• Welcome to the new COTI server. We've moved the Citizens to a new server. Please let us know in the COTI Website issue forum if you find any problems.

Weapons I've proposed

Eh ... I talked with a high priced lawyer who deals with the entertainment industry and publishing, and he said I couldn't, but I think he was thinking that I was going to reference specific rules, which I was not going to do.

I'm not big on Cephus. It just looks like Traveller with maybe half the serial numbers filed off, not all of them. So if I'm ineligible for a CT license, then I'll just write, copyright, and post on some website some full adventures.

I've written or called nearly every game company or author, and my inquiries to a lot of agencies down in LA were essentially all rejections, so it's self publishing.

It would have been nice to have written up stuff using OTU background material, but after 21 years of coming to this forum, having passed on Hunter's offer because I was too scared (and he's passed on now), I'm not really married to the OTU in terms of writing anything scifi for any system. But think the concepts are interesting enough that people would have fun with them.

As for T5, I have lots of opinions on it, all bad, so I'll withhold my comments. Of all the games I played in my life time, the only system I really don't have concepts for is "Champions". I don't know why. I guess I'm not big on superheroes. Oh well.
 
Blue Ghost said:
Of all the games I played in my life time, the only system I really don't have concepts for is "Champions". I don't know why. I guess I'm not big on superheroes. Oh well.
Click to expand...
Champions is for all intents and purposes "superpowers by numbers" ... somewhat literally.
 
Well if you self publish some stuff, then you'll have a portfolio to present to the studios, may make them more amenable to giving you spec work.
 
Well, at this point in my life it's going to be made either for free or just thrown up on DriveThru for something like a dollar or fifty cents. I understand concerns of various property owners not granting me a license when it seemed like everyone else, people who, quite frankly, are not as good as writers as I am, were getting permission. A lot of the personal drama I suffered over the last 20 years since I first came to this forum was my effort to discover what had been going on. And apparently it's kind of done. So, many apologies here, to ADB, SJ Games and elsewhere.

Having said that ... I've lost a lot of motivation for everything I used to really cherish and enjoy. So anything I write will be filtered through that lens, and so I don't think I'll be putting in the kind of care and quality I might have from say maybe six or seven years ago. So I don't think I'll be offering submissions to anyone.

When I tried some 8 to 10 years ago all I got were a lot of cold shoulders and rejection letters from agencies down in the LA area. The lawyer I consulted some five years ago even told me that I couldn't do what I wanted to, but to "heck" with him. I'm going to do it anyway.

Aaron Alston published his Autoventures' series back in the mid 1980's for the big three car combat games at the time, and he had the consent of SJ Games and the two other companies that published the two other game systems. He knew those people. I know no one, so I'm not even going to try. And again, to be brutally honest, I wanted to translate the games to the big screen or the TV screen because I thought people might enjoy them. And again, I wasn't the first one to think or try, but circa 1988 I was probably in the best position to do so.

Even so, I like writing adventure and sometimes coming up with gear or vehicles for various systems far more than trying to map out character motivations and syncing that with a plot and story for a screenplay. SPs are all about emotional gratification, though they need not be, but that's what they are today.

Getting back on topic, it always struck me that there was a huge gap between the PGMP-12 and the LASER rifle. You go from 5D damage to ...what, 12D? I can't remember, and am too lazy to look it up, but there really seemed to be a gap between your standard LASER weapon and high energy weapons, and that was part of the motivator. And I never really liked Gauss Guns. They just seemed like a "+10" sword for D&D that had built in magic resistance and never tarnished. And again it seemed like there would be some intermediary between Gauss Gun concept and the weapon introduced in Book 4. And I really liked Blizzard Entertainment's take on the Terran Marine "Gauss Gun" with a report, and a weapon that was much bulkier and heavier than GDW's Gauss Gun for Traveller.

Just my take.
 
As for Champions ... you know, I had a lot of fun with Champions, but like a lot of other games I also had a lot of heart ache due to the GM sniping at me with flaws in my character design. The upside of Champions was that like this thread or section of the BBS, you could create not just characters but devices and weapons for your gaming session. That way you could make super heroes who had devices, weapons or things that gave them their super power status. And even though Champions used the same impulse mechanic as SFB and Car Wars, it didn't generate any arguments over rules (or rarely). That verse the heated debates and "near friendship ending" arguments that rose out of starship combat or arena battles. In that sense Champions was a more mellow game.

Back on topic; and with Champions it feels like you could conjure a device there, then translate it back to some version of Traveller. I've never done that, but I'm sure it's been done.
 
whartung said:
Well if you self publish some stuff, then you'll have a portfolio to present to the studios, may make them more amenable to giving you spec work.
Click to expand...
I'll add this. I didn't want to get to know any of the game authors nor publishers on a personal basis. I thought they were all like Steve V. Cole at Task Force / ADB when Task Force was still around; i.e. like a magazine. That is you send something in for scrutiny, and if it passed muster, then it got published and you got a credit and maybe a few dollars out of it.

