DrTemp

Re: Perry Rhodan Hero

Actually, a Perry Rhodan RPG is due to be available in about a month.

In German, of course. It is based on a very annoyingly old-fashioned gaming system called "Midgard"- which is a typical fantasy system, with random character creation, levels, and the like.

It does not, however, play in the Solar Imperium, since in the German novels, the Solar Imperium does not exist any longer- The League of Free Terrans has succeeded it a few centuries ago. The new RPG seems to focus on current events in the "Perryverse".

I am not sure whether they accept english language questions, but just for completness: You can find a web forum for this new RPG at

http://www.midgard-forum.de/forumdisplay.php?f=121

Re: Campaign: The Turakian Age

Since my position is obviously a real minority positon, please ignore it. :.)

Re: Campaign: The Turakian Age

While I really admire the effort you put into reporting the campaign here in a novel-like style, I believe at least for me it would be more useful if you summed it up a bit- I simply don't have the time to read a full-scale book...

Re: Conan vs. Elric

Elric would win. Howard is dead and Moorcock can still write.

On the other hand, Elric is dead, while Conan lives...

Re: Lowdown on the Xenovores?

Guess I'd better get my FLGS to order me a copy of Alien Wars.

It's a really good book. You'll quite probably enjoy the reading.

Man, I'm putting Steve Long's kids through college...

Why not. Good work deserves good payment.

Re: Turakian Age: Drakine Population Dynamics

Breast shape is not merely for asthetics. You have the larger form in humans to signify a ready state, and to decieve mates into believing mating with you will be rewarded with offspring, and that those offspring will be well nourished.

 

If the breast has no direct or indirect function -presently or in the evolutionary history- it has no reason to grow into exageration as a 'display organ'. It has no meaning - nothing to signify to a potential mate.

The "breasts" of Drakine females might also have some kind of evolutionary function, such as signalizing being well-fed (it's fat tissue, and due to some anatomical reason concentrated there) and thus able to feed offspring.

Of course, it might just as well be that Drakine actually have this one mammalian feature. Parallel evolution, aided by the gods.

Re: Turakian Age: Drakine Population Dynamics

Human breasts are there for a reason, and it has nothing to do with Hugh Heffner. It's a food organ,

I'm afraid I must correct you. The nipples are required for food production for the offspring. All that fat tissue around those nipples ist not at all required for food production- which is why most mammals have only nipples, but no real "breasts", except at the time when actually having offspring.

The beautiful form of human female secondary sex organs is just there for being beautiful, i.e., for attracting males. Therefore, it is pretty reasonable that Drakine breasts are there exactly for the same reason, even without any nipples.

Re: Turns, Segments, Phases and simulation

Thanks to all for your replies- this was very insightful for me. Even though I still disagree on how many times Joe Average can swing a club in 12 seconds or aim and shoot a semiautomatic weapon, I can see now how strongly this mechanic is tied to the Hero system.

It has taken me quite a while to get used to the speed chart too, but there are two points which are my solice.

1. Hero simulates literature not real life.

2. Think of each point of speed as one panel in a comic. Each point is just a picture of that character's total action for the round.

 

The second being the most handy point.

Quite finely summarized. So Hero is just not what I am looking for (but I fear I won't be able to resist buying those nice setting books anyway...)

I am relatively new to Hero System, and I think, as far as I can say up to now, I like it.

There is one thing, however, which kind of bothers me:

Combat turns are divided into 12 Segments of 1 second each. SPD tells us when a character

is allowed to make his moves- which means, Joe Average is not supposed to be able to act every second,

but merely every six seconds.

Of course that does not mean that Joe will act and then freeze for six seconds until it's his turn again, but

that it takes him that long to actually prepare and perform the action. From a pure gaming perspective, this may be

interesting, make sense in the name of game balance etc..

But from a simulation POV: Is there actually a human being who is that slow? I simply can't imagine that.

Are there any "official" optional rule-replacements for this turn sequence? If no, what would be your ideas/suggestions?

Re: Achtung! Panzer!

Sorry. It's not my native language.

No need to apologize. It was just one of my Psychological Limitations that made me write that.

Re: Hyperspace in TE

As I understand it, a hyperspace drive puts you into hyperspace for a limited time -- the better the drive, the longer you can stay there. Once you are in hyperspace, you move at whatever rate your conventional thrusters dictate (times one million, of course). Thus, all ships move at more or less the same rate in hyperspace; what varies is the length of time you can be in hyperspace before the drive has to recharge or whatever.

That's how it is said in the book. Actually, it cannot be that way, because then, a ship's velocity in hyperspace would also depend on the distance travelled (time to accelerate and decelerate is needed). The ETA, however, seems to be a linear function, which also makes it much more usable for gaming purposes.

