Post by Alex Efasteyo on Feb 27, 2011 22:09:19 GMT -5
Dave and Alex have talked here in the forums, we've also chatted in IRC too. There is some stuff Dave wants that seem like Alex's cup of tea. So basically our questions for Griff are on the order of can these be allowed, what would be their stats, and how long game time will it take Alex to make what he can make (or maybe what sort of extended rolls Alex has to make).
Project 1) Grappling Guns for Motorcycles.
Based on RL technology, this certainly seems doable - in general. Some problems and potential problems are the size, mass, range, accuracy, noise, and how hidden it needs to be so cops won't easily notice it as Dave and his boys go cruising. Dave's reference to Alex for what he was thinking about can be seen by watching the following video www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQTvXskADTs.
The military actually does have powerful grappling guns. Typically they're "small" cannons. These cannons are likely to be as long as, if not longer than, any given motorcycle. So downsizing from those designs seems appropriate and necessary. Unfortunately, this reduces power, range, penetration and accuracy. Fortunately, it also reduces mass.
For balance purposes, Alex would figure that two - one on each side of the motorcycle - would work best. The reasoning being that most of the time driving the motorcycles, the grapples would be loaded and be balanced while driving. The exception being that if only one was fired, then the balance will be off. Alternatively, one could probably arrange it so the cabling was stored on one side while the grapple on the other, with other pieces of equipment placed as best for balance - and even some sort of ballast possibly added.
As mentioned above, cabling is Alex's preferred way to attach the grapple. The cabling should should have at least two ways of finishing. In one case, it should have some sort of ratchet lock type mechanism to keep the cable taught while the cable remains to attached to the motorcycle. In the second case, it should have some sort of release mechanism to help prevent damage to the bikes. Another possible feature might be a small motor to rewind the cable after use. A possible advanced feature (one almost certainly requiring some redesigning and rebuilding of the bikes) would be some sort of gear mechanism that would convert the motorcycles' normal engines to something that could put a lot behind the rewinding of the cables. The main use for this last feature would really be to haul the motorcycles over a distance they couldn't normally cross like a slippery and steep incline (or possibly even hauling themselves up vertically). Obviously Dave would have little use for this feature, but perhaps his followers might.
The grapple itself might have a mechanism or small explosive charge to help jam it into whatever it hits. (There are whaling harpoons that do this, so it is something that can be done in real life.) The effectiveness and best design for this will depend on the nature of the material that is the target. So we can't really get a best here, but whatever Dave thinks he wants to shoot at the most is what Alex can try to optimize it for.
For propulsion, there are a few possibilities. Dave mentioned heat seeking type grapples. This would be rocket powered, and rocket powered grapples actually exist IRL. Alex had been thinking more along the lines of gunpowder as a propellant. While I don't see why it wouldn't work, I didn't find any evidence of such existing IRL while skimming the internet. The other possibility, and actually Alex's favorite choice, is pneumatic/compressed air power. While it would almost certainly be less powerful than the other two methods, it would be much more quiet. It's also the most common method in use today for grappling guns, which means there are more designs to use as a basis when Alex goes to design this for Dave.
If used against a living target, my first thought is to treat these grapples as improved spears. As three of the four spears in the RAW do +4L damage, I'd start with that. Then add an extra +1L or +2L based on which method of propulsion is used (+1L for pneumatic, +2L for the other methods of propulsion). So I'd figure a base +5L or +6L damage. I'd expect aiming them would be difficult for a couple significant reasons: a variable distance means a variable weight of cable to slow down the grapple, plus the aiming wouldn't be nearly as natural as a thrown object or bullet...or even an arrow. As most normal weapons don't have worse than a -1 accuracy, I might recommend that. Or maybe a -2 as that is what a bazooka has, and in some ways these seem pretty similar. They're pretty obviously single fire, so clip is 1. I'd guess speed should probably be 5 (like most rifles) or 6 (like the cannons). I definitely think it should be piercing.
