What you can buy, and where

What a world can make, and what it can only import.

Technology Level — tech level, or TL — is one number doing two jobs. On a world it measures what that society can build and support; on a piece of equipment it is the earliest tech level at which the thing exists at all. Every item in this chapter prints its own TL, and reading it against the world you are standing on is how you know whether you can buy it here, order it, or forget it.

The parenthesised letters from 10 upwards are the same numbers written in a single character, which is how a tech level is recorded in a world profile — A is 10, B is 11, and so on up to F for 15. Higher tech levels than 15 exist and may appear in a setting; the ladder printed above simply stops naming them.

The descriptor column matters as much as the number when you are judging a place rather than an object. Primitive covers everything up to standardised mass production; Industrial is the age of plastics, radio and fission; Pre-Stellar can reach orbit and eventually its own system but not another star; Early, Average and High Stellar are the jump-capable band, and the divide you will care about most is the one at 9 and 10, because that is where a world stops being somewhere ships visit and starts being somewhere ships come from.

Finding a given item, at a given place.

Compare an item’s tech level against the world’s. The item’s TL is what local industry needs in order to MAKE the thing — so at or below the world’s tech level it is something the place can manufacture and stock, and above it the item is an import or nothing at all.

Every price and mass in this chapter assumes the item was manufactured by an interstellar society at tech level 10 to 15. The same item made at a lower tech level does the same job and will probably be bulkier and more expensive, so a low-TL world is not merely a place with less choice — it is a place where the choices it does have cost more and weigh more than the tables say.

The credit, and what the tables assume about it.

Prices are in Credits, written Cr. A thousand Credits is a KiloCredit, written KCr, and a million is a MegaCredit, written MCr — the same amount of money written three ways so a starship and a set of lock picks can sit in the same book without one of them growing an unreadable row of zeroes.

The prefix is attached to the number rather than following it: Cr200 is two hundred Credits, KCr200 is two hundred thousand. Some tables in this chapter print the prefix on every cell and some print a column headed Cost with bare numbers; both are Credits unless the column says otherwise.

Protection worn, and what it costs to wear.

Armour reduces the damage a hit does to you, by its armour rating, every time you are hit. It is not a chance to avoid being hit and it does not run out — but it is not absolute either: a hit with Effect 6 or better always does at least one point of damage, whatever you are wearing.

You may wear only one type of armour at a time unless the suit itself says otherwise — and one does. Where layers are permitted, damage is resolved from the outside in: whatever gets through the outer layer is then applied to the inner one.

Jack is a leather jacket or body suit over your torso and upper limbs. Mesh is a jacket or body suit lined with flexible metal or plastic mesh, which is what makes it worth something against bullets. Cloth is a heavy ballistic body suit that spreads impact across you — bruising rather than a hole — and it conceals under ordinary clothing, though an observer making an Investigate or Recon check at 8+ notices something unusual about the way you are dressed.

Ablat is a cheap answer to laser fire, made of a material that vaporises when hit. Every laser hit on ablat reduces its armour value against lasers by one — so it is armour that is being used up while it works, which is the reason it is cheap and easy to replace. Reflec is the expensive answer: a flexible plastic suit layered with reflective material and heat-dispersing gel, superb against lasers and worth nothing against anything else. Reflec is the one suit that may be worn over another.

A vacc suit is the spacer’s standby: breathable atmosphere and protection from the temperature extremes, low pressure and radiation of hard vacuum, reducing radiation exposure by up to 40 rads, for six hours. A hostile environment vacc suit does everything a vacc suit does for the same six hours and adds imperviousness to flame, to intense radiation such as a nuclear blast site — reducing exposure by 180 rads — and to high-pressure environments like an undersea trench. Combat armour is a full-body military suit that also protects against hard vacuum exactly as a vacc suit does, with six hours of life support; it is not sold openly, though military or criminal contacts get one without much trouble.

Battle dress is powered combat armour and the only suit in the catalogue that changes your characteristics. Its servomotors raise your Strength and Dexterity by +4 while you wear it, and those raised values are what you use for everything except damage taken — hand-to-hand damage and skill checks use the suit’s numbers, while damage to your characteristics is worked out from your own as normal. The suit is fully enclosed with a six-hour air supply, gives full protection against environmental hazards including NBC shielding exactly as a hostile environment suit does, and carries a built-in Model 2 computer running Expert Tactics-2 for tactical advice. It requires the Battle Dress skill, which is why it is a skill on your sheet and not only a line in a catalogue.

