nice
Just a note, check the campaign page for interesting stuff for the game. Some of it's mostly just my OCD (like measurements!) and won't come up a ton in game. :P
Ok, I now have a permanently cramped right hand, but I think I got it recolored correctly. Or at least close enough.
He looks great! That's above and beyond, sir. I'm speechless.
That's a first. :P
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The half-way point wasn't bad either to be honest. That's as far as I could get with automated software online. After that, I had to do the yellow(White) and dark red(black) by hand. The automated software couldn't handle changing white or black.
That's a first. :P
Hey, I'm a chatty and talkative player, but I'm also a constructive chatty and talkative player. ;)
Out of curiosity, what'd you use to fiddle with the image?
Online it was IMGOnline.com (I think I spelled that right).
Once it hit it's limit, I used the latest GIMP to go in and select sections pixel by pixel and then recolor the selections.
While the image of Chatter jumping the gorge is funny, do remember that the pop-culture references should wait until you've been on Earth long enough to buy off the 'completely unfamiliar with Earth Culture' disadvantages. :)
My good sir, I will have you know that Acme Incorporated is a time-honored Cybertronian corporation with deep roots in the community! Why, I have even used many of their products, from the cyber-anvil to the cyber-TNT I used to try to decimate my hated enemy, the Decepticon Road-Runner-con....
just a heads up, I will be mostly out of pocket for the next 24 hours
Local Language Issues : This will not take too long to resolve, as a Cityspeaker, Redshift can build a language pack for any language he can study for a few hours, and then download it to the other PCs (this still requires expenditure of character points by the recipient, 2 to 4 depending on how well you want to speak the language).
Ship's Computer : The ship's computer is fried, meaning your ship is difficult to control, and can't move on it's own. There are two options for this, spend character points to build a new computer from scratch, steal a cybertronian computer from someone else (if you can find one to steal), salvage one (if you can find one to salvage), or Ula can try to find a Terran mainframe to scan for her fourth alt mode (currently unused) and she can plug herself in to compensate for the computer when you need it. Downside obviously is it's boring to be the ships computer all the time. But it could work as a workaround until you can build/salvage/steal one. A terran supercomputer might work as a very poor ships computer if it's reprogrammed, but only with difficulty.
Campaign Info updated again.
Energon entry added.
The default for the campaign is Synthetic Energon. That means your energon reserves are measured in how much energy you can store with synthetic energon. If you do find some processed energon somewhere, then that endurance reserve would double if you filled it up with processed energon.
Local Language Issues : This will not take too long to resolve, as a Cityspeaker, Redshift can build a language pack for any language he can study for a few hours, and then download it to the other PCs (this still requires expenditure of character points by the recipient, 2 to 4 depending on how well you want to speak the language).
Ship's Computer : The ship's computer is fried, meaning your ship is difficult to control, and can't move on it's own. There are two options for this, spend character points to build a new computer from scratch, steal a cybertronian computer from someone else (if you can find one to steal), salvage one (if you can find one to salvage), or Ula can try to find a Terran mainframe to scan for her fourth alt mode (currently unused) and she can plug herself in to compensate for the computer when you need it. Downside obviously is it's boring to be the ships computer all the time. But it could work as a workaround until you can build/salvage/steal one. A terran supercomputer might work as a very poor ships computer if it's reprogrammed, but only with difficulty.
Red might actually suggest scuttling the ship and keeping it out of the hands of the natives, honestly.
Dog is dying if I dont post for a few days please bot me. Thanks.
My condolences on that, Shadow. I know how bad that can be from personal experience (cat vs dog, but same thing). Take the time you need.
Red might actually suggest scuttling the ship and keeping it out of the hands of the natives, honestly.Local Language Issues : This will not take too long to resolve, as a Cityspeaker, Redshift can build a language pack for any language he can study for a few hours, and then download it to the other PCs (this still requires expenditure of character points by the recipient, 2 to 4 depending on how well you want to speak the language).
