Second Sphere Technologies

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Technology Rules

Xenotech

Plasma Guns
Guided Plasma Shells
Bubble Fields
Enhanced Regenerative Bubbles
Nephilim Armor
Insidium
Repair Conduits
Bionano Integration
Drone Haxoring
Ship-Drone Hybridization

Basic Theotech

Mercurion Drives
Theta Jump Drives
T-Forced Fusion Plants
Mega Particle Beams
Needle Beams
Resonance Armor
Contortion Buffer
Glitterblowing ECM
Tactical Teleportation
Gravity Control

Advanced Theotech

Assymetrical Metric Compression Drives
Omega Jump Drives
Metric Compression Generators
Vector Cannons/Launchers
Infinity Cannons
Valence Armor
Distortion Field
Distortion ECM
Stutter Unit
Dimension Eaters

Projectile Weapons

Chemical Propellant Guns

It has taken a long time for the venerable ‘gun’ to die out. Popular due to their rugged simplicity and ease of manufacture, conventional guns remain common outside of high-tech centers. While they can never match modern electromotive or directed-energy weapons in raw performance, modern chemical engineering ensures they offer excellent value for their price point. Plus, they require no sophisticated manufacturing base.

Missiles

Another standby, missiles are powerful and effective weapons, however their physical size limits the endurance of equipped units. Long supply lines and the proliferation of cheap anti-missile systems has seen them fall out of favor in some circles, but they still remain an important part of most arsenals.
Specifics TBA

Electromotive Weapons

The standard for first-world militaries, electromotive weapons use powerful electromagnets to propel projectiles at high velocities. While this ties them to a significant power source, it also means that they have good performance and have compact, non-volatile ammunition. Unfortunately, this performance comes at a price and they required substantially more high-technology materials. Some advanced designs integrate reactionless drive concepts to further increase performance.
Special
Open-sheaf: Warship railguns normally fire a tightly-packed cluster of projectiles, similar to a shotgun. This ensures hits at range and effective immunity to point-defense systems.
Closed-sheaf: Alternatively, warship railguns can load solid slugs. This reduces range substantially but hits much harder. (-50% range, +50% FP, can be intercepted?)

Directed Energy Weapons

Powerful directed-energy weapons took a long time to mature. Hampered by power demands and inefficient heat-to-output ratios, it was only the use of posthuman-derived Delta Dust technologies that finally turned them into compact, effective packages that had a role outside of niche applications. Currently, a number of subtypes exist.

Lasers

Relatively simple but inefficient energy weapons, used in high-accuracy roles. + accuracy - power drain - weapon power

Pulse Cannons

A common particle-accelerator weapon, commonly used by Pac-Am ships. Warships can also mount beam cannons, which are less accurate but have longer effective range.
Special
Variable-mode: Some particle accelerators can vary between Beam and Pulse mode.

Mega Particle Weapons

Powerful particle beam weapons originally developed by Asakuran scientists and adopted as the standard direct-fire weapon of ZOCU.
Special
Armor-killer: All Mega Particle Weapons have the Armor Piercing characteristic.

Armor & Structure

Conventional Armor

Baseline armor is made of up high-efficiency titanium-steel alloys; nothing particularly exotic and generally affordable. However as expected, performance is not exceptional either.

Depleted-Uranium Armor

High-density armor compounds encased in conventional steel alloys.
Special
Heavy Metal: Depleted Uranium armor is very resilient for its volume, but also very heavy, inflicting penalties on speed and agility.

Polarized Armor

Modern derivative of ‘electrical’ armor, Polarized armor is particularly effective at dissipating directed energy weapon strikes. However, it does require continued energy imput to maintain polarization.
Special
Polarize!: These armors are designed to accept an electrical charge which substantially increases their effectiveness against energy weapons.

Bafflecladding

Not all armors are designed solely to provide protection against weapon impacts. Bafflecladding is an evolution of passive stealth materials that absorbs a broad spectrum of EM radiation, making the fitted craft more difficult to detect.
Special
Low Profile: Bafflecladding reduces a ship’s sensor cross-section, making it more difficult to detect and target.

Dilatant Armor Core

High-velocity kinetic impactors have been a military problem ever since the invention of the gun. One solution to increase resistance against them is the use of dilatants fluids in armor voids to provide breach-sealing and increased shockproofing.
Special
Shear Thickening Fluid: Boosts armor against kinetic-type weapons with AP, repairs 1 point of Belt per turn in any turn in which the unit took damage.

Superconductive Grid

The proliferation of directed-energy weapons has led to developments in protective measures. One such is the integration of superconductive grids into armor cladding.
Special
Spread the Load: S-Grids absorb the damage taken to Belt by energy-type weapons up to its rating, storing it in a ‘pool’ and dissipating 1 point a turn. A critical strike to the S-Grid instantly inflicts all its stored damage to the ship’s Belt.