The toughest thing for me to recommend is a range, as that depends on how much extra weight Dave wants on his bikes as well as how strong he wants the cable. A steel cable is normally considered pretty strong, so I checked around and among other interesting info on the internet there is this (the bottom) table www.lexcocable.com/7x19_aircraft_cable.html#gac. You can use it to crunch numbers like I did for Alex, but the bottom line is pretty much the strength is kinda low for the weight for our purposes. However, some modern man made materials, like kevlar, are considerably stronger for their weight. Several sources I found make them out as on the order of 10 times better than steel (but there are other variables involved). Anyway, the top table on this site www.rigshop.com/catalogue.html has some samples figures for kevlar. Considering the weight, strength of our opponents, etc., Alex would think the 20 mm (a little more than 3/4 of an inch) diameter cable is a sweet spot. It'll hold up to 60,000 pounds, so useful for most anything - and while the cable could be cut, pure strength trying to burst this would be probably be high demigod or better. Assuming a maximum length/range of 60, the weight for a pair of these would be less than 80 pounds, which shouldn't make too significant of an effect on the everyday performance of the motorcycles (well, unless they're racing). If we want to get more fantastic, you could allow Alex to make carbon nanotube cables. Theoretical guesses I've seen as to how good these would be range between 12 to 60 times better than kevlar or other modern fiber materials, but experimental evidence based on our currently quite limited ability to manufacturer carbon nanotubes gives a range more like 3 1/2 to 14 times stronger. But no matter how you slice it, carbon nanotube cables would be a big improvement, if allowed. But assuming kevlar cables at the sweet spot above, I'd give the object a range of 15, and the appropriate accuracy penalties for greater distances until its maximum of 60.
Another possible feature is instead of having the grappling guns shoot straight ahead at a fixed elevation, they could possibly be on turrets that allow a small amount of rotation: up, down, and outward. Alex envisions joystick like controls for these. And because they'd be hard to practice with, at this point Alex would recommend some sort of aiming feature. Alex would want this with computers, cameras, and probably laser range finders. The output would be a picture of what the computer calculated as the most likely target area (note this may take a lot of development time on its own, and most of it can't be done until all the rest of the equipment is in place to experiment with). However, I'd expect this to offset the negative base accuracy, and maybe even add a +1 for ranges greater than 15.
So, these are most of Alex's and my thoughts on the subject. The exact details of what is desired are obviously up to Dave, while what's allowed is up to Griff. I'll contribute more if you want me for something, but unless something new comes up I think mostly it's between the two of you to figure out the details on this.
Project 2) Convert Motorcycle Helmet into Something Like Splinter Cell Goggles.
Well, first off after Dave and Alex's last bit of conversation on the forums, I am not sure how interested Dave still is in these. But Alex loves the idea and would love to work on them for Dave and his followers if Dave is still interested.
For reference, there's a nice wiki article on these goggles, splintercell.wikia.com/wiki/Multi-Vision_Goggles.
So first up, night vision mode. As Alex mentioned to Dave, the combination of Penetrating Glare and Night Vision boons are far better than this. But this sort of basic light enhancement goggle has been around for decades, so no problem doing something along these lines. One problem with this that probably isn't too well know is that these sorts of goggles do interfere with depth perception (at least per some stuff I read some months ago that was written by former Recon Marines who actually used them).
Second up, infrared vision mode. Unless were fighting something like warm blooded chameleons in the dark, the boons mentioned previously will be far more beneficial. And again, these things have been around for decades, so they are totally doable. Per the same source as above, they also suffer from the depth perception problem.
Lastly, there's the "computer pick up thingy" (as Dave called it) mode. To the best of my knowledge, this is not possible with our current technology. I know of things that if improved over time might be able to do the job, so I expect it's possible. (And for all I know the military actually has stuff like this under development.) Anyway, the only way I know to do it now requires the helmet to become an active instead of passive sensor, meaning it would have to radiate stuff and interpret the return signal. Also, the equipment for this would be fairly large, more man sized than something that could fit in a helmet. Not to mention the range is currently pretty short (as in a few feet), plus because it's radiating (magnetic fields, radio waves, sound waves, etc.) the helmet could act sort of like wearing a spotlight on your head - not really I'd expect Dave to want.
The wiki mentions modes for the goggles that Dave did not mention, but most of these seem similar to the previous one. That is they're mostly too high tech for our RL tech plus they're likely to be active sensors which could actually alert whoever you're trying to sneak up on. The obvious exception to that is color night vision. This has been done in real life, but it's not - and to the best of my knowledge can't be - perfect (like the boons). Anyway, color night vision only works to a certain level of dimness, too dim and it no longer functions. (I'd guess there'd be a noise versus information problem that will set an absolute limit on how dim it can go, whatever our technology currently has as its limits). Currently this technology is also pretty expensive.
