From: nasato@wiliki.eng.hawaii.edu (Neil Asato)
Subject: Re: Armor and whatnot (BTRC)
Organization: University of Engineering, College of Engineering
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 19:26:00 GMT


     Looking over my previous post on armor and anti-armor,
I have noticed some of my errors.
     The damage value equation refers to the amount of damage
done, not the DV. The DV is actually about twice the computed
damage dealed out, though it might be easier for GMs to just
put the damage done in parenthesis next to the DV, since most
modern equipment are consistent in the damage done.
     For composite armor, the resistance to attacks can vary
with the type of attack. Generally, the armor is designed to
be somewhat general purposed. Unless the GM has advanced knowledge
of armor design or materials science, it is probably easier to
just stick with one AV against all attacks. Composite armor could
suffer from an attrition type of degradation before the
armor is actually pierced. If the GM really wishes to go through
the computations, take the material with the highest AV and compute
the AV as if the entire armor was made of that material, then
compute the BP of the armor by taking the BP as if the entire
armor was made of the material with the highest BP. Note that the
computed values are for the armor itself, not the protection it gives.
Now anytime an attack occurs, if the AV for the armor itself is exceeded
take the damage to its BP. The loss of BP affects the AV protection
it gives, but not the AV for the armor itself. This might be a bit
off, but is a lot easier than doing a full 3-D dynamic modelling of
the transfer of energy.
     In general, powered armor (and to a lesser extent, the "giant robot")
has to be designed around the limitations of the power source, since
you do not have much power to play with (those with matrix level technology
excepted). Always base the design on the amount of weight supported
to give you an idea of how rapidly you use up your fuel/energy reserves.
Do the weight in Joules (mass multiplied by acceleration due to gravity).
At 10% of the weight, the power source supports walking/ slow movement.
At 50% of the weight, the power source supports rapid movement/movement
across very rough terrain. At 80% of the weight, the power source
supports melee combat/evasive actions. At 100+ %, the power source
supports those super-powered/anime type actions.
     For those who want to use a technomagic campaign, enchanted
diamonds in the "back pack" of the powered armor could supply
the armor with enough energy to allow super-powered actions on a 
constant basis. 
     For those who want to run the powered armor off fission/fusion
systems should consider the radiation shielding for it. For relatively
inconspicuous systems, forcefields or magic related shielding is needed.
For TL12 or so technologies, it will require use of multiple layers
of different materials to contain the radiation (and a fairly large amount
of volume). Berylium and hydrogen-rich layers would help reflect the
neutrons. Boron and cadmium would help absorb the neutrons. Lead
and related materials would help absorb the radiations (the main concern
would be the gamma rays). It may be possible to have materials that can
refract/reflect gamma rays, but I have never heard of research on this
possiblity.
 
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