From: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org (deltagreen-digest) To: deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Subject: deltagreen-digest V1 #93 Reply-To: Delta Green List Sender: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Errors-To: owner-deltagreen-digest@nocturne.org Precedence: bulk deltagreen-digest Wednesday, August 5 1998 Volume 01 : Number 093 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 13:07:17 GMT0BST From: Robert Thomas Subject: Re: DG: Little Nukes > >So it would be messy as an environment (pollution) bomb, not like an > >explosive bomb? > > I seem to remember, somewhere in the murky mists of time, reading a > book in which a nuclear bomb 'fizzled', Hello All, Its from the Tom Clancy novel "The Sum of All Fears" basically middle eastern terrorists find a downed fighter bomber from Israel which was carrying a nuclear weapon. IIRC according to the book the bomb they created fizzeled, (didn't convert its matter into energy e=mc2), because of tritium contamination but it looked to the satellites which measured the flash, much greater, because of the snow in the area flashing into steam and reflecting some of the blast and it also had something to do with the tarmac in the car park where it went of I think. Anyway thats all from the top of my head. Outahere Rob. "You have to be, not only in R'lyeh, but in R'lyeh when the stars are right. Then all you have to do is open a big door. And get killed, natch." - J. B. Lee, on summoning Cthulhu "Oh MY God... They Killed Kenny!": "YOU BASTARDS!". ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 13:41:45 +0100 From: Nick Subject: Re: DG: Little Nukes <<>>> That's the one Rob. "You have to be, not only in R'lyeh, but in R'lyeh when the stars are right. Then all you have to do is open a big door. And get killed, natch." - J. B. Lee, on summoning Cthulhu "Oh MY God... They Killed Kenny!": "YOU BASTARDS!". ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 09:13:09 -0400 From: "Eric Brennan" Subject: Re: DG: RE: Accountability I'm probably a little late on this thread due to vacation, but I know in Jim's game that at least my character was on call as a "cleaner," i.e. somebody who saw fit to clean up sloppy messes. I imagine with the DG mindset, there's probably one guy in every other cell who's just a little too close to the edge. These guys make the best cleaners. Got a friendly who's getting out of line? Get rid of him. It's easier to do this early when the mess is small. The flip side of this was that my character was more than a little afraid that one day _he'd_ be cleaned. As for financing, where does all that money from drug cartels go? I'm sure hundreds of millions of dollars in various pharms each year goes missing from evidence rooms and captured frieghters into the hands of mysterious DG Men in Black, who then hand it over to Mafia "friendlies" at a decent enough discount. If the CIA was doing it and got caught, do you think DG couldn't do it and not get caught? Our game is a dirty one, my friends. Be seeing you, Agent WALLACE aka Eric Brennan - -----Original Message----- From: CroakerJr@aol.com To: deltagreen@nocturne.org Date: Friday, July 31, 1998 9:59 PM Subject: Re: DG: RE: Accountability >SNIP< >About security: > >Very few Friendlies in the game should have any idea what they are really >involved in; your typical Friendly should be convinced that their contact >Agent is a lone wolf operative trying to save the world (or that the cell of a >few agents is the only such group), and that he or she is one of the only >people in all the world that they can turn to to ask for help. A Friendly >should be shocked to learn that there are DOZENS of Agents and HUNDREDS of >Friendlies "just like me" out there; and by the time a Friendly learns that >much, it should be time to reevaluate whether the Friendly is trustworthy >enough to be made a full Agent... or not. > >And that brings us to the other issue: what do we do about leaks? We stop >them. Clean and cold. In most DG games in which I've been player or Keeper, >the only thing that would distinguish most DG Agents from those slimy NRO- >Speedwagon boys is ideology (NROD wants to steal the nasty alien secrets; DG >wants to kill the nasty alien secrets) and resources (they have more than we >do); their methods and sense of conscience tend to be about the same. They >are men and women who have grown hard and dangerous and cruel for the sake of >doing the greater good; and hopefully that does not itself cause them to lose >track of the greater good. Delta Green agents are largely federal law >enforcement, intelligence, and special forces types who have consciously >decided to abandon operational ethics as necessary in pursuit of their goal: >as a group they are very very well acquainted with blackmail, money >laundering, evidence tampering, and murder. > >Have a nice day. :-) > >Shane Ivey >http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Shadowlands/6580/dg.htm ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 10:24:00 -0400 (EDT) From: Jonathan P Keim Subject: DG: neutron bombs Someone made a reference to the lovely neutron bomb. I remember hearing vague stories about it doing quite a number on life, but leaving all the inanimate spoils of war just fine and ripe for the taking. Is this true? Anyone care to share just what these things do? Thanks in advance, Munch, who really does play with that laser pointer too much and should probably stop before he hurts himself or others... ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 10:37:56 +0000 From: "John P. Yuda" Subject: Re: DG: Lasers and Peter Gunn > You're right - people here in Switzerland are already talking about banning > these lasers from classrooms since it's hip here to have one !? > What I really like about laser sights is the effect these things can make if > pointed on an agents head through thick fog - imagine that! This is a very real problem where I was just vacationing on the Delaware shore. Apparently these laser pointers are all the rage there, and several of the towns are considering banning them, because they fear that a policeman will be investigating a legitimate crime where the suspect is considered to be armed and dangerous...sees a little red dot on his chest...and BANG. dead kid. The stupidest things become fads, really. Yuda ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 15:49:13 GMT0BST From: Robert Thomas Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs > Someone made a reference to the lovely neutron bomb. I remember hearing > vague stories about it doing quite a number on life, but leaving all the > inanimate spoils of war just fine and ripe for the taking. Is this true? > Anyone care to share just what these things do? Hello All, As far as I understand them Neutron bombs will kill every living thing inside their radius of effect. Now what I think happens is that instead of your classic A-bomb, (matter converted to energy in the forms of the explosion / sound / light), the matter is just converted to radiation. IE I think a neutron bomb just takes the matter and excites it to an energy level where it gives off radiation which is lethal to organic life, not to an energy level, (as in a classic A-bomb), where it gives off the other effects, (sound / light etc), (Does anyone know if with a neutron bomb there is actually a physical explosion or just a reaction emitting radiation?), Now how this is done I don't know, I remember reading a novel where Chicago was Neutron Bombed and it killed every living thing there, however one interesting fact is that it is not continually lethal so once the level of radiation has dropped to background the area neutron bombed is perfectly safe, and filled with corpses. This would prevent interesting challenges to anyone moving back into the city what do you do exactly with 6-7 million dead people, (guessing Chicago's population), not to mention cats and dogs and other pets? The scavenger problem would be huge animal migrating inwards to feed off the corpses. Now an intersting scenario could be constructed around a neutron bombing, Ghouls migrating into the city after the bombing, hell there's enough food after all;-) back to doing my dissertation which isn't going well :-( Rob. J.R.E.Thomas. Science Library PC Room Advisor ext 6135 / 5128. MScII City and Regional Planning Student. ThomasR@cardiff.ac.uk ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 04 Aug 1998 08:36:56 -0400 From: "R. Menzi" Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs >>> Someone made a reference to the lovely neutron bomb. I remember hearing vague stories about it doing quite a number on life, but leaving all the inanimate spoils of war just fine and ripe for the taking. Is this true? Anyone care to share just what these things do? Thanks in advance, <<< Like a brick in a sock, it kills the people, but leaves the buildings standing. I don't know the mechanism for it, but does it really matter, everyone in the area is dead, but you can move into the homes. This makes me ask how small they can be made, and if an NYC landlord find a way to kill off his rent controlled tenants and bring the units up to market value. Regards, >>> R. Menzi ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 15:57:57 +0100 From: "Winkelman, Mark" Subject: DG: RE: The good friends of Stephen Alziz & some other points I am getting the DG list in digest form to reduce the traffic. This of course makes it less immediately easy to respond on certain issues. Either way here are a few different points: My Campaign (i.e. stop reading if you are involved) Its an occasional campaign set in contemporary NYC. Its fairly low powered: the players are a collection of cops, doctors, psychiatric care givers and students generally floating around Bellevue, the cops got on the wrong side of Y'Golonac and ended up recovering at Bellevue where one of the Doctors was carrying out his own experiments.... For