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Talking across a room, a world or a system.

Talking to someone you cannot see needs a radio, and the catalogue sells four sizes of one. Using them routinely takes no check at all — you press the button and you are talking. The Comms skill is what you throw when there is interference to fight through or you are using the set for something it was not built for.

The long range set is back-pack mounted, reaches 500 km and will raise a ship in orbit, on ten separate channels. The medium range set is belt-mounted or sling-carried, reaches 30 km on five channels, and can reach official radio channels. The short range set is belt-mounted, has three channels and reaches 10 km — much less underground or underwater.

All three shrink at tech level 7. The long range set drops to 1.5 kg and becomes belt or sling mounted, the medium set drops to 500 grams, and the short range set drops to 300 grams and becomes hand-held. The masses in the table are the versions built at the tech level the row prints.

The personal communicator is the odd one, and its range is printed as Special because it has none of its own. It is a hand-held single-channel device that taps the world’s satellite network: on a world at tech level 8 or higher, with the right address, it reaches any other communicator on that world, for a fee. The channel is private but not secure and may be monitored on some worlds. Network access is usually arranged at the local starport for a small charge. On a world at tech level 7 or less it does not work at all.

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Processing, by size and technology level.

A computer’s power is its rating — Model 0, Model 1, Model 2 and up — and the rating measures the complexity of the programs it can run. A system can run as many programs at once as its rating allows, and a program that demands a higher rating than the machine has will not run on it at all.

Storage is effectively unlimited at tech level 9 and above, so a computer in this catalogue is bought for processing rather than for capacity. Every machine in the table below is laptop-sized. Battery life is two hours at TL 7, eight hours at TL 8, and effectively unlimited at TL 9 and above. Desktop machines give slightly more processing for the same money, not enough to matter in play, and become obsolete during TL 8.

A computer terminal (TL 7) is a dumb terminal with only limited processing of its own: it is an interface to something more powerful, such as a ship’s computer or a planetary network. Its size depends on how it is controlled — a holographic display terminal is far smaller than one with a physical keyboard and screen. A terminal is Model 0 and costs Cr200.

A hand computer (TL 7) is a portable machine with real processing power, more capable than a terminal and usable with no network at all. It costs twice as much as an ordinary computer of the same tech level, and buys you a machine you hold in one hand and work with the other.

A data display/recorder (TL 13) is a headpiece worn over one or both eyes giving a continuous heads-up display of data from any linked system. The screen is transparent, so your vision is not obscured while you use it, and it is not restricted to computers — it will show vacc suit oxygen reserves, grav belt status, neural activity scanner results and anything else that will talk to it. Cr5,000.

A data wafer (TL 10) is the standard storage medium: a rectangle of hardened plastic about the size of a credit card. At TL 10 it is memory diamond, encoding information in structures of carbon atoms; more advanced wafers use more exotic means. Cr5.

A specialized computer is built for one purpose and gets a rating 1 or 2 higher FOR THAT PROGRAM ONLY. A starship’s navigation computer might be no more than a Model 1 and still run Expert Navigation/3, because it was designed for that task and nothing else. It costs 25% more per added rating, and the program it is specialised for does not count against how many programs the machine can run at once.

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What a computer runs, and the rating it needs.

Every program prints a Rating, and the rating is a gate: a computer whose own rating is below it cannot run the program at all. You may run high-rating software at a lower rating, down to the lowest rating that program prints — so a machine that is merely modest gets a weaker version of the program rather than nothing.

Anything above Rating/1 cannot be copied easily: transferring it takes a non-trivial amount of bandwidth. That is why serious software is bought rather than shared, and why stealing a copy is an errand rather than a keystroke.

Interface and Security at Rating 0 are Included — they come with the machine and cost nothing extra. A database has no rating at all, which is why its row prints a dash: it is information rather than processing, and its price is a range because the cost depends entirely on what is in it.

