actually I would jump at the chance to be apart of the ship design... visual mapping and capabilities...
That which is not dead can eternal lie and with strange eons even death may die
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
of the basic hull designs in traveller, I like the saucer the best. It just sounds like a shitload of fun to fly into atmo in a huge chrome saucer blasting away with a dozen bay mounted particle beams. woot!Thael wrote:actually I would jump at the chance to be apart of the ship design... visual mapping and capabilities...
Do you guys want marines at your disposal? Obligatory 'red shirts'? due to the long range nature of the mission at the very least a security force should be present.
Here's what I think. In starforge, you guys had a frozen army standing by because your mission was to secure a planet for earth to colonize. In gurpforge, the mission is even more open ended. Make contact, find out who called for help, and help them. Again, a frozen army sounds like a reasonable proposition. The game system more than provides for the necessary tech to keep a large number of people safe and sound while they sleep. They would not need to sit around getting bored and in the way.
As mentioned, the GF has been at peace for some time now. Ships security forces would be available, and somebody trustworthy (probably the riker character) would be in 'charge' of them. In addition, ground forces and boarding parties might be needed. These would probably come from a member race of the GF that retained their warlike practices through peacetime. They should all be of the same race (which could be human, I don't care) and come from a basic template. They might even be TL9 to make them a little more gritty and dirty then the rest of you. I'm thinking in terms of powersuit infantry carrying heavy gauss machine guns, with some nearside grav tank support. Your security team will be better for away missions then a military escort. The "Gropos" are useful for occupying cities and wiping out enemies. Not for providing security to diplomatic or exploratory missions. Of course, if you want Gropos you need to buy them gear. That could get expensive depending on what you buy. It's really up to you, but the statline for grunts is essentially free, aside from the need to store them.
If you'd rather have robots, then you can buy them with your mission budget. By and large, with living beings you only have to feed and house them, either in stasis tubes of some sort or in barracks and quarters.
Here's what I think. In starforge, you guys had a frozen army standing by because your mission was to secure a planet for earth to colonize. In gurpforge, the mission is even more open ended. Make contact, find out who called for help, and help them. Again, a frozen army sounds like a reasonable proposition. The game system more than provides for the necessary tech to keep a large number of people safe and sound while they sleep. They would not need to sit around getting bored and in the way.
As mentioned, the GF has been at peace for some time now. Ships security forces would be available, and somebody trustworthy (probably the riker character) would be in 'charge' of them. In addition, ground forces and boarding parties might be needed. These would probably come from a member race of the GF that retained their warlike practices through peacetime. They should all be of the same race (which could be human, I don't care) and come from a basic template. They might even be TL9 to make them a little more gritty and dirty then the rest of you. I'm thinking in terms of powersuit infantry carrying heavy gauss machine guns, with some nearside grav tank support. Your security team will be better for away missions then a military escort. The "Gropos" are useful for occupying cities and wiping out enemies. Not for providing security to diplomatic or exploratory missions. Of course, if you want Gropos you need to buy them gear. That could get expensive depending on what you buy. It's really up to you, but the statline for grunts is essentially free, aside from the need to store them.
If you'd rather have robots, then you can buy them with your mission budget. By and large, with living beings you only have to feed and house them, either in stasis tubes of some sort or in barracks and quarters.
the Spartan mod (TL10) is a pretty low cost template (96k, 49pts) and since we are putting them in cold storage most of the time we could take the Spartan Bioroid option making each only cost 51k for a 21pt template since the biggest negative is short lifespan
a slightly more effective and of course more costly option would be the Chronos mod (TL10 59pts 144k)...
and no these are not based on any bounty hunters or led by Commander Cody
a slightly more effective and of course more costly option would be the Chronos mod (TL10 59pts 144k)...
again a cheaper option does exist the Chimera (44pts 129k) and Bioroid (24pts and 109k) again these use short lifespan as the major negative but with cold storage who cares... they are basically organic battle botsA race of Chronos parahumans could be intended as slave soldiers or hostil-world colonists.
and no these are not based on any bounty hunters or led by Commander Cody
That which is not dead can eternal lie and with strange eons even death may die
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
well like I said they would be essentially organic robots... the bioroid description plainly says that it is a pure fabrication of genetic material that is modified based on purpose... it is basically achieved by introducing outside genetic material that has the desired trait.... kinda like making a machine with stock chasis that you add the right parts (engine with supercharger, or little 4 cylinder) to get the right product... just using organic material instead of inorganic.... and at this tech level there is little difference since even inorganic materal can "self-heal" with dedicated nanites...
that aside there are some great profession templates in the traveller book as well that make it easier to be more well-rounded... and since templates are just groupings of options (no discounts) then you can customize to suit your needs/desires... real easy... I bring these up because we could add the 130pt soldier to the "red shirts/brute squad" so we know what they can do without have to put in any effort in building them... ready made "defense" force
that aside there are some great profession templates in the traveller book as well that make it easier to be more well-rounded... and since templates are just groupings of options (no discounts) then you can customize to suit your needs/desires... real easy... I bring these up because we could add the 130pt soldier to the "red shirts/brute squad" so we know what they can do without have to put in any effort in building them... ready made "defense" force
That which is not dead can eternal lie and with strange eons even death may die
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
I'm not sure if this fits...I think keep the biotech stuff mostly for player characters. If you want to buy biorobots, you can do that I guess, but I think hardware is cheaper than wetware. Robots, I believe, have a flat pricetag. I haven't yet given you a pool of character points for an army. I guess we can explore this some if you'd like, but I think you're building shadow corps, and you aren't meant to.
the GF doesn't need to have kept an army of biologic deathbots in cold storage, just one of the member races needs to be able to do so.
