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Hi,

I just picked up the English printing of Mutant, I think that it is really well done, so much so that I immediately pledged on the Genlab Kickstarter running at the moment.

I have a couple of questions regarding Gearheads and Jury-Rig skill:

1. Gearheads start with a random artifact - do we assume that they know how to use it, or should they roll Comprehend depending on the Ark's DEV level?

2 Jury-Rig: Do scrap armour/scrap weapons/Rot suits only work once unless the device is made durable? i.e they can only protect vs one hit, shoot once (per barrel), or only roll vs Rot once, regardless of their Gear points? The sections on armour (p88) and rot (p126) seem to imply that they work normally i.e that they lose points when Gear is damaged.

For example, I have a Jury-Rig Rot suit (Prot 3) and I spend a day in a Rot 1 sector. When I roll my 3 Gear dice to see if it absorbs the Rot, is the suit then immediately useless regardless of the number of Gear failures (1s) that I roll?

thanks

Mark

1) I give the player a choice. Either he can assume that he during pre-game has rolled a success with the Comprehend Skill or he can make the roll in play. The bonus with the first choose is that the player won't have to face a failure. The bonus with the second choose is that you can get more than one success and with that teach how to use the artefact to other characters. If the Ark's DEV level is high enough for the Artefact, everyone in the Ark knows how to use the artefact.

2) The armour only work once unless it is made durable. So in order to make a PV3 scrap armour you probably want two successes. If an armour is not durable, it will "fall apart" after you roll your armour roll once.
A gearhead can repair armours. A successful repair will make the armour work one more time (with the PV that the armour had). Although, instead of repairing, I think it is better to go to another sector (or whatever the GM decides is needed) and make another armour, that is durable.

Great - thanks for the quick reply!

We are about to play some more Mutant, and re-reading through the rules I was wondering about Jury-Rig again:

When the PCs are in the Ark, is there any limit on the number of Jury-Rig rolls that can be made? Since the penalty for trauma loss is a nights sleep, there is little reason not to push each roll, as a failure will just mean that you wait until next day. While in the Ark the PCs don't need to use their own food/water. In addition if the PC pushes the roll they could stand to gain MP from the trauma. Since these don't go away it could be relatively easy to always start with 10 MP.

I could decide in advance how many days the PCs have at the Ark to do stuff before they head back out again - and if the Gearhead works on projects, then they have fewer days to rig stuff and they miss out on an XP for not workjing on a project. (What's the rough estimate of how long PCs work on a project to get a skill roll and 1 XP?)

Makes a lot of sense. I like the idea that "explore sector" = find enough scrap to build one thing. That seems a straightforward workable rule and encourages exploration.

I'd also forgotten that fail = something bad happens...hm...

thanks for the ideas.

Does this mean making a Jury-Rig roll to repair a Scrap Spear can repair the spear AND make it durable if enough successes rolled, or is the durable stunt only available on first Jury-Rig of that spear?

Seems like tracking the "original" condition of item would be bothersome, but if not then Repair and Jury-Rig a new item are the same which seems bad too.

Yeah I suppose it's not bad to track and the roll20 sheet someone put together allows for tracking it thus.

So if I understand it correctly, the term "Jury-Rigged" actually describes most weapons in Dawnworld that are not actually Artifacts.

And then, on the character sheet, you simply mark "Jury-Rigged (Durable)" for a weapon that takes Gear Damage as opposed to breaking after a single use?

Thanks again with all the help.