Aberrant: War Journal - War Journal OOC

[Alex Green]

OK, I'm confused. T-port pads work without Warpers? How many people can they do at a time?

[Asbjørn]

OK, I'm confused.

Ditto. ::confused

T-port pads work without Warpers? How many people can they do at a time?

Or even more basic: What the hell is a T-port, and how is it different from the warp thingies? ::huh

[Heritage]

OK, I'm confused. T-port pads work without Warpers? How many people can they do at a time?

Some days it seems all I do is sow confusion ::rolleyes

Okay, think of t-ports as being somewhat like the transporters from Star Trek if they could only beam folks to another transporter - none of this 'away team' nonsense ::wink Every base has at least one single person t-port, but battalion HQs tend to have two. The ones at WS Bravo are larger and can handle four people at a time, but the only other base with t-ports that big is WS Delta up north. One trick you can do with a four-pad though is set it to fire in sequence - four people go in, one per square, you set the destination for each pad, and they fire off in order. This can be done very fast, but not if they're all going to the same receiving unit; however, this can be circumvented if you alternate (1-2, 1-2) and the first person to each receiving unit gets the hell out of there fast, but that still sends two to one base and two to another. With a longer delay between 'ports, you can send four folks to one single person unit, but timing is critical if you want to do it smoothly - if a receiving t-port is blocked, a buzzer goes off, there's an error message, and you have to hit the reset key, all of which can take valuable time in an emergency situation.

Each t-port has its own dedicated nuke (hyperfusion reactor) to power it - as long as the pad, controls and nuke are all working, a unit can send anywhere there's a receiving unit. The controls are pretty simple, at least as far as basic, non-emergency operation goes: there's a computer monitor where you enter in the destination, you verify that receiving unit is in working order and unoccupied, the passenger steps in and off they go. If you don't know where you’re going, there is a search menu; there are rumors of 'secret' t-port units outside of Green bases, but nothing is known for sure, at least not by any of the PCs. There are code entry pads on each t-port, but they're usually only used for maintenance.

Most t-ports at bases can be operated by the passenger; there's a time delay to give you enough time to make it onto the pad, and if your not there in time it won't fire. The timer can be set to various lengths (usually it's thirty seconds), but a creative operator (usually an Engineer) can effective set the time delay as long as he wants, even a year later.

Any of the more 'innovative' t-port manuevers requires an Engineering roll - on the plus side, it's very hard to kill someone with a t-port (at least three botches, also breaks both units), but it can be done.

And to clarify the warpers:

The warpfloor is a large open area with designated points where a warper would stand and open up a warp for a team - these points were marked out with yellow paint and numbered, and there is a thick metal sheild that could be raised behind each pad (sorry to use the same noun) to protect anyone from gunfire spilling in from the outside. Without warpers to open holes in space/time, the warpfloor is little more than a large concrete room with hallways leading out of it and two four man t-port units, one at each end.

[archer]

That explanation helps a lot, thanks H.

Uh, on a separate note, is Rourke supposed to be doing something else, or am I good for now? ::confused

[Heritage]

That explanation helps a lot, thanks H.

Uh, on a separate note, is Rourke supposed to be doing something else, or am I good for now? ::confused

I've still got some more posting to do, and I apologize for letting you and Phoenix sit on the bench so long - look for next post tomorrow afternoon CST bringing you two up to speed, and then more posts in the evening for everyone else.

[ezekiel]

Yeah, that really clears things up. I thought a porter was necessary to work the T-Port pads, kinda like a clear is needed for the Tessers in Trinity...only different.

Course the fact that there're nukes powering each T-Port is kinda worrisome...Say you stick an explosive on one what happens?

[Alex Green]

Atomic reactors do NOT blow up and kill millions of people, that's a myth. They melt down and kill thousands.

However, this is hyperfusion, which is a different technology. Hyperfusion generators are pretty common in abby so I assume they've ironed out the bugs (like producing radiation during the reaction). In theory, fusion's waste product is helium while fision's waste products are pretty toxic.

[ezekiel]

Atomic reactors do NOT blow up and kill millions of people, that's a myth. They melt down and kill thousands.

That's comforting... ::biggrin

But if you blow it up with an explosive what happens?Will it still just melt down / radioactive leak?

[Alex Green]

If you mean in Abby, then I doubt it. Hyperfusion doesn't have radioactive stuff to produce a radiation leak (the reaction itself might make radiation, but when you blow it up the reaction and thus the radiation stops). Of course that's just the radiation.

If you mean in real life, maybe. It depends on the reactor type and what you blow up. If you somehow got a hold of radioactive material and blew it up, you've just described a 'dirty bomb'. A melt down is a run away reaction (which leads to a radiation leak). The Russians really had to work hard to make theirs as bad as it got (let's design it wrong, disable multiple levels of safty equipment, then see if we can make it break: They could). The majority of nuclear energy's problems are exagerated and political, it's a lot safer than people realize.

