The Gaming Den

Can magic be a power source for technological items in AT?

maglag wrote:As Frank pointed out, a laser isn't that complicated of a system when you get down to it plus you don't need any moving parts so less wear and tear. With no smoke/residues being produced, there is no need to open it up for cleaning after a day's work either. A Gauss would be less robust and reliable, but then they would probably be used more as the squad's special weapon like a flamethrower or rocket launcher.

How would they handle shock and impact, though? In the field these weaposn would get banged around quite abit over their lifespan.

Mind you, I am not trying to contradict you here, I am just honestly curious.

Since the laser gun doesn't have need moving parts you can build it pretty solid. The most "fragile" bits would be any lens but you're not in a worst position than rifle scopes and helmet visors and lanterns and whatnot. Bonus point because you don't need a barrel so you can build it shorter than your usual rifle so it'll bang on less things. Heck, you can try it with one of those cheap toy lasers they sell right now, they can take a few hits, a laser gun would be basically be the same thing just with a lot more power and a proper reinforced frame.

Gauss guns again I'll quote Frank directly

Frank couple pages ago wrote:And well, Gauss Weapons are high velocity slug throwers, but they are also precision electronic equipment with a series of delicately calibrated magnets. I don't think hitting people with gauss rifles is ever going to be considered a good idea.

So not so much, but again you also don't want to go around banging your rocket launcher/flamethrower.

Thanks for the reply, maglag. So I guess the big rodblock is storing enough power. Then again, we're talking about a world in which cyberware that severly exceeds human limitations can be powered de facto endlessly.

Just as an example; the proposed US ABL (Airborne Missle) system uses what looks like a jet liner with a nose mounted capsule.

Field Operation example:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/v5SDo0rH1Xo

Sales Pitch on R&D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfZxrBoIkRg

Examples of ground-based anti-missile laser
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL9_Tldmrhs

How does AT handle enchanting bullets?

I've been thinking about how to do that for my not-40k heartbreaker and figured there should be a size limit so nothing smaller than a 12 gauge to fit in the spell tag, gem, pile of salt or whatever the magic component is. Also thinking of a certain level of 'connection' between the firer and weapon so it only works for hand held weapons and not drone guns or missiles.

Drones or Missles you just cast Invisibility on to make sure they make it to their target and can do their maximum ammount of damage unmolested.

Bullets you would want velocity or true aim or something on i guess?

Stahlseele wrote: Bullets you would want velocity or true aim or something on i guess?

I figure technology is already good at making bullets kill people, maybe things like bullets that make vines sprout out, encase the target in ice, animate their corpse to go on a rampage

Yeah, sure, why not. Sounds neat enough.

Or for slightly wacky but creative:
healing bullets! (as long as the healed damage is more than the expected damage from the bullet so it is a net win)
shield bullets! (if you are in danger of taking much more damage than a bullet to the arm)

Bullets loaded with magical effects sound interesting, but there are a couple of issues that can pop up depending on what rules are being used for enchanting items (I was unable to find any in the thread, please point them out if they are there.)

1. Ammo for the weapon itself. Laser ammo is unlikely to be enchanted, as even enchanting the battery should not have an effect on the energy produced unless I read the rules wrong. Same with Spray. Metal storm would be firing a large number of rounds, enough that to have magical ammo you would have to abstract it to entire clips for the system to work versus tracking actual rounds, but I'm guessing that would be better anyway.. Gauss rounds could work, if the link is purely mental. Conventional firearms could easily work,and if magical ammunition was a conventional firearms only trick it could make such weapons actually useful in comparison to those other weapons.

2. Sheer quantity. For Metalstorm/Gauss/Conventional, you're talking 30+ rounds per clip in an assault rifle equivalent if not more, each of which has to be individually rolled for while enchanting, and then has to have stress rolled for it. Unless the system abstracts enchanting entire clips, it will take a mage a very long time to enchant ammo vs. enchanting the weapon/wielder or just casting the spell in the first place, if the time to enchant is not dependent on material size/composition.

Magic Ammo either has to be specialty rounds which are very expensive on a per-round basis, to reflect the man-hours and effort on the mage, or abstracted to be cast on an entire clip vs individual bullets, but that messes with the assumption of sympathetic link. An alternative would be making the individual bullets much easier to enchant and much faster to enchant than other items, but I can't think of a justification for it. Perhaps magic bullets are made out of a material that is much easier to enchant than others for setting reasons?

Also, Frank, out of curiosity, why no Plasma weapons alongside Laser/Gauss/etc?

saithorthepyro wrote:Laser ammo is unlikely to be enchanted, as even enchanting the battery should not have an effect on the energy produced unless I read the rules wrong.

This is true, however enchanting the lenses might have an effect. I can't say that I recally any aspect of how AT handles enchanting weapons/ammunition though.

saithorthepyro wrote:
Also, Frank, out of curiosity, why no Plasma weapons alongside Laser/Gauss/etc?

Aside from melee examples, I was going to say "b/c projecting plasma energy @ range isn't possible w/out a containment vessel for the plasma", but apparently neon gas-filled vacuum tubes w/ copper bases make it possible to fire plasma via modified gauss/coil guns. There have (apparently) been several military research projects over the years, but we care mostly about person-portable arms when we're thinking about a cyberpunk heartbreaker.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTLCHKb20zI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvrQciFL0ig

Article describing the mechanism in more detail:https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech ... a-bullets/


The creator admits that their design failed after ~10 shots, but that the failure may have been due to insufficient sheilding between the coils and the ammunition.

Honestly, this is more likely (and impressive) than current models of infantry-scaled laser xor gauss/coil arms; because of it's non-trivial kinetic power in a man-portable package.

Lasers and railguns might be limited to naval, vehicle, or artillery roles, possibly as edge-case squad support weapons; but now it seems much more plausible for plasma-cartridge coil-guns to be a futuristic line infantry arm.

[edit] It's a helix rail, not a coil; supposedly to magnetically "rifle" the barrel and add spin to rounds. Which is also pretty impressive.[/edit]

Judging__Eagle wrote:

saithorthepyro wrote:Laser ammo is unlikely to be enchanted, as even enchanting the battery should not have an effect on the energy produced unless I read the rules wrong.

This is true, however enchanting the lenses might have an effect. I can't say that I recally any aspect of how AT handles enchanting weapons/ammunition though.

I'm basing my assumption on Frank's statements in the first few posts where it was said that the mage needed a link of some form to be able to cast magic on the device. I don't see it as likely that a link can be formed from the mage to energy. The focusing lens is definitely a possibility though, but it might lead to some discussion over what kind of magic it can be enchanted with to affect the ammo. Enchanting the lense would certainly be more cost-effective compared to weapons with physical ammo, especially Metal Storm weapons.

I'm going to assume that firearms can't be enchanted then? If that's the case, then lens-enchanting is likely off the table as well.

Why would you not be able to enchant firearms?
Usually it does not help one bit, because the bullets are the actual damage dealing agents and not the actual gun . .
We could have a pages long debate about that being different with lasers and enchanting the lens of a lasergun could change things around . .
For example, enchant it with a movie realism spell. Now the laser hitting things has physical mass!

You can almost certainly have a bullet be a marker, if you're willing to fire it at low muzzle velocity. You can also enchant the gun itself. Take an uzi and spell it to be silent and invisible to all but the wielder. Enchant it to be self cleaning and self repairing. Put in illusory laser sights, again visible only to the one holding it. Put a battle spirit into the gun which can commune with the wielder, giving them martial insights. Transmute the bullets out of water, so they disappear before forensics can learn anything.