New Inventions: first steps towards an early TL11 bioplastic nanomorph?

[vicky_molokh]

Greetings, all!

After some rather weird incident in the campaign*, described by witnesses as 'very very early attempt at a T-1000', I have to wonder: just how close is the ability to build a TL11 Bioplastic Nanomorph (UT111) in Transhuman Space, and how much of the possibility is likely to be bluff/hype?

Some thoughts I already have:

• Transhuman Space is surely too green to get TL12 living metal.
• THS has (TL10) polykeratin (TS117), which is the most likely candidate for the soft morphing tissue. Yes, T-1000's will be heavily based on a technology [in]famous for its sexual application. Progress is like that!
• The more hard, yet modular and versatile sort of tissue is likely to be an extension of swarmbot technology (TS168). A single swarm with proper specialisation can achieve ST3 and mass 1lb. It'll take something like 25 such swarms to achieve an effective ST15 in their specialisation. Let's double that to 50 swarms, maybe even triple, to account for universalisation and other factors. Swarmish 'modular skeleton' units will have to be enveloped in polykeratin, and extend connectors when appropriate.
• Nanomorphs are bioconverter-fed. Luckily, THS already supports this power system for its micro- and nanoswarms (TS169).
• The AI. Nanomorphs require a distributed intelligence system. That's . . . actually hard. But not impossible. There are two approaches to a distributed intelligence systems: analogue gestalts (Rat King, DB114) and Gestalt Cyberswarms (DB136). The former seems to not be an option. The latter pretty much limits the morph to being a NAI-4/IQ8 or (if having 100lbs dedicated to its swarmbase) NAI-5/IQ9. Seems like making it a LAI is not an option as of 2100; not sure about 2103.
• Even assuming some part of the swarmbase is dedicated to Repair units (TS170), it seems like Transhuman Space will have to ditch the full-scale Regeneration from the nanomorph template, and have to contend with doing repairs relatively slowly.
• Judging by components involved, this thing would cost a lot. The TL11 $50,000 price tag is definitely from a different era.

Thoughts? Anything I missed?

Thanks in advance!

* == At this point, I guess I should characterise the campaign as 'Weirdness Magnet in THS Hard-Sci-ness', i.e. stuff that stops just one inch away from the edge of possibility of the setting, and definitely beyond the general educated public expectations.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Even assuming some part of the swarmbase is dedicated to Repair units (TS170), it seems like Transhuman Space will have to ditch the full-scale Regeneration from the nanomorph template, and have to contend with doing repairs relatively slowly.

One of my fellow players wants to be an amnesiac with implanted nanobots that gives him Regeneration useful on a combat time scale. I've told him that this appears to be far beyond the technological assumptions in THS and, indeed, probably closer to magic than any realistic biotech.

What would be the practical maximum Regeneration possible in THS, assuming a powerful transnational using an African brush war to field-test illegal experimental soldiers with TL11 nanotech?

Assuming that the nanotech comes with a range of Disadvantages and Limitations, both to represent being experimental and to avoid breaking physical laws such as Conservation of Energy?

The player is fine with massive energy requirements, in the form of constant eating of high-calorie foodstuffs. We might, or might not, be able to talk him into other Disadvantages and Limitations.

Can THS have any such trait? If so, how should be stat it?

[johndallman]

Well, we canonically have nanosymbionts that give Regeneration (Slow; Radiation only -60%) [4] in Changing Times, p66. I wouldn't blink at a new, expensive and unreliable nanosymbiont that gave Regeneration (Slow) [10], but that isn't what your player wants.

"Usable on a combat timescale" sounds like Regeneration (Very Fast) [100], for 1 HP/second. I'm pretty sure you can't do that within THS assumptions, simply because the waste heat will cook you alive, ignoring any other problems.

I could just about believe Regeneration (Regular) [25], giving you 1HP/hour, which is still wonderful for recovering from fights rapidly. However, you'd need vastly increased consumption to power and supply it, and you'd have some kind of reversed Temperature Tolerance while it was running. Since these are biological nanomachines, they aren't especially vulnerable to radiation or EMP the way electronic ones would be, but if someone targets them with the right nanovirus, you could just die, rapidly and messily.

[Flyndaran]

Heat dissipation and energy costs are the main handicaps to even the best physically possible healing. That will help tiny creatures a little through the square cube law, but really hamper more human sized bio/techno robots.
Even 1 HP/hour means going from a mulched but intact arm to perfectly uninjured in 1/4 of a single day. That doesn't really seem possible. But THS is not metal-hard science fiction, so it would still pass muster for nearly all gamers.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Icelander

What would be the practical maximum Regeneration possible in THS, assuming a powerful transnational using an African brush war to field-test illegal experimental soldiers with TL11 nanotech?

A lot of this depends on what you're regenerating.

There are two basic ways you can regenerate. Either you can build new tissue from scratch, or you can have durable small components held together by weak connectors which simply reconnect after being pulled apart.

The first method tends to be slow -- it will, at a minimum, take about the same amount of time to regenerate a limb as it would take to grow a new limb in a biofac, and you'd probably need machinery as big as the biofac to do it in the same amount of time.

The second method is potentially quite fast, but won't work for anything much resembling human tissue -- it's basically a bunch of swarmbots that know how to link up to one another to form a larger object, and when you bash the larger objects the swarmbots fly apart, but as long as the bots themselves aren't damaged they can just crawl back together again and rejoin. I would note that the existing rules for fighting cyberswarms are more about playability than about realism, they could plausibly be much much tougher than they are.

[Flyndaran]

Metal/bio/Lego morph?
I suppose one could also hedge one's bets with one of the first two coupled with the third. It can "heal" in the classical way but it's MUCH faster to use prefabricated micro/mini interchangeable "bits".
Of course everyone knows T-1000. But does anyone else remember Virtuosity, the 1995 movie that had a regenerating A.I. android that used glass to repair itself? Oh wow; it made 25 mil in box office compared to its 30 mil budget.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Metal/bio/Lego morph?
I suppose one could also hedge one's bets with one of the first two coupled with the third. It can "heal" in the classical way but it's MUCH faster to use prefabricated micro/mini interchangeable "bits".

This would probably result in some sort of lossy regeneration -- it regenerates some fraction of damage, but not all.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Anthony

This would probably result in some sort of lossy regeneration -- it regenerates some fraction of damage, but not all.

How so? I'm saying that it's merely an ability added to one capable of self-healing. Like giving stem cells to an injured human to help healing/regrowth, regrowth in Gurps terms which medically I think would be called regeneration.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

How so?

Because some damage will be reparable (links between two interchangeable bits are broken), whereas others will require additional supplies (individual bits are broken, forcing replacing them with new bits). As long as the construct as surplus capacity it can make up for lost bits by stealing bits from where they're currently not needed, but eventually you run out.

[Flyndaran]

So exactly like everything that heals? I kind of assumed our THS hypothetical robots weren't violating conservation of mass/energy.