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Another example of Power Variation.

Take a look at the Triax "Devastator". Can anyone say LAME!!! Sure, it has missiles, but it's HUGE ASS laser that only does something like 1D6x10 MD or something. That seems kindof silly for something that is about as long as a Mark V APC itself.

One must remember that Triax was one of the first World Books. Much power creep since then.

all that equipment you're dissing rocked at the time.

first, take a look. it's world book 5

now take a look at Coalition War Campaign. world book 11

yes, it's bad now, but was top of the line at the time several years before.

I think that they should come out witha Triax 2 to show how far Triax and the NGR have come in their weapons development programs and their war on the Gargoyles. I think that it would be a great book desired by many readers.

The Galactus Kid wrote:I think that they should come out witha Triax 2 to show how far Triax and the NGR have come in their weapons development programs and their war on the Gargoyles. I think that it would be a great book desired by many readers.

yea, and more info on the actual war rather than the latest weapons manual. discriptions of NGR cities and towns woudl be great, along with maps of a few.

It always seemed to me that much of the NGR/Triax small arms were designed for heavy use against either high tech(variable laser), or magically empowered forces that make standard energy weapons less then effective.

The rails guns have the option of firing DU, or U rounds to give them more punch, and are also used on the squad level as modern machine guns. Against a Gargoyle or Brodkill with bioregeneration they are much more useful then just about any energy weapon since the damage won't regenerate.

I also go on the basis that the pre-rifts Glitterboy, or a similar laser resistant armor was seen as a threat to pre-rifts Germany. This would explain why they use so many partilce beams, ion, and variable laser weapons as well as projectiles like railguns and the cartridge weapons.

Speaking of which, the pump cartridge guns have a definate advantage against magic(defeat impervious to energy), have a small area of effect, can do serious harm to supernatural beings(DU/U rounds), and even fire silver shells for use against vampires and werewolves. It should even be able to fire some form of SDC shell for hunting ect. If I had to go out in the wilds of Western Europe with a single weapon it would be the pump cartridge rifle for it's versatility.

This still doesn't begin to explain why robot mounted weapons are even in the same catagory with small arms, but that is found all over rifts, and I assume is there to make it more of a "personal" game.

The Galactus Kid wrote:I think that they should come out witha Triax 2 to show how far Triax and the NGR have come in their weapons development programs and their war on the Gargoyles. I think that it would be a great book desired by many readers.

I too think that this should happen if you read in CWC they say that NGR is only slightly bigger than the Coalition and to me I think they should also have slightly better weaponry

Even with my earlier comments I'm all for a revamped NGR military. They would have learned some lessons from the SoT, and I would love to see some cross polination for Russia, or even the New Navy, or Japan, but I doubt that will happen.

volkmar wrote:Greetings. >snip<
2) the Triax sniper rifle is a below subpar weapon that does less damage than the standard Triax (or Coalition) rifle. Snipers rifle should pack more of a punch as they usually cannot use bursts . If we compare this rifle to the Ja-12 it has no chance.

3) Triax must have the lowest and weakest particle beam rifle of the whole multiverse. They usually goes around at 1d6x10, but nope. Triax has this beauty at 5d6+6 that is, on average, less than 1d4x10. So much for the particle beam.

4) Railguns are even worse. They have 3 railguns. one is a small version for human sized infantry that does same damage than the single shot of the assault rifle (4d6) with a burst, with the obvious loss in precision. Might be nice to have along when fighting beings/armors resistant to energy/laser, but else....
Second and third railgun are both at 6d6 mdc, one for borgs and other for PA (classified as GIANT size). Now 6d6 MDC for a PA weapon is quite lousy... especially considering the Borg weapon does same damage, just 600 meters of range less.
I would have tought the Triax Railgun would at least do same damage than the C-40R, the original SAMAS railgun that Coalition had from book 1 and can be used by PAs and Borgs alike, right? nope. do not seems so.