If you guys are comfortable with having supersoldiers at your disposal, then I'll think about allowing it. But that was a big, big problem in starforge, was having SC on call at all times.
also, the numbers you're looking at thael, $100k+, seem like quite a bit actually. 100 of those is 10M, that takes a decent chunk out of your shipbuilding budget, throw on top of that another 250k each for stasis tubes, battlesuits, weapons and ammo, also need a drop pod system to launch a bunch of them at once without dropping your shields. You may be spending up to a tenth of your budget on these guys.
Actually, I can see volunteers coming forward to get the spartan mod, knowing the importance of the mission. That might be a bit of a stretch (yoga gaming) but it eliminates the ethical dilemma.
Robots are a lot more ethically cleaner, but what you're proposing is pretty cool.
Think about it guys, let me know what you come up with.
the GF doesn't need to have kept an army of biologic deathbots in cold storage, just one of the member races needs to be able to do so.
If you guys are comfortable with having supersoldiers at your disposal, then I'll think about allowing it. But that was a big, big problem in starforge, was having SC on call at all times.
also, the numbers you're looking at thael, $100k+, seem like quite a bit actually. 100 of those is 10M, that takes a decent chunk out of your shipbuilding budget, throw on top of that another 250k each for stasis tubes, battlesuits, weapons and ammo, also need a drop pod system to launch a bunch of them at once without dropping your shields. You may be spending up to a tenth of your budget on these guys.
Actually, I can see volunteers coming forward to get the spartan mod, knowing the importance of the mission. That might be a bit of a stretch (yoga gaming) but it eliminates the ethical dilemma.
Robots are a lot more ethically cleaner, but what you're proposing is pretty cool.
Think about it guys, let me know what you come up with.
I was only thinking a squads worth (20ish).. a readymade internal defense squad or some extra muscle when exploring planet side... not a full on army... and robots are not much different in a tech level that has free willed and aware AIs
the spartan mod was more in line of what I was wanting but threw the uber out for variety... and the solder template is just skills... like what I am using to help build my pilot... I am using the bridgecrew and tweaking it to suit... granted there is likely a lower cost skill set that could be used but it was the one I found... that or make up a new template... should be easy with the generator program...
so the question I have now is what are you allowing for building them... how many points if any... Really we could just buy chipsets with the build we want and do it that way but then it is a money issue... if we are at 250 and using bio in tubes (volunteer or built) say 50-100 pts total for their template and skills...
and I am going to have to look deeper into programming and chipped skills to find out how to give the bots proficiency enough to be worth the cost or see if some are ready made...
the spartan mod was more in line of what I was wanting but threw the uber out for variety... and the solder template is just skills... like what I am using to help build my pilot... I am using the bridgecrew and tweaking it to suit... granted there is likely a lower cost skill set that could be used but it was the one I found... that or make up a new template... should be easy with the generator program...
so the question I have now is what are you allowing for building them... how many points if any... Really we could just buy chipsets with the build we want and do it that way but then it is a money issue... if we are at 250 and using bio in tubes (volunteer or built) say 50-100 pts total for their template and skills...
and I am going to have to look deeper into programming and chipped skills to find out how to give the bots proficiency enough to be worth the cost or see if some are ready made...
That which is not dead can eternal lie and with strange eons even death may die
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
My Color is Blue
I value Knowledge, logic, and deceit. I love to pursue wisdom but also to manipulate and deceive. At my best, I am brilliant and progressive. At my worst, I am treacherous and cold. My symbol is a water droplet. My enemies are green and red.
the ships security team is another group entirely, they should be just normal people, probably about 20 of them, and I'll allow 150 points each to build them. They are just a security team, intended to provide professional protection to the crew on away missions and to maintain discipline in crises on board. They are not commandos.
your mission includes the possibility of large scale military action, so a reasonable fighting force of battlesuits, tanks, and fighters is almost intuitively necessary. I think the volunteer spartans work for this, they are probably not what you want for security unless you're going into a warzone. They aren't going to bother with the whole 'friendly vs enemy' when encountering people. Their job would be to take ground and hold it to support either the wiping out of an openly hostile force or the rescue of an oppressed group. we did get asked to send help after all, and 20 redshirts is hardly 'help'. so between 100 and 200 units is probably reasonable. It's a decision that needs to be made early because it necessitates certain facilities within the ship.
your mission includes the possibility of large scale military action, so a reasonable fighting force of battlesuits, tanks, and fighters is almost intuitively necessary. I think the volunteer spartans work for this, they are probably not what you want for security unless you're going into a warzone. They aren't going to bother with the whole 'friendly vs enemy' when encountering people. Their job would be to take ground and hold it to support either the wiping out of an openly hostile force or the rescue of an oppressed group. we did get asked to send help after all, and 20 redshirts is hardly 'help'. so between 100 and 200 units is probably reasonable. It's a decision that needs to be made early because it necessitates certain facilities within the ship.
chris: RTFA
cheyne: possibly, but that is TL11/TL12 stuff, and really doesn't fit with the feel of the campaign. We might find something like that, but it'd be treasure instead of mission equipment.
If you guys don't want an army then that's fine by me. It requires a different kind of strategy to overcome a ground force that way.
You guys have a blank slate to build your mission equipment with, I suppose it would be nice of me to customize all of your encounters to your loadout. But I'm not always nice.
cheyne: possibly, but that is TL11/TL12 stuff, and really doesn't fit with the feel of the campaign. We might find something like that, but it'd be treasure instead of mission equipment.
If you guys don't want an army then that's fine by me. It requires a different kind of strategy to overcome a ground force that way.
You guys have a blank slate to build your mission equipment with, I suppose it would be nice of me to customize all of your encounters to your loadout. But I'm not always nice.