If one wishes to make larger Meson Guns superior to smaller Meson Guns,
one should first consider the physics of Meson Guns. A Meson Gun consists
of two particle accelerators, one for protons, the other for electrons. The
two beams are made to cross at a point in space. The resulting nuclear
interation produces a shower of mesons headed away from the firing vehicle.
The input energy to the reaction effects the velocity with which the mesons
move, causing them to move at relatavistic velocities, producing a time-
dilation effect. Mesons have a definite half-life before they undergo
radioactive decay, but the time-dilation may be used to caused this decay
to occur at a desired place in space (i.e. inside an enemy vessel). However,
as you wish to cause this decay to happen farther and farther away from the
firing vessel, it is necessary to accelerate the mesons faster and faster,
requiring greater input energy to the Meson Gun. Hence, larger mesons guns
(which generally have greater energy requirements) should possess larger
range. There should, in fact be a trade off involved, as the energy can go
into making more mesons of the same velocity, or the same number of faster
mesons. This effect can be simulated by stating a Attenuation type statistic
for Meson Guns, as well as a Maximum Range. Of course, Meson Guns do not
"Penetrate" in the usual sense, but the Attenuation statistic should reduce
the number of hits caused by the Meson gun at greater range. I suggest that
the stated number of hits for each meson gun be that at short range, and that
the following table be used for Attenuation:
Attenuation TL
1 12
2 13
3 14
4 15+
The effect of Attenuation is to reduce the number of hits by half. Attenuation
should be considered for each range band beyond Planetary range.
By the by, none of this is going to effect the original reason this thread
started, which is the desire of a ref to cut down the number of vessel
available to screw with PCs, as even a 10kT vessel could make an adventure
real short (hello, zap!).