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[Empiricist]

Glasses that give you a heads up display. That could be useful.

Could you please specify what you want on the HUD?

I dunno, ammo count, minimap, stuff like that

Ammo count would require electronics added to your weapon if they don't come with it inbuilt. Should be feasible possibly without any cost, but no-one's really lost count of ammo before. Minimap should be doable, not sure if it can get the user's position, and it probably won't be updatable.

Why glasses anyway? Suits come with a HUD that we could probably just add those features to assuming they aren't there already.

[renegadelobster]

Better armor. Shields maybe? Better, more useful, more versatile guns. More versatile support items? MOAR GENEMODS. More blops usable stuff, genemods and/or equipment?

[Empiricist]

Better armor. Shields maybe? Better, more useful, more versatile guns. More versatile support items? MOAR GENEMODS

Could you be more specific? By versatile do you mean like the Specktr and it's multiple wavelengths? Or the Pawn and it's use as a turret and explosive?

[renegadelobster]

Like the Spektr. Maybe like a set of weapons that all have the same ammo, but fill different roles? Laser based maybe? Blueradite based? For sharkmist based for manufacturing ammo.

[swordsmith04]

Something to let us avoid bullets and such, rather than wear a ton of armour to tank the shots. Something like Simus' phase suit or a weaker version of Renen's bullet time.

[Empiricist]

Glasses that give you a heads up display. That could be useful.

I consulted Piecewise about a more inconspicuous, reliable alternative and it is indeed possible. We could make an implant that streams that data straight into your brain. No need for glasses that may break, get lost or draw too much attention.

Better armor. Shields maybe? Better, more useful, more versatile guns. More versatile support items? MOAR GENEMODS. More blops usable stuff, genemods and/or equipment?

Like the Spektr. Maybe like a set of weapons that all have the same ammo, but fill different roles? Laser based maybe? Blueradite based? For sharkmist based for manufacturing ammo.

For Blops, I'll have to go check with the Doctor on this, now that Xan's lost his abilities. But it should be possible to coat robobodies with a fleshy veneer. Not sure how well it work to evade detection from more sophisticated system, but should be fine for deceiving the naked eye. Well, up until shit hits the fan and people burst out of their fleshy coats like a bunch of clumsy, terminators a couple years off their prime. Since it makes regular robobodies look fat, I have a feeling that synthflesh bodies would look morbidly obese.

We do have invisibility cloaks, though blops doesn't seem to use them. There was the discussion of some sort of blitzkrieg option to allow them to move quickly and take out all witnesses, but no one really put forth any ideas for how to achieve this. One possibility is some kind of directional teleport system with an amp-like interface for course corrections, though that limits it to people with CON skill and high MIND. Another idea that comes to mind would be to replicate the vibrations of sharkmist to cause agitation in the general populace, though I'm not sure how useful it would be.

For pseudo-universal ammo, that's probably going to be far easier to implement for energy-based weaponry. It'll be a matter of debating adapters vs common ammunition. That is, whether to have units that can adapt one weapon's power source to another, or to just have them all run off the same thing. Adapters would probably take longer to use, but would require no real change to our existing weapons and would let us adapt our powersources to other implements, like those heat-guns that proved oh so invaluable during the Eater of Cold mission.

For kinetic weapons, I asked PW on IRC and apparently, it may be possible to grow weapons (mostly melee but also simple rifle) through some kind of yet-to-be-discussed mechanism. Perhaps it may be possible to grow ammunition using this process, though it depends whether or not the substance is ferromagnetic.

Versatility-wise, I'm not really sure what energy weapons need beyond wavelength, focus and intensity settings. For kinetic weapons, one possible idea to pursue to to just be some sort of kinetic-amplifier based system that just launches whatever gets shoved down the barrel, though that would probably have a rather low rate of fire. Another possibility is to have an electronically-fired superposed load weapon that can rounds one by one, discharge entire "ammo-tubes" as a lance of metal, or discharge everything as a large mass of white-hot metal. The plasma projector needs to be investigated as I suspect that it may use some sort of space-magic to keep its rounds from dispersing (electromagnetic fields should not be able to keep the shots in the shape they are in), if that can be analyzed further, it may be possible to create some smaller plasma or electrical weapons, possibly with firing modes that range from sprays to bolts to beams.

