[HoE] JunkGuyver

[Abdullah Oblongota <toadpooka@usa.net>]

The honorable Mr. Steflik writes:
  I brought up the point the other day however, that it seems pretty 
  obvious that there are a number of people who would like to play a 
  "magic MacGuyver" type of character. I'm all for keeping my players 
  happy, and if they wanted to do something like this I'd try to oblige
  but I'd tell them it wouldn't be a true Junker.
-- 
Well, one way to go about it would to peruse the Thaumaturgical Diffusion
booklet from the City o' Gloom boxed set.  It sounds like you're talking along
the lines of "Infernal Machine" here.  Of course, since the Manitous stopped
talking to the Mad Scientists, you'd need a version that would make an instant
junker device instead of a gizmo.
Also, most anything that you'd want to "MacGuyver" together would only have one
power as far as a Junker device goes.  As long as you didn't try to make
anything too fancy or big, you could put it together in the 2 or 3d20 minutes
category.  Add in the side effect that it falls apart after a set number of
uses, you could probably put something together on short enough notice.
The example someone used, MacGuyver making a lockpick, was him using an
improvised tool to pick a lock.  He didn't turn gum and WD-40 into a computer
that analyzed the lock and picked it for him (which is what people used as the
Junker equivalent).  Apples and Oranges, man.
I also recall someone wanting to make a scope for their rifle using Targeting,
and having problems since it needed Sensor and Commo to work.  The Targeting
power is like software that allows a computer to pick out and track a target. 
To get the requisite information, the computer needs Sensor.  To display the
results of the computation, the device has to have Commo and a screen.
Basically, an easier way to accomplish the scope effect would be to just use
Sensor alone, with the Enhanced Senses option.  It'd have a lower Drain, be much
smaller and easier and faster to build (on the MacGuyver level, in fact).  It'd
be basically only a magnifier, reducing range penalties, but that's because you
don't have a mini-supercomputer tracking for you.
Also, remember that the real strength of the junker isn't the ability to make
amazing devices that can do impossible things (the Mad Scientists' days are
over), but the ability to make a functional device with none of the right
parts.  Your junker scope may be a bit bulky and take a while to make, but you
don't really need any scope parts to make it.  Now which would take longer: To
scavenge for the proper parts for a rifle scope, the tools to make it, and then
to build and test it, or to grab a handful of scrap metal and some busted up
circuit boards, stick 'em together with rubber bands, and start blasting?

--
From Whom It May Concern,
Richard Ranallo

"I was sitting there alone on Prom night, in that God damn rented tuxedo, and
the whole night flashed before my eyes, and I realized finally, and for the
first time, that I wanted to kill somebody.  So I figured that since I loved you
so much, it'd be a good idea if I didn't see you anymore."
-Martin Blank, Grosse Pointe Blank