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Post by Insano-Man on Apr 25, 2019 5:17:31 GMT -5
SCIENCE!
It's hard to get a good idea of how technology works on Set. Science and society are mixed up six ways to Sunday. Mass production and major industry are myths in most places. People are packed together in isolated areas without a single way to get in touch with anyone else. All that has a way of breaking things down just as much as it breaks them up. Townsfolk make due with improvisation. Spacers get by with what they can scavenge. Schools everywhere teach just what they can figure out on their own. People live just as much on the rusting back of the Pioneer Network's corpse as much as they do with their own smarts.
What makes it all tricky to come to grips with is the way the old world was. In its heyday, the Pioneer Network almost made divinity sound tame. Immortality, gravity manipulation, mass teleportation - the fact that it never went out to conquer the universe was nothing short of a Set-sponsored miracle. People pick through old ruins, find old magic machines, and pry them apart to learn their secrets. They figure out nuclear power before they learn proper hygiene. They learn railguns before they've got running water. What they can't learn from, they use as-is, and start pulling ideas and inspiration from what it does.
At the same time, technology is a touchy subject on Erf. Between all the insane artificial intelligences, sleeping mad-science experiments, and the several centuries of rust and decay, most folks don't trust tech. Between all the ruin-stalking monsters, iron-gripped Loonies, and grabby unionites, most folks can never keep their hands on the top-level technology. With history full of holes and education out of the majority's reach, the best most people on the ground can hope for are gunpowder and steam engines. Spacers get by at the absolute bare minimum of spaceflight - and even that much is pushing it in places.
The following is a list of major technologies on Set. This list will cover only what is specific to the planet, or technologies that may need to be properly clarified for the setting. Inventions that are extant in reality will only be covered if they are notably different in the setting, and should be considered valid otherwise. In addition, this topic includes a breakdown of technological capacity by region, as well as a general ranking of technological advancement between factions.
This is an open topic.
If you'd like to invent a new kind of technology, post it here! Remember to read through this topic first to see if it already exists, and be sure to give it strong consideration before working on it.
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Post by Insano-Man on Apr 25, 2019 5:26:00 GMT -5
TECHNOLOGY BY REGIONScience and society being all kinds of mixed-up means everything is spread out and split up. Tribal cannibals out in the snowy wilds of Ridgesalle aren't going to pack the same kind of firepower as a squad of clones from the Blue Wall. Podunk yokels from northern Ventannen don't know a tenth as much as a spacer does about keeping a transorbital freighter running. Technology and education tend to concentrate around specific hubs, so knowing where they are can be just as important as knowing what you want out of them. The following is a list of major regions and their overall technological development. Bear in mind that these are all rough guidelines - especially when geodisplacement events get involved. - It's no surprise to anyone that space is where the planet's top technology is. It's the home of the unionites, the Space Loonies, and the sneakily-smart harvester drones. It's where computers, electricity, and high-performance rocket engines are all mandatory hardware. At the same time, space is big. It's just as broken-up as the continents down on the ground. Different slices of orbit have different conditions.
- The Comm Slice down at the bottom is a bit funny when it comes to technology. It's one of the most advanced parts of orbital space - and it doesn't even make up a sliver of its population. The key reason why is the Green Angel Array, host of the MASTER network and some of the planet's most advanced communications technology. Alongside the Looney satellites are all the runners-up - which have to be as sophisticated as they are sturdy to stay in the Slice.
- The space in low orbit is just shy of the bottom of the pile - depending on where you look. Most spacers are stuck in wrecks, trash balls, and ships or stations that only just qualify above derelicts. Firearms are still in fashion, artificial gravity shows up only once in a blue moon. Most people are lucky just to have working radios. All that changes when you start getting close to Unity Station. Deep inside the home of the unionites, science and technology are king - and some of the most advanced on or off the planet.
- High orbit keeps up the hot-then-cold trend for space over Set. Long-distance traffic through orbit's highway means most spacers flying by have their act together. The concentration of Space Loonies at this altitude jumps the technological trend even higher. Artificial gravity is on one in every three spacecraft in high orbit, AIs live comfortably alongside flesh-and-blood creatures, and life is a little less rusty.
