High Guard: Are collectors too good?

[Sigtrygg]

They exist a lot more than ion weapons do.

The Annic Nova was the first adventure in the first issue of JTAS, it would later become part of the 1st double adventure. Third Imperium worlds are mentioned in the fluff around the adventure. Clues within the Annic Nova lead to more JTAS adventures.

If you can find me a reference to a Star Wars like ion weapon the MgT rules have introduced anywhere in the Third Imperium setting I would like to see it. Ion weapons along with Tachyon weapons were introduced in MgT but should never have appeared in a Third Imperium setting book. Sadly MgT authors aren't always fully conversant with previous setting canon - hey it's in the crb it must be in the Third Imperium right. Let's sneak a personal energy shield in there too because they look so cool in Dune, Foundation, Star Wars...

 

[Arkathan]

They exist a lot more than ion weapons do.

The Annic Nova was the first adventure in the first issue of JTAS, it would later become part of the 1st double adventure. Third Imperium worlds are mentioned in the fluff around the adventure. Clues within the Annic Nova lead to more JTAS adventures.

If you can find me a reference to a Star Wars like ion weapon the MgT rules have introduced anywhere in the Third Imperium setting I would like to see it. Ion weapons along with Tachyon weapons were introduced in MgT but should never have appeared in a Third Imperium setting book. Sadly MgT authors aren't always fully conversant with previous setting canon - hey it's in the crb it must be in the Third Imperium right. Let's sneak a personal energy shield in there too because they look so cool in Dune, Foundation, Star Wars...

I think the ion weapons were a good addition to the High Guard, but should have been in the exotic tech section.

 

[Sigtrygg]

An ion weapon as described in the Mongoose rules is not a bad idea, it is basically a directed energy weapon that interrupts electronics, i.e. it is similar to a directed EMP.
What I can not get over is the naming and description are also a direct rip off from Star Wars and once again highlight the Mongoose subliminal inclusion of Star Wars tropes in their vision of the Third Imperium.

 

[WHULorigan]

An ion weapon as described in the Mongoose rules is not a bad idea, it is basically a directed energy weapon that interrupts electronics, i.e. it is similar to a directed EMP.

T5 calls it an Electronic Scrambler but it is basically the MgT idea, though it is alternately either a centered-field or can have a directed option to produce the directed EMP idea mentioned.

(T5 also has Gravitic & Magnetic Scramblers at higher TLs).

 

[Morgoth99]

I mean the thing is, ion weapons, don't really change the fundamental assumptions of the setting. It's a different kind of energy weapon that has a slightly different effect but it's not for example something that would let an Empire that had it overpower Every Other Nation. Nor is it something that is just obviously better than every other weapon.

Collectors, and for that matter any other alternate style of drive system, has to be much more careful because it does impact some of the really base assumptions that underlie the social financial and technological underpinnings of The Traveler universe.

 

[WHULorigan]

Collectors, and for that matter any other alternate style of drive system, has to be much more careful because it does impact some of the really base assumptions that underlie the social financial and technological underpinnings of The Traveler universe.

Yes. And you can include an alternate drive system, but you have to be careful to craft it in such a way that it is generally inferior in most ways to the primary system (otherwise it wouldn't be primary).

But I think the idea is that the Collector is one of those items that once you know it can be done, you can build it beginning at a given TL; but that doesn't necessarily mean a given society has discovered it by that TL. I think that is the case with the Imperium. The ANNIC NOVA may be the first example it has ever seen, and the ANNIC NOVA's "Canopy" may be degraded or patched-up with substandard component technologies over the millennia to keep it in working-order, which may be why it currently operates differently from standard.

At any rate, the technology on ANNIC NOVA would not have altered things in Charted Space . . . yet.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Or perhaps the disruption is the point of the introduction of the technology. In my version of the Ancients campaign, I have begun the introduction of the hop 1 drive. It is very new tech and will be disruptive, but I want it to be. Very few ships will get it anytime in the near future, but it's presence will cause upheaval, and that is my intent for the players to navigate.

 

[Morgoth99]

Yeah. In a way, it's sort of like Virus, only with less death and destruction. Changing how jump drive works, or adding say, FTL radio, essentially is a "Before and after" style story, where much of hte rest of the campaign is going to (if it's more than a one-off black box drive), be dealing with all kinds of fallout.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Yeah. In a way, it's sort of like Virus, only with less death and destruction. Changing how jump drive works, or adding say, FTL radio, essentially is a "Before and after" style story, where much of hte rest of the campaign is going to (if it's more than a one-off black box drive), be dealing with all kinds of fallout.

Indeed.