Approved Tech "The Hardpoint" Guild Armor

[Cassus Akovin]

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION

• Intent: To create an attractive armor to the common Bounty Hunter, for the Bounty Hunters Guild
• Image Source: N/a
• Canon Link: N/a
• Permissions: N/a
• Primary Source: N/a

PRODUCTION INFORMATION

• Manufacturer: The Bounty Hunters Guild
• Affiliation: The Bounty Hunter's Guild
• Model: Multi-Faceted Hardpoint Suit
• Modularity: Yes, it's primary feature is its easy modifiable nature
• Production: Limited (Only one small group of characters. IE: A Single Minor Faction, Company, or Group within a faction.)
• Material: Variable

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

• Classification: Multipurpose
• Weight: Heavy, Average, or Light (Every Two Resistance Ratings of High, increase weight class.)
• Resistances: For every two High ratings chosen, one other rating must be Low.
  • Energy: (And other Blaster type weapons) Low, Average, or High
  • Kinetic: Low, Average, or High
  • Lightsabers: Low, Average, or High
  • Ion: Low, Average, or High
  • Sonic: Low, Average, or High
  • Elemental: (Either Heat or Cold, High rating will provide both) Low, Average, or High

SPECIAL FEATURES

• Customization!: Designed with modularity in mind, it comes with six hardpoints that allow easy custom reconfiguration of any given suit to suit whatever needs the Bounty Hunter wearing it might need for any given context. It is said that no two Hardpoint suits are ever alike due to its easy customization.
• Jet-Suit: In addition to its ability to be modified, the suit comes standard with a number of repulsor thrusters located throughout the suit (Lower and Upper Back, Boots, [optionally] Gauntlets, and [Optionally] Chest. Obviously, a lighter suit is preferable for full flight capabilities.

STRENGTHS

• Battle-Preparation: The greatest Bounty Hunters in the galaxy are often the best investigators, and know the strengths and weaknesses of their enemies. Given their preparation, their armor will be nicely suited to face off against almost any individual in the galaxy with significant levels of protection.
• Programmable Tracker FOBB: Like most Guild equipment, this armor comes standard with a Bounty Hunter Guild Tracking FOBB built, which can be programmed to track targets not covered by a Guild sponsored Bounty, and links with an optional HUD system for additional targeting efficiency.
• Easily Links with other Guild Equipment: Though it does work nicely with third-party equipment, it is quick and easy to integrate other Guild Equipment alongside this armor.
• Flight: Repulsor Jets throughout the Suit come standard, and allow any Hunter a high degree of mobility, so long as its weight isn't heavy. Though flight is still possible at heavier weights, it comes with greatly reduced speed and maneuverability. At an average weight, flight speed is comparable to a standard Jetpack but much quieter. At a Light weight, the flight speed is exceedingly fast, faster and quieter than a standard Jetpack.

WEAKNESSES

• Unpredictability: Bounty Hunting is a complicated profession, and sometimes a hunter can make a mistake when researching a target. This means that while it is easy to customize and prepare for specific encounters, it is decidedly NOT good at protecting everything at all times. If a Hunter prepares to fight a smuggler and figures they are using a blaster and prepare for such an encounter, once their quarry pulls out a lightsaber there is no going back on their choices. All armor changes are not possible while in the middle of combat, and takes time sometimes resources to alter it to certain specifications.
• Limitations: This armor is not capable of including all of the highest pieces of protection at once, and similarity cannot maintain a Light weight for faster flying while harboring extensive protective plating. More protection will make the armor heavier, and thus reduce the flight capabilities of the suit. Additionally, additional protection from one kind of weapon type will take up space that would otherwise be used to provide protection for a different type. For example, generally, armor designed to stop blaster bolts will not prevent Kinetic weapons from penetrating. Armor can be designed to protect both here, but there are not enough Hardpoints or space to layer all types of protection. In essence, the owner must actively choose where the armor will be weakest for the improved benefits they seek. (The rule is: for every two Ratings that are High, one other Rating must be Low, and the weight increases one rating. [i.e., if Blaster and Ion protection are rated High, Kinetic, Lightsaber, Sonic, or Elemental must be a Low rating, and the weight class must be increased by one rating, i.e. from Light to Average. All other ratings will default to Average.)
• Not Space Hardened: Given the plug-n-play nature of the armor, it is understandably not a sealed environment to the harshness of Vacuum. Additionally, Repulsor-Jets notably does not work in environments without gravity, so it will be bereft of flight capabilities.

DESCRIPTION

To continue providing Bounty Hunters with exclusive gear and equipment that can help assist any Bounty Hunter to become successful, they developed a highly modular piece of armor that can suit and fit the tastes of any Bounty Hunter, for any given situation. Utilizing six Hardpoint sections across the suit, that comes with a number of adjustable pieces of plating which each provide different benefits and with differing weights, it allows any hunter to personally design their own armor more or less. Unfortunately, not all the plating can fit on the armor at the same time, so there are some limitations to a Hunter's ability to design but does allow them at least to cater to a specific encounter they have in mind.

 

[Alkor Centaris]

Cassus Akovin

I'll level with you, I'm leaning toward denying this sub. However, I'm more than willing to work with you to make it work, but it may require you to retool the sub pretty heavily.

Here are my concerns:

First- while the idea of modular armor is fine, and I'm all for it, this particular method leaves too much open for abuse. While we don't specifically preclude things for that reason from approval in the factory, the way this is written right now if I stamped it with the go ahead, people would just flat out ignore balancing and mod it however they wanted.

And we honestly couldn't just tell them no, because it almost literally says that you can play with the stats, right down to the weight of the armor.