Security and Intrusion are the two halves of the same contest and are read against each other. A defending system’s Security rating sets the difficulty an intruder faces — Average at Rating 0, and hardening down through Difficult, Very Difficult and Formidable as the rating climbs. Intrusion software works the other way, adding a bonus equal to its own rating to the attempt. Intrusion is often illegal, which is a separate problem from whether it works.

An Expert program is a skill in a box, and it is deliberately worse than knowing the thing: you check as though you had the skill at the program’s rating minus one, and only for Intelligence and Education-based checks. If you already have the skill at a higher level the program stops substituting and simply gives you +1 DM. Expert programs require an Intelligent Interface to use at all. An Intellect program is an improved Agent that can use Expert systems, and runs as many skills at once as its own rating.

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Medical, combat and anagathic compounds.

Drugs are what you take when a doctor is not available or not enough. Nine are catalogued: some are ordinary medicine, some buy you a few minutes of being faster and tougher than you are, and two of them buy time itself at a price paid later.

Medicinal drugs are the vaccines, antitoxins and antibiotics, and their cost is a range — from Cr5 to 1D6×1,000 Credits — because it depends on how rare and complex the compound is. They need the Medic skill to use properly: with a successful Medic check the right drug counteracts most poisons and diseases, or at least gives a positive DM towards resisting them. The wrong drug is worse than nothing, and is treated as a Difficult (–2 DM) poison doing 1D6 damage.

Panaceas are wide-spectrum medicinal drugs designed not to interact harmfully, so they can be used on any wound or illness and are guaranteed not to make things worse. Using them lets you make a Medic check as though you had Medic 0 when treating an infection or disease — which is the difference between being untrained and being merely unqualified.

Anti-radiation drugs must be administered before, or within ten minutes after, radiation exposure, and absorb up to 100 rads a dose. You may use them once a day. Any dose beyond that causes permanent Endurance damage of 1D6 per dose, so the second dose in a day is not a smaller benefit — it is a permanent injury.

Stim drugs remove fatigue at a cost, and the cost escalates. The first use removes the effects of fatigue and does you one point of damage. Used again to remove fatigue without an intervening period of sleep, the second costs two points, the third three, and so on upwards.

Both combat drugs have to be taken before the shooting starts, because four rounds and eight rounds are most of a fight. Neither is free: the combat drug leaves you fatigued and the metabolic accelerator crashes you for 2D6 damage and leaves you exhausted, which is a serious wound arriving ten minutes after you decided you needed the edge.

Fast drug — hibernation — is the opposite trade: it slows your metabolism to a ratio of 60 to 1, so a subjective day for you is two months outside. It is normally used to stretch life support reserves or as a cheap substitute for a cryoberth. Medicinal slow is a variant that runs the metabolism about thirty times normal instead, letting a patient heal a month’s worth in a single day; it can only be applied safely in a medical facility with life support and cryo-technology available.

Anagathics slow ageing. Synthetic anagathics become possible at TL 15, but natural spices and other rare compounds with comparable effects exist at every technology level. They are illegal or heavily controlled on many worlds, and they demand consistency: one dose every month maintains the effect, and a missed dose forces an immediate roll on the ageing table as the body reacts badly to the interrupted supply.

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Charges, detonators and what they do to a structure.

Explosives are placed rather than fired, and the Demolitions skill is what places them. The Effect of your Demolitions check MULTIPLIES the damage — with a minimum of ×1 for an Effect of 0 or 1 — so a well-set charge is not a little better than a badly set one, it is several times better.

None of these is legally available on any world with a law level of 1 or greater — which is nearly everywhere with a government. Buying explosives is therefore a black-market errand on most worlds rather than a shopping trip, whatever the printed price says.

Plastic is the generic multi-purpose charge, and it is what military units, demolition teams and adventurers actually carry. TDX is an advanced gravity-polarised explosive that detonates only along the horizontal axis, which is what you want when the thing above you is holding the roof up. The pocket nuke is briefcase-sized, hideously illegal on many worlds, and too large to fit into a grenade launcher — its damage is 2D6 multiplied by 20, inside a radius of 15D6 metres.

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The small equipment a character carries.

Personal devices are the small things a character carries: a compass, a watch, a calculator, and the sensors that let you know something about a room without touching anything in it. Nothing here is a weapon and nothing here is armour — this is the pocket rather than the arsenal.