Thus, I personally believe that the hyperdrive can not only push one's ship into hyperspace, but also propel it there warp-like - the "maximum time in hyperspace" is an additionaln limitation of the drive separate from its speed, but somehow also linked. Beacons can stay in hyperspace almost indefinitely because they use their own special version of the hyperdrive optimized for their purpose.

Re: Achtung! Panzer!

Something urges me to point at the mising "h" in the title of this thread.

Re: Turakian Age: Drakine Population Dynamics

Considering that the females usually die in childbirth' date=' we do have to wonder why they have mamary glands. Since it says it is the females and not the males who develop them, it's a bit illogical if they then almost never live to use them.[/quote']

 

Except, of course, if the "mamas die at childbirth" feature is a new thing, in evolutionary terms.

 

Additionally, it is an Epic Fantasy setting. It is entirely possible that they were actually created by their gods, who just liked breasts for some reason.

Re: Turakian Age: Drakine Population Dynamics

This solution is valid by the numbers, and has the charm of changing the sahisha only superficially into something that ensures the race's survival.

Re: Turakian Age: Drakine Population Dynamics

Well, the "more than one child per pregnancy" idea makes some sense. But. A defining element of their race seems to be that fathers raise single children.

So to me, it actually makes the most sense to assume that the phenomenon of the mothers dying at childbirth is a very young development. Possibly the result of evil and powerful magery and/or the working of an insidous god... before that, they had maybe a low rate of reproduction, but were still able to grow in numbers.

Hm... that somehow calls for a mystic quest to save the Drakine race...

Thinking about Turakian Age (which i like), i came across the follwing question:

If I have understood correctly, Drakine Population halves every generation. Is that so?

If yes, how do they maintain their empires over the milennia?

If no, what is the actual population development of the Drakine race?

Originally posted by Aroooo

Well, they say there are no original ideas... Personally I don't agree with that statement 100%, but is sure is damn hard these days.

What I meant is: Which already published idea/SF subgenre has not yet been written into an RPG setting somewhere?

Originally posted by Realms of Chaos

Yes - roleplaying games are reflective as you suggest - but the evidence seems to show that sci-fi roleplaying games are far more likely to be successful when they reflect something they have never reflected before.

True. Now, what new SF subgenre should one use for an innovative RPG setting?

My feeling is, they have all been done already. Am I wrong?

Originally posted by Realms of Chaos

I seriously think that sci-fi is a very different animal compared to say, fantasy. Fantasy authors and game developers can get away with churning out the same old stereotypes time after time, but sci-fi fans demand innovation and originality - that is a large part of what the genre is about. [/b]

But is this also true for SF RPG? I mean, Traveller obviously has some success, and it was not even innovative when first brought to the market - but it is a solid space opera background.

Role-playing games, in my opinion, are a reflective medium- they reproduce, but don't innovate. This is due to the fact that if it is designed to be actually played, all the players and the GM will have to agree (at least implicitly) on what kind of story to play, which is hardly possible when only one person knows what kind of events are gpoing to happen. (Not the exact events, of course, but the "genre" will usually be known to all players.)

Would you love to make yourself a Star Hero Character designed for a typical Alien Wars campaign who then finds himself in an adventure like the movie Solaris? I certainly would not.

There _are_ "innovative" RPG's, true, but they usually either vary an old theme (most notably, a variation of the super hero genre, mixed with something else, as in the German RPG "Engel" or White Wolf's World of Darkness) or are really niche products. (Which is unsuitable for a universal system like Hero, I'd say.)

Originally posted by Drakkenkin

Nevertheless, they have rules and regulations

Do they? This is the very first mission of that kind. All former spaceships have Warp 1 to 3-drives, which means they need months or years to reach any foreign star.

It doesn't stretch my suspension of disbelief a lot to see people without any historical experience behind them act just as if they had no historical experience behind them.

Remember, they even had to invent a "tactical alert" because such a cpncept was obviously not needed before the NX-01's mission.

I would think that earth would have hand picked their best men and women to go on this mission. With a bases of past service record and mental e-val.

They are. It's all in the criteria by that those service records were written.

That problem is known even in today's militaries- some people are excellent in training, but fail under more realistic circumstances, and vice versa (though the latter seems to be rather rare).

As with the original ST you could hope for the best. The Vulcan's are not human but the writer have them act human. Not all Supper powers need to be into secret bases and the quest for power.

 

[...]

 

I guess, to me, they acted more like Romulans of the original series then Vulcans. Spy tech, lives sworn to the empire, and the government is after power- type of people. I'm not saying they are fully like this just more so.

