 February 2, 2018 - 6:36am | There is a paragraph in Zebs (Im working form the digitally remastered one right now) about mines, it appears right after the descriptions of the various detonators and just before the descriptions of grenades but on the equipment lists where your get the weight and cost details there are no mines? I'm guessing the PCs were not intended to purchase them? In light of the chinese menu format of Zebs with the missiles being a choice from column A and a choice from collumn B; maybe you're supposed to match a detonator with one of the missle warheads? If so its actually a pain in the butt to use and fiddly IMO. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 2, 2018 - 6:51am | Adding to the mess that is Zebs I'm interested in limpet mines as well two methods of making them stick: magnetic: same tech as mag boots and most likely activated by user and mine has a small SEU power disk to power this effect. tangler adhesive: adaption of tangler thread technology-a plasti-paper backing is pealed off the mine exposing tangler adhesive to air and activating it causing it to foam up a little and the mine can be attached to any surface. It will remain stuck there for 60 minutes (the decay time for tangler threads is 30) before the adhesive decays and the mine drops. For this reason limpet mines of this sort generally have a variable timer of 60 minutes because the mine dropping would drigger its anti tamper feature. I suppose there would be a velcro backed limpet mine- for sticking to the velcro strips lining floors and walls in space habitats and on star ships. I suppose any treatment of mines should also include a trip wire detonation feature as well. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 2, 2018 - 6:59am | The prices on all of the Zebs detonators are 5 to 15 Cr so I'm inclined to just say in the mines description that it comes with variable timer and mechanical activation (mechanical being pressure plate for stepping on or a tripwire ala the real world claymore) or for 15 Cr more can have one of the following X,Y or Z detonators as well. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 2, 2018 - 7:10am | Working off the Claymore's stats a standard Frontier mine might be 20 cm diameter 1.5 kg I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 2, 2018 - 9:09am |  The Claymore might be a worthy conversion to SF. Especially for game tending toward bug hunts. This diagram says effective range is 50 meters and Wikipedia says shrapnel travels 110 meters. I suppose the primary blast area of 60 degree arc is the kill zone and a secondary blast area out to 100 meters and in the 180 degree arc. The question is how to treat damage expressions in these two areas? Edit The Burst fire rules in SF may be the way to go here. If a claymore has 700 steel balls as its "ammo" how many machine gun burst would that be? On heavy machine gun burst does 10d10 and the ammo belt has 10 such burst. Actually just reread the burst fire rules it might become complicated to apply them to the number of targets that could be in the primary blast zone alone let alone secondary blast zones. so for a simplification a massive ammount of damage to every target in primary blast zone say 5d10 or 7d10 or 10d10 and a smaller ammount to every target in secondary blast zone: 2d10 with a RS check to hit deck and only take half. EDIT 2 Additional information: According to wikipedia there is a 10% chance of hitting a prone individual and 30% of hitting targets in primary blast radius. so those numbers could be used to dice for all possible targets in blast area or a referee can simply apply an average ammount of damage to 30% of the targets in blast area for simplicity. 5d10 is probably the damage expression with secondary blast area targets getting hit at 20% chance for 2d10 and RS check for half. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 February 3, 2018 - 1:43am | You could use the claymore pattern with other types of offensive weapons used in SF. For example, it could be a claymore-like mine but instead it uses a laser, or has an electro- or sonic stunner effect. Maybe one throws out marble grenades. |