A dash in the weight column means the thing is light enough to carry or wear without difficulty, which is the same convention the rest of this chapter uses. A magnetic compass indicates magnetic north, if the world has any. A wrist watch tells the time, and at tech level 9 can be configured to several worlds’ time as well as standard, with alarms. A hand calculator does arithmetic quickly. A hand computer — the handcomp — provides the services of a small computer and doubles as a terminal when linked to a larger machine by its integral radio, a network jack or any other circuit.

A radiation counter indicates the presence and intensity of radioactivity within a 30-metre radius, the signal strengthening as you approach the source. A metal detector does the same for metal within a 3-metre radius, underground included. An inertial locator indicates direction and distance travelled from where you started — no satellites, no network, just how far you have come and which way.

An electromagnetic probe detects the emissions of technological devices. It is a diagnostic tool worth +1 DM to work out what is wrong with a piece of equipment, and it is also how you find hidden bugs — the Comms skill is what sweeps a room with it. A densitometer reads an object’s natural gravity to measure its density, building a three-dimensional image of the inside as well as the outside of the thing.

A bioscanner sniffs for organic molecules and tests chemical samples, analysing whatever it is aimed at: poisons, bacteria, organic matter, life signs, unfamiliar organisms. Its data is interpreted with Comms or Life Sciences. A neural activity sensor is a backpack with a detachable handheld unit that detects neural activity up to 500 metres away and gives a rough estimate of an organism’s intelligence from its brainwave patterns; its data is interpreted with Comms, Life Sciences or Social Sciences.

A holographic projector is a toaster-sized box that creates a three-dimensional image in the space around it, roughly three metres in every direction, with speakers for sound and pre-programmed animations within a limited range. The images are obviously not real, so the device is mostly used for communication. The TL 12 version produces holograms convincing enough to fool anyone who fails an Intelligence check made on first seeing it, at double the cost; the TL 13 version produces true-to-life images at ten times the cost.

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Autonomous machines, their ratings and their limits.

A robot runs an Intellect program and makes its own decisions. A drone does not — it is remote-controlled by a character using the Comms skill. That single difference is what separates the two words everywhere else in this section.

Both operate in combat like characters and take damage like vehicles. They have Hull and Structure instead of an Endurance characteristic, and an Endurance DM of 0. Any robot running an Intellect program has an Intelligence and an Education score; drones have neither.

A robot’s Education represents the information programmed into it, so even a low-end machine can carry a high Education. Most robots have Social Standing 0 because they are not social creations — the exceptions are usually high-end models running advanced Intellect programs. Drones have no Social Standing at all; where one is used for diplomacy or other social business, the operator uses their own.

The cargo robot is the heavy-duty machine you meet in starport docks and aboard cargo ships. Cargo drones can be built as low as tech level 9, but their usefulness is extremely limited until Intellect programs exist. The repair robot is a small crab-shaped shipboard machine carrying welding and cutting tools; a specialised one may run Expert Engineering instead of Expert Mechanics. The autodoc is an immobile medical robot, usually installed inside a vehicle or spacecraft rather than carried.

The personal drone is a floating globe about thirty centimetres across with holographic projectors, so you can be present somewhere you are not. The probe drone is a hardened, armoured version carrying more sensors, with a five-hundred-kilometre operating range and a speed of 300 kph. The combat drone is a flying gun on a grav floater — flown with Remote Operations, but attacks are made with the appropriate weapon skill, and loading one with Intellect and combat Expert programs makes it an autonomous combat robot, which is illegal on many worlds.

One thing about the combat drone’s price is easy to get wrong, and the source states it: the Integral Weapon upgrade is ALREADY INCLUDED in the Cr90,000. The row’s “plus the cost of the weapon” means the gun itself and nothing else. Do not add the Cr10,000 from the options table on top — that machine is sold with the mounting fitted, which is why its own traits row lists Integral Weapon.

The servitor is the exception to the Social Standing rule: an expensive humanoid robot programmed as a butler or servant to the nobility, carrying Social Standing 7. Some owners reprogram theirs with Expert Carousing or Expert Gambling to suit the household better.

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Seeing, hearing and detecting past human range.

Sensory aids extend your own senses rather than adding new ones. Most of the list is light: something to see by in the dark, and then, further up the ladder, something that sees for you in a dark you could never have seen through.

