Post by providence13 on Jun 27, 2013 9:33:35 GMT -8
Reading over the robot stats in TME, I noticed some peculiarities.
A lot of the bots have energy weapons that are listed as "shots per day", but they have standard power cells. With a regenerating power source, I could see a micro-reactor (for instance) charging a back up battery dedicated to weapons. But that's not how it's presented.
The pocket bot has a wrist laser with 10 shots/day. Self-charging? From where?
Light Combots (Erickson 3000) use a mounted laser carbine and have 40 shots/day from one power pack. ?
Spider bots also have a wrist laser, but it's capacity is 40 shots/day!
I understand the need to keep power cell energy (kilowatt hours, joules, etc) vague. The numbers could be obsolete in a few years of real world tech advancements. It makes me think of old rpgs (2300AD) from the 80's and 90's that described far future portable computers as having 20 megabyte hard drives.
The power cell energy requirements for lasers are clearly stated in the rules, however. It kind of looks like the robots initially had micro reactors/broadcast power but was changed as the game developed. Maybe the power cells run a fuel cell that runs the weapons. If that were the case, my players would pry one out of the chassis at the first opportunity to power their weapons.
For my games, I have a solution that might help anyone else troubled by the discrepancy.
Use the standard power cell ammo requirements for weapons on pg 100 TME. A pocket bot uses a mini power cell. Wrist lasers use a mini power cell that provides 16 shots. I assume the 7 yrs duration for the bot is accurate in this instance. Compared to the extreme energy storage needed for lasers, motors and sensors on a bot would be a negligible drain.
So the mini power cell can power 7 yrs or provide 16 shots from a wrist laser. 7 yrs is 2555 days. So 1 shot from the wrist laser uses 159 days (!) of robot power.
Spider bots require even less power to run their systems as they get 11 yrs from a mini cell. Yet they get 40 shots a day.. In my game, each shot from a spider bots wrist laser burns almost 250 days.
Normally a laser carbine gets 20 shots from a power cell. Power packs = 10 power cells. Light Combots, with their weapon dedicated power pack should get 200 shots with their laser carbine. If that's not enough, I'd let them switch over to the systems power pack as a back up for weapons. 8 yrs system power is 2,920 days/200 shots = 1 shot drains 14 days of power. Looking at it another way, they could function for 16 yrs or have 400 shots with the laser carbine.
What do you think? Is my math correct. Comments are always welcome.
A lot of the bots have energy weapons that are listed as "shots per day", but they have standard power cells. With a regenerating power source, I could see a micro-reactor (for instance) charging a back up battery dedicated to weapons. But that's not how it's presented.
The pocket bot has a wrist laser with 10 shots/day. Self-charging? From where?
Light Combots (Erickson 3000) use a mounted laser carbine and have 40 shots/day from one power pack. ?
Spider bots also have a wrist laser, but it's capacity is 40 shots/day!
I understand the need to keep power cell energy (kilowatt hours, joules, etc) vague. The numbers could be obsolete in a few years of real world tech advancements. It makes me think of old rpgs (2300AD) from the 80's and 90's that described far future portable computers as having 20 megabyte hard drives.
The power cell energy requirements for lasers are clearly stated in the rules, however. It kind of looks like the robots initially had micro reactors/broadcast power but was changed as the game developed. Maybe the power cells run a fuel cell that runs the weapons. If that were the case, my players would pry one out of the chassis at the first opportunity to power their weapons.
For my games, I have a solution that might help anyone else troubled by the discrepancy.
Use the standard power cell ammo requirements for weapons on pg 100 TME. A pocket bot uses a mini power cell. Wrist lasers use a mini power cell that provides 16 shots. I assume the 7 yrs duration for the bot is accurate in this instance. Compared to the extreme energy storage needed for lasers, motors and sensors on a bot would be a negligible drain.
So the mini power cell can power 7 yrs or provide 16 shots from a wrist laser. 7 yrs is 2555 days. So 1 shot from the wrist laser uses 159 days (!) of robot power.
Spider bots require even less power to run their systems as they get 11 yrs from a mini cell. Yet they get 40 shots a day.. In my game, each shot from a spider bots wrist laser burns almost 250 days.
Normally a laser carbine gets 20 shots from a power cell. Power packs = 10 power cells. Light Combots, with their weapon dedicated power pack should get 200 shots with their laser carbine. If that's not enough, I'd let them switch over to the systems power pack as a back up for weapons. 8 yrs system power is 2,920 days/200 shots = 1 shot drains 14 days of power. Looking at it another way, they could function for 16 yrs or have 400 shots with the laser carbine.
What do you think? Is my math correct. Comments are always welcome.