GURPS Celebrity Deathmatch!
Tonight on GURPS Celebrity Deathmatch: the U.S.S. Enterprise vs. Great Cthulhu!
Sources: GURPS Prime Directive, GURPS Cthulhupunk, and Star Fleet Battles.
Great Cthulhu:
Offense: Can attack with claws for 17d6 (exp. val. 59.5) cutting damage twice per turn, and with his tentacles for 11d6 (exp. val. 38.5) crushing damage once per turn.
Defense: 160 hit points, 21 points of damage resistance. Can regenerate 1 hit point per second. If reduced to -100 hit points he will be destroyed, but re-form at full hit points in 2d6+8 minutes.
Movement: Can run at a speed of 24 yards per second, fly at 16 yards per second, or swim at 20 yards per second.
Other abilities: Can cast any spell known to man and probably others as well (but not any spell having to do with the god Nodens or nightgaunts.)
The U.S.S. Enterprise:
Offense: Six class-I phasers, four photon torpedoes. A single photon torpedo deals 8 "boxes" of damage (or up to twice that much if overloaded) and can be fired once every two minutes; a class-I phaser at a range of 10,000 km or less deals 4-8 "boxes" of damage (exp. val. 5.33) and can be fired once every minute. See below.
Defense: 30 "boxes" of forward deflector shield; slightly less in other directions. At least one shield must be destroyed entirely before the ship takes any internal damage. Shield can also be reinforced (potentially up to an additional 36 "boxes") by pouring more energy into it, and, if damaged, can also be repaired at rate of 2 "boxes" per minute by pouring more energy into it. Complete destruction of the ship could take as many as 90 "boxes" of damage, but the ship would probably be crippled after about 40. See below.
Movement: Can fly through space at the speed of light and beyond during combat; can fly much faster when merely travelling.
Other abilities: Tractor beams, transporters, advanced on-board laboratories, long-distance probes, four shuttlecraft (each with a defensive class-III phaser).
Notes on scale:
There exists some degree of ambiguity about time scale here. GURPS is clearly discussing time in seconds, but in SFB a "turn" is stated to be 1/30 of a second from outside the ship but about a minute from inside the ship due to "relativistic effects." I offer the alternate hypothesis that the authors of SFB (and, for that matter, the authors of Star Trek) are ignorantly bullshitting their way through physics, and assume for purposes of this argument that one "turn" represents one minute. (Note, though, that if we accept the 1/30 of a second time scale, then a phaser can fire 30 times a second, a photon torpedo 15 times a second, a downed shield can fully regenerate in half a second, and the ship can fly at 31 time the speed of light--not all at once, of course.)
The main difficulty, though, lies in comparing GURPS's "hit points" (human scale) to SFB's "boxes" (starship scale). It seems clear that a single "box" is equivalent to many, many "hit points" (e.g., a single shot from a shuttlecraft's phaser would instantly kill even an armored human, while the strongest barbarian with a greataxe wouldn't even dent a starship's shields).
Alas, GURPS Prime Directive has no weapons table for starship weaponry, but it does have detailed statistics for personnel-scale phasers. The largest soldier-portable phaser weapon is the repeater pulse phaser rifle, which can fire 8 times per second, deals 8d6 damage (exp. val. 28) per shot at its highest setting (disintegrate-III), grants +12 to the user's to-hit roll due to advanced aiming mechanisms, and reduces the target's damage resistance by 66%. It seems reasonable to assume that a class-I phaser is at least this powerful; if it isn't, why not just mount phaser rifles on the hull? We'll give Great Cthulhu the benefit of the doubt and assume that the Enterprise's class-I phasers are equivalent to repeater pulse phaser rifles. A photon torpedo can be expected to deal about 50% more damage than a phaser, but, as will be seen shortly, this is in fact irrelevant. Let's see what happens!
They fight.
--Shakespeare
During yet another routine delivery mission, the Federation heavy cruiser U.S.S. Enterprise is in standard orbit around the M-class planet Sol-III, better known as Earth. Suddenly, a tremor shakes the blue expanse below, and a red light flashes on the science officer's dashboard.
"Captain," says Mr. Spock, "sensors register a large disturbance in the southern part of your Pacific Ocean."
"I'm picking up a strange signal from that region, sir," reports communications officer Lt. Uhura. "It matches no known frequency, and doesn't make any sense."
"Let's hear it," replies the legendary and incredibly awesome Captain James Tiberius Kirk.
PHNGLUIMGLWNAFHCTHULHURLYEHWGAHNAGLFHTAGN
"What the hell was that?" demands the easily excitable ship's surgeon Dr. McCoy.
"The universal translator does not appear to be capable of fully interpreting it," muses Spock. "It would appear to be either an incredibly advanced or incredibly primitive language, or perhaps no language at all. Meaning uncertain; perhaps something about an entity called Cthulhu either dreaming or dying in a place called Ryleh."
"Strange," frowns the captain. "Any more information on that disturbance in the south Pacific?"
"Sensors report that volcanic activity has raised a new--or perhaps very old--island to the surface," replies Spock, raising an eyebrow. "It appears to hold a number of artificial structures, perhaps buildings, made of very large boulders. Architecture appears to be... no, the sensors must be malfunctioning. The geometry of these buildings is highly illogical!"
"Maybe they hired an eccentric architect?" jokes McCoy.
"I do not mean, Doctor, that the buildings' architecture is aesthetically nonsensical," Spock says derisively, "but that their geometry is mathematically impossible. They should not--can not--exist."
"Yet there they are," says Kirk.
"Aye, I jest checked the sensors yesterday," chief engineer Scott points out. "They're in fayne order."