As it turns out, based on second and third hand accounts, it seems like it's more of a "who you know" kind of affair. I blew my stack on the Lone Star way back in 2001 or 2002 when another new user asked about the same thing, and there was some criteria for screening or vetting candidates. Whatever. I'm not going to lose sleep over it.

I understand ADB's position of having to kowtow to the Paramount people because their work is derivative of Star Trek. That's self explanatory. And maybe the people at Pod9 have stars in their eyes like Gygax. I don't know,. I don't want to know. But I didn't want to get to Marc Miller nor Steve Jackson, nor Gary Gygax nor the Flying Buffalo people on a personal basis. Nor even Gordon Hunter even though he tabled an offer before he passed on.

We'll see it depends on what happens in the next few weeks or months. I'm burnt out on forums and online gaming. But thanks for the interest.
 
As we talked about in the Traveller Video Game forum, unless you're tied to "The Imperium", you can writer "whatever you want" for something like Cepheus. Or, in fact, most any system.

Producing something "local" (for some reason your ship crash landed on a Desert World and you discover a colony that can help but maybe they're a little bit TOO friendly).

What this demonstrates is that you can produce, well, ANYTHING. Everyone has ideas, rendering those ideas takes Work. Work not all are capable of doing.

I'm not an actor. I'm convinced that many "actors" are more performers. Early on Arnold Schwarzenegger(sp?) was a performer. Later, he finally developed some actual acting skills. GOOD actors are rare, but there are lots of performers. But I'm convinced many character actor roles in TV and movies are filled by people that demonstrated that they can simply show up and deal with the actual process of film production. Kurt Russel once said "Acting isn't hard, you go where the director says, and say what they tell you." But getting folks to actually perform to schedule in the grind of production, THAT is a real skill and temperament that not everyone shares. And this is why "you have to know people". People who know you show up on time and put in the work.

Producing a published adventure is the same thing. Lots of folks can get a scenario to a place that they can wing it and play it with their group.

Producing a finished work is a tangible step up, and worth demonstrating.
 
Well, I've published. I've got stuff out there.

What I have that a lot of other people didn't was a hyper-fearful mother who suffered sleep paralysis and has a very absurd view of the world and my efforts to write for the scifi genre. And some people close to her see the scifi genre as nothing but overweight nerdy cowards, and I had servicepeople tell me the such over the last 20 plus years since I came to this forum trying to get my stuff published somehow.

That was one of many obstacles. And not to get too off track, but it baffles me to this very day, because Traveller, Star Trek, even Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica all deal with military conflict on some level. So ... how do you combat her logic and those advising her? You can't really. So, I did what many citizens do, I wrote my congressman :)

My aim was to just publish short little adventures that could be completed in an evening, and do it for the proto-version of this game; Leviathan and Shadows early era (Imperium optional) kind of stuff. If I hadn't been so skittish of the D20 system (I've never administered a classic D&D adventure), then I would have taken up Hunter's offer way back in 2005 to 2007 / 2008 when he made it, and we wouldn't be having this exchange.

As far as film goes, I really didn't like the film industry. I hate psychology and psychiatry even more, and to discover that film is all about both of those practices really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. So no, I'm not "going back." Not ever. Things like Aliens, 2010, Superman, Empire Strikes Back, Wargames, and other films including some anime titles, helped keep the passion alive to create. But films are all about fantasy release, which also means helping people confront fears and taboos, and I'm not into that.

Like I said on the other thread on opening day of Star Wars back in 77, I walked out feeling good about the film but wondered why it wasn't more serious. Games, like Traveller or D&D, let you be as serious or as silly as you want. You're not trying to help a player overcome their irrational fear of ... I don't know ... tricycles or car fresheners or something. So ... back in 81 or 82 when I made it an aim to put SJ Games and GDW up on the big screen, I thought it would be easy. Turns out it isn't because of all of the psychological resea4rch that goes into making a film or TV series. And I want nothing to do with it.

Back on topic; it's one of the reasons I gravitated towards this game and others of its ilk (Car Wars as an example). You can make vehicles, weapons, gadgets, and circumstances for players. Players reveal the drama by their actions, and reveal their character as well. And in this way it's kind of fun to make up a HEL Gun or a man portable mini-gatling-gun. It's why designing ships is a fun thing for a lot of people. Make up your own version of a scout; the Hammer class, the Fast Scout by Ian or my personal fav the Florian by Wayne Peters. And to me that's what makes games infinitely superior to films and TV.
 
whartung said:
I'm not an actor. I'm convinced that many "actors" are more performers. Early on Arnold Schwarzenegger(sp?) was a performer. Later, he finally developed some actual acting skills. GOOD actors are rare, but there are lots of performers. But I'm convinced many character actor roles in TV and movies are filled by people that demonstrated that they can simply show up and deal with the actual process of film production. Kurt Russel once said "Acting isn't hard, you go where the director says, and say what they tell you." But getting folks to actually perform to schedule in the grind of production, THAT is a real skill and temperament that not everyone shares. And this is why "you have to know people". People who know you show up on time and put in the work.
Click to expand...
I swear, I'm going to keep this on topic.

