides in have 50G accelerations and are actively guided from their mother ship though they do seem to have their own radar.

In Triplanetary itself the usual mix of personal weapons seems to be a blaster and a "heavy automatic pistol". By inference from a scene where Lyman Cleveland is taking inventory this is the Lewiston MK 12.

The auto pistol appears to be very like a Colt M1911 .45 ACP except that Costigan's gun is loaed with special ammo that explodes like artillery shells. I would assume this to be aty least equal to a 75mm howitzer round (though without the frag).

Gharlane of Eddore also attempts to use a similar weapon to volatilize Nils Bergstron in First Lensman. Exactly how the Arisian negates this weapon's function is not described.

There's a heavy sutomatic pistol used in First Lensman that seems Colt .45 aCP-like. Samms (while infiltrating some zwilnicks) threatens to use his to put a "half-ounce" of lead in some zwilnick's brains if they don't do what he says.

A literal half-ounce would be either 240 or 218.75 grains depending on if your ounce it troy or avoirdupois. I have reason to believe from discusions about old shotgun loads that troy was traditionally used for lead in firearms. Either figure is quite close to the .45 ACP's traditional load of 230 grain bullets.

The other autopistol in First Lensman is explicitly the Lewiston MK 5 and just when we decide it's .45 like it runs out to be a selective fire machine pistol with a variable burst length selector. This capability is only used to shoot Herkimer Herkimer III as thoroughly as he deserves though. Previous heavy automatic pistols might or might not be as adavnced as the MK5.

The blaster pistol in First Lensman is not obviously different from the MK 12 in Triplanetary though it is identified as the MK 17. Given the tech shift to ultrawave in the alst half of Triplanaetery we may assume that the MK 17 is like the MK 12 except in being redesigned to use ultrawave frequencies. This would mean that previous models of shields would be ineffective.

Technically ultrawave would be an FTL weapon as seen on UT p.133 but at least for eprsonal weapons the halving of range penalties does not make much sense.

The reason for carrying both the blaster and the auto-pistol is seen in the ballroom assasination scene of First Lensman. The Lensman are armed only with MK 17s but when alerted to the planned assasiantion they need to go out to Rod Kinnison's car to get MK 5s to avoid causing mass slaughter.

So there is something about the MK 17 (and presuambly the MK 12) that makes it unsuitable for areas where hostiles and friendlies are mixed.

The first possibility is in the ROF. These blasters and most other energy weapons in Lensman are continuous beam. This woudl be reflected as ROF 10! or so which means no siingle shot capacity. This would have at least some of the desired effect. You couldn't fire without concern for what was downrange to be hit by your alsmot inevitable misses.

Another posibility is that Lweiston blasters are area effect/cone weapons. Perhaps with a 1 hex area like some of the weapons in UT (Screamers, Nerve Pistols, etc). This also would not make them precision implements. I know that Powers doesn't allow mixing of Cone and Rapid Fire but some weaposn in UT already do that.

A third possibility is that Lewistons are not Variable in Powers terms. This would mean that they can not have their damage reduced.

Lastly, overpentration might be a severe issue, especially when combined with one or more of the previous options. I think all might be appropriate.

Note that damage is relativley high by gunpowder weapon standards. If adapting weapons from UT I would flip the Superscience switch from David Pulver's Blaster and Laser design article from Pyramid #37 and double base damage. Exact;ly what the armor divisor should be is uncertain.

Then there is the Nevian P-ray, a fairly standard space opera paralysis gun. Seen late rin First Lensman only and highly illegal. This by iteself is odd as weapons in general except for things like V-2 gas) seem very lightly regulated. I don't remember ever seeing a zwilnick busted on a weapons charge.

Lastly from Tripalanetary there is the Standish. A 25-30mm cannon in an over/under cofiguration with a Lewiston-like energy weapon. We're a little short on description generally but this energy weapon has opaque lenses.

Fast-forwarding to the Galactic Patrol era and the auto-pistols have disappeared The standard energy weapon is the Delameter in the form of the MK 27 for most of this part of the series but the MK 28 has become Patrol standard in Masters. At a guess the MK change results from the propagation of Medonian superconductors through general technology.The MK 28 is probaly much like the MK 27 but perhaps lighter.

The Delameter defintely has none fo the proposed shortcomings of the Lewsiton. It is selective fire, tight beam (thuogh this seems adjustable) and variable in output. The Delameter can even be used to weld.

The Delameter also seems to have apertures rather than lenses.

We have just a few benchmarks for Delameters and their semiportable cousins. A second tight-beam burst from a Delameter will make a hole one inwide and a foot deep. This is one reason to set base damage to 8-10D. a one inch wide hole in a man is certainly no harder than one in stone. The foot deep part is not a problem is you can get all your shots in the same hole.

In Children we see that a pair of semi-portable energy weapons together can make a hole a man in space armor can walk though in just a few seconds through an inch and a half thick steel wall. Faster at least than anyone who notices the wall getting hot can repsoitition his own weapons anyway.

Also in Masters there is a scene whene Delameters and possibly even heavier weapons take measurable time to cut through a steel vault door.