the most part I have constructed it out of a number of published scenarios which have been spliced together along with some Dreamlands gaming. There is a possibility of the PCs being contacted by DG but at this rate it is unlikely as they aren't covering their tracks well enough. The next session is going to involve a trip to the Club Apocalypse where some interesting acquaintances should be made. The material in the Pagan Publishing Deltagreen book is very good and rather tantalising but short on more plot details, though I am cooking up some ideas. The Network is being introduced as long term backdrop rather than a quick enemy (obviously). I was wondering has anyone made use of any of these areas in their campaigns and if there is anything available (plots, NPCs etc.) or stuff that people might be able to forward to me or indeed any other suggestions. I don't have access to any net tech beyond E-Mail though I occasionally go to an Internet cafe to look at sites of interest. Similarly I am interested in the Karotechia (some interesting snippets there recently) but have no immediate plans to incorporate them into my campaign. Anyway all help would be appreciated. Thanks. Detective Music: John Zorn's "Spillane" is an obvious tribute, though with his experimental style is not a straightforward pastiche of film noir music styles. Similarly the group Red Snapper are interesting, they are a live jazz band who make extensive use of sampling/ programming technology. Apart from just liking it their use of sax, double bass etc. in slightly odd musical atmospheres may be of interest. I gather their latest LP makes use of a rapper and singer and so may not be as useful as background music for gaming. They record for the Sheffield based label WARP (whose product is only available on import in the US) who while seen as mainly a dance based label have a lot of interesting electronica and other atmospheric music. Covering Up DG operations: I think its a good question but it depends on the style of campaign. Some people want to avoid such "detail" for others its part of the fun. Personally I'd pay it some mind. Or alternatively if the PCs leave loose ends all over the place it gives you stuff to hang them with later - should you need it. I'll leave it at that for now and see you soon. Mark ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 11:56:40 -0400 From: graemep@immagene.mcg.edu (Graeme Price) Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs Other guys (can't say who originally: Servitor problems again!) wrote: >Like a brick in a sock, it kills the people, but leaves the buildings >standing. I don't know the mechanism for it, but does it really matter, >everyone in the area is dead, but you can move into the homes. This makes >me ask how small they can be made, and if an NYC landlord find a way to >kill off his rent controlled tenants and bring the units up to market value. As I recall (which possibly isn't very well), with neutron bombs there is a jacket of material (tritium I guess, as it is basically hydrogen with a couple of extra neutrons) around the primary thermonuclear device which undergoes fusion when the primary device blows. One of the by products of this fusion process is gamma radiation which goes through concrete like a knife through butter and irradiates the people/animals/plants and generally causes the unpleasant nastiness. The problem (as with all nukes) is that there will be fall out from the primary, which will make the area uninhabitable for a time. Fallout can be minimised by fusing the device so it airbursts (fallout is basically the cloud dirt sucked up in a mushroom cloud, mixed with the highly radioactive bomb fragments). It is possible to convert a "normal" A-bomb into something much dirtier by putting a jacket of something which has a long half life (cobalt for example) around the primary and fusing it for ground burst. This mixes in the long half life component with the fallout and makes the surrounding area uninhabitable for, say, a few thousand years. Again, check out the opening chapters of Tom Clancy's "The Sum of All Fears" (handy reference for keepers interested in nukes), in which the retreating Israeli army are on the verge of using a cobalt jacketed nuke to deny territory to the advancing Arab forces. Not nice. Graeme graemep@immag.mcg.edu ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 08:54:10 -0700 From: Christian Conkle Subject: RE: DG: neutron bombs I'm no nuclear physicist or weapons expert, but I was under the impression that the Neutron bomb is basically a small atomic bomb whose explosion creates a great deal of leathal radiation. The explosion is relatively small, but everyone for miles and miles and miles dies of radiation burns, loss of limbs and eyes, or worse. BAKOOM! "Did you hear somethi- GACK!" (flump). - ----------------------------------------------------- Christian Conkle Web Development Specialist Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory work: conklec@nwrel.org home: conkle@europa.com - ----------------------------------------------------- > -----Original Message----- > From: R. Menzi [SMTP:menzi@asan.com] > Sent: Tuesday, August 04, 1998 5:37 AM > To: Delta Green List > Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs > > >>> Someone made a reference to the lovely neutron bomb. I remember > hearing vague stories about it doing quite a number on life, but leaving > all the inanimate spoils of war just fine and ripe for the taking. Is > this > true? Anyone care to share just what these things do? Thanks in advance, > <<< > > Like a brick in a sock, it kills the people, but leaves the buildings > standing. I don't know the mechanism for it, but does it really matter, > everyone in the area is dead, but you can move into the homes. This makes > me ask how small they can be made, and if an NYC landlord find a way to > kill off his rent controlled tenants and bring the units up to market > value. > > > Regards, > >>> R. Menzi ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 04 Aug 1998 12:25:41 -0500 From: cimjindy Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs > > > Now an intersting scenario could be constructed around a neutron > bombing, Ghouls migrating into the city after the bombing, hell > there's enough food after all;-) > Heh, that would sure be a perfect scheme for a certain pack of renegade crack using Ghouls, who fester in the slums and sewers of NYC..Scene One: Investigators are put on the case of a basic robbery. They discover a small atomic device has been stolen.. DG contacts them. DG agent is planted in PC's party. Ties to the Cult Of Transcendence are found (wiping out the worlds population is #1 on their list. Is it hard to imagine them having a neutron bomb lying around, or locked in one of their bank vaults?). Investigation is taken to the slums of NYC, where the Old Order of Ghouls warn of the imminent disaster (fun scene, investigators first contact with the mythos:). DG calls in some of the bigger guns, possibly a friendly swat team (?) which has gone on several DG ops. Investigators and co decend into the sewers.. Small fire fights insue, hit and run tactics are used by the renegade ghouls. After losing nearly 50% of the team, the agents fight their way into the ghouls lair (having been givin a map by the Old Order Ghouls earlier[?]). Sanity Ripping [TM] ending ensues, with either the investigators winning in the end, or reducing NYC's population to sludge. Yikes. I haven't done any thing like that for sometime. Could I be over my writers block? :) Some parts still need to be ironed out. Esp. the Cult of Trancendence ties, and some explanation as to how the ghouls hijacked such a haul (you'd think the CoT would have some pretty wicked security systems installed, ehh?) Any comments/feedback is welcome. As always. Back in the saddle again, Adam [no, not _that_ Adam. I deny it all] > back to doing my dissertation which isn't going well :-( > > Rob. > > J.R.E.Thomas. > Science Library PC Room Advisor ext 6135 / 5128. > MScII City and Regional Planning Student. > ThomasR@cardiff.ac.uk ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 04 Aug 1998 11:38:56 PDT From: "Christian Klepac" Subject: DG: Remote simulation exercises To all active operatives: Recent security compromises have forced me to go into hiding at a classified location. Unless I somehow make contact with operatives in my vicinity, I cannot engage in the simulation exercises that are part of my regimen. My question is: Does anyone know of, or have plans to start a Delta Green simulation over the internet? I understand the technical problems, time constraints and security hazards that make this practise generally unfeasible, but I have heard rumors of its being done. Any suggestions would be appreciated. - - agent Christian ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 04 Aug 1998 14:37:19 -0400 From: "R. Menzi" Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises >>> My question is: Does anyone know of, or have plans to start a Delta Green simulation over the internet? I understand the technical problems, time constraints and security hazards that make this practise generally unfeasible, but I have heard rumors of its being done. Any suggestions would be appreciated. <<< I'm not sure if there re any games planned, but you could very easily start one on the java chat page that R. Mendez put on his site for us. The address is: http://www.geocities.com/~rmendez/deltagreen/chat.html There are no regulaters, no way to kick some one off, no way to talk to only one person in the room, but it seems to work pretty well to bounce text back and forth at a relatively fast pace. Regards, >>> R. Menzi ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 21:20:33 EDT From: CroakerJr@aol.com Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises In a message dated 98-08-04 15:22:39 EDT, you write: << Does anyone know of, or have plans to start a Delta Green simulation