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[RFC][Technology] Boom Boxes
04-29-2011, 08:20 PM
Ben has his Blue Hair Moments. Nowhere is this more evident than when he created the Sonically Driven Matter Displacement Device, or, more colloquially, the Boom Box.
It started out innocently enough. Ben was attempting to create a device that would turn any solid surface into a high definition surround sound speaker. The prototype would work, up until the first 'big sound' (usually an explosion or a particularly loud chord), then the surface would be destroyed in a spectacular (and, incredibly enough, fiery) explosion.
The device itself is resilient. It can be reused numerous times without ill-effects.
Ben's preferred soundbite: a huge, deep, and distorted voice screaming, "Kick out the JAY-UUUUUUUYYYMMMS, Mother-f*****s!" followed by the infamous Chord From Hell.
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Where do I place an order?
Those thing's would be great for forced entires without carrying sensitive explosives around. Plonk onto a wall, key in something like the 1812 overture... with real cannonfire... have the perfect distraction along with the perfect countdown. "Wait, where's that music coming from... KABOOM!"
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My initial thought is that as described it's too powerful, and shrapnel make it too dangerous. Too close to violating Rules #1d i and ii.
Maybe it could be limited to confetti explosions...
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Where'd the confetti come from? To just manifest would take up all the quirk-value and get rid of the 'useful' attibutes IMO.
A limit on affected mass is a MUST. As written, you theoetically could attach it to a cube and explode it. It doesn't matter if said cube was 1m^3 or 1km^3... How about attaching it to Grover's Corners? Or EARTH?
A dust explosion would work. Shattering the substance of the surface into dust is safe enough. Need a mass and range limit though.
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Ah. I suspect that this is similar to something I was working on for the Rugsuckers. Rather than explode it shakes things to pieces, serving as both a sonic-based weapon and a variant on the Goldfish Warning (rather than interfering with radio transmissions, it actually does terrible things to the ears and sinuses). Their code phrase is " Bring the Noise."
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I'm going to let folks argue about this one while I think about it...
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Dust or vapor explosion? Easily doable, especially when you hit that sweet spot that is the resonate frequency.... and with all the subtlety of ten-thousand raving screaming maniacs with sledge hammers. 
And obviously there should be a limit on the mass that it would affect. I'm thinking roughly the equivalent of door that is 6x9 feet with a maximum depth of about two feet. That's roughly about 3.6m^3. The charge would only be good for one, maybe two walls, depending on their thickness. Sound reasonable enough?
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6'x9' seems fine. 2' deep? Bit much. Shaking something that deep is a bit much. 6" at most, IMO.
Cobalt Greywalker Wrote:6'x9' seems fine. 2' deep? Bit much. Shaking something that deep is a bit much. 6" at most, IMO. Maybe it should scale with the size of the emitter device... if you are willing to build a room sized one, you can get more effect, but its a lot harder to deploy.
Operational limits can be as effective as technical ones.
Its still not the most dangerous waved weapon, so it should not be against the rules.
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I mostly envisioned this as a 'door maker' that both surprises and disorients the enemy forces inside. These ideas that it's something with planetoid-shattering power (or even ship-shattering) are more than a little out of the scope I had imagined.
Seriously, the way I had imagined it, it was supposed to simply be a helluva way to make an entrance.
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Yeah well, your description didn't put any limits to it; it just said 'surface' which can be taken many ways. If it's only good for room sized walls (because that's what Ben built it for) then point it out in the creation story. Then we don't go off on these 'OMG Too Powerful' tangents and can explore the Cool.
Even if it just "scales" badly, it could be a funny thing...
"YEAH... we will threaten to crack the surface of Earth with a Boom Box! Think about all the billions and billions of dollars we will make !"
"Hmm... Boss, I just punched some numbers... we could do what you suggest, but the necessary boom box would be a little bit larger than Earths Moon."
So it will (most likely) have a "usable operational range".. for everything larger it will be not a valid weapon.
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