Ship's Computer : The ship's computer is fried, meaning your ship is difficult to control, and can't move on it's own. There are two options for this, spend character points to build a new computer from scratch, steal a cybertronian computer from someone else (if you can find one to steal), salvage one (if you can find one to salvage), or Ula can try to find a Terran mainframe to scan for her fourth alt mode (currently unused) and she can plug herself in to compensate for the computer when you need it. Downside obviously is it's boring to be the ships computer all the time. But it could work as a workaround until you can build/salvage/steal one. A terran supercomputer might work as a very poor ships computer if it's reprogrammed, but only with difficulty.
That might be very problematic, considering it's your only source of parts and energon conversion...
Ok, and I think I've got a reasonable 'how can bots have DNA' section up now that works within the continuity and explains how it's useful, and how it can remain 'intact' over millions of years. As well as explaining why there are clans of Cybertronians and Cybertronians who are extremely similar (such as all the Seekers, Ultra Magnus & Optimus Prime being close in appearance, and 'brothers').
Dog is dying if I dont post for a few days please bot me. Thanks.
Oh man, that's awful.
Sympathies and condolences. Remember to take care of yourself.
sorry to hear that Shadow. All the best
Waiting on :
Warpath/Chatterbox (RE : Scoping out the locals)
Redshift (RE : Organics in the water with him)
Skitter (RE : What his priority is on starting repairs)
Repairs needed :
Hull Breaches (Requires time & effort)
Draining Breached Areas (Requires Hull and time & effort)
Cleaning Breached Areas (Requires Draining and time & effort)
Fixing Weapons (Requires time & effort)
Fixing Energon Converter (Requires time & effort)
Fixing Thrusters (Requires Parts, time & effort)
Fixing Computer (Requires Parts, Character Points, time & effort)
Fixing Sensors (Requires Parts, Character Points, time & effort)
Fixing/Building Cloaking System (Requires Parts, Character Points, time & effort)
Fixing Comm System (Requires Parts, Character Points, time & effort)
Cleaning Hull of local Life Forms (Requires time & effort)
Skitter will prioritize energon converter (assuming it will work in the water). If not, let's go ahead with the hull breaches.
Ok, then I need the following :
1) 2 Mechanics rolls & 2 electronics rolls (to get the power systems back online)
2) 1 Energon Conversion Tech roll, to get the converter online.
Guys I am swamped at work. Will try to update tomorrow but today is a wash.
Dog passed away Sunday not been good will try to update tonight.
aww man, sorry to hear that Shadow.
Condolences.
I need to a little meta here and ask about expectations from the GM and other players?
Are we wanting to play this as sort of a covert thing, or do just roll up and say, "People of Earth, we are Autobots..."
Expectation from the GM was you were 'robots in disguise', since you don't know how the locals will react, or whether they can hurt you or not. Plus, Autobots have a history of getting blamed for Decepticon activity, by other races...
Expectation from the GM was you were 'robots in disguise', since you don't know how the locals will react, or whether they can hurt you or not. Plus, Autobots have a history of getting blamed for Decepticon activity, by other races...
I was thinking the same thing.
Tomorrow I should be able to post, today as rougher than yesterday which I was not expecting at all.
I went to the gym and really beat myself up between that and my daughter being so damn sweet I am almost feeling normal, the question is, how will I react tomorrow when I wake up and realize he is not there once more.
Thanks for the patience, be back soon.
Take the time you need, Shadow. I don't think anyone here's going to begrudge you that.
At least until you're all settled in and a bit more familiar with the locals, we'll probably be having more cut scenes. Unless you want to RP out every day of repairs and getting more info on the local inhabitants.
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Cut scenes are fine.
I imagine us at one point having a conversation not unlike Terry Bisson's "They're Made Out Of Meat".
Unlikely, remember, Cybertronians have had contact with organics before, out in the wide universe. There aren't many alien races, but there are a few, and you get around when your life span is in the millions of years.
ok, so quick question while we're kind of on the subject... how do the older autobots, like Alpha-Trion for example, grow "beards"? At what point do you decide you're old enough to solder on a beard? Or does someone else do it for you? As a joke? As a request?
Personally, I'd put it down to a cultural adaptation after meeting a few organic species with facial hair. IE: During the Golden Age, Cybertron had visitors from other planets, so the Elders affected fake facial hair to convey age to organics who couldn't tell a venerable bot from a newly awakened newbie.