Absolutely right - it has nothing to do with power creep as it was underpowered from the begining. Triax was supposed to be the tech superior of the CS yet their rail gun does less damage? HUH? They have a giant sized version that does the same damage? Double HUH?

volkmar wrote:Might be my personal opinion but i would think that any PA size weapons should do more damage than a normal infantry weapon right? (5d6+6 is more than 6d6 on the average) Especially when it is said is a GIANT weapon

exactly, makes no sense and has nothing to do with powercreep, just stupidity. In my games all PA weapons do double the listed damage and all Robots do triple (except the Glitter Boy which dosen't change).

volkmar wrote:Now i did not checked Ranges out most precisely (i know the Railgun range is quite high at 1.8km) so maybe that is the area of expertise of Triax weapons (but for the pump weapons that i know for certain are not that great in range)

Also... it seems triax has forgot to design an heavy plasma rifle like even the NG has.

So, did any of you realize this or is just me?

No it is stupid and I have noticed it since Triax first came out, I remember hoping that it would fix some problems with silly PAs that didn't do enough damage to warrant using them let alone making them and instead it was almost worse.
Oh don't even start me on the Devestator, it was one of the first threads I ever started here and went on for quite a while. It's been deleted now but the general consensus is that it's just flavour text and the real damage should be something like 1d6x100 or something like that.

If you only care about damage and range of a gun, then something is either A) something is wrong with you, or B) something is wrong with your GM. You need to take into account payload, and weight too. Along with cost and aviablity. NG obviously wins the aviabilty part handsdown, only weapons easier to aquire then NG are Wilks. I don't have any books here, so someone else is gonna have to compare payload and weight.


Oh and the biggest thing I want to see in an updated NGR book are Force Fields. In fact my favorite bot is the Ulti-Max due to it and the aviabilty of big weapons suitable for the ultimax

Esckey wrote:If you only care about damage and range of a gun, then something is either A) something is wrong with you, or B) something is wrong with your GM. You need to take into account payload, and weight too. Along with cost and aviablity. NG obviously wins the aviabilty part handsdown, only weapons easier to aquire then NG are Wilks. I don't have any books here, so someone else is gonna have to compare payload and weight.

If your comparing NGR weaponry to CS weaponry, cost and availability are irrelevant as we are talking about military issue, the average soldier will care about stopping power and damage potential not how much it cost the army to make. My problem is that Triax had supposedly superior weaponry, but it didn't turn out that way. Sure they had better robots to begin with, but in the description of the SAMAS C-40R railgun it says that it is widely duplicated -if the black market can do it I'm sure the tech advanced NGR can do it or do it better.

Esckey wrote:
Oh and the biggest thing I want to see in an updated NGR book are Force Fields. In fact my favorite bot is the Ulti-Max due to it and the aviabilty of big weapons suitable for the ultimax

I agree, why haven't Triax put this technology into anything else? It's an incredibly useful technology considering Triax make a lot of giant Robots which could use it and power it. It would save a large amount on repairs thereby saving money and units in the field could stay on the front line longer.

I think weight and payload are major aspects. I would rather have a gun with 30 rounds then one with 8. More cost effective to have a bigger clip especially when they cost a couple grand just to recharge(if you don't have your own nuke)

And with weight, well not that big of an issue however after adding in the weight of other weapons, clips, gernades, body armour or PA it'll add up in the end.

Ok, Math lesson. Lets say that someone has a weapon, the C-40 Rail gun for example. That weapon does 1D4x10 MD. The character takes 4 shots and does 10 damage the first shot, 20 the second, 30 the third, and 40 on the fourth shot. Here is where we AVERAGE the damage.

10+20+30+40=100 MD

100/4=25 MD

Therefore, a weapon that can do 1D4x10 MD has an average damage output of 25 MD. Sure, you can't actually get 25 on the die roll, but throughout the course of a battle you can average the ammount of damage to 25 MD per action. That is what is meant by average damage output.

From what I have seen on the website, I don't think that Palladium s planning a triax 2 anytime soon. Sure, it would be fantastic, and there are many people who play in that setting who see a need for such a book, but If it comes out, I would say that it is at least a year or two off.

I never like U-Rounds. Especially the explanation for them. Radiation affects the regenration of creatures. Why? No real logical reason it just does. Plus the combat example used makes no sense imo. How does a dragon who is immune to radiation be affected by U-Rounds filled with radiation?