A torch — the burning kind — lasts an hour, clearly illuminating a 6-metre radius and giving shadowy illumination out to 12 metres. An oil lamp clearly illuminates 4.5 metres, gives shadowy illumination out to 9, burns for six hours on a pint of oil, and can be carried in one hand.

An electric torch is the common flashlight: battery-powered, about six hours of continuous use, throwing a wide cone of light up to 18 metres away with a 6-metre radius at the end of the beam. Later tech level models add an adjustable beam — a tight beam up to 36 metres long with a 1-metre radius, or a circle of 10-metre radius. A cold light lantern is the fuel-cell version of the same thing: identical beams, and three days of continuous use rather than six hours.

Infrared goggles let you see exothermic — heat-emitting — sources in the dark. Light intensifier goggles let you see normally in anything short of total darkness by electronically amplifying whatever light there is. The two answer different problems: one finds warm things in a black room, the other makes a dim room bright.

Binoculars let you see further, and they gain capability with tech level rather than being replaced. At TL 8, electronic enhancement lets them capture images and light-intensification lets them be used in the dark, at Cr750. At TL 12 the PRIS version — Portable Radiation Imaging System — observes a large section of the electromagnetic spectrum from infrared to gamma rays, at Cr3,500. The table’s Cr75 is the plain TL 3 pair.

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Habitats and survival structures.

When you are not indulging in the comforts of civilisation you need shelter, and the catalogue runs from a sheet of waterproof canvas to a modular pressurised base for six. What separates them is what they keep out — weather, then cold, then the atmosphere itself.

A tarpaulin is heavy waterproof fabric, 4 metres by 2, for temporary shelter or for keeping moisture off something. A tent shelters two people against precipitation, storms and temperatures down to 0° Celsius, and withstands light to moderate winds. Larger tents that shelter more people, stand higher winds or hold out colder temperatures weigh and cost more.

A pressure tent is the first shelter that holds an atmosphere: basic pressurised quarters for two, giving standard atmosphere and conditions along with protection from precipitation, storms and up to strong winds. There is no airlock, so the tent must be depressurised every time somebody enters or leaves — which is a real cost in time and in the air you are carrying.

A pre-fabricated cabin is modular UNpressurised quarters for six, standing light to severe winds and sheltering against precipitation, storms and temperatures down to −10° Celsius. It comes as 16 modules, each 1.5 m wide by 1.5 m long by 2 m high, arranged into whatever layout you want, and takes 8 man-hours to erect or dismantle. Packed for shipment it weighs 4 tons.

An advanced base is the pressurised version of the same idea: modular quarters for six, withstanding anything short of hurricane-force winds and all but the most extreme temperatures. It is also 16 modules of the same dimensions, takes 12 man-hours to erect or dismantle, weighs 6 tons packed, and its price includes life support for six people for 7 days.

Basic life support supplies — waste reclamation chemicals, oxygen supply, CO2 scrubbers and the rest — support one person for one day inside an enclosed pressurised environment such as a pressure tent or an advanced base. That is the consumable behind everything on this list that holds air, and it is the number to multiply when you plan how long you are staying.

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Staying alive where the air or the temperature will not let you.

Survival equipment is what keeps you alive and able to act in an environment that would otherwise stop you — the wrong temperature, the wrong atmosphere, water, or no gravity at all. Most of the list is about breathing.

Two oxygen tanks last six hours, and a refill of the proper atmospheric mixture for your race costs Cr20. Underwater air tanks are the same equipment built for water: two tanks, six hours, and a Cr20 refill for the proper mixture at the expected depth. An artificial gill extracts oxygen from the water instead, letting you breathe underwater indefinitely — but it only functions on worlds with thin, standard or dense atmospheres, types 4 through 9.

Cold weather clothing protects against frigid weather at −20° Celsius or below and adds DM+2 to every Endurance check made to resist cold weather exposure; reduce its weight by 1 kg for every 5 tech levels. An environment suit protects against extreme cold or heat with a hood, gloves and boots, but leaves the face exposed in normal operation. Swimming equipment is fins, wet suit and face mask: it protects against cold at 5° Celsius or below, improves speed and manoeuvrability underwater, and adds DM+1 to Athletics checks in those situations while you are wearing it.

