(TFT) Build-a-Sense, 0.1

[Prophesor <prophesor@yahoo.com>]

> >>Intriguing...  is that 4 points for Sight the sum of: 1 for
> >>Detect Intensity, 1 for Detect Frequency (Color), 1 for
> Detect
> >>Direction, and 1 for Object Resolution?  That would fit with
> >>3pts for Hearing being Intensity, Frequency, and Direction.
> >>I smell a ruleset here...
> 
> Neato! I love the ideas here! This would allow the piecemeal
> building of
> aliens with special senses in a really neat way! Eagerly
> awaiting more
> detail...;)

Ah... OK: (and be kind, this is extemporaneous)

The Build-a-Sense Alien Perception kit, ver 0.1

Choose a medium for the sense: Radiation, Pressure, Chemical,
Contact, or Wierdo.

For Radiation or Pressure, buy zero or more of these for 1 pt
each: Gauge Intensity, Gauge Frequency, Directional,
Resolution(requires Directional).  Also Keyed Frequency, worth
1/2 pt, taken either as addition to Gauge Frequency or alone.

For Chemical, buy zero or more Trace Detects for 1/2 pt each. 
Each Detect senses the Trace presence of one class of chemicals.
 Sugar, Salt, Acid, Alkali, Combustion Products, Ozone/Ion,
Decay Gasses, or whatever.  For 1/4 pt, a Detect Dissolved X may
be bought.  Dissolved Chemical senses require a larger amount of
the target chemical than Trace Chemical Senses, in some
environmental medium.

For Contact, buy Intensity, Frequency, Thermal and/or
Resolution(requires either of the others) for 1/2 pt each.  For
1/4 pt, any of these may be bought in a very limited sensory
area or the creature's body.  Directional is available, costs a
point, and doubles the cost of the others.  See below.

For Weirdo... ah, let me get back to you on that.  :)

What it all means:

Radiation is light, heat, UV, IR... etc.  Pressure is sound,
ultrasound, infrasound, etc.  Chemical is what we call smell and
taste.  Contact is sense of touch, vibration, and the like. 
Weirdo may not even be needed, but I'm still thinking about
that.

Intensity is 'loudness', 'brightness', pressure against the
skin.

Frequency is color in light, and tone/pitch in sound.

Directional is the ability to tell where a sensation is coming
from.  Our eyes work this way, but my old girlfriend's sense for
microwaves (stomach butterflies, I didn't believe her at first
either...) didn't.  An alien might be able to sense light, but
have no concept of it having 'direction'.  It would be for them
as though they had 'smelled' it.

Resolution is the ability to identify objects based on input
from that one sense.  It allows the use of that sense for
targeting attacks.

Keyed Frequency, taken alone, is like the firefly's color-coded
ability to find his mate, or the bat's sonar sense ( the
receiving of it, I'm not sure if we can charge points for
screaming ) or the male mosquito's exact sense for the frequency
of a female's wingbeats.  None of these critters has great
range, they may in fact be otherwise insensible to similar
signals, but they sense that _one_ thing very well.  Taken with
Frequency, Keyed Frequency allows things like Perfect Pitch, or
some folk's ability to tell two shades of 'terribly light blue'
apart.

Trace Chemical is 'smell', Dissolved Chemical is 'taste'.  A
version of Keyed might be availiable, I suppose.  In fact I
begin to see that Resolution is really just Keyed...

Contact is 'touch'.  Resolution means having enough sensibility
to manipulate fine tools, as in the case of the human hand. 
Directional means having enough Contact sensors on a surface or
in a medium that its possible to sense the passing wavefronts of
impacts with that medium, and to use that time-based data to
localize the source.  Scorpions and some spiders do this,
feeling the ground move as prey walks on it.

Of course, critters evolve senses that are useful. 
Cave-dwelling critters are blind, but if the (ferrous?) cave
were suffused with an electromagnetic field, and something of
interest in the environment, predator, prey, or food, disturbed
that field, then a "Radiation (EM fields), Intensity,
Directional" sense would tell a critter which way to run.

Similarly, Chemical senses are going to be for compounds in the
environment, Pressure senses for frequencies that the medium
(air, water, astral plane, lava?!) supports, etc.


> Actually, I mostly just reversed the points from Handicap
> values for Blind
> (-4 points), Deaf (-3 points), One-Armed, etc. (from the Space
> Gamer
> articles). 
> 
> > 33 points of physical characteristics. A Powerful race
> starts
> > the game with
> > more than 33 CP. A Very Powerful Race starts with 66 points
> or
> > more when
> > they begin the game. 
> 
> I also forgot to mention that there are some races that are
> especially weak
> (pixies) and need only half the EP to raise an attribute. I
> guess these
> should have starting values of 16 Character Points or less. 
> 
> Thanks!
> Michael
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