Anyway I am in favor of a Triax update. They more than anybody should have had better tech than the CS considering the facilites they have access too. Finally can anyone fix the devestator gun. The damage on that thing is a joke.

Now you do realize that most Triax weaponry has "standard" rate of fire, making them very versatile. Furthermore as the weapons are mass produced of course they will seem to be slightly lacking in damage, they are not particularly meant for mass marketing (although Triax has started to do this).

One adventurer with a Naruni Plasma Rifle or a ten man squad with the Triax variable freq. lasers? You do the math.

I just made the Devastator's "main" weopons do more damage; other than that, I love the Triax stuph. I just figured those damages were typos anyway when the book first came out.

Nagisawa Takumi wrote:Uh, Glitterman? If Triax is so effective, why haven't they won yet? It's a war of attrition, where numbers mean everything, and unfortunately when the enemy can take several hundred more blasts than you EACH, and there are thousands more of them, HOW can you win? Assassination, when according to a comic by KS himself, the first attempt failed and they are on alert of such things, how would that work?

The way it's written up Triax can only be saved by GM Fiat or heavy modification of both toys and rules.

except that while they have fewer numbers Triax can dish out a lot more damage per unit.

Lord Cre-al wrote:Because when someone takes damage from radiation 99% of it is genetic and the faster you heal the faster the damaged DNA propigates. This is why cochroachs will live through Nukes and humans wont. I work with radiation as part of my job and that is the number one concern "Genetic Damage". No one realy cares if you can get blasted by 100 RAD and not get burn't, they care that you will start decaying from the inside out. So the way radiation actualy works is that the faster you heal the less it takes to affect you. Ie a child can get 5 REM and be f'd for life while a 60 year old man gets 50 and is just fine.

Realy it makes perfect sense. (Just ask any Nuclear Health Practitioner and every hospitol will have one if the have an oncolagy dept.)

LOGIC YOU DARE USE LOGIC IN A RIFTS FORUM!!!

Just kidding you make excellant point I never thought about it that way. It makes sense now. Maybe they can use this description for U-Rounds if they ever do a Triax second edition book. A much better expalnation than the one given in the book.

I don't think it's got anything to do with optional armor penetration and soak rules or DU rounds or power creep.
A C-40R from the original book does more than the TX-railgun.
1d4x10 vs 6d6.
Triax was supposed to make superior weaponry.
huh?

[sarcasm]here is a novel idea, that I dont think has been mentioned...
Write up what you would like to see yourself, and submit it to the Rifter![/sarcasm]

z0b wrote:I don't think it's got anything to do with optional armor penetration and soak rules or DU rounds or power creep.
A C-40R from the original book does more than the TX-railgun.
1d4x10 vs 6d6.
Triax was supposed to make superior weaponry.
huh?

The difference is the Triax rail guns are small and compact. Many are man portable. A little bit of damage was traded for weight.

GlitterMan wrote:

z0b wrote:I don't think it's got anything to do with optional armor penetration and soak rules or DU rounds or power creep.
A C-40R from the original book does more than the TX-railgun.
1d4x10 vs 6d6.
Triax was supposed to make superior weaponry.
huh?

The TX-50 is a light rail gun, actually usable by non-borgs. It also fires only 20 rounds per burst instead of 40. The rounds per burst makes a difference in the damage I'd wager. You get 10 bursts from this gun using just its short clip, the same way the C-40R gets 10 bursts from a whole belt.

The TX-250 has a range advantage of 2000 extra ft. and uses 10 fewer rounds per burst compared to the C-40R. I bet if you modified the TX to fire 40 rounds per burst instead you'd have yourself a 1d4x10 damage rail gun...

The TX-500 is also lighter weight, same range, but fires the shorter burst length again of only 30 rounds. You may not think conserving ammo is a big deal. Until you run out... Reloading a rail gun is not usually a quick task.

So you see, the Triax rail guns DO have advantages, you just have to *look* for them. If you don't like the damage, take it to an operator and have them mod it up to a 40 round burst to do 1d4x10 MD. I would have no problem with PCs doing this in my games.

