Forums of the Megaverse®

Do you know which forum your on?


Again, these are the PB forums right?


I am going to skip making fun of the "for real" comment and simply again say this is the Palladium Megaverse. All of the posts prior to yours deal with what is in the books so I assumed that was the conversation we were having.


Palladium Books, limited only by your imagination. Might I suggest that is the problem.
The republic of Japan has scopes that can detect magic and see beings invisible by magic. The CS has restraints and detection devices that detect magic in use. Finally, there are dog boys, a creation of genetic science, to ID & track magic beings.


Disagree? Simple question, do you allow people to have saving throws or is it just magic always wins? If no saving throws then the conversation, and any game you run, is pointless. If you do have saving throws then the attributes are completely relevant.

No offense, and I really mean no offense, but a game the way you run it just doesn't sound very interesting. Do all players in your games have to run mages to accomplish anything? I run Palladium because I can have a player in giant robot and another playing a dragon and they both get to achieve something, and both can win depending on there wits and the dice.


First, have to say that this is one of my favorite quotes and I use it in my Advanced Placement history class every year. But, it doesn't fit the discussion in the least. There is no historical precedent for this so you as the player or GM must come up with one and "Magic beats tech any day" don't cut it.


No, because that is the history given in PFRPG, Hades Book, Dyval Book, Dimensional Outbreak, etc., etc.

Listen, the beauty of pen and paper RP is that you can make it very personal. You can change the Megaverse in any way you want, but this forum is about what is in the books not your mind as that is a very difficult thing to have a conversation about unless you personal preferences or available on PDF.

Is that susposed to be a response to what I said?



Do you always give sarcastic non-responses when someone says something you disagree with?








How does us have a conversation mean that I cannot disagree with you?



I see that cut this line out and didn't respond to it. Why is that? Doesn't fit your tidy argument?




I thought we were talking about The Mechanoids. Do the Mechanoids have Japanese or CS technology? No, they do not.




Did I say that "magic always wins"? Nope. I said: "Because you can do more with magic than you can with technology. Technology can't even detect magic and magic-using forces could easily cause catastrophic damage to non-magic-using forces."
That is my personal belief. You have a different belief. Does that make either of us right or wrong? No, it simply means that we disagree.



Do you always make vast assumptions about people and put words in their mouth because they disagree with you? You're making huge unfounded extrapolations. I'm talking about my philosphy of magic vs. technology, but you'd already decided that my entire game is messed up because you disagree with me on this one point.







I think it does. Bill Gates assumed that nobody could ever need more than 640K because there was no precedent for it. You argued that nobody could trick the Mechanoids because there is no precedent for it. Looks like the same thing to me.



Nobody thought the Spartans could hold Xerxes back at the gates of Thermopalae; they did even though they were vastly outnumbered (not unlike your argument about the "billions of Mechanoids").





Are you telling me you can accurately predict the future based on what's been done in the past? Isn't it possible that the demons and deevils could temporarily put aside their emnity and unite to face the Mechanoids? If you say 'no', then why not?

In Megaverse Builder, there's a alternative dimension in which the CS & Federation of Magic unite to fight the Mechanoids (p26). But according to you that's not possible because "there is no precedent".

"Rifts: Endless possibilities limited only by one's imagination." -- Kevin

If you want to limit your imagination, that's up to you.



Until I have official word that I'm not to use my imagination on a RPG forum, I think I'll disreguard your claim to that effect.

No disrespect Nightfactory, but generally on the forums people ask that canon be used as the basis of discussion since that way everyone has a common ground to work from. That means that we have to assume that the materials in the books is, in fact, accurate. Unless we are explicitly talking about a non-canon subject then the answer "But I don't want it to be so" is not considered to be a valid argument. Offering counter examples is a great way to do things, but just simply stating "Well in my game it wouldn't work" doesn't do much other than tell the rest of us how your personal house rules work.

For the record I think that neither side would win. The Demons would have the initial advantage, which would last up until the Mechanoids mindrip the secrets of magic out of some Demonic flunky. Then the Mechanoids become a Megaversal Threat of epic proportions, and pretty much everyone and their god crawls out of the woodwork picking sides. The survivors of the resulting Armageddon can have fun restarting interdimensional civilization and pick names for the previous era, the war, and the current era.

What I've bolded is true of some forum members only.

If you want canon answers, specify that in the original post. Otherwise don't complain when some people try to post answers that make sense rather than answers that are strictly canon.

--flatline

Thank you for phrasing that diplomatically; I do appreciate it.

