Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

[Nyrath]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

If it has not already been mentioned, there is lots of inspiration to be gleamed from Edison's Conquest of Mars by Garrett P. Serviss. It is available online here:

http://durendal.org:8080/ecom/

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Cool! I can use this. Thanks, Nyrath!

[Sweeper]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I'm rather surprised no one's mentioned the following sources of steampunk:

 

Girl Genius http://www.girlgeniusonline.com Very silly, but a fun read and a good source steamtech inspiration.

 

Space 1889 http://www.heliograph.com/space1889 One of the first Steampunk games that I know of before the term was coined.

 

Hope these help.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I'm rather surprised no one's mentioned the following sources of steampunk:

 

Girl Genius http://www.girlgeniusonline.com Very silly, but a fun read and a good source steamtech inspiration.

 

Space 1889 http://www.heliograph.com/space1889 One of the first Steampunk games that I know of before the term was coined.

 

Hope these help.

Good call on both, and both are favorites of mine.

 

I'm especially fond of the British Ironclads from Space 1899/ Sky Galleons of Mars.

 

But then again I have a minor obsession with the Hotchkiss Revolving Cannon

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I owe you rep, Sweeper. Hopefully, I can be the one to ascend you. Thanks.

[Sweeper]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Always glad to help.

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I haven't done much with this setting lately. Maybe I'll tinker with it some more this weekend.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I was contemplating the eternal the other day, when a movie quote drifted through my head...

 

"But then, in the midst of my preparation for hara-kiri, it came to me: it is possible to synthesize excited bromide in an argon matrix. Yes, its an excimer, frozen in its excited state." -Chris Knight, "Real Genius"

 

and the discussions on Cartridge Lasers over on another thread coughed up it's bit at me and suddenly my inner genre fiend went berserk.

 

Cartridge fired Laser cannons, complete with highly unstable "laser magazines" (cryopods) to store the ammuntion.

Totally could work out like old school battleship turrets.

There could be a special crew of Gunners-mates equipped to work in the cryo storage under combat conditions, The Freezer Gang? The Chiller gang? (riffing on the Black Gang from steamer days, the guys who worked the coal engines)

 

Just thought I'd share the idea, maybe we can chew on it a bit. I wonder what'd happen if a magazine lost it's coolant reserves. IOW...what happens if a whole magazine thaws?

[Spence]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

 

Just thought I'd share the idea, maybe we can chew on it a bit. I wonder what'd happen if a magazine lost it's coolant reserves. IOW...what happens if a whole magazine thaws?

 

Interesting, but a wee bit more info on how the gun/cartridge works would allow a better idea of the effect of coolant loss.

 

Are the charges like batteries and slowly lose stability as the temp increases so that eventually a jar or shock will release the stored energy?

 

Are they good to go till they reach a magical temp and then spontaneously release their charge?

 

Does the charge state simply rely on extremely low temperatures to keep the charge at an excited state, and warming up simply turns them into inert paperweights?

 

Do the charges just function like a uber battery/capacitor and deliver an electrical charge that is used to generate the beam.?

 

Do the charges actually detonate and the gun harnesses the energy to create a beam akin to a pump laser harnessing a nuclear detonation?

[Kristopher]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Does the charge state simply rely on extremely low temperatures to keep the charge at an excited state' date=' and warming up simply turns them into inert paperweights?[/quote']

 

That one, IIRC.

 

On the other hand, the stuff in the tube is frozen gas. If it "thaws", it doesn't have any room to expand.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

That one, IIRC.

 

On the other hand, the stuff in the tube is frozen gas. If it "thaws", it doesn't have any room to expand.

 

I'm the first to admit my chemstry knowlegde is lacking, but I think a frozen eximer would expand quite a bit, so thawing them would create quite a lot of pressure in the "cardridges", if they're contained in some kind of pressure shell, and make thawed munitions very volatile until refrozen. If the charges aren't cased they'd simply melt, and the excess gases would have to be vented, I think.... Like I said... not a chemist.