Yeah that makes much more sense, now that you point that out. You make it seem like a much better gun than I thought (although I think it would make sense to have a 20, 30 and 40 round burst option - maybe for Triax special forces they are customised). It still has nothing to do with power creep or DU rounds or penetration though...

Something I haven't seen mention yet is that the CWC book states that the new Cs additions put them on par with the NGR military. Not superior to, but equal.

Since most of the new CS weapons are based on pre-rifts American tech combined with Triax know how I would wager on Triax keeping copies of the design specs at the minimum. I see them going a different way then the CS, but the NGR could start mass producing new CS firepower. I really see the NGR using infantry in support of Borgs, PA, and Bots as opposed to the other way around.

Right, so it's taken us... four pages of posts so far to establish that tech stats in Rifts are arbitrary, nonsensical, wildly inconsistent from book to book, and that they rarely match the hype in the descriptive text? Wow, talk about efficient use of our time

Rallan wrote:Right, so it's taken us... four pages of posts so far to establish that tech stats in Rifts are arbitrary, nonsensical, wildly inconsistent from book to book, and that they rarely match the hype in the descriptive text? Wow, talk about efficient use of our time

No, that was established in my mind a long time ago. However I hope I'm not coming across as a whinger, in my games I just change anything I don't like including weapons, tech stats and stupid flavor text.

No offense is meant by this, but some of you remind me of my less intellectually gifted players, the ones that immediatly look at a weapon's damage capability or a robots mainbody M.D.C. without even considering the other variables and then making a very foolish assessment.

The one think I definetly agree with, the Devastators main gun...it does 1/3 the standard damage of a GB's boomgun yet is a helluva lot bigger. Everybody who complained about that l'il tid bit is justified in their griping.

volkmar wrote:TX-11 Triax sniper laser rifle:
Damage: 3d6 (1 setting)
Range: 488 meters (what a sniper rifle ah?)
Bonuses: +1 to strike (or +2 as it says aimed shot became +5)

VS


Ja-11 Juicer Assasin's Energy Rifle
Damage: Laser: 2d6/4d6
Ion: 3d6
7.62mm: SDC
Range: Laser: 1200 m (Now THIS is a sniper rifle range)
Ion: 488
SDC: 610
Bonus: +1 strike

Result: the Ja-11, while done by unknown manufacturer, beats on all fields the superior Triax weapon.

Hey...not fair, compairing two German designed weapons!

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:No offense is meant by this, but some of you remind me of my less intellectually gifted players, the ones that immediatly look at a weapon's damage capability or a robots mainbody M.D.C. without even considering the other variables and then making a very foolish assessment.

The one think I definetly agree with, the Devastators main gun...it does 1/3 the standard damage of a GB's boomgun yet is a helluva lot bigger. Everybody who complained about that l'il tid bit is justified in their griping.

If you trying not to be offensive, then don't judge others intelligence. I'm sure you must count yourself as one of the "intellectually gifted" as you clearly know better than others who are not "intellectually gifted". If you actually read the posts you'll see that sure, we talk a lot about damage but we also are talking about range, payload and how many rounds are fired in a burst. Also please do not make out that damage isn't of paramount importance, especially in a world where everyone wears full body armour.

I always thought there should be a "reliability rating" for weapons, many are described as being "reliable" or "sturdy" as a selling point yet they don't jam any more or less than any other gun.

Just out of curiosit, does anyone realise how badly TX pistols suck, when using the FSE clip they are -1 strike, unless using 2handed ???? huh???, why bother with pistols then ?

and now a question, can a TX pistol use both the FSE clip and the short clip simultaeously?

Mental note: use spelchecker next time.

Rimmer wrote:Just out of curiosit, does anyone realise how badly TX pistols suck, when using the FSE clip they are -1 strike, unless using 2handed ???? ***, why bother with pistols then ?

and now a question, can a TX pistol use both the FSE clip and the short clip simultaeously?

Mental note: use spelchecker next time.