- The Scuttler Slice is the roughest part of orbit bar none. As much as it might be full of AIs, about half of them are brainless garbage haulers. The remainder are mostly harvester drones - who aren't exactly crazy about submitting to a census. The living in Set's asteroid fields are all forced to subsist with thrice-salvaged junk and zero industry. Most are outcasts, pirates, or miners looking to leave as soon as possible. Some have even degenerated into techno-savages that wouldn't be out of place in the Knobbled Cutters.
- The graveyard orbit is something like the Comm Slice. It's the home of hundreds of old derelicts, some of them still in Pioneer Network paint jobs. The lack of anyone living there means the quantity of half-scrap rustbuckets is low. What's left - or what's left of what's left - manages a decent level of overall sophistication. Not much of it works, but gravity, cold fusion, and long-lost AIs are regular finds. There's just the question of whether it's worth salvaging - if the distance hasn't already discouraged the interested parties.
- Down on the ground, the city of Cloneston is one of the major centers of technology on the planet. It's also one of the only places where science, research, and the industry to keep both of them moving are all still together. The city's headlining problems are hallmarks of its sophistication. AIs, mass cloning facilities, top-shelf cybernetics - if you can find it in orbit, you can find it in Pedro's hometown. Even the wasteland around the city does better than Set's norm - when they aren't dodging mutant warbands and city-stirred pollution.
- The Chopping Blocks are something like Set's orbit condensed down onto the ground, with a few seas of asphalt for good measure. Space Loonies and regular spacers come down on a regular basis. Regular Loonies do regular business with regular townsfolk and passing merchants. High-tech mercenary outfits swing through for make-or-break missions - and leave all their top-dollar hardware behind if they fail. Radios, running water, and electricity are all baseline for most townies. Railguns and hover technology sit around the top for spacers stopping by.
- Strictly speaking, technology in Evispin is some of the highest on the planet - because no one lives there. The only visitors to Set's continent of spite are the occasional spacers, unionites, and Space Loonies. Permanent residents are almost exclusively Loonies. Anyone going outside, flying around, or even just hiding in a hole has to conform to a certain standard of spacefaring technology. If not, they'll be lucky if anyone finds the puddle that's left of them.
- At the top of the Big Toe on Talto, Loonies rule the day. Railguns shake out of trees, three-dimensional printers make up half the area's industry. Wartime measures and Space Looney cooperation means the region is one of the best developed on the planet. The one caveat is that all that hardware and know-how is mostly consolidated into Looney bunkers. Townsfolk and nomads are only a little better off than Set's not-quite-industrial norm. Only the chosen handful that snuggle up close to a bunker see the real treats.
- Something no one's ever been in a rush to admit is that the Knobbled Cutters are more advanced than most of Set. They're home to hundreds of clans of tech raiders, combing through old Pioneer Network facilities that cluster up on the mountains. They're where the washouts and dropouts from the Chopping Blocks go to when they're ready to hang up their guns - if not necessarily their hovertanks. Most mountain folk are backwoods Ventannen townies, but the spikes elsewhere are enough to skew the average towards a scrappy kind of scavenged sophistication.
- Zorah's Eye is where spacers go to die. The sheer emptiness of the whole desert means the only signs of technology are spacecraft wrecks and aircraft husks. Even those are spread into little clusters that mostly crop up around the Eye itself. Even those go missed and unseen by the vast majority of people who pass by or through the Iris desert. Without any people to skew the spread, the sand-scoured hulks are all left to stand on their own.
- The Dead Angel Wastes rank up just behind Zorah's Eye for similar reasons. The main difference is in inhabitance. With people down in the sands to improvise, bastardize, and plagiarize all the desert's wrecks, the tech level of the region shifts down. Scavengers rule the day, whether they're surface-slickers or spacers on a salvage stopover. Cultists creeping in from the Veinlands drop the average down even more.
- The meat-free side of Kelpak is where spacers and Space Loonies dump off the worst of their worst, especially around the Wretchwoods. Castaway cultists hide out wherever they're tolerated. The lack of industry and the occasional crab uprising mean that most only have what they came in with. Even then, the end result is still better than most of Set. Pressure suits and plasma cutters stand out in the crowds of garage guns and blacksmiths. Electricity and long-distance communications are all hand-improvised with scrappy ingenuity.
- As with most of Set's depopulated areas, Zuhverl is surprisingly advanced. Zorah's Eye and Aliah's Rupture keep population figures low, meaning the smaller players - Loonies, salvagers around the Eye - contribute more to the average. A few holdouts of Set's style of civilization help throw off the spread, especially down south, but the emptiness on the continent keeps it all in check.
