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Old 07-08-2020, 02:05 PM   #11
Apollonian
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
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Default Re: Infinity Unlimited Questions - Gear and Whatnot

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
It'd be funny instead of tragic if they developed World Jumper(Involuntary) instead of Alzheimer's.
Heck, have the side effect vary by timeline because Reasons. Infinity being responsible for the development of superpowers, psionics, or the return of magic on various timelines could be hilarious.
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Old 07-08-2020, 02:34 PM   #12
ericthered
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Default Re: Infinity Unlimited Questions - Gear and Whatnot

For messages, I usually have them be a pain to transfer back and forth, limited to a conveyor traversing between worlds. This is a core limitation of the base setting, and gives players an excuse not to call HQ everytime something goes off the rails.


I do have a number of message systems in place for the players though. I give infinity a number of parachronic satellites that go from world to world, letting teams on low-tech worlds give and receive messages. On worlds that would notice the radio-waves, you can usually send a message to a location with regular conveyor travel on the time-line. These methods give one to three day response times on messages.



I've got a set of houserules that lets conveyors send messages between worlds if the proper expensive gear is on the receiving world, but that tech set also includes narrow time-frames for jumps and the ability to block or triangulate an incoming jump-- and the message sending is based on the blocking technology.


For TL9 gear, I mostly just embrace that infinity is TL9. Players are allowed one or two cool pieces of gear from a nifty world.



I've never worried about conveyor trip prices unless you were renting the whole conveyor, in which case I use its value divided by 250 weeks (the time in which its expected to earn its keep), and possibly double that number for profit and time spent trying to find a renter. That's the price per week. If you're worried about the fare on an established route, its comparable to a taxi or train fare: its there, and it varies, but ultimately its not worth tracking.


I've never used Eraser in an infinity game.
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Old 07-09-2020, 08:20 AM   #13
MakDemonik
 
Join Date: Dec 2014
Default Re: Infinity Unlimited Questions - Gear and Whatnot

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
I do have a number of message systems in place for the players though. I give infinity a number of parachronic satellites that go from world to world, letting teams on low-tech worlds give and receive messages. On worlds that would notice the radio-waves, you can usually send a message to a location with regular conveyor travel on the time-line. These methods give one to three day response times on messages.
In that case I'm even harsher than that. I figured that since a whole division like Communication exists. There is a need for old school couriers. Where there are maybe 3 conveyor ports on the whole timeline and a message can travel weeks across a TL2 world where it is carried by foot or horseback. My players are basically on their own once in a new world. I suppose thought that satelites in a world where radiowaves cannot be detected are a logical conclusion.


Quote:
Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
For TL9 gear, I mostly just embrace that infinity is TL9. Players are allowed one or two cool pieces of gear from a nifty world.
I kind of agree and i really like empowering the players with cool tools and other gadgets. My main problem with the ISP however is mainly that it stands above all without question. My players just don't even look at gear anymore.
Why have a shotgun if a slug barely does a single die of damage more. Why use submachine guns when the ISP has a RoF of 10 and also hits harder. Why use armour piercing bullets when - because of the damage type reduction from pi to pi- - anything smaller than a full sized rifle deals less damage with the armor divisor than the ISP in basic damage. Why use any other pistol at all if every single stat is worse. Why even use the ICW (Infantry Combat Weapon), Infinity's other standard weapon, if after damage type adjustment, yhey deal the same damage, but the ISP can be hidden in a jacket. etc. Of course there is some gear that they use. Like frangible rounds for doors etc. but still most of the guns are non viable at all for them.


Quote:
Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
I've never worried about conveyor trip prices unless you were renting the whole conveyor, in which case I use its value divided by 250 weeks (the time in which its expected to earn its keep), and possibly double that number for profit and time spent trying to find a renter. That's the price per week. If you're worried about the fare on an established route, its comparable to a taxi or train fare: its there, and it varies, but ultimately its not worth tracking.
Hmm that is a nice suggestion. I'm usually not worried about the cost if its a mission. IU just transports them. But sometiems questions do come up, especially when the players are wondering, how expensive it would be to transport something from or to homeline.
One of the sillier examples I could name from my games was when the player were at a bathhouse in Johnson's Rome and additional towels were ridiculously pricy. When asked why I just quickly came up with the response.
"Well a Conveyor costs 50 million per ton of weight. A towel is about a pound. So transporting those Towels from Homeline would cost about $25 per towel if we assume that it makes about 1000 jumps before breaking down"
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Old 07-09-2020, 10:07 AM   #14
ericthered
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Default Re: Infinity Unlimited Questions - Gear and Whatnot

Quote:
I kind of agree and i really like empowering the players with cool tools and other gadgets. My main problem with the ISP however is mainly that it stands above all without question. My players just don't even look at gear anymore.
Why have a shotgun if a slug barely does a single die of damage more. Why use submachine guns when the ISP has a RoF of 10 and also hits harder. Why use armour piercing bullets when - because of the damage type reduction from pi to pi- - anything smaller than a full sized rifle deals less damage with the armor divisor than the ISP in basic damage. Why use any other pistol at all if every single stat is worse. Why even use the ICW (Infantry Combat Weapon), Infinity's other standard weapon, if after damage type adjustment, yhey deal the same damage, but the ISP can be hidden in a jacket. etc. Of course there is some gear that they use. Like frangible rounds for doors etc. but still most of the guns are non viable at all for them.
I looked at things closer. The stats are not a mistake, unless you consider the entire ETC rule to be a mistake, and some forumites do. It is competitive with UT weapons if you make the weapons ETC (The ISP is already ETC by default). See page 139 of ultratech. ETC does a bunch of things, but the most relevant to your concerns is increasing damage by x1.5. If you make UT weapons ETC, they're competitive with the ISP. Though I've just eyeballed the numbers for the most part.

I generally roll my eyes and say "Please No" when a player tries to use ETC. In my infinity games, if this is a place to be using out-time gear its usually also a place to be bringing body armor and heavy weapons.
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Last edited by ericthered; 07-09-2020 at 11:06 AM.
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