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Old 03-17-2013, 07:55 AM   #1
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Some notes on Lensman for 4e

I think I managed to build a pretty good Space Axe last night using the rules from Martial arts/Low Tech/LT Companion 2.

First take a Round Mace, though your mace head is probably cylindrical rather than literally round. Note the stats for using this as a 2-handed weapon from LTC2. the important one is Damage = Swing + 3.

Then you give it the "Heavy Blunt" quality and raise the weight from 5 to 10 lbs with damage going to up to +4 and Min ST to 13. This is the "bludgeon" component of the Space Axe.

Then add an Axe blade, +1 lb. There is some confusion in the sources about damage but I think it's same as Crush because our Mace has no flanges.

Then you make the whole thing Superfine with the TL9 metallurgy (heavy alloys only) of the Lensman setting. For all I know it's made out of "carballoy" like Klono's claws. This gives you damage of Swing +6 (2).

Then you start adding in the "lumberrman's picaroon" elements. Said implement is like a sharper, shorter boat hook and we're going to add a pick point and a thrusting spike.

We'll use the rules for armor piercing weapons from LTC2 to produce a base damage of Swing +2 (2) and a Superfine damage of Swing +4(3). The thrusting point is treated similarly and ends up at Thrust +2(3).

Our weight ends up at 12 lbs which sadly is till 3 lbs short of the canonical 15lbs. I'm prepared to live with it becasue our Min ST is now 14 (2-handed) and that's around my SOD for Terran Space Marines. ST for 1-handed use is 16 and damage is 1 lower.

Assuming that Space Armor is the TL9 item from UT of that name (and I beleive it to be very close) our primary target is probably the DR30 faceplate. ST14 is 2D Swing + 4 is an average of 11 and with the (3) you can indeed put a Space Axe through a Boskonians's faceplate. A victory for Civilisation.

You could arbitraily add 3 lbs, perhaps in the form of the all metal haft but this only raises Min ST (to 16 and 19 for 1h)without improving damage.

Other observations will be forthcoming as time permits.
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Old 03-19-2013, 02:31 PM   #2
tratclif
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Chillicothe, OH
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Thanks for doing the work, very nice.
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Old 03-20-2013, 11:03 AM   #3
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by tratclif View Post
Thanks for doing the work, very nice.
Thank you. I'm glad _somebody_ is reading this. I'm not really as OCD some people around here but Space Axes have been gnawing at my brain since I was 12.

I'm going to change up with some brief notes about a timeline.

Approxinate dates are given for the Atlantis and Rome sections of Triplanetary and the to stories directly about Ralph K. Kinnison have firmer dates.

However the story of the Third Phase of the Wiorld War given only an approximate date "19--?". From evidence in the frst two stories though I can tell you that I beleive it is before 1986. In the story "1918" it says plainly that Ralph K. Kinnison lived to be 96. Then in "1941" it can be worked out that his birth year was 1890 (same as Doc's).

The 3e version of Lensman picked 1962 and the Cuban Missile Crisis as the date for the Third Phase. While evocative it does not stand up well when compared with a Kinnison generational calender or gneral technology as seen in "19--?".

Ralph K. Kinnison was born in 1890 and got married in 1915 after getting both a basic (5 year) Engineering degree plus a Masters (again same as Doc). His son Frank was born no soomer than 1916. At the time of Pearl Harbor, Frank was a design engineer at Lockheed and a Kinnison at the Skunk Works could explain much about divergent aerospace technology after that date.

By the typical Kinnison schedule Frankl would have been 25 and newly married at best.

In "19--?" Theodore K.Kinnison (presumably the eldest son of Frank) has a wife and two small children, the oldest said to be a 4 year-old boy. The wife and kids head to Idaho and safety with "Grand-dad Kinnison". This is presumed to be Ralph and is where we get out "pre-1986" date.

Ted Kinnison has some relatively important job as an engineer and is definetly not still working on his degrees. He's also had Air(Aerospace?) National Guard training and is very unlikley to be much less than 30. So it'd set the date of this story as c.1972. If Frank Kinnison and wife had a girl first it could be 1975.
If you want to make Frank "Grand-dad Kinnison" you've got to squeeze in another whole generation of Kinnisons before 1999 and it's just a barely possible.

At any rate, 1962 is just too early. Theodore K. would have to have been born in 1932 when Fran was 16 and Kinnisons just don't behave that way.

