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Greetings fellow Herophiles!  

 

Recently I have been endeavoring to continue work on my Space Opera campaign setting.  Back in the day before everybody committed information to computer disk, I had this notebook I affectionately called "The Notebook of Doom" that included writeups of various weapons, armor and scifi equipment.  I consider it to be some of my finest work.  That notebook was lost in one of my many moves over a decade ago and I lament it's loss to this day.

 

So now I have begun the writeups anew.  I have already finished with laser weaponry but before I move on to particle weapons ("Blasters") I have decided to take on combat armor.

 

I use a variety of sources for my writeups, but the most influential is the Intergalactic Space Opera RPG Battlelords of the 23rd Century which has a weapons and equipment sourcebook called "Lock and Load" which includes a plethora of high tech gadgetry to convert.

 

There are a couple of concepts utilized in Battlelords that i plant to port over for my campaign setting.  The first is "Absorption Polymers" which is a layer of high tech polymers within the combat armor that is designed to absorb the kinetic energy of attacks that penetrate the armor.  In Battlelords this is essentially additional "hit points" that the armor has that attacks must blow through before damage can be done to the wearer.  I debated converting these over as additional Body but I decided against this.  I decided to make the Absorption into extra Normal Defense (PD and ED) that helps absorb the Stun damage of attacks that penetrate the armor.  This will help mitigate the massive amount of Stun damage that some of these high tech weapons will be capable of producing (for example, Particle Beam weapons have an inherent +1 Stun multiplier with an average of about 2 1/2D6k damage!) depending on the armor in question, this normal defense bonus can be from +2 to +20 (though higher than +10 is rare).  How balanced do you think this particular approach will be?

 

The next concept I am planning to port over, which I did in my original notebook of doom, is the concept of Armor Options.  These are different equipment that can be added to a suit of armor to improve soldier effectiveness in battle (or adventuring).  In Battlelords, each suit of armor are able to mount a specific number of options into each location (and may options can only be mounted in specific locations, like Jumpjets being mounted to the feet and calves of a suit of armor).  How would you simulate this in Hero?

 

I am not so concerned with point costs, as all of this will be considered equipment and bought with money, not character points.  I'm not concerned with active point costs as everything will be balanced to be as effective as it is meant to be within the context of the setting. (some weapons will be overwhelming, but they will be prohibitively expensive.  Some armor will be seemingly omnipotent but again, incredibly expensive)  Just curious as to the method one would employ to reach the end result (combat armor with optional equipment one could equip on to armor regularly which can be changed out in a workshop if desired of course)

 

Specific examples of armor options would be appreciated as well.  I will be posting examples of armor that I design in here as well for critique and eventually I will post the entire document when i'm finished with it.  For now I will post my Lasers document to give you an idea of the damage levels I'm working with.  Keep in mind that Lasers are on the low end of the damage scale, with particle beam, plasma and pulse (focused force field projected out as pure kinetic energy weapon) doing considerably more damage (also, keep in mind when I say "considerable" that I support the damage model of +1DC = X2 energy, so +2 or +3 DC is rather considerable in my view)

Dark_Universe_Laser_weapons-1.pdf

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Always good to see more resources on the board.

 

One question I have is why not make the Absorption Polymers as Damage Reduction vs Normal PD? Doesn't really matter if the extra normal PD is what you feel is the best. The description just lends itself to that concept.

 

Onto the concept of mount points. I like to keep things simple, but the constrained flexibility you describe really lends itself to a Multipower for each major location group (Chest/Stomach, Legs, Arms, Shoulders, and maybe Head). Define what abilities might fit into those MPP. That seems needlessly complex to me, but may be what the doc ordered.

 

Armor Options (have to remember you have chosen to stick with 5th Edition):

1) Ablative Armor - Extra Body that cannot be healed except in a lab (wherein the armor is replaced).

2) Sensor Suite - IR, UV, etc.  Radar and sonar. Passive detects across the radio band and increased PER.