 February 3, 2018 - 4:09pm | I think the claymore would be a good addition. Yes, Zebs gives the land mines, but not much else. I whipped the following together if it would be of any use to your project. < Mines Land-mines come in several different sizes and types. They are defensive weapons, often used to help protect a position or campsite, used to funnel an enemy into a particular area, and are effective in difficult terrain where an attacker cannot simply bypass a minefield. Mines have also been used in guerilla warfare to target civilians.[1] Some of the types of mines that characters might be able to purchase or encounter include: EMP Field Mine, Grasshopper Mine, Leap Frog Mine, and the small land mine that would contain a grenade. Larger mines are designed to be equipped with type I, II or III missile type warheads. Characters could also employ improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using explosives, bombs or warheads without using an official mine kit. Land-mines do not have secondary blast areas. They use motion, pressure, proximity, time delay, voice or photon or other activation sensors. Detecting Mines. When entering an area with mines, characters without mine detection equipment should make an Intuition check to notice the device(s). Characters with a demolitions skill and technical skills, such as detecting alarms and defenses, should make a skill check. Since mines are normally concealed, those relying strictly on an Intuition check might receive a -10 to -30 percent penalty to notice and avoid a mine. Other equipment, everything from ground penetrating radar sensors to trained bomb-sniffing animals can be used to varying degrees of success to detect land-mines. Disarming/Clearing Minefields. A character with a Demolitions skill can attempt to disarm a land-mine, though the best way is to avoid them or use various remote-controlled devices to cause the mine to “harmlessly” explode. Grasshopper Mines. These weapons will fling themselves up to three meters straight up in the air before detonating, which can help them attack low flying or hovering targets. If it hits an obstacle on its way up, it will be deflected two meters in a random direction before detonating. Use the Area Effect Weapon Miss Diagram for random direction. Leapfrog Mines. This mine is made to jump toward its target. Use the Grenade Bounce Chart to determine where it lands. The trigger system is usually a scanner, as it must know which direction to leap toward the target. (See the equipment section of the Zebulon’s Guide to determine how scanners work.) Joe Cabadas |
February 3, 2018 - 4:17pm | The Zebs missile rules need a bit of work, which is what I've tried to do under my Joe's Half-Baked Ideas project. The different warheads are simply like grenade mortar rounds or grenade rifle bullets. One big difference is the fact that a Type II cares two warheads -- which are double the size of a Type I -- while the Type III missiles have three warheads, which are three times as large as the Type Is. The big problem I've had with the missiles is the cost. They are far cheaper than other alternatives such as cannons or howitzers or dropped bombs. Who would want those when you can buy a cheap missile? Joe Cabadas |
February 3, 2018 - 4:19pm | I have to go back and recheck the figures on these, but I did put together a combined weapons and cost chart (which I know jedion is aware of but others may not) here: http://www.starfrontiers.us/node/9562 Joe Cabadas |
February 3, 2018 - 10:00pm | Yeah Zebs sucks and not in the right way. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 3, 2018 - 11:58pm | Yeah Zebs sucks and not in the right way.  Joe Cabadas |
February 4, 2018 - 6:00am | Tsk, it's not that bad. It just occasionally needs a bit of work  |
February 4, 2018 - 6:07am | Tsk, it's not that bad. It just occasionally needs a bit of work Yes, it needs a bit of work like this Chevy Vega does.  Joe Cabadas |
February 4, 2018 - 6:15am | Bah, I don't agree  Maybe we were doing something wrong - or right - but my SF group rarely had any problems with Zeb's. We just figured out where the cracks were and papered over them with some houserules. But I don't recall us being unable to play SF because of it - if anything it made the game better for us. We would have used Zeb's again in our recent revisiting of SF, but we remembered more of AD than Zeb's and thus just used a bit of a mix of the two.As for mines, I seem to recall us having versions which had the same capabilities of the various new grenades in Zeb's, especially for the 'bouncing betty' types. As for missiles, I can't recall what we did - possibly because they didn't really feature in any of our games. |
 February 4, 2018 - 8:19am | Having actually denoted claymore mines in training (not combat) a couple quick things. Effective range is a subjective term. Some say it is the range you can reasonably expect a kill 50% of the time others range at which a weapon can still kill, others same maximum effective range which is also subjective. Also the claymore mine has been in use for more than 50 years. Improvements have been made. Oh and terrain has an effect on effective range. Usually for the claymore mine it is the BBs exploded from it that are used for determining damage. The shock wave is not. I watched balloons set up 20 feet behind the mine burst because of the shock wave. In front is worse. You are instructed to put something like sandbags behind the mine to protect yourself. Mine detection equipment needs to be specialized. Metal detectors work for some but many mines are all plastic these days. Different types of explosives mean using different types of scent detection settings. Also some mine detonators can be detonated by the mine detection equipment. Grasshopper mines were usually called Bouncing Bettys in my day but I am getting old. Personnally I would not use alot of reality with mines and go for the more dramatic effect. A true minefield is a death trap characters would not escape. See the movie Uncommon Valor to see a minefield in action Vrusk take great offence at the term bug hunt. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