Things not mentioned by Dave or listed as having their own modes in the Wiki, but that Alex was thinking about are telescopic, microscopic, and camera functions. Electronic zooming for telescopic or microscopic functionality is best limited otherwise things get blurry or pixelated. Optical zooming for either of those works much better, but would require larger lenses. I'd guess somewhere between 1.5x and 3x optical zoom and a 3x electronic zoom would be about best we could put into a helmet. Camera functionality requires very little extra, as there's plenty of space to add the components of a very small camera.
The last thing Alex was thinking about was a computerized enhancement. Now if we used cameras in the first place (that is IR and LE cameras) and processed them through a computer, the output could be a stereoscopic image displayed on the inside of the helmet visor. The idea here is to help offset the know problem with depth perception normally found when using goggle of these types. There's also the built in advantage or preventing too much light from causing any sort of temporary blindness.
Project 3) Make Motorcycles Quiet.
This is probably next to impossible with technology due to the a combination of the nature of the changes that would need to be made and the fact that the bikes are relics or semi-relics (Dave's followers bikes might not be full blown relics, but they have a magical link that lets them be restored if damaged). My reasoning for this is that significant alterations in the bike seem most likely to be treated the same as damage and the changes undone; as the new parts were not endowed with any ichor while missing/altered parts were.
Anyway, from a technological standpoint, the best thing I can think of for this is a redesign and rebuild as hybrid bikes. A white noise generator that sends out sound waves that perfectly cancel the output from the motorcycles seems impossible as everyone's ears are in different and moving positions relative to the bike. Soundproofing, a better muffler, etc. would all help - but almost certainly not enough, assuming Dave wants a real "stealth mode" for his bikes. Even typical electric motorcycles aren't really silent. Their very quiet compared to a normal motorcycle, but the few I've heard have all been louder than your average car.
However, if an electric motorcycle designed for pure quiet was combined with a typical powerful 2 stroke cruiser (like I figure a strapping Aesir would be riding), it just might be possible to do something acceptable. Alex envisions a hybrid, it can be powered by electricity, gas (petrol), or both. Normal mode would be gas powered and performance should be marginally less than what Dave and his followers typically get. High performance mode would be both motors at once, giving a noticeable, but not huge, boost in performance. Then there is the electric stealth mode. Acceleration is likely to suck in this mode, but cruising at a speed already attained should be easy enough as long as the driving is not mostly uphill. The range in stealth mode wouldn't be too great, no doubt under 60 miles without some super high tech or magical electric power.
But as stated earlier, the main problem here is whether or not these enhancements can somehow be made so that they work with the relicy nature of the motorcycles. If that's not an issue, Alex would be eager and willing to work on this.
Project 1) Grappling Guns for Motorcycles.
Based on RL technology, this certainly seems doable - in general. Some problems and potential problems are the size, mass, range, accuracy, noise, and how hidden it needs to be so cops won't easily notice it as Dave and his boys go cruising. Dave's reference to Alex for what he was thinking about can be seen by watching the following video www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQTvXskADTs.
The military actually does have powerful grappling guns. Typically they're "small" cannons. These cannons are likely to be as long as, if not longer than, any given motorcycle. So downsizing from those designs seems appropriate and necessary. Unfortunately, this reduces power, range, penetration and accuracy. Fortunately, it also reduces mass.
For balance purposes, Alex would figure that two - one on each side of the motorcycle - would work best. The reasoning being that most of the time driving the motorcycles, the grapples would be loaded and be balanced while driving. The exception being that if only one was fired, then the balance will be off. Alternatively, one could probably arrange it so the cabling was stored on one side while the grapple on the other, with other pieces of equipment placed as best for balance - and even some sort of ballast possibly added.
As mentioned above, cabling is Alex's preferred way to attach the grapple. The cabling should should have at least two ways of finishing. In one case, it should have some sort of ratchet lock type mechanism to keep the cable taught while the cable remains to attached to the motorcycle. In the second case, it should have some sort of release mechanism to help prevent damage to the bikes. Another possible feature might be a small motor to rewind the cable after use. A possible advanced feature (one almost certainly requiring some redesigning and rebuilding of the bikes) would be some sort of gear mechanism that would convert the motorcycles' normal engines to something that could put a lot behind the rewinding of the cables. The main use for this last feature would really be to haul the motorcycles over a distance they couldn't normally cross like a slippery and steep incline (or possibly even hauling themselves up vertically). Obviously Dave would have little use for this feature, but perhaps his followers might.
The grapple itself might have a mechanism or small explosive charge to help jam it into whatever it hits. (There are whaling harpoons that do this, so it is something that can be done in real life.) The effectiveness and best design for this will depend on the nature of the material that is the target. So we can't really get a best here, but whatever Dave thinks he wants to shoot at the most is what Alex can try to optimize it for.