I personally think there are valid ways to disable a Mechanoid mothership using magic and also that in this thread, the demons are being played as dumb stooges (which I don't think they are).



Very interesting....and you could be right.

Glad you said that, too.

That's a fine opinion to have. But it doesn't mean that you can just dismiss books by saying "nah, I don't think I like this part of that book, so I will dismiss it, and thus you are wrong" You are free to argue logically sure, but when a person posts something from the books, if you don't have more than a "but I don't like that, so its wrong" don't expect to be taken seriously. Or put another way, with out having some sort of basis in common, there is no discussion just a bunch of people declaiming that their opinion is the one true way. Canon provides that common ground. It doesn't have to be sacred untouchable writ, but when deviated from, it is, at minimum, good form to have a reason/explaination, and offer why that is. Other wise to the rest of the forums it just comes across as looking like a "no your wrong because your wrong" post.

I understand that. I guess I feel that the Mechanoids are too powerful. I don't believe in a unstoppable foe, especially in a RPG setting.



Makes perfect sense to me. However, I don't think that Warshield's arguments were all sound.

Fair point. I know people who feel the dame about the Splugorth and Coalition States. And just to clarify the Mechanoids are not unstoppable, they have been stopped before.


Fair enough. But just to be clear,

this is exactly how you came off, intentionally or not and when your not using the common reference point (i.e. the books) it left nowhere for the conversation to go.

Sorry if it came off that way.

Solid point here. Truthfully I took this, going on the title of the forum and the Dimensional Outbreak book, as fleet engagement. Who would win a war if the demons invaded Mechanoids universe. In that instance, I hold to my previous statement. However, I do not think the Mechanoids could wipe demons out and there is no way they could invade Hades or Dyval. So in that instance, I agree you could say that neither side could truly win.

I like the scenario of Megaversal Armageddon you generated. Very Babylon 5.

Yah its all fun and games till the Floopers wind up being the Last Race Standing, and become the new Elder Race for the Megavers 2.0 reboot

Could be worse, could be wing tips as the new elder race.

After further looking it would seem the mechanoids win.

After researching some things i have also come to realize that even though the mechanoids control 6 or so galaxies, no one has come up with an idea that maybe these might be dwarf galaxies which could range from 1600 to 32,000 light years in size. something to think about.

Does it matter the size? How many galaxies do the demons have?

Mods: Why hasn't this been locked as a year+ necro post when Dragunov vs. The megaverse got tagged for being necro when it was less than a year old? Cuz enquiring minds want to know.

Either because none of them have checked in here recently, or because they realize they'd have to lock all the threads in the Mechanoid section since they all fall under that rule and no one's opened a new post in here since Feb AFAIK.

DB6p100 the Enormous Tentacles of normal Demon Planets can reach 1000 miles, but it's unclear how fast they move, it's probably not 'instant' from the maw to the full reach so it may allow enemies to simply shoot at the tentacles from a distance when they're outstretched. They just need to keep in mind the necessity to withdraw if they enter within 1000 miles to attack the main body of the planet. Even if they're able to fly at Mach 10 like the planet, that'd be over 7 minutes to travel the distance. Even if the planet was moving toward an opponent as they launched the tentacles and you wanted to stack that to Mach 20, you're still looking at over 3 minutes to hit people at that barrier. There's mentions of 'Gravity Glands' you can destroy to free a 200 mile radius, but since these only generate 1 G I don't really get the point of doing that in star combat. Their 500 mile energy blast is a bit more impressive.

DB12p105 Cormal actually has gravity glands worth avoiding, reaching 250 000 miles (1250 times as far as a normal Demon Planet) and they actually have a described penalty (unlike Demon Planets, unless I missed something other than the 1 G) of preventing Star/Rift drives from working.

They can actually gravity-beam something within 125 000 miles. This seems like the main weapon of the Demon Fleet. I don't know of anything else to compare. The repulsor function I can't find a range for so I'm assuming it's also 125 000 miles.

Initially I did not know if Cormal had Enormous Tentacles like normal demon planets do. The MDC by location is listed differently and it seems like they might've been left out unless I'm not noticing it. The order is:

Demon Planets

Main Body
Enormous Tentacles
Nerve Clusters
Digestive Organs
Hearts
Brain Nodes
Gravity Gland
Blood Vessels
Major Artery
Epidermis

Cormal

Main Body
Brain Node
Gravity Glands
Organs

Nerve Clusters
Digestive Organs
Hearts
Blood Vessels
Major Artery
Epidermis

DB12p106 does mention under 'Enormous Maw Tentacles' that they are twice as long, so he should be able to attack up to 2000 miles with them. I guess I just don't know how much MDC they have? I guess maybe double due to 'twice as thick' or maybe quintuple based on organs all being 5x. Up to GM I guess.