- The snowy side of Darimesa is home to a major reservoir of garbage haulers, cutter drones, and the people who live off their leftovers. It's where lost clones freeze over with all their gear, and where wasteland exiles bring their toys stolen from the city. The cold, cutters, and long, empty tundras help enforce a limit on it all, but all the choice cuts keeling over keep scavengers busy. The Middle Ages charm of most places is comfortably wrapped around a borrowed variety of industry.
- Technology out in Naza's Prong isn't impressive, but what really turns heads is how flat the curve is. Set's grey haven knows how to share with its own. Most towns have a baseline level of electrification, and just about every major settlement has running water. Caravans of junk trucks and sandy scrap-trains run loops right alongside beast-drawn wagons and well-worn footpaths. A few major radio installations keep news circulating - even if they're not keen on sharing it with the greys in orbit.
- Talto off the Big Toe is a wretched place of iron and viscera. The Cult's technophobia, as it turns out, only works when there isn't an army of Loonies standing up against them. Industry and grit were the only ways to rectify that. Scrap tanks and sloppy rifles roll out of half-electrified factories, while towns made out of bone, gore, and misery stew in their own filth. Improvised anti-tank guns bumble along next to parades of meat monsters. Non-combat cultists are lucky just to have somewhere to cook their food.
- The northern half of Ventannen is the standard for most of Set. It's the definition of rural, so sparse and spread-out that most towns don't even have roads connecting them. Computers are non-existent, genuine factories are the stuff of legend, and only the biggest towns are lucky enough to have electricity. Crossbows and pikes are just as common as rifles and handguns - and even those are lucky to be more than just muzzle loaders. At the very least, automotive transport is more than once a month - in some parts.
- The Jigges Icelands are mostly empty, sometimes uninhabitable, and not all that far up the technological ladder. Jiggesies live quiet, isolated lives on chilly islands, making deals with passing ships from better-inhabited areas. The up-and-down nature of trade means some settlements have figured out motorboats, while others are still trying to settle on a language. The lack of high-level salvage targets means most never climb as far as the other desolate parts of the planet.
- The Great Filter is the one place in the underground where there are more regular folk than Loonies or monsters. It hasn't done anything for the average level of technology down there. People are a few centuries shy of industrialized, stuck in a kind of Iron Age spacerhood. Handmade environment suits and oxygen supplies are vital to daily life, but most folks can never figure out more than animal husbandry and a written language. The big chunk of Loonies and high-tech ruins rising from the Chambers of Myth shift the centerpoint wildly between regions.
- The Baclama Desert is chiefly empty, sometimes upside-down, and not all that far up the technological ladder. Sand people go about their lives without knowing a thing about electricity. Cottage industries are the main providers of just about everything. Only up in the northern husklands and out near the Meket Gumwoods can you expect to see anything modern - if you're not too fussed about it wearing someone's skin.
- The bulk of Grusgau is a mix of terrorscapes and husklands that play hard and fast with nearby settlements. If you live there, you either step up your game or economize down to nothing. The average usually works out in favor of wagons and subsistence living. Closer to major ruins, technology - and daily terror - amp up. Cars and radios make regular appearances. Out in the rest, and especially the Iverat Tundra, people get by with bronze and iron.
- Snowy, mountainous Patzaghd is a sparse mesh of aliens, snowmen, and stranded spacers trying to make the most of it. Unlike close-by Darimesa, Set's chief antarctics don't have the mixed blessing of a major garbage hauler infestation. Cutters still chase around better-developed areas, but technology is terrible down on the bottom. Electricity is a myth, unfrozen plumbing a legend, and frostbite is a fact of life. The big bulk of sorassan in the snow helps bring the technological ceiling down low like a squidly parody of Darimesa's cutters.
- Sadas Vitia, Set's big sad face sticking off of Ventannen, is the kind of picture-perfect fantasy realm that no one can ever believe. It's a place of ice, fire, and volcano castles, complete with backwards ideas on technology. It's a place where electricity is honestly seen as the work of demons, where computers are the mouthpieces of the prime evil. The tiny sliver of people that live there put the Cult of Meat to shame. They just need somewhere to sleep without freezing, melting, and then freezing again.