A rescue bubble is a 2-metre pressurised plastic sphere carried as an emergency lifeboat aboard space vessels and water craft. Piezoelectric layers in the wall turn your own movement into electricity, recharging the bubble’s batteries and powering its distress beacon; a small oxygen tank inflates it and provides two person/hours of life support, and a self-repairing plastic seal acts as an emergency airlock.

A thruster pack lets you manoeuvre in zero gravity, and using one accurately takes a Zero-G check. Thruster packs work only in microgravity and are practical only for journeys between spacecraft at Adjacent range — they are not a way to cross a system, or even a long way across one. A portable generator is a heavy-duty fusion generator that recharges weapons and other equipment for up to a month of use.

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Toolkits, and the checks that need one.

Technical skills require specialist tools, and the word in most of these entries is REQUIRED. A toolkit is not a bonus you buy to do a job better; for the jobs that name one, the kit is what the job is written to assume you have. The source prints no modifier or consequence for working without it — what it costs you is a referee’s call.

The six toolkits in the Cr1,000 band all contain the same four things: diagnostic sensors, hand tools, computer analysis programs at the appropriate tech level, and spare parts. They differ by what they are FOR, not by what is in the case, which is why owning one does not cover another’s work.

A medical kit is the exception in content: diagnostic devices and scanners, surgical tools, and a plethora of drugs and antibiotics — enough for a medic to practise in the field rather than in a surgery.

A lock pick set is the exception in price and in law: it costs Cr10 and picks ordinary mechanical locks, and it is illegal on worlds of law level 8 or higher — where the cost rises to Cr100 or more, because the price of a prohibited thing is the price of finding someone who will sell it.

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Hand weapons, their damage and their reach.

A melee weapon is used at arm’s length, and its Range column tells you which arm’s length: close quarters or extended reach. Two of them can also be thrown, which is why their rows name a ranged category as well.

The tables in this section and the three that follow are a small selection of what a campaign has available rather than everything that exists. A world’s law level limits which of them you may legally carry, and every weapon row prints the law level at which it first becomes illegal.

The unarmed strike row is you with no weapon at all: 1D6 bludgeoning at close quarters, no cost, no mass, and no law level — nowhere makes your hands illegal. Every other row is something you have to be carrying.

A dagger is a small knife with a flat, two-edged blade about 200 mm long, carried in a belt sheath or concealed in a boot sheath or on the forearm. It is as much a tool as a last-resort weapon and is worn constantly — and its 250 grams do not count against your carried weight, precisely because it is never taken off. A bayonet is a similar knife-like weapon usually attached to a rifle; detached, it performs as a dagger.

The bladed weapons climb by size. A blade is a heavy, flat, two-edged knife nearly 300 mm long, often with a semi-basket handguard, carried in a belt scabbard and found in emergency kits and lifeboats as often as in a fight. A cutlass is a heavy, flat, single-edged weapon with a full basket hilt, 600 to 900 mm — the standard shipboard blade, sometimes kept in bulkhead lockers near the places that matter. A foil, or rapier, is light and pointed at 800 mm with a basket or cup hilt, worn in a belt scabbard. A sword is the standard long-edged weapon, flat and two-edged, 700 to 950 mm, which is why its Type is P/S — it works with the point or the edge. A broadsword is the two-handed one, extremely heavy and 1000 to 1200 mm, with a simple cross-piece hilt, worn at the belt or over the shoulder.

The shafted weapons are the cheap end and the long end. A cudgel is a stick — obtained from a standing tree or from an unloaded long gun such as a rifle or carbine, though laser weapons are far too delicate to swing — 1000 to 2000 mm. A spear is a long shaft with a pointed metal tip, 3000 mm, for thrusting or throwing. A pike is the two-handed 3000-to-4000 mm version with a pointed steel or iron head. A halberd is a two-handed pole weapon with an axe-like blade and a steel spike on the end of a long shaft, 2500 mm.

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Guns, their damage, range and ammunition.

A ranged weapon row carries two things a melee row does not: a rate of fire, and a range category naming the class of weapon it shoots like. A separate ammunition table gives what a full magazine or power pack costs, what it weighs, and how many rounds it holds before you have to reload.