Cormal can also energy-blast a 2000 miles as well. Castle Halthhag also has one with equal range on DB12p109 but only 1/3 the damage. Their 5000 mile range Cruise Missiles are more of a threat.

DB12p133 the Cruise Missiles of the Demon Fury Frigade can only reach 1000 miles, but have limited payload and can be shot down. Hell Fury missiles going Mach 15 for a full 8 minutes (per Pg137) would only be able to go 1522.414104 miles.

DB12p135 the Dark Energy Cannons of the Bone Maw Carrier can reach 200 miles, unlimited payload, can't be shot down.

Now: let's look a the top-tier of range for Mechanoids...

Trilogy page 95: Mother Ship: 52 000 kilometres plasma. That's 32,311.3 miles.

The Mechanoid Mothership is basically capable of defeating anything except Cormal.

Cormal v. Mothership would basically come down to: the Mothership is going to park far away (as its main unit is very slow, a meager 40 kmph unless they go to warp) and remove the Detachable Assault Unit and Planet Excavation Head Quarters (or DAUPEHQ). The main unit will try to stay say 500 thousand to 1 million miles away from Cormal, because if Cormal can get within 250 000 miles of them, they can no longer go to warp to escape and are screwed.

The DAUPEHQ will close in at a more agile 830kmph (515.738mph) and park 32 000 miles away and begin firing. Cormal will advance on the DAUPEHQ to get it in range of its more dangerous weapon systems. The DAUPEHQ will attempt to fly away to keep their distance advantage, however Cormal will hit it with a concentrated beam from a Gravity Gland to prevent its escape.

This then becomes a contest of: can the DAUPEHQ's plasma weapons destroy the gravity gland and escape before the gland draws it in range of Cormal's closer range weapons. I don't know how quickly Cormal's glands can draw things in though.

Make this assumption, not in Cormal's favor, and in favor of the Mechanoid mothership: the gravity gland doesn't draw them closer, the focused beam just holds them in place so Cormal can fly towards them at Mach 15 or 11 418.1058 mph. This would mean Cormal could get from the outermost range of the Mothership's plasma to melee range within 2.829830145732228194977839494183 hours or 169.78980874393369169867036965098 minutes or 679.15923497573476679468147860392 melee rounds. Let's round that up to 680 melee rounds.

The problem here: Cormal knows Impervious to Fire and Impervious to Energy and Invulnerability, all of which I think would make it and all its body parts (including its Gravity Glands) immune to the Plasma weapons of the DAUPEHQ. Plus, heck, even if this wasn't done, the plasma weapons don't do very much damage. Even if you converted SDC to directly to MDC, 6D6x30 isn't all that much.

Based on that, I think Cormal could definitely defeat the DAUPEHQ at which point, the core unit of the mothership is probably just going to hightail it to FTL before Cormal gets close enough to affect it with the Gravity Glands. So maybe a stalemate. Plus Cormal can heal damage and the Mechanoids would have to go to the effort of repairing it.

If we want an interesting scenario: have Cormal wake up and leave the Demon Fleet and go do his own thing. I think only Dominators and Robotech-tier space-ships are able to compete with Cormal's range, and even then, his ability to cast protective spells to protect himself are going to make hurting him implausible with energy weapons.

Mechanoids vs Fury Frigates and Maw Carriers would seem like more of a toss up.

Even a normal Demon Planet would know Impervious to Fire to counter the DAUPEHQ plasma weapons, but on the flip-side, they don't have Cormal's advanced gravity glands, so it would be plausible for the DAUPEHQ to withdraw from combat before getting in range of the DP's weapons. The DAUPEHQ is slower though, so they would have to retreat to the Mothership and re-attach to go to FTL in a prolonged chase.

Fixed.

A right, there's more than one...

I think even 12 of them would still be unable to beat Cormal though, unless there's some decent weapons I'm forgetting here.

Even ignoring Cormal, while a Mechanoid Mothership could hit-and-run a smaller Demon Planet, I don't think they could beat them either.

Can someone do up a scenario where 12 Mechanoid Motherships are able to defeat the weakest possible rolling of a Demon Planet's stats?

This keeping in mind that Impervious to Fire is going to nullify their main weapon and they have enough PPE to keep it up pretty much indefinitely?