- Japhze is a quaint backwater in the antarctic regions of Set. It's home to an idyllic assortment of uneducated, easy-going towns. People live calm, isolated lives with only just enough know-how to keep from freezing to death. When meat isn't drifting in from the Veinlands and sea monsters aren't terrorizing the coast from Ridgesalle, locals keep to basic cold-weather agriculture. When it's time to move, hunting takes over with simple bronze tools and weapons.
- The Well of Japes - meaning the Cackling Circle, where people actually live - is trapped in a permanent cycle of savagery. People are never in the same place, with the same neighbors, or with the same resources long enough to do much in the way of research. They do what they can, with what they've got, where they landed - which is never very much. Spears, swords, and bows are the best most can handle. Only structural engineering is anything more than prehistoric - and not by much.
- Ridgesalle is, to put it as lightly as possible, a tribal hellhole of monsters and barbarism. Trade hardly touches the landmass. Loonies mostly stay in their caves. Just finding another person is close to impossible. Finding someone who's not wearing the skin of something they killed, someone who speaks an actual language - you're more likely to find a pig-bat first. Only a handful of techno-barbarians have ever seen electricity - and they're the worst of the bunch.
- The Southern Veinlands are mostly meat. Metal and machinery don't have a place in the screaming stretches of gore-slopped spleen-swamps. It is so close to the bottom of the technological ladder that some people are forced to wander nude and tumored through their daily lives. Leather is the only kind of fashion that matters. Despite it all, daily affairs for the Cult are as booming as they've ever been - and the place is still growing by the day.
- People don't go to Bokose. People don't talk about it. People don't want to be there. No people means no technology. As complex as Set can get, Grusgau's pariah island is as simple as can be.
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Post by Insano-Man on Apr 25, 2019 5:27:05 GMT -5
TECHNOLOGY BY FACTIONThere aren't many organizations on Set that can keep their level of technology even, but that's never stopped anyone from trying. Some do better than others, some are just as split-up as the towns in the Cackling Circle. Some represent the be-all, end-all to scientific progress, others represent the bitter end of technological advancement. Knowing what flag means what kind of guns you might have to expect - if any at all - can be just as important as knowing the lay of the land. The following is a list of significant factions, in order of most advanced to least, and what technology is - or was - their standard. As always, there may be deviants from the norms outlined here. - Ask any history buff and they'll tell you right away - the Pioneer Network has always been the top of the pile. They may not be here anymore, but no one's ever doubted what they managed to achieve. Most of Set's technology is either tame by comparison, or a holdover from Pioneer days. City-sized gravity manipulators still dot the planet from before the Splinter Wars. Nanofabrication plants still churn out maintenance drones to keep themselves running. Time-accelerating superluminal drives were, supposedly, something they could - but didn't - produce. The fact that they couldn't figure Set out before it killed them is something to think on.
- The Unity Trust is one of the Pioneer Network relics that survived to the present day. They've kept up the trend ever since. As far as active powers in orbit go, the unionites are the stars of the science game. Gravity manipulation, self-programming artificial intelligence, and flawless immortality are all in their domain. Official policy even claims they've been dodging technological singularity just to avoid any unexpected cultural consequences. Most figure they're just trying not to make the Space Loonies jealous.
- What is honestly nerve-wracking to think on is that the harvester drones are some of the most advanced machines on the planet. Some even reckon that the drones that got away are even scarier than the Unity Trust and Pioneer Network. No one can really see it under all the spare parts and random radar dishes, but it's all there. Hyper-efficient AI, quantum communication, and industrial efficiency as close to perfection as reality can afford. If every harvester fleet was as advanced as it could be, they'd have eaten half the galaxy by now.
- The Space Loonies might not be at the absolute top of the peak, but they're still the face of the cutting edge on Set. They've added onto everything they've inherited from the Pioneer Network, and done their best to keep science going even after the apocalypse. All of it's honed with a sense of practicality that makes Unity Trust equivalents look like high-fashion art projects. Flawlessly-sentient AI, gravity manipulation on every fleet, and cybernetics on a level no one can touch - all theirs. They don't much like to share, either.
- The Loonies might not be the most advanced out there, but the thing they've always had is consistency. Every bunker knows how to build a railrifle, a fusion plant, and a biowarfare division. Every bunker knows how to handle nanofabrication with a 3D printer. They're the progenitors of the Pioneer Network, still kicking around today - and still just as impossible to explain as they were in prehistory. They're not all that fond of sharing, either. What's absolutely baffling about the Loonies is that they absolutely refuse to research much further than what they all start with - which makes the "caveman" nickname sting even more.
