Another important thing to keep in mind is that early turn of the century medical care is not what it is today. Many people died not of being shot, but because the bullet wasn't properly or completely removed, and the injury became infected.

Enter Kevlar/silk. If it is able to prevent the bullet from peircing the fabric (through whatever means gets it to this level of bullet resistance) then the bullet, while it may have still pierced the flesh, can be more easily removed since the fabric has caught the projectile. painful, yes. Still bloody? Possibly. But there is a higher chance of survival (albeit, not much higher in these circumstances). Also, a really bad cleaning bill...

This same concern came up in a Deadlands game I was in. Someone happened to be a big nut about this sort of stuff and toted in his textbooks about arms and armor for the 19th century. Interesting info...
This message was last edited by the player at 03:58, Sat 31 Aug 2013.

In reply to rudderick (msg # 90):

Oh, I am definitely going to have a zeppelin. My character is going to be richer than GOD. (Millionaire in the 1901 era: and some time around 1928 is going to for reasons no one can fathom move most of his fortune into solid gold...)

In reply to rudderick (msg # 90):

Silk would very likely be an awesome skin coating for an airship, due to its weight compared to typical canvas, and its strength besides, but in a game set in 1901 the concern of bullet resistance is pretty small. The Airship (Zeppelin) was actually highly resistant to bullet fire to begin with. Any holes punctured through the skin were small enough, often, that with even several hundred bullet holes, a zepplin could continue flight long enough to pass a typical war zone and land safely (albeit an emergency land).

It wasnt until incendiary bullets were invented late during the first world war that dirigibles had any fear of bullets. Then the often used hydrogen gas would ignite, and the hindenburg is pretty much how that went.

HOWEVER, in America, zepplins had the benefit of sometimes being filled with a much rarer and less flamable gas:Helium. America has a store of this gas which could not be made chemically (like hydrogen), so zepplins filled with helium could be even more resistant to bullet fire. The issue then is ignition of the outer skin, not the gas.

The dirigible had alot of air superiority over planes until incendiary rounds and sturdier plane design caught up. Its major flaw was really just that they are slow moving and steer like aerodynamic, air borne cows.

Part of the resistance of zepplins to gun fire is that what we see as the big football shape is the outer skin. There are the gas filled ballons inside of that. So a bullet going in hits balloon 1 of 100+ (or whatever the number is).

Incendaries, came along mid WW1, caused a fire. Balloon one explodes tossing fire on the nearby balloons. Chain reaction possible. Also the outer skin coating was sometimes not so fire resistant.

Our Space 1889 PC-Nation leader is dreading and counting the days to the end of his Hydrogen supremecy brought down by flaming bullets. Of course we have villian inventors so he doesn't actually know when that is.

Mythbusters did a great Zepplin show.


http://www.ask.com/wiki/Zeppel...n=apn&ap=ask.com

Near the top 1/3 is a picture with a caption

"The pink ovals depict hydrogen cells inside the LZ 127"
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:12, Sat 31 Aug 2013.

Best Zeppelin evvvveeeerr!

Real Life American Zeppelin aircraft carrier

http://www.airships.net/us-nav...hips/uss-akron-macon

Oh baby, had those worked out.

The very old Computer Game "Airpower" was based on Zeppelin Carriers moving around challenging each other. Each of the nations 4 carriers supporting a certain royal claimant. Each had like 6 fighters with rockets and a few bombers with heavy bombs.
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:30, Sat 31 Aug 2013.

They were neat craft.

I'd think chemistry (like someone already said) and armory (body armor).

hmmm

Kevlar is a fabric so instead of armory perhaps tailor. Or hire a good tailor.

True, but I was trying to think within the rules of GURPS and what would fit. Armory (Body Armor) can cover all types of wearable physical protection.

EDIT: and I may as well ask this here (let me know if it should go somewhere else).