Juggling DR and HP from p.558 of Campaigns along with damage, ROF and armor divisor I get something like 24D(3) ROF10! for a semi-portable of this period. The Delameter would also do alright with a (3) divisor. Triplanetary-era weapons could be given a (2). That's a lower divisor than I expected but even melting your way through a steel wall is fairly astounding.

The "machine-rifles" seen throughtout the series will be at least equivalent to a .50 BMG. The space armor in Triplanetary is expticily said to be proof agaisnt rifles. They are water-cooled because you can't use air-cooled guns in vacuum though the cooling system must be more advnaced than the simple ssytem used in WWI.

The reasons even Valerians don't use rifles in .50 BMG probably have to do with the bulk of this cooling system and recoil problems.

As a single odd note, just once in Children a Boskonian uses a "bullet projector". I would predume this to be a weapon that propels bullets with something like a minature pressor beam. Weapons simlar to this are used in mid-to-late Skylark but do not otherwise appear in Lensman.

Ship-mounted guns in both Tripalnetary/First Lensman and the GP era are like enormous semi-portables until we get to the primary beams. These are regular energy projectors boosted to levels where major components burn out in a fraction of a second regardless of any reinforcement.

The components that will burn out are grouped together into an ejectable/replaceable module that is treated much like a gunpowder using gun's cartridge.

While very powerful explosives are available throughout the series such as Duodec these do not seem to have the detonation velocity to harm inertialess targets. This changes in Children where they have "super-attomic" (total convserion) bombs that will destroy "Free" spaceships.

Negaspheres, mobiler planets and even sunbeams seem fairly staightforward (if of starkly astounding magnitude)to me.

Lastly we have hyper-planets. While the conversion of Nth Dimesion physics where inert velcities of 15c are possible to universes of regular physics by our standards may be complcated engough to require direct Arisian supervision, the end state seems simple.

You go from a state where KE = M x 15c to one where KE equals 225M x c. Of course this is going to e a rather large number.

If there's anything i've left out or inadequately discussed, expansion is available on request.
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Old 04-01-2013, 04:12 PM   #15
dcarson
 
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Stats for Kinnison's ring that makes anyone he wants just die in fairly large area probably aren't needed but would be interesting to stat up.
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Old 04-01-2013, 05:40 PM   #16
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
You go from a state where KE = M x 15c to one where KE equals 225M x c. Of course this is going to e a rather large number.
AS I was shutting down the computer this afternoon I thought about how I'd left out a "squared for "c" both times. Missed that even though I corrected a lot of typos.

The Worsel-Throndyke molecular disruptor is actually quite dficult to stat as it simply kills _anyone_ who isn't shielded from its' radiations.

An Innate Attack with the toxic class and enough dice would be very large because creatyures with larger than human bodies but less than human minds have many, many HP. A lethal Affliction wpuld; be resistable and so forth.

Analagous problems show up when you try the psi and need to deal with "bolts of mental force calculated to slay any living thing".
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Old 04-01-2013, 10:00 PM   #17
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Analagous problems show up when you try the psi and need to deal with "bolts of mental force calculated to slay any living thing".
As I recall, Smith had occasion to write achieved, calculated quantities as "point zero zero zero" or "point nil nil nil". It we treat that as meaning within the rounding error of 1.000 for affirmitive statements, we just have to reduce the probability of survival for the toughest expected living creature to 1/2000, which is simply if not easily done by making them roll consecutive 3's or 4's to resist.
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Old 04-02-2013, 12:00 PM   #18
Fred Brackin
 
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Originally Posted by jeff_wilson View Post
As I recall, Smith had occasion to write achieved, calculated quantities as "point zero zero zero" or "point nil nil nil". It we treat that as meaning within the rounding error of 1.000 for affirmitive statements, we just have to reduce the probability of survival for the toughest expected living creature to 1/2000, which is simply if not easily done by making them roll consecutive 3's or 4's to resist.
I see no way to reduice survival below the odds or rolling a 3 out of 3D6.

An option fro rationalizing mental combat under soem assumptions that occurred to me was to have separate Mental HP,


Probabkly based on IQ. Will is undoubtedly important but it's the Mental analoguie to HT. Per would map to Dex and IQ would be the Mental analogue to Size/ST and the source of Mental HP.

If you do it all off of Will then most organisms will be the same "size" mentally.
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Old 04-02-2013, 12:40 PM   #19
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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I see no way to reduice survival below the odds or rolling a 3 out of 3D6.
.
Of course there's a way. Do enough cosmic damage with one shot that takes the subject below -5x HT instantly. Although it's the kind of thing that I would be perfectly content to leave out of a gameable adaptation of the source material.
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Old 04-02-2013, 03:12 PM   #20
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Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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I see no way to reduice survival below the odds or rolling a 3 out of 3D6.
You make an ability that does multiple zaps per attack, sort of like at the climax of the last Harry Potter movie where sweet Mrs Weasley hits Bellatrix Lestrange with a curse that simultaneously paralyzes, crushes, stretches, and disintegrates.
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