over the internet? I understand the technical problems, time constraints and security hazards that make this practise generally unfeasible, but I have heard rumors of its being done. Any suggestions would be appreciated. >> As a matter of fact my present simulation is being conducted entirely over the Internet, using an IRC server which our NSA assets assure me is secure. We considered using the aforementioned Java-based chat page built by Case Officer Menzi, but several of our participants use web browsers which do not support the Java code. Originally I had planned to run the game in a chatroom on AOL, but thankfully I decided to expand the game to IRC so that non-AOL users could participate. You can see all the information on the game on my website, including operation background information, and full transcripts of the action so far, on the "Operation SANDMAN" page. My site URL is below. Follow the "M CELL" link from the main page: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Shadowlands/6580/dg.htm There are a number of challenges in conducting an online simulation which are unique to the format. I'll outline a few here. First of all, the action is slower. IMO, this is actually kind of nice for the Keeper, because it allows one to keep track of everything and time things more effectively. But it is frustrating that an investigation can take twice as long to complete. Another problem is that people generally are not as accomplished at communicating via the written word as they are at communicating verbally. Almost all of us talk more than we type. Given the spontaneity of online games (as distinguished from e-mail games) it is easy to make mistakes and confuse people, and it takes longer to backtrack and clarify afterward. There is a distinct advantage to be had here, though, if everyone is conscientious and attempts to write well: the roleplaying can be very distinct and powerful. Frankly, I can write much better than I can act, and I can portray characters much more effectively in print than in person. In online games I always ask the players to always use ordinary quotation marks to distinguish their characters' speech from the players' comments and questions: this encourages dramatic roleplaying, and if you maintain a transcript of the games (another advantage, and without all that tedious transcription of microcassette tapes!) this practice will make later review MUCH more enjoyable. There are also technical challenges. Servers lag or crash. In an AOL-based game last year, one player was excluded from the game about half the time because his AOL connection was shoddy. In my current game, we started on comicsrv.microsoft.com (largely because it was the default server in my software) but we encountered constant delays and I was booted regularly. After I did a minimal amount of research I compiled a list of what looked like promising alternate servers, and we have been using irc.erols.com with hardly any problems since then. Of course, every player in the simulation will need to download the appropriate IRC software and learn how to use it; like any Internet format, IRC has its own simple commands and protocols. In addressing the technical aspects of online gaming, I should note that WebRPG looks to be an outstanding resource for online gaming if all your players can use it. In our game, one of our players operates from a school computer and he cannot install WebRPG because it would alter system files in violation of his terms of use. WebRPG may also require advanced web browsing software. There are also any number of MUSHes, MUDs, MUXes, MOOs, et al, devoted to conducting online roleplaying via telnet. The limiting factor here is that the smaller ones tend to have unpredictable connections, while the larger ones are usually devoted to specific themes and tend to have tight restrictions on what kind of gaming is done there. The commands for using them are also much more difficult to master than those of IRC or Web-based chat, though they are correspondingly more powerful once you know the language (and of course there are many applications out there to make the interface more user-friendly; as an ElendorMUSH addict I used MUSHClient). Jason Thomas once operated CthulhuMUSH, but it folded a few years ago. There is now BarbaryMUX, a themed game which appears to be set in 1890s San Francisco. I don't know of any such system which is appropriate for conducting Delta Green games via telnet. Using dice can be a tricky proposition in online games. On AOL, in telnet games, and on WebRPG there are codes which you can use to get random die rolls. On basic IRC there is no such code of which I am aware. (If anyone knows of an IRC dice code, please let me know.) This has not been a terribly difficult problem, though; when events call for dice I just roll my dice manually and inform the players of the end result, usually without bothering to tell them the numbers involved (except for SAN and HP and MP loss and when a die roll