"Captain, look!" cries Uhura, pointing at the main viewscreen.
It's late; I'll finish it later.
Sources: GURPS Prime Directive, GURPS Cthulhupunk, and Star Fleet Battles.
Great Cthulhu:
Offense: Can attack with claws for 17d6 (exp. val. 59.5) cutting damage twice per turn, and with his tentacles for 11d6 (exp. val. 38.5) crushing damage once per turn.
Defense: 160 hit points, 21 points of damage resistance. Can regenerate 1 hit point per second. If reduced to -100 hit points he will be destroyed, but re-form at full hit points in 2d6+8 minutes.
Movement: Can run at a speed of 24 yards per second, fly at 16 yards per second, or swim at 20 yards per second.
Other abilities: Can cast any spell known to man and probably others as well (but not any spell having to do with the god Nodens or nightgaunts.)
The U.S.S. Enterprise:
Offense: Six class-I phasers, four photon torpedoes. A single photon torpedo deals 8 "boxes" of damage (or up to twice that much if overloaded) and can be fired once every two minutes; a class-I phaser at a range of 10,000 km or less deals 4-8 "boxes" of damage (exp. val. 5.33) and can be fired once every minute. See below.
Defense: 30 "boxes" of forward deflector shield; slightly less in other directions. At least one shield must be destroyed entirely before the ship takes any internal damage. Shield can also be reinforced (potentially up to an additional 36 "boxes") by pouring more energy into it, and, if damaged, can also be repaired at rate of 2 "boxes" per minute by pouring more energy into it. Complete destruction of the ship could take as many as 90 "boxes" of damage, but the ship would probably be crippled after about 40. See below.
Movement: Can fly through space at the speed of light and beyond during combat; can fly much faster when merely travelling.
Other abilities: Tractor beams, transporters, advanced on-board laboratories, long-distance probes, four shuttlecraft (each with a defensive class-III phaser).
Notes on scale:
There exists some degree of ambiguity about time scale here. GURPS is clearly discussing time in seconds, but in SFB a "turn" is stated to be 1/30 of a second from outside the ship but about a minute from inside the ship due to "relativistic effects." I offer the alternate hypothesis that the authors of SFB (and, for that matter, the authors of Star Trek) are ignorantly bullshitting their way through physics, and assume for purposes of this argument that one "turn" represents one minute. (Note, though, that if we accept the 1/30 of a second time scale, then a phaser can fire 30 times a second, a photon torpedo 15 times a second, a downed shield can fully regenerate in half a second, and the ship can fly at 31 time the speed of light--not all at once, of course.)
The main difficulty, though, lies in comparing GURPS's "hit points" (human scale) to SFB's "boxes" (starship scale). It seems clear that a single "box" is equivalent to many, many "hit points" (e.g., a single shot from a shuttlecraft's phaser would instantly kill even an armored human, while the strongest barbarian with a greataxe wouldn't even dent a starship's shields).
Alas, GURPS Prime Directive has no weapons table for starship weaponry, but it does have detailed statistics for personnel-scale phasers. The largest soldier-portable phaser weapon is the repeater pulse phaser rifle, which can fire 8 times per second, deals 8d6 damage (exp. val. 28) per shot at its highest setting (disintegrate-III), grants +12 to the user's to-hit roll due to advanced aiming mechanisms, and reduces the target's damage resistance by 66%. It seems reasonable to assume that a class-I phaser is at least this powerful; if it isn't, why not just mount phaser rifles on the hull? We'll give Great Cthulhu the benefit of the doubt and assume that the Enterprise's class-I phasers are equivalent to repeater pulse phaser rifles. A photon torpedo can be expected to deal about 50% more damage than a phaser, but, as will be seen shortly, this is in fact irrelevant. Let's see what happens!
They fight.
--Shakespeare
During yet another routine delivery mission, the Federation heavy cruiser U.S.S. Enterprise is in standard orbit around the M-class planet Sol-III, better known as Earth. Suddenly, a tremor shakes the blue expanse below, and a red light flashes on the science officer's dashboard.
"Captain," says Mr. Spock, "sensors register a large disturbance in the southern part of your Pacific Ocean."
"I'm picking up a strange signal from that region, sir," reports communications officer Lt. Uhura. "It matches no known frequency, and doesn't make any sense."
"Let's hear it," replies the legendary and incredibly awesome Captain James Tiberius Kirk.
PHNGLUIMGLWNAFHCTHULHURLYEHWGAHNAGLFHTAGN
"What the hell was that?" demands the easily excitable ship's surgeon Dr. McCoy.
"The universal translator does not appear to be capable of fully interpreting it," muses Spock. "It would appear to be either an incredibly advanced or incredibly primitive language, or perhaps no language at all. Meaning uncertain; perhaps something about an entity called Cthulhu either dreaming or dying in a place called Ryleh."
"Strange," frowns the captain. "Any more information on that disturbance in the south Pacific?"
"Sensors report that volcanic activity has raised a new--or perhaps very old--island to the surface," replies Spock, raising an eyebrow. "It appears to hold a number of artificial structures, perhaps buildings, made of very large boulders. Architecture appears to be... no, the sensors must be malfunctioning. The geometry of these buildings is highly illogical!"
"Maybe they hired an eccentric architect?" jokes McCoy.
"I do not mean, Doctor, that the buildings' architecture is aesthetically nonsensical," Spock says derisively, "but that their geometry is mathematically impossible. They should not--can not--exist."
"Yet there they are," says Kirk.
"Aye, I jest checked the sensors yesterday," chief engineer Scott points out. "They're in fayne order."
"Captain, look!" cries Uhura, pointing at the main viewscreen.
It's late; I'll finish it later.