Your ship is as repaired as you can get it now without spare parts from Cybertron, or building up new parts from scavenged Earth tech.
Everyone gets 5 experience points for the intro. Those who don't have English or Universal Translator probably want to put 3 or 4 points into English language.
We're now at the point where you tell me what you'd like to do. You have a ship that can go anywhere on Earth, or to the moon or outer planets. It's low on energy though. It will be picked up on radar, sonar, or visually if you're not careful however, so keep that in mind. You can stay around Anchorage if you want, or move somewhere else.
I have things planned that will happen no matter what your group does, and other things may happen depending on what you do. This is semi-sandbox to some extent, in that you the players influence things. Depending on what you do, some things I have planned may be more or less dangerous, or may or may not happen as I intend (for an example, if you decided to burn down a bridge in a Pathfinder game, and I intended you to escape later via that bridge, then obviously you've made things harder on yourself).
I would like you all to discuss what to do next OOC, and I'll answer questions and comment, and then point out things you missed, if needed.
I'd say top priority is securing Energon.
Any way we can use the computers to scan for energy reserves here in Alaska? We know they must have energy to power their machines somehow.
Energy, then allies!
our computers are virtual scrap. Energy is super important, but so are the computers. I'm willing to use the ocean to hide while we continue to scout and try to figure out how to fix these two issues.
Unfortunately, the ship's scanners are fried. (IE : You didn't have points enough for sensors on the ship).
Your options are to cobble something together by scavenging earth tech and pulling bits of other ships's systems apart to make some sensors (indicated by people donating points toward the ship so you can buy sensors) or going out in vehicle form to scout.
You've watched enough tv to realize that the vehicles here appear to be using mostly hydrocarbons (who the heck came up with the idea of using precious hydrocarbons by burning it? What a moron!), which can be used to make energon.
Table of KWh/Gallon of conventional fuels. You need about 1000 KWh of energy to produce an energon cube of synthetic energon. A synthetic cube has 50 points of endurance in it for a cybertronian character (or 10 points of ship endurance). So basically, to make a cube you need 30 gallons of RFG87 gasoline, or 26 gallons of diesel.
Hydrocarbon fuels are the best source for energon, as they contain the carbon and hydrogen needed, with only some silica required to be added to the process to make the energon. You have an energon converter on the ship that you can hook up to a tank of hydrocarbons mixed with silica and get energon. It can create 60 points of energon per minute (ship scale) which requires 6*30 = 180 gallons of RFG87 per minute to power it. Your ship's energon tank (which was damaged) can only hold 100 energon (ship scale) currently. That's about 500 energon points (endurance) for a character. If you repair the ship's other energon tanks, you can increase the amount of endurance it can hold (IE: donate more experience toward the ship and increase the endurance capacity of the ship). The ship doesn't use a lot of endurance unless you're firing it's weapons, but it slowly drains endurance for maintaining power/movement/etc.
I think we can safely split up into a team to fix the computers and one to seek energy. Probably best for me to be on team energy.
Ideally, we could hide out somewhere in a desert with a lot of silica and a high albedo, so that we could run solar conversion. The electrical generation of a hydro-power damn was good enough for the Decepticons in an episode of the show, is there a reason we can't set up our Reasonably Highly Efficient Solar Conversion station (think Hoist's "Solar Power Tower"), hook it up to the Energon Convertor, and show these fleshlings a thing or two about using that enormous nuclear reactor in the sky?
@Red - Only issue you'd have with a solar panel array is that it would be noticeable from orbit if anyone looked (or from the sky if anyone looked). It wouldn't generate a ton of energy (I'd guess Cybertronian panels would be about 80% energy efficient, or 4 times Earth efficiency), so you'd likely get about 4KwH per day from a 17.6 sq ft panel (that's a 3x5 panel). So, you can produce one cube every 250 days off one panel. The more panels you make, the faster it goes, however, they are also then more noticeable.
You could disguise them as earth panels, and put out some, and run cables into a cave or something if you can find one big enough for the ship. That would give you some hiding. If you had 10 of them going (30 x 5 ft) you'd get 40 KwH per day, meaning you'd get one cube per month, roughly. It would work as a supplement, but not a primary source.