On the unconventional side of affairs, there's the weapon Charles is about to receive which is basically just a Piezoelectric Shard Launcher with all its firing mechanisms removed, so that it only costs 5 tokens and is used to create items like throwing knives, caltrops and trip wires. Basically, if you can shove something into it and have enough fluid, it can create piezoelectric crystals in its shape. Tripwires from it are quite weak but can still knock people out. Throwing knives are probably going to be significantly more powerful. Should probably look into whether my kinetic shunt cane idea would work, if so it might be usable as a shield, weapon and general purpose tool. There's also the possibility of having autonomous organisms partially contained in a weapon unit, so like a murder-tentacle in a scabbard that prevents it from hitting its weilder and whatnot.

Exotic is space magic. We don't really have access to that stuff. That's for ARESTEVE, The Doctor and R&D. With the symbiotic hives capable of chemical analysis, minor body modification, anti-infantry use and whatnot, I doubt they'll need anything more versatile right now.

Genemods are probably The Doctor's exclusive domain.

For equipment, I do have an idea to just have Charles with his (soon to be) +4 Charisma scream insults into a microphone and record them, then to have remote speakers that can play those insults to berserk enemies like how Charles was able to accidentally drive Xan into such a murderous rage that he was unable to use his amps and instead charged at him. Those units could also play other audio that the user gives them.

Alright, here's what I need: A badass fuckin' eyepatch. Hook me up.

How practical does it need to be? As in, could it just be a kinetic amplified strapped over your eyesocket which has been filled with blueradite? Nothing says badass like keeping an immensely powerful electrical capacitor in your skull right up against something that can discharge all of its contents upon activation. That discharge of contents was referring to both the capacitor and your skull by the way.

Again, this does depend a bit on the R&D people. I'm hoping that they've looked into weirdvision enough for us to make eye replacements with it inbuilt.

Something to let us avoid bullets and such, rather than wear a ton of armour to tank the shots. Something like Simus' phase suit or a weaker version of Renen's bullet time.

Phase armor depends on the R&D team. Bullet time depends on the Doctor. Invisibility cloaks we can do. Short-ranged personal teleportation as mentioned above might be possible for those skilled enough.

[Doomblade187]

I support the lesser bullet-time genemod, specifically in combination with an enhanced reflexes genemod.

[kj1225]

You know, that thing you mentioned about growing bullets made me think, why isn't there anything that prints bullets? Like 3dthe printing in the future must be fucking awesome right?

[Empiricist]

You know, that thing you mentioned about growing bullets made me think, why isn't there anything that prints bullets? Like 3dthe printing in the future must be fucking awesome right?

Not necessarily. Things can and do hit brick walls. One example is how computers get faster as we shrink the components, that hits an upper limit as there's a point where quantum mechanics just fucks it all up.

Also, there's no real need for something like that when you can just carry those bullets with you. Why carry the raw materials and take time to print when you could just bring more magazines which would be lighter (since you don't need to carry a printer with you)?

[kj1225]

Because most of us can't be trusted with actual bullets unless nessesary.

[Empiricist]

Because most of us can't be trusted with actual bullets unless nessesary.

Then we definitely can't trust you guys with a 3D printer and raw materials

Especially considering that most bullets are now just lumps of metal that don't even have propellant.

[syvarris]

 Nik asked about auxiliary tools?  Well, Saint hasn't made his available, and they're all prototypes, but I did make a few programs.  Note that I made them, but they're generally the type that PW would say are successful, but they actually maim the user when activated.  Because PW likes maiming me.
--A melee combat program, which directly controls your exoskeleton or robotic body, and executes pre-defined movements based off an aux roll.  Essentially, as long as you have a movement library for a given action and an undamaged body, you swap the relevant roll for an AUX roll.

--The above, modified for ranged combat.  Even more prototypey.

--A prototype HUD, which I'm actually not sure if I worked on.  It was supposed to show the statuses of friendly teammates, and have a user friendly interface for viewing their video feeds and various minor things.  I think I abandoned fhe idea after I realized it pointless because we already meta-gain that knowledge anyway.

