Jump Packs & Flight Packs

[MrNexx]

Ok, let's make up some numbers for people to tweak.

Craft: Arakyd Aerodynes, Inc. Hush-About AJP-400
Type: Personal jet pack
Scale: Character
Length: .5m
Skill: Jet pack operation
Crew: 1
Crew Skill: Varies widely
Passengers: 0
Total Capacity: 300 kilograms
Cover: 1/2 (back only)
Altitude Range: Ground level-200 meters
Cost: 1,800, 150 (power pack recharge), 150 (portable carrying case)
Maneuverability: 1D+1
Move: 30; 90 kmh
Body Strength: 3D+2

Availability: 3, F or R
Game Notes: The Arakyd Hush-About AJP-400 is capable of lifting up to 300 kilograms (total). It moves vertically 200 meters per charge, horizontally up to 500 meters per charge. A fully charged unit has 10 charges and can be run on continuous charge-feed.
During normal operation this unit produces very little noise. Any attempt to locate a Hush-About using auditory pickups requires a successful search roll at a +10 penalty to the difficulty.

Notes: Most of this is straight copy, so I bolded the stuff I had to make up.

Length: About 2 feet; fits on a human-sized back
Cover: Covers a human-sized back, so about 1/2 cover, but only from the back; you can still get shot in the arms, legs, or head.
Altitude Range: None's really given, and I could have justified up to 1km (5 charges up, 5 charges down), but I felt 200m was reasonable
Manueverability: Y'all's call on whether this is high or low. I figure it's a personal-level device, and so you have SOME maneuverability, but it's also an inexpensive one, so it doesn't match an airspeeder or a swoop, while going to be more maneuverable than a sail barge or a skiff.
Move: I set this at about three times a human walking speed.
Body Strength: Made it up. Seemed reasonable. I don't see any reason for it to be less tough than a speeder bike (1d+2 Speeder scale), so left it there, and converted to character scale.
_________________
"I've Seen Your Daily Routine. You Are Not Busy!"
“We're going to win this war, not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love.”
http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/

[MrNexx]

And, a completely made up JumpPack

Craft: DagTech Industries Rapid Assault Pack (RAP)
Type: Personal jump pack
Scale: Character
Length: .5m
Skill: Rocket pack operation: Jump Pack
Crew: 1
Crew Skill: Varies widely
Passengers: 0
Total Capacity: 300 kilograms
Cover: 1/2 (back only)
Altitude Range: 1-15m
Cost: 1,800, 150 (power pack recharge), 150 (portable carrying case)
Maneuverability: 1D+1
Move: 30; 90 kmh
Body Strength: 3D+2

The DagTech RAP is a Rapid Assault Jump Pack; not capable of sustained flight, it instead thrusts the wearer forward with shocking rapidity. Standard safe use (i.e. cruising speed) moves the user forward 30 meters as a single move; the pack is capable of tripling that, but it is considered reckless and dangerous; not surprisingly, reckless and dangerous is favored by anyone willing to use a rocket pack to close distance with an enemy.

DagTech RAPs have a limited amount of fuel; they're kept effective by limiting their weight. Each pack has 20 charges, fully fueled, and each charge allows 30m of forward movement. Note that this might not be the total distance traveled; slower, more careful burns might travel 90m along an arc, but with a flight ceiling of 15m, it moves about 30m forward. Skilled Rapid Assault Troops will be firing the entire way.

RAPS in Space: Being rocket-based jump packs, RAPS function in space, but with a few modifications. Each spent charge provides 30m of acceleration along a vector; spend all 20 charges on the wrong vector, and you can get going to a 360 move that will end when you get sucked into a gravity well in several thousand years. Spend a charge along one vector, and you must spend another charge along the opposite vector to stop. Use of a RAP in space is limited by the lesser of one's Rocket Pack Operations or Zero-G Maneuvering (a Dexterity skill).
_________________
"I've Seen Your Daily Routine. You Are Not Busy!"
“We're going to win this war, not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love.”
http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/

[Naaman]

What determines the difficupty of the roll for the RAPS? And, does it double as a reaction skill (if so, why shouldn't climbing/jumping also be a reaction skill)?

If conditions at the targeted landing spot change while in flight, I assume course correction is not possible?

[MrNexx]

[CRMcNeill]

Jump Pack
Skill: Jump Pack Operation
Range: 10m-20m/50m/100m (Long Jumps expend 2 Fuel Charges)
Fuel: 20 Charges
Capacity: 1 Character & their personal equipment. Additional cargo increases all Jump Difficulties by +1 for every 10 kilograms.
Game Use:

-To initiate a jump, the operator designates a landing point, then rolls his Jump Pack Operation against the Difficulty for that Range. +5 to all Difficulties when making an Ascending Jump, and -5 when making a Descending Jump (this is at the GM's discretion, but as a rule of thumb, it applies if the jumper is ascending or descending a greater distance than they are moving laterally).
-On a Failed roll, the jump still occurs, but the jumper deviates from his intended landing point by 1 meter for every point by which the Jump Pack Operation roll failed, in a direction dictated by the Grenade Deviation Diagram (2R&E Rulebook, pg. 92), with the '4' result being direction of the intended jump.
-The Operator may also attempt to 'double jump', that is, make another jump Move while still in mid-air, but at +10 Difficulty, and expends an additional Fuel Charge (Jumpers may use this option to recover from a failed jump by making a Difficult Jump Pack Operation roll).
-On a successful Long Jump, the operator may extend the maximum distance traveled by 1 meter for every point of success.

_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Mamatried]

I have been looking over these, and i like them.
great write ups.

I do have one question though, for a jet pack/flight pack how long can you use it? minutes or hours?

[Naaman]

[MrNexx]

[CRMcNeill]

[MrNexx]

TBH, when thinking flight packs, I was thinking of Cad Bane's rocket boots.
_________________
"I've Seen Your Daily Routine. You Are Not Busy!"
“We're going to win this war, not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love.”
http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/

[CRMcNeill]

[Raven Redstar]

I think the flight packs should be able to match speed with your basic speeders. Whenever I've seen them used, they were able to keep pace with skiffs and speeders.

I feel like the inherent danger of failing a maneuver and crashing doing full direct damage to the pilot is enough of a deterrent to keep the packs from being overused/abused by players.

So, maybe something in the 80; 230kmh speed range?

Also, as far as flight ceiling is concerned, make it as high as it still has enough atmosphere to operate, see my above solution. If a character flies so high and runs out of fuel or whatnot, they'll most likely fall to their death. No reason to cap operational altitude.
_________________
RR
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[CRMcNeill]

My concept for flight ceiling is to treat it as an Altitude Increment, so that every increment step you go up, you suffer a Lost Move. So, if your Base Altitude is 1,000 meters, you can perform normally at 1,000 meters or below, then if you go up to 1,001-2,000 meters, you can no longer go All-Out, then from 2,001-3,000 meters, you can't go Full, and so on and so forth.

It's not perfect by any means, but it's better than a hard altitude cap.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Whill]

[MrNexx]