[Heritage]

If you mean in Abby, then I doubt it. Hyperfusion doesn't have radioactive stuff to produce a radiation leak (the reaction itself might make radiation, but when you blow it up the reaction and thus the radiation stops). Of course that's just the radiation.

If you mean in real life, maybe. It depends on the reactor type and what you blow up. If you somehow got a hold of radioactive material and blew it up, you've just described a 'dirty bomb'. A melt down is a run away reaction (which leads to a radiation leak). The Russians really had to work hard to make theirs as bad as it got (let's design it wrong, disable multiple levels of safty equipment, then see if we can make it break: They could). The majority of nuclear energy's problems are exagerated and political, it's a lot safer than people realize.

In my research on fusion power at the theoretical level, it is pretty darn safe - as Alex said, the by-product is helium, which as exhaust goes ain't too bad. Apparently over time some parts of the reactor would become radioactive, but with a much shorter half-life than anything associated with fission. And yes, modern fission reactors are much safer than they used to be - however, the old weezy ones in Illinois aren't in such good shape, since several of them are leaking tritium (radiocative hydrogen), which I find less than encouraging. My big issue with fission has always been the waste, but with fusion there's almost none.

In fact, as far as I can tell, the only really dangerous part of fusion is the hot plasma if it escaped, but even here I've read contradictory statements; for the purposes of drama, I've said it would be a super-bad thing if plasma leaked out of a HF reactor, but I've also read that plasma cools rapidly and that it's so diffuse you barely experience any heat at all.

On the plus side, these are hyperfusion reactors, so we can make up all kinds of crazy facts about them ::wink

"Look out, white hot jelly shooting out of the vents! Aiiieeee!"

[Alex Green]

RE: Tritium

Tritium isn't too bad.

http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/tritium.htm

RE: Plasma

It depends on how much, how hot, and how intense. It's sort of like Liquid Nitrogen, although it has extreme properties, a small amount will just bounce off you. Too much and you get a first hand look at extreme physics. Basically we are assuming that a hyperfusion explosion falls into the "too much" catagory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_%28physics%29

[Heritage]

RE: Tritium

Tritium isn't too bad.

http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/tritium.htm

True, as radiation leaks go, this is not so bad, but if three (or possibly more, I forget) of your fission reactors have leaks in one state, enough to warrant the EPA shutting them down, then I do get a little concerned. As in most things, it's the people who make it scary - ComEd is not the best run utitility, for a number of reasons.

RE: Plasma

It depends on how much, how hot, and how intense. It's sort of like Liquid Nitrogen, although it has extreme properties, a small amount will just bounce off you. Too much and you get a first hand look at extreme physics. Basically we are assuming that a hyperfusion explosion falls into the "too much" catagory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_%28physics%29

Like he said - the one saving grace, as I see it, is that any sort of 'event' will be over very quickly and have few lasting effects...unless you consider death to be one.

[Heritage]

More to follow this afternoon!

[Heritage]

Sorry to have been so scarce the last week or so - the story has hit a sort of 'hump' that I'm just having trouble getting past. My schedule has gotten a little busier recently as well, which ain't helping either. I hope to be more active this week, so keep your eyes peeled ::smile

[Heritage]

Just to clarify, 'Monty' is (or was) the affectionate nickname for General Henry 'Manticore' Ballard, head of the Cobras; even people who hated the Cobras liked Monty. A mountain of a man with skin like rock and a thick heavy tail, in many ways he was the antithesis of the stereotypical Cobra; quiet and unassuming, he loved to read and play basketball (hard to do at his size), but he lead his men and women with a firm, mighty hand. And now he's gone ::sad

[Asbjørn]

Refresh my memory... How many exits are there from Bravo?

[Heritage]

Refresh my memory... How many exits are there from Bravo?

There are two 20' wide tunnels that run to the surface, one in the south-east corner that runs due south and one in the north-east corner that runs due west. There are also two elevator shafts, one in the armory on the east side and another in T&S in the north-west corner, that go to the surface with emergency ladders on the walls. After that it's just the two four-pad t-ports, one on the north side of the warpfloor, the other on the south. I'll highlight the exits on a map for Goodies section.

Edit: I might as well put a link to it here for convinience sake. Just a reminder that the motor pool is large area directly adjacent to the northeast tunnel, which is where Greens are queing up to jump in vehicles and shoot on down the tunnel after the Cobras, who are welcome to grab onto them as they pass and hold on for dear life. And a few of the soldiers sent to get their gear back at their bunks have decided to say 'screw it' to returning to the warpfloor and are starting to haul ass down the southern tunnel.

