Sudden Character Inspiration - Techno-Wizard Astronaut!

[GlitterKnight]

Hey all! It's been awhile since I posted, but I'm back and finally, I actually have gotten a chance to play RIFTS! And it's awesome! Yay, Russian Cyborg Shocktroopers! Holocaust FTW!

But I've been reading the UMB and the Book of Magic, imagining all the clever uses I can for each spell, and was struck by an awesome Techno Wizard idea! A TW whose life's goal is to send Man back into space...with MAGIC!!!

Basically, my idea is that he grew up in a scavenger community, picking over the ruins of pre-Cataclysm cities and especially, spaceports. I'm thinking somewhere around the ruins of the Houston Spaceport, where NASA's mission control once resided. Basically, he spent his childhood looking at all the advertisements and pictures, fading and cracked, dreaming of the wonders of the world that was. Dreaming of it's ultimate triumph, traveling beyond Earth's embrace.

This drive and wonder inspired him to learn everything he could, to hopefully achieve his dreams of going to space, and leaving the dangers of RIFTS Earth behind. He eventually became a TW, and has spent years learning all he could about spaceflight and TW vehicles. His plan for a TW rocketship is to build a launchpad and the vehicle on nexus. Since he doesn't have the kind of teleportation or Rift opening spells to send the whole vehicle into space, he's gonna go with what he knows, and build it as a TK vehicle. To lift the whole craft the distance he needs, he designed it to absorb vast quantities of PPE from the nexus, and is waiting for a planetary conjunction to make the nexus flare to the power levels he needs to achieve lift off. The craft is supposed to draw on the flare of the planetary alignment to achieve lift off, until it's beyond the range of the ley lines a mile or two up, then it's going to throw all it's PPE into TK flight boosters to achieve orbit. Once in orbit, the TK booster detaches and deploys the actual spacecraft, which is going to be a sweet ride, loaded with technological and magical options. It's primarily a stealth and re-entry craft, built to minimize it's signature in an attempt to evade whatever destroys ships leaving Earth. His hope is that the enemy is technological, and won't expect the magical nature of his craft. Plus, with a TK engine, the booster won't show up much on thermal scans, and he wants to magically hide it from view and sensors.

My idea for the character is basically TW Cid from FF7. He's on a tight deadline to build and launch the rocket, since he's sitting on an uncapped nexus, waiting for a planetary alignment. He would be harried and need help defending the site and finishing the vehicle, because if he misses his window, he'll have to wait years for the next alignment. So he suffers a set back as the PCs come by, and they end up helping him finish and launch the ship, and they get to go up with him, and cue RIFTS in Space fun!

Thoughts?

[glitterboy2098]

neat idea, but he'll still be faced with the Counter-orbital debris feild and the network of orbital kill-sats.
i presume he'd have hit the library of lazlo or tolkeen on the subject, and would have ideas for magical defenses to avoid being sandblasted to death and then shot to peices.

and he doesn't need to draw on the planetary alignment surges to acheive lift off, that is just a matter of building the 'bootstrap' drive well enough. but what he likely will need is a a massive reserve of PPE (which means lots and lots of carats of diamond or emerald... or plenty of Talisman spells), which could be gathered over a long period of time, but siphoning off from a nexus during a surge would allow you to charge up faster for as long as it lasts.

[TechnoGothic]

ONE problem by Rifts canon setting wise.

Orbitial Communities and their Debris field can take out Starships with thousands of mdc in 15-30 seconds.

The debris field chews you up, cause your getting it with debris at mach 25+ by themselves in counterorbit. The a ring of huge Killer Satillites start to shoot you. Then when you get past them, the Orbitial commities attack you with spaceships, and space glitterboys.

Your Safest method it to use the nexus to Teleport to another nexus on the Moon or Mars.

If you don't have : Mutants in Orbit : you should get it asap.