- The real harvester drones - the kind people actually meet and run screaming from - mostly manage a level of technology about on par with spacers. Their one edge is that they don't usually live onboard old rustbuckets with half-finished, half-functional systems. Instead, they fill their days trying to figure out how to balance their master-crafted AI cores with all the stolen and kludged equipment they're left with. Hijacked garbage haulers and swiped spacer ships drag down their average even more.
- Back before they bit the big one, the Third Invaders were no slouches. They had an interstellar empire - as far as anyone knew - and a navy big enough to bring down the Pioneer Network. Cybernetics were everywhere, on everyone, with the kind of specifications to turn a unionite's head. These days, there's not much left of them, but the little holdouts still manage a stubborn level of sophistication that's several orders over Set's standard. There are still cybernetics on the upper castes, still personal coilguns on their guards. At least a quarter of their settlements can still afford air travel.
- Regular spacers are the bottom end of high technology by Set's standards. They've only just got it together for spaceflight, with only just enough ports to justify docking clamps. There's no faster-than-light travel, no suspended animation, and no sterile, servile AIs to keep everything moving. It's all rust, radar, and recycled oxygen, limping along on hungry engines and empty stomachs. Firearms are still in style, gravity is the devil's work, and inertia still hasn't been tamed. Life doesn't feel so futuristic for most of Set's spacefarers.
- Drop down to the surface, with the common folk of Set, and sophistication follow's altitude's lead. Only one in every ten towns is electrified, automobiles are just a third of total transportation, and communication is done expressly through caravan couriers. Running water is hit-or-miss, medical treatment still centered on amputations and half-practical folk medicine. Bandits mug people at spear-point just as much as they do at gunpoint. Spacer trade and huskland raids just end up confusing things instead of upsetting the average.
- The Cult of Meat is full of meat-crazy luddites, but enough of them have the sense to know that tumors aren't everything. They need a roof over their heads when the meat's not around, an oven for their meals when the meat's too feisty to eat. The tug-o'-war between necessity and the Cult's top-level technophobes ends somewhere in the Dark Ages. Scavenging, trade, and intellectual infection from nearby towns occasionally manage to jump things up, but the Cult is content to stay low.
- The cave people of Set's underground have it all kinds of strange. They're forced to figure out how to make a gas mask and an oxygen supply to survive Set's cave systems, but that's usually as good as it gets. Most never see a school, never have the chance to scavenge a ruin, and only ever see light from glowing monsters and deadly fungus. Scavenging and society bump it up around the Great Filter, but that's as good as it gets. Spears, bows, and squatting in the corner are the best most can manage.
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Post by Insano-Man on Apr 25, 2019 5:27:26 GMT -5
EXAMPLE TECHNOLOGY
Type: What applications this technology is primarily utilized for. Industry, military, communications, recreation, and so on. If this technology does not fit nicely into three primary categories, use "Flexible".
Users: The primary producers and/or users of this kind of technology. This does not necessarily exclude others, but indicates who makes the most use of it.
Dispersion: Where on Set - or in orbit - this technology is found the most.
Prevalence: How regularly the primary users of this technology make use of it, and how often it is usually found.
Sophistication: The rough level of prerequisite science, technology, and industry needed to create and maintain this technology.
Discovery: The first date this technology was discovered, invented, or entered into general use.
Inventor: The person, people, or organization responsible for introducing this technology.
A single paragraph description, at least, outlining the specifics of the technology. This should include what it does, its impacts on the world, and history related to its creation and use.
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Post by Insano-Man on Apr 25, 2019 5:27:41 GMT -5
JUNKSMITHING
Type: Flexible
Users: Everyone
Dispersion: Everywhere
Prevalence: Excessive
Sophistication: None
Discovery: Prehistory
Inventor: Desperation
It's been said that necessity is the mother of all invention. Nobody ever said she was pretty. Whether we're calling it scrapcobbling, kitbashing, or DIY, junksmithing is one of Set's oldest trades. It's ugly no matter what its name is. It's all garbage on top of garbage. Whether you're a spacer soldering a six-century-old circuit board or a townie welding up a scrap wagon, a band-aid's still a band-aid. Shoddy welds, jagged edges, rust - what style might be in the paint job still can't cover up the sloppy proportions on it all. It's all quick fixes with a "don't think on it too hard" mentality, ready to fall apart at the first sign of trouble.