Oh man, I completely forgot I mentioned there were small service vehicles on the warpfloor many posts ago in the old thread - these would be drafted for evac duty as well. Picture the sort of carts you see at airport terminals, mixed in with a few four-wheeled ATV's ala the ship's mule from Firefly.

Edit deux: Also since some of those little vehicles are part of the Engineering group, I imagine a few of them are queing up in the south corridor leading back to Engineering, ready to haul ass to the southern tunnel as well.

[Heritage]

For the record, the elevators are both behind large movable walls (to T&S and Armory) which T&S personnel will begin opening up as backup routes in my next post. And if anyone wants to ask Kelso for any kind of crazy gear like big-ass lasers or man-portable surface-to-air missiles, now would be a good time ::wink

[archer]

Refresh the board and read my PM ya damn hippie! ::biggrin

[Heritage]

Refresh the board and read my PM ya damn hippie! ::biggrin

I just did, you capitalist running dog! ::tongue

[phoenix]

Montyyyyyy ::sad

[Alex Green]

Question for ST: Vlad can move through rock, I assume without leaving a trail. Can he choose to leave a trail (or tunnel) behind him?

[Asbjørn]

Ok, this might have been mentioned somewhere, but I can't remember reading it. How many people are we talking about evacuating here? Hundreds? Thousands?

[Heritage]

Ok, this might have been mentioned somewhere, but I can't remember reading it. How many people are we talking about evacuating here? Hundreds? Thousands?

I would say somewhere in the range of 200 souls in WS Bravo, based on my estimates.

[BlueNinja]

So ... did I miss it, or was nothing posted about the teleport pads for me?

[Alex Green]

OK, this is what Vlad wants to do.

Make a tunnel by pushing and compacting the dirt to the sides. Presumably this would drag air to fill the new void and create rock on the sides strong enough to support the tunnel itself. The problem is this sounds like a combination of increase/decrease and movement, so I don't know if it's allowed or not. The other problems (in no order) are:

1: Lack of air in the tunnel as we get going.

2: Vlad's movement rate is only 25 or so KPH so it will take a while to go anywhere.

3: With the creation of a new tunnel I expect people to rush it.

4: Where the heck should we go

[archer]

OK, this is what Vlad wants to do.

Make a tunnel by pushing and compacting the dirt to the sides. Presumably this would drag air to fill the new void and create rock on the sides strong enough to support the tunnel itself. The problem is this sounds like a combination of increase/decrease and movement, so I don't know if it's allowed or not. The other problems (in no order) are:

1: Lack of air in the tunnel as we get going.

2: Vlad's movement rate is only 25 or so KPH so it will take a while to go anywhere.

3: With the creation of a new tunnel I expect people to rush it.

4: Where the heck should we go

Actually Alex, Vlad should be able to use the Shaping technique if H allows it...granted, it's on a much larger scale, but he can literally shape the earth and rock into a tunnel, buttressing included.

[Alex Green]

Shaping does 3 cubic meters per dot, I'll run out of juice real quick. I could powermax that for MIRV (area?) and create an island, but here that's not good.

Or maybe we could call it "Shaping as a maintenance power", but that brings us back to "movement + shaping" or some such. There really should be something that allows it, and I'd be happy to call it "shaping", but the vanilla rules don't quite do it.

[archer]

Shaping does 3 cubic meters per dot, I'll run out of juice real quick. I could powermax that for MIRV (area?) and create an island, but here that's not good.

Or maybe we could call it "Shaping as a maintenance power", but that brings us back to "movement + shaping" or some such. There really should be something that allows it, and I'd be happy to call it "shaping", but the vanilla rules don't quite do it.

Good point of the Q cost for Shaping, didn't have the book with me when I posted that. I thought of something else earlier though...the description for movement mentions tunnelling through the earth. That doesn't necessarily mean the tunnel collapses behind you; I mean, groundhogs and gophers tunnel all the time and leave perfectly sound tunnels behind them that stay there for years.

Couldn't you just have Vlad's Movement technique allow for open tunnels behind him? It would force the tunnel to be fairly narrow(ie, the size of Vlad), but it would allow for people to follow single-file.

[Heritage]

So ... did I miss it, or was nothing posted about the teleport pads for me?

Dude, you're absolutely right - sorry I dropped the ball there ::blush Look for Judy-specific post soon, possibly tonight.

[archer]

Dude, you're absolutely right - sorry I dropped the ball there ::blush Look for Judy-specific post soon, possibly tonight.

Are the T-Ports on the Warpfloor as well? I thought they were, but I can't remember. If they are, that mean's we've got Judy, Vlad, and Rourke in the same area.

[ezekiel]

Couldn't you just have Vlad's Movement technique allow for open tunnels behind him? It would force the tunnel to be fairly narrow(ie, the size of Vlad), but it would allow for people to follow single-file.

