19 March 2013

Operation RESET

Operation Reset is the plot of the Twilight 2000 module, Free City of Krakow.

It purports to be a device that can emulate just about any processor via a kind of giant cube of wires.

The author of the module didn't know near as much about how computers work as my players and suspension of disbelief kept them from really accepting the adventure hooks.

I realized, years later, that the MacGuffin doesn't have to be plausible.

That the thing depicted in Operation Reset doesn't work is irrelevant to the plot.  That something wired like a telephone switch board with drop wires cannot work like a microprocessor is even less relevant.

The explanation is the DIA couldn't afford to ignore such a device even if it was very unlikely to work, so an operation would be mounted to obtain it.  The materials in question would be sought until someone who was an expert could say, "WTF is the BS?"

Still, even that doesn't matter.

All the players need to know is that someone wants this stuff and they'll pay for it.

If I ever get a chance to run T2K again, I will remember this.

By the way, T2K works much better in GURPS than it ever did in its native system.  The module The Black Madonna failed utterly with the original rules.  GURPS has fright checks, and mechanics to force the atmosphere onto the players.  That enhances the effect rather than getting its way.

2 comments:

  1. If I'd been familiar enough with the system, I'd have submitted a module set in Kaliningrad, with Germans coming back to take what once was theirs back from the Russians, Lithuanians, and Poles all getting involved.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Not sure they were after it. They didn't have aspirations on Gdansk either. The German position was essentially keep what we have and try to survive. Although with Poland fragmenting as hard as it did, getting them back might not take much effort.

    ReplyDelete

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