All I can figure is prolonged harassment where you just keep harassing it until it runs out of PPE. But considering that Demon Planets have at least 4 ley lines built into them, I don't think that's feasible.

Also keeping in mind that once you get within 100 000 miles, this thing can prevent your FTL, and FTL is about the only way that Mechanoids can move at at decent speed to get away from these Mach 10 Monsters.

I notice that Cormal has Bio-Regeneration as a natural ability. Hundreds to thousands per minute.

I cannot seem to find bio-regeneration listed for Demon Planets under MDC or Natural Abilities.

Does this mean normal ones don't have bio-regen and have to rely on their magic spells or psionic powers to regenerate MDC?




Maybe they wiped them out 1 at a time rather then engaging them all simultaneously? Not enough to wreck the sum but enough to beat individual powers because they wouldn't unify? Or they just got outmaneuvered and spread resources too thinly to defend against concentrated Mechanoid assaults? 2 soldiers can invade an outpost guarded by 4 soldiers if there is only 1 per corner of your fort.

It might depend on the power level of a given galaxy, maybe the galaxies encountered by the mechanoids had much weaker inhabitants than the Three Galaxies? Perhaps smaller poplations or lower inferior technologies?

Also regarding the 240 billion robots thing, I don't know if anyone brought this up, but I noticed in MITp124 that there is an estimated total of 192 billion robots. It is possibly they were underestimated though.

The 240 is based on 800 000 x 30 x 10 but 800 million is the "estimated" total population and it is actually "about" 10%. The only thing set in stone is 30 robots per Mechanoid, really. So there's a lot of wiggle room in estimations in both MIT and SB2 to account for the 192 billion vs 240 billion discrepancy.


RCB2 (Pantheons) 157 has a goddess with an IQ of 29 thinking she can approach Mechanoids as a potential ally. I realize she's a "mad" goddess but she doesn't seem stupid. If she thinks that a non-human bio-wizard body will make them befriending her plausible, I see no grounds to disagree with her, she's far more experienced and intelligent than I am. All rogue/technical means she's well versed in lore and manipulation. She hasn't made contact but she's been observing them and I trust her plans will succeed.


I guess the question is more like... billions of what vs billions of whom? A lot of demons are slow land-locked melee-range fighters, tactically I wonder what their impact would be in mass warfare. I'm more concerned about the big ships and the massive range they would have in space combat. A billion demons who can't confront a mothership firing from 30 000 miles in orbit are kinda useless.

Hiding and dimensional teleporting and ripping up ships from the inside is probably going to be their main tactic, but whether they can successfully target a teleport moving through space, dunno.

Luckily for them, the big Mechanoid ships (unlike similar equivalents in Robotech or Phase World) have pretty slow FTL speeds which could make it feasible.

I still think you'd need some kind of aid in knowing where to teleport though, and whatever sensor systems you rely on to do that, the Mechanoids could target them.

The big deal with the Demon Fleet is controlling Cormal and his kids. Those things I can see trumping the Mechanoids, but if Cormal wakes up and takes his babies to go live with her in another city, then the Demon Fleet is going to be at a severe disadvantage.



I would posit that such a FoM would be dominated by the Society of Sages instead of the City of Brass, and that such a CS would have re-absorbed (or never kicked out in the first place) the Vanguard. Perhaps it was even a FoM which the Tolkeen never left, because the Great City never attacked Chi-Town. Maybe a Lizard Mage and 4-armed gods never got enough sway in this FoM to form Stormspire/Dweomer.

OR they locked the Dragunov vs. the megaverse thread because they misread something. I dunnoh. I thought the necro post was supposed to be like a year or something. Oh well.

I'm thinking they're only locking the threads if there's a report, or if it's in a section that's frequented by the mods more often. This section tends to be the least active one.

Now that I think about it, that may be why they're leaving them unlocked as well...

Is Cormal from the HU demon books? There's a version of Impervious to Energy, and a version of Invulnerability that are actually not as buff as the Rifts versions. Though I forget the books they're in. I guess the dimension Cormal is fighting in might govern how the spells work...a la megavers builder, or something.

I really don't know. >_>

He's in DB12.

Wait how is the HU version of Invulnerable not more buff than Rifts? In HU it IS invulnerable, while in Rifts it is MDC. In HU one could argue that N&S is close enough to be "same world" in which case there is an MD weapon that by HU rules does no damage to someone with Invulnerability.

actually, unless I'm not remembering correctly, invulnerability in HU works like this:

You take no damage from anything that isn't magic or psionics. You take half damage from SN PS and particle beams.