For propulsion, there are a few possibilities. Dave mentioned heat seeking type grapples. This would be rocket powered, and rocket powered grapples actually exist IRL. Alex had been thinking more along the lines of gunpowder as a propellant. While I don't see why it wouldn't work, I didn't find any evidence of such existing IRL while skimming the internet. The other possibility, and actually Alex's favorite choice, is pneumatic/compressed air power. While it would almost certainly be less powerful than the other two methods, it would be much more quiet. It's also the most common method in use today for grappling guns, which means there are more designs to use as a basis when Alex goes to design this for Dave.
If used against a living target, my first thought is to treat these grapples as improved spears. As three of the four spears in the RAW do +4L damage, I'd start with that. Then add an extra +1L or +2L based on which method of propulsion is used (+1L for pneumatic, +2L for the other methods of propulsion). So I'd figure a base +5L or +6L damage. I'd expect aiming them would be difficult for a couple significant reasons: a variable distance means a variable weight of cable to slow down the grapple, plus the aiming wouldn't be nearly as natural as a thrown object or bullet...or even an arrow. As most normal weapons don't have worse than a -1 accuracy, I might recommend that. Or maybe a -2 as that is what a bazooka has, and in some ways these seem pretty similar. They're pretty obviously single fire, so clip is 1. I'd guess speed should probably be 5 (like most rifles) or 6 (like the cannons). I definitely think it should be piercing.
The toughest thing for me to recommend is a range, as that depends on how much extra weight Dave wants on his bikes as well as how strong he wants the cable. A steel cable is normally considered pretty strong, so I checked around and among other interesting info on the internet there is this (the bottom) table www.lexcocable.com/7x19_aircraft_cable.html#gac. You can use it to crunch numbers like I did for Alex, but the bottom line is pretty much the strength is kinda low for the weight for our purposes. However, some modern man made materials, like kevlar, are considerably stronger for their weight. Several sources I found make them out as on the order of 10 times better than steel (but there are other variables involved). Anyway, the top table on this site www.rigshop.com/catalogue.html has some samples figures for kevlar. Considering the weight, strength of our opponents, etc., Alex would think the 20 mm (a little more than 3/4 of an inch) diameter cable is a sweet spot. It'll hold up to 60,000 pounds, so useful for most anything - and while the cable could be cut, pure strength trying to burst this would be probably be high demigod or better. Assuming a maximum length/range of 60, the weight for a pair of these would be less than 80 pounds, which shouldn't make too significant of an effect on the everyday performance of the motorcycles (well, unless they're racing). If we want to get more fantastic, you could allow Alex to make carbon nanotube cables. Theoretical guesses I've seen as to how good these would be range between 12 to 60 times better than kevlar or other modern fiber materials, but experimental evidence based on our currently quite limited ability to manufacturer carbon nanotubes gives a range more like 3 1/2 to 14 times stronger. But no matter how you slice it, carbon nanotube cables would be a big improvement, if allowed. But assuming kevlar cables at the sweet spot above, I'd give the object a range of 15, and the appropriate accuracy penalties for greater distances until its maximum of 60.
Another possible feature is instead of having the grappling guns shoot straight ahead at a fixed elevation, they could possibly be on turrets that allow a small amount of rotation: up, down, and outward. Alex envisions joystick like controls for these. And because they'd be hard to practice with, at this point Alex would recommend some sort of aiming feature. Alex would want this with computers, cameras, and probably laser range finders. The output would be a picture of what the computer calculated as the most likely target area (note this may take a lot of development time on its own, and most of it can't be done until all the rest of the equipment is in place to experiment with). However, I'd expect this to offset the negative base accuracy, and maybe even add a +1 for ranges greater than 15.
So, these are most of Alex's and my thoughts on the subject. The exact details of what is desired are obviously up to Dave, while what's allowed is up to Griff. I'll contribute more if you want me for something, but unless something new comes up I think mostly it's between the two of you to figure out the details on this.
Project 2) Convert Motorcycle Helmet into Something Like Splinter Cell Goggles.
Well, first off after Dave and Alex's last bit of conversation on the forums, I am not sure how interested Dave still is in these. But Alex loves the idea and would love to work on them for Dave and his followers if Dave is still interested.
For reference, there's a nice wiki article on these goggles, splintercell.wikia.com/wiki/Multi-Vision_Goggles.
