In the modern world, scientist are currently working on weapons far less powerful and yet more dangerous than conventional bombs. EMP weapons. They scramble and screw up anything electronic, and can paralyze entire ships. WHERE ARE THESE WEAPONS IN TRAVELLER? I've come up with one idea. When a nuke goes off, it also lets of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) that can scramble computers, targeting systems, ect. Treat it's "roll to hit" like a High Guard Nuclear missle, minus the Dampner, but it's damage should only be on the Radiation Damage Table. Not being familiar with other ship combat systems, this is all i can do. If you can come up with either another way to achieve an EMP weapon, or how it would work in another system, please add it
EMP weapons
- Thread starter endersig
- Start date
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
They are also working on antimatter weapons, according to this article 
Michael Taylor
SOC-13
It is amazing you should come up with this at just this hour. I'm currently working on EPIC X: Merc Heaven, and I have the LSG attempting to deploy a "superweapon", although it is slightly different to that outlined above. The weapon is an ELF scalar electromagnetic transmitter, the kind theoretically used since 1975 by the USSR and now the USA (HAARP) to manipulate weather and create other effects in the Earth's crust.
The Oz
SOC-14 1K
I think EMP weapons would be mostly useless against TRAVELLER warships equipped with fiberoptic-backbone computers.
Given the rather intense electromagnetic environment starships routinely operate in (unprotected by planetary magnetic fields) I imagine most civilian starships are resistant to EMP effects.
Sigg has a good point: where are the anti-matter weapons? According to MT, they don't show up until TL-17, but as that article says, we're already working on them.
Given the rather intense electromagnetic environment starships routinely operate in (unprotected by planetary magnetic fields) I imagine most civilian starships are resistant to EMP effects.
Sigg has a good point: where are the anti-matter weapons? According to MT, they don't show up until TL-17, but as that article says, we're already working on them.
BetterThanLife
SOC-14 1K
The problem with an anti-matter weapon is containment. But in all seriousness they have been working on AI for the past 30+ years, where is that? Just because they are working on it doesn't mean that it is actualy going to work. How long have we been working on a controled fusion reaction? And it is something that is obviously possible, just look at the sun. (But don't stare at it!
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As for the EMP effect of a Nuclear weapon, you will notice that the damage charts in HG/MT/T20 all effect computer components on the Radiation Damage chart. Radiation actually would have little physical effect on these types of systems however the EMP component of the blast would have this effect. As for an EMP weapon without the Nuke? Actual utility of such a weapon is rather limited. Most military systems are already hardened against it and the weapon itself doesn't exist in a practical form yet.
Weapons that don't have a practical military application are unlikely to be built. Notice major powers willingness to abandon Chemical and Biological Weapons. These weapons were developed in the past, before there was a practical defense against them. Using, even the most advanced Nerve Agent against a modern military, IE the US Army, The British Army, The German Army, even the French or Russian Armies is unlikely to produce significant casualties, probably less than a conventional explosive round, on the other hand it is likely to tick off the army that it was deployed against.
The big threat of, So called, Weapons of Mass Destruction is against civilian targets. Even Nukes are not extremely effective against a deployed field military unit. (Though in quantity they will cause more damage than conventional munitions.) Now against civilian targets, hardened point targets, Command and Control Centers they are extremely effective.
As for the EMP effect of a Nuclear weapon, you will notice that the damage charts in HG/MT/T20 all effect computer components on the Radiation Damage chart. Radiation actually would have little physical effect on these types of systems however the EMP component of the blast would have this effect. As for an EMP weapon without the Nuke? Actual utility of such a weapon is rather limited. Most military systems are already hardened against it and the weapon itself doesn't exist in a practical form yet.
Weapons that don't have a practical military application are unlikely to be built. Notice major powers willingness to abandon Chemical and Biological Weapons. These weapons were developed in the past, before there was a practical defense against them. Using, even the most advanced Nerve Agent against a modern military, IE the US Army, The British Army, The German Army, even the French or Russian Armies is unlikely to produce significant casualties, probably less than a conventional explosive round, on the other hand it is likely to tick off the army that it was deployed against.
The big threat of, So called, Weapons of Mass Destruction is against civilian targets. Even Nukes are not extremely effective against a deployed field military unit. (Though in quantity they will cause more damage than conventional munitions.) Now against civilian targets, hardened point targets, Command and Control Centers they are extremely effective.
Antimatter is expensive and energy intensive to make and dangerous to store. At a rough estimate, making enough antimatter for a Hiroshima sized bomb will take about 20 Giga-watt hours to make. It is possible that a small amount of antimatter could catalyze a small, sub-critical fission reaction. This could be the primer for a "clean" fusion bomb with less fallout.
The above posters are absolutely right about "hardened" ships avionics, particularly the fib computers. And remember that the effect of the EMP is porportional to the square of distance, so unless you are pumpig your EMP weapon with a nuke you better be within a few meters.
The above posters are absolutely right about "hardened" ships avionics, particularly the fib computers. And remember that the effect of the EMP is porportional to the square of distance, so unless you are pumpig your EMP weapon with a nuke you better be within a few meters.
