Review: GURPS High Tech: Electricity and Electronics, William H. Stoddard

[Roger Bell_West's autoposter]

This GURPS supplement is primarily an equipment catalogue, listing
electrical and related equipment from Galvani and Volta to the present
day.

Disclaimer: I was lead playtester for this book and therefore did
not pay for it. Sometimes lead playtesting means mostly standing back
and letting the other playtesters get on with it; this time I got
quite involved.

The first chapter deals with the science: the history of electricity
and some standard terminology, as well as clarifying skills and laying
out the format for statistics in the rest of the book. (Alas, power
requirements are still described in narrative terms rather than in
actual units.)

The remaining five chapters list typical equipment, starting with
laboratory and workshop gear: electrometers to digital oscilloscopes,
Tesla coils, scientific and medical hardware, and working tools. Power
generation, storage and transmission come next, then lighting, magnets
and motors, and switchgear. "Signals and Waves" covers communication,
but also electronic synthesisers, video cameras, and rangefinders.
Computers come next, going into some detail so that e.g. pocket
calculators and networking kit now have stats. Finally, "Electronic
Warfare" deals with security, espionage, SIGINT, guided weapons, and
electricity _as_ a weapon with EMPs and area denial weapons.

It's notable to me that this is the first extension to the _High Tech_
sub-line of GURPS that hasn't been about guns. All credit to
Hans-Christian Vortisch, who knows his subject well, but there is more
to life (and even to role-playing games) than shooting people, and
this is a very welcome development. One could argue about the
inclusion or exclusion of particular devices, but as a general
overview of things that are done with electricity at particular levels
of technological development, and as a list of items for PCs to buy
that's a bit more subtle than just another gun catalogue, this
supplement gets the job done, and is enjoyable to read for its own
sake.

_High Tech: Electricity and Electronics_ is available from [Warehouse
23](http://www.warehouse23.com/products/gurps-high-tech-electricity-and-electronics).

https://blog.firedrake.org/archive/2019/10/GURPS_High_Tech__Electricity_and_Electronics__William_H__Stoddard.html