Because they're still small weapons, easy to carry and or conceal? Modern pistols are held in a 2 handed grip typically to be fired, and THEY are useful today.



Daniel Stoker

Just out of curiosit, does anyone realise how badly TX pistols suck, when using the FSE clip they are -1 strike, unless using 2handed ???? ***, why bother with pistols then ?

Unlike in moves and vedeo

AGRHHHHHH! WRONG BUTTON!!!

Just out of curiosit, does anyone realise how badly TX pistols suck, when using the FSE clip they are -1 strike, unless using 2handed ???? ***, why bother with pistols then ?

As I was saying, unlike we see in moves and video games, using a pistol two handed is FAR better than one handed, the -1 to strike represents that. If you use a pistol two handed it is much more stable, and you get better aim. On a related note, using two pistols at the same time is a very bad idea, try it, see if you can hit the broad side of a barn.

While we're on dissing the Devastator, has anyone ever sat down and looked at how pathetic it's MDC is? I mean sure, we've all noticed that it's main gun is less powerful than most handheld plasma ejectors despite being THE LENGTH OF A FREAKING BUS, but let's look at how much mega-damage it can take.

Add up MDC of every single location, and you get a grand total of 7965 megadamage. That's what it takes to trash _everything_ on a Triax Devastator. This doesn't just include big stuff like the main body, pilots compartment, head, and limbs, it covers the whole thing right down to the searchlights cooling pylons, and escape hatches. So we're being generous here. That 7965 MDC is what you need to thrash every single component of the unit, not just what you need to effectively shut it down by destroying the main body.

Beefy until you realise that the thing weighs 150 tons. That's 150,000 kilograms. That's an average of 0.0531 points of MDC (or 5 points of SDC) per kilogram of mass.

Now to put this in context, let's bring out something pretty badass and indestructible: a cardboard box. Let's assume that a medium-sized cardboard box only requires 2 SDC to render completely unusable. Let's further assume that that, since cardboard boxes are fairly light, you probably need ten of them to have a kilogram of cardboard boxes. Ten cardboard boxes? Not a problem, once you've dealt out about 20 SDC damage, all ten of them are completely buggered.

So there you have it folks, pound for pound, according to Palladium's own rules, CARDBOARD BOXES PROVIDE FOUR TIMES THE PROTECTION OF TRIAX DEVASTATORS.



Rallan

thats awesome

z0b wrote:

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:No offense is meant by this, but some of you remind me of my less intellectually gifted players, the ones that immediatly look at a weapon's damage capability or a robots mainbody M.D.C. without even considering the other variables and then making a very foolish assessment.

The one think I definetly agree with, the Devastators main gun...it does 1/3 the standard damage of a GB's boomgun yet is a helluva lot bigger. Everybody who complained about that l'il tid bit is justified in their griping.

If you trying not to be offensive, then don't judge others intelligence. I'm sure you must count yourself as one of the "intellectually gifted" as you clearly know better than others who are not "intellectually gifted". If you actually read the posts you'll see that sure, we talk a lot about damage but we also are talking about range, payload and how many rounds are fired in a burst. Also please do not make out that damage isn't of paramount importance, especially in a world where everyone wears full body armour.

I always thought there should be a "reliability rating" for weapons, many are described as being "reliable" or "sturdy" as a selling point yet they don't jam any more or less than any other gun.

Note that I said "some of you."

And no, I do not consider myself to be intellectually superior to someone (this is almost begging someone to make a snide comment), I'm not going to judge or evaluate myself, such an assessment would be biased and vain. I was comparing MY (as in the people I GM) good players with MY bad ones. The intellectual estimation of the bad ones has many variables other then the whole weapon thing and is really only achieved through comparison with the good ones.

I believe you minsunderstood me, which is all fine and well. Usually when someone says "No offense is meant by this" someone is bound to get offended.

So for that I apologize if I offended you.

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:

z0b wrote:

Josh Sinsapaugh wrote:No offense is meant by this, but some of you remind me of my less intellectually gifted players, the ones that immediatly look at a weapon's damage capability or a robots mainbody M.D.C. without even considering the other variables and then making a very foolish assessment.