3) Aforementioned Jump Jets (Leaping)

4) Mounted weaponry (think Boba Fett's wrist mounted gyrojet rocket or perhaps a shoulder mounted cannon like in Edge of Tomorrow).

5) Extra ammo/ordnance (Naked Advantage equal to the cost of increasing charges or clips of charges)

6) Life Support options. Some will probably be built in, but maybe extra ED to represent more thorough radiation protection or vacuum seals to operate in space. Again, probably standard equipment.

7) Deployable drones (Summon).

 

That's all I got for the moment. More later.

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I'm going to leave the previous post intact for reference and archival purposes but I am shying away from that implementation. I have a new concept.

 

Simply define several Zones on the body. I don't want to call them locations for fear that they may be confused with Hit Locations. There will certainly be some crossover and an attack that hits a specific Location might also hit the upgrades in a Zone that overlaps the location. For example, one of the Zones might be Head.  An attack that hits the Head Location will likely hit the upgrade in the Head zone. Using Zones lets us be more granular than the hit chart.

 

Alternate: Make the Hit Location chart more granular. I know that I have seen a Hit Location chart that really broke down the locations. 

 

Now each item must be built with a 0 Point Limitation, uses Zone x (where x is the location on the body).

 

For myself, I would define the Zones as Helmet, Left/Right Shoulder, Left/Right Bicep, Left/Right Forearm*, Chest, Back, Front/Back Belt, Left/Right Thigh, Left/Right Calf, Left/Right Boot

 

*Including Hands which would traditionally be left unhindered beyond the armored glove.

 

Here is a rough example of the concept.

 

Deployable Sentry Turret

Summon 170-Point Automaton (34 Active Cost), 1 Recoverable Charge (-1.25), OIF: Turret Kit, (-0.5), Extra-Time: 1 Turn, Only to Activate (-0.75), Uses the Back Zone (-0)

Real Cost: 10

 

Note that I added the quick 'n' dirty turret write up as an attachment. I am sure that it is nowhere near perfect but it might serve as a base to tweak from. While 6E, I think everything there is immediately backwards compatible.

Sentry VII Automated Turret.zip

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Doh! Assumptions and all that. Here is a PDF export. Too much information in the way of tables and whatnot, but it has the basic write-up.  

 

EDIT: It also has the Summon power because I didn't want to make a new file just for the quick example I was working on. Drop that from the Powers list and drop the character total to 170. A minor thing, but one to be aware of.

Sentry Turret.pdf

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An interesting writeup. thanks for posting.

 

Work continues slowly. the armor options are going to take the longest as there will be several dozen options.

What i want to discuss right now is the actual defense. how much is too much?

 

In the context of the settin, body armor is categorized into three types:

Standard body armor.

Heavy body armor.

Powered armor.

 

Standard body armor is typically what you think of as armor in most hero games. in my setting its any armor that is NOT servo-driven which ultimately limits the amount of defense possible due to the weight of the armor and the effects of encumbrance on the warer.

 

Heavy body armor is that armor which consists of heavy plates to allow the wearer to survive heavy combat. Heavy armor is servo driven to take some of the weight off the wearer...all heavy armor has at least the half mass version of the mass limitation, so the armor could weigh 100kg+ but will only feel like half that (or less in the case of more expensive armor) to the wearer. heavy body armor is also environmentally sealed (normal body armor is not generally) and hardened.

 

Powered armor is beefed up heavy armor. the servos will reduce encumbrance either to 1/4 mass or effectively no mass (for encumbrance purposes, not actual mass) and have enough power to assist the wearer's muscle power and movement. powered armor can give bonuses to STR, DEX and SPD. Of course, powered armor is environmentally sealed, hardened and impenetrable.

 

Anything bigger and meaner than powered armor will generally be written up as a vehicle. (Starting with Landmate class armor)

 

What i'm wondering about here is where the overlap in defense should be. in general i'm thinking that standard armor will go as high as defense 10. heavy armor will begin at defense 8 and go up to defense 12. and powered armor will begin at defense 10 and go up to defense 15. anything higher than 15 will be the purview of armored vehicles.