is particularly interesting in its own right--like the lawyer's "99" psychology roll last time). I have been gaming online for more than three years now in one format or another, and I am glad for it. Presently I am maintaining a great simulation with participants in locales ranging from Alabama to Ohio to Cardiff. "Handouts" and other evidence can with a little effort be maintained for easy access on the World Wide Web, and it is easy to keep transcripts to keep players apprised of the action when one misses a session. After a little practice and a little trial-and-error you should be able to get an online game going smoothly. Good luck! Be seeing you, Shane "Them Lepuses Is Good People" Ivey Birmingham, Alabama ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 20:56:51 -0500 (CDT) From: Don Juneau Subject: Re: DG: Little Nukes On Tue, 4 Aug 1998, Nick wrote: > I seem to remember, somewhere in the murky mists of time, reading a > book in which a nuclear bomb 'fizzled', but the geological nature of > the region (it was up in Denver somewhere; something to do with the > rocks reflecting the radiation) made it look like a full-blown > nuclear explosien from satellite. Ergo, the terrorists responsible > nearly started WWIII anyway. THE SUM OF ALL FEARS, by Tom Clancy. Thermal pulse of the weapon reflected off the snow'n'ice (it being winter) and the satellite viewing the nuke-flash thought that the flash heralded a *much* larger weapon. Seems doable, I guess. The book I liked better was nonfiction, I forget the title, but dealt with how much "neat stuff" was floating around out there; *much* detail about the Pakistani nuke-program, the South African detonation, how Brazil and (I think) Argentina were trying to bootstrap their way into the Club... detailed more on nukes than chemical/biological weapons, but still interesting. (I should see if I can find a copy for myself; I'd checked it out of the Great Falls Public Library a while ago, thus the disremembrance of the title. IIRC, the same authour wrote DEEP BLACK, about the high-altitude and satellite surveillance programs...) Don ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 21:29:13 -0500 (CDT) From: Don Juneau Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs On Tue, 4 Aug 1998, Graeme Price wrote: > Other guys (can't say who originally: Servitor problems again!) wrote: > > >Like a brick in a sock, it kills the people, but leaves the buildings > >standing. I don't know the mechanism for it, but does it really matter, > >everyone in the area is dead, but you can move into the homes. This makes > >me ask how small they can be made, and if an NYC landlord find a way to > >kill off his rent controlled tenants and bring the units up to market value. > > As I recall (which possibly isn't very well), with neutron bombs there is a > jacket of material (tritium I guess, as it is basically hydrogen with a > couple of extra neutrons) around the primary thermonuclear device which > undergoes fusion when the primary device blows. One of the by products of > this fusion process is gamma radiation which goes through concrete like a > knife through butter and irradiates the people/animals/plants and generally > causes the unpleasant nastiness. It's not all that publicised, but I'm certain that the general details can be found in scientific publications, or on the Web. Can't really be tritium, though, because the idea of the neutron bomb is *less* breakage. (IIRC, such a weapon, by that name , was theorised in the late '50s/early '60s. Popped up in some book I read the other day, at least. ) Once you've pumped it to a full-on fusion reaction, it's safe to say you're going to have massive damage. (Note that early H-bomb tests produced *far* more megatonnage than design-estimated; the "Mike" bomb was expected to do a few thousand kilotons - a few megatons. It did ten megatons, and scared Norris Bradbury, the Los Alamos director, to the point that he was thinking of having the Eniwetok crew conceal what happened from the New Mexico bunch.) As detailed somewhat in SUM OF ALL FEARS, and more specifically in FOOTFALL (Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle), it's possible to direct and use the radiation from the blast. In FOOTFALL (and some non-fiction I've read) the idea is to use a nuke to pump an x-ray laser... essentially, redirecting and laseing the output. (I'm not really up on the theory, but again, I bet it can be found online. ) Something similar is probably what an N-bomb does - excessive radiation pumped out, in such a manner to cook from the inside out. (Swanson's Russian Tanker Suprise! Coming to the Fulda Gap nearest you...) > The problem (as with all nukes) is that there will be fall out from the > primary, which will make the area uninhabitable for a time. Fallout can be > minimised by fusing the device so it airbursts (fallout is basically the > cloud dirt sucked up in a mushroom cloud, mixed with the highly radioactive > bomb fragments). It is