The Range column names the category a weapon is treated as for difficulty by range, and it does not always match the weapon’s name — a carbine shoots as a shotgun does, a laser carbine as a pistol does, and a bow as an assault weapon does. Read the category, not the noun in the first column.

The ammunition table lists the cost, mass and capacity of a full magazine or power pack for each weapon. Rounds is how many shots you get before you must reload or recharge — so a laser rifle’s 100 and a revolver’s 6 describe the same column, and the ammunition’s own tech level always matches the weapon’s.

Ammunition compatibility is specific and it matters when you are scavenging. Rifle ammunition may also be used in automatic rifles — rifle and auto rifle magazines are interchangeable and weigh the same. Auto pistol ammunition is interchangeable with submachinegun ammunition, although the MAGAZINES are not. Carbine ammunition is not interchangeable with any other type, a carbine being a short rifle firing a smaller, lighter cartridge. Body pistol ammunition fits nothing else at all. Laser power packs are not interchangeable between the laser carbine and the laser rifle.

Reloading is not free either. Replacing an empty magazine on a rifle, carbine, auto pistol or body pistol takes a reload action. A shotgun’s cylindrical ten-shell magazine takes two combat rounds to change, and a submachinegun’s takes one. A revolver takes two combat rounds, because six cartridges go in individually — or one round, if you forgo the benefit of evasion. A TL 2 crossbow takes 6 minor actions to reload, reduced to 3 at TL 4, and at TL 9 crossbows are self-loading.

The slug throwers divide by what they are for. A rifle is the standard military arm, firing a 7 mm, 10-gram bullet at about 900 metres per second from a twenty-round magazine, one round per pull. An automatic rifle is a refined version firing four-round bursts, switchable to semi-automatic — at the end of a combat round, after all firing, it is then treated as a rifle until switched back. An assault rifle is a lighter, cheaper automatic rifle, and the advanced combat rifle is a further development of the assault rifle. A carbine is a short rifle with a ten-round magazine ahead of or behind the trigger guard, usually slung on the shoulder.

The pistols divide the same way. A revolver is an early handgun firing 9 mm bullets similar to — but not interchangeable with — those of the auto pistol, which is the basic repeating handgun, one cartridge per pull. A body pistol is small and non-metallic, designed to evade most weapon detectors, which is why it is the one weapon on this table illegal at law level 1. A snub pistol is a low-velocity revolver built for shipboard and zero-g use, which is why it has no recoil. A submachinegun is a small automatic firing pistol ammunition in four-round bursts from a thirty-round magazine.

A shotgun is the basic weapon for maximum shock without regard to accuracy: an 18 mm barrel firing shells of either six 7 mm bullets or a hundred and thirty 3 mm pellets, 30 grams of projectiles either way, at about 350 metres per second. The magazine is clumsy — roughly 350 mm long and 20 mm across — so shotguns come with a sling. A gauss rifle is the ultimate slug thrower, accelerating a dense armour-piercing core in a softer metal covering to high velocity along an electromagnetic barrel; the hollow-point round gives it both stopping power and armour penetration, and its 1/4/10 rate of fire is the highest on the table. An accelerator rifle is built for zero-g: its round is accelerated by a secondary charge after it leaves the barrel, normally in three-round bursts, adjustable to single rounds. A bow is a strung stave, improved at higher tech levels with additional strings and pulley systems; a crossbow is a horizontal bow in a mechanical firing mechanism with a stronger pull.

The laser weapons all draw from an external power pack connected by a heavy-duty cable, and none of them has recoil. The laser carbine is the light one, firing a 2 mm beam aimed by integrated optic sights, with a pack good for 50 shots and a recharge needing at least eight hours on a high-energy source. The laser rifle is heavier and sturdier, capable of longer sustained action, with 100 shots in a pack. The laser pistol is the carbine’s pistol equivalent and still needs the external pack.

Laser sights give an extra +1 DM to any attack that has been AIMED — not to every shot. At TL 10, x-ray lasers and improved displays remove the tell-tale red dot. Telescopic sights give the same extra +1 DM on an aimed attack and are more useful at longer ranges, but they are delicate: any violent action — being left in a moving truck, a close explosion, a drop — knocks them out of alignment on an 8+ on 2D6, and a weapon with misaligned sights ALWAYS misses. Laser telescopic sights combine both electronic and telescopic capabilities and are still rather fragile.

