Peasant Railgun

[Troodos]

One of my players loves to abuse the rules in order to create ridiculous schemes. I generally don't have a problem because it isa obviously good spirited, and today he came to me with an idea that was absolutely hilarious in its insanity.
When he first approached me about his idea for a "Peasant Railgun", I was understandably concerned for his character's alignment. Fortunately, as he explained, the peasants were not the ammunition, but the firing mechanism. With a line of peasants about a hundred long, a ten-foot pole is given to the one at the back. This peasant then uses a move action to pass the pole to the next, who then uses their turn to take the pole (first action), and pass it on (second action). Technically, there is no limit to how many times that this can be done in a round, effectively allowing them to create a hyper accelerated projectile.
Of course, no reasonable GM would actually allow this for obvious reasons, but I have been wondering, on a purely mechanical level, if this would work.

note: this does not factor in the damage that the later peasants would take from holding the white-hot pole

[Umbral Reaver]

The last peasant in the line throws the pole as an improvised weapon with a range increment of 10 ft.

[Nicos]

On a purely mechanical level, Umbral have it right.

[Troodos]

Umbral Reaver wrote:

The last peasant in the line throws the pole as an improvised weapon with a range increment of 10 ft.

That was the idea

[Davor]

I hate to make your friend sound unoriginal, but the Peasant Railgun has been around for a long, long time. :P

[Troodos]

Davor wrote:

I hate to make your friend sound unoriginal, but the Peasant Railgun has been around for a long, long time. :P

Doubt he had heard of it, he doesn't really look at RPG community stuff

[Lord Fyre]

This would work better.

[boring7]

Yes, it's an old joke. Dates back to at least 3.0 when my friends came up with it by the coincidental development principle, probably even further back to days before internet was really a thing.

As a mental exercise it is mildly amusing, as an example of game rules and game balance it serves an excellent point. The underlying conceit is that you allow physics to be suspended in favor of game rules, then re-apply physics when it becomes convenient to do so. The primary problem is not that you use one or the other, but that you use one and THEN the other to cheat.

A ten foot pole moving 3 miles in 6 seconds is not a particular issue, since the logistics of feeding/paying such a large peasant army far outweighs any benefit from such a transit system.

A ten foot pole not being able to relay such a distance at such a speed is not particularly bad, as all (however many) peasants could be hired to walk that 3 miles carrying many ten foot poles and ultimately deliver more than a single chain relay could in the same amount of time.

A ten foot pole accelerated to 2.4 times the speed of sound is not particularly bad as long as a rules-consistent (and therefore prohibitively expensive) method is used.

[Rynjin]

RAW there's no acceleration. The pole would reach the end of the line with no momentum and be thrown by the last peasant as normal.

Now, this essentially results in peasant operated teleportation of the pole, but not a railgun. =)

[boring7]

Precisely.

[Lakesidefantasy]

Give each peasant an arrow and pass an enchanted longbow instead of a ten-foot pole. They can use each of their standard actions to fire their arrow before passing the bow by dropping it as a free action.

[Thanis Kartaleon]

I had a discussion with a friend about this a year or two ago. We came to the determination that a single object should be able to be moved (picked up, passed, dropped, thrown, etc.) no more than three times unless some sort of magic is being used. Yes, it is an arbitrary number, but it's the one we thought sounded right.

[Cap. Darling]

Troodos wrote:

Umbral Reaver wrote:

The last peasant in the line throws the pole as an improvised weapon with a range increment of 10 ft.

That was the idea

If this was the idea. Then what is your question?

[The 8th Dwarf]

There is a poster called Peasant Railgun... Hasn't posted since March though.

[YogoZuno]

Quote:

We came to the determination that a single object should be able to be moved (picked up, passed, dropped, thrown, etc.) no more than three times unless some sort of magic is being used.

I think you guys should go watch the opening scene for Temple of Doom, and then have another think about that limit.

[Bob Bob Bob]

This is sort of old hat. More interesting (and hilariously still viable) is the internet. BBS are easy (make a line of any creature that doesn't need food, water, or sleep and that can speak, have them yell to the next one in line, instantly transfer messages across continents). By that same token you can transfer pictures (not copy, unless I'm missing some easy way to do it) the same way as the commoner railgun. With enough horses or other riding animals you can fast mount/dismount to fast travel across worlds. Just hop on one side and off the other. If you need to encrypt you can get a line of skeletons and code in 10-digit binary with, well, their digits.

[Claxon]

Yeah, the answer is that the javelin pole or whatever moves however long the chain is and is then thrown for 1d6+str damage (in the case of a javelin) and no bonus from momentum, because this isn't a physic simulator and the rules for momentum don't exist to abused by players. There is no stated damage increase, so there isn't.

[Ciaran Barnes]

Rynjin wrote:

RAW there's no acceleration. The pole would reach the end of the line with no momentum and be thrown by the last peasant as normal.

Now, this essentially results in peasant operated teleportation of the pole, but not a railgun. =)

The distance an item travels in one roound is limited only by the number of creatures participating.

You could actually have the peasants stand abount 30 feet apart. On the peasant's turn, it picks up the item (move action), walks 30 feet (move actions), and drops it adjacent to the next peasant (free action). To account for oopsies such as reduced speed or difficult terrain, reduce the distance between peasants to 15 or 20 feet.

[Tectorman]

What you really want to do is line up a hundred or so horses and then get a really good Ride skill. Mount as a free action, dismount as a free action, and you've moved 150 ft and still have your whole turn left to you.

It's practically Pounce if there's a bad guy at the end.