possible to convert a "normal" A-bomb into something > much dirtier by putting a jacket of something which has a long half life > (cobalt for example) around the primary and fusing it for ground burst. > This mixes in the long half life component with the fallout and makes the > surrounding area uninhabitable for, say, a few thousand years. Again, check > out the opening chapters of Tom Clancy's "The Sum of All Fears" (handy > reference for keepers interested in nukes), in which the retreating Israeli > army are on the verge of using a cobalt jacketed nuke to deny territory to > the advancing Arab forces. Not nice. If you've watched DOCTOR STRANGELOVE, you'll see the true Fun Guy benefits of cobalt-jacketed weapons. (IE, kill all them pesky Soft Ones..) 'course, that's a different objective from cleaning out the cockroaches (which even nukes won't do, without breakage ). My speculation is the neutron bomb was a small-yield device, within a good thick blanket of "boosting" material or else something focussing what radiation there was. (Atomic claymores, anyone?) I've got a small program for the Amiga, which calculates various nuke-data based on yeild, distance from detonation, and altitude (IIRC). I *think* it noted that the actual high-gamma wavefront was rather short-range - somewhat less than the thermal pulse. (I'm probably wrong, tho.) You'd want gamma, for sure, but not so much as to permanently irradiate your loot. Not sure how to figure "volume" vs. "persistance", as it were - "loud" enough to cook everything but without lasting a few thousand years. Hmmm. I don't think they gave us this info in the FEMA classes I took in the Civil Air Patrol... Don ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 21:57:42 -0500 (CDT) From: Don Juneau Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises On Tue, 4 Aug 1998 CroakerJr@aol.com wrote: > There are also any number of MUSHes, MUDs, MUXes, MOOs, et al, devoted > to conducting online roleplaying via telnet. The limiting factor here > is that the smaller ones tend to have unpredictable connections, while > the larger ones are usually devoted to specific themes and tend to have > tight restrictions on what kind of gaming is done there. The commands > for using them are also much more difficult to master than those of IRC > or Web-based chat, though they are correspondingly more powerful once > you know the language (and of course there are many applications out > there to make the interface more user-friendly; as an ElendorMUSH addict > I used MUSHClient). Jason Thomas once operated CthulhuMUSH, but it > folded a few years ago. There is now BarbaryMUX, a themed game which > appears to be set in 1890s San Francisco. I don't know of any such > system which is appropriate for conducting Delta Green games via telnet. Yah, Barbary is 1890's, heavy on the role-playing when I was in. (I should go back sometime, when I have a good IRC client again.) What *is* possible on quite a few MU* is a "tabletop" game using a private room. I've seen a couple with dedicated TT rooms - Storyteller's Circle comes to mind, as well as one a couple friends of mine have been running for quite a while now. (Forget the name, natch. ) A "dedicated" TT room will naturally have dice commands, but the ones I've seen also include character-sheet utilities and NPC "puppets" - need someone to be the Mad Hermit? Describe, feed it lines, and *boom*, Wino Bob in all his glory. However, if they allow private rooms for players, and allow out-of-character actions/speech in 'em, there y'go; get people together, and just type it out like a chat-room or IRC. Use the MU* dice, or roll 'em yourself. The biggest problem I've had with trying to get a "live" TT game like this up has been time-zones. My last try had Mountain, Pacific, and Central all vying for on and off times for "real world" events. Of course, lag and crashes will come into play as well. Beyond that, my own personal prob is being a wordy bastard. I type fast, I have lots of stuff to say (sometimes) and I read fast... a deadly combination. (Ask the people I forward to. ) Whenever I get around to doing such again, I think I'll slap all the "source" material into webpages, and only give out the URL when they get the info. (Might go to more work, and make disinformation or partials for those less-than-optimum rolls. )(BTW, Matt, knowing this won't help... "y'all be some doomed puppies", as Al-Azred sez.) Of course, with skill and a fast enough machine, you can do all this on the fly; maybe make up quick floorplans and mark 'em up, then upload for the players to reload the image and see what changes there are. (Combat-type operations, mostly. Graphical browser required, but with a simple, smallish image, it's doable...) Hook lots of head-and-face images from wherever, maybe screen-caps from vid and TV, and use those for NPCs. Sounds, even. ("Fred just went down the stairs. Hit www.io.com/~djuneau/its_not_there.wav to hear what happens to him" ) Kinda