 

For that matter.... I'm not a physicist either.... I wonder what would happen if a full power laser shot hit one of the frozen lasing elements. I suspect it'd cause a rather energetic reaction, but I could be wrong. For a game tho, I'd make 'em volatile, because I like the threat of magazine explosions.

 

 

In other news I drew up a design for a steam powered pneumatic 22mm rotary man-portable cannon/AMR while on a smoke break yesterday.

[Nyrath]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Well, if there is lots of energy in the magazine, and the magazine thaws or or otherwise is rendered incapable of holding said energy, the energy has to go somewhere.

 

The energy levels we are talking about make it highly likely that the energy will be released explosively.

 

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3l.html#lasermagazine

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

So if I include Cthulu and friends in this campaign, where should I place them? I was thinking of leaving them in Pluto, which was still undiscovered in the Victorian era. That way, the PCs may still have creatures from "beyond the stars."

 

And if the players insist on "discovering" Pluto, I'll whack them with a backscratcher (Well, not really).

[Dholcrist]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

So if I include Cthulu and friends in this campaign, where should I place them? I was thinking of leaving them in Pluto, which was still undiscovered in the Victorian era. That way, the PCs may still have creatures from "beyond the stars."

 

And if the players insist on "discovering" Pluto, I'll whack them with a backscratcher (Well, not really).

 

Hmm... do you think they should inhabit a planetary (or sub in Pluto's case) body, or that perhaps exist elsewhere? Perhaps on a comet (real or fictional) that enters the solar system every few hundred years, bringing with it untold horrors from "beyond the stars" as it were. Or something similar.

 

Either way, having Cthulu would be awesome.

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Hmm... do you think they should inhabit a planetary (or sub in Pluto's case) body, or that perhaps exist elsewhere? Perhaps on a comet (real or fictional) that enters the solar system every few hundred years, bringing with it untold horrors from "beyond the stars" as it were. Or something similar.

 

Either way, having Cthulu would be awesome.

I like the comet idea. Thanks.

[Dholcrist]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I like the comet idea. Thanks.

 

My pleasure. I was also thinking, what if you were to combine the ideas? Say that Pluto is where lesser demons live, awaiting the return of their master and the destruction of all things, foretold to coincide with the return of a comet, a harbinger of death that enters this realm (aka the solar system) once a millennia, inside of which is entombed Cthulu, frozen, slumbering until the time for his awakening comes.

 

A great place to look for inspiration of using Cthulu-esque creatures in a sci-fi setting would be the Hellboy comics. There's a few stories that involve Greater Demons being monitored and imprisoned by what look like steampunk-ish aliens.

 

Which also gives me an idea, what about also having one of the races having had previous contact, and thus are able to quantify the supernatural scientifically? Say a mysterious race that is seen only rarely by others, and through this self-imposed isolation have taken on a nigh-mystical reputation. Maybe this race could actually be the original inhabitants of Pluto, which was the site of the last Apocalypse a millennia prior, when their own burgeoning civilization was almost destroyed, and they had to rebuild off-world, becoming nomads while constantly fighting the Demonic threat and trying to keep it from extending its reach off of Pluto, keeping the rest of the races in the dark, which in turn causes the rest of the solar system to believe that the Plutonians (?) are the actual threat.

 

Alright, sorry for that stream of thought, just throwing ideas out at random. Hope something sparks something grander and far more refined. Look forward to whatever comes next.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

My pleasure. I was also thinking, what if you were to combine the ideas? Say that Pluto is where lesser demons live, awaiting the return of their master and the destruction of all things, foretold to coincide with the return of a comet, a harbinger of death that enters this realm (aka the solar system) once a millennia, inside of which is entombed Cthulu, frozen, slumbering until the time for his awakening comes.

 

A great place to look for inspiration of using Cthulu-esque creatures in a sci-fi setting would be the Hellboy comics. There's a few stories that involve Greater Demons being monitored and imprisoned by what look like steampunk-ish aliens.