In Rifts, there're no exceptions aside magic and psionics, really. the extra MDC is there to be MDC vs the few things that actually hurt you.

I'll have to look it up again, but could have sworn in Rifts all it did was give the PC MDC.

No it also makes you impervious to energy and resistance to poisons and stuff.

Only thing I've been unclear on is whether the bonus MDC you gain is also impervious to energy, or if energy can deplete the MDC but not harm you afterward.

the MDC is there, basically, to allow SDC creatures to have some padding vs Magic and Psionics when they cast Invulnerability on themselves. Otherwise it's like,

"Mwahaha! I'm invincible!"

*firebolt*

"aaaarrrggghhh..." /dead

+10 save vs psionics, as i recall (it's been a while).

Correct.

And well stated.

What's wrong with Furlings?

Didn't their planet blow up?

Okay, so our Elder Races are
Floopers, Wing Tips, Slurmph, and the Fingletooth Carpetbaggers

No only one eldar race are supposed to be hopeless dorks that no one knows how the heck they survived.

Phase in

poink here I am back in the Mechanoid space.... lol.

I'd have to say the mechies on this one way to many of them and with them being loyal to one another far above to loyalty shown by mortals and demons/devils the demons/devils are not going to be able to tempt enough of the cog boys to make a difference before the mechies learn about rifts and drop in on hell/Dyvall(SP) for a *friendly*chat and sharing a six pack with the demons/devils.

The Mechies invading Hell and Dyvall(SP) now those would be a hell of a war(s) to be in.-

Except mecchies can't use magic

After going back through this thread I think there's three main things in the favor of demons that have been either overlooked or missed entirely.

First there's the issue of magic. While it's not the ultimate weapon of doom in the demons' arsenal it is something that can throw any match in their favor when used properly. The Impervious to Energy spell alone would rend most (if not all) mechanoids weapon meaningless for the spell's duration. Furthermore, the evil mechanoids are forbidden from not only learning magic, but using it to open a rift as well (SB2, page 52). This brings me to my next point...

Dimensional travel. Every demon returns to Hades when it dies to be reborn, and can only be killed permanently in that dimension. That's going to help the demons tremendously. The demons will always be able to retreat to another dimension if whatever fight they're in goes badly for them even if they die. The only thing that would help the mechanoids in this case would be getting an "inhuman ally" to create rifts for them to go through. Even then, such a being would have to be non-humanoid/biped for them to be allied with the mechanoids (SB2, page 87), and would be considered an enemy if ever found to be helping humanoids/bipeds. That description includes deevils as well. The deevils might be able to get by convincing the mechanoids that they're not humanoid/biped for awhile, but it just takes one deevil (or a captured demon for that matter) to make the mistake of letting the mechanoids in on their true form before they all know about it. The mechanoids are a species that communicates psychically. One deevil makes that mistake and it gets passed around to the other mechanoids locally, eventually to a runner, brain, brute, overlord, or oracle and from there it ends up going to a brain pool. Once that happens evey mechanoid knows the truth and they reenact the Order 66 scene with the deevils. This kind of dove tails into my last point.

Everyone else in the Megaverse. Demons aren't stupid. Demons likely know which humanoid species the mechanoids ticked off the most, and are going to be able to either recruit from those species or trick into fighting the mechanoids on their own (Kittani are the first to come to mind). Other species might be able to be guilt-tripped into fighting them ("Well Mr. Cosmos-knight. You could stay and fight me, but there's a Spider Fortress about to crush that colony of settlers over there.") Either way, mechanoid threats are likely one of the few things that get people to team up with the demons to fight, kind of like what the US and Britain did with Stalin against Hitler in WW2.

What's the exact quote that you're referring to?

"None will actively learn magic or how to use it to open a rift, because the pursuit of magic is forbidden."

I suppose there's a little leeway with the word "actively," so they might use a TW-device. However I'm of the opinion that once they knew for sure it was a magical device they'd stop using it.

I always took this to mean that they would never do it themselves but they would allow non-humanoid allies, like a Neuron Beast, to do it for them.

I had always assumed that Mechanoids would never use TW gear. They would always know that it's magic as they all have object read or similar powers.

Bizarre!
Is there any further explanation than that?



Apparently, if it's forbidden.

I'm of the opinion that the evil mechanoids don't want their free-thinkers becoming too independent and end up rebelling against their idea of a humanoid/biped-free Megaverse like the original Oracles did.