Note, the Hoover Damn (the one used in the show) produces about 11 million KwH per day, which is why the Decepticons went after it. It can, with enough converters, produce 11,000 energon cubes per day.
@Warhawk - Fixing the computers is fine, but people will need to donate some of their exp toward it. You gained 5, and learning English at fluent is 4. So if everyone donated one exp, that would generate a small computer for the ship.
Hm. I wonder if we could set up a wave action conversion system. Hydropower isn't going out of style any time soon.
@Red - Just a note, Hound's 'solar tower' was actually a Solar Power Tower (or a Heliostat Tower). The new one they built in Nevada produces about 1,780,000 kwh per day (650 GwH per year), which means it would produce about 1,780 energon cubes per day. However, it's impossible to hide!
Wave Generators would be concealable, and mobile, allowing you to move the ship and set them up. The power they produce will be variable, but would range from 10 KwH/day (very calm gulf waters) to 10 KwH/hour (stormy seas) per square yard of generator. So, a 9x9 generator (9 square yards) on an average ocean could produce around 7.5 KwH/hour, or 180 KwH per day (or around one energon cube per week).
You could either steal one or more, or scavenge the parts to build a few. Scavenged parts would produce less power, but not attract as much attention than stealing them would. Stealing a 75Kw wave generator (which produces up to 75KwH per hour) would be a 12 meter deep 24 meter per edge triangle of generator. It would produce between 75KwH per day and 75KwH per hour depending on the seas. Again, 75KwH is it's maximum in a very stormy sea. It'd probably average about 75KwH per 12 hours (or 6.25 KwH / hour, which is 150 KwH per day, and produce one energon cube per week).
You could scavenge parts from sunken ships (once you find some) and make some that aren't as efficient, but also wouldn't be as noticable, and produce about half that per unit. It would give you a steady, but not massive, source of energon.
To simulate this, you'd donate some points to the ship, and buy off the limitation on the energon reserves recovery. This would simulate that it has a power source to recover energy, and no longer needs fuel (energon cubes) as you're making them. You could then store additional energon in cube form (unstable! Could blow up!) or just turn it off when you're at full power and power it back up when you run low. Alternately, you can donate more points to the ship and increase the energon reserve (stable storage area) to store more energon in the tanks (stable, not likely to blow up).
However we do it, we need something that doesn't require us scavenging the resources from native stockpiles.
Thievery isn't the Autobot way. That's Decepticon territory.
There scavenging and there's scavenging.
Scavenging from wrecked ships at the bottom of the ocean would be scavenging but not stealing. Scavenging from someone's power plant would be stealing. :P Autobots would do the former, but not the latter.
Also, Red's not an autobot, correct? As that didn't exist until the war started. So it's 3 autobots, and two independents, yes?
Depends on the continuity, but if the Prime is an Autobot, Redshift's an Autobot. It's pretty simple.
Sorry, let me rephrase that. Red might not realize he's an autobot, in that he slept through most of the war. Once he finds out about the war, and that the Prime is the leader of the Autobots, he'd likely put on an Autobot symbol. No problem with that. Just meant that as a city speaker who slept through most of the war, he's not a war weary autobot veteran, and hasn't actually joined up officially is what I meant.
Does that make sense?
Ula on the other hand, has her emblems put on with ruthenium fibers so she can change it from red to purple to invisible depending on who she's dealing with. :P
I had been thinking about hydropower as well but instead of tapping the surface, focusing on the underwater ocean currents of the thermohaline cycle. Estimates of the strength usually run around 15-20 Sv (a sverdrup is 1 million cubic meters per second), with a heat transport of like 1.2PW. Being near the Bering Strait, we should be pretty close to one of the major pacific upwelling sites. As those deepwater currents come up, they pick up a ton of nitrates, phosphate, and silicic acids so we should be able to harness tht for our use. The antarctic cicumpolar current would be probably better in terms of turning a generator (it clocks in at 125 Sv... which is a LOT). It might be easier to hide down there, too.
We could also try tapping the heat energy available at one of the local subduction zones, but that might be a bit more difficult. It might also be a bit more difficult to figure mathematically.