 

Which also gives me an idea, what about also having one of the races having had previous contact, and thus are able to quantify the supernatural scientifically? Say a mysterious race that is seen only rarely by others, and through this self-imposed isolation have taken on a nigh-mystical reputation. Maybe this race could actually be the original inhabitants of Pluto, which was the site of the last Apocalypse a millennia prior, when their own burgeoning civilization was almost destroyed, and they had to rebuild off-world, becoming nomads while constantly fighting the Demonic threat and trying to keep it from extending its reach off of Pluto, keeping the rest of the races in the dark, which in turn causes the rest of the solar system to believe that the Plutonians (?) are the actual threat.

 

Alright, sorry for that stream of thought, just throwing ideas out at random. Hope something sparks something grander and far more refined. Look forward to whatever comes next.

 

I like the Ancients of Pluto?Yuggoth idea

 

Hmmm... I like the comet idea, but instead of old Cthulhu residing within, howzabout its more literally a harbinger of doom... a constantly evolving biomass that sheds "spores" as it scribes it trail through space, leaving all sorts of little presents behind.

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

That would work, and since there are many comets, they can bring different surprises. Any ideas on Uranus and Neptune?

[Kristopher]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Well, if there is lots of energy in the magazine, and the magazine thaws or or otherwise is rendered incapable of holding said energy, the energy has to go somewhere.

 

The energy levels we are talking about make it highly likely that the energy will be released explosively.

 

http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3l.html#lasermagazine

 

It depends. Is the energy coming from a chemical reaction, or is the chemical in the tube simply used to get a single wavelength of EM radiation out of the radiation from another source?

[BlackSword]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

That one, IIRC.

 

On the other hand, the stuff in the tube is frozen gas. If it "thaws", it doesn't have any room to expand.

 

For a game tho' date=' I'd make 'em volatile, because I like the threat of magazine explosions.[/quote']

I haven't worked with lasers and various ways to excite them, but I think Kristopher may have gotten it. Without the cooling it will just thaw into gas. On the other hand, its Pulp SciFi, Amadan hits the nail on the head, what's the most exciting outcome.

[Spence]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Or maybe try another approach.

 

CAUTION: RUBBER SCIENCE ALERT

 

Space is cold so keeping things frozen isn’t normally a problem. Instead the “shells” contain a special “gas” that is safe when frozen but becomes unstable when gaseous. When loaded special igniters trip the charge into a superheated plasma that releases all of the potential energy at once which powers the laser cannon similar to a pump laser. The problem is that the shells must be pre-heated before they can be loaded. This is accomplished in a warships ready magazine where safe frozen shells are transformed into containers as touchy as nitroglycerin.

 

Drop one and BOOM.

[tkdguy]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Rubber science is the way to go in this thread. That's how I started it, after all.

[Kristopher]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

I haven't worked with lasers and various ways to excite them' date=' but I think Kristopher may have gotten it. Without the cooling it will just thaw into gas. On the other hand, its Pulp SciFi, Amadan hits the nail on the head, what's the most exciting outcome. [/quote']

 

Well, I did leave in a rather exiting and dangerous posibility even if the gas isn't dangerous in a reactive way (corrosive, explosive, or whatever). What's the difference in density between frozen argon and gaseous argon (since it was mentioned earlier in reference to a laser in a movie)? If it's very large, you don't want your containers of frozen argon to heat up.

[Jachra]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

You know, that'd be a lot like lighting the powder magazine of a sailing vessel. KAPOW.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Pulp/Steampunk SF Ideas

 

Well' date=' I did leave in a rather exiting and dangerous posibility even if the gas isn't dangerous in a reactive way (corrosive, explosive, or whatever). What's the difference in density between frozen argon and gaseous argon (since it was mentioned earlier in reference to a laser in a movie)? If it's very large, you don't want your containers of frozen argon to heat up.[/quote']

 

suddenly over pressured gas is good *said in Fred Savage Princess Bride voice*

 

Frozen in an excited state no less...I'd think that energy would translate to increased expansion as the state changes from solid to gas. The "shell casings" might be designed as pressure vessels, but if a warmed up magazine of now super high pressure capsules gets hit...

 

get a mop, it's gonna be messy.