[llywelyn]

a. Holocaust what?

b. I imagine the test runs will be very ... messy. Wouldn't want to be this guy's apprentice / nearby farmer.

c. Rifting is going to be much easier than running the gauntlet (gantlet?), although theoretically a TW wingboard will suit you: stupidly, but canonically, there are transastral ley lines. How they work isn't clarified, but presumably they circle the earth along the lines from major nexi & centers of gravity.

d. As I recall, some aliens blasted a hole through the orbital field in one of the South American books. An Epic Quest south across the Vampire kingdoms & Incan empire might be in order. (Unless the defenses were already rebuilt...)

[glitterboy2098]

c. Rifting is going to be much easier than running the gauntlet (gantlet?), although theoretically a TW wingboard will suit you: stupidly, but canonically, there are transastral ley lines. How they work isn't clarified, but presumably they circle the earth along the lines from major nexi & centers of gravity.

IMO they 'jump' from nexi to nexi as the earth rotates. Astral ley lines are described as spanning between each planet (IMO are the reason for 'conjunctions and alignments boosting ley line power) and stars. since all those things are in constant motion relative to each other, the ley lines between them have to be moving as well.

so say, the two ends of the line between earth and mars jumps between nexi on the respctive planets in a semi-random fashion. kinda like how electrical arcs between two rotating objects will stay in one spot on each until the gap gets too big, and it instantly jumps to another spot with a better connection.

in theory, a magic user with a high percentage in both Astronomy and Astrology could predict when the different connections overlap with earth and a rough area to be in during that time to take advantage of such transitory events.

d. As I recall, some aliens blasted a hole through the orbital field in one of the South American books. An Epic Quest south across the Vampire kingdoms & Incan empire might be in order. (Unless the defenses were already rebuilt...)

the orbitals constantly maintain the net. not as involved as it would sound, since it's mainly launching a few kill sats every month, and dumping any space junk they can't recycle into a near earth orbit where it can be ripped apart by the CODF and contribute to the Kessler shell... the distributed nature of the feild also means any 'holes' blown into it close up rapidly. every few months maybe toss a few tons of large metal marbles in highly eccentric orbits (high apogee, low perigee) with the low end just barely skimming the atmosphere to create a web of kinetic impactors at low orbits..

the only way to clear it from the ground would be to spend a few decades with a Laser Broom array...

[Killer Cyborg]

Could he win in a fight against a Techno-Wizard Caveman?

[GlitterKnight]

I have read Mutants in Orbit, but I know the mutants aren't exactly prepared for a sophisticated, magical countermeasure. The character wouldn't know the exact nature of the orbital defenses, he'd have loaded for bear and built for stealth. Hoping, basically, with enough magical abilities onboard, he can beat whatevers trying to stop him.

I hadn't thought of test flights. But as a TW creation, it can't work that well without a magician piloting it. I suppose he could send probes powered/crewed by bound supernatural creatures perhaps. Ha, sending up little bound gargoyles like they did with chimps. There's an idea...

[DhAkael]

Didn't we have a multi-page thread with the slide-rule brigade Vs. the GM's who just wanted to tell a story LAST year?
Long answer short?
You are the GM? Then you say that a TW astronaut can get into space. Simple neat and tidy. WHY?
Because you're the GM and it's YOUR game.

Anyone else says otherwise, they have no relavence because it is YOUR game.

[llywelyn]

I have read Mutants in Orbit, but I know the mutants aren't exactly prepared for a sophisticated, magical countermeasure. The character wouldn't know the exact nature of the orbital defenses, he'd have loaded for bear and built for stealth. Hoping, basically, with enough magical abilities onboard, he can beat whatevers trying to stop him.

I hadn't thought of test flights. But as a TW creation, it can't work that well without a magician piloting it. I suppose he could send probes powered/crewed by bound supernatural creatures perhaps. Ha, sending up little bound gargoyles like they did with chimps. There's an idea...

Nah, you just need a few children: hence, apprentices, nearby farmers. Gargoyles - which aren't little - would muck it up on purpose.

Still, not rifting means they don't care what y're packing - spacejunk would rip it to shreads anyway. But Dhak's right: as long as you think it's cool, run with it & just ignore all us h8rade drinkdrs who bring stuff like physics to the table. That SA thing was just a canon excuse to do that.