As awful as it all looks and runs, junksmithing is everywhere on Set. Living in a world full of old ruins and spacecraft wrecks means using what you can find. All you need to put it to the test is a little bit of ingenuity and a whole lot of duct tape. Travellers dig old guns out of ditches and mix up the parts until they work again. Townies drag old trucks back home, cut them apart, and use the scrap leftover for roofing. Loonies find old stone temples, mine them for masonry, and use their sarcophagi as tunnel supports. If it can be repurposed, someone on Set will find just what it was never meant to do.
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Post by Insano-Man on Nov 24, 2021 15:33:15 GMT -5
ENIGMATICS
Type: Flexible
Users: Anyone
Dispersion: Minimal
Prevalence: Scarce
Sophistication: Impossible
Discovery: Occasional
Inventor: Unknown
Every once in a while, somebody digs up some strange death-blaster nobody can figure out. Sometimes, it's a handgun that shoots radioactive hardlight bullets. Sometimes, it's an electro-gauntlet with a telekinetic lasso. Sometimes, it's just a fancy lightbulb. The key traits each one shares is that nobody knows who made it, and nobody can explain how it works. These kinds of so-advanced-they're-magic artifacts fall under the umbrella term of "enigmatic technology", or just "enigmatics" - which, funnily enough, is a name nobody can remember inventing.
Enigmatics can be just about anything. They can be old Pioneer relics people can't explain anymore, made by familiar hands in familiar laboratories. They can be curios of lost civilizations that have a practical application, but little documentation. They can be strange hunks of rock and goo that somehow formed naturally, and somehow do strange and unnatural things. Despite all that, the popular conception of enigmatics are usually sleek-lined, curvily-proportioned destructo-what's-its without a scrap of utilitarian intent behind them.
The truth of enigmatic technology is that, in most cases, they do make sense. There might be some that only work in certain anomalous areas, and there might be some that may as well be frank magic, but most are just missing a user manual. Under all the weird segmentation, the funny glowing lights, and the spiky parts that are just there, there's usually something running off of mechanisms that science has already charted and explained. Behind all the unnecessary synthetic muscle, the magnetically-suspended floaty things, and the awkward flaps by the handle, there's a plausible concept that just needs a bit of time in the lab to be reproduced.
But, of course, there's still that one-in-a-dozen enigmatic doodad that may as well be wizardry - and that's the one everybody talks about.
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Post by Insano-Man on Nov 25, 2021 3:07:41 GMT -5
SPACEFLIGHTType: Transportation, Habitation Users: Spacers, Space Loonies, Harvesters, Unity Trust Dispersion: Orbit, Chopping Blocks, Cloneston Prevalence: Negligible (Planetside), High (Orbit)Sophistication: High Discovery: PrehistoryInventor: UnknownIn the old, civilized days, people liked to think of space travel as a high-minded scientific adventure into the vault of the heavens. For people over Set, it's a daily slog of microgravity vacuums and debris-dodging over a planet that hates their guts - all with a flight ceiling to keep the daredevils in check. Scarce supplies, hand-me-down ships, harvester drones - the cold, hard void of orbit is anything but glamorous. For Set's indigenous population of born-and-raised spacers, the starry expanse above lost its "final frontier" smell a long time ago. Nowadays, it's all business as usual. Boring or not, space travel over Set isn't as unique as it could be. Ignore the invisible boundary of the Lost Reach and the requirements are all still the same. Spacecraft need dedicated, educated staff to stay running. They need people with top-quality training and discipline. They need constant communications between their destination, their ship, and every object in between. They need pricey, high-tech parts and equipment, regular supplies of fuel and power, and continual maintenance. They need industry to support it all and an academic basis to keep the qualified minds coming. With all that in mind, it's no wonder to anyone why Set's orbit is so miserable. Education is as much up to mom and dad as it is to ships and schools. Industry is almost solely dedicated to putting old junkers back into the fight. Shipyards are so far and few between that some old hulks have done laps around the planet and never once gone in for repairs. The big ships, with the cool toys, the breach-free hulls - those are all concentrated into just a few hands that aren't interested in sharing. Ships in orbit rely on certain key technologies as their primary means of propulsion. Only a few are anything but disappointing. The following is a list in no particular order. - "Ion engines" is a commandeered catch-all term for low-maintenance economy drives that are only just good enough to keep a ship or station moving. Most are honest ion engines, but some are plasma engines or even Pioneer-era electrodynamic tethers. In better days, they were only ever used for pleasure craft and station-keeping burns. Nowadays, ion engines are the main form of propulsive power for Set's spacecraft. About seven in ten ships rely almost exclusively on ion engines, and most of the rest have backup ion engines in case their other propulsion systems clam up.