A few players in my game, mad scientist types, want to create clockwork automatons. I'm inclined to disallow them, because programmable or semi-sentient robots seem a bit too advanced for Steampunk in my opinion. What are peoples thoughts here? Appropriate for the genre? Too advanced?
This message was last edited by the player at 16:12, Wed 04 Sept 2013.

It really depends on the setting.  In a purely alternate-history setting, I would likely say no, or at least VERY limited in function.  However if there is a touch of magic, or general metaphysics, then the automation could simply be a mechanical shell.  A collection of clockwork and steam, in addition to a few sensory devices would all connect into a Control Cortex, which through special crystals and an ectoplasmic alchemical substance is housing some form of spirit/conscience within its Nexus.

For a more alt-history route, I would go with radio control.  The humanoid apparatus is actually just a REALLY fancy RC Car.  You have a HUGE control room somewhere in a facility that operates the automations within it.  For short range external support (travel within the city) a wagon sized radio repeater filled with glass jar batteries could accompany the automation.  I can already picture a brass and steal C3P0 going down the street with his rickshaw/pedicab mounted repeater so he can pick-up the professors mail and a 5 gallon keg of grease.

I could see punch-card programmable robots. Very limited in scope, but awesome nonetheless.

Punch-card robots sounds great. I'm going a bit more "alternate history" and have tried to do some extrapolation of what widespread use of Difference Engines would realize.

Thanks to ninthbit too, for explaining how automatons could be justified :)

If you're going punch-card, give this wikipedia article a read.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punched_tape

Many people don't know the history of computers.  Everyone knows that they started with cards, but few people seem to know that it quickly evolved to punched paper tape.  In a steam setting, you could even take it further.  Perhaps to power on his robots, he needs to read several reels of tape into the machine to load the complex program.

Basically, anywhere you would see magnetic tape today, you could have reels of punch tape in an alt-history.

Fun fact: the US military <b>still</b >uses this stuff today.  When I was in the military just a few years ago, I had to use a portable tape reader to load encryption keys into a video teleconfrence system.  We where a remote office, and the overhead of using electronic key management was a hassle and too expensive.  The tape could be treated like any standard secret documents and simply stored in a safe and burned in a steel barrel when we where done with it.  Electronic management requires a full room to be setup and secured with expensive locks and other unique requirements, not to mention a special stand-alone computer to be installed that was used only for manageing encryption keys.
This message was last edited by the GM at 13:49, Thu 05 Sept 2013.

Could definitely work, and allow me to give a nod to Ada Lovelace one of the (arguably) first computer programmers :D

Here's an older game now $6

http://www.gog.com/game/arcanu...s_and_magick_obscura

Think I played a few minutes of it back in the day. Was into other RPG at the time.

Stumbled across the Dieselpunk game March of War ads on Steam

Thought I would pass its existence on here

http://1879.fasagames.com/

Something new coming from FASA Games.

Steam has a new indie game up called "Ironclad Tactics"

Not a card fan myself but as always passing on Steampunk leads to our community

I hope I did not miss the earlier discussion but did people see Space 1889: Red Sands?

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/...?src=SteamPunkeBlast

Is it any good?

Been running an 1889 game for a while with generaly tossing about the whacked out rules so we never migrated to Red Sands.

---

DriveThruRPG just sent an email notice of a big steampunk sale

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/...p;keywords=steampunk

Nice stuff on the sale.

Okay... while the Kerbal Space Program is about space flight in the 60s to the modern day the mod of these dudes on airships just needs to be shared. Check out the pics in here and tell me a Steampunk Space Program wouldn't consider them!

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/23774

Some of those would fit right in.  They need more brass work though.

Clockworks and magic...

http://fireproofgames.com/the-room

'The Room' is a great game.
It only cost me $2 for my Kindle and is most entertaining! Impressive realistic graphics, an eerie soundtrack (my girlfriend doesn't like it, bad juju she says) and feel to the game. I have yet to finish it, but love what I have discovered so far :)

Indie game out

Airship Dragoons

http://www.gamersgate.com/DD-A...p-dragoon?aff=ggnews

looks funky, haven't tried it yet