So it's basically a battlesuit with less equipment, that has a lot more and better armour and that uses equipment slots and is easily upgradable like Sean's Modular replacement for the MKIII instead of using built in equipment, correct?
It's a bvattlesuit with a less equipment, but you can choose your own equipment to make up for that. Has better armor (the stuff ARESTEVE will design once the artifacts arrive), not sure to what exact amount (thickness/amount of protection) that will come down to.
Not sure if pw will allow extra equipment from the equipment slots to be bought separately after that fact (for less tokens than it would normally cost from the armory, that is).
Seems reasonable to me, and is highly compatible in principle to the MACS. The MACS can probably largely replace a battlesuit's control-cuff system, by reading biometric data directly from the body of the wearer (or from robo- or synth-limbs, in case of integrated MACS systems), so in effect it would be the same as the regular MACS with a regular exoskeleton - just upscaled to a more threatening size.
No offense, but I think I'd like to keep this suit a separate, individual unit. No saying I won't consider it, but I kinda feel it should be a piece of equipment on it's own (meaning it's more like a battlesuit in that all you need to control it is inside).
I would like to point out that kinetic amps constitute a very small part of battlesuit price. I recall Piecewise once pointing out that a battlesuit prototype would cost a hundred tokens or so, and most of that is its armor. Other such components might be similarly cheap, given the mass-production scale required, and overall cost reduction wouldn't be so great as one might want.
You are very right. Basic idea is this: imagine buying a battlesuit and having 0 uncon skill, but upon purchase the Am tells you you could switch out the kinetic amps for installing a weapon hardpoint on the suit (this is something that's often done) for the same 20 tokens. Wouldn't that be convenient?
Furthermore, while exciting, it might prove very difficult to keep track of all the customization
Dunno, it'd just mean adding a line with the chosen options to it's inventory entry, just like what he does for the AoW right now.
and either each one is nigh-custom built, which would mean barely any cost reduction from mass production, or (much more likely) there would have to be some kind of modular design, and then likely some upgrades will compete for space/mountpoints - like, say, the rocket pods upgrade and the power backpack.
Yeah, you just have the basic suit with space and ports left for installing stuff. You might have a point about space problems, but a) pw doesn't take this into account often (a weak, cop out reason, I know) and b) I think that it shouldn't be to much of a problem if I try to plan in enough space and ports. But you are right, some stuff might end up mutually exclusive (you can only fit so much into an arm, for example).
That said, the design sounds very promising. In your opinion, would there be possible to purchase and install additional components for the same standardised fee?
That'd be awesome, but not sure if pw would allow it. If he would, then I'd try to make sure every option costs about the same (aiming 5-ish tokens)
Just one more idea - if the upgrades actually turn out to cost very little, why not go all the other way? Tinker in as much upgrades as we can and then apply them all to Battlesuit Mk II - slightly more expensive, yes, but far more capable. It would be in line with all the previous philosophy of suit design, and mind it: the flat cost to token price seem to be exponential - the more we stuff in, the less each additional component would add to the whole cost (if mass-produced, of course). Avatar of War prototype price to Battlesuit prototype price to Mk III prototype price to Mk II prototype price.
Or maybe let that be New Battlesuit Mk II, and let New Battlesuit Mk I be what you envisaged.
One problem: the small price gap between the battlesuit and the AoW. While I know there are several downsides to the AoW, in terms of raw power and bang-for-buck it outshines everything else by miles and miles (I think it is underpriced by 10 tokens at least, but eh). I very much doubt we can anything as performant. So, if my new suit ends up costing, say, 25 tokens, then the gap is so small that I fear most people would rather shell out for the AoW. Secondly, adding in all sorts of stuff means some of it will be useless to people, and thus a waste of resources (both tokens and in-game). Kin amps are the perfect example of this.
I sense a great deal of haggling and compromise in the future, but the basic idea is just fine and dandy.
I can live with that. In fact, it seemed obvious it'd need some tweaking and finding middle ground when I started typing, so it's all cool bro.
I kinda wonder about some of it, like an improved genner for weapons, because I'm pretty sure that idea was shot down.
How so? It would be a separate generator, to ensure the basic suit stays the same (to ensure we get mass production bonus).
Maybe offer as a generic option of 'more armor', make the default amor level three layers, and add two more slots for choices? Then you could customize something like the mobility or melee battlesuit, sacrificing armor for more utility.
Right now I'm thinking of two basic suits: one is like a battlesuit, with high armor and mobility like a battlesuit, but with equipment options to boost that somewhat, and one is like a melee battlesuit, less armor but small maneuvering rockets (note that, for high jumps or flying, an equipment slot is needed, it just gives good 'horizontal' mobility). I consider the exoskeleton the core of a suit, since replacing that means taking the entire thing apart, so I didn't want to let 'upgrade exoskeleton to mobility type' as an option, since that means a whole new suit anyways.
The first one would have a bonus to strength and hopefully +2 to end (due to high-tech armor and exoskeleton to carry it), while the second one trades the second +1 end for +1 dex.