So the date of "19--?" is either in the early 70s (but not sooner) or right up against 1999 (but not in the generational span between that date and the early 70s).

The 4 Jovian Wars that occur off-screen between "19--?" and the beginning of Triplanetary begin no sooner than 2 centuries after "19--?". Those presumably took up most or all of a century which sets Triplanetary at c. 2300 if not later. There could easily be a whole nother century in there.

First Lensman is probably at least 10 years after Triplanetary but probably not too myc more than that. Costigan hasn't even begun to slow down.

After that dates get even thinner but there is one mention of the timeline of loose atomic vortices in Masters of the Vortex that sets that book c. 1000 years after First Lensman.

Masters of the Vortex is fairly definitely after Second Stage Lensman and most chronologies seem to put it between that book and Children of the Lens but nothing I know can actually prove that Masters did not occur after Children.

The amount of time spanned from Galactic Patrol to Childrn of the Lens is farly obvious but I can't really give hard dates.
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Old 03-20-2013, 11:33 AM   #4
SCAR
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Yorkshire, UK
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
I think I managed to build a pretty good Space Axe last night using the rules from Martial arts/Low Tech/LT Companion 2.
...
I haven't really had a chance to look at the various weapon customisation rules before, but some of the options you list look to be of interest. I

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Thank you. I'm glad _somebody_ is reading this. I'm not really as OCD some people around here but Space Axes have been gnawing at my brain since I was 12.
I've been trying to create a good Vibro-Axe for my own version of Space Marines for a few years, because the image of Space Marines with Axes is just so cool, and Vibro- seemed to be the best way to get something even vaguely sensible compared to even TL9 Guns/Beams.

You've inspired me to take a look at the LT weapon options, although it might be a while before I can get much time to think through them.
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Old 03-25-2013, 12:37 PM   #5
MrTim
 
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Albuquerque, NM
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Masters of the Vortex is fairly definitely after Second Stage Lensman and most chronologies seem to put it between that book and Children of the Lens but nothing I know can actually prove that Masters did not occur after Children.
It's been quite a while since I've read the books, but isn't there a reference to the vortex beings in Children that implies it takes place after Masters?
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Old 03-25-2013, 01:14 PM   #6
David Johnston2
 
Join Date: Dec 2007
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by MrTim View Post
It's been quite a while since I've read the books, but isn't there a reference to the vortex beings in Children that implies it takes place after Masters?
Yes there was.
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Old 03-25-2013, 07:50 PM   #7
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by MrTim View Post
It's been quite a while since I've read the books, but isn't there a reference to the vortex beings in Children that implies it takes place after Masters?
Can you give me a clue where?
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Old 03-26-2013, 12:22 AM   #8
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
The amount of time spanned from Galactic Patrol to Childrn of the Lens is farly obvious but I can't really give hard dates.
The academy takes five years. Kim graduated at 23 at the start of GP; Kit graduated at 23 at the start of CotL. That makes Kim at least 46. But you have to allow a number of years in between. Quite a lot happens, so I'm going to say no less than five and possibly ten. Say that Kim is 53, then, and you have a neat 30 years.

Bill Stoddard
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Old 03-26-2013, 12:25 AM   #9
whswhs
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

One of my pet ideas for a campaign was to cross the Lensman world over with the Cthulhu Mythos. The Overlords turn out to be, not simple Boskonians, but a tentacle of the Elder Gods bringing cosmic horror into the setting. You can either do a straight continuation where it turns out that there is a cosmic third force for the Kinnison kids to deal with, or an AU where the Boskone/Elder Gods alliance breaks up and one side needs to ally with Civilization. Or even a three-cornered struggle like LotR.

Bill Stoddard
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Old 03-26-2013, 08:20 AM   #10
Fred Brackin
 
Join Date: Aug 2007
Default Re: Some notes on Lensman for 4e

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Can you give me a clue where?
I just scanned thorugh the first chapter of Children and while Kit does talk about detecting a burst of thought from an unknown entity on a very high band where almsot no one thinks that turned out to be a Plooran and not a Cahuitan.

There might be soem emntion of Cahuitans by name elsewhere but it would probably have to have snuck in during a revision.

The end of Masters was written after Children. The first 3 arcs of Masters were written and published as short stories before Children but the finale wasn't done until well after.
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