What I'd do here would be sub the armor itself with a set series of average stats, and then sub mods or parts to be kitted to it that could then be posted in a given thread. That way, the person could use gear that ultimately has set values and still have the wiggle room you're intending to give them.

Also, the weakness to strength ratio is far too inordinate. You need more to balance out all those strengths you've listed.

If you are willing to roll with something like that fantastic! Let me know.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Alkor Centaris I am going to preface this by saying, I am more than willing to make any adjustments you require, however, I personally don't agree with your assessment.

If people "flat out ignore balancing and mod it however they want", then it is their abuse, not the abuse of the armor. The submission clearly states what happens for every modification. For every two ratings that are High, one other rating must be Low, and the weight increases.

1. To test out the most powerful set of modifications for this armor, I followed this rule and came with an armor that is Heavy, with Four High ratings and two Low ratings, and putting this through the SWRP Chaos Factory 5.1 Technology Spreadsheet for armor indicates that this would be "-1 a little underpowered".
2. To test it again, to see how powerful one could make an armor that flies very quickly (and thus keeping the weight Light), they could only have one Rating of High with everything else at Average, which the spreadsheet indicates is balanced.
3. To test it a third time, to see what an Average Weight armor would look like, it has two high ratings, one low rating, and three average ratings, and the spreadsheet indicates that this is "-1 a little underpowered".

I understand this is a tool still in Beta and not exactly official, but I feel that this demonstrates I never had the intention of making this an all-powerful armor people can simply use as they please. If they ignore the constraints, I do not feel that the submission should be at fault for it.

You are right on the strength to weakness ratio, though, of course. I shall correct that soon.

 

[Alkor Centaris]

I should say, I have faith that your intention wasn't to abuse the system. Abuse by the end user would result in this sub being pulled, and your hard work being archived. I understand that you've set a standard for what should happen in an ideal world.

Our reality is that we have people who try to game the system, and because of that, the submission is necessarily going to be treated as the mode.

That is why I'm asking you to make those changes.

Cassus Akovin

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Understood, I'll tag you when I've made the changes. Thank you for your input!

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Alkor Centaris okay, so I've expanded the weaknesses a bit based on the logic of the armor.

As for your previous suggestion of setting the armor all to average, and using additional submissions for modifications, I have elected to postpone my adherence to it as I present a final argument as to why this is not as open to abuse as you might believe. I have set the ground rules for how the armor can be modified directly into the weaknesses of the submission. If this is ignored, I once again posit it is the issue of the writer using the armor, not the submission itself.

It would be the same as an individual ignoring the lightsaber resistance of an armor which explicitly states that it is not resistant to it. In such a case, would an RPJ not penalize the writer for godmodding, or would they have the submission reviewed?

So in the case of this armor, if a writer states that they can fly extremely fast unimpeded, declares significant resistance to multiple types of damage, and they are reported, the RPJ will see the rules written into the submission itself and determine very quickly it would be the writer at fault, and penalize them accordingly.

My last and final point:

If I were to take your suggestion, make the armor all Average, and then make additional submissions for each type of possible modification, correct me if I am wrong, but according to what I've calculated I would have to make something on the order of 729 different possible combinations. Now, of course, some of those combinations can be eliminated immediately (such as where they are all low, or mostly low, no one would sensibly do that), that is still much more work than I am willing to do, and this was the easiest, simplest, and most direct method I could find for the concept I have produced here. If I tried to simplify it and make a High Rating plate for each damage type... well now I have officially enabled a writer to just mod the armor to have complete High ratings for all damage types listed here, which is most certainly not the balance we are seeking.​

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So now I implore you to see, that what you're asking me to do is much more work on my end, and probably more of a headache for the users of this submission. If we can trust basic reading competency for every other submission in the factory or codex, I would like you to put a touch more trust in the rest of the community at large for an armor that is, to be frank, not otherwise very impressive.

If by some chance for whatever reason an RPJ determines that this submission needs to be given a second look after an incident of some kind has occurred, I will eat that responsibility. Submissions should not be denied on the basis that an RPJ might pull it for a second look after an incident involving it occurs... because that is true of every submission in the Factory and Codex.

Aaaaaaand now this is where I apologize for writing you a short essay lol

If my modifications above are not to your satisfaction, I will be requesting a second chance. Thank you for your input and support!

 

[Alkor Centaris]

So, I get where you're coming from and I'm not the one who can make this call; so, for the sake of a swift and fair decision I'm going to hand this over to John Locke

Cassus Akovin Thanks for working with me and being chill about everything, I just want you to get an answer definitively from the boss man.

 

[John Locke]

Cassus Akovin | Alkor Centaris

I've read through the submission and the arguments laid out in your responses thus far. Firstly I wanted to thank you both for keeping this discussion civil and helpful. This is what every review process should look like.

As for the submission, I do understand what it is that you're aiming for here, and what you're trying to do with this submission. Creating a standard catch-all suit of armour for the Bounty Hunters Guild is a fun idea and I can see how it would be useful for the bounty hunters in facing their various targets. However, even with your limitations weakness, the suit is still rife with the potential for abuse. Not because of any ill intent on your part but because if a writer fails to declare the stats on his armour then he can modify the armour mid thread. It might have started as a simple oversight on the writer's side but the potential exists to make a situation unfair to the opposing writers.

Which leads me to your point about the RPJs going after the writer vs the armour. In the case of a report involving this submission, both the submission and the writer will potentially come under review. In such a case the likelihood exists that the armour itself will be pulled for a more detailed review and one where changes may be required instead of suggested.

However, at the moment, the factory doesn't stand as the arbiter of balance on the site. So I'm going to approve this submission now with the normal caveat.

If the armour is abused, then you could potentially lose the submission.

With that said.

APPROVED