 

Is going up to 10 too high for standard body armor? Full plate armor is defense 8. high tech body armor composed of composite materials should prove superior (and half the mass as well).

 

On the flip side is defense 10 too low for powered armor? i want there to be a fairly wide variance in the defense characteristics of various armor, but i want defense 15 to be the top end, so i feel that defense 10 is where powered armor should start.

 

I think heavy armor is good sitting between defense 8 and 12. good protecton without being invulnerable. and the level of hardened protects it from the nasty laser which will cut through lesser armor pretty effortlessly.

 

What are your experiences and opinions in this arena? i want armor to be an essential piece of equipment in the campaign for those who expect to engage in high tech combat. (Wading through a battlefield without armor while being blasted by 4d6k plasma bolts from an assault plasma rifle is a good way to get killed fast!) so i want to make sure i hit the sweet spot with the defense. good enough to keep soldiers alive reliably but not so high that soldiers feel invulnerable.

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I think your numbers are good. In theory, your 4d6k Plasma Rifle will do between 2-24 Body per hit, with an average of right around 12-13. That's pretty ideal for what I am picturing your combat zone to look like. An average hit will overtake Standard Body Armor, will just be stopped by Heavy Armor, and will be ineffective against Powered Armor. Now that is an Average hit. A close to full damage hit will probably nearly kill a Normal character in Standard armor. Severely damage a Normal character in Heavy Armor, and do more than moderate damage to a character in Powered Armor. This is assuming full Def values for those classes of armor.

 

Breakdown

Standard Body Armor 10 rDef vs 12 = 2 Body bleeds through.

Standard Body Armor 10 rDef vs 24 = 14 Body bleeds through.

Heavy Body Armor 12 rDef vs 12 = 0 Body bleeds through.

Heavy Body Armor 12 rDef vs 24 = 12 Body bleeds through. 

Powered Armor 15 rDef vs 12 = 0 Body bleeds through.

Powered Armor 15 rDef vs 24 = 9 Body bleeds through.

 

So on average, Heavy and Powered armor types are going to be able to stop the 4d6K plasma rifle you casually threw out. A really good damage roll is going to hurt, even the guy in Powered Armor.  But that looks pretty decent and will make for some gritty space battles. If you throw in Hit Locations, Bleeding and Autofire, the characters are going to favor ambush tactics and combat avoidance. Make cover readily available to use as protection too.

 

Are there going to be personal force fields?

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I'm going to support hit locations, impairing/disabling rules and maybe bleeding rules.

 

Yes, personal force fields will exist but are EXPENSIVE and rather low level protection because more protection requires an exponential amount of power to implement, so small, personal sized generators cant create anything more than 10 defense shields and they tend to burn out easy when attacks blow through their defense so they arent exactly reliable. ship mounted force fields are more reliable because they can mount backup generators to keep the shields viable throughout long engagements.

 

There will be a few armor options that are force fields of various strengths, but as i said they are expensive so they arent super common on the battlefield. (Though if you plan to spend the millions of credits for a suit of powered armor, might as well spend another half-million creds to protect that investment with a forcefield so your PA doesnt get trashed the first time you face off against a cyborg wielding a BFG!)

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I am considering using ablative limitation on my shields. or maybe a combination of ablative and burnout where each time the defense is penetrated there is a burnout roll made and if the shield doesnt burn out the roll is reduced by 1 so eventually the shield will burnout.

 

"Tank" armor starts at around defense 15 and goes as high as defense 30, but it's pretty rare to see something higher than defense 25 on an AFV. They use a combination of armor and force fields to defend themselves.

 

There is Landmate class powered armor which is power armor that is larger than the standard type so they are writen up as vehicles. they range between 8 and 12 feet tall. they have armor ratings between 12 and 20 and almost always hardened.

post-384-0-78108800-1405145440_thumb.jpg

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