Ultra-Tech: Broadcast Power Transmitters

Ultra-Tech: Broadcast Power Transmitters

When creating my multi-TL sci-fi setting, I had to read through GURPS Ultra-Tech, GURPS Bio-Tech, and GURPS Psi-Tech and forbid/allow items on a case-by-case basis. One superscience technology has caught my eye - broadcast power (GURPS Ultra-Tech, page 21). In the setting it relies on an exotic material - polymodular crystals that is mostly monopolized by a TL 11 megacorp MacroDynamic Tech Alliance. Until now I haven't actually read into the rules for power broadcasting too deep, and now I feel that it's a good time to create some broadcast power transmitters and see how they work.

According to GURPS Ultra-Tech, broadcast power transmitters are generally double the cost and weight of an equivalent power cell per yard of radius. At first I thought that this means "cost*2^radius", but then I was told that it should be "cost*2*radius". My poor googling skills prevented me from finding the typical military squad spread radius, so I will just pull the number out of thin air.

Let's say that we want a broadcast power transmitter that can power a squad of five soldiers within 50 yards. We will assume that all five of them are armed with rainbow laser rifles. A rainbow laser rifle is powered by a D cell and has 83 shots.

An E cell holds 10 times as much power as a D cell. An F cell holds 10 times as much power as an E cell and 100 times as much power as a D cell. Let's make 50-yard radius broadcast power transmitters based on these cells.

E-Transmitter (50 yards): $200,000, 2,000 lbs. LC4.

F-Transmitter (50 yards): $2,000,000, 20,000 lbs. LC4.

Boy, that's heavy and expensive. Only a few vehicles can carry 2,000 lbs. without the passengers, making this radius non-viable for military squads. Even drop pods cannot drop one safely from orbit. Let's consider a smaller area of coverage.

E-Transmitter (25 yards): $100,000, 1,000 lbs. LC4.

F-Transmitter (25 yards): $1,000,000, 10,000 lbs. LC4.

That's more manageable. Even an armored hovercraft (UT227) would be able to carry the squad with an E-Transmitter, but would require the soldiers to stay close to the vehicle and provide each soldier with 2 D cell worth of energy. Not sure if that's viable.

Let's consider a portable fusion reactor (UT20). The notes say that we can divide cost by 5 and weight by 10, if certain superscience technologies exist. And they do.

Portable Fusion Reactor Broadcast Transmitter (50 yards): $2,000,000, 500 lbs. LC2.
Portable Fusion Reactor Broadcast Transmitter (25 yards): $1,000,000, 250 lbs. LC2.

Now this is much more manageable weight-wise, and isn't that costly for a whole reactor. Could be carried by an armored hovercraft if the megacorp has a large military budget. And it does.

Conclusion is that broadcast power wouldn't really work for what I had in mind. It's much easier, lighter, and cheaper to carry five beamed power transmitters than a single power broadcast transmitter. Or just carry spare cells, like normal people. Broadcast reactor transmitters make it more viable and remove a lot of bookkeeping (how much power of an F-Transmitter does a shot of a 2B cell powered pistol drain?).