- "Chemical rockets" is an umbrella term for the conventional rocket engines that most spaceships have installed somewhere. That doesn't mean they get to play around with them. Without a planetary resource base, the production of rocket fuel over Set is slow and unsteady. The few places that can produce reliable fuel are usually strategic assets to somebody - which means all that usually gets funnelled into a single source. For most spacers, only in danger or desperation is any of that precious reaction mass ever to meet the nozzle. That means that the bulk users of rocket fuel are typically well-to-do mercenaries, high-class transportation services, and down-on-their-luck Space Loonies.
- Fusion rockets are a category of expensive, heavy engines that rely on a fusion reaction to supply thrust. On the one hand, the down payment and cost in maintenance on one is enough to rent out a fleet of disposable clunkers for the same task. On the other hand, their overall performance profile is near enough to the top of the pile. Some models even supply enough power on the side to run all of a ship's systems during a burn. Between all those traits, most fusion rockets are in the hands of either top-tier mercenaries, middle-of-the-road Space Loonies, or run-of-the-mill harvesters.
- Antimatter rockets are everything a fusion rocket is, cranked up to 11. They're some of the absolute best, some of the absolute heaviest, and some of the absolute most expensive things out there. The cost in fuel for just a month's worth of ordinary maneuvers is enough to buy out half the stations over the Erf. The cost in maintenance is obscene - and that's without counting the top-dollar engineers you'd need to keep it running. Only the Space Loonies, Unity Trust, and harvesters keep any of these monsters running - and usually only on their biggest, most important ships.
- Gravity drives are arrays of gravity manipulators installed onto a ship that enable it to generate artificial gravity wells. Their chief use is for shielding and onboard gravity, but most ships running a gravity drive can use them as performance enhancers for their propulsion systems. They can be used to boost the efficiency of their main engines, or to pull off hard turns and fast burns that'd ordinarily rip the ship to pieces. In a pinch, most gravity drives can be used as emergency propulsion if the rest of the engines have gone cold - even if they're only just faster than ion engines. Given the technology behind them, only high-budget Space Loonies and Unity Trust ships ever put them to use.
- Faster-than-light drives technically do exist, but nobody uses them. With all the debris and planetary mass in the way, most are just a quick way to kill yourself - or half the planet, depending on the drive. With that in mind, it's to everyone's good fortune that just about nobody knows how to build them anymore. Likewise, the Space Loonies and Unity Trust maintain a monopoly on those minds - and J-COM's ready to send a few dozen cruisers over if they ever catch wind of an FTL drive out in the wild.