So first up, night vision mode. As Alex mentioned to Dave, the combination of Penetrating Glare and Night Vision boons are far better than this. But this sort of basic light enhancement goggle has been around for decades, so no problem doing something along these lines. One problem with this that probably isn't too well know is that these sorts of goggles do interfere with depth perception (at least per some stuff I read some months ago that was written by former Recon Marines who actually used them).
Second up, infrared vision mode. Unless were fighting something like warm blooded chameleons in the dark, the boons mentioned previously will be far more beneficial. And again, these things have been around for decades, so they are totally doable. Per the same source as above, they also suffer from the depth perception problem.
Lastly, there's the "computer pick up thingy" (as Dave called it) mode. To the best of my knowledge, this is not possible with our current technology. I know of things that if improved over time might be able to do the job, so I expect it's possible. (And for all I know the military actually has stuff like this under development.) Anyway, the only way I know to do it now requires the helmet to become an active instead of passive sensor, meaning it would have to radiate stuff and interpret the return signal. Also, the equipment for this would be fairly large, more man sized than something that could fit in a helmet. Not to mention the range is currently pretty short (as in a few feet), plus because it's radiating (magnetic fields, radio waves, sound waves, etc.) the helmet could act sort of like wearing a spotlight on your head - not really I'd expect Dave to want.
The wiki mentions modes for the goggles that Dave did not mention, but most of these seem similar to the previous one. That is they're mostly too high tech for our RL tech plus they're likely to be active sensors which could actually alert whoever you're trying to sneak up on. The obvious exception to that is color night vision. This has been done in real life, but it's not - and to the best of my knowledge can't be - perfect (like the boons). Anyway, color night vision only works to a certain level of dimness, too dim and it no longer functions. (I'd guess there'd be a noise versus information problem that will set an absolute limit on how dim it can go, whatever our technology currently has as its limits). Currently this technology is also pretty expensive.
Things not mentioned by Dave or listed as having their own modes in the Wiki, but that Alex was thinking about are telescopic, microscopic, and camera functions. Electronic zooming for telescopic or microscopic functionality is best limited otherwise things get blurry or pixelated. Optical zooming for either of those works much better, but would require larger lenses. I'd guess somewhere between 1.5x and 3x optical zoom and a 3x electronic zoom would be about best we could put into a helmet. Camera functionality requires very little extra, as there's plenty of space to add the components of a very small camera.
The last thing Alex was thinking about was a computerized enhancement. Now if we used cameras in the first place (that is IR and LE cameras) and processed them through a computer, the output could be a stereoscopic image displayed on the inside of the helmet visor. The idea here is to help offset the know problem with depth perception normally found when using goggle of these types. There's also the built in advantage or preventing too much light from causing any sort of temporary blindness.
Project 3) Make Motorcycles Quiet.
This is probably next to impossible with technology due to the a combination of the nature of the changes that would need to be made and the fact that the bikes are relics or semi-relics (Dave's followers bikes might not be full blown relics, but they have a magical link that lets them be restored if damaged). My reasoning for this is that significant alterations in the bike seem most likely to be treated the same as damage and the changes undone; as the new parts were not endowed with any ichor while missing/altered parts were.
Anyway, from a technological standpoint, the best thing I can think of for this is a redesign and rebuild as hybrid bikes. A white noise generator that sends out sound waves that perfectly cancel the output from the motorcycles seems impossible as everyone's ears are in different and moving positions relative to the bike. Soundproofing, a better muffler, etc. would all help - but almost certainly not enough, assuming Dave wants a real "stealth mode" for his bikes. Even typical electric motorcycles aren't really silent. Their very quiet compared to a normal motorcycle, but the few I've heard have all been louder than your average car.
However, if an electric motorcycle designed for pure quiet was combined with a typical powerful 2 stroke cruiser (like I figure a strapping Aesir would be riding), it just might be possible to do something acceptable. Alex envisions a hybrid, it can be powered by electricity, gas (petrol), or both. Normal mode would be gas powered and performance should be marginally less than what Dave and his followers typically get. High performance mode would be both motors at once, giving a noticeable, but not huge, boost in performance. Then there is the electric stealth mode. Acceleration is likely to suck in this mode, but cruising at a speed already attained should be easy enough as long as the driving is not mostly uphill. The range in stealth mode wouldn't be too great, no doubt under 60 miles without some super high tech or magical electric power.
But as stated earlier, the main problem here is whether or not these enhancements can somehow be made so that they work with the relicy nature of the motorcycles. If that's not an issue, Alex would be eager and willing to work on this.