Re: [HoE] [Hopler]Couple questions / What else is new? :)

[Darrin Bright <darrin@neobright.net>]

At 06:42 PM 1/28/00 -0600, you wrote:
>
>1)    Quantum Leap
>    The Doomie power of quantum leap is pretty clear as to its use
>although a bizarre situation came up recently. The Doomie was in an out
>of control vehicle and was going to be crushed into a building with a
>few seconds.  He could have jumped but was already badly hurt and then
>thought of using Quantum Leap to simple zap over to the side of the
>street and arrive standing still.  Now I ruled that your inertia is
>still skipping you along at whatever speed you were moving at when you
>Quantum Leap. His argument was that since its technically (Love that
>word.. mean a rationalization is to follow hehe) matter transmission he
>should arrive at the teleported spot standing still.  I don't believe so
>but would be interested in hearing what you think.

Larry Niven discusses this problem with his "Teleport Booths" in some of
his short stories. If you want to be scientifically accurate, yes, there
ought to be some sort of conservation of momentum when you teleport. This
can be very messy when you're teleporting between two different elevations
or two different energy states, but let's not get into that right now. Tell
your Doomie to consider this example: he's falling from the top of a
20-story building. Just before he goes splat, should he be able to Quantum
Leap safely to the ground? I don't think so.

I'd tell the Doomie that he can do it, but he'll then be outside the
vehicle and moving at the same speed, which is VERY VERY bad. If you leave
or are thrown from a vehicle during a crash, the chances of a fatal injury
skyrocket. 

>2) Diesel vs Spook Juice.
>    The prevalence of Semi's laying about after the war brings up a
>point in the game I am running.  Although the characters do not have a
>Semi they do have a vehicle that runs off of diesel.  All the info in
>the Road Warriors seems to imply that the trucks within it run off off
>spook Juice and if that's the case then no problem I could see the
>Trucks in 2080 being all gas versions for some reason. However if not
>then Diesel would be a hard fuel to scrounge up. Spook juice and gas
>would be easy to find or create.

What I'd do with Spook Juice: running a vehicle on this stuff causes it to
attract certain spirits. For each day you run the vehicle with Spook Juice,
draw a card. If it's a non-face card, nothing happens. If it's an ace or a
face card, then the vehicle has attracted some kind of spirit to it. It may
be a benign or benevolent tech spirit, or it may be somewhat of a
prankster, but it infuses the vehicle with a certain personality or
attitude for a while... if you draw a joker, of course, a manitou or
gremlin starts ripping the engine apart.