Problem is that it opens Pandora's box...if movement allows a tunnel you can envision problems if Vlad ever gets hypermovement or something. How does shape matter work? Maybe we could convert that into a volume instead of an area, allowing for longer tunnels than would normally be allowed...

[archer]

I understand your point, but I disagree. There are no restrictions in the rules for such a thing, nor is there any indication that travelling via other elements is similarly limited.

Let's use fire as an example:

Flame-O propels himself through the air by using existing flame as a jet behind him. His fire trail unfortunately combusts everything behind him. Useful if he wants to make steam by flying over a lake, but not so handy inside a shopping mall.

Similar problems exist for my idea of tunnelling...yeah, he makes tunnels. But what happens if he's making tunnels underneath a building's foundations? Even moving under sandy soil would likely cause the tunnel behind him to collapse immediately.

And in that case, how specific do we need to be about the type of terra he's moving through? Certain types of rock are more stable than others, etc, etc.

Basically what I'm getting at is that any power can be abused horribly if care isn't taken by the ST and players to keep an eye on things. I just never liked that argument, it's too circular.

[ezekiel]

I think that'd depend on the jet flame...If its strong enough to make a lake steam up I'd vote that you'd have to activate immolate. If a player doesn't use immolate I'd only allow for enough flame to start a fire on easily combustible material, not damaging if you zip by someone...

Anyway, back to earth, what's wrong with "diminish"? It's a maintenance power and allows you to remove 100% of the element with four successes in an area of Quantum + power rating x 10 meters, that's pretty darn good. It says the effect of the element but then gives air as an example which would create a vacuum...I'd vote that Diminish makes a tunnel that lasts as long as the power does and Shaping makes a permanent tunnel. Meaning that creating a base for everyone would take longer than making a quick escape.

[Asbjørn]

Are the T-Ports on the Warpfloor as well? I thought they were, but I can't remember. If they are, that mean's we've got Judy, Vlad, and Rourke in the same area.

Judy, Vlad, Rourke, Nomad and Hood, actually. So all the Bravo PCs are pretty close together, except Sarah.

[Alex Green]

My editor here is limited so I'm going to use multiple posts.

Problem is that it opens Pandora's box...if movement allows a tunnel you can envision problems if Vlad ever gets hypermovement or something. How does shape matter work? Maybe we could convert that into a volume instead of an area, allowing for longer tunnels than would normally be allowed...

Shaping is already a volume, and hypermovement wouldn't change his movement rate since h-move doesn't interact with the suite movements (maybe they thought of this one).

In theory Vlad could use movement to leave an open trail, the problem is he's already defined it as an earth merge.

This doesn't have to be a problem, the suite powers actually list *two* movement techniques. Propel and movement, and one leaves a trail of your element behind you. In theory Vlad could have both, one just isn't mastered.

But IMHO this would require ST permission.

... what's wrong with "diminish"? It's a maintenance power and allows you to remove 100% of the element with four successes in an area of Quantum + power rating x 10 meters, that's pretty darn good. It says the effect of the element but then gives air as an example which would create a vacuum...I'd vote that Diminish makes a tunnel that lasts as long as the power does and Shaping makes a permanent tunnel. Meaning that creating a base for everyone would take longer than making a quick escape.

Not bad... but I'm not sure this quite works either.

Problem 1: Going to zero percent takes 4 succ, this isn't mastered so spending willpower just let's him function normally. Statistically he'd get 2 succ, for 50% (does he make half a tunnel?)

Problem 2: Area implies a radius, we'd need ST's permission to make it a tunnel. We might also need ST permission to center the effect on myself, but that sounds more reasonable.

Problem 3: A 60 meter tunnel with 60 people will probably run out of air pretty quick.

Note problem 3 is something we could work out via roll playing, i.e. we have a limited amount of time to save everyone. I could have added people would fight over being one of the 60 but that's also a role playing problem.

So going this way is an option, but it'd be hard.

[tooho]

Hey, guys, just wanted to apologize for being away from the board this two weeks. Home interent is bugging on me, and my little brother is moving in with me and I'm trying to get the house ready. Much apologies. I will post tomorrow in all threads that I'm overdue in! ::blush

[Heritage]

I just got it in and I need to be up early-ish, but I do plan on responding to the whole tunneling debate this weekend, as well as more posty goodness. And good to see you back, T! ::biggrin

[Heritage]

I don't know if I've mentioned it, but I've got a frickin' abcess that is not resonding well to antibiotics; I never thought the day would come where I'd actually want to have a root canal done, but there you go. Vicodin is really not helping, but I see Senor Dentista again this Thursday. Sorry for yet another posting lag, but life is not fun right now ::sad

[tooho]

Ohh, you poor poor ST. I feel your pain. Well, actually I don't, but I'm glad I'm not you! ::blush