I considered using 1 'basic suit' with low armor, and then let the buyer either get extra armor (to get battlesuit-like suit) or the rockets for maneuvering and exoskeleton upgrade, but that didn't seem realistic from an in-game perspective (I think armor needs to be somewhat integrated into a suit, instead of just duck taped on ad-hoc, except for outer layers maybe. And taking it all apart to upgrade the exoskeleton seems silly, and having another variant with dex-based exoskeleton seems more practical).
Also, you might add "Even stronger exoskeleton" to that list.
For reasons stated above, I think that'd it be better to have a third variant that focuses on something else than dex or end if needed, than to expect the whole suit to be taken apart to replace such an integral part of the suit as the exoskeleton. This might just be an unnecessary need for realism on my part though.
Even worse, space magic doesn't really give a carp about any of it's heavy armor.
It's kinda unbalanced that way, since if the pilot (but not the suit) would be somehow protected from direct amp influence, it would give way to much more interesting tactics for amps than 'heat brain, gg'. Such as that trick the AM showed about heating up a joint to disable a battlesuit (even though the same heat could just be used to kill the pilot and be done with it).
Basically, most weapons have one of two levels of effectiveness against battlesuits: "Plink", or "Kill". There's a few exceptions; both the HGC and HEP remove one layer of armor only, but basically everything else falls into those two categories.
Not sure if I entirely agree (a 'kill weapon' only kills on a good hit, a glancing shot might mean that the armor saves the suit's life). I think I get what you are saying though: make the armor
juuuust strong enough to shrug of low tier weapons, resist mid tier, and hope the mobility gained will save it from high-tier.
Make mobility improvements like jetpacks standard, so that you have better defense against BS killers like PSLs, Lavalamp cannons, and space magic.
Note that there are situations where mobility doesn't matter as much, such as cramped environments (tight urban environments, a battlesuit's primary habitat) or on defending a fixed position (oversimplifying, yes, but you get the idea). And note that I try to consider not just situations for players, but sod or allied forces as well. So I do think giving the option of mobility is a bit better than making it mandatory, to prevent giving stuff where it won't be used/needed (because I'm cheap, both from tokens/player perspective, as well as in-game Hep/resources perspective). Also note that mobility is expensive, and for reasons above I wanna keep this around 20 tokens.
Finally, change the cockpit to a braincase, so that the overall size of the thing can be reduced so that it can still fit through doors.
The space savings from the latter should make the former two things even easier, because it's way lighter and you have much less area to protect than a full body. We might be able to armor the joints with Avatar cloth, closing another weakness. The biggest problem is that you have to get decapitated to use one. I think that's acceptable- the fleshies that want to keep their head can get an old BS, and the robos can get this. They complement each other, much like heavy tanks and light tanks. And all our robosods wouldn't mind at all, I'm sure.
The idea in and of itself is good, and occurred to me way back when I was thinking of designs for tanks (before that was 'shot down' by pw). I had considered making the vehicle smaller by only allowing for braincases. However, I don't think you'll ever get a suit like this with the power and equipment of a battlesuit in a package that's small enough to comfortably go through doors while keeping cost reasonable (might be wrong about that). And there have been plenty situations where being able to get out of the battlesuit was handy: when Gilgamesh was damaged on the planetoid, for Flint to join the boarding (though a robo could have gotten his braincase put in a body for that), roleplaying reasons. And it would confine the player to the suit for the most part, like with an AoW. Still, for our sod forces it would make a lot of sense (though in that case it'd be more like another flavor of sod than a sod with a suit). I'm just not sure it'd be a good idea from a game perspective. It'd be a pretty big change to the suit philosophy: can't loan it out, if damaged you're screwed, hard to supply to allied forces (it'd have to come with it's own sod).
I was considering it before, but was leaning to keeping it simple and more 'open for everyone', so didn't mention it to keep focus on the core idea. Might have to reconsider, trading universal use for smaller size. Hmm...
Also, what, AP rounds? The basic round is solid metal. What would an AP round be? Mythril penetrator core? Kinetic amp tip?
Shaped charge perhaps?
And yes, it is kind of a larger version of Milno's suit. Primary differences are that it's cheaper, better armored, and uses actual fully steel robotic limbs instead of flesh. Also, instead of operating a bunch of complex functions with your tounge and chin, you can operate them with a mere thought.
And yeah, It's like a mini-Lukas. He had heavy massive cheap armor though, rather than BS plate. And wasn't highly mobile. And had a much larger armory- I agree with Radio, integrating weapons is a bad idea.
I think there is certainly a place for such a suit (modern Milno-like suit but upgraded), but I don't think I could rhyme it with this idea, because I just don't know if a) taking away the universality is a good idea, b) I'm not sure you'll ever get all that power into a small enough package to bump it down to 'can move around inside like a regular player' and c) even if we go for it, it might be a good idea to keep the core idea (it's a tank/ heavyinfantry support platform) and use the space won for armor or subsystems (inside the suit. I think a quantum entanglement computer/ AWACS pack might already make up for the space won).
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Topic: Einsteinian Roulette: OOC and NEW PLAYER INFO (Read 2525796 times)