The one think I definetly agree with, the Devastators main gun...it does 1/3 the standard damage of a GB's boomgun yet is a helluva lot bigger. Everybody who complained about that l'il tid bit is justified in their griping.

If you trying not to be offensive, then don't judge others intelligence. I'm sure you must count yourself as one of the "intellectually gifted" as you clearly know better than others who are not "intellectually gifted". If you actually read the posts you'll see that sure, we talk a lot about damage but we also are talking about range, payload and how many rounds are fired in a burst. Also please do not make out that damage isn't of paramount importance, especially in a world where everyone wears full body armour.

I always thought there should be a "reliability rating" for weapons, many are described as being "reliable" or "sturdy" as a selling point yet they don't jam any more or less than any other gun.

Note that I said "some of you."

And no, I do not consider myself to be intellectually superior to someone (this is almost begging someone to make a snide comment), I'm not going to judge or evaluate myself, such an assessment would be biased and vain. I was comparing MY (as in the people I GM) good players with MY bad ones. The intellectual estimation of the bad ones has many variables other then the whole weapon thing and is really only achieved through comparison with the good ones.

I believe you minsunderstood me, which is all fine and well. Usually when someone says "No offense is meant by this" someone is bound to get offended.

So for that I apologize if I offended you.

No worries, I wasn't really offended, but obviously I did missunderstand you. If you don't want to offend anyone posting can be like treading on eggshells. I was actually pointing out how it is easy to accidently offend if you start refering to others intelligence (especially gamers).

Well the first question kinda got answered, but what about the second ? can TX pistols use both the FSE clip and the short clip at the same time ?

Purchased a spellchecker yesterday

Angryjack wrote:Some more on the Devestator: it has an insane payload of missiles, and it can attack Far more times then a glitterboy considering it has 4 gunners.
it also has a camel Load of missiles that 150 tons of Cardboard Boxes has.


Now True, it would barely last a few minutes against a Metal Siren armed with 5 Squires, but those don't exist in Rifts Germany.

Thing is, four glitter boys will weigh a fraction as much and have twice as much combined main body MDC.

And while we're on the silliness of the Devastator compared to other units, there's always the Chipwell Warmonger, notorious for being the most notoriously protected robot in Rifts because the manufacturer is cheap as chips and used SDC materials. The thing is though, pound for pound, the infamous flimsy piece of crap built from the cheapest materials available turns out to have something like 8 times as much protection as the state of the art Devastator, which is presumably meant to have been made from the heaviest, most sophisticated mega-damage protection the eggheads in Triax's labs could devise.

But then, this is pretty much par for the course when it comes to the stats on larger units in Rifts. Compared to man-sized power armour (or worse yet, man-sized body armor), they're generally ludicrously underprotected. I mean take most MDC tanks for example, the poor things seem to have barely as much protection as a moderately heavy suit of power armour, despite the fact that logically you'd be able to just heap tons and tons of armor plate onto the damn things, and the fact that they've got the advantage of sloped surfaces to minimize the impact of most incoming attacks, _and_ the fact they've got a shape with a far more economical surface area to volume ratio.

eh, Rifts doesn't even have anime stats. The -10 dodge rule and the fact that guns always do pitiful amounts of damage compared to the armour means that combat is pretty much a matter of standing around firing wildly at your opponent and hoping he drops first.

I doubt Triax would even bother competing with the Chipwell end of the market, since Triax's whole thing is about providing the most sophisticated and effective military hardware money can buy, not the cheapest. Or at least that would've been the case if Rifts stuff had consistent stats that were well-balanced from book to book so that the state of the art stuff actually performs better than the cheap stuff.



Rallan

Relax, if you don't think Triax weapons are powerfull enough just up them to the level you think they should be at. I personally increased the power of the TX-41 & TX-42 by 50% each.

They should come out with a book titled, "The Gargolye Empire" or "The NGR War Machine" too further this outdated stuff, kinda like "The Coalition War Campaign/Machine/Whatever" has done for the outdated coalition equipment...no way the humans would still be alive against the Gargoyle Empire for long with that sappy equipment!