Nuclear dampers and alien romance

A thread of 3 messages, 19 May 1992 to 20 May 1992, in the order they were sent.

#4157 Nuclear dampers and alien romance

J.A.F.O. · 19 May 1992

1)
I recently shelled out on a copy of Hard Times (wot no virus?) and was intrigued
 by part of one of the scenarios in which the evil (boo hiss) pirate is tricked
into stealing this ship with a nuclear damper in the cargo hold,  when said
baddie stores his nukes in there this device renders them PERMENANTLY inoperable
............. comments any one?
If this is the case in the Trav' universe then surely you might be able to use
one to tidy up radioactive messes?

NB   PLEASE,  no 400 megabyte physicist raves about all this! PLEASE....
I have enough trouble staying awake long enough over the gravitics debate :)

2)
 A long while back I posted some queries about how many of you had had cross
species romance/physical liasons going on in your games and how you reckoned
soceity might view it.   I got a deafening silence..... anyone new out there
got sommat to contribute.

3)   Additional point
  Has anyone thought how dumb imperial archaeologists must be to not have
realised WHO the ancients were?

#4180 Re: (4157) Nuclear dampers and alien romance

Robert S. Dean · 20 May 1992 · reply to #4157

"J.A.F.O." [email removed] writes:

> I recently shelled out on a copy of Hard Times
> (wot no virus?) and was intrigued
>  by part of one of the scenarios in which the
> evil (boo hiss) pirate is tricked
> into stealing this ship with a nuclear damper
> in the cargo hold,  when said
> baddie stores his nukes in there this device
> renders them PERMENANTLY inoperable
> ............ comments any one?
> If this is the case in the Trav' universe then surely
> you might be able to use
> one to tidy up radioactive messes?
>
> NB   PLEASE,  no 400 megabyte physicist raves about all this! PLEASE....
> I have enough trouble staying awake long enough over the gravitics debate :)

OK.  I'll keep this very short. (-:  You're right.  A damper can clean
radiaoactive messes.  This function is specifically described in the
advanced rules for Striker (Book 2 out of 3), which is unfortunately a
little hard to come by right now.

This, by the way, is another example of a MT problem--the old-timers know
what a damper is and roughly how it works, but it isn't described anywhere
in MegaTraveller...lots of Striker stuff in MT without the required
explanations...

Rob Dean

#4173 Re: Nuclear dampers

Hans Rancke-Madsen · 20 May 1992 · reply to #4157

"J.A.F.O." writes:
>
>1)
>I recently shelled out on a copy of Hard Times (wot no virus?) and was
>intrigued by part of one of the scenarios in which the evil (boo hiss)
>pirate is tricked into stealing this ship with a nuclear damper in the
>cargo hold,  when said baddie stores his nukes in there this device
>renders them PERMENANTLY inoperable
>............ comments any one?
>If this is the case in the Trav' universe then surely you might be able to
>use one to tidy up radioactive messes?

You've heard about situational ethics, right? Well, this is situational
physics.

>
>3)   Additional point
>  Has anyone thought how dumb imperial archaeologists must be to not have
>realised WHO the ancients were?

You mean the Droyne? Don't tell me you really believe the one about
Grandfather!?! In that case I've got a bridge that might interest you.


      Hans Rancke
University of Copenhagen
     [email removed]
- ------------
  "Free speech gives a man the right to talk about the
'psycology' of an amoeba, but I don't have to listen".
                  Elihu Nivens in 'The Puppet Masters'