--A remote visualizer, which extrapolates video feeds from known locations (Read: Your buddy's suit) and creates a ghost recon-style outline or highlighted area, even through walls.  Mostly meant to allow ampers to easily target enemies through walls, as long as teammates had a view.  Also useful for CON users with AP weapons, such as a cutlas or PSL, since they can just shoot through any walls.  And useful for any soldier to shoot through concealment, I guess.  This one in particular is very very prototypey, because I'm not even sure the underlying requirement (Our tech having a good idea of relative position) is possible.


Hey, PW asked what people want us Hephers to make!  Awesome!

@Tryrar

More vehicles are planned, but you aren't getting any.  Vehicles aren't generally useful for missions, and they are also way too expensive in general.  It's possible that you could occasionally get some as mission equipment, like the vehicles on the anomalous planetoid mission, but otherwise... no.

@Yoink

Bigger guns?  Better armor?

Well, I was gonna make a Doctrine HMG, sort of an intermediate between the Testament and PSL, similar in role to an M2 Browning.  It should be cheaper, and arguably more effective, than the PSL.

Armor isn't really a space we can improve without getting new tech.  Sorry.

@KJ

Yeah, you have to wear a helmet with a screen.  Glasses are unnecessary.  Also, see above, a HUD is essentially useless- you already know all the stuff it could tell you.

@Renegadelobster

I'm not sure what to think of shields.  On one hand, they should be cheaper than shaped armor, and arguably more effective since shields don't have joints.  As a person who played through Xenonauts with half my force constantly using shields, I can understand the value.

On the other hand, shields are cumbersome, and useless if you're flanked.  You can't use a large weapon with one, and unlike Xenonauts, if you shoot from behind one you're exposing a part of your body.  The minor discount from full armor probably isn't enough to counter the major discount in protection.

"Better, More Useful, More versatile guns"  There's three options here: cheapness, power, versatility.  Pick two.  The shard line of weapons is the least versatile, but most damaging.  Lasers are extremely versatile, but not as damaging, and easily defended against.  Gauss weapons are a midline; kinda versatile, kinda damaging, and generally cheaper.  I am planning to give all our gauss weapons a 'suppressed' setting, though.  Yes, even the gauss cannon.

Genemods aren't my area.  I'd like to experiment with them, but I know basically nothing right now.

@Emp (implant that streams a HUD)

Hey, good idea!  Since we already have the MMI, all we need to do is write the software for it.  We can even have a HUD with binocular vision, which is better than the helmets which I think are monocular.

@Universal ammo idea

Sorta exists already; the entire shard line of weapons all use the same ammo, just a container of liquid.  Problem is, it's only really useful for making bullets, or inefficiently being formed into stuff like knives.  It's also way cheaper tha  metal bullets, considering the Testament gets 18x the rounds a gauss rifle gets, and is similarly effective.

We probably won't get any truly universal ammo unless we switch to purely energy weapons.  There's just too much variety in the types of guns that exist... too many kinetics, too many black boxes.

[Empiricist]

How do you suppress a gauss weapon? Isn't all the noise from something breaking the sound barrier (i.e. the noise you can't suppress)?

[kj1225]

You know what would be really useful? The HUDs that apparently exist coloring allies a specific color. And something that automatically tazes you if you take hostile action against said allies.

[syvarris]

Exactly.  Set it to a lower power level, so it launches the projectile at a subsonic velocity.

Technically, gauss weapons are all already suppressed.  They fire supersonic rounds without any muzzle blast, much like a suppressed weapon firing supersonic ammo.  Really, the original designer was just foolish and didn't consider stealth use, despite it being an obvious and trivial addition.  I'm just calling it a 'suppressed' mode because that's more obvious than 'subsonic' mode.

@KJ

I've considered making a program that automatically zaps you if you harm allies.  The problem with it is when an ally gets mind controlled.  If they pull out a nuke and start pressing buttons while standing in the middle of the group, you can't do anything to stop them.

I considered an intricate system of votes that would allow a team to agree to redesignate an ally as an enemy, but decided that it would be far too cumbersome.