A gyrostabilizer fits any weapon with recoil and reduces the recoil penalty by one point, to DM-1. A silencer fits any slug thrower with a rate of fire of 4 or less and masks the sound: −4 DM to detect it. Folding stocks fit carbines, rifles and shotguns and shorten the weapon by 300 mm. Shoulder stocks attach temporarily to a pistol or revolver for a crude carbine; while fitted, treat the weapon as ranged (shotgun), the pistol cannot be holstered, and attaching or detaching the stock takes five combat rounds.

A secure weapon requires authentication before it will fire — a DNA or iris scan, a password, an unlocking code transmitted from a comm. An intelligent weapon adds a Model/0 computer to any weapon; the TL 13 upgrade adds Model/1 instead, for Cr5,000. An underslung RAM grenade launcher can be added to any rifle: it holds one grenade, cannot fire on automatic, and takes four minor actions to reload.

Reference rule — not active yet

Thrown explosives and their areas.

A grenade is a small explosive thrown by hand or launched from a grenade launcher, and which of those you do changes the range category: treat a thrown grenade as ranged (thrown) for difficulty by range, and a launched one as ranged (shotgun).

All four become illegal at law level 1, so grenades are contraband on almost any world with laws at all, the same as explosives. The cost column being per case of six is the easiest thing in this chapter to misread: a frag grenade is Cr30 each, not Cr180.

Frag grenade damage falls off with distance from the blast, and the three figures in its damage cell are the three bands of the table below.

A smoke grenade makes a thick cloud six metres in radius centred where it lands, imposing −2 DM on all attacks made within or through it — doubled for laser weapons. An aerosol grenade makes a fine mist, also six metres in radius, that diffuses lasers without blocking normal vision: any laser attack through it has its damage reduced by 10, and laser communications through it are blocked completely. Both dissipate in 1D6×3 rounds, and high winds or other extreme weather can sharply reduce that time.

A stun grenade is non-lethal and does not inflict normal damage. Anyone within six metres of the detonation makes an Endurance check with a negative DM equal to the stun damage AFTER armour is subtracted. Fail it and the character is knocked unconscious; pass it and they are unaffected — the stun damage is then simply ignored rather than carried.

Reference rule — not active yet

Crew-served and vehicle-scale weapons.

Heavy weapons are man-portable and larger weapons that cause extreme property damage. They read like ranged weapons with two differences: the rate of fire is Single Shot / Auto with no burst column, and two of them do no damage of their own at all — their damage is whatever grenade you loaded.

A grenade launcher throws grenades over long distances, and its grenades are NOT interchangeable with handheld ones. A RAM grenade launcher — rocket assisted, multi-purpose — has a longer range and can fire up to three grenades in a single attack using the rules for firing on full auto; unlike other automatic weapons it cannot fire in burst mode. Reloading a RAM launcher takes two minor actions, and its grenades are likewise not interchangeable with handheld ones.

A rocket launcher channels its exhaust backwards in a back blast to counteract recoil, which is why its Recoil column says No and why anyone standing up to 1.5 metres behind it when it fires takes 3D6 damage from the burning gases. A vehicle-mounted rocket launcher loses that side-effect, a vehicle being a more stable firing platform than a person. Reloading takes three minor actions.

The rockets in the catalogue are high-explosive models with their own resolution rule: do NOT add the Effect of the attack roll to their damage. Instead apply that damage to everything within six metres of the impact point. A rocket that misses has a 50% chance — 4+ on 1D6 — of detonating on impact with the ground, at a distance of 6 minus the Effect metres away in a random direction; otherwise it misses completely and leaves the battlefield without striking anything or detonating.

The PGMP — plasma gun, man-portable — is so heavy and bulky that it can only be used easily by a trooper with Strength 12 or more, usually achieved by wearing battle dress. Every point by which your Strength falls short is −1 DM on any attack roll made with it. The FGMP — fusion gun, man-portable — includes a gravity suspension system that reduces its inertia, making it easier to use than the PGMP at a minimum Strength of 9, and it fires what amounts to a directed nuclear explosion. Anyone nearby without radiation protection when an FGMP is fired takes a lethal dose: each firing emits 2D6 × 20 rads, affecting everyone in the immediate vicinity.