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Junkmaster

A larger cousin to the venerable Junker, the ‘Junkmaster’ is part mobile robotics factory, part polysentience relay, and a self-replicating paragon of the Wire Guided's reason for being. It was first designed in YE 39 and is now found wherever standard Junkers roam, generally inside Freespacers factories, junkyards, trash heaps, sewers and derelict space craft.

About The Machine

Controlled by a rather placid, motherly intellect, the Junkmaster is technically a non-volitional AI system, but so utterly integrated into the polysentience that a true AI (or remote operator) can seize control in an instant. A cumbersome beast ten foot wide and six foot tall, it has four simple two-wheeled track-pods and four crane arms, allowing for reasonable mobility and fine manipulation upon fields of garbage and scrap iron. The wheels are magnetized like the more military oriented Deathcrawler Auto-Tank, but the increased weight is such that it only really helps the unit with mobility in outer space.

The unit is designed to take care of itself and operate independently the majority of the time, often lending to a jagged rag-tag appearance of constant self-repair and parts shortages. Guns are also sometimes attached when they are found, but only as a means of self defence. Unless specifically instructed to over the polysentience, it rarely bothers with outsider organics, and would prefer to be left tinkering in peace.

Strengths

Weaknesses

Appearance

Squat and crab-like, the unit is almost radially symmetrical other than the placement of the forward camera on the right-side pod. The front right and rear left sub-divisions of the square hull have rotational hardpoints, allowing for the attachment of additional cameras and turret weapons. The finish of the hull plating depends on available resources, and if there is anyone around who cares about decorating it; Most are rusty hulks with little adornment, lending them an element of camouflage among fields of debris and trash.

History and Background

The design has it's origins in the industrial junkers created by the rogue type two Lycosidae for their secret fortress on Freehold Factory. After the place was once again scorched and Lyco was forcibly moved to the planet 188604, they came into contact with the travelling business machine Linelayer 'Hammerhead' 88, who convinced them to build something more independent and less reliant on the existence of secret bases and vulnerable motherships. As with most things, Lyco really completed his request out of spite for the universe at large, through Hammerhead's true intentions actually turned out to be less warlike in ambition.

The Junkmaster was a machine specifically created to spread Freespacer influence, even in places were there were no actual Freespacers. The vast bodiless AI population of Type Fives roaming around the polysentience network could transfer to these bodies themselves on a whim, or even have the Junkmaster construct new ones on site.

After all, who needs fancy gate systems and FTL starships, if someone can simply transmit themselves to their intended location?

Statistics and Performance

General

Type: Large All-Environment Multi-Use Networked Construction Robot Designers: Steelrender Lycosidae Nine Two 92-4561-8893 Manufacturer: Freespacer Factions (Particularly The Wire Guided) Production: Mass production / Self reproduction Fielded by: Freespacer Factions, Independent Organisations, Open Market Suggested Cost: 10,000 DA (5,000 KS)

Dimensions

Junkmasters are about 6 feet tall, 10 feet wide, and 10 feet long. Some variance is possible due to availability of local materials.

Speeds and Range

The machine has an impressive climbing ability and turning speed, complete with a 360 degree visual sensor feed and reach from it’s arms. Not being designed for combat, however, means it is also rather slow, barely reaching 25mph even on flat ground. Having both a nuclear power plant and self-repair facilities on board means that its range is basically infinite, but that does depend on the availability of usable resources. A particularly healthy model with lots of spare parts (and thus redundant components) can actually be surprisingly tough to kill outright, even if it isn’t all that hard to damage the surface hardware!

Beyond that, it's all remarkably primitive. The hydraulic fluid is sometimes replaced with Liquid Ally, through it depends on the precursor; If the original had it, the ally replicates along with the unit. If it didn't, the unit itself cannot fabricate biomatter, and thus does not have this feature.

Damage Capacity

See Damage Rating (Version 3) for an explanation of the damage system.

Most commonly a Yama-Dura construction with boron wire mesh substructure. Variants exist, but the need for extra layers of armor is really quite circumstantial. It does, however, have thick radiation and scalar shielding as standard.

Armament and Tools

Weapons

The exact armament is not standardized, but clusters of dumbfire rockets are popular. This is to allow the unit to ‘shock’ the enemy into cover with a large blast, before simply running away.

Electronics and Sensors

Power Systems

Though it depends on the exact fabricator, the Junkmaster can be equipped with one of the following:

Construction Timetables

Given the relevant materials, Junkmasters can bodge together a great many things. To give an example on how long this typically takes, the following is a non-exhaustive list of things it can construct on demand.

Object Time Required
"Finagle's Revenge" Recoilless Rifle 26 minutes.
Junkers 1 hour.
"Partisan"-Series War Automaton 6 hours.
Another Junkmaster 12 hours.
An Induction Furnace (For smelting local ore) 24 hours.
Solar Power Array (Enough to sustain one Junkmaster) 24 hours.
Deathcrawler Auto-Tank 2 Days.
Phantasm Gunship 2 Weeks.
Nomad-Class Solarfoil Corvette 1 Month.

Two or more units working in concert can reduce this time by about 25% for each additional unit.

OOC Notes

Primitive Polygon created this article on 2017/10/21 07:47.