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Post by Insano-Man on Jun 30, 2022 11:59:10 GMT -5
FIREARMSType: Weaponry Users: EveryoneDispersion: EverywherePrevalence: High (Planetside), Moderate (Orbit)Sophistication: VariableDiscovery: PrehistoryInventor: UnknownIf you want to get anywhere on this planet, you'd better be packing. Whether you're down a thousand miles in a demon-infested tomb-slurry, or a thousand miles above onboard a derelict full of meat monsters, a gun's a gun. Whether it's a black-powder blunderbuss or a liquid-propellant ship-to-ship cannon, a gun's a gun. Whether it cycles itself, aims itself, or detonates as soon as you pull the trigger, a gun's a gun - and it's always better to have and not need than the other way around. As ever on Erf, it's always the other way around. Nomads out scouting the trails need something to keep the bears at bay. Townies scraping by need something to keep the crabs off the walls. Pleasure kings and cyber-queens in Cloneston need that little pocket protector tucked under a pillow in case a hit squad makes it past their security detail. We can fuss around over the technological disparity across the planet, but even most Stone Age savages on Set fall right in line; everybody knows the gun, and everybody knows to respect it - even if they're still trying to find one. As the trendsetter of ranged combat, firearms terminology has bled into just about everything similar in application. Railguns aren't rifled, but you'll never convince a Looney that his Stumpy isn't a rifle. Lasers don't fire pistol-caliber rounds, but you aren't going to find a better name than "laser pistol" for his sidearm. On at least one occasion, the city of Cloneston invented a practical plasma revolver - which is to say nothing of what all the brainy tinkerers in space have done over the last few hundred years. Language is a flexible thing. It bends to meaning before it twists back to the dictionary. Right along with that, it's always trouble to tell just what kind of gun you're going to get. Standard patterns and centralized concepts were bad jokes even before the Pioneer Network bit the big one. There are still identifiable makes and models, but any armory with more than one rifle probably has at least one flavor for every person who'll ever stop by. When it comes to guns - like everything on Erf - it's not as simple as just expecting to see a single style of service rifle with whoever you're working with or against. - When it comes to terrestrial firearms, it's a mess. The ugly truth on Set is that, despite most towns needing at least six heavy machine guns to break even with a crab siege, most only have a potluck of scavenged and scratch-built rifles. Most militias have to make due with bolt-action rifles and muzzle-loaders. Closer to ruins, spaceports, and centers of industry, they might luck out with battle rifles and water-cooled machine guns. When it comes to the heavy stuff, most townsfolk never see anything bigger than a black powder cannon. Anything more sophisticated in that size bracket usually doesn't have a reason for being - which usually means a spot on a watch list for the local Loonies.
- As in most things, Looney firearms don't fit the typical terrestrial bill. Assault rifles with caseless smart rounds, indestructible shotguns with frag slugs - put lightly, they are the absolute best of the best when it comes to firearms on or off the planet. There's just one problem; Loonies don't actually use them - which means they don't build a whole lot. Given their preference for magnet guns, Looney firearms are made almost exclusively for trade. They're sold off to adventurers and merchants instead - usually with a killswitch hidden somewhere out of the way. Occasionally, bunkers buddied up to a town will outfit the local militia with export rifles, but only when their budget is tight will the Loonies ever go back to smoke and fire.
- Even as snooty as they are about firearms, the Cult of Meat still has guns. Most are shoddy, sloppy muskets hand-made by the same person shooting them. Most are a few cuts below the terrestrial average. Not many of them get around. What sets them apart from scrappy smoke-blowers elsewhere is what they fire. Cult weapons don't usually use lead and powder. Instead, it's iron maggots and razorbladder extract. They shoot out tiny, blood-seeking meat monsters that burrow their way into the target and eat it from the inside out. The only exception to the trend is up in Talto; with Loonies blowing them up left and right, the Crimson Expanse needs something to shoot back with. With all the export-augmented towns to ape, that puts them up with battle rifles and field guns - with all that juicy stuff still rammed down the barrel.
- As in most things, Cloneston firearms don't fit the typical bill for...well, anyone. There are plenty of good guns out in the big city - some of which even punch up with Looney hardware - but they're all dragged down by the hundred-to-one ratio of clone firearms. Clone weapons are hardy and effective, but any of them in their stock configuration weighs about ten times more than it should - with about ten times as many laser sights and flashlights as it needs. That means that most non-clones in the city have to make due with stripped-down skeletal things they've scavenged from the latest police raid - better as they are than what most of the planet gets.
- Spacer firearms are in a constant struggle for supremacy with lasers and magnet guns. As with most things space poverty has beaten over the head, they're not all that impressive. People in orbit might get assault rifles, auto-loading cannons, and all that stuff that sounds good on paper, but none of it hits the way it should. In a microgravity vacuum, a round keeps all its muzzle velocity out to a hundred kilometers - and recoil hits twice as hard. They've got to worry about puncturing critical systems, and wild ricochets in all-metal hallways. That means most space-native weapons are light, low-velocity, and borderline useless planetside. Only big-bore guns ever hit like they should - and only because they can sink all that recoil into the hull of a ship.
- Just like Loonies on the ground, Space Loonies do actually build firearms - sometimes. Just as the technological gap suggests, the stars have to align for that to happen. Export rifles don't see so much interest when people expect high-end lasers and Gauss weapons from someone as savvy as the Space Loonies. What might come across as strange is that, despite their heritage, Space Looney firearms aren't a whole lot better than spacer guns, either. They're only about on par with above-average terrestrial weapons - and frankly disappointing next to a bunker's products.
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