Well, any major power that wants to remain a major power needs to take steps to preserve its power, otherwise it, well, will stop to be a major power. Very soon. Given their Cold War against the Andorians, they have no choice but use these methods- the Andorians will, certainly.

Concerning the Romulans, well, they _are_ related to the Vulcans. And it _is_ pretty TOS canon that the Vulcans of the time did not inform the humans who the Romulans where, even though they knew it for certain- so a bit secrecy on the side of the Vulcans was always there, obviously.

BTW, the Earth-Romulan War will very likely take place in the series, given the timeframe. For a TV show, that could be really fun.

Originally posted by Realms of Chaos

However, while this is obviously useful to me I think it's also one of the major weaknesses of Terran Empire. Traveller in all its various incarnations is the 'big fish' out there when it comes to far future spacefaring sci-fi, and to attempt to compete with it by releasing a product so similar to it in so many ways seems like madness. If people want a traveller style game to play, they will play traveller. [/b]

I guess the authors don't need us to play the settings presented. They just want us to buy them. For you and me, it obviously worked.

They'll also do a "Galactic Federation", which seems to be very Trek-related in outlook, and I guess it's intentional. It's an example on how to convert these settings to Hero without actually being forced to pay license fees. Terran Empire works a bit like Traveller earlier in it's history, and can be used as Star Wars to the end.

Of course, these settings are also very good on their own (at least the two I know).

Originally posted by Drakkenkin they often ignored the federation rule book, [/b]

That's because the Federation doesn't exist yet.

and the Vulcan's had too much emotions and they seemed to be painted as being underhanded with secret bases and such.

Well, they are the major power of their time. What else could one expect than acting like one? Their emotions have always been there, that's pretty canon. There is one episode where it is revealed that "Vulcan mind-meld" is actually viewed as something really perverse by Vulcan society in 2151. That makes sense, I think. I always wondered why a culture that is so secret about heir inner feelings would share those very feelings willingly.

I did like them using some old, less used races more. On it's own I think I could get into it but as part of the ST world I have a hard time with it.

Actually this is a good explanation of how I enjoy the show. Just imagine it's parallel universe. Given all the time travel involved to date, that's even quite plausible, and parallel universes are actually ST canon, so...

Re: Re: Alien War: Chemical Rockets ?!?

Originally posted by Cybrarian

Just acquired AW this afternoon. Seems to me that the first reference to chemical rockets in the Starships section is a typo/omission/oversight. The paragraph immediately below it specifically says that, "Humans commonly used chemical and fusion rockets for STL movement of starships." My emphasis. The accompanying table lists Fusion Rockets as being developed in 2253, easily in time to be in general use by the 24th century. Just say they're using fusion and roll from there.

Well, I assume the first working prototypes of a fusion rocket were developed much earlier in the Hero universe. Terran Empire lists even later years for chemical and fusion rockets, so I assume these are simply the introduction dates fo those specific designs of rockets.

Of course, fusion rockets are the obvious answer. It's just a pitty they did this one mistake in an otherwise very good work. Drops the overall rating of the book to just "good". 8)

Originally posted by Champsguy

I figure in a future where that technology moves beyond the experimental phase, they'll find all sorts of nifty uses for it. [/b]

You are talking about

http://www.americanantigravity.com/podkletnov.html

?

Well, NASA failed to reproduce the described effects. This does not mean it's bogus, but it's just not clear if this works at all. I don't think that the said scientists just throw away all their career just for a joke or out of laziness to check the results, but they still could err. (And of course, this all could be just a hoax.)

Funny sidenote: The experiment described, which was first undertaken in 1996, describes a method that looks pretty related to the inner workings of the Star Trek artificial gravity generators, as described in the Enterprise Tech Manual - which was written in 1991.

Originally posted by keithcurtis

Keep in mind that any fusion drive that delivers significant thrust becomes a vicious particle beam weapon at non-trivial ranges. I'd outlaw them in my spacelanes.

 

Keith "Kzinti Lesson" Curtis1

That depends on the amount of thrust and the range of other weapons available. To produce 1 MN of thrust (roughly acclerating 100 tons at 1 g), one would have to use 1 kg of reaction mass per second- but not as one projectile, but as plasma/dust. Although it moves at about 10 million meters per second, a single particle (or billions of single particles) should not be able to penetrate armor built for stopping micrometeroites or against a heat shield. But there is that other problem: Today's "spaceships" don't have that kind of armor, and not all have a heat shield.

Without "reactionless thusters" or similiar "rubber science", there is no other usable way for interplanetary spacecraft. Chemical rockets are not an option- they are too thirsty.

Of course, this all comes down to "before we don't know how to manipulate gravity and use this to propel a spaceship, real spacecraft as needed for interplanetary/interstellar societies are not doable".