Spiders
From OPU Wiki
Properties
- Common Metals Cost: 300
- Rare Metals Cost: 0
- Build Time: Very Short
- Hit Points: Very Low
- Armor: None
- Track Type: Legged
- Speed: Very Fast
Commands (not always available): Move, Stop, Repair, Reprogram, Transfer, Self-Destruct.
Description
The most precious resource Plymouth colony possesses is its people. There are never enough hands to do the work, never enough minds to solve all the problems. Human Workers are fragile, expensive to feed and house, and take years to reproduce, train, and mature. The ever-present Savant computers and their lesser kin help take up the slack, but many of the most difficult and dangerous jobs take more brawn than brains.
Spiders are the answer. Each is built around an Earth-designed Paris-series bio-optic computer for fast real-time response, a pair of miniature R-10 cool-fusion power cells, and linear response actuator artificial "muscles."
Spiders are used outside the colony for minor service and repair tasks. While primarily designed for structure repairs, Spiders can also make limited field repairs to vehicles. While not intended as combat units, Spiders are expected to be useful in combat in conjunction with the new EMP weapon. It should be possible for Spiders to approach vehicles Disabled by EMP and reprogram their computers to respond to Plymouth commands, effectively capturing them for Plymouth use.
Operational Notes: Spiders are available only to Plymouth and are constructed at the Arachnid Factory rather than the Vehicle Factory. They can field-repair any vehicle up to one-half of its original hit points and structures up to their full hit points, using Common Metals (and Rare Metals, if the item being repaired cost Rare Metals to build) in the process. Spiders can also reprogram enemy units that are disabled by EMP weapons, capturing them for use by the Spiders' colony. Note: Spiders are not affected by the EMP weapon.
Tales from New Terra
Jix Oltion watched as hurricane winds ripped his wheat crop out by the roots, and knew that was the least of his problems. The crops could be replanted, the holes meteors had punched in the Agridome could be repaired, but unless he could get to an airlock quickly, Jix was going to be very permanently dead.
He grabbed a breathing mask from a red emergency locker and slapped it over his face. It might buy him only 30 extra seconds of consciousness, but those seconds might be the difference between life and death.
He'd been out in the dome, inspecting the new irrigation tubes, exposed, on foot, and far from any shelter, when the meteors had hit. He ran as hard as he could for the far end of the dome, wind-whipped corn stalks lashing at his exposed arms. He could feel the pressure dropping, tugging at his skin, making him feel like an expanding balloon, and knew that he'd never make it to shelter. Gasping, he stumbled and fell, knowing that he'd never get up again. Then the wind stopped. For several minutes he just laid there, catching his breath and looking up at the overhead tracks and lighting panels. Then he glanced over at the nearest of the large window panels to see who his saviors were.
Then he started to laugh uncontrollably. As he watched the Spiders clambering over the ripped hull, spreading patching material, stitching the rent plates back together with carbon fiber webs, he could think only one thing: farmers and bugs were supposed to be natural enemies.