February 4, 2018 - 12:53pm | Bah, I don't agree Maybe we were doing something wrong - or right - but my SF group rarely had any problems with Zeb's. We just figured out where the cracks were and papered over them with some houserules. But I don't recall us being unable to play SF because of it - if anything it made the game better for us. We would have used Zeb's again in our recent revisiting of SF, but we remembered more of AD than Zeb's and thus just used a bit of a mix of the two.As for mines, I seem to recall us having versions which had the same capabilities of the various new grenades in Zeb's, especially for the 'bouncing betty' types. As for missiles, I can't recall what we did - possibly because they didn't really feature in any of our games. When Zebs first came out, I eagerly got it. I loved the new equipment and weapons and the idea that there were new skills, but I couldn't get anyone to play it. I did not like the column shifts and color codes. I did not like the fact they changed the weapons ranges with a universal system that eliminated the point blank and extrme ranges. I hated the timeline. I did not mind the new races, but hated how they tried to incorporate them earlier into the Frontier history. And I soon realized it was an incomplete redo of the game -- i.e. the cover features a guy in powered armor but no powered armor rules were included. The bodycomps were interesting but dorky. Etc., etc. Joe Cabadas |
February 5, 2018 - 1:11pm | One man's poison is another man's meat then, I guess. We liked the column shift stuff, the weapon stuff didn't bother us, bodycomps were used alot, and the timeline was never really a factor (much of that was new information to us anyway). Various things were a bit rough around the edges, but we did quite a lot of homebrewing in our various RPGs so it wasn't really an issue. I didn't see the cover guy as wearing powered armour - instead that and other imagery gave us an idea for something called a 'battlesuit', which I have to write up sometime. |
February 5, 2018 - 4:11pm | One man's poison is another man's meat then, I guess. We liked the column shift stuff, the weapon stuff didn't bother us, bodycomps were used alot, and the timeline was never really a factor (much of that was new information to us anyway). Various things were a bit rough around the edges, but we did quite a lot of homebrewing in our various RPGs so it wasn't really an issue. I didn't see the cover guy as wearing powered armour - instead that and other imagery gave us an idea for something called a 'battlesuit', which I have to write up sometime. Ironically, I am using a Zeb's spinoff -- the Star Frontiers 2000 project rules. It's more of a Zebs/Alpha Dawn hybrid. I know jedion has grown to hate that version -- I've read his earlier comments about it versus more recent ones -- but I've tried to address that in my home rules... I think I've simplified it and made it more useable and posted it under the Joe's Half-Baked Ideas project... Though one compliment I got was essentially "that ship has sailed." Well, to each their own. And, I didn't totally hate Zebs, but ... Joe Cabadas |
February 5, 2018 - 4:36pm | If your group uses a set of rules and it works for you thats all good. Its about having a frame work for resolving actions in game. Somethings i like better then others. Hated hand walking a newbie through SF2000 who wanted a roboticist character but hadnt taken all the individual robotics subskills. Im actually playing in a PBEM game that is a Zebs & AD fussion. I would not be playing in it if it was D20 modern though, those rules annoy me. I also played in the Black Hand Gang PBP. Captain Hellraiser used a AD/ Zebs fusion that i didnt mind either. Im not against having all the cheap new skills that Zebs added just hated that it fractured the med, technician, computer, roboticist and etc. Into the individual subskills. This is why i like "A Skilled Frontier" it expands the AD skills catalog and maintains an AD feel. A AD/Zebs fussion works, it just looks like a mongrel. That is not to say a mongrel cant be a good dog they just aint a pretty one. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 5, 2018 - 4:41pm | Re effective range: got to go with something so im inclined to use data from the net and fudge up something that works game wise. The numbers on wikipedia, while maybe not to be trusted in reality could be a good basis for a mechanic to resolve this. No doubt there will be trade offs. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 5, 2018 - 4:54pm | [quote=jedion357... Hated hand walking a newbie through SF2000 who wanted a roboticist character but hadnt taken all the individual robotics subskills... Yes, I understand that objection. Zebs took all the subskills and turned them into skills. I doesn't work. It's better to combine several Zebs skills together and then force the player to take what they need. Want to know how to use a computer, OK, that's included in Computers Basic, but you want to hack into it, take Computers Advanced... or whatever I ended up calling it. Joe Cabadas |
February 5, 2018 - 5:14pm | What would call a Zebs AD fussion skill set? Alpha Zebs Zebulon Dawn Omega Dawn Beta Dawn I think i like Omega Dawn. It has the virtue of sounding cool and interesting. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 February 5, 2018 - 8:05pm | What would you call a Zebs AD fussion skill set? An improvement on Zeb's and a hindrance on AD. |
February 6, 2018 - 10:03am | What would you call a Zebs AD fussion skill set? An improvement on Zeb's and a hindrance on AD. Well, you could view it as a difference between Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced D&D. Or between the Star Frontiers Basic Game and the Advanced Game. Improving Zebs does not necessarily detract or hinder AD... especially if you move Zebs closer to Alpha Dawn. My version of the Zebs rules I call Zebulon Sunset (and those rules are a heavily edited version of Star Frontiers 2000, so I am not claiming to have developed it independently)... So, Zebulon Sunset is a tongue-in-check reference to Alpha Dawn and a backhanded reference to Zebs that killed off one of my favorite games... killed off as a TSR-supported product ... Not counting a few articles in Dragon that were published after Zebs... Joe Cabadas |
February 6, 2018 - 10:00am | Anyway, I seen some posts that they use GURPS to replace the Alpha Dawn rules or this D20 system. It's (almost) whatever you want for your own game. Joe Cabadas |
February 6, 2018 - 11:33am | Well, you could view it as a difference between Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced D&D. One could, assuming AD&D only published one book and folded before the other two were penned. Or between the Star Frontiers Basic Game and the Advanced Game. Nope, Expanded built heavily off of Basic. Zeb's ignored both (along with everything else that had been published) and offered up conflicting and senseless info instead. At best it's a source of ideas to incorporate and house-rule into the original game, and one could just as easily do the same with Traveller, Gamma World, WEG Star Wars, Shatterzone, etc etc etc. |
February 6, 2018 - 12:39pm | So me and my RPG must've been doing something wrong then, judging by the above posts  We really liked Zeb's and got a lot of good gaming mileage out of it. Replaying again after a 25 year gap, we mixed the AD and Zeb's just because we liked both and remembered enough of both to make it useable. I still think that this works well - but, like I said, my group had an established history of houseruling and homebrewing stuff so if any given RPG had gaps in it we had no problems working around it. As a referee I was chomping at the bit to start running adventures using Zeb's as there was a lot of idea fuel in it, and my players really liked it. |
February 6, 2018 - 6:49pm | So me and my RPG must've been doing something wrong then, judging by the above posts We really liked Zeb's and got a lot of good gaming mileage out of it. Replaying again after a 25 year gap, we mixed the AD and Zeb's just because we liked both and remembered enough of both to make it useable. I still think that this works well - but, like I said, my group had an established history of houseruling and homebrewing stuff so if any given RPG had gaps in it we had no problems working around it. As a referee I was chomping at the bit to start running adventures using Zeb's as there was a lot of idea fuel in it, and my players really liked it. I wouldn't say you are wrong. Glad you liked it. Joe Cabadas |
February 7, 2018 - 6:34am | my group had an established history of houseruling and homebrewing stuff and the immortal demigod Gygax smiled on the mortals who pleased him well.... I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 7, 2018 - 8:20am | Sorry for diverting the attention of this topic. Besides claymores, grasshoppers (bouncing betties) and leapfrog mines, any other ideas? Joe Cabadas |
February 7, 2018 - 8:44am | What about laser and sonic mines? These might need a particular design to work well. Maybe they would operate similar to claymores and would have a cone of destruction in front of them? Joe Cabadas |
