A Cozy, Creepy, Winter Campaign PART TROIS: Salt can melt ice edition

Wow, you are such a faggot, giving names to your drive, because "ships have them".

Well... That's your playstyle, user. More power to you.

What else can we explore in this setting? I don't have access to GURPS, so I've just been using Powered By the Apocalypse's vehicle system to select crawler details.

>Select 2 positive traits for your crawler
>Huge, fast, agile, resilient, hi-tech, always warm, quick-start ignition, weapons attachments, extra storage space, extremely comfortable

>Cons: pick 1
>Always cold, slow, temperamental, rare fuel type, cramped, cumbersome, no amenities, ugly, fragile

Obviously you can't pick conflicting pros and cons for the crawler. Example:

>X-989: The Trooper
>Resilient, fast, ugly
>This crawler is a quick, sturdy ride that always makes the next delivery run on time. However, it is so poorly maintained that its shoddy appearance can send natives running in terror from the "smelly metal demon."

get mad and stay mad

naming my crawler the "asperger's fury" in your honor

>We need to set up rules!
>Set ups a stupid rule that will provoke exact the same shitstorm
Here we go again.

At this point I hope this thread will just fucking die. The first one was comfy. The second one was salt. This one fucking starts with salt

Keep eating dick, mate. It goes well with being a faggot who gives his drive a name

New thread rule: We accept each other's playstyles. No one is forcing you to play in their version of the setting with exactly their house setting rules and ideas. These are design threads only.

Now post crawlers, ye maggot-ridden primitives.

>Question: Would crawlers with smooth bellies and insect legs be more, or less efficient than belted tracks? Would this design only appear in certain areas? Would other crews be superstitious about these "bug" crawlers?
>"I ain't ridin' in that! Where are muh wheels? Hell with this! I'll just walk."

>Does a vehicle carried by 8 legs, depending on all 8 being fully operational, is less or more efficient than a vehicle using tracks
How do you think we don't use legged vehicles, even the most primitive ones, IRL?

This is another planet user. Different rules might apply. Then again, the sheer old school coolness of rolling tracks is awesome and can't be denied.

...

>This is another planet user
And that affects basic mechanical redundancy... how?

Maybe they have tech that allows for the legs to be a practical mod? Or perhaps it's just cool. Wall-crawling canyon crawlers would be an interesting way to defeat glaciers, ice rifts

>Rivets
>On armour

>8 parts that can be broken
>Rather than 2
>Rather than tracks that can be fixed with crowbar, you need a complex hydraulic shit that can just leak fluid and you are done
Yeah, they've got technology for stupid ideas - they throw them to the bin

If the terrain is uneven, you don't bring land vehicle...

From the dead incarnation

>Lost Soul. A hazy, indistinct sort of 'ghost' that usually manifests in a way where you're not sure what you saw, if you even saw anything. Doesn't mean ill, it's curious at worst. If confronted, communication is rather difficult because there's not a lot of 'person' left, if it was ever human to begin with. Combat is a no because they only barely interact with the physical world -- they can't hurt you, and at most your display of hostility will scare it off, not actually hurt it. Despite being benign, it might be a good "pilot fish" for worse spooky stuff to come... or you're in trouble when you STOP seeing this one, because something has driven/scared it off.

>Icy Wraith. Was it just the wind, or was something in it? A malevolent breeze may not sound like much, but in the arctic north regular breezes are bad enough. While this one can maybe do spooky things (Like actually talk, possibly even mimic voices to lead crew astray) its active hostility can still be warded off by heaters and even jackets, at least to an extent, so any threat it poses is more from how able or not able it is to mess with your head.

>Remnant. A ghost that can look like a normal, living person. Whether or not they realize they aren't one, they act like normal, living people too, which in a setting like this they're more likely to offer you a cup of (ghost) tea than to be hostile. Interacts like a regular NPC, but PCs may come to realize the spectral nature of their new friend if they note discrepancies between what the remnant presents and actual reality.

>First settlers on the planet tried to use hydraulic leg crawlers
>They all fucking died

Nice

Mechanical redundancy in its finest, I guess.

>players have to chase a zeppelin as part of the plot
>the zeppelin, actually, moves much faster than them

kek

It's not funny man. Add rugged terrain and suddenly a blimp doing 40 km/h is moving twice as fast by comparison, even if normally you would be able to make circles around it.

>Zeppelins not hilarious

What world do you live in

Also

>Zeppelins as an extremely expensive mode of delivery
>Players competing with zeppelins to make sure they don't get put out of business

No gods or kings, only man, etc.

Zeppelins are shit at transportation, regardless of just about anything. Mostly due to extremely limited cargo space. They excell in completely different things, like land exploration.

That's true. Would be cool to have them as a recon option for the crawlers, like someone they can pay to scout dangerous areas. Or even mobile radio stations, broadcasting frequencies and bouncing channels to various groups and settlements.

>tfw have a crush on a zeppelin radio station girl but will never meet her or talk to her

Germans had something similar for their U-boots. A special spotting position, when the U-boot was on surface. They were towing a guy sitting in a chair with a rotor, and the blade of the rotor was moved due to the fact it was tugged. Sort of kite, but chopper, but kite.

Technicals here: uboat.net/technical/bachstelze.htm

>You sit on comfy chair, looking around from your autogyro
>Suddenly your crew needs to drop you
>You end up in the middle of snow nothingness on your own
Works both as a plot hook for rescue mission AND some extreme survival game

Some extra NPCs

>The Loon on the Radio. You don't see him, but he broadcasts from his little compound up here pretty regularly. Maybe he has the approval of the FCC or equivalent, maybe he doesn't but nobody's turning him in. He's a conspiracy/spooky theorist who is very invested but for any given campaign, totally wrong. If your flavor of spooky is ghosts, he's on about aliens. If it's traditional magic, he believes in government conspiracies. If there's government/alien stuff going on, he's all about ghosts and magic. He may be a little nuts, but he's friendly enough to anybody who calls into his 'station' and plenty of people listen to him if only for entertainment, including most crawler crews, so if you need to get a message out he could be convinced.

>The ForeverMayor. A male in his late 40s or early 50s. Wanted to be mayor of his town in his early 30s and while the job has lost its charm he runs unopposed every election cycle because... heck, nobody else wants to be mayor. Despite being somewhat interested in a career change, he's very dedicated to his home town and the people who live there. He has a respect for those who do his town a good service and an interest in those who live a life of travel

>Ranger. A member of the forest service who is mostly here to count animals, make sure camp fires are up to code, and occasionally arrest or drive off a poacher or something Probably a mid-20s woman who's not at all native to the area and has a pretty 'green' belief system. She's not a pushy hippy, she just has a high respect for the world she lives in. Knows the lay of the land better than anyone and has access, if not swift access, to geological survey and advanced meteorology if you need information. If you include creepy elements in the campaign, she may have seen some shit being in the woods alone as often as she is.

Should've given it a few days.