gimmicky, but gimmicks can be fun, too... ICQ users might be able to do all this a little easier as well, but my Amiga port doesn't have chat or file-transfers yet. (And I'm still at 14.4k - whining snipped 'cause I could be at 2400, or paying by-the-minute. But *still*... kinda puts a damper on it.) I s'pose my mind has wandered far enough off the original topic to have been thouroughly exercised for tonight... Don ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 22:06:50 -0500 (CDT) From: Tenebrous Technologies Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises >The biggest problem I've had with trying to get a "live" TT game like >this up has been time-zones. My last try had Mountain, Pacific, and >Central all vying for on and off times for "real world" events. Don, as usual, resounds some truth. On line is hard an being a bit of a vetran of both MU*s, online TT's and PBEM's it ain't as easy as it sounds. IRC style TT's are fun but you have to deal with a buhjillion idiots wandering through or passwords (not to mention the time thing again), plus getting people together online makes getting people together at your house to play like trying to find inteligent philosphical exchange on Springer. ("You keep sayin' 'I love her, I love her' then don't be hittin' her.") Online gaming is a noble idea and has much merit, but also draaaawbacks. Face to face table top is so much better and, Cthulhu Live..righteous. (Anyone interested in a CoC Live game in the midwest this Halloween, our fourth annual, gimmie a shout). Matt C. + | + Matt Cowger - 'The worst are full of passionate intensity, while the best lack all conviction.' - Yeats Tenebrae@Earthling.net ICQ UIN:5409084 Cam #:9607-020 http://home.gvi.net/~tenebrae + | + ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Aug 1998 15:32:26 +0900 From: ft203004@fsinet.or.jp (Jay and Mikiko Noyes) Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises >Online gaming is a noble idea and has much merit, but also draaaawbacks. >Face to face table top is so much better and, Cthulhu Live..righteous. >(Anyone interested in a CoC Live game in the midwest this Halloween, our >fourth annual, gimmie a shout). (Loud wail of despair from a man sitting on the butt end of the gaming world) I'm fiending to do some Cthulhu Live, or even Cthulhupunk Live (Tokyo was _made_ for cyberpunk, but organizing gamers is like herding cats even under the best of conditions. - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - --------- Stercus, stercus, stercus, moriturus sum Terry Pratchett, "Interesting Times" - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - --------- ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 5 Aug 1998 08:57:16 -0400 From: "John C. Detwiler" Subject: Re: DG: neutron bombs Message text written by Delta Green List >Like a brick in a sock, it kills the people, but leaves the buildings standing.< "You gotta kill, you gotta maim/The real estate is not to blame." ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 05 Aug 1998 11:01:27 -0400 From: Doctor TOC Subject: Re: DG: Remote simulation exercises CroakerJr@aol.com wrote: > In addressing the technical aspects of online gaming, I should note that > WebRPG looks to be an outstanding resource for online gaming if all your > players can use it. In our game, one of our players operates from a school > computer and he cannot install WebRPG because it would alter system files in > violation of his terms of use. WebRPG may also require advanced web browsing > software. Hi all! I've been running a game on WebRPG for quite a while now and can safely say it is excellent. It's a great tool if you can't get your players together in one place. My current game has a player from Puerto Rico, and we've had players from as far away as the Netherlands with no problems other than the time difference. WebRPG has options for sound effects, handouts, maps and dice rolling. You can create your own character sheet and some games even make their rulebook available for you. I've been a face to face GM for well over ten years, but find that it's easier to create an atmosphere on WebRPG. The players aren't chatting amongst themselves, and if you choose the right images for your handouts and have a modicum of writing talent, you're sorted. A trick I've learned is to pre-write critical descriptions, and to script out possible dialogue, so that you can cut and past it into the game at the critical point. You can do whatever quick edits you need before you send and presto, you're away. WebRPG only requires a net connection and that you have java on your machine. You can actually run it with no browser at all. all the best, Doctor TOC - -- The Reverend Doctor "The Other Chris" ,;:;;, ;;;;; Beware... .=', ;:;;:, /_', "=. ';:;:; Squirrels! @=:__, \,;:;:' _(\.= ;:;;' `"_( _/="` `"'`` jgs UIN # 4814586 URL: http://www.fortunecity.com/tattooine/wilhelm/148/ ------------------------------ End of deltagreen-digest V1 #93 *******************************