Electronics Operation

This skill lets you use all electronic
equipment within a known specialty.
Make a skill roll in an emergency situ-
ation or for “abnormal” use of equip-
ment – not for ordinary, everyday use.
(Exception:
Unskilled users must
always attempt their default roll!)
You must specialize. Available spe-
cialties vary by game world, but might
include:
Communications
(Comm):
All
forms of electronic communications
technology: radios, satellite uplinks,
laser communicators, etc. Includes
knowledge of any standard, current
communications codes appropriate to
your background. These do not
require a skill roll – although attempts
to understand or use an unfamiliar
code do require a roll. At TL5-7, this
includes telegraphy: you can send or
receive 2 words per minute (wpm) per
point of skill at TL5, 3 wpm per point
of skill at TL6-7.
Electronic Warfare (EW): All sig-
nals-intelligence and jamming equip-
ment, including electronic counter-
measures (ECM) and electronic
counter-countermeasures (ECCM). In
most game worlds, only intelligence
agencies and the military teach this
specialty – and only to individuals
with suitable Military Rank (p. 30) or
Security Clearance (p. 82).
Force Shields: Portable, vehicular,
base, and starship force shields and
deflectors.
Matter Transmitters (MT): All mat-
ter transmitters and teleporters.
Critical failures can be disastrous,
especially when transmitting living
beings!
Media: All forms of audio, film, and
video editing equipment. If three-
dimensional video (“holographics”) or
sensory recordings (“sensies”) exist in
the setting, this specialty includes the
ability to operate the relevant equip-
ment. Treat different media as mutu-
ally unfamiliar technologies.
Medical: All manner of electronic
diagnostic and life-support equip-
ment.
Parachronic: Technological means
of travel between dimensions or time-
lines.
Psychotronics: Psionic technology,
such as telepathic shields and ampli-
fiers.
Scientific: Laboratory electronics
and survey gear. You are automatically
familiar with the equipment used with
any scientific skill on which you have
spent at least one point.
Security: Both operating and cir-
cumventing all forms of alarms, secu-
rity sensors, and area-surveillance
technology.
Sensors: Most forms of long-range
detection gear, from air-defense radar
to starship sensor suites. Certain high-
ly specialized sensors (such as sonar,
below) have their own specialties.
Sonar: All types of acoustic detec-
tion and ranging gear (normally used
underwater).
Surveillance: All forms of conceal-
able or remote surveillance gear:
“bugs,” hidden cameras, long-range
microphones, wiretaps, etc.
Temporal: All manner of time
machines. Critical failures can be dis-
astrous for the time travelers! Make
separate rolls to “lock onto” and trans-
fer the travelers.
These specialties default to one
another at -4; however, the GM is free
to rule that in his campaign, there is no
default between exotic specialties
(Parachronic, Psychotronics, etc.) and
mundane ones (Media, Security, etc.).
The technologies covered by a particu-
lar specialty vary with TL. For instance,
Electronics Operation (Comm) covers
telegraphs at TL5, telephones and
radios at TL6, and digital communica-
tions systems at TL8 . . . and might
cover faster-than-light or telepathic
communicators at higher TLs.
Familiarity (p. 169) is crucial here!
Electronics Operation/TL8 (Sensors)
covers both thermographs on fighter
jets and ground-penetrating radars on
satellites, but going from one to the
other gives you -2 for type (thermo-
graph to radar) and -2 for implemen-
tation (jet to satellite), for a net -4 to
skill until you familiarize yourself
with all the differences.
Modifiers: Equipment modifiers
(p. 345); -2 for an unfamiliar technol-
ogy of a known type (e.g., radar when
you are used to thermograph) or an
unfamiliar implementation of a famil-
iar technology (e.g., air-defense radar
when you are used to weather radar);
-1 to -10 if you have been away from
the field for a long time (this varies by
field) and have not had a chance to
become familiar with the changes.