The only time I ever wanted to be an actor was when I was a five year old kid, and was watching westerns and war movies. Kind of the idea was that if you were an actor then you were in those environments in real life.

Fortunately I've taken that aspect of my imagination and transplanted and translated it to writing.

Other weapons;
Neural Paralyzer; I think I saw this in the Big Black Book, but never followed up with write up.
Personal Disintegrator; Kirk, in "That Which Survives" mentions a type two pistol hand phaser emits a beam that's 8000 degree Celsius. That's hotter than the sun. Steven Petrick on the ADB forum brought up some interesting points; what if a phaser beam hits ... your shoelace or a clump of hair or your sleeve. My response; "You'd be in big trouble" :D(y)

CT's shortcomings for weapons is the lack of granularity for weapons--specifically damage; delivered and taken. So, what to do? You make up stuff, maybe give it a bonus or a shortcoming for both targeting and damage.

Side note; one Trek publication said that a phaser combined both a LASER and PPC somehow. Eh, maybe. That sounds more like a fan after-thought than anything you could really combine. LASER moves at the speed of light. Particles from a Projection Cannon move at 99% the speed of light. My thinking is that one would cancel out the other, but I don't really know.

I've thought about borrowing from Starfire, or the Imperial Army; i.e. a hand held or rifle version of a MESON gun. A Meson Rifle? :unsure: A primary beam carbine?

How about an auto Gauss-shotgun; i.e. a bundle of needles wrapped together that are accelerated down a rifle via an electromagnetic field, and then separate once they exit the barrel? An SFB "scatterpack" like personal weapon 😁

I saw some weeks or months back that someone finally wrote up the personal shields from DUNE.

Did anyone ever write up the "seeker" weapon from DUNE? A fire and forget drone that hunts down its target. Nasty stuff. 😬

A Gauss shotgun ... I may write that one up tonight.
 
The issue with new weapons, beyond cosmetics, is how their game effects differ.

For example, the normal Shotgun is +5 vs nothing, -3 against cloth. Does the Gauss shotgun become +6/-2?

Being a game, there needs to be a compelling game effect for the weapon. The gauss rifle, for example, is not easier to hit with than a rifle, based on range, but punches through armor easier, and does more damage.

It also has a benefit of larger magazine capacity and automatic fire. It's a little bit lighter, but a lot more expensive.

So, the trick is not to just come up with neat sounding names and such, but come up with game effects that can influence a decision
 
I kinda suspect that a gauss based shotgun has a different damage effect from ye standard technological level five variant.

With gauss smallarms, ammunition tends to be fletchettes, while what we think of shotgun shells tend to varying sizes of pellets.

Also, muzzle velocity is much higher, empathizing accuracy range, compared to a more scattershot distribution at lower velocity at greater mass.
 
Well, that was kind of the gist of the shotgun-Gauss hybrid. The idea I had in my mind, and your imagination may differ, is that it would be abundle of needles wrapped by some material that broke away, thus letting the individual projectiles flare out or separate during flight. I imagined that there might be a similar spread or area effect that the current shotgun has, but with the penetration of a Gauss based weapon.

It was one of my minor gripes with the basic CT combat system as a whole. As functional as it was and is, it didn't allow for too much wiggle room in terms of variant effects. What we're discussing here is an example, but so is the JTAS article on Archaic weapons, where they're essentially all 2D or mostly 3D in damage. So, I don't know.

Please tweak, alter or propose your own version of what I've put down here.
 
Blue Ghost said:
Other weapons;
Neural Paralyzer; I think I saw this in the Big Black Book, but never followed up with write up.
Click to expand...
Similar in effect to the stun carbines from DA6: Divine Intervention, though I'm assuming they're higher TL and don't need a backpack power supply. (Traveller not only didn't anticipate Moore's Law, but also failed to anticipate battery technology advancement.)
 
Last edited:
It comes down to what's better, a large mass moving at a slower speed or a low mass moving at a higher speed.

Military pragmatism ended up at both ends, depending on incentives and desired, or acceptable, outcomes.
 
Condottiere said:
It comes down to what's better, a large mass moving at a slower speed or a low mass moving at a higher speed.
Click to expand...
Kinetic energy (MV2) is the Messenger.
Momentum (MV) is the MESSAGE getting delivered.

Kinetic energy doesn't knock you down/over or push you back ... Momentum transfer does.

This is why an arrow shot from a bow can go right through sandbags and hit what's behind the sandbags, while a bullet gets stopped by the sandbags. If people want to see proof of this, there are youtube video references that can be provided to support this assertion.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

C
Gauss weapon speculations
2
Replies
28
Views
813
infojunky
infojunky
C
General The infantry laser problem
6 7 8
Replies
157
Views
3K
Rupert
R
C
Rifle mini-grenades
2
Replies
32
Views
698
warwizard
W
pzmcgwire
Navy Gauss pistols -ceremonial?
2
Replies
23
Views
1K
Meteoric Assault
Meteoric Assault
C
Imperial military robots
Replies
16
Views
407
Dragoner
Dragoner
Back
Top