Dear GURPSnet, our Traveller crew is on a TL9 desert world. Yes, I know, "it rained on Planet Mongo" and all that, but our campaign is visiting a lot of stereotyped planets. We had a jungle world with dinosaurs, a vacuum world, an ice world, an urbanized world, and so on.
It could happen that we get into conflict with the local government, so I was wondering what the Planetary Defense Forces look like. I don't expect a shootout between a TL10 Free Trader and a TL9 SDB, but it could come to dodging patrols on the surface. The setting is this: * GURPS Traveller 3E TL9. * Contragrav is available (since GTL8) but it is used mostly on few large vehicles, not many smaller ones. * No AI and relatively limited computing. A "safetech" feeling. * The planet is not completely covered in sand dunes, but there is very little surface water, sparse vegetation, and plenty of sand and rocks. * The government is pretty autocratic, with infighting between big families. Internal security will be an issue. * There are marginalized "primitive" people. How primitive? Nobody really knows :-) Again a possible COIN mission. * In the Spinward Marches, we're pretty close to the Zhodani. The Planetary Defense Force might have to hold out against invaders. On water-rich worlds, System Defense Boats can hide in the oceans. Here there are just a few briny puddles near the poles. So I thought about a "self-entrenching ATV" -- a wheeled or tracked vehicle with a bore (VE67) to dig itself a hiding place in the sand. If you can do it, is it worthwhile? And what could it look like? Most real-world tunnel boring machines have a circular cutting wheel, while I want a machine which travels forward at a good speed and then digs in downwards. One concept would be a tracked vehicle with four tracks. When it switches from ground movement to digging, the forward tracks go into reverse gear while the rear tracks go forward. This throws the sand out forward and back. Reconfigurable equipment, tracked drivetrain to (super) bore? Unfortunately, that is TL11 ... a high-tech import, maybe. Or the bore is separate, and the tracks just help to remove the spoil. Another classic desert vehicle is the Land Rover 'Pink Panther' LRDPV, or the FAV. These days, MRAPs seem to have replaced the light stuff. Is the TL of the FAV over, or is it a specific condition of the WoT? When I think desert worlds, I think Dune. Could contragrav flyers take the role of Thopters and Carryalls? Any thoughts? Regards, Onno _______________________________________________ GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]> http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