Shields

Particle Screen

The effects of charged particles upon ship crews has always been a concern and almost all spacefaring vessels of worth include some level of radiation shielding. However, the appearance of ZOCU’s mega particle weapons on the battlefield put a high priority on high-powered non-physical defenses.
Special
Energy Protection: Particle screens only protect against directed energy-type attacks. Physical weapons that have an energy component (eg, energized missile warheads) are also unaffected as they pass through the screen before detonating against the hull.

Scattering Field

Developed by a joint Russian-Chinese program in the ‘40s to increase the survivability of warships, spherical scattering fields are the ancestor of almost all modern combat shielding. Powerful, fairly robust and effective at their job, they nonetheless have the significant downsides of immature technology. That hasn’t stopped them from remaining in use to the current day, suitably modernized.
Special
Scifi Energy Shield: Scattering fields provide strong protection against all attacks.
Sideband Emissions: Active scattering fields tend to interfere with sensors and targeting systems, imposing penalties.
Bubble Field: The technology behind scattering fields limits them to a simple sphere or slightly elongated ovoid. Coupled with their sideband emissions, equipped ships tend to be easy targets to find and hit – but not damage.

Flash Field

The large quantities of delta dust to be found in the expanse proved to be a boon for scientists and engineers, particularly once the various worlds of the ZOCU organization began to share technical information. Among the technologies developed independently by both Pac-Am and Expanse scientists during the Breakdown were so-called Flash Fields. These solved many of the issues plagueing scattering fields, resulting in a more refined if not quite as potent defensive system.
Special
Instant Response: Flash fields 'flash' to full power when struck, reducing sensor interference to effectively nil.

Bubble Field

Another development of energy shield defenses, bubble fields (or, as they are sometimes known, sponge fields) do not deflect or disperse energy, but instead store it in the shield matrix to be radiated in a controlled manner. This has the advantage of providing near-perfect protection so long as the field remains active, but the weakness is that the bubble can only contain so much energy before it is full.
Special
Energy Sponge: Bubble Fields absorb all attacks made against them, like a pool of structure points. Damage only penetrates once their pool is full.
Radiate It Away: Over time, bubble fields can 'empty' their pool of damage. This allows for extended survivability but is highly unstealthy.
Shields Can't Hold Captain!: All energy-type attacks are particularly effective against bubble fields, inflicting double their damage.

Propulsion

Plasma Drives

Standard Newtonian drives are open-cycle plasma motors using a liquid reaction mass (typically water) to provide thrust. A fairly mature technology, they have been in use in one form or another for over a century.

Cold Gas Rockets

Some situations call for more discretion than blasting in with fusion motors blaring. In these cases cold gas rockets are used; instead of pumping million-degree plasma through the exhaust bells, low-temperature reaction mass is used to limit one’s emissions.
Special
No Annoying Emissions: Cold gas rockets avoid the large IR blooms of plasma rockets, making them much more difficult to passively detect.
Newton’s Punishment: Thermal energy directly affects the efficiency of a Newtonian propulsion system. Cold gas rockets thus have relatively anemic thrust:weight ratios.

Mercurion Drives

A recent development in pseudoNewtonian propulsion, Mercurion drives utilize tricks of vaccum fluctuation to provide thrust.
Special
No Fuel Needed: Any unit with just Mercurion gains an automatic 10% Utility space due to no need for bulky reaction mass tanking.
Glitterblower: Mercurion drives emit copious quantities of short-lived, harmless spacetime transients. While pretty, they significantly reduce any ability to be particularly stealthy.

Power Systems

Electron Matrix

High density energy storage matrices are built and used across the human sphere in roles from household batteries to aerospace power grids. While not ideal for high output/high duration applications like interstellar ships, they are a competitive replacement for fusion reactors on short-endurance craft.
Special
High Energy Density: Electron Matrices can output huge amount of energy in very short periods and have no heavy, bulky reactor to parasitize their performance.
No Endurance: Unfortunately, over long durations, fusion reactors have much greater sustained output. Electron Matrix craft have limited combat endurance.

Fusion Reactor

A troublesome technology during the 20th and 21st century, modern advances have made fusion powerplants cheap, reliable and safe. Almost all starships have one or more fusion reactors for primary power.
Special
Slow And Steady: So long as they’re adequately fuelled with He3 fusion premix, most fusion reactors can operate for years without significant maintenance, providing plentiful energy all the while.
Magnets Are Heavy: Contemporary reactors can have quite a degree of miniaturization but are still substantially inferior to electron matrices in their peak output.