New updates for old ships

[Golan2072]

Originally posted by Andy Fralix:
IMTU, dumbots are basicly smart tools. Relativly expensive tools, but still tools.

This is exactly how I handle it IMTU as well - until a very late TL (15 at the very least), AI (actually "autonomous" proto-AI) is simply not cost-effective for most purposes unless you're a Hiver; Dumbots are, on the other hand, far, far cheaper and extremely enhance your (flesh) crew's performance.

So most ships have a few Dumbots around; most technicians have a Robot Ops skill (I'll probably make it more frequent on my CharGen system). Robots do not, generally, replace workers; they turn the workers into technicians and Robot-minders ('Bot-supervisors).

This is how I run things in my Solar Triumvirate ATU and my post-SolConfed OTU variant.

By the way, AIs (or, for the very least, sophosticated "autonomous" systems) are best used in a "master-slave" configuration: one brain, many "hands".

 

[GypsyComet]

Of course, in a metagame sense, robot expert systems (mobile or otherwise) are present to allow a small group of PCs to mostly operate a larger ship, or provide a solo (N)PC